Why, why... ways of expressing reason. A deserted London

Hi everyone!

Paired with relaxing images, very suitable for a Monday, this video will enable us to explore different ways of expressing reason and effect/consequence. Only one question, why, but many possible answers.

The video is a collection of photos taken at a very specific time to capture an unusual effect: a hidden city inside the city. Can you find the answers to these questions and tell us how the speaker is expressing cause or effect? You can transcribe the sentence if that helps.

1. Why did he decide to take these pictures?
2. What are the effects of such few cars and people on the streets?
3. Why doesn't he usually have the time to reflect on or play around with images?
4. That day, when did the appearance of the city start to change? Why?


Consider elements like sentence order (why shouldn't one start the sentence with "because"?), alternatives to because like "since" or "as", using nouns instead of clauses (linking in this case with "because OF" or "due to/owing to/thanks to"), or, my favourite, starting the sentence with a present participle clause (which can also be used to express condition, result, time...)

Not a bad idea to start using alternatives, seeing as Spanish learners can reportedly spell because in (wait for it...) 237 different ways! It's not our fault if we're imaginative when it comes to spelling!

Now seriously, variety is the key here. Knowing that these are common ways of expressing cause will also help your comprehension. "Since you're here, we're going to start" has nothing to do with time but with reason (meaning "now you're here" / "given that you're here"), and sometimes the result may be clearly positive, so you may want to use "thanks to" to make this connotation clear.

See you in the comments! Enjoy!

Vocabulary With Film Trailers

Hello again!

Watching a film trailer, if you do it attentively, with the eye of an active language learner, is what we could call a visually-aided vocabulary activity. And there are so many available to you every year!

Many film trailers feature superimposed short reviews to encourage the viewer. Expressions like "it will keep you glued to the screen" and such. If the expressions or vocabulary used in these captions are new to us, we will be using two (usually involuntary) strategies to understand them: one is connotation, since we know that these trailers are in fact a form of advertising so the language in it will be largely positive. The second one is their context, which includes visual cues, dialogue and voiceover.

Can you provide a definition, even if it's just approximate, of the expressions in the captions of these film trailers? Share the expressions and your definitions in the comments section! Some of you will want to focus on adjectives, while others may prefer idiomatic expressions (like the "glued to the screen" I mentioned earlier).

I hope you enjoy the trailers! I chose four documentary films: a different way of showing love to nature in A Will for the Woods, the talent hidden in the background of the stage in Twenty Feet from Stardom, the hardest exam in the world (no, not your certificate exam!) in Somm, and visual impact in Samsara.

Hope to see your comments soon!

A WILL FOR THE WOODS - Trailer from First Run Features on Vimeo.

Yosemite again: free-climbing Dawn Wall

Hi everyone!

I guess many of you have woken up to the news of the incredible feat of these two climbers to have made it to the top of El Capitan's Dawn Wall in Yosemite.

Having seen El Capitan featured here, in a previous post about Yosemite Park, it seemed only like a natural continuation to have a little activity about this incredible sporting success.

This is a gap filling activity with two kinds of gaps, which you can complete all at once or in two rounds. The first kind is vocabulary, while the second kind (in bold) is for examples of ellipsis and reference (ways of avoiding repetition in discourse).

Even though I include the key for you to check, I'd like you to tell us in the comments what those words in the gaps refer to. For example:

- Everybody was writing comments on the blog, but inexplicably, I wasn't. (there's an ellipsis here, and it refers to "writing comments".)

- There's a previous post about Yosemite, so I may check that out after this video. (we avoid repetition by using the pronoun "that", which refers to "a previous post about Yosemite".)


I'm aware that many of you may have seen the video already, but it really is the most beautiful one around. I had to pause it and just admire the view. Where would you pause the video?

Enjoy!

Tommy starts by describing his father, a bodybuilder, as a __________ character.

When he was a child, his father would put a harness on him, tighten him into a rope around him and ________ a rock outside their house.

_________ he was 14, he started to realise there were climbs he could do that his father ________ .

His ___________ is to climb the Dawn Wall in Yosemite Valley.

About five of the hardest wall free-climbs have been Tommy’s ________ , and Dawn Wall is ________ harder than the hardest of __________.

In North America, there is no granite wall that is as blank and  _______________ as Dawn Wall.

Tommy wrote about a day when his fingertips were cracked and bleeding, he made ____________ despite great conditions, and yet he couldn’t wait to be back up on the wall.

Tommy really ___________ to his father, who taught him about this _____________ way to live.

He says that we have these ____________ ideas of where our boundaries are, and that maybe _________ are completely wrong.

The Dawn Wall from Facebook Stories on Vimeo.

Recycling Electronics

Hello again! Happy 2015 to you all!

We're back with a bit of responsible recycling and reuse of electronic devices. It's a very brief video, but it shows us some of the consequences of irresponsible disposal of  electronic waste, as well as some greener alternatives.

Just a regular gapfill for you! We're getting back into shape step by step... I'm still going to let you enjoy some of the holiday season hangover before stepping into more challenging work!

Enjoy! Key available here (but don't rush to it!)

In America, 2m __________________ of __________________ are thrown away every year.

It can leak into __________________ and into __________________.

It’s a cause of environmental __________________ and it can cause harm to the people who __________________.

The biggest __________________ to recycling is cost, which is compensated in this company by fixing and reselling __________________.

They may may take two products __________________ and combine them together to make one that is reusable.

They can recuperate __________________ per cent for reuse.

They track down the reused items __________________ be able to provide that information to environmental organizations and manufacturers. The manufacturers could then decide __________________ to make next.

An EcoATM will let you hand in your cellphone and get cash __________________.