Shadowing Practice: National Geographic Reading Explorer 2 Unit 9 The Global Village - Learn English Speaking with Video
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44 sentences
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1
Welcome to New York City.
2
There are people here from every corner of the world, raised in different cultures, with different experiences.
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Today, some New Yorkers are attending a very special meeting.
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These people all took part in the Genographic Project.
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They have taken DNA tests to learn about their ancestors.
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Together, they are going to travel back through time and find out where we all come from.
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Good morning everybody, how are you?
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Let's wave those flags.
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First, everyone is divided into five groups.
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They are grouped according to the region of the world their most recent genetic ancestors moved to.
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You are basically standing in the part of the world, if you imagine this is a world map, that your ancestors came from most recently.
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Each group is given a different colored flag.
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The red flags represent the people whose ancestors arrived in North and South America about 14,000 years ago.
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So these are descendants of the first inhabitants of the Americas, the Native Americans.
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So you guys are the furthest point on the human journey.
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Now I'm going to switch all the way to the other extreme of the globe.
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This big group over here, the Europeans.
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Let's see those flags.
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The blue flags represent people whose recent ancestors came from Europe.
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Our ancestors were pretty amazing people too.
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They began living in Europe about 35,000 years ago.
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But the genetic tests show that before they came to Europe and the Americas,
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the ancestors of both groups lived in one region, Central Asia.
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We all share a genetic marker in common a guy who was living in Central Asia around 40,000 years ago.
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So at that point there were no Europeans, there were no Native Americans, there were Central Asians.
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And now the pink flags represent people from East and South Asia.
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Their ancestors arrived in Asia about 45,000 years ago.
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Now, if we could ask everybody in Central Asia
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and everybody in East Asia to coalesce over here to the Middle East around 50,000 years ago or so.
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As we can see, Europeans,
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North Americans, South Americans, East Asians and Southeast Asians all share a common ancestor in the Middle East.
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So we are now down to two groups, one in the Middle East, the other in Africa.
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Will they too join together?
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Absolutely. But where?
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Where did humans live first?
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In Africa, human beings only moved from Africa to the Middle East about 60,000 years ago.
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Welcome home everybody.
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This means that all of us alive today can trace our family histories back to Africa.
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In fact, we have spent most of our history as a species, three-fourths of it, living only in Africa.
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From there, our ancestors began their journeys all around the globe.
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But what does this news mean to the people who participated in the project?
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We're all very, very similar no matter what we say or do, no matter what language we speak, we're all the same.
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Just think, every person on the planet is connected to every other person.
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We are truly one world.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This B1 speaking lesson is built on the video “National Geographic Reading Explorer 2 Unit 9 The Global Village”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: ancestor, East, flag, Asia, Africa. This video has 44 sentences and 509 words to shadow. The speech runs for 4:25. The speaker talks at a steady 115 words per minute, a comfortable pace for shadowing. 89% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is easy to follow.
Key vocabulary in this video
The 13 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| genetic adjective | /d͡ʒəˈnɛt.ɪk/ | Relating to genetics or genes. |
| arrive verb | /əˈɹaɪv/ | To reach; to get to a certain place. |
| globe noun | /ɡloʊb/ | The eyeball. |
| participate verb | /pɑːˈtɪs.ɪ.peɪt/ | To join in, to take part, to involve oneself (in something). |
| connect verb | /kəˈnɛkt/ | To join (to another object): to attach, or to be intended to attach or capable of attaching, to another object. |
| trace noun | /tɹeɪs/ | An act of tracing. |
| divide verb | /dɪˈvaɪd/ | To split or separate (something) into two or more parts. |
| marker noun | /ˈmɑː(ɹ)kə(ɹ)/ | A felt-tipped pen, a marker pen. |
| ancestor noun | /ˈæn.sɛs.tɚ/ | One from whom a person is descended, whether on the father's or mother's side, at any distance of time; a progenitor; a forefather; a forebear. |
| coalesce verb | /ˌkoʊ.əˈlɛs/ | To join into a single mass or whole. |
| descendant noun | /dɪˈsɛndənt/ | One of the progeny of a specified person, at any distance of time or through any number of generations. |
| furthest adjective | /ˈfɜː(ɹ)ðɪst/ | Most distant in time, space or degree. |
| inhabitant noun | /ɪnˈhæb.ɪ.tənt/ | Someone or thing who lives in a place. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| find out verb | To discover, as by asking or investigating. |
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is divided · are grouped · is given |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | have taken · have spent |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | guy who was · people who participated |
| Superlatives the -est / the most … — the top or bottom of a group | their most recent · the furthest |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 3 contractions and reduced forms, such as we're, I'm. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- Long words — get the stress right: participate /pɑːˈtɪs.ɪ.peɪt/, inhabitant /ɪnˈhæb.ɪ.tənt/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Shadow it sentence by sentence at normal speed, repeating each one until your rhythm matches the speaker.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like genetic, arrive, globe.
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.