More hard-to-define sound vocabulary, Part 2 in our series about passive verbs, a lesson about asking someone for a favor, the Joke of the Week, a listening quiz, a special guest, and more.
Episode 136 of the Everybody ESL podcast has good vocabulary about sounds, a lesson about asking someone for a favor, Part 2 in our series about passive verbs, the Joke of the Week, a listening quiz, and more. (Can you find this episode’s special guest?) If you have questions, comments, or suggestions (or if you’d like to record an introduction for future episodes), send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com!
Episode 136 rundown:
Vocabulary (hard-to-define sounds): 1:25,
Grammar (Part 2 in the series about passive verbs): 6:20,
Small talk (asking someone for a favor): 11:25,
The Joke of the Week: 14:30,
Listening quiz: 16:10
TRANSCRIPTION
Vocabulary: hard-to-define sound words
For this episode’s vocabulary list, I want to teach you another set of words that describe sounds. These are words that I think can be very hard to describe or define. But if I just play you the sound, I think you will understand these words very quickly and very easily. This is the second time I have presented a list of words like this. If you want to go back to check out the first time I did it, that was back in episode 106.
The first word on this episode’s list is gurgle. Gurgle. G-u-r-g-l-e. Gurgle. A gurgle is a sound like liquid boiling or bubbling or flowing. Or liquid going down the drain in the bath tub. And we sometimes call the happy sounds that a baby makes gurgling. Well here is a good gurgle sound: {gurgle sound}
And the next word on the list is hiss. Hiss. H-i-s-s. Hiss. A hiss is a sharp whispered sound like the sound that a snake makes or a sound like this: {hiss sound}
The next word is sputter. Sputter. S-p-u-t-t-e-r. A sputter is a series of small explosive or popping sounds. We often describe old motors as sputtering because old motors can sound like this: {sputtering engine sound}
Maybe you know this one: rattle. Rattle. R-a-t-t-l-e. Rattle. A rattle sound—or a rattling sound—is a series of fast, sharp sounds, like this: {rattle sound}
And I think you might know this one. This one is a little more common than some of the others. It is whistle. Whistle. W-h-i-s-t-l-e. A whistle is a breathy, musical sound. You might hear somebody whistling as they walk down the street. Or you might hear a teakettle whistling as the water inside boils. And it might sound like this: {teakettle whistle sound}
All right, how about this one? Zap. Zap. Z-a-p. Zap. A zap is a kind of electric buzzing sound like this: {zap sound}
Now this next one I think is very hard to describe, very hard to define. The word is click. Click. C-l-i-c-k. Click. A click is a small, sharp sound. Maybe the sound of something tapping, like a fingernail on a tabletop, or the sound of something being pressed down or pressed into place, like the sound of a button being pressed on a computer mouse. Here's an example of a clicking sound: {click sounds}
And the last word on our list of hard-to-define sound words is fizz. Fizz. F-i-z-z. Fizz. A fizz—or a fizzing sound—is a hissing, bubbling sound like this: {fizz sound}
Okay, well, that is this episode’s list of hard-to-define but easy-to-understand sound words. And if you keep your ears open, maybe you will hear some of these sounds around you soon.
Grammar: Part Two in the series about passive verbs
Our grammar lesson today is Part Two in the series about passive verbs. If you want to go back and review Part One—or listen to it for the first time—you can find it in episode 133.
Now let me give you a quick review of what we talked about in Part One. In Part One I told you about active sentences. Active sentences are sentences where the subject is the thing that does the verb. Here's an example of a simple active sentence:
"The dog sleeps on the bed."
In this sentence, what is the action? What is the verb? The verb is sleeps. Something is sleeping. Something is sleeping somewhere: on the bed. What is the subject of this sentence? Who is doing the thing in this sentence? The subject is the dog. And you will notice that it is the subject that is doing the verb. It is the dog that is sleeping. That's what makes this an active sentence: the subject of the sentence is the thing that is doing the action.
One more example of a regular, simple active sentence:
"The girl kicks the ball." The girl kicks the ball.
What is the action in this sentence? What is the verb? Kick, or kicks. Something is kicking something. That's what is happening in the sentence. Okay, well, what is the subject of the sentence “The girl kicks the ball”? The subject is the girl. And in this sentence, the subject (the girl) is doing the action (kicking the ball). The subject does the action: the girl kicks the ball. That's what makes it an active sentence.
Okay, that's active sentences. What about passive sentences? What makes a sentence passive? Well, it's one simple difference. In an active sentence, the subject does the action. In a passive sentence, somebody else does the action to the subject. The subject does not perform the action—the subject has the action performed upon it. Somebody else does the action to the subject. Here is a simple example. When I was telling you about active sentences, I said, “The girl kicks the ball.” Here is a passive sentence:
"The ball is kicked by the girl." The ball is kicked by the girl.
What is the action in this sentence? Is kicked. So, something is kicking something. What is the subject of this sentence? The ball. That's what this sentence is about. It's about the ball. Well, what happens to the ball? Somebody else kicks the ball. The ball is not the thing that does the action. The ball is not kicking something. The ball is being kicked. The girl kicks the ball.
So this passive sentence describes the same situation as the action sentence did: “The girl kicks the ball.” That's an active sentence. “The ball is kicked by the girl.” That's a passive sentence. So in a passive sentence, the subject is not the thing that does the verb or the thing that does the action or performs the action. The subject is the thing that the action is done to or done against. It's a different kind of relationship between subject and verb. And in a passive sentence, the subject is not the thing that performs the action; it is the thing that the action is done to. Somebody does the action to or on the subject. In our example, the ball is kicked by the girl. It’s the girl who is kicking the ball.
So that's what it means for a sentence to be passive. And that's all we're going to say for Part Two. I want to make sure we do this slowly so each point can be clear. When it's time for Part Three in the series, in a future episode, I will show you how to create passive verbs, how to make passive sentences. But for now it's enough to know what they are and what they mean and how they are different from active sentences.
Small talk: asking someone for a favor
For today’s small talk situation or social situation, I want to teach you an important skill. I want to teach you how to ask someone for a favor, how to ask someone to do something for you.
I think there is a simple formula to use when you're asking somebody for a favor. The first step is telling the person that you are asking for a favor. And you do that by saying something like this: “Can I ask you a favor?” Can I ask you a favor? Can I ask you a favor?
Now, after you say that, the person will probably answer, “Okay” or “What do you need?” or “How can I help you?” or “Well, what do you have in mind?”
When they say that, you can say a lot of different things. And I'm going to teach you four ways that you can ask for a favor, starting with the most casual and ending with the most formal-sounding.
Now, let's say this is our situation:
You are going to be going away on a short trip, and you need a friend to come to your house and feed your cat while you're gone. So here's how this conversation could work: First, you say, “Can I ask you a favor?” And your friend says, “Well, okay. What do you have in mind?”
So now you know a few good ways to ask somebody for a favor.
The Joke of the Week
And now it's time for the Joke of the Week! This is a joke that is probably not going to be very funny, but it might show us something interesting or fun about English. Here is this week's joke:
What do you call fish with no eyes? What do you call fish with no eyes?
I can’t wait. I just have to tell you the answer. What do you call fish with no eyes? Fsh! That's what you call fish with no eyes! Fsh!
Do you understand that one at all? I think this one's actually pretty good, but it might be hard to explain. When I said “with no eyes,” that can mean two different things. It can mean not having any eyes in their heads. They cannot see because they don't have any eyes for seeing. Or it could mean they don't have the letter i. Well, how do you spell fish with no letter i? If you start with the word fish—f-i-s-h—and you remove the letter i, you are left with fsh! Fsh!
What do you call fish with no eyes? You call them fsh!
Okay, well, that is this week’s joke. I actually think that one was pretty good.
Listening Quiz
It’s quiz time. I have five sentences here, and I'm going to read them at a normal, fast, conversational speed. And I want you to listen closely and see how much you can understand. If you need to listen to these sentences many times to hear every word or to try to hear every word, that's fine. Just do your best to understand everything that I'm saying. After I read the sentences at a fast speed, I will read them again much more slowly, and I think it will be easier for you to understand what I'm saying.
Okay, well let’s start with sentence number one: “The old truck sputtered down the road.” The old truck sputtered down the road.
Sentence number two: “The tourists took pictures of many colorful fish.” The tourists took pictures of many colorful fish.
Sentence number three: “I was surprised to see that the window was broken.” I was surprised to see that the window was broken.
Sentence number four: “Would you be able to drive me to the airport?” Would you be able to drive me to the airport?
And sentence number five: “The winter wind hisses through the forest.” The winter wind hisses through the forest.
Okay, well how was that? Was it easy for you to understand everything I was saying when I read those sentences at that normal, natural conversational speed?
I think it will be much easier when I read them at a much slower speed—
{A cat meows.}
Can you hear my cat?
{A cat meows.}
That’s McCloud.
{McCloud meows.}
Okay, well, McCloud, let me finish up the listening quiz.
Okay. Sentence number one: “The old truck sputtered down the road.” The old truck sputtered down the road. Do you remember that word sputter from our vocabulary list? This sentence has the word sputtered, and that is spelled s-p-u-t-t-e-r-e-d. Sputtered. The old truck sputtered down the road. In other words, as the old truck went down the road, it made a sputtering sound.
Sentence number two: “The tourists took pictures of many colorful fish.” The tourists took pictures of many colorful fish.
Sentence number three: “I was surprised to see that the window was broken.” I was surprised to see that the window was broken.
Sentence number four: “Would you be able to drive me to the airport?” Would you be able to drive me to the airport? This is one of those good ways to ask for a favor: Would you be able to... do this favor? Would you be able to drive me to the airport?
And sentence number five: “The winter wind hisses through the forest.” The winter wind hisses through the forest.
Okay, well, that is this episode’s listening quiz. How did you do?
The Ending
And that is the end of episode 136 of Everybody ESL. Remember, if you have any questions about English, or if you have comments or suggestions for me about the podcast, or if you would like to record an introduction that I can use at the beginning of future episodes (the same way Mia recorded the introduction you heard at the beginning of this episode), send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com.
I'll be back soon with another episode. And until then, keep going, keep practicing, and keep learning. Good-bye! I'll see you soon.