Shadowing Practice: 2168 - Move From B1 to C1 By Describing Your Favorite Tasks - Learn English Speaking with Video

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hey Aubrey what's shaking hey I'm great how are you Lindsay I'm feeling good I'm working on my Spanish actually getting ready for my trip to Panama in April so nice have you had any language

classes recently that were especially helpful yeah I found myself a tutor over an IT talkie which is my go-to actually when it comes to finding a tutor that I could just get language practice when

I learned Arabic when I learned Portuguese that didn't go so well my Portuguese but coming back to Spanish is the most natural thing because I have the B the foundation but yeah it was great it's

been great I I get on with this tutor once a week and we just chat for 30 minutes it's really casual it's more of a language partner than anything okay amazing and so today's episode we're diving

into something really interesting because linsay you were telling me about a class that you loved you felt was so helpful where your your tutor your teacher was asking you to describe a task

right and we realized that we want our listeners to be able to do this yeah the interesting thing is that this came up pretty organically it's not like he came to the class and said I've decided

what our lesson is you're going to describe to me how I can start a podcast it's more that he has a YouTube channel and is interested in starting his own podcast and because our format is quite

organic um he just asked me questions on how to do this and so I found that at the end of that conversation I felt different than I normally do after typical conversation classes where it's just

how's it going how's the weather tell me about this tell me about that it was something extra yes so you were describing to your teacher how to make episodes record get a co-host and this felt

sort of a you know felt different than what you normally would in a class yeah because there was also the element that he asked me what would I do first um kind of and what it did was it forced me

to use new vocabulary so it forced me to already think harder and expand my vocabulary I think what we one of the challenges our listeners might have at the B1 B2 level is that we're reusing the

same vocabulary over and over and over I mean the number of times I've described my year traveling through South America how I learned Spanish it's over the top Aubrey so many times but

have I ever told someone what the steps are to launch a podcast in Spanish no right oh this is so interesting and we're really excited about this so we are going to give you guys phrases that you

could use to ask a tutor or a teacher to to build a lesson this way to have you describe a task we're also going to share tips for how you could do this with a speaking partner or even on your

own to like Lindsay said pull out that interesting vocabulary and build your fluency at the same time exactly because we're adult Learners right where I'm an adult learner Spanish I'm not a child I'm not I am not expecting the world of my teacher I am going to guide my teacher into what I know is

going to work for my language learning and that's what we're showing you guys how to do today so good yes exactly but first be sure to hit follow guys right here on the allers English podcast we

have four episodes every week and if you're not following you are for sure missing some of these awesome tips yeah we're bringing in our real life experiences here too it's it's cool that we all learn languages at different times right I mean I know you're fluent in French alry and you have

a lot of experience to bring into the show for our listeners absolutely we've maybe talked about French too much lately I think we got I can't help it I love French all right tell us a little bit

more about what our listeners should know today yeah okay so first we're going to teach you how to ask a teacher to structure a lesson like this and of course we're going to share this later so

stay to the end to find out how to do this with a speaking partner or on your own as well but first we're going to dive into how could you ask a teacher about this because I don't know about you Lindsay but when I have a teacher in Spanish or in French I have a tendency to just expect them

to lead expect them to create a l I'm disappointed whereas if I advocate for myself and take control and have ideas for how I would like the class to go I think I would feel more fulfilled and happier

about the class afterward yeah I mean in an ideal world that teacher will come with complete lesson plans and they should don't get me wrong they should be prepared but at different levels like

what I had signed up for in I talkie was much more of a conversation class and he doesn't come prepared but I don't know if that bothers me as much for what I need so what we ended up doing but he asked good questions and we ended we end up in interesting conversations and so I found that

I was using kind of transition phrases and next and after that and interesting things that I never would have said if we were just tell me about your year traveling in South America right what do you do in your free time these are twoo basic at this level exactly right so and because Lindsay felt

how useful this class was we're going to give you phrases so that you could ask a teacher to structure a class this way sure so your first one let's Dive In here is you could say I would like

to set a goal of being able to describe a task can you help me with that because then you might find that this teacher is like yes that would be fantastic that's G to pull out vocabulary and help

you become more fluent let's and then might have lots of ideas about the different tasks you could describe well actually it's going to tell you a lot about your teacher too the way they react to that is this a teacher that is good for you or not because if they react like oh that seems

like work then obviously we want to move on and find another teacher and there are tons of them on sites like iie right um great so then another thing that we could say is I would like to be able

to describe different tasks that I perform in my daily life could you ask me follow-up questions as I describe the task great yes love that and for both of these the teacher might have ideas for

tasks or we definitely are going to provide you with lots of examples of tasks that you could you could give the teacher ideas right you like share a whole bunch of different tasks that you perform

in your day daily life and just to give them ideas and then they can come up with follow-up questions yeah I'm excited to see those examples of what you know if it's not obvious if we can't think of anything there's lots of things that we already know really well but maybe we've never actually

taken the time to describe them in English or in our second language right exactly and so then if your teacher is like I love this idea and but they haven't had the time to think it through

in advance you could give them an example so you could say for example you could give me the task of planning a meal I might describe how I would find a recipe and then you could ask me like you

can give them ideas for follow-up questions even just so that they get a good idea of what you're asking them to do in this class right you could ask me which ingredients would be needed and the steps needed to buy them and and what steps would be needed to prepare the meal and then I guarantee

you your teacher is going to start thinking oh okay this is very doable we can just pick a task and I ask you follow-up questions think about all of the different steps to complete that task oh for sure for sure okay Aubrey so we're going to get into a bit more detail on those examples

right the possible task in a second but there's another thing that we could do is this maybe for number two maybe if we don't have a teacher with us right how tell us about that yeah or I mean you

might do it with your teacher or if you don't have a teacher or if you want to do it more on your own as well you can do this activity either with a speaking partner or even on your own so

one thing you could do is write out tasks we're going to give you a bunch in a minute on pieces of paper fold them put them in a bowl and pull one out at random and then describe it out loud think

of all the different steps and you can just do this on your own out loud or even more fun right Lindsay with a speaking partner and have them ask you follow-up questions that's so fun I love that

idea or if you have a language exchange partner which is a little bit different I did this a lot in my 20s sitting in cafes in New York and someone from the Spanish speaking world and me you could actually each pull out the same one task in first the person describes it in Spanish and then in

English that could be interesting I love that idea absolutely right and then you're ready to ask follow-up questions in your native language and they will ask you follow-up questions in your target language so cool so cool and then yeah follow-up question tell us a little bit more about

followup questions then yes so for each of these tasks if you're doing this on your own you could write on this paper some follow-up questions or you can just think of them be creative as you're going like for example if the task is planning a vacation you could include followup questions like

describe the process of choosing a destination describe the process of booking flights and for each of those you would share the steps right describe how do you do this yeah there's a lot

of subtasks things within an overall idea that we could that are quite interesting and especially leaning into your true strengths like if you're into I don't know if this is as much of a thing

but the credit card points thing if you're into like hacking miles and that sort of thing getting miles off your credit card describe that how to you know rack up credit card points to get mileage yes I love that idea we just discovered we didn't realize that we have so many credit card

points for mileage because we just don't use them we weren't really clear on how that works and a friend of ours was like let me look into this like oh we need to start using these go somewhere yeah

or or cash it out or something I mean you need to use those because you can get around the world for free exactly right amazing yeah okay so then going a bit more into those tasks have we have we

given our listeners all the possible tasks I mean there's so many yes there's so many we want to share with you guys some tasks that you can even you can give these ideas to your teacher or you

can write them on papers on your own to do this or with a speaking partner a language exchange partner to have lots of different tasks you want this to be something you do that has multiple

steps like multiple things that you have to do so for example errands maybe shopping for groceries returning an item picking up dry clean and think about it from the very beginning like leaving your

or leing your office and you can get really minute describe where how you go do you go to a parking garage to get in your car describe driving there describe the directions there's so many things

that's going to pull out so much interesting vocabulary oh my gosh I love what you said is take it to the very minute level be detail oriented here right what what happens before the step that you think is the first step there's probably a pre-step um love that I hope you guys be a teer

or speaking partner to be thinking if they just say well I drive to the dry cleaner office okay now wait how did you get to their your car where do you park your car are you leaving from home or

from work yes which roads do you take to get there what's the closest dry cleaner to your house and now you've had a half an hour conversation andly about this I love it I love it or household task

we said doing laundry prepping a meal maybe your favorite meal that would be interesting I think I think it's important as I said before something that you identify with almost like your specialty

what is your specialty in life my specialty I guess is podcasting right or one of them and and what or maybe you have a favorite meal that you only you know how to do it because there's a special twist you put on it that will actually be more enjoyable to describe it's true because

there there are options here right you could describe a time when you were preparing a meal and it went terribly wrong and you could share all of the steps and and what happened and what you would do different next time that would also be amazing but you're right that if you

think about trying to stay positive and engaged if you choose something that you're passionate about that's probably going to be the most fun half an hour of discussion well and just to add

a layer to that we just in I just interviewed Bri AC from into the story podcast and one of her key points was when emotions are involved you're going to be more likely to remember something

and what's the difference between just describing kind of a mundane task that you do you tolerate it versus something you love to do which is bake this make this chocolate mousse that no one has ever tasted anything so good and you get compliments every time you make it right

that would be really cool it'll be interesting to vary your intonation as well because you'll be more excited and passionate about it right you can also talk about leisure activities right vacations

planning a vacation meeting a friend for drinks going to brunch choosing a book at the library all of these tasks that we do that are fun for us that we're choosing to do in our free time will

be fun to describe to someone yeah definitely Veer towards the fun stuff you could talk about work maybe we'll see see how you feel about it something like podcasting I was happy to describe

it and I also wanted him to start a podcast so I was invested in it right so describing steps of a task that you complete ordering material submitting reports scheduling meetings finding

clients this could work on your business English right yes absolutely and if you think about if you're if you're practicing with a teacher or a speaking partner you could just have the question be you know describe a task at work that you do really well or that youone else because that will

pull in that passion like this is something I I love and I know I'm good at so then it still be fun like podcasting for you Lindsay I like that you know Al that's going to do is help us start to identify our strengths our strengths and it's going to help us get better when we if we end up

in a job interview in the future describing what we do better than other people for example what unique value that we add to a company that's a skill we want to be building all the time not

that interview yeah so good oh my gosh we are just saving the world today Aubrey right well we have a little role play this is going to be fun Lindsay you are my language teacher in this role play and

I'm going to ask you to help me structure a task this way ready yes I would like to set a goal of being able to describe a task can you help me with that that is a fantastic goal describing

a task will help you build fluency and use new vocabulary awesome could you ask me about a task and then ask follow-up questions absolutely well I know you love volleyball so today let's have

you describe how to serve the ball during a game now that would be a great one for you don't you think it would absolutely never it's funny I think about this and I don't know if I've ever really talked about volleyball in French or Spanish because some things just don't come up

and that would be fun for me to describe that and maybe my speaking partner or the teacher is also loves volleyball and suddenly we're having this really fun conversation about it I think that's really important what you just said maybe that's the takeaway for today is a lot of things are just

not going to come up a lot of vocabulary is never going to come up if we keep going in circles in our conversation practice the same Stories the same greetings the same Hobbies no let's stop

that let's push ourselves to a new place you need this vocabulary for business or life but it's not going to come up unless you create a scenario right exactly and you can you can create those

scenarios right anything that's interesting to you anything that's multi-step right whether it's with a teacher or a speaking partner or by yourself alone it's also fun just to practice to get the

practice you need so that you're ready for those one-on-one conversations yeah I mean and don't don't forget guys we all have something that we do better than most people that we're uniquely good at so figure out what that is first and then in your next lesson ask your tutor to listen to you

as you describe it and ask those questions this is really empowering and I love it I'm so excited for you guys to have your next class or to chat with a speaking partner and try this out yeah I love

it you know in our community at allers English if you're in one of our courses you can always find speaking Partners right there in our community in our social media Community right Aubrey we have a special group just for the courses yes and we have open conversation Club every week I just

hosted it this morning it was amazing so many students from all over the world professionals at a high level of English and they I mean we use conversation starters I we're going to have to do

this in one of our open conversation clubs soon I was just going to say maybe this will be one of the room breakout rooms in open conversation Club yeah now we're gonna describe a task interesting

so stay tuned if you're in one of our courses or if you join one of our courses you will be automatically invited to open conversation Club as a bonus so check out our courses guys go to allers english.com Aubrey good to hang out today you too thanks Lindsay I'll see you soon take care bye

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Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
vocabulary noun	/vəˈkæb.jə.lə.ɹi/	A usually alphabetized and explained collection of words e.g. of a particular field, or prepared for a specific purpose, often for learning.
tutor noun	/ˈtjuːtəː/	One who teaches another (usually called a student, learner, or tutee) in a one-on-one or small-group interaction.
listener noun	/ˈlɪs(ə)nɚ/	Someone who listens, especially to a speech or a broadcast.
volleyball noun	/ˈvɒlibɔ(ː)l/	A game played on a rectangular court between two teams of two to six players which involves striking a ball back and forth over a net.
specialty noun	/ˈspɛʃ.əl.ti/	That in which one specializes; a chosen expertise or talent; bailiwick.
fluency noun	/ˈfluːənsi/	The quality of smoothness of flow.
fluent adjective	/ˈfluənt/	That flows; flowing, liquid.
mileage noun	/ˈmaɪləd͡ʒ/	The total distance travelled in miles or in air miles.
gosh	/ɡɑːʃ/	A mild expression of surprise or enthusiasm.
passionate adjective	/ˈpæʃənɪt/	Fired with intense feeling.
breakout noun		An escape from prison.
brunch noun	/bɹʌnt͡ʃ/	A meal eaten later in the day than breakfast and earlier than lunch, often in a leisurely, festive, and/or social way, and often consisting of typical foods…
doable adjective	/ˈduː.ə.bəl/	Possible to do; feasible.
errand noun	/ˈɛɹənd/	A mundane mission of no great consequence, concerning household or business affairs (dropping items by, doing paperwork, going to a friend's house, etc.)
intonation noun	/ɪntəˈneɪʃən/	The rise and fall of the voice in speaking.

Word	Meaning
follow up verb	To take further actions remaining after an event; to continue, revisit, or persist; especially, to maintain communication or verify.
come up verb	To emerge or become known, especially unexpectedly.
pull out verb	To withdraw; especially of military forces; to retreat.
end up verb	To bring to a conclusion.
check out verb	To record the departure or withdrawal of someone or something (such as guests, employees, books, etc.).
come up with verb	To manage to produce, deliver, or present (something) by inventing, creating, thinking of, or obtaining it.
figure out verb	To come to understand; to discover or find a solution; to deduce.
find out verb	To discover, as by asking or investigating.

Structure	In the video
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now	I've decided · I've described · have I ever told
Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it	would be needed · are involved · was invested
Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing	talkie which is · partner which is

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