This mini episode teaches you a common way of talking about your progress.
Episode 138 of the Everybody ESL podcast teaches you the “down / to go” construction, a common way of talking about your progress. Send your questions about English and your suggestions for future episodes to EverybodyESL@gmail.com! (And let me know if you’d like to record the introduction to a future episode.)
Have you ever heard an expression like this: “Well, that's two down and three to go.” Have you ever heard anyone say something like that? Well, this is the construction that I want to teach you today. It's a way of keeping track of things or a way of marking your progress. Let me give you an example, and then I will explain this construction.
Let's say you are taking an English class, and your teacher has given you an assignment. Your teacher has said, “For tomorrow's class, you must write ten English sentences.”
You are busy these days. You don't have a lot of time to do your homework assignments, so you think writing these ten sentences will be difficult. It will take a long time, but you get started on your homework. After you finish writing your first sentence, you say, “Well, that's one down and nine to go.” One down and nine to go.
What does this mean? This is a way of keeping track of something or marking your progress. When you say, “That's one down and nine to go,” what you're saying is, “I have done one of the things, and I still have nine things left to do.” So I guess we can call this the “down/to go” construction. I've never heard it called that before, but that can be our name for it: the down/to go construction.
So if you are ever trying to keep track of something or mark your progress as you move through a project, you can use this down/to go construction. First, you say the number of things that you have already completed or the number of things that are over or done. Then you add down. D-o-w-n. Down. Then you say the number of things that you have not yet completed. The number of things that you still have to do. Or the number of things that are still around. And you add to go. T-o g-o. One down and nine to go.
Getting back to our example: after you write your second sentence of the assignment, you could say, “That's two down and eight to go.” I think this is a common construction, and you will hear it in all kinds of situations
And that’s the end of episode 138 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 Ryoko 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.