Shadowing Practice: Let's Learn English! Topic: Damage and Wear! 😎🚙🚪 (Lesson Only) - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Well, hello and welcome to this English lesson about damage and wear.
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The world around us, the world around us is filled with things and those things wear out.
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Those things get damaged.
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Eventually, those things aren't new anymore.
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If you're wondering what the inspiration for this lesson is or was,
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it's the fact that my old blue van with almost 300 ,000 kilometers on it has now gone to the wrecking yard.
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It is being turned into scrap metal.
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First, they'll take out any of the parts that might still be good but it is no longer here.
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We have replaced it with a small white car and that van is no longer around.
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So, if you want to go back, you can watch an English lesson where you will see that van because I talked about car parts but it was,
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it wasn't damaged but it definitely had a lot of wear.
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And so, and so I thought to myself, I should do an English lesson about damage and wear.
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So, you buy things that are brand new, eventually they get damaged, eventually they have wear, and eventually you need to replace them.
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So, welcome to this English lesson about damage and wear.
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Chipped.
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Having a small piece broken off an edge or surface, and I do have my example sentence here, this mug is chipped, but I still use it.
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This is actually true of how Jen and I live.
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We have several mugs that are chipped, but some of those mugs are still our favorite mugs, so we keep them.
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You just drink from the side where there is no chip.
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So again, this mug is chipped, and I would refer to that as a chip.
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This mug has a chip in it, and this can happen when you drop a mug
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but more likely this is something that happens
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because it happens at work a lot
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because we put the mugs in the dishwasher
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and I think the heat of the dishwasher can cause the mugs to chip a little easier
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so chipped having a small piece broken off an edge or surface.
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Stretched.
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This happens to most of my t -shirts over time because I keep them for so long.
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Stretched.
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Made longer, wider, or looser by pulling or repeated use.
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And the example sentence, the bottom of the t -shirt was stretched after wearing it for a year.
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I find a lot of my t -shirts, especially if I tuck them into my pants,
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the bottom of the t -shirt will eventually get stretched i think
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if you wear a t -shirt untucked it's less likely to get stretched
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but in the winter in canada it's common to dress in layers
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and when i wear a t -shirt as my base layer i often will tuck
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that t -shirt into my pants and somehow i think
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because it's caught in the pants that must stretch it a little bit
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so stretched made longer wider or looser by pulling or repeated use.
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I'm sure you all have an article of clothing that is stretched.
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Crushed.
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Sorry, here's the normal pronunciation.
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Crushed.
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Pressed or squeezed out of its original shape.
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And then this is something I have seen happen many times in my life.
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The man crushed the can to show how strong he was.
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So you'll often see this on a TV show.
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Someone will drink, finish drinking a can of something and they'll crush it on their head.
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I won't say what beverage, but usually not soda.
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Or they'll crush the can in their hands.
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So notice a lot of these can also be used as verbs.
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Crushed.
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Pressed or squeezed out of its original shape.
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And there is something fun about crushing a can, isn't there?
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Like you finish drinking your soda or your pop
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and you can crush the can like this
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or you can crush the can like
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that don't crush it on your head only crazy people in tv shows
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and movies do that crushed pressed or squeezed out of its original shape smashed
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and shattered slight difference here but they're pretty much the same smashed is badly broken
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or damaged by a strong impact someone threw rocks and smashed the windows.
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So you'll notice these windows are smashed.
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It means that they were nice and new and someone threw rocks and now they have cracks in them.
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They are smashed.
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When we talk about shattered, we often talk about something being in pieces after an impact or a fall.
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So shattered, broken suddenly into many small pieces.
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I dropped the plate on the floor and it shattered.
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Now, I should say this.
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Someone might say to me, someone threw rocks at the school and all the windows are shattered.
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It might mean this.
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It might mean that there's glass on the ground.
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Smashed and shattered can sometimes be used interchangeably.
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If I drop a plate though, it might shatter.
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But if I throw a plate on the ground, I might say I smashed the plate.
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So, just be a little careful here.
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I think they're interchangeable but the more I think about it, there might be a slight difference. So, smashed.
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Badly broken or damaged by a strong impact.
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Shattered.
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Broken suddenly into many small pieces.
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Torn.
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Pulled apart or damaged by a tear.
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My jeans caught on something and now they are torn.
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This happens a lot when you work on a farm.
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Quite often I have shirts and pants that are torn because I've caught them on something.
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Maybe I'm climbing over a fence and my shirt or pants gets caught on a wire and then it is torn.
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So instead of the fabric being really really nice uh the fabric has a bit of a hole in it
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because maybe a nail or a piece of wire or even like
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if there's a splinter of wood sticking out somewhere
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if you walk past your shirt might get torn you might end up with a tear in your shirt
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so torn pulled apart or damaged by a tear.
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Frayed.
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Having threads or fibers coming loose along an end or edge.
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So often this refers to something like this rope.
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The end of this old rope is frayed.
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It can refer to like the edge of a carpet.
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If the threads are starting to come loose, you could say the carpet is frayed along the edge.
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The like the sleeves of my shirt could be frayed or the bottom of my shirt.
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So, it's like the end or edge of something where the threads or fibers are starting to come loose. So, frayed.
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Having threads or fibers coming loose along an edge or end or edge.
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Then corroded.
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Let me make this one a little bigger.
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Gradually damaged by a chemical reaction, especially on metal.
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And then the battery terminal is badly corroded.
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This can happen with batteries in an actual device as well.
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Sometimes you open up the back and there might be some like weird green powder.
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We say that that is corrosion.
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We say that the batteries are corroded.
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So corroded, gradually damaged by a chemical reaction, especially on metal.
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Peeling.
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So we have peeling and flaking they're kind of the same thing.
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Peeling is having an outer layer that is starting to curl up or come off.
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Sometimes on a car if you get a dent or
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if you get in an accident if you don't fix it it might start to peel.
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The car might be peeling.
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The paint is peeling off the car.
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The paint on this on the old door is peeling.
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So you can see a really good photo of what peeling looks like.
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A long time ago this door looked amazing it might actually be a window i did search for door
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but that looks like a window either way the paint on the old door
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or window is peeling a long time ago this was perfect it was a perfect light blue door
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and everyone probably thought it was beautiful
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but eventually with age it started to have a bit of peeling and if you're wondering flaking is the same,
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but pieces are actively falling off.
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So flaking coming off in small pieces, small, thin pieces, the paint on the door is flaking off.
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So you can see here, if you looked on the ground, there would be little flakes of paint on the ground.
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So this door is definitely flaking.
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Warped.
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If you ever build things out of wood, you try to buy wood that is straight.
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When wood is bent or twisted out of the original shape, it's usually because of heat or moisture.
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This piece of wood should be straight.
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If I was building a house, I wouldn't use this piece of wood.
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Example sentence, this piece of wood got wet and now it is warped.
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So, a piece of wood is normally straight but sometimes it can because of moisture or heat.
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or it might even dry out.
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The wood might dry on one side more than the other, and you might end up with a piece of wood that is warped.
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When I was a construction worker during the summers, between my years at university, so I would do nine months of university and then three and a half months,
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so eight and a half, three and a half, I would work construction.
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If we had a piece of wood like this, we would actually cut it into smaller pieces to use in other places.
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Because you wouldn't want to use a warped piece of wood while building a house.
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Ripped.
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So I specifically chose this picture because ripped has two meanings.
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Actually, probably more than two.
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Ripped.
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Torn suddenly or forcefully.
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I caught my shirt on a nail and it is now ripped.
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So you can see this guy here.
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He's, I'm pretty sure he bought the shirt this way.
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But for, as an example, he is a construction worker
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and he has walked past a lot of nails sticking out of pieces of wood and now his shirt is ripped.
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I also choose, chose this picture because this guy is ripped.
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When you say someone is ripped, it means they have visible muscles from weightlifting.
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So not only is his shirt ripped, using it with a different meaning, this guy is ripped.
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when I was younger I probably could have looked like
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that I don't think at my age I can look
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that ripped or jacked anymore
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but this guy definitely construction worker you can tell by the rips in his shirt
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and he is also ripped
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so let me repeat ripped in its most common usage means to be torn suddenly or force forcefully.
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And we have the sentence, I caught my shirt on a nail and it is now ripped.
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Worn.
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Showing, showing, showing damage or changes caused by regular use over time.
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The carpet is worn under the rolling chair.
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If you work in an office building and
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if there are chairs with wheels and
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if you don't have a protective mat the wheels will eventually
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wear on the carpet the carpet will wear out the carpet will be worn
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so there are a couple of places where i work where the carpet is worn i don't have
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that under my chair yet i should probably be probably be buying a plastic protective mat.
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But worn, showing damage or changes caused by regular use over time.
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Worn out, used so much that something is no longer in good condition.
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So these work boots, if you look at them, there's kind of a tear and then the front, it looks like they're coming apart.
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Like the the sole of the boot is starting to separate, kind of like how my van,
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the passenger area was separating from the frame and axle.
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These boots are completely worn out.
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So if I, oh, that's really big.
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If I owned work boots like this, I would probably buy new work boots because these work boots are completely worn out.
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And then I don't have a slide for this, but I talked about worn in.
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When you buy a new pair of work boots or shoes, they need to be worn in.
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That means you need to wear them for 10 or 20 times.
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And as you wear them, the, uh, the shoe will kind of form to your foot a bit and it'll start to feel more comfortable.
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So you need to wear them in so that they're worn in so that they're comfortable and you enjoy wearing them.
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Faded, having lost some of its original color or brightness.
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And so this happens to my shirts.
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So I wrote this sentence, this shirt used to be black.
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Now it is gray because it faded.
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If you leave an article of clothing hanging on a chair by a sunny window, the, it will actually fade.
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Like if you took a black t -shirt and you hung it in the sun and left it there for a year.
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This like if it was over the chair like this, the side facing the sun would actually be faded
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and the side not facing it would be probably close to the normal color still.
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So when something's faded, it doesn't have the same amount of color as before.
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Having lost some of original color or brightness.
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So once again this shirt used to be black.
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Now it is gray because it faded.
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stained.
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I'm not sure if any of you have had this happen, having a mark or change in color that is difficult to remove.
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I spilled coffee on my shirt and now it is stained.
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This has happened to me once at work
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and I actually went to the local dollar store
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and bought a cheap t -shirt to wear for the rest of the day
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because I was wearing a lighter colored shirt
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and I spilled coffee on it back in the time back
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when I used to drink coffee and you can't get a coffee stain out very easily at work.
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Like you can, you can try, like you can go to the washroom and put some hand soap on it and try to get the stain out.
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But generally a white shirt with coffee on it is stained.
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The other stain that is very common is a grass stain.
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So if you play outside, you will probably like if you roll around in the grass
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and just do all kinds of fun stuff like
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if i played with my kids outside my pants would be
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stained afterwards i would have grass stains where the knees would be green from the grass rusty
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or rusted covered with or damaged by rust the back fender and handlebars on the bike are rusty.
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You could also say the back fender and handlebars on the bike are rusted.
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So if you look here, the fender is the metal or plastic piece covering the wheel.
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And here it's obviously metal because you can see that it is rusted.
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It was probably nice and white when the bike was new.
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And now it has brown rust on it.
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It is rusty.
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It is rusted.
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If you look at the handlebars up here, the handlebars are what you hold.
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They were probably silver or chrome.
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Chrome is like shiny, like reflective, like a mirror.
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And now they're definitely rusty or rusted.
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Again, you can use either word interchangeably when you are talking about something that is rusted or rusty.
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Scratched.
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Having thin marks on the surface caused by something sharp or rough.
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My car, my car door is scratched.
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We have another term for this in English.
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So if you, if you drive by something and hit it with your car, it will get scratched.
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But if someone does this, I don't have my keys.
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If someone's angry with you and they walk along your car with their keys, you would say your car is keyed.
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So someone was angry and they keyed your car.
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Sometimes when people are in a romantic relationship and they break up, one person might be angry at the other person.
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And in a fit of anger, they might scratch the person's car with their keys.
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They might key their car because they are angry.
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Hope that's, I think that's what actually happened to this one.
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An angry person scratched this car.
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But anyway, scratched having thin marks on the surface caused by something sharp or rough my car door is scratched
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scuffed have sorry i don't know what i'm over pronouncing some
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of these scuffed it's not scuffed scuffed having surface marks caused
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by rubbing against something my shoe new shoe is already scuffed
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so if you look at the very end
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or tip of the shoe i can't point over there my
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finger goes behind the picture i should find a auto find a way maybe i got a green screen this
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but anyways you can see on the very tip the shoe
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is scuffed obviously the person the shoe somehow rubbed against the curb
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while they were in the parking lot or something
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and the surface of the shoe has gotten a little bit of wear on it it is scuffed
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so scuffed having surface marks caused by rubbing against something.
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Dented.
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Having an area pushed inward after being hit.
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Someone hit my car and now the door is dented.
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I did just buy a used car and there is a small dent on the door.
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I was a little disappointed to see that
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but I think it might be fixable but in the end I probably won't fix it because it's a used car. So dented.
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Having an area pushed inward after being hit.
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Someone hit my car and now the door is dented.
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Cracked.
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I have seen this many times at school.
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Students are not allowed to use their phones in class
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but they are allowed to use them at lunch
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and as I walk around I will notice a few of them have cracked screens.
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Cracked.
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Having a line where something has started to break.
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This definitely has started to break.
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It's gone far past just having a single crack.
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I dropped my phone and now the screen is cracked.
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So not a nice thing to have happened, but I think from the picture, you get a definite, um,
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a definite example of what cracked looks like.
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Having a line or many lines where something has started to break.
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I dropped my phone and now the screen is cracked.
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Bent.
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Curved or changed from the original shape.
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I stepped on my glasses and now they are bent.
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So my glasses are not bent.
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These are actually brand new.
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My other glasses, when someone was asking about when I replaced things, um, my other glasses, oddly enough,
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were too strong to use on a computer screen.
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I don't know why they are the, I guess it's distance, right?
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Like my old glasses were great for reading.
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Um, but I found that they were too strong for using a computer.
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I don't know if it's because I've been eating better and working out whether my eyesight is improving.
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I don't think that's possible.
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But I got a weaker prescription of reading glasses.
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So anyways, mine aren't bent.
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But you can see the one arm on this pair of glasses is bent.
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It's not how it normally should be.
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It's bent.
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And bent can mean this too.
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Like something can be bent this way it can be bent like
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that it is just not it's curved or changed from the original shape
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dull no longer as sharp or as shiny as it should be
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so i chose the sharp example the knife is dull
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so i need to sharpen it you can see here
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that on the one picture the tomato is being sliced cleanly because the knife is sharp.
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But in the second picture, the knife has trouble breaking the skin of the tomato because the knife is dull.
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So, no longer as sharp as it should be.
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We also use this to describe things like we talked about chrome earlier.
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Chrome is when they treat metal so that it's shiny and eventually it can become dull.
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It usually looks like a mirror but eventually it fades a bit
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and it's dull and it's not as shiny as it used to be.
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So dull, no longer as sharp or as shiny as it should be or as it was.
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Blunt, having an edge or point that is not sharp.
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A butter knife isn't sharp.
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It is purposefully blunt.
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So I'm not sure if this is for safety.
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There's no point on a butter knife and if you ever try to cut something with a butter knife, it doesn't really work because it's blunt.
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A butter knife is made for eating cooked food and for putting things onto stuff.
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So it is blunt.
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It is the opposite of sharp.
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Loose, not firmly attached or fastened.
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The handle on this door is loose.
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We would also say it's falling off.
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That would be another description I would use.
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Um the handle on this door is loose
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if you wiggle it it it's it's like it probably isn't even it's probably not even working properly this one
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so loose not firmly attached or fastened and you can see here the handle on this door is loose
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We'll see you next time.
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What You'll Learn
This video helps you build practical speaking skills for describing everyday objects—like mugs, T-shirts, or even cars—using words for damage and wear. You’ll learn to talk about small flaws ("chipped") and gradual changes ("stretched") naturally, plus how to use verbs like "crush" and "smash" in real-life stories. It’s perfect for english speaking practice when chatting about household items or explaining why something needs replacing.
Listen For These Sounds
Notice how the speaker links words smoothly, like "it is" becoming "it's" and "because I" turning into "’cause I." You’ll also hear reductions in phrases like "I think" (sounding more like "I thihnk") and "a lot of" (shortened to "a lotta"). These connected speech patterns make your English sound more natural, so listen closely to mirror them in your shadow speech practice.
Say It Like a Native
To match the speaker’s rhythm, stress key words in descriptions: "This MUG is CHIPPED, but I still USE it" (emphasize "mug," "chipped," "use"). For longer sentences, pause slightly after commas, like in "The bottom of the T-shirt was STRETCHED after wearing it for a YEAR." Practice shadowing technique by repeating lines right after the speaker—copy their pace and emphasis to make your speech flow. Whether you’re talking about a crushed can or a stretched shirt, using this rhythm will make you sound more confident. Remember, shadowspeaks is all about mimicking real speech, so don’t be afraid to repeat tricky phrases until they feel natural!
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result | if you play outside, you will probably |
| “Used to” used to + verb — a past habit or state that is no longer true | used to be · used to drink |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | has now gone · have replaced · have seen |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is filled · being turned · wasn't damaged |
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.