Shadowing Practice: How to Talk About Pets - 2 Minute English Mini Podcast - Learn English Speaking with Video

This video has 18 sentences and 167 words to shadow. The speech runs for 1:30. The speaker talks at a steady 112 words per minute, a comfortable pace for shadowing. Only 81% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.

Key vocabulary in this video

13 less common words from the video, with pronunciation and meaning:

• pet /pɛt/ (noun) — An animal kept as a companion or otherwise for pleasure, rather than for some practical benefit or use.
• rabbit /ˈɹæbɪt/ (noun) — A mammal of most genera of the family Leporidae, with long ears, long hind legs and a short, fluffy tail. (Those of the larger kind are instead called hares)
• ear /ˈɪə̯/ (noun) — The organ of hearing, consisting of the pinna or auricle, auditory canal, eardrum, malleus, incus, stapes and cochlea.
• lover /ˈlʌvɚ/ (noun) — One who loves and cares for another person in a romantic way; a sweetheart, love, soulmate, boyfriend, girlfriend, or spouse.
• brush /bɹʌʃ/ (noun) — An implement consisting of multiple more or less flexible bristles or other filaments attached to a handle, used for any of various purposes including…
• snake /sneɪk/ (noun) — Any of the suborder Serpentes of legless reptiles with long, thin bodies and fork-shaped tongues.
• carrot /ˈkæɹət/ (noun) — A vegetable with a nutritious, juicy, sweet root that is often orange in colour, Daucus carota, family Apiaceae, especially the subspecies sativus.
• feed /fiːd/ (verb) — To give (someone or something) food to eat.
• fill /fɪl/ (verb) — To add contents to (a container, cavity, or the like) so that it is full.
• bowl /boʊl/ (noun) — As much as is held by a bowl.
• cute /kjuːt/ (adjective) — Possessing physical features, behaviors, personality traits or other properties that are mainly attributed to infants and small or cuddly animals; e.g. fair…
• favourite /ˈfeɪv.ɹɪt/ (adjective) — Most-liked. (In other words, [person]'s favorite [noun] = the [noun] that [person] likes the most.)
• calm /kɑm/ (adjective) — Peaceful, quiet, especially free from anger and anxiety.

Phrasal verbs you will hear

• fill up (verb) — To make (something) completely full.
• play with (verb) — To fiddle with; make small adjustments to, for example to something mechanical in order to improve its performance.
• talk about (verb) — Used to draw attention to the speaker's characterization of someone or something.

How to practise with this video

1. Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
2. Shadow it sentence by sentence at normal speed, repeating each one until your rhythm matches the speaker.
3. Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like pet, rabbit, ear.

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video: