englishpod_B0020pb

E: Well, hello everyone! And welcome to EnglishPod! My name‟s Erica.

M: And I‟m Marco.

E: So, Marco, how‟re you doing today?

M: I‟m doing great and I‟m really looking forward to our lesson, because we‟re going to the

eye doctor today.

E: Okay, so, we‟ve got an elementary lesson about going to the eye doctor.

M: Yes!

E: Well, let‟s get started then with our “vocabulary preview”.

Voice: Vocabulary preview.

E: We have three words today in our vocabulary preview. All three words come from our

dialogue. Our first word is struggle.

M: Struggle.

E: Struggle.

M: Struggle.

E: So, Marco, when I struggle to do something, what does that mean?

M: It means it‟s difficult, it means that you have a hard time, so you can‟t really do it very

quickly.

E: So, what you have to try really hard.

M: You have to try really hard.

E: Yeah, to do something that‟s difficult.

M: Yes.

E: Okay, our next word is…

M: Blurry.

E: Blurry.

M: Blurry.

E: Blurry. B-L-U-R-R-Y.

M: Blurry. Whenever something is blurry, you can‟t really see it well.

E: It‟s not clear.

M: Right.

E: That‟s right, everything will be blurry.

M: Uhu.

E: Okay. And our final word is…

M: Prescription.

E: Prescription.

M: Prescription.

E: Often when you go to the doctor and you need some medicine, he writes out a

prescription.

M: Right, a little paper that says all the medicine that you need and then you can go to the

drug store and buy it.

E: Exactly.

M: Uhu.

E: Okay, so, those three words you‟ll hear in today‟s dialogue and I think it‟s time we listen

to the dialogue.

DIALOGUE, FIRST TIME

E: Well, this guy really has poor vision, hey?

M: Hehe.

E: Well, actually, you know what, I‟ve walked in to the bathroom, the men‟s bathroom,

actually, instead of the women‟s bathroom. And that‟s not „cause I wasn‟t wearing my

glasses.

M: It‟s because you weren‟t paying attention.

E: That‟s true.

M: Hehe. Okay, let‟s take a look today at out “language takeaway”.

Voice: Language takeaway.

M: The first word on our language takeaway for today is twenty/twenty (20/20) vision.

E: 20/20 vision.

M: 20/20 vision.

E: If I have 20/20 vision…

M: It means that you have perfect vision.

E: Which I do not have.

M: Hehe. No, me neither, so, I… I usually wear glasses as well.

E: Yeah.

M: But, yeah, people that have 20/20 vision don‟t need glasses, they can see clearly with…

E: And perfectly.

M: And perfectly.

E: Yeah. Next word is far-sighted.

M: Far-sighted.

E: Far-sighted.

M: Far-sighted.

E: So, if I‟m far-sighted, I can‟t see very well, right?

M: So, if you‟re far-sighted, you can‟t see things that are near.

E: So, you can see things that are faraway.

M: Right.

E: But thing that are close are blurry. Okay.

M: And the opposite would be…

E: Near-sighted.

M: And which is…

E: You can see things that are close well…

M: But not far.

E: Yeah.

M: Hehe.

E: Okay.

M: Far-sighted and near-sighted.

E: Okay, so, our next word is make out.

M: Make out.

E: Make out.

M: Make out.

E: Make out, that‟s kind of a funny little phrase. And let‟s listen to a few examples of this

phrase, so we can understand how it‟s used.

Voice: Example one.

A: I can’t make out what this says. The writing is too small.

Voice: Example two.

B: If you look carefully, you can almost make out a few of the stars in the sky.

Voice: Example three.

C: Can you see what’s written on the sign there?

D: No, I can’t quite make it out.

M: Okay, so, basically, make out is to see clearly.

E: Exactly.

M: Uhu, make out.

E: To see.

M: Okay. And our last word for language takeaway today is blind as a bat.

E: Blind as a bet.

M: Blind as a bet.

E: So, this is a really funny sounding expression, one of these weird English idioms.

M: Yeah, it‟s a really common expression that just means that you can‟t see.

E: Exactly, so, it‟s not like you actually are blind, right?

M: But you just really can‟t see very well.

E: Okay. Alright, we saw four great words today in our language takeaway, now I think we

can listen to our dialogue another time.

M: But this time it‟s gonna be slower, so we can pick up all these great words that we just

talked about.

DIALOGUE, SECOND TIME (slow)

M: Alright, great stuff on our dialogue and with this we can start now with “Putting it

together”.

Voice: Putting it together.

E: So, we saw a couple of useful phrases in this dialogue and I think we can show you how

to use these phrases in a few different ways.

M: Right, um, the first one that we have today is what seems to be.

E: So, we heard in the dialogue the doctor said…

M: “What seems to be the problem?”

E: We can use this same expression in a number of different ways. Let‟s listen.

Voice: Example one.

A: What seems to be the problem?

Voice: Example two.

B: What seems to be the matter?

Voice: Example three.

C: What seems to be the trouble?

M: Okay, so, with these examples we can see how we can use the phrase what seems to

be in many different ways.

E: Yeah, it‟s a great way of asking “What‟s the problem?”

M: So, now let‟s take a look at another phrase.

E: We heard in the dialogue the doctor said “Head on over to the other room”.

M: Right, and with this phrase head on we can combine it with other prepositions to

indicate another place.

E: Exactly, let‟s hear three examples.

Voice: Example one.

A: Head on in.

Voice: Example two.

B: Head on out.

Voice: Example three.

C: Head on up.

M: Okay, so, for example, we can say “Head on into the house, it‟s gonna rain soon”.

E: Or we can say “Hey guys, let‟s head on out to the park”.

M: Uhu, or I can also say “Head on up to my room, I’ll be there in a second”.

E: Great! Those are some cool phrases.

M: Right, and they‟re really useful.

E: So, why don‟t we listen to our dialogue and maybe we‟ll hear them again.

DIALOGUE, THIRD TIME

M: Okay, so, talking about going to the eye doctor today, I have a question for our

listeners.

E: A challenge for our listeners.

M: A challenge. What‟s it called when you can‟t distinguish colors?

E: So, like when you can‟t tell the difference between read and blue and green.

M: Right, so, what is that condition called? So…

E: There‟s like a technical term, we want the technical term.

M: Hehe. We want the technical term. So, we‟ll be looking for it on our comments‟ page and

be sure to… if you know the answer, post it.

E: At englishpod.com, also if you have questions about today‟s lesson or any other lesson,

please come and visit our website and, uh, ask us.

M: Yeah, we hope to see you there, but until then it‟s…

E: Good bye!

M: Bye!