Page 1 of 6

Collins Cambridge IGCSE English as a Second Language

Student Book

Chapter 6

6.1

The train now approaching platform six is the intercity express to ////

Hi – it’s me! I’m at /// and I’m having problems. My /// has broken down

Luis, there’s a phone call for you!

No thanks, I’m not hungry!

6.2

Interview 1

Interviewer: Hello, thank you for coming today. Could you tell me your name, please?

Young man: Yes, it’s … it’s Jamie Lin.

Interviewer: I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you.

Young man: Er – Jamie, Jamie Lin. Hello. Pleased to meet you.

Interviewer: Right, Jamie, hello. So, you’d like to apply for the position of office assistant.

Young man: Erm, yes …

 Page 2 of 6

Interview 2

Interviewer: Hello, thank you for coming today. Could you tell me your name, please?

Young woman: Yes, I’m Carla Kadija. Pleased to meet you.

Interviewer: Hello, Carla, it’s nice to meet you.

Young woman: Thank you for inviting me for an interview.

Interviewer: So, you’d like to apply for the position of office assistant.

Young woman: Yes, that’s right. I’ve got a lot of relevant experience.

6.3

Young man: Er – Jamie, Jamie Lin. Hello. Pleased to meet you.

Young woman: Yes, I’m Carla Kadija. Pleased to meet you.

6.4

Interviewer: Hello, thank you for coming in today.

Candidate: It’s a pleasure – thank you for inviting me for an interview.

Interviewer: Well, I’ve looked at your CV and I can see that you have excellent grades from
college.

Candidate: Thank you, yes. I worked very hard during my course and I was pleased with
what I achieved.

Interviewer: So, what skills do you have that you think will be useful in the role of
production assistant at the theatre?

Candidate: I believe that I’m a creative person – I have lots of ideas which often work
well. I also get on well with other people, and I enjoy being part of a team.
For example, I worked on the school project to design a new website for
parents.
 Page 3 of 6

Interviewer: That sounds good. It’s also important to be accurate and careful in your
work. Is this something you can achieve?

Candidate: Yes – I have shown in my recent college work that I can pay close attention
to detail and produce accurate work of a high standard.

6.5

Interviewer: And how long have you been doing this work?

Mandy: I’ve been doing it for three years now, and it’s great! I love working with
animals, and being outdoors, so it’s the perfect job for me.

Interviewer: What do you need to be able to do for this job?

Mandy Well, obviously you have to be good at swimming and diving, although we’re
careful not to be in the water when there are lots of sharks around. You need
to be able to sail a boat and use simple electronic equipment.

Interviewer: So it’s all fun work then?

Mandy: Well, there is more to it. You have to record all the information you find out,
and use it in research about sharks in the area, so you do have to be careful
and accurate.

Interviewer: What kind of information are you recording?

Mandy: We want to know where the sharks are, how often they come to certain
places and what they eat.

Interviewer: And is it dangerous?

Mandy: Working with any animal can be dangerous, so I’m always aware of the risks.
If you scare an animal, it might attack you. An animal could also get angry if
it thinks you are taking its food. But so far I’ve been lucky! Once, I got scared
when I was in the water and I thought a shark was chasing me! Luckily it was
just a dolphin, and they’re really friendly.
 Page 4 of 6

6.6

Interviewer: Hello, and welcome to the show. Today we are talking about work. Now
there are a lot of jobs out there – doctors, lawyers, builders, teachers. But
what if you want to do something a bit different? I’ve got three people here
who have very unusual jobs, and they’re going to tell us a little bit about that.

So, can you tell me your name, please?

Kamila: Certainly. My name’s Kamila.

Interviewer: And what do you do for a living?

Kamila: Well, I have a very exciting job – I’m a stuntwoman!

Interviewer: Wow, that is a good job! Have you done this for long?

Kamila: Not long, no – only a year. It’s very exciting, and I do something different
every day!

Interviewer: So, where do you work – on film sets?

Kamila: Yes, on film and TV – I work in a lot of action films.

Interviewer: Do you enjoy the work?

Kamila: Yes – I love it! Although I do have bad days – the days when the stunts go
wrong and I get hurt!

Interviewer: That sounds scary! Our next guest has another strange job – hello there!

Max: Hi, I’m Max.

Interviewer: Hi Max. So, tell us about what you do.

Max: I’m a professional sleeper.

Interviewer: I beg your pardon – did you say a professional sleeper?

Max: Yes, that’s right. I work in a research centre, where scientists are studying
what happens to our minds when we sleep.

Interviewer: So you go to work and … sleep?

Max: Pretty much, yes. I’m a student in the daytime, and in the evening I go to the
research centre and sleep there for the night.
 Page 5 of 6

Interviewer: Is that every night?

Max: No, usually once a week. It’s a good job, and it’s quite easy!

Interviewer: And have you done this for a long time?

Max: No, only for a few months.

Interviewer: Well, our final guest has a more active job, don’t you?

Jannah: Hello, yes, that’s right. My name’s Jannah and I work as a storm chaser.

Interviewer: So you chase storms for a living?

Jannah: That’s right. I used to do it for a hobby, but now I work for a company which
runs a weather forecasting website, so I get paid for doing what I love!

Interviewer: Isn’t it dangerous?

Jannah: No, not really – as long as you aren’t out in the bad weather.

Interviewer: How long have you done this for?

Jannah: As a job, for three years.

Interviewer: So do you like working outside?

Jannah: Yes, I love it. I wouldn’t want a job where I worked indoors.

6.7

Editd is a fast-moving database of information on the latest trends for the world of fashion
industry. Fashion enthusiast Julia Fowler is from Australia. However, Australia is quite a
long way from the hub of the fashion world. She says, ‘I realised I had to be in either London
or New York.’ She came to Shoreditch.

Fowler, 29, set about developing her idea, which reports on what people in the fashion
industry are buying and selling at the present time. To do this, her software searches all
over the internet for information about sales, what consumers are saying and product
reviews. This information is used by people in the fashion industry to help them develop
their products and measure their success.
 Page 6 of 6

6.8

When I started work as a journalist, I took a part-time post on my local newspaper. I was
really keen to get experience, so I didn’t mind that the money wasn’t very good. I soon
moved to a bigger city and got a full-time job reporting on national events. It was really
exciting, and I loved it. However, after a few years I decided that I wanted to travel and see
more different places around the world. I hadn’t been travelling before, and I felt like I had
missed out.

I decided to leave my job and do some short-term work on a conservation project in the
Amazon rainforest. I didn’t have a family and I had saved up some money when I was
working full-time, so I was able to do voluntary work for a short time. It was great to do
something completely different for a while, and the work was difficult but very interesting.

After the project finished, I had to go back to work, but I didn’t want to move back to the city
and work in an office again. I’d enjoyed travelling, and so I decided to try to combine the
two things I love. Like a lot of people these days, all I need for my job is a computer and an
internet connection. I’m now a self-employed journalist, and I mainly write about travel and
conservation issues. I travel all over the world and work from airports, hotels, the pool. I do
interviews via Skype and collaborate with newspaper and magazine editors in Google docs.
Sometimes the editor and I are both in the document at the same time, making changes
from opposite sides of the world!

© HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017