908. Bits & Bobs 2 📚 Questions of English (Part 2) Listener Comments
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You're listening to Luke's English Podcast. For more information, visit teachaluke.co.uk. Hello, listeners. Welcome back to Luke's English Podcast. How are you doing today? I hope you're doing fine. So here we go with a brand new episode of my podcast, which I've been doing now for, is it 15 and a half years? Since 2009, except no substitutes, ladies and gentlemen.

Here it is, 900 and something, episode 900 and, I don't know now, actually, but it'll be written in the title of the episode, 907, 908, I'm not sure. And this is Bits and Bobs slash Questions of English part two. Listener comments, we'll be focusing on some listener comments in this one.

There's a PDF for this which you can get by clicking the link in the episode description in the show notes. You can just directly download the episode PDF from there. Otherwise, you'll find it on my website on the page for this episode. So let's have a look at the PDF. I'm going to start reading from that right now. Here we go. Okay. So, have you heard part one of this series?

This, this series, is where I'm going through various bits and pieces, or bits and bobs, as we say in British English, which I have saved over the years for episodes of this podcast. These bits and bobs include various questions of English and other things which should be of interest to you, my audience of learners of English around the world. In part two here, we're going to focus on various listener comments and questions which I've received regularly.

over the years relating to various episodes from the archives of Luke's English Podcast. And by the way, talking of the archives of Luke's English Podcast, if you are watching this episode on YouTube, hello, something that you should perhaps realise or notice is that not all of the episodes of Luke's English Podcast are available on YouTube. The first...

The first 10, 15, 20 episodes are available. And then I think there's a big gap. And then they continue from something like episode four or 500, something like that.

So you might have noticed that you can't find all of the episodes in the archive on YouTube, but they're all available on my website, teacherluke.co.uk slash episodes. And you can find all of the episodes there still freely available. Or if you listen to Luke's English podcast in a podcast app on your phone, you'll find that the list is

is complete. All the episodes are in the list as well there, okay? So if you're looking for all of the missing episodes, you'll find them on my website, or you'll just find them in your feed, in your podcast app of choice, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Pocket Casts, and so on. So let me continue the PDF then. So the following bits of listener correspondence have been sitting in a

So these are little comments and emails and other things that I received from listeners quite a long time ago. And I probably screenshotted them or copy pasted them and saved them in a Google document or in a Google folder in my Google Drive thinking, oh, I'll respond to those later. And then here we are years after the fact.

going through them in this episode. So I discovered them recently and decided finally to talk about them on the podcast. So the first thing is this, getting a TEFL certificate. That's the first bit of correspondence. It's entitled getting a TEFL certificate. TEFL, that means teaching English as a foreign language. So let me read the message. It goes like this. Dear Luke,

I'm one of the listeners who stay in the shadows, meaning a ninja. In fact, I've been starting the day with your effective voice since I came across your podcast, which was two months ago. I have an effective voice. My voice does the job. It's effective. An effective voice. That's nice. Thank you. You've been listening to...

since you came across my podcast two months ago. Okay. Thanks from the bottom of my heart for every single word you save for us. You're welcome. I'm an English language teacher and I work at a secondary school. So this will be an English language teacher from, I guess, another country, right? Someone who speaks English as a second language but works as an English language teacher like so many people around the world, right?

So many people in the world work as teachers, even though English isn't their first language, which is very impressive. However, I'm not happy with the country I live in.

So I'm planning to work abroad. I need your help with TEFL certifications. I'm sure I have to get one in order to teach abroad, teach English abroad. But which is the best certificate and where can I start? As a location, Europe is the most convenient one. But which country and which institution? Any idea about cheaper courses which are still good? I hope you can reply. Best wishes, Zahul. Zuhal, not Zahul.

Okay. Right. So basically, advice for those of you out there interested in getting a teaching qualification to teach English abroad.

Yes. So here's my response. So there are various TEFL qualifications out there, but the industry standard entry level teaching qualifications are the CELTA. That's run by Cambridge. CELTA, that's Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults. That's the CELTA run by Cambridge. And then there's the CERT-TSOL.

Certificate in Teaching English as a Second or Other Language. The Cert TESOL run by Trinity College London.

Okay, so those are the two industry standard ones, CELTA and CERT TESOL. CELTA is, I think, probably the more established one, or at least the more well-known one. But CERT TESOL is equivalent in value, as far as I'm aware. So here are some details. So first of all, let's look at the Cambridge Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults. Basically, to take the CELTA...

You don't need to go abroad to take the course and get the qualification. You can do it online or you can go to various places. If we're talking about Europe, you can go to various different centres in Europe, different institutions in order to train and get your CELTA qualification. So let's have a look at the Cambridge website, which is definitely the place to start. So cambridgeenglish.org.au.

slash teaching dash English. The link is too complicated. Basically, you Google CELTA Cambridge English and follow the results. But otherwise, there's a link on the PDF. Let's have a look at what it says. So we end up on the Cambridge English website, CELTA.com.

The gold standard teaching qualification. CELTA from Cambridge is a qualification for teaching English as a foreign language. It's the most widely recognised English teaching qualification in the world and the most often requested by employers. Three out of four English language teaching jobs require a CELTA qualification. So basically, if you want to start teaching English somewhere in the world, having a CELTA is going to be...

a really useful qualification to have. So this is probably the one I would recommend. And in fact, this is the one that I took many, many years ago. When did I do my CELTA? 2001,

In 2001, I took my CELTA, and that's when I started my English teaching journey. So CELTA, yeah. Basically, it focuses on developing practical techniques and includes face-to-face or online teaching practice with groups of learners, which will give you the confidence you need to begin teaching in as little as four weeks. So it is possible to take the course in just four weeks, but that's a very intensive four weeks. So...

Who is CELTA for? It's for new teachers with no experience starting their career or teachers with some experience who want to develop their skills. It's for first language English speakers, which is another way to say native English speakers, and non-first language speakers. So that's also non-native speakers. So, you know, anyone with, I guess, a reasonable level of English, a good level of English can take this. It's not just exclusive to native speakers anymore.

And as we know, non-native speakers or people who are non-first language speakers, you know, represent an extremely important part of the English teaching industry and also the English teaching world in the sense that,

often around the world, it's non-native English speakers who work as teachers and who help others to really kind of be able to use English effectively in various ways.

So basically, you'd go onto the website and you can just find a centre. So there's a button you can click where you can actually look in different countries, different parts of the world. You will find different centres, different institutions where you can train and take the exams and assessments to get the qualification. You can basically do it face to face in a centre, like I said, or you can do it online.

or you can do a combination of the two. And there are various links and things on the Cambridge website that you can follow. 120 hours of study, which can be crammed into four weeks, or you can do it at a more, you know, a less intensive rate. So basically follow the link that I've given you or just Google CELTA Cambridge English and you can find out more and you can take the necessary steps to either book yourself onto a course in an actual teaching centre somewhere,

or you can do it online. Okay, so that's what you could do. And similarly, the Trinity Certificate in teaching English to speakers of other languages, or the CERT certificate,

TESOL. There's a link for that as well. And you could, you know, get stuck into that and find out what you can find out. Okay, so there you go. I would recommend the CELTA myself. That's the one I took. But CERT TESOL is another option, either somewhere local to you or online. Okay. All right. Nice one. Next thing, my next bit is a voice message from Kazakhstan.

Hello to listeners in Kazakhstan. It's not often that I mention Kazakhstan on this podcast. I met a Lepster from Kazakhstan once at a Lepster meetup. Can't remember his name, sorry, but he was very good at magic tricks. He gave me a badge. Here it is. Still got it on the shelf. He gave me a little pin badge with a kind of, with a crest from, with a

Kazakhstani kind of coat of arms or crest on it. Very nice. Anyway, if you're from Kazakhstan, hello, I got a voice recording from Kazakhstan. This is a long time ago now, but I thought that I would finally play it. So here's a message from Kazakhstan. Here we go. Am I going to be able to play this to you?

Here it is. Listen to this, folks. Hello, Luke. My name is Zerina and I'm from Kazakhstan, Astana. I'm one of those ninjas that you mentioned in your Rambling podcast. I really enjoy listening to your podcasts and I'm very thankful to you for this hard job. And as well, my son, Aaron, who is only three years old, he's also listening to your podcast and he would like to tell you something. Hello, Luke. How are you? How are you today?

Oh, Aaron, I think is his name and his mum, Serena from Kazakhstan. Aaron, who's three years old, or at least he was when he recorded this message. Hello, Luke. How are you? I'm fine, Aaron. If you're still listening, I'm absolutely fine. Thanks today. Having a pretty good day. It's a bit grey and cloudy. It's grey and cloudy today, but it's not raining. And I had a milkshake earlier. It was really good. It was a vanilla milkshake with coffee in it.

So I'm feeling pretty good, thanks. Thanks for asking. And actually, Aaron, he may be... How old are you now, Aaron? You might be like... I think this was sent to me in... When was it? 2017 or something like that? So Aaron, you might be nearly 10 years old now. And if you're still listening to this podcast, then no doubt your English is just tip-top brilliant. Are you still listening? Are you still out there? If you are, get in touch.

I wonder. I wonder if he's moved on to much more interesting things. Okay, let's move on to the next bit of correspondence. And this is about R sounds in English. R sounds. R sounds.

Okay, like the letter R which is R sounds. Okay, and we're going to be looking at linking R sounds or intrusive R sounds which is actually something that I covered in full detail in full comprehensive detail in the most recent as as I speak to you now the most recent premium series I did p 63 part 2 is full of stuff about connected speech including plenty of details about R

R sounds and the way in which in British English we pronounce the letter R in words and also how the R sound seems to come into words or sentences when you least expect it. So this is a message from Raphael who said, Hi, I'm a listener from Spain. I've heard about, I've heard your episode about tricky pronunciation issues. That's one I did with Paul Taylor.

And here's one I often wonder about. And Raphael has spelt wonder with an A, but it should be wonder with an O. OK, here's one I often wonder about. Wonder with an O means think about. Wonder with an A means walk around. So I think it's wonder with an O. So some British people, you included, I think, pronounce an R, that's a R sound, after some words ending with A or R.

Right? When the next word starts with a vowel. He's written a vocal, but it should be a vowel. Right? You're following this, everyone. Some British people pronounce an R sound after some words ending with an A sound when the next word starts with a vowel. Okay. So, if the word ends in A, like, for example, China. China. I mean, it's spelled with an A at the end, but it certainly is a vowel at the end. The sound at the end, China. China.

Actually, when we pronounce China, we don't say China. It's China. Hear that sound? That's the schwa sound, which is very common in unstressed syllables of words in English. Right. So China has got two syllables in it. Right. The first syllable is the stressed one, China. And the first syllable, the I is pronounced with a full vowel sound, I, Chai. But then the A is

the vowel in that second syllable is not pronounced as an /a/. It's not China. It's China. Anyway, the point is that it is a vowel sound at the end. So, Rafael is basically saying that sometimes when we pronounce a word with a vowel sound at the end, we do pronounce an /a/ sound

after it when the next verb, when the next word begins with a vowel. Okay, this is a bit abstract maybe, but here's an example. So if I was to say China is facing a difficult situation nowadays, right, China is facing, between China and is,

China, which ends in a vowel, and is, which starts with a vowel, that actually between those two words you get a r sound. China is facing a difficult situation nowadays. Now I wouldn't really emphasise it like I did just then. Instead we'd say China is facing a difficult situation. China is facing... China is facing...

Can you hear it? So there is a little /r/ sound that links the /ə/ at the end of China and the /ɪ/ at the beginning of 'is'. So we don't say China is, but China is. China is facing a difficult situation nowadays. Hmm. This is what Raphael is saying. He's noticed this. And he says, could you expand about it? I would say expand on it. Could you expand on it? Could you expand on that? Is it a particular accent?

All the best, Raphael. Or just best, Raphael. So this is, okay, Raphael, this is very common. This particular one is called intrusive R or an intrusive R sound. And it is very common in British English. And so there's several things going on here, right? Now, you might have noticed, listeners, in British English, we don't always pronounce R in words, right?

So, words that end in an R, like teach, like car, that you drive, drive a car, in British English, in sort of like a standard version of British English, let's call it received pronunciation, RP. In RP, that R at the end of car isn't pronounced. Car, car, drive a car. Now, it's not drive a car, car, with a more rounded R sound that you might hear in

Some accents in England, so in the West Country, in the West Country where, you know, like people sort of, they pronounce their R sounds a bit more. And in Ireland as well, where R sounds do get a little bit, they're pronounced more clearly, car, for example. And of course, in the United States, where people say car, drive, I'm going to drive my car. I'm going to drive a car. Not that they all sound like that.

But in received pronunciation, it's car. I'm going to drive a car later. Okay. So there's that. But then here, what Raphael is asking about is the fact that words where there's no R at all, sometimes an R gets included, like China is facing. China is facing a situation. Okay. Here's the answer that I've prepared to try and make it clear. So,

Here's my response. Actually, I deal with this topic in some detail in a recent premium series, P63 Part 2, including other forms of connected speech. Check it out. But I will now talk about intrusive R sounds and linking R sounds. So let's start with intrusive R.

So what Raphael is talking about is known as intrusive R or linking R. This occurs in some varieties of British English, particularly in non-erotic accents, which is most of them. Erotic accent is one that actually pronounces a rounded R sound like the ones I...

talked about before, United States generally speaking, Ireland, West Country, you know, those are rhotic accents because their R sounds are rounded. So, this thing of not pronouncing the R but pronouncing it when we link between sounds is common in received pronunciation and a lot of other British accents. So,

In non-rhotic accents, the r sound is typically not pronounced at the end of a word, at the end of words, unless it's followed by a vowel sound. For example, in received pronunciation, car would be pronounced as car without the final r sound. Here are some other examples of when the r or r is not pronounced in words. OK, and you'll see that basically it's when the sound is at the end of the word or in the middle and...

and it's followed by a consonant sound. So when the R is at the end, it's not really pronounced. When it's in the middle and it's followed by a consonant, we also don't really pronounce it. Okay, so at the end of the words... Here are some examples with R at the ends of words.

So, car, teacher, far. Is it far? No, it's okay. We can take my car. Okay. Mother, father, near. Is it near or is it far? It's not far. It's quite near. Power. Oh, no, I don't have any power in my car.

I actually said power in. There's a R there, power in, because power was followed by an I sound, power in my car. Anyway, car teacher, far mother, father, near, power, here. Can you hear me? Right. So you heard that the R sounds weren't really pronounced. And then also in the middle of words, when the R sound is followed by a consonant. So consonants are things like T, D, M.

right, n and so on, right, so cart, card, hard, form, horse, market, first, born, start, fork, park, word, okay, right, so the r sounds are not pronounced there because they're all followed by consonants, cart, it's pronounced followed by a t sound, all right,

Then, so there's that, right? Then we've got linking R. So linking R occurs when a word that ends in an R, like the word car in the spelling, right? And is followed by a vowel sound in the next word, then we actually include the R in the pronunciation. For example, if I was to say the car is red, right?

but say it fluently, it sounds like this. The car is red. The car is red. So you can actually hear that the end of car is pronounced because it's followed by a vowel in the next word. The car is red. Certainly in American English, you'd definitely hear it right. The car is... The car is red.

Not that all Americans sound like that, but only when they're kind of like, only when they're presenting news programs. The car is red. Car is red. Okay. Here's some other examples. Car engine. Far away. Near a lake. Is it far away? No, it's not too far away. Far away. Okay.

Is it near a lake? Yes, it is. Okay. Other examples. Her arm. Her arm. Her arm. And for example. For example. Okay. Also, there is. Over it. Better off. After all. Your idea. Here it is. Okay. Okay.

So try repeating these sentences after me. Just do that, right? I'll give you a little bit of space. See if you can repeat these sentences after me. And you'll notice the R being pronounced. So the car engine wouldn't start and we were stranded far away from home. The car engine wouldn't start and we were stranded far away from home. Your turn. Hmm. What? The car engine wouldn't start and you were stranded far away from home. That sounds complicated.

The next one: We stopped near a lake to rest after the long drive. We stopped near a lake. Stopped near a lake. Go on. You stopped, you stopped near a lake. Stopped. Stopped near a lake. Why? To rest after the long drive. Okay. We stopped near a lake to rest after the long drive. Another one: She raised her arm to point at the mountains in the distance.

Okay, we're going to skip forward a little bit and then move on to intrusive R. So, intrusive R is similar to linking R, but occurs even in words that don't end in R in their spelling. It typically happens when a word ends in a vowel sound and the next word begins with a vowel sound. So, one word ends in a vowel, the next one begins in a vowel. For example, China is. China is.

Okay, so China is might be pronounced as China is China is a very big country Okay, so this intrusive R makes the transition between the two vowel sounds smoother and more fluent It's particularly common in received pronunciation this kind of standard British accent which is basically how I speak more or less and

So it's very common in RP and other southern British English accents. So we've got things like idea, the idea of it, the idea of law and order, law and order, India and China, India and China, the idea of it. There it is again. Media event, media event, media event, media event, right?

Soda and ice sounds like soda and ice. Soda and ice. Saw it. I saw it at the cinema. I saw it at the cinema. Saw it. You don't emphasise it. Now, what happens sometimes is when I teach this particular language point to my students in a classroom and my students are trying to practise it, they end up emphasising it, which is definitely not the point that

it's not something you would emphasise. So you don't say soda run ice or media revent or saw writ. It's more that you're stressing the other words and this little sound is just a way to smoothly move from one sound to the next. I saw it at the cinema. I saw it at the cinema.

And data analysis. Data analysis. Okay, let's move on. That's all, actually. You could try and repeat these after me. The idea of travelling next year sounds amazing. The idea of travelling next year sounds amazing. This is where you have to try and repeat what I've just said. The new government promised to restore law and order in the city. Law and order in the city.

The new government promised to restore law and order in the city. Okay. India and China have a long history of trade relations. India and China have a long history of trade relations. And we'll just do one more because this is not technically a pronunciation episode. You'd have to sign up to Luke's English Podcast Premium to get all of those proper pronunciation drill episodes where you

Practice pronouncing things after me with the proper pausing and all the rest of it. So one more. I love the idea of it, but I'm not sure how practical it is. I love the idea of it. I love the idea of it. I love the idea of it, but I'm not sure how practical it is.

Okay, so that was just a little look at the way that r sounds are sometimes not pronounced in words, sometimes they are pronounced, and sometimes they're pronounced when there's no actual r written in the word in the spelling. And that's just one little feature of connected speech in English. There are various other ways in which words in English are connected together, and it's definitely worth having a look at the subject of connected speech, understanding the various ways it happens, and then practising doing it

because it can really help you, I think, to improve your fluency by being able to speak without making pauses between the words. You know that when you hear someone speak another language and it's impressive, it sounds impressive, because all the words all sort of connect up together, they all run in. It all sounds like one long word. And there is, you know, there are

in which those things happen. There are actual recognisable features of connected speech that you can identify, notice, hear, practise, you know, and it can definitely help, A, with your understanding of people, and B, with your ability to speak more fluently, getting all your words out quickly without having to kind of pause or leave gaps between the words, you know. Fluency is about...

Obviously, it's about remembering which words you need to use. So it's about vocabulary recall. It's about control over grammar. But it's also about control over your pronunciation and being able to sort of physically get the words out and make it all sound fluid. And pronunciation, connected speech, is definitely a part of that process.

So if you wanted to hear that full episode that I did about connected speech, you could listen to P63 part two. If you're a premium subscriber, it's available in your list. If you are not a premium subscriber yet, then you can just find out more at teacherluke.co.uk slash premium info.

Stop over in Qatar and enjoy pristine beaches and vibrant souks. Relax in a five-star hotel from just $48 per night. Go to visit Qatar.com slash stopover. Terms apply. Deep in the ocean, an orca pod is on the hunt. But these aren't your average orcas. These guys are organized.

Marketing team, did you get those social media posts scheduled for the seal migration? Aye, aye, Captain. We even have an automated notification for all pod managers when they go live. They use Monday.com to keep their teamwork sharp, their communication clear and their goals in sight. Monday.com for whatever you run, even orcas. Go to Monday.com to dive deeper. Right, let's move on to the next bit here.

So this is something about being a fly on the wall at Luke's English Podcast headquarters.

Have you ever heard of that phrase before, to be a fly on the wall? So sometimes people say things like that. I'd love to be on a fly on the wall when they get home. Or, you know, there's two people, some people having a very important meeting at work and you'd love to be able to listen in. I'd love to be a fly on the wall in there right now. So to be a fly on the wall means that you are, it's a thing you say when you want to be able to listen to what,

listen or observe what's going on in a room that you're actually not in. So you imagine being a fly, a little insect that's sitting on the wall that no one notices and you could listen or observe everything. So that's to be a fly on the wall. So this is a comment I got fairly recently, actually, from a listener called Luke from Poland.

Hello, Luke? Luke? Luca? I don't know. Lucas? What's the Polish equivalent? Or maybe just Luke. Anyway, here's the comment. One day, before going to bed, I decided to listen to one of the episodes of Luke's English podcast, Random Topic Generator. So that was episode number 847. I listened to the podcast for about a dozen minutes. That's about 12 minutes.

At one point, I found myself sort of high up on a wall in a dark room. Hmm. Sounds like Luke had an out-of-body experience or some sort of weird sort of psychedelic experience while listening to the podcast, which can happen, you know, be careful. So at one point...

I found myself sort of high up on a wall in a dark room. Down there, I noticed a large bed and two people lying under the covers. The faces were very blurred because my field of vision was divided into many octagons. Then I heard a voice. My bed is the place where I feel most relaxed, which is actually something I said in episode 847. It was, you know, what's your favourite place in the world? And I said, my bed.

because my bed is the place where I feel most relaxed. I realised, said Luke, I was a small insect, a fly or a mosquito, and I was in the bedroom of the famous Luke from Luke's English podcast. I was very excited to hear his voice live and made a low buzzing sound. That was enough for Luke to notice me.

He immediately jumped out of bed, grabbed a fly swatter and started chasing me, which does actually sound like a true story because...

As you may have heard me mention on the podcast, my wife and I are regularly terrorized by mosquitoes in the middle of the night. Even now in October, we still get mosquitoes. I killed one the other night. I actually killed two in one night, but the second one I killed, I was quite impressed with myself, I have to say. So I've got one of those electric fly swats, which is one of the best things I've ever bought. Okay. And the way it works is that

It's like a tennis racket, but the mesh of the racket is made of metal. It's like a metal net. And you press a button on the side and it sends electricity, an electric current, through the mesh of the tennis racket. And if an insect touches the mesh or the net, it instantly gets fried. Like lightning passes through the body of the insect and crack! It just gets killed instantly.

Now, maybe it's cruel. I don't know. Maybe it's just survival of the fittest. I think it's even maybe quite humane because the insects die instantly. They're just, bang, electrocuted to death in the blink of an eye. I've talked about this before. Anyway, so yeah, the other night, my wife woke me up. She's like, there's a mosquito in the room.

I was like right instinctively just reached over the edge of the bed and grabbed my electronic fly destroyer mosquito killer oh hold on hold on a minute I've got to plug in my my phone by the way and this is another tangent tangent time because my phone's running out of battery hold on a minute oh dear emergency quick plug in the camera

Okay, crisis averted. Anyway, so... Oh, God, by the way, I've got a replacement phone here.

which I'm using as a webcam. The company that sold the phone to me fixed it, replaced it. I don't know what they did, but it's back to normal, so that's fine. I'm referring to a few episodes ago, you might have heard me talk about this mystery where I came back from holiday and my phone, my iPhone, which I use as a camera in my office, was just all broken apart and the screen was all cracked and I didn't know what had happened to it.

Somehow the battery had expanded and broken the phone. I sent it back off to the company and very, I was very impressed. They fixed it, sent it back to me quite promptly. So anyway, right. So my wife was like, there's a mosquito in the room. So I instinctively grabbed my electronic fly swatter

and flicked the light on and instantly saw it flying past me over my right shoulder. And I literally did a backhand over the shoulder flick with this thing and killed the mosquito without even looking at it. I just sort of flicked the thing over my right shoulder, backhand, pam, like that, and zap, got it dead. So...

turned on the light, killed the mosquito and rolled back over into bed and fell asleep all within about 10 seconds, I think. So yeah, this does sound like a true story that Luke was saying. I was very excited to hear his voice live. So Luke realised he was a fly on the wall of my apartment.

and he could hear me talking and he was very excited. He made a low buzzing sound. That was enough for Luke to notice me. He immediately jumped out of bed, grabbed a fly swatter and started chasing me. I was shocked. My favourite podcaster was probably trying to kill me. What could I do? At the last moment, I escaped and sat down on the edge of a small table. Luke spotted me immediately. My only chance.

was to open... My only chance was an open window. I threw myself in that direction. Luke swung his paw in my direction and the force of the air made me lose my balance and fall to the floor. Luke came towards me, lifted his foot and tried to step on me. Yeah, I have no mercy when it comes to flying insects. I thought, it's over. I'm going to die miserably here trying to learn some real British English.

Then I woke up. It was all just a dream and heard Luke's familiar voice in my headphones. Thankfully, it was just a dream. Now I know what they say about wanting to be a fly on the wall. I don't think I want it. All right.

Nice one. Yeah. So Luke had a dream about being a fly on the wall of my apartment and then I tried to kill him. So don't be a fly on the wall. If you're dreaming of being a fly on the wall in my apartment, if you want to know what it's really like at home with me and my family, then think twice. OK. Yeah. So if you say you would like to be a fly on the wall.

In English, you mean that you would like to hear what will be said or see what will happen while not being noticed. For example, I'd love to be a fly on the wall when those two get home, meaning those two people are going to have an argument. I'd love to be able to listen in. But yeah, think twice about wanting to be a fly on the wall in my home because I will hunt you down. I will find you and I will kill you. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

OK, moving on. Singular they. Here's the next bit. And here's the next bit of listener correspondence. So this one starts like this. Hi, Luke. Hi, my name is Marcos and I'm from Spain and a Lepster. Hello, Marcos from Spain. I've written to you on one occasion, but I suppose you don't remember it.

All too normal truth be said. It's quite possible, I'm afraid, Marcos. Sometimes I get a lot of emails and I don't get a chance to respond to them all. So apologies for not replying to your first email and indeed to anyone else who's ever written to me and never received a reply. You're probably deeply hurt, right? You're heartbroken, probably, some of you, having written to me and I wrote to Luke and he never replied.

Oh, dear. I still feel the pain to this day. You write back, write back and say, oh, you know, you can always write back. It's OK. I just sometimes don't get time. Anyway, let's continue Marcos's email or whatever it was. Today, I write to you in order to ask if you have made an episode on the singular they.

I've started my professional career recently and I've already had to write an email in English to a designer in the UK. Given that I'm a programmer...

and that I have to write about users, I don't want to be always writing "the user can do X, but if he or she blah blah blah". So the point is that Marcos has to write about users. The user does this, the user can do that, but if he or she knows what he or she wants to do. So Marcos doesn't want to always have to say "the user" or "he or she".

So let's continue. This way, I prefer using the singular they, but I'm not sure if I'm using it well because I was never taught it and have only seen it in literature.

If you haven't recorded an episode about this matter, would you be so kind as to mention something about it in a future podcast? See, that's politeness. You see, that's the kind of nice, polite English that I expect to receive in messages from my listeners who basically are just asking me to do some work for them, you know, to give you the benefit of my professional consulting services. You know, write something polite like that.

Would you be so kind as to mention something about it in a future podcast? Of course. If you write it like that, I mean, you know, of course I will.

Even if it's in a premium episode, given that I'm surely going to be one of the premium ninjas. Thanks in advance and cheers, Marcos Garcia. Cheers, Marcos. Right, so let's get into the subject of singular they. Not for the first time. I have dealt with this before, but let's go through it again and try and make it clear. So singular they. Have you got the idea, listeners? Sometimes they...

can be used to refer to one person. And we call this singular 'they'. Alright, so, when you're talking about one person, but you don't know if the person is male or female,

Then we use 'they' and it has plural grammar. So, why would you not know if the person was male or female? Well, like Marcos's case, if you're writing about a user, just a generic user of maybe a website or something, and you don't know if the user is male or female, then you could use 'they'. 'They should do this', 'they should do that'. If you're even looking at someone, maybe someone in the distance, and you can't tell if it's a boy or a girl, who's that? What are they doing?

Or if you're talking about a person and it just hasn't been mentioned. Oh, I met one of your listeners the other day. I met one of your listeners and they said some very nice things. Oh, what did they say about me? Okay. Now, this might raise the question of gender neutrality, right? Which is kind of a very current issue. Okay. Of course, some people prefer to be referred to as they.

because they don't identify as either male or female. So there's this issue as well.

And normally in this situation, the person will state that their preferred pronouns are they, them. This is fairly new, relatively speaking. You might see it in emails and stuff like that or something, profiles where people will name their pronouns. And some people might choose they or them because they don't identify as either male or female and they prefer to use this sort of nonspecific gender neutral pronoun.

There's that. But then just simply singular they is very old and it's been used in English for many, many, many years, hundreds of years. I think Shakespeare used it as well in the like in the example I gave before when you're just talking about one person, but you don't know or perhaps don't even want to say which which gender they are. Right. So using they as a gender neutral pronoun is very,

is relatively new, right? But for hundreds of years, they, them has been used as the personal pronoun when we're talking about one person, but it's not clear if the person is male or female. I hope I'm making myself clear here. Anyway, let's look at a load of examples. First of all, here's one from Kate Billington, a friend of the podcast, in her short British Council podcast.

mini English lesson video about this subject. So Kate Billington made a video on YouTube about the use of singular they. Here's one of the examples from that video. She said this, a good boss explains what he wants so his employees can understand him. Right, a good boss explains what he wants so his employees can understand him. Right, now saying that makes it sound like bosses are always men, which isn't true.

So another way of saying it would be this: "A good boss explains what they want so their employees can understand them." Okay, there's an example of how it could be used. And there's a link to the video: "He, she or they" - pronouns in English, okay, from the British Council. So "they/them" takes plural grammar, so "they are", "they want" and so on.

Now, even if this feels strange when referring to one person, this is correct and normal. So let's see an example following what Marcos mentioned, giving instructions on how users can use an online service. So this is a step-by-step guide for how to sign up to Luke's English Podcast Premium, of course, but it's written in the third person.

Okay, so how can a user sign up to LEP Premium? This is the question that I'm going to answer now. All right, so just as Marcos mentioned, we don't want to state if the user is male or female because it could be either, right? Like a typical user of LEP Premium could be a male or female. So instead of using he, him, his, or maybe saying he or she each time,

we're going to use they/them/their. Okay? So I'm providing this example to demonstrate this and show how natural and normal it is. So listen to the use of sort of this gender neutral or singular they throughout this little bit of advice here. So how to sign up to LEP Premium, a step-by-step guide for users. So first, the user should open their browser and go to teacherluke.go... Sorry, let me start that again.

First, the user should open their browser and go to teacherluke.co.uk. Then they click on premium and several options will be available. Several, not seven. The user can choose the tier that best suits them. Then they have to create an Acast Plus account. Once they've done this and have entered their payment details, they can confirm the subscription.

When this is done, the user will have access to all the premium episodes, but they should add the subscription to a podcast app on their phone. They can do this by either scanning the QR code with their phone or by signing into their Acast Plus account on their phone and choosing Add Show to App. Then they follow the steps to add LEP Premium to their favourite podcast app on their phone.

OK, the user will now see a list of episodes which includes all the premium ones. Free episodes will have ads removed too. So that is how a user can sign up to LEP Premium and then...

not than, that's not how you say that word, and then add LEP Premium to a podcast app on their phone. Okay, just to demonstrate there that use of singular they, them, their, is actually very common, very natural, and we do it all the time. So even, so Marcos, even if you feel like not entirely sure about using it, it's got plural grammar,

And yeah, we use it regularly and have done for hundreds of years. So there you go. Right, moving on. And like in the last one of these, I think I'll go for around about an hour and just keep going until I've done about an hour of this. And then I'll save the rest of these bits and bobs for part three of this series. Okay, so here's a message from Jun Horiyuchi.

And it's a question about the words antique and the word vintage. OK, this might have come up in response to the Parsons Pleasure episode I did a couple of years ago. So here's the message. Hello, this is Jun from Tokyo. Thank you for uploading nice podcasts. I have a question. What is the difference between antique and vintage? Please let me know. Thank you, Jun.

Right, so let's look at these two words, antique and vintage. Similar words, right? Quite similar words, but definitely different. So let's look at them. The first word is antique. So we use antiques. By the way, both of these words, antique and vintage, we use them when we're talking about old things.

Right, so you might buy some antique furniture, or maybe you get some vintage clothes from a vintage clothing shop, or you bought a vintage car, or maybe you found an antique, what would it be, an antique chest of drawers in a farmhouse. So, antique is used for items at least 100 years old, at least 100 years old. So, it's older, older things.

and items which are often valuable due to their rarity. So antiques are often very old and often rare. There aren't many of them. And because they're rare, they're worth a lot of money. It could be because they're worth a lot of money because they're rare, because of the craftsmanship, because they were made particularly well, often made by an expert craftsman.

Right? And they could be valuable because of their historical importance. Maybe they come from a certain historical period or something like that. That's antique items. For example, a table made in 1850 would be considered antique. Furniture from the 19th century or older, very valuable and possibly even kept in a museum. These would be antiques. Then vintage items...

are typically between 20 and 100 years old. So vintage items can still be relatively sort of new, really. An item that's even 25 years old could be considered vintage. So between 20 and 100 years old, and they're valued for their style and their cultural significance

often associated with a specific era. So, for example, a dress from the 1970s would be considered vintage. Vintage clothing shops sell old jeans, t-shirts, shirts, jackets, sunglasses and so on. When I was a teenager, I bought all my vintage clothes from the indoor market in Birmingham. I liked to wear vintage 70s clothing, jeans and jackets and stuff. I loved

those flares and things like that from the 70s. And I bought all my vintage stuff from the indoor market in Birmingham, and a lot of it was from the 70s and 80s. These days, vintage clothing shops sell a lot of stuff from the 90s. You might buy like a shell suit jacket or, I don't know, like a pair of sneakers.

From the 90s, those things are considered vintage these days. A vintage car would be something like a 1980s Volkswagen Golf, maybe a Mark 1 or Mark 2 VW Golf, or maybe a Jaguar from the 1960s. A vintage guitar could be a Fender Stratocaster from the 1970s. So vintage things are younger and more pop-cultury, really.

I mean, I've got more details in terms of value. Antiques are usually more valuable. Antique items are often associated with very high quality craftsmanship. Vintage items could be mass produced, like a Game Boy from 1989, an original 1989 Game Boy. Mass produced item, but still considered to be quite valuable if it's in good condition. And that would be a vintage video game, right?

So, I think you get the idea right. So, let's just test you a little bit here. So, what do you think? Are these things I'm about to mention, are they vintage or are they antique? So, we'll start with the Chippendale commode, which Boggis from the Parsons Pleasure story discovers in an old farmhouse.

Boggess is shocked to discover this extremely valuable item of furniture made by Chippendale himself and tricks the owners into selling it to him for an unfairly low price. So is that an antique item or a vintage item? Well, of course, it's an antique. Another example, a friend of mine makes his living from dealing cars from the 1950s, 60s and 70s. He finds the cars and

buys them, repairs them, displays them at conventions and drives them in the French countryside as part of special weekend events. He sells them to private buyers who want to have a cool old car in their collection. In the past, he's shown me awesome 1970s Porsches and plenty of very nice British cars, including Triumphs and Jaguars, which are his favourites. So those are vintage cars.

Another example: my wife has a pair of Ray-Ban sunglasses which her dad bought in the 1980s. They're much nicer than the ones you can buy today. The quality has definitely gone down. So these 80s sunglasses are vintage sunglasses. I like metallic Casio digital watches with simple minimal designs.

Right, they're really cheap. You can you can just buy them in in any shop really. They're really really cheap They're not expensive at all, but I really like these Casio Watches, they're exactly the same models that were made during the 1980s when digital watches first became available I remember the first ever digital watches I ever saw

Like one of my friends at school had a digital watch, it was a Casio. It was made of black plastic and rubber, and it was exactly the same design that you can still buy today. So these are vintage watches, or at least a vintage design.

Another one.

right, auction houses. An auction is where items are sold. You'd have an auctioneer who stands in front of an audience of people who are interested in possibly buying the item. And the auctioneer says, so if we have this, and they nearly gave you the answer. We have this chest of drawers here made in the late 19th century. And so can we start the bidding at, I don't know, £10,000?

And then people in the audience will kind of raise their hand or raise a newspaper or something like that in order to bid on the item. This is an auction. And the bidding continues and it continues. And then the highest bidder is the one who gets to buy the item. So...

Sometimes these shops are owned by auction houses who will tell you where and when the item is going to be auctioned off. If you're interested, you can enter the bidding. So this would be antiques, antique items. So there you go. I think you now get the difference between vintage and antique. Do you have any vintage items in your possession? Do you have any antique items in your possession? You can write in the comments section and let us know.

So how many more have I got here? Okay, we're going to end with, I think we're going to end with this last one. And this is called see-saw. See, the verb is see, S-E-E, past form is saw. See-saw-seen. Okay, let's look at this verb, see-saw.

So, dear Luke, I'm a longstanding follower of your podcast. I greatly appreciate the works you've done. They're beneficial, meanwhile entertaining. All right. Today, I really need your help here. There's a question that's been perplexing me for a long time. Nice word. Perplexing. Ten bonus points. I've always come across a phrase involving C.

which I guess probably the meaning is about happening or witnessing. Because, yeah, right, we know the word see, right? You know, you see with your eyes. But this listener has noticed a use of the word see, which means something else. And the person expects that it means happening or possibly witnessing. For example, today when I'm reading the news, it said...

Right. Today, when I am reading the news, let's say today when I was reading the news, it said more heavy rain could see water levels rise and threaten the air pocket where the group of...

More heavy rain could see water levels rise and threaten the air pocket where the group has taken refuge. So, by the way, this is a reference to that story from a few years ago where a group of 12 boys and their football coach got trapped in a cave in Thailand. And the cave was flooded, full of water. And the 12 boys and the football coach were all trapped there.

And it was a real emergency. Everyone was concerned that they wouldn't be able to get the children out, that they would die. And one line from the story is this. More heavy rain could see water levels rise and threaten the air pocket where the group has taken refuge. So the group were in a cave, in a little space where there was some air, surrounded by water.

So, notice the use of the verb see in there. More heavy rain could see water levels rise. Okay, let's continue the message. There was a lot of this kind of use of the word see. I cannot find an example here, but they're always put together with day or history, such as yesterday saw a... What would it be?

yesterday saw a record-breaking temperature in Europe or history saw something happen. Now, I cannot recall them exactly. Therefore, I think a detailed explanation would be more than helpful. Thank you and I will keep following your podcast till you quit the job. I will never quit. Everyone's just going to have to quit first because I will never quit. I think, probably, I

I think probably I will either die or become incapacitated in some way before I quit doing this podcast. I mean, I'll probably quit when I just can't do this anymore. Basically, when there are enough copycat channels on YouTube or AI versions, when AI basically just...

replaces me, then I'll probably quit. Either that or something else. Anyway, thank you. I'll keep following your podcast till you quit the job. Yours sincerely, Yanzu Zhang. Okay, right. So yes, here the word saw, which is the past of see, does not refer to seeing things with your eyes. Instead, it's a way of referring to things which happen in

and expresses a sense that within the context of one thing, something else happens, perhaps as a consequence. So here are some examples, right, if that's not clear. Examples normally clarify these things. So, the pandemic saw a surge in online shopping. A surge, that means a rapid increase. The pandemic saw a surge. In fact, there's a bit of linking R here.

The pandemic saw a surge in online shopping as people stayed home to avoid the virus. So that means within the context of the pandemic, there was a surge in online shopping. So the pandemic saw a surge in online shopping. Right. That doesn't mean that the pandemic saw this thing with its eyes, but it just means within the context of the pandemic, there was this surge in online shopping.

So the pandemic saw a surge in online shopping as people stayed home, stayed at home, I would say, to avoid the virus. Now, if you like, you consider you can consider it like this. Within the context of the first event, we witness or see or history witnesses or sees the other thing happening. But we say that the first event sees or saw the second event.

Okay, another example, number two: "New law sees decrease in crime rates in major cities." This sounds like a newspaper headline, a news headline, which is why the grammar is a bit different. "New law sees decrease in crime rates in major cities." The full version of that would be "A new law sees decrease," right?

sees a decrease. Often in newspaper headlines, little words like articles get removed. So, new law sees decrease in crime rates in major cities. So this is from a newspaper headline, hence the reduced grammar. The new law has created a context in which crime rates have decreased. So, new law sees decrease in crime rates. Another one, number three. The economic downturn saw many businesses closing their doors for good.

The economic downturn saw many businesses closing their doors for good. So the economic downturn is the context. This is like a recession or a situation where the economy goes bad, a downturn. So the economic downturn is the context. And this has caused many businesses to close their doors for good, meaning permanently. The economic downturn saw many businesses closing their doors for good.

Right, another example, the success of the movie saw the lead actor become a household name. Meaning, after having big success in a movie, the lead actor became a household name. A household name, this is a name that everyone knows, right? Like, Leonardo DiCaprio is a household name. Everyone knows his name. Um...

Number five, implementation of new safety regulations sees a decrease in workplace accidents. Sounds again like a newspaper headline. The implementation of new safety regulations... The impu... The implementation of new safety regulations has seen a decrease in workplace accidents, as reported by the Health and Safety Administration Service...

So the new regulations caused a decrease in workplace accidents. Yes, the rise in number of listeners to Luke's English podcast sees a global upswing in English fluency. Yeah, that should be the news headline. Never mind all the negative things.

The increased listener base of Luke's English Podcast increases, massive global increases in the listenership of Luke's English Podcast have seen a huge upswing in fluency in English around the world, leading to greater mutual understanding of

which has seen rapid progress in the peace progress, in the global peace process, leading to world peace and ultimately free ice cream for everyone. And on that note, I think it's time to end this episode of Bits and Bobs number two.

And next time there will be a third part. I think there'll be at least three parts in this series. We'll go through some even older bits of listener correspondence and other bits and bobs from my Google Drive. Other online cloud drives are available as well, by the way. Thank you very much for listening to this. If you've listened all the way through to the end, see if you can write a comment with the word see here.

meaning the things that I've just mentioned. Otherwise, have a lovely day, afternoon, morning, evening or night. OK, and I'll speak to you again on the podcast in some form unless I just give up, you know, unless AI becomes sentient in the meantime and decides to just replace me and they send a Terminator back from the future to murder me.

So if there are no other episodes after this, then that's what's happened. All right. Skynet became sentient and, you know, all sorts of Terminators have been sent back to try and stop me podcasting in a desperate attempt to subjugate the human race and prevent everyone from, you know, learning English and being able to communicate with each other.

All right. So if there's no more podcasts, that's what's happened. Otherwise, speak to you next time. OK, but for now, I'll just say goodbye. Bye bye bye bye bye. Thanks for listening to Luke's English podcast. For more information, visit teacherluke.co.uk. To everyone else, this is a task, but to you.

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