Shadowing Practice: Unit 5 New York SkyscraperReading Explorer 1 3rd Ed Video - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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New York City is home to over 6,000 high-rise buildings.
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It's an amazing sight.
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But have you ever wondered what it's like to build a high-rise in one of the most crowded places in the world?
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Let's find out from the people working on One Bryant Park.
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There are several factors that make this work challenging, especially on the corner of 42nd Street and 6th Avenue.
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This location is one of the busiest places in the whole city.
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The first challenge was digging the building's foundation.
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It took an entire year for workers to remove 198,000 cubic meters of earth.
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After the foundation was finished, workers could begin bringing in building materials.
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Thousands of kilograms are received at the site each day.
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There is very little room here in the middle of Manhattan, so there is only one option for getting the materials to the workers.
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Everything has to be lifted up into the tower.
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About 200 meters above ground, the workers are hard at work.
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This crane operator is so high up that he can't see what he's lifting.
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Workers far below him provide careful instructions on what to do.
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The potential for mistakes is high, so there is no room for error.
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The biggest job is lifting these huge beams that to form the structure of the building.
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But first, the beams have to make it there.
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Getting access to the site is not so easy.
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Driving a truck this size through city traffic can be a challenge.
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Trucks start coming in at 5 a.m.
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And as the day continues, the traffic only gets worse.
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After the beams arrive, the men work quickly.
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With a building this size, everything is big.
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And that always presents a challenge.
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This is one of five water tanks that will hold the total of 260,000 liters of water.
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Its size makes it difficult to place.
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But if you think this looks hard, the greatest challenge is yet to come, the spire.
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It's so large that it comes in 70 separate pieces.
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Going into New York City, you basically lose two days.
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It is true what they say, this is a city that never sleeps and there's always traffic out there to deal with.
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It gets a little hairy at times, you know, but you have an escort behind you and he kind of blocks it off a little bit.
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Even though New York is a really big city, the streets aren't the biggest.
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Each piece must be lifted and put together nearly 300 meters above ground.
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With its spire, One Bryant Park stands 366 meters high,
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making it one of New York's tallest buildings.
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It attracts residents and tourists alike, and forms an important part of the New York City skyline.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This B1 speaking lesson is built on the video “Unit 5 New York SkyscraperReading Explorer 1 3rd Ed Video”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: workers, meters, challenge, beams, traffic. This video has 37 sentences and 454 words to shadow. The speech runs for 4:23. The speaker talks slowly, about 103 words per minute, so there is time to copy every sound. 88% 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 14 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| meter noun | /ˈmitəɹ/ | A device that measures things. |
| beam noun | /ˈbiːm/ | Any large piece of timber or iron long in proportion to its thickness, and prepared for use. |
| spire noun | /ˈspaɪ.ɚ/ | A young shoot of a plant; a spear. |
| kilogram noun | /ˈkɪləɡɹæm/ | In the International System of Units, the base unit of mass; conceived of as the mass of one litre of water, but now defined by taking the fixed numerical… |
| skyline noun | /ˈskaɪˌlaɪn/ | The line that seems to be the boundary of the sky and the ground; the horizon. |
| cubic adjective | /ˈkju.bɪk/ | Used in the names of units of volume formed by multiplying a unit of length by itself twice. |
| hairy adjective | /ˈhɛɹ.i/ | Having a lot of body hair. |
| crane noun | /kɹeɪn/ | Any bird of the family Gruidae, large birds with long legs and a long neck which is extended during flight. |
| escort noun | /ˈɛs.kɔɹt/ | A group of people or vehicles, generally armed, who go with a person or people of importance to safeguard them on a journey or mission. |
| alike adjective | /əˈlaɪk/ | Having resemblance or similitude; similar; without difference. |
| instruction noun | /ɪnˈstɹʌkʃən/ | The act of instructing, teaching, or providing with information or knowledge. |
| attract verb | /əˈtɹækt/ | To pull toward without touching. |
| dig verb | /dɪɡ/ | To move hard-packed earth out of the way, especially downward to make a hole with a shovel. Or to drill, or the like, through rocks, roads, or the like. More… |
| operator noun | /ˈɑpəˌɹeɪtɚ/ | A person or organisation that operates a device, system, service, etc. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| put together verb | To assemble, construct, build, or formulate. |
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 | was finished · are received · be lifted |
| Superlatives the -est / the most … — the top or bottom of a group | the most crowded · the busiest · The biggest |
| Obligation: must / have to / need to saying that something is necessary | has to be · have to make |
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 meter, beam, spire.
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.