Series 1

TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 1: ELECTRONIC CRIME
Hello. I’m Margot Politis. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation.
In this series, we look at the skills you’ll need to write formal, academic English, and
you’ll have the chance to listen to people talking about topics you’ll find at colleges
and universities.
In today’s episode we’re going to hear someone talking about a new type of crime –
electronic crime.
Listen carefully to this police officer.
Then we’re going to look at word families, and do some spelling.
It is a new frontier, and there are old, traditional forms of crime being committed
electronically, and via computers and the internet, but there are also new crime types
emerging.
Electronic crime really does cross over a whole range of different crime types.
You can imagine stalking offences that may be facilitated via email, harassment,
threatening emails, small-scale fraud offences, right up through to large-scale frauds
committed via the internet.
OK, so let’s have a closer look at that clip.
We’re going to focus on vocabulary building, and word groups, but first, listen again
to this sentence. See if you can hear the keyword, the main subject of the sentence.
electronically, and via computers and the internet.
He says there are old, traditional forms of crime being committed electronically.
The keyword is ‘crime’. That’s what the sentence is about.
Crime is a noun.
We say that a crime is committed, or done.
To commit a crime is to do something illegal.
Let’s have a closer look at the word ‘crime’.
In English, many words can change to have different uses. In this way, they form
word groups.
Learning words groups is an excellent way to build your vocabulary.
You should write them down in a table like this showing adjectives, nouns, verbs, and
adverbs.
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Of course, there are often at least 2 different sorts of nouns – nouns for things, and
nouns for people.
Let’s have a look at the crime word group.
Crime is a noun. It’s a thing.
A ‘criminal’ is a person who commits a

crime.
Criminal is also the adjective.

We can describe something by using
the word ‘criminal’ before the noun.
That was a criminal act.
And we have the adverb criminally.

To behave criminally is to behave in an
illegal way.
There’s no verb from crime.

We have to use the phrase to commit
a crime.
OK. We’ll come back to our table a bit later.
Right now, listen to what sort of crimes are being committed these days – and listen
for an ‘-l-y’ adverb.
electronically, and via computers and the internet.
He says there are old forms of crime being committed electronically.
Electronically is an adverb. It means in an electronic way, or using electronics.
Electronics is the study of electricity and the things that use electricity.
Listen to the way electronic is used here
electronically, and via computers and the internet, but there are also new crime types
emerging.
He uses the phrases ‘electronic crime’, and ‘committed electronically’.
Notice that ‘electronic’, the adjective, comes before the noun ‘crime’, but that the
adverb ‘electronically’ comes after the verb ‘committed’.
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Let’s look at the table again.
We have electronic the adjective,
electronically the adverb, and
electronics, the noun.
You’ll notice that not all words take all

these different forms. But where they
do exist, you will be able to see
patterns emerging.
For example look at the adverbs

criminally and electronically.
They both end in '-l-y', '-ly'.
OK, so we’ve looked at electronic, and

its word family.
These days, electronic is often used to

mean relating to computers, or new technologies. It sometimes gets shortened to ‘e’.
We have e-mail – electronic mail, e-business, electronic business.
So we could call these electronic crimes e-crimes – crimes committed using

computers and the internet.
But what sorts of e-crimes are being committed? Listen for the two main types of
crimes that he mentions.
You can imagine stalking offences that may be facilitated via email, harassment,
threatening emails, small-scale fraud offences, right up through to large-scale frauds
committed via the internet.
He mentions two main types of crimes: stalking offences and fraud offences.
An offence is another word for a crime.
Notice how you can build your vocabulary by looking at words on a theme.
An offence is a crime, and offenders are criminals.
But look at some other crime words. We’ve got robbery and robbers, burglary and
burglars.
And there are lots more - you should try to learn words in themes like this. See how
many words you can find for different types of crimes and criminals.
OK, now let’s have a quick look at some spelling.
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Spelling is very important in formal writing, but English spelling is very difficult.
They’re aren’t too many rules, and most of them can be broken.
Notice that many words can have doubled letters, but you can’t tell by just listening to
the words.
In today’s story we’ve seen the words committed, electronically, different, cross,
harassment and offences.
They have all got doubled letters.
There aren't really any rules for spelling these words - you have to learn them all one
by one.
When you come across new words, try writing them down out a few times, and
spelling them out loud.
Notice in Australia and England, we spell doubled letters out by saying the word
double before them. Double f, double s.
But in the United States, they just say the letter twice – f-f, s-s. So you can choose
either way, but you should learn to recognise both.
Listen to this…
Different - d-i-f-f-e-r-e-n-t - different
Harassment - h-a-r-a-s-s-m-e-n-t - harassment
Electronically - e-l-e-c-t-r-o-n-i-c-a-l-l-y - electronically
Notice that even though English spelling can be very difficult, it’s very important to
make sure you spell words correctly.
It makes your writing look bad if you misspell words in essays. So you’ll need to
work hard at it!
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So our lessons for today are: write down
new words you find. Check the spelling
in a dictionary, to make sure you’ve spelt
them correctly.
See if you can find other words that

belong to the same family – can the
word be used as a noun or verb? Write
all the word forms in your word family
table.
Don’t forget that it’s very useful to keep

your words listed according to topics –
like crime words, or business words, or
computer words.
And that’s all we’ve got time for today.
I’ll see you for the next episode of Study English! bye bye.
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TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 2: VITAMIN D
Today, we’re going to look at ways of discussing a topic. When you’re writing or
speaking, you can present facts, or you can use your opinion - but how can you tell
the difference? Today we’ll find out.
We’re going to listen to a scientist talking about Vitamin D and cancer.
In the clip, see if you can hear both facts and opinions being used.
I believe that the public health problem for vitamin D deficiency is quite significant. I
would estimate minimum 25% of adults in the United States, Europe and probably
even in Australia are vitamin D deficient.
I mean if you think about it, over 250,000 women in the United States will develop
breast cancer this year. Something like 50,000 will die. If 25% of those breast
cancers could have been averted, prevented in some way, just by having a little
exposure to sunlight, would have been really tremendous.
So he was talking about the links between vitamin D and cancer.
Many Australians these days are avoiding the sun, because they know it can cause
skin cancer. But by avoiding the sun, they’re missing out on vitamin D – the vitamin
that you get from sunshine, and this is leading to other health problems.
When you’re reading, writing or listening to an argument like this, it’s important to be
able to tell the difference between statements of fact, and statements of opinion.
But how can you tell the difference?
Well, there are a number of ways you can express your opinion.
Today we’re going to look at two of these: using phrases that express an opinion;
and using modal verbs.
First, let’s look at some phrases.
The key words to listen for when you’re trying to decide whether someone is talking
about facts or opinions are words like believe, think, argue, feel, opinion, or view.
These vary from formal to informal.
If I was talking with my friends I might say “I think” or “I believe”
If I was in a class or tutorial, I might say “In my opinion”, or “in my view”.
But if I was writing an essay, or giving a very formal talk, I’d probably choose “it is
believed”, or “it is thought”.
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In formal writing, many people think you should avoid using the word ‘I’, even if you
are giving an opinion.
Here’s the clip again. Listen for some of those phrases.
I believe that the public health problem for vitamin D deficiency is quite significant.
breast cancer this year. Something like 50,000 will die.
Another way we can express opinions is by using modal verbs.
Model verbs express opinions and attitudes. They make statements less certain or
less definite.
They can also be used for recommending and advising.
Here are the modal verbs used for opinions:

would
should
could
might
These words signal that the speaker is giving an opinion.
Look at these examples. Can you tell which ones are facts, and which ones are
opinions?
Fifty thousand will die.

Fifty thousand might die.
The second statement uses might - it is an opinion.
Here’s another one…
I do not think small amounts of sunlight increase the risk of cancer.
Small amounts of sunlight do not increase the risk of cancer.
In the first statement, you can see ‘I do not think …’. This is an opinion.
Now look at these 2 sentences:
'I believe that vitamin D deficiency might become common among adults'.
'Vitamin D deficiency will affect 25% of adults'.
The first is an opinion - 'I believe', 'might become'.
The second is a fact - 'will affect' 25% of adults.
Now let’s watch the clip again – listen for the phrases and modal verbs of opinions.
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I believe that the public health problem for vitamin D deficiency is quite significant. I
would estimate minimum 25% of adults in the United States, Europe and probably
even in Australia are vitamin D deficient.
breast cancer this year. Something like 50,000 will die. If 25% of those breast
cancers could have been averted, prevented in some way, just by having a little
exposure to sunlight, would have been really tremendous.
OK, so you can see that Professor Holick is expressing an opinion, using a
combination of phrases and modal verbs.
But now we’re going to look at some pronunciation tips.
When you’re learning English, there are 3 very important parts of pronunciation.
They are: word stress, sentence rhythm and intonation.
Today we’re going to look at the first 2 – how you can practice word stress and
sentence rhythm together, to improve your spoken English.
Listen to this sentence closely for word and sentence stress…
I don’t think we should blame moderate, intelligent exposure to sunlight throughout

our lives as the culprit for markedly increasing our risk of developing skin cancer.
Notice that the speaker uses many words with more than one syllable. That is
common in formal academic language.
But when you come across longer words, you have to learn which syllable to stress.
For example, we say: intelligent, increasing, and markedly.
Notice that when you stress one syllable, the vowels in the other syllables are
shortened.
Sometimes these short syllables become a schwa - an 'uh' sound - or an 'i'. They're
short, relaxed sounds.
Listen to: 'moderate', 'intelligent', 'exposure', 'culprit', 'markedly', 'developing', 'cancer'.
This shortening of syllables preserves the overall sentence rhythm. Listen to the clip
again...
I don’t think we should blame moderate, intelligent exposure to sunlight throughout

our lives as the culprit for markedly increasing our risk of developing skin cancer.
So when you're learning to speak English, you need to learn the pronunication of
individual words. But you also need to practice sentence rhythm - putting the words
together into sentences. This is much easier when you get used to shortening the
non-stressed vowels.
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OK. Listen again to the clip, and then we'll practice some more...
breast cancer this year. Something like 50,000 will die.
If 25% of those breast cancers could have been averted, prevented in some way, just
by having a little exposure to sunlight, would have been really tremendous.
OK, now you can try it. Listen to this sentence:
It would have been tremendous to have averted or prevented significant vitamin D

deficiency.
Let’s look at each of those words – we’ll highlight which syllable is stressed. See if
you can work out how to pronounce each word.
tremendous
averted
prevented
significant
vitamin
deficiency
Now let’s see what happens when we put these words back into a sentence.
It would have been tremendous to have averted or prevented significant vitamin D

deficiency.
Making your spoken English sound natural takes a lot of practice.
Don't forget to listen closely to vowel sounds and sentence stress, and remember to
practice reading and writing in English every day.
And that's all from me today.
I'll see you next time on Study English. Bye.
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TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 3: COMPANY GROWTH
Today we’re going to talk about businesses, and different ways to discuss economic
information.
We’re going to listen to an interview with the head of a large clothing company.
Then we’re going to look at how he describes the success of his company.
Here’s Derek O’Neill.
Well, we've said before that we've had consistent growth over the last four to five
years. We've delivered EPS growth in excess of 20% over the last three years. You
know, growing earnings at 25, 30, 35% forever becomes impossible. I think we end
up owning US GDP in about 2023 with 25% growth.
We've registered that 15 per cent is our plan and we think that's a good target.
We're very happy with our level of sales. We grew sales in the US in girls’ wear at 50
per cent and we think that's a fantastic performance, so we'll stand by those
numbers.
We've had solid momentum in that market for four or five years and we expect that
momentum’s going to continue.
OK. So today we’re going look at the language of description, particularly describing
economic information.
In formal academic writing, it’s important to use impersonal, objective language when
describing things.
Notice that in the interview, Derek O’Neill often begins his sentences with ‘We’ve’,
short for we have.
Using phrases like I’ve or we’ve is very common in spoken English.
years. We've delivered EPS growth in excess of 20% over the last three years.
He says:
‘We’ve had consistent growth’.
‘We’ve delivered growth in excess of 20 per cent’.
‘We’ve had solid momentum in that market’.
How would you turn these sentences into more formal descriptions?
Take the first sentence: we’ve had consistent growth.
Generally the first person forms of ‘I’ and ‘we’ are not used in more formal writing, or
when describing economic data.
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We’d use an objective form: there is, there are, there has been, or there will be.
So ‘We’ve had consistent growth’ becomes ‘There has been consistent growth’.
Look at this one: We’ve delivered growth of 20%.
That becomes: There has been growth of 20%.
Now listen to him again …
We've had solid momentum in that market for four or five years and we expect that
momentum’s going to continue.
He said:
We've had solid momentum.
We expect that momentum is going to continue.
We’ve had, we expect.
How could you write that information in a formal way?
We’ve had solid momentum.

There has been solid momentum.
We expect that momentum is going to continue.

It is expected that momentum is going to continue.
So looking for the use of the first person is a good way to tell whether someone is
discussing information in a formal or informal way.
You should remember that in an academic context, you always need to include
evidence to support your opinions or descriptions.
You should try to always include data to explain and support what you’re saying.
Data is information, especially facts and figures - numbers, percentages, and dates.
In formal language, you need to include data to support your arguments.
Listen to the data Derek uses…
We've delivered EPS growth in excess of 20% over the last three years. You know,
growing earnings at 25, 30, 35 per cent forever becomes impossible. I think we end
up owning US GDP in about 2023 with 25% growth.
We've registered that 15% is our plan and we think that's a good target.
He mentions a variety of facts and numbers, but he also describes how the data has
changed – that is, the degree or type of change.
To describe data, there is a variety of word choices.
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You can use both adjectives and adverbs – words that describe.
Of course, adjectives describe things, and adverbs describe actions.
So you'll need both nouns and verbs for your descriptions.
For example, you might use nouns like the rise, the increase, or the growth.
Listen to Derek again…
years.
They’ve had consistent growth.
He uses an adjective, consistent, with a noun, growth.
Let’s look at a table.
To describe numbers going up, we

can use nouns like the rise, the
increase, or the growth.
And to describe numbers going down,

we can use the drop, the decrease.
Then we’ve got adjectives to describe

those nouns – like rapid, slow, slight, dramatic, sudden or consistent.
And we can put these together – a sudden rise, a slight decrease, a sudden drop, a
consistent growth.
But, there’s another way of describing these changes.
We can use verbs and adverbs.
Many nouns like the rise, the increase, the growth can be used as verbs - to rise, to
increase, to grow, to drop, to decrease.
And many adjectives can become adverbs – rapidly, slowly, slightly, dramatically,
suddenly, consistently.
By using these new words, we can describe data by using verbs and adverbs.
We can say to rise suddenly, to decrease slightly, to drop suddenly, to grow

consistently.
So look how these phrases change:

a sudden rise, becomes to rise suddenly.
A slight decrease, to decrease slightly.
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A sudden drop, to drop suddenly.
And look at how sentences can be changed to fit these different phrases:
It has grown consistently.

There has been consistent growth.
It’s important to always use a variety in your written work. Sometimes use verbs and
adverbs to describe data, and sometimes use adjectives and nouns. It will make
your English sound much better.
OK, listen to the clip again, and then we’ll try to put together all the things we’ve
looked at today. Listen for personal descriptions, simple verbs, and descriptions of
data.
years. We've delivered EPS growth in excess of 20% over the last three years.
We've registered that 15% is our plan and we think that's a good target.
We're very happy with our level of sales. We grew sales in the US in girls’ wear at
50% and we think that's a fantastic performance.
He finishes by commenting on the data, and its significance for the company.
OK, let’s go back over the steps we’ve looked at today.
When you’re making an argument, it’s important to support your case – you must
include data or facts.
Make sure you discuss this data - use objective, impersonal language.
Describe changes to data by using a variety of noun/adjective, and verb/adverb

combinations.
And finally, comment on the data, using formal objective language.
And that’s all for Study English today. Don’t forget to keep reading, writing, speaking
and listening to English as much as you can. And why not try to rewrite some
conversational English into more formal academic styles.
I’ll see you next time for more IELTS preparation. Bye.
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TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 4: RISING DOLLAR
Today we’re going to be making comparisons, and looking at some tricky

prepositions of time.
But first, let’s listen to an academic talking about the Australian economy and the
Australian dollar. See if you can hear him use some comparative adjectives.
It couldn’t have come at a worse time, in the sense that with business investment
weakening, and with the housing market, at least in activity terms, having turned,
that’s where the timing is unfortunate for us.
The stronger the value of the Australian dollar and the longer it stays strong, the
weaker our economic activity will be next year.
I think growth in 2004 will be comparatively weak. My own prediction is that

throughout the year growth will be around about 2 per cent.
Being around the Reserve Bank's board table at this time I think would not be a
comfortable place to be. The bank is probably in a bigger dilemma over what to do
with interest rates with monetary policy than at any time that I can remember.
Dr Ian Harper is discussing the value of the Australian dollar, and the growth of the
Australian economy, including interest rates.
He describes all these factors by comparing information. Listen to him talk about the
value of the dollar.
The stronger the value of the dollar, and the longer it stays strong, the weaker our
economic activity.
The adjectives used in the clip are strong, weak and long.
The Australian dollar is strong.

It is stronger than it used to be.
It has been strong for a long time.
It is making economic activity weak.
The longer it stays strong, the weaker the economic activity.
Let’s look at comparative adjectives a bit more

closely.
With single syllable words, we add –er’:

strong stronger
long longer
weak weaker
big bigger
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But not all adjectives follow this simple pattern. Some are irregular.
It couldn't have come at a worse time.
It couldn’t have come at a worse time.
Worse.
Worse comes from the adjective bad:
bad, worse.
Irregular adjectives are often best learnt with the superlative or ‘most’ form:
bad, worse, worst
and
good, better, best.
When comparing, there are 2 ways to do it.
To say 2 things are the same, we use as ______ as.
Growth is as slow as it was last year.
When saying one thing is more than the other, we use the comparative form. We
usually use the word ‘than’ when comparing.
Growth is slower than last year.
The superlative form, the ‘most’ or ‘-est’ form, is used with the word 'the' -
Growth is the slowest it’s ever been.
Notice that we usually use 'more' and 'most' with adjectives that have more than 2
syllables.
So we have:
slow, slower, slowest,
but
beautiful, more beautiful, most beautiful.
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OK, now we’re going to look at some prepositions of time.
Listen for one in this clip…
I think growth in 2004 will be comparatively weak.
He says ‘in 2004’. ‘In’ is a preposition of time.
The prepositions of time are: at, on and in.
Let’s look at how they’re all used.
At is used for times. For example:
The lecture is at 7 o’clock.
‘On’ is used for days and dates:
The lecture is on Thursday.
The lecture is on the 27th of October.
‘In’ is for periods of time, and for months, years and seasons:
The lecture is in the morning, in June, in 2004, in winter.
So we’d say:
The lecture is at 7 o’clock, in the morning, on Thursday, on the 27th October, in 2004.
Notice that we say:

in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening,
but we say:
at night.
Now let’s test you on these prepositions
I saw her _ _ _ _ _ Tuesday, _ _ _ _ _ 3 o’clock _ _ _ _ _ the afternoon.
We’ve got the choice of in, at, or on.
I saw her on Tuesday, at 3 o’clock, in the afternoon.
Here’s another one…
They went shopping _ _ _ _ _ night _ _ _ _ _ Friday last week. Shops are open late
_ _ _ _ _ summer.
They went shopping at night, on Friday last week. Shops are open late in summer.
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OK, now let’s listen to the whole clip again. See if you can hear how much he thinks
the Australian economy will grow…
It couldn’t have come at a worse time, in the sense that with business investment
weakening, and with the housing market, at least in activity terms, having turned,
that’s where the timing is unfortunate for us.
I think growth in 2004 will be comparatively weak.
My own prediction is that throughout the year growth will be around about 2 per cent.
Being around the Reserve Bank's board table at this time I think would not be a
comfortable place to be. The bank is probably in a bigger dilemma over what to do
with interest rates with monetary policy than at any time that I can remember.
His prediction is for growth to be about 2 percent.
We write 2 percent like this: 2%
Percent comes from the Latin phrase per centum, by the hundred or in every
hundred.
It’s used to express proportions out of a hundred, including rates of interest.
Percent is always used with a number.
So we say:
Twenty percent of students attended the lecture.
That means: 20 out of every hundred students attended.
Or ‘She got 90 percent in the test.’ means she got 90 out of every hundred questions
right.
Or: Growth will be around 2 per cent.
We also have the word percentage. Percentage is a noun. It means the portion or
amount of something.
So we say:
What was the percentage of students who attended the lecture?

20 percent of students attended the lecture.
She got 90% in her test.

That is a high percentage.
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OK. Now let’s test you using percent or percentage.
The _ _ _ _ _ of high school students that go to university is about twenty _ _ _ _ _.
The percentage of high school students that go to university is about twenty percent.
The bank has raised the interest rate by two _ _ _ _ _.
The bank has raised the interest rate by two percent.
The _ _ _ _ _ of married women in the workforce rose from 50 to 60 _ _ _ _ _.
The percentage of married women in the workforce rose from 50 to 60 percent.
If his answers are all correct, he’ll get 100 _ _ _ _ _ on the test.
If his answers are all correct, he’ll get 100 percent on the test.
So you should notice that the signal for using percent is that there’s always a number
first. And of course, you can always use the percent sign [%] instead of writing out
the words.
And that’s all we’ve got time for today.
I’ll see you next time on Study English!
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TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 5: GLOBAL WARMING
Today we’re going to look at a topic you’ve probably heard a lot about – global
warming and the environment.
First we’re going to look at ways of brainstorming, taking notes and developing ideas.
Watch while we play some vision that contains ideas about the causes and effects of
global warming …
While you watch, try to note down some of your ideas about what global warming is.
visual clip (you can play this from the website)
OK so you saw some ideas, and perhaps took some notes, during that clip. What
were some of the ideas you saw?
What has caused global warming?
We saw gases in the air, cars, factory waste, and people cutting trees down.
So if you made those notes, you’d get an idea that these were the things causing
global warming.
Now let’s listen to someone talk about the causes…
Heat-trapping gases are building up in the atmosphere.
Heat-trapping gases are building up in the atmosphere. What else?
So what is global warming? It's the result of billions of decisions. It’s caused by
decisions made by individuals – like driving big cars rather than small cars. And it’s
caused by decisions made by corporations and nations, like dumping waste into the
atmosphere.
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Global warming is caused by about people using big cars, and people dumping
waste into the atmosphere…
OK, so you’ve looked at the vision, and listened to the speaker, and you’ve made
notes about some of the causes of global warming.
Now let’s look for some of the effects…
So after watching that, you might be thinking that global warming is having an effect
on weather patterns, and on nature.
Listen to the speaker…
Nature is already responding to global warming. There have been changes in global
weather patterns.
Trees are flowering earlier. Birds are laying eggs earlier. Butterflies are moving up
hills.
So there’s been weather changes, and changes to the ways trees, birds and
butterflies behave.
So we have a list of causes, and list of effects. You might have identified those
things from a text you’ve read, or from listening to someone speak. This is how you
can take notes.
Once you’ve got your notes, you need to be able to link those causes and effects in
sentences.
Let’s look at a couple of different ways.
The first and most basic way is just making a sequence of statements. This can
sometimes be a powerful way of making a connection between things. Listen.
Heat-trapping gases are building up in the atmosphere. Trees are flowering earlier.
Birds are laying eggs earlier, and butterflies are moving up hills.
From the sequence of information, we realise that birds are laying their eggs earlier
because gases are making the earth warmer.
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So a simple list of statements can show a cause and effect relationship.
But there are other ways too.
You can use the language of cause and effect. We can say:
X causes Y.
Driving cars causes air pollution.
There are many other word choices as well.
Driving cars leads to air pollution.
Driving cars results in air pollution.
Notice you can also turn the sentence around…
'Air pollution is caused by driving cars'.
'Air pollution is the result of driving cars'.
'Air pollution is due to driving cars'.
Listen to an example here …
There have been changes in global weather patterns.
hills.
So what is global warming? It is the result of billions of individual decisions.
He’s talking about global warming.
Global warming is the result of billions of decisions.
Global warming is due to billions of decisions.
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And remember we can turn the sentence around, and change the phrase:
Billions of decisions cause global warming.
Billions of decisions result in global warming.
Billions of decisions lead to global warming.
When you’re writing about causes and effects, make sure you use a variety of these
kinds of phrases. There are many to choose from. You should make lists of cause
and effect language, and the kinds of vocabulary you can use to describe cause and
effect relationships.
Now listen to another clip.
hills.
So what is global warming? It is the result of billions of individual decisions.
When you’re writing up your notes using cause and effect language, you’ll need to be
able to follow or track the subject of the text.
Let’s look at that now.
“What is global warming? It is the result of billions of individual decisions”.
The word ‘it’ here is called a referent. We use referents to identify and track subjects
through a conversation or a piece of writing.
If you repeat the subject too many times, your work will sound boring.
Listen to this:
The woman came into the room. The woman sat down. The woman drank her tea.
Look at how we use referents:
The woman came into the room. She sat down. She drank her tea.
When you are reading, you’ll need to be able to understand referents, and follow the
subject through the text.
Other referents are this, that, these, those.
Here’s the clip again. Listen to the way the referents are used.
What is global warming? It is the result of billions of individual decisions.
The word it here refers to global warming.
What is global warming? Global warming is the result of billions of decisions.
Page 4 of 5
And here’s another referent.
What is global warming? It is the result of billions of individual decisions.
You can’t manage that at the scale of the individual.
He says:
He means:
You can’t manage global warming at the scale of the individual.
But notice how the subject changes here.
What is global warming? It’s the result of billions of individual decisions.

Managing the atmosphere has to take place at a global level. That’s why it needs
international agreements.
Managing the atmosphere has to take place at a global level.
The subject of this sentence is ‘managing the atmosphere'.
That’s why it needs international agreement.
So the 'it' here no longer refers to global warming. Now ‘it’ is referring to 'managing
the atmosphere'.
That’s why managing the atmosphere needs international agreement.
When reading and writing, you must be very careful to notice when subjects change,
and to be clear about which subject is being referred to. This can be quite tricky
sometime.
Next time you see a paragraph, try to highlight all the referents like:
it, this, that, these, those, he, she, they.
Then try to work out what subject they are all referring back to.
It’s a great exercise, and it will help your reading, writing and speaking skills.
And that’s all for today. Hope you keep enjoying your English studies and Study
English! I’ll see you next time.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 6: GREENHOUSE GASES
Hello. I'm Margot Politis. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation.
Today we're going to talk about the environment. Global warming is caused by the
presence of greenhouses gases in the atmosphere. One of the worst greenhouses
gases is carbon dioxide.
We're going to look at the language of cause and effect while we find out why these
greenhouses gases are a problem.
The main problem is our use of fossil fuels. So what we've done is put the whole
natural system out of balance by digging up coal and oil that took about 200 million
years to accumulate and we're releasing it all in about 100 years. So it's put the whole
system out of balance at the moment, which has resulted in higher levels of these
gases in the atmosphere.
That was Dr Roger Francey talking about the natural system. He says that the
natural system is 'out of balance'.
He also talked about the causes and effects of this.
Listen for the main cause of the natural system being out of balance…
The main problem is our use of fossil fuels.
He says 'the main problem is our use of fossil fuels'.
So if we look at a table of cause and effect, we can say that 'the use of fossil fuels' is
a cause, and 'the natural system out of balance' is an effect.
Listen again.
years to accumulate and we're releasing it all in about 100 years.
So the natural system has been put out of balance by people digging up and burning
coal and oil. This releases gases into the atmosphere. Coal and oil are fossil fuels.
So if we go back to the table of cause and effect, we can say that 'digging up and
burning coal and oil' is another cause.
Page 1 of 5
See if you can hear another effect.
years to accumulate and we're releasing it all in about 100 years. So it's put the
whole system out of balance at the moment, which has resulted in higher levels of
these gases in the atmosphere.
It's put the whole system out of balance, which has resulted in higher levels of gases
in the atmosphere.
So here, 'the natural system out of balance' is now a cause.
It has 'resulted in', or 'caused', higher levels of gases in the atmosphere.
This is an effect.
To express these relationships, there many different word choices.
We can use verbs like 'causes', 'leads to', 'results in'.
So we can express the relationship like this:
'A causes B', 'A leads to B', 'A results in B'.
Listen to an example here.
The main problem is our use of fossil fuels. So it's put the whole system out of
balance at the moment, which has resulted in higher levels of these gases in the
atmosphere.
'Our use of fossil fuels has resulted in higher levels of gases.'
But we can also express the cause/effect relationship the other way round:
'Higher levels of gases are the result of our use of fossil fuels.'
Notice that we use a noun phrase here. This is very common.
Page 2 of 5
We can use nouns like 'the result', 'the effect', 'the consequence'.
If we look at these effect relationships, we can say:
'B is the effect of A', 'B is the result of A', 'B is the consequence of A'.
Remember that it's always important to have a variety in your language. Make sure
you use both nouns and verbs to express causes, and effects. This will make you
written work and your speech sound more interesting.
OK, so Dr Francey and his team have designed a new way of measuring one of the
worst greenhouse gases in the earth's atmosphere: carbon dioxide.
Listen for what they're trying to find out.
We need to understand what happens in the tropics, that's where the biggest forests
are and that's where some of the biggest changes are occurring in terms of human
modification of those forests through conversion to agriculture and regular burning of
these forests.
Our interest is not so much in that diurnal or daily variation. We're interested in what's
happening on time scales of days or months or years.
They are interested in what's happening over days, months or years.
Their interest is not so much in diurnal or daily variation.
The conjunction 'or' here works to connect alternative meanings.
In this sense, 'or' means 'that is', 'I mean'.
'We're interested in diurnal, that is daily, variation.'
'We're interested in diurnal, I mean daily, variation.'
The second word defines the first. It tells the reader or listener what the more
unfamiliar, technical word means.
Page 3 of 5
Listen again for what diurnal means.
Our interest is not so much in that diurnal or daily variation.
He says diurnal or daily.
'Diurnal' means 'daily'.
See if you can work out the meaning of CO2 here …
"One of the main causes of global warming is CO2, or carbon dioxide."
'CO2 or carbon dioxide'
'CO2 is carbon dioxide'
When you're looking at environmental issues, like global warming and greenhouses
gases, it's often necessary to be familiar these kinds of chemical terms.
You should try to learn the more common ones, like 'CO2'.
You might want to keep a copy of the 'periodic table' in your notebook. That's the list
of all chemical elements and their abbreviations.
Here are some of them:
'hydrogen' is H, but 'helium' is He.
Notice that with abbreviations of elements, the first letter is always a capital, and the
others are always small.
See if you can guess these ones:
'oxygen', that's O,
and 'carbon' is C.
But they're not always that easy:
'lead' is Pb,
and 'sodium' is Na.
OK, now let's listen to Dr Francey talk about the new CO2 measuring device…
Then we'll look at the names of countries and nationalities.
There's been interest from Korea, Japan, France and Malaysia, where the analyser
could be installed on a 100metre tower on the island of Borneo.
She says there's been interest in their device from Korea, Japan, France and Malaysia.
Page 4 of 5
It's important to learn and recognise the English names of the major countries of the
world, their nationalities, and how to spell and pronounce these.
It's a good vocabulary exercise to make lists of these families of words.
To help you remember them, try grouping countries according to how the nationalities
are formed.
Notice that they're all spelt with capital letters.
We have the '–an' group:
'Australia, Australian',
'Korea, Korean',
'Malaysia, Malaysian',
'Fiji, Fijian'.
We have the '–ese' group:
'Japan, Japanese',
'China, Chinese',
'Vietnam, Vietnamese'.
Then there's the '–i' group:
'Bangladesh, Bangladeshi',
'Kuwait, Kuwaiti'.
And some nationalities are formed in an irregular way:
'France, French',
'New Zealand, New Zealander',
'Philippines, Filipino'.
And watch the change in spelling with that one!
Why don't you start your own list of English names for countries and their people.
Some countries also take separate adjectives that you can learn along with them.
And that's all for Study English today.
I'll see you next time. Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 7: ENVIRO-LOO
Today we have an environmental theme on Study English, but it’s an environmental

story with a difference.
We find out about a new toilet system that has been developed to save the local
environment in a Tasmanian park.
We’re going to be looking at how to talk about ‘processes’, so listen carefully to David
Holman talk about his new environmentally friendly toilet.
The liquid waste comes from the toilet behind me. There’s a containment vessel for
the solids. From the bottom of the solids you drain off the liquid and it comes down
here down this pipe.
OK. The pipe tips into this tipping bucket arrangement, and what this does is it fills
up to a point, and then it suddenly tips and that will measure each time it tips. So we
can calculate the amount of liquid effluent that’s gone in.
As that fills up, you can see the towelling material here will come in contact with the
effluent, the air is drawn in through these holes and will actually direct the air in onto
the surface of the water, through the wick and out through the top.
OK, so David was talking about how his toilet, the Enviro-Loo, works.
He was describing a ‘process’. Today we’re going to look at the type of language
you’ll need to describe processes.
We’ll listen to David again. This time, listen out for the types of verbs he uses.
The liquid waste comes from the

toilet behind me. There’s a
containment vessel for the solids.
From the bottom of the solids you
drain off the liquid and it comes
down here down this pipe.
OK. The pipe tips into this tipping

bucket arrangement, and what this
does is it fills up to a point, and then
it suddenly tips and that will measure
each time it tips. So we can
calculate the amount of liquid
effluent that’s gone in.
David uses a variety of verbs and tenses. But mostly he uses the ‘simple present
tense’.
Page 1 of 5
The ‘simple present’ is often used to describe processes and procedures.
Let’s look at some examples.
The liquid waste comes from the toilet behind me.
OK. The pipe tips into this tipping bucket arrangement, and what this does is it fills up
to a point and then it suddenly tips.
There’s also another, more formal way of describing processes.
That’s using the ‘passive voice’.
In academic writing, it’s common to use the ‘passive voice’ for actions in a process or
procedure. When you use the passive voice, your writing becomes impersonal and
distant. This is more formal, and is often more suitable in an academic setting.
Listen for a passive verb here.
As that fills up, you can see the towelling material here will come in contact with the
effluent, the air is drawn in through these holes.
He says ‘is drawn in’: ‘the air is drawn in’.
Notice there is no ‘subject’, no person or thing doing the action, it is just done. This is
called the ‘passive voice’.
This highlights the process or action, rather than the person or thing doing the action.
The passive is used when the important thing is not who did the action, but the action
itself.
This is true when you are describing processes. The process is the same, no matter
who is doing it, so we choose the passive voice.
Let’s look at bit more closely at how the passive is formed …
Passive verbs are formed by using the

verb ‘to be’ plus the ‘past participle’ of
the verb.
Let’s look at the verb to ‘draw in’, to bring

something in.
The past participle is ‘drawn. This is an

irregular past participle.
So the passive form is ‘to be drawn in’.
Page 2 of 5
The different forms of the passive vary according to the action, and when the action
happened.
OK. So in formal writing, we use the passive form for processes. But David doesn’t
always use the passive, because he’s having a conversation with someone.
Let’s look at one of David’s more informal sentences, and see how we could change
it into a more formal description.
There’s a containment vessel for the solids and from the bottom of the solids, you
drain off the liquid.
He says ‘from the bottom of the solids you drain off the liquid’. Let’s look at the main
part of that sentence.
‘You drain off the liquid’.
The verb is ‘drain off’.
In a passive sentence, we’d say ‘is drained off’, the ‘past participle’ with the present
tense form of ‘to be’.
To form the passive, we also need change the sentence around.
Most English sentences use the active form – that’s ‘subject verb object’. But in the
passive, sentences begin with the object of the verb – ‘object verb subject’.
In this sentence, we know that ‘drain off’ is the verb, ‘you’ is the subject and ‘the
liquid’ is the object.
So to form a passive sentence, we’ll need to turn the sentence around into ‘object
verb subject’. Notice that we add the word ‘by’.
‘The liquid is drained off by you.’
But in a process, we don’t need to include

the agent of the verb, so it usually gets left
out.
Our new, more formal sentence reads:
‘The liquid is drained off.’
So let’s go back to that full sentence
‘From the bottom of the solids, you drain

off the liquid.’
‘From the bottom of the solids, the liquid is drained off.’
Page 3 of 5
Here’s another one.
We can calculate the amount of liquid that’s gone in.
We can calculate the amount of liquid.
The subject is ‘we’. This will be dropped in our passive sentence.
The object is ‘the amount of liquid’.
The verb is ‘can calculate’.
‘Calculate’ has the past participle ‘calculated’.
When there are auxiliary verbs like ‘can’, we use the infinitive form of the verb ‘to be’.
So the full verb phrase ‘can calculate’ becomes ‘can be calculated’.
Remember that a passive sentence starts with the ‘object’, then the ‘verb’, so:
‘We can calculate the amount of liquid.’
becomes:
‘The amount of liquid can be calculated.’
OK, let's finish today by testing you on the passive.
Listen to the steps in a simple process.
This is how you make a cup of coffee. It’s in a conversational style.
You fill the kettle with water.

You turn on the kettle.
You boil the kettle.
You pour the hot water into a mug.
You add some sugar.
Then you can drink it.
OK. Let’s start at the beginning.
You fill the kettle with water.
What’s the verb? ‘Fill’. The subject? ‘You’. The object? ‘’The kettle’.
The passive verb is ‘is filled’.
The new sentence is:
‘The kettle is filled with water.’
Page 4 of 5
See if you can do the next one …
‘You turn on the kettle.’
The verb is ‘turn on’.

The subject is ‘you’.
The object is ‘the kettle’.
‘The kettle is turned on.’
‘You boil the water.’

‘The water is boiled.’
‘You pour the hot water into a mug.’

‘The hot water is poured into a mug.’
‘You add some sugar.’

‘Some sugar is added.’
‘Then you can drink it.’

‘Then it can be drunk.’
But we’d usually say,

‘Then it’s ready to be drunk.’
So let’s go through that again.
‘The kettle is filled with water.’

‘The kettle is turned on.’
‘The water is boiled.’
‘The hot water is poured into a mug.’
‘Some sugar is added.’
‘Then it’s ready to be drunk.’
And I think I’ll go and make a cup of

coffee right now.
Don't forget to practice these active and passive sentences.
And I'll see you next time for Study English. Bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 8: CROCODILE TOURISM
Hello. Welcome again to Study English, IELTS preparation. I’m Margot Politis.
Today we’ll look at some words that cause a lot of confusion - the relative pronouns
‘that’, ‘which’ and ‘who’, and then we’ll do some pronunciation practice.
But first, let’s listen to some people talk about a very dangerous tourist attraction from
Australia’s Northern Territory.
People have always been fascinated with death. Most of the mysteries that you see
on television, the films that you see, involve murder in one kind or another.
Crocodiles are one of the last remaining dinosaurs and the idea of a crocodile
coming out of the water and grabbing somebody is absolutely riveting.
I read about the death of the German tourist who was taken by a crocodile. It didn't
put me off coming to the Northern Territory, quite the opposite in fact.
I think the NT is famous for its crocodiles and probably quite famous for its crocodile
attacks and that tourists who come here would like to be, or feel as though they were,
involved in that danger.
Tourists want to have a story to take

home and if they can say that they were
in the Northern Territory where the
German tourist was taken by the croc,
then it adds to their own adventure.
So he thinks people may actually be

attracted to the Northern Territory
because of the dangerous crocodiles.
But now we’re going to leave the

crocodiles, and talk about something
else that can be dangerous – the
relative pronouns ‘who’, ‘which’ and
‘that’.
Listen for some relative pronouns here.
People have always been fascinated

with death. Most of the mysteries that
you see on TV, the films that you see,
involve murder of one kind or another.
I read about the death of the German

tourist who was taken by a crocodile.
Most of the mysteries ‘that’ you see on

TV involve murders.
Page 1 of 5
I read about the death of the tourist ‘who’ was taken by a crocodile.
Relative pronouns are used to introduce relative clauses.
They give more information about a subject.
The subject here is ‘mysteries’.
The ‘that clause’ gives us more information about the subject - ‘the mysteries that
you see on TV’,
‘The tourist’ is the subject. The ‘who

clause’ gives more information – ‘the
tourist who was taken by a crocodile’.
But how do you choose between ‘who’,

‘which’ or ‘that’?
Well the relative pronoun ‘who’ is only

used with people.
‘Which ‘is only used with things.
‘That’ is usually only used with things as

well. Sometimes, in informal language,
it can refer to people.
But when you’re learning English, it’s probably best to avoid using ‘that’ for people.
The most difficult thing with these relative pronouns is working out the difference
between ‘which’ and ‘that’.
As a general rule, we use ‘which’ when the clause does not affect the meaning of the
sentence.
A ‘which’ clause just gives us extra

information.
It can be left out of a sentence, and the

sentence still has the same meaning.
When ‘which’ is used in this type of

clause, we put commas around it.
‘The hat, which is on the bed, is new.’
Here, the clause ‘which is on the bed’,

just gives us additional information.
Page 2 of 5
We can take it out, and the sentence still makes sense.
There is only one hat, it’s the hat on the bed. We take out the which clause, and the
important information is still there:
‘The hat is new.’
OK, now let’s look at ‘that’.
We use ‘that’ for clauses that are a crucial part of the sentence. They are actually
part of the definition of the subject.
‘The hat that is on the bed is new.’
Notice ‘that’ clauses do not use commas, because they are a crucial part of the
sentence.
There are a number of hats that this sentence could be referring to. But the sentence
is specifically talking about the hat on the bed, so we use ‘that’.
The ‘that’ clause cannot be taken out of the sentence.
‘The hat is new.’
It doesn’t make sense here, because it doesn’t tell us which hat is being discussed.
It will take some practice to get used to when to use ‘who’, ‘which’ and ‘that’.
To sum up, we use ‘that’ to define the subject.
We use ‘which’, in a clause with commas, to add extra information.
You will notice ‘which’ often being used in place of ‘that’, especially in spoken
language. While not strictly correct, it is very common.
The word ‘who’ is a bit simpler. It’s only used when the subject is a person, and can
be used in both of these types of clauses.
OK. Now we’re going to do some pronunciation practice.
Students learning English often complain that native speakers speak too fast.
Well, it’s true. English speakers do run their words together, so it’s often very difficult
to hear when one word ends and another begins.
To make your spoken English sound natural, it’s important for you to do this too.
You need to learn to link words ending in a ‘final consonant’ sound to words with an
‘initial vowel’ sound.
Page 3 of 5
Let’s look at some words linked with ‘of’.
People have always been fascinated with death. Most of the mysteries that you see
on television, the films that you see, involve murder in one kind or another.
Crocodiles are one of the last remaining dinosaurs, and the idea of a crocodile
coming out of the water and grabbing somebody is absolutely riveting.
I read about the death of the German tourist who was taken by a crocodile. It didn't
put me off coming to the Northern Territory, quite the opposite.
He uses the phrases:
‘most of’,
‘one of’,
‘out of’,
‘death of’.
But in sentences, these phrases will usually become linked together:
‘most of, most of’,
‘one of, one of’,
‘out of, out of’,
‘death of, death of’.
Notice that ‘of’ in these phrases is unstressed.
Practice these ones:
‘many of, many of’,
‘most of, most of’
‘one of, one of’
‘several of, several of’.
Listen to the differences when I read these sentences in a natural, conversational

way.
'One of my best friends lives here'.

'One of my best friends lives here'.
'Many of the trees have died'.

'Many of the trees have died'.
Page 4 of 5
'I enjoy most of her songs'.
'I enjoy most of her songs'.
People have always been fascinated with death. Crocodiles are one of the last
remaining dinosaurs and the idea of a crocodile coming out of the water and
grabbing somebody is absolutely riveting.
He says people have always been fascinated with death.
People ‘have always’.
Notice how in conversation, we link the final consonant sound ‘v’, with the initial
vowel sound ‘aw’:
‘have always’,
‘Crocodiles are, crocodiles are’,
‘is absolutely, is absolutely’.
Ok, now let’s try these sentences.
‘She is always studying hard.’

‘She is always studying hard.’
‘They aren’t scared by crocodiles.’

‘They aren’t scared by crocodiles.’
So make sure you practice words in phrases and sentences. That way you’ll get used
to linking your words, and your spoken English will sound more natural.
And don’t forget to listen to native speakers as much as you can, and try to copy
them, even if they do speak fast!
And that’s all for today. I’ll see you next time on Study English. Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 9: ADHD
Today we’re going to talk about acronyms, abbreviations and names, and then we’ll
do a bit of vocabulary building as well.
The boy in today’s clip is about to have a test to see whether he has Attention Deficit
Hyperactivity Disorder, or ADHD.
While you’re watching, listen for some other abbreviations.
How do you know if your child does have ADHD? An EEG brain scan helps answer
that, say the Swinburne researchers.
Jacques Duff is a psychologist and one of Richard’s PhD students. A computer

programme will compare Xavier’s brain scan with a database of scans of ADHD
sufferers. If he does have the condition, the ADHD diagnosis will be automatically
triggered.
Xavier was having a test to see if he has ‘ADHD’.
‘ADHD’ is an abbreviation.
An abbreviation is the short form of a phrase or a

word.
We often abbreviate phrases using the first letter

of each word.
Notice that you use capitals letters for these

types of abbreviations.
‘ADHD’ stands for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. ‘ADHD’ is much quicker
and easier to say, and to write.
You might recognise some of these common abbreviations:
‘UFO’ stands for ‘Unidentified Flying Object’.
‘ASAP’ means ‘As Soon As Possible’.
Other common abbreviations are:
‘PC’, ‘Personal Computer’,
‘TV’ for ‘Television’,
and ‘CD-ROM’ – that’s a ‘Compact Disc with a

Read Only Memory’!
Page 1 of 4
Notice that each letter in the abbreviation is pronounced separately, but the last letter
is pronounced more strongly because it carries the primary stress.
So we say ‘USA’, ‘ASAP’, ‘ABC’, and ‘TV’.
Listen for another abbreviation here.
Jacques Duff is a psychologist and one of Richard’s PhD students.
Jacques Duff is one of Richard’s PhD students.
‘PhD’ stands for Doctor of Philosophy.
Another abbreviation you’ll recognise is ‘IELTS’.
‘IELTS’ stands for ‘International English

Language Testing System’.
This form of abbreviation is called an ‘acronym’.

With an acronym, we don’t pronounce the
individual letters, we pronounce it as a word.
So we say ‘IELTS’, not ‘I - E - L - T - S’.
Some other examples of acronyms are:
‘AIDS’, that’s ‘Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome’,
and ‘RAM’, ‘Random Access Memory.’
Another example is ‘ASEAN’ – that stands for the ‘Association of South East Asian
Nations’.
There’s one more common shortening in today’s story. Listen for whether it’s an
abbreviation or an acronym.
An EEG brain scan helps answer that, say the Swinburne researchers.
He says an ‘EEG’. That’s an abbreviation. We don’t pronounce it ‘eeg’, we say ‘E E

G’.
‘EEG’ stands for ‘Electro- Encephalograph’.
That’s a type of brain scan, but you can see why we shorten it to EEG.
Notice that in formal academic writing, it’s necessary to write out an abbreviation in
full the first time you use it.
Page 2 of 4
So if you wanted to write about an EEG, you’d
write it out in full the first time, and place the
abbreviation in brackets, like this.
‘An Electro – Encephalograph [EEG] can help

treat patients.’
After that in your paper, you can just use the

abbreviation on its own.
OK. So let’s listen to the clip again, but this time,

listen for words to do with universities.
How do you know if your child does have ADHD? An EEG brain scan helps answer
that, say the Swinburne researchers.
Jacques Duff is a psychologist and one of Richard’s PhD students. A computer

programme will compare Xavier’s brain scan with a database of scans of ADHD
sufferers.
He refers to the Swinburne researchers.
‘Swinburne’ is the name of a university in Victoria.
There were also some other university-related words.
Jacques Duff is a psychologist and a PhD student.
A great way to learn new words is in themes like this, and by organising them into
word trees.
Let’s look at university words.
Students might study for a ‘Diploma’, a ‘Bachelor degree’, an ‘Honours degree’, a

‘Masters degree’ or a ‘PhD’.
Jacques Duff is a PhD student, so that’s where he fits into this tree.
There are number of different people and places mentioned in today’s story. We
don’t see them all, but we hear their names.
Listen for the names in this clip.
An EEG brain scan helps answer that, say the Swinburne researchers. Jacques Duff
is a psychologist and one of Richard’s PhD students. A computer programme will
compare Xavier’s brain scan with a database of scans of ADHD sufferers.
The people he mentions are ‘Jacques Duff’, ‘Richard’ and ‘Xavier’.
If someone has an uncommon name, people will often ask how their name is spelt.
Page 3 of 4
For example, ‘Xavier’ is an uncommon name in Australia. So if I met Xavier, I might
ask him, “how do you spell your name?”
So it’s a good idea to get used to spelling out your name.
‘Xavier’ is spelt like this: X-A-V-I-E-R, Xavier.
‘Jacques’ is also an uncommon name in English, because it’s a French name.
In this case, we have both a first and a last name.
His first name is ‘Jacques’, and his last name is ‘Duff’.
A first name is sometimes called a ‘christian name’. It’s also called a ‘given name’.
It’s the name your family chooses for you.
The last name is also called a ‘surname’, or ‘family name’. That’s usually the name
of one parent that’s passed on to their children.
Jacque’s first name is spelt ‘J-A-C-Q-U-E-S’, and his surname is Duff.
Notice that if you asked someone in Australia to spell out the name ‘Duff’, they would
say: ‘D-U- double F’.
But in North America, people would spell it like this ‘D-U-F-F’. They don’t use the
word ‘double’. They say the letter twice instead.
So if we asked Jacques Duff to spell out his surname, he would say:
‘D-U-double F’, or, he might say ‘D-U-F-F’.
You’ll need to be familiar with both ways of spelling out double letters. You should
also make sure you know exactly how to spell out your own name in English.
That’s all for today.
I’m Margot Politis - that’s M-A-R-G-O-T P-O- L-I-T-I-S.
See you next time.
Page 4 of 4
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 13: UNDER THE SEA
Hello. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation. I’m Margot Politis.
We’re going to look at articles today - indefinite articles ‘a’ and ‘an’, and the definite
article, ‘the’.
But first, let’s meet an oceanographer. She’s talking about using underwater devices
to predict weather patterns.
See if you can hear her using articles while she talks about monsoons.
The monsoon gets a lot of its energy from the equatorial and sub-tropical Indian
Oceans. Dr Susan Wijffels, an oceanographer from Australia’s CSIRO, is hoping that
by measuring the state of the Indian Ocean in those areas, scientists will be able to
learn something about monsoon predictability.
Predicting the monsoon is a very difficult thing and yet it impacts on millions and
millions of people, and so we think that, if we can predict the monsoon usefully, we
can make a real difference.
We know from El Nino that it’s a fully global system, so you just can’t study one small
part of the ocean and solve these problems. You really need a global integrated
observing system, and the Argo program is the first real big ocean attempt to do that,
and it’s the float technology that’s allowed us to even think about doing this.
Using ‘articles’ before nouns is one of the most

difficult things in learning English.
You can choose between indefinite articles ‘a’

and ‘an’, the definite article ‘the’, or no article at
all.
Let’s start with the indefinite articles ‘a’ and ‘an’.
The rule is that ‘a’ is used before words starting

with a consonant, and ‘an’ is used before words
starting with a vowel.
So we have ‘a banana’, but ‘an apple.
There are a couple of exceptions to the rule.

Where the consonant ‘h’ is not pronounced, we
use ‘an’.
So we say ‘a happy man’, but ‘an honest man’.

The ‘h’ is not pronounced, so ‘honest’ sounds like
it starts with a vowel.
Where the vowel ‘u’ is pronounced like a ‘y’ sound, we use ‘a’.
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So we say ‘an umbrella’, but ‘a user’, because ‘user’ sounds like it begins with a ‘y’.
‘A’ and ‘an’ are only used with singular nouns. We use ‘some’ with plural nouns.
The indefinite articles ‘a’ or ‘an’ are used to refer to ‘indefinite’ things, things that
aren’t specific. You use them when you’re referring to any member of a group of
things. The indefinite article does not refer to a particular thing, but one out of many
possible things.
If I say ‘I would like a banana’, I just want any banana, it doesn’t matter which one.
Let’s look at an example of indefinite articles from the clip.
She uses the indefinite article twice.
She says ‘predicting the monsoon is a very difficult thing’. There are many things
that are difficult to do, and predicting the monsoon is just one of them.
Secondly she says ‘we can make a real difference’. There are many differences that
can be made in the world, but she is just talking about one of them.
So when do we use the definite article ‘the’?
Well, we use it when we’re referring to ‘definite,

specific’ things. We also use ‘the’ when we’re
talking about one particular member of a group.
Luckily there is only one form of the word ‘the’,

and it can refer to both singular and plural nouns.
We say ‘the banana’ and ‘the bananas’.
There is a difference in pronunciation though, when ‘the’ comes before a vowel

sound, we say ‘thee’, ‘the apples.’
So ‘thee’ before vowel sounds, and ‘thuh’ before

consonant sounds.
Let’s look at the clip again. Listen for ‘the’.
You really need a global integrated observing

system, and the Argo program is the first real big
ocean attempt to do that, and it’s the float
technology that’s allowed us to even think about
doing this.
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She says ‘the Argo program’. She uses ‘the’ because there is only one Argo
program. It’s a unique, particular thing.
She also says ‘the float technology’. She is talking about a particular type of float
technology, not just any float technology.
There was a third ‘the’. She said ‘the first real big ocean attempt’.
We use ‘the’ in front of ‘first’, ‘second’ and so on, because they refer to something
particular or unique.
There can be only ‘one’ first attempt.
In the same way we use ‘the’ in front of superlatives - ‘the best example’, the biggest
banana’ and so on – because there can only be one best, or biggest, of anything.
OK. So that’s the major difference between ‘definite’ and ‘indefinite’ articles, but
there are other rules as well.
We use ‘a’ and ‘an’ with countable nouns, that is, if the noun can be counted.
‘I ate an apple’ [apples can be counted].
We use ‘the’ with uncountable nouns, with things that you can’t count.
‘I swam in the water’ [water cannot be counted].
‘I drank the milk’ [milk cannot be counted].
We also use ‘a’ with counting expressions like ‘a bottle of’, ‘a cup of’, ‘a bit of’.
Listen to this…
The monsoon gets a lot of its energy from the equatorial and sub-tropical Indian
Ocean.
She says “The monsoon gets ‘a lot of’ its energy”.
Look at ‘the monsoon’, and ‘the Indian Ocean’.
These are both examples of other rules for ‘the’.
We can use ‘the’ to describe ‘generic nouns’.
A ‘generic noun’ is a noun that describes a category or type of thing. It can often be
the same as using a plural noun.
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So sometimes ‘the monsoon’ means the same as ‘monsoons’. She’s talking about
monsoons in general.
We know from El Nino that it’s a fully global system, so you just can’t study one small
part of the ocean and solve these problems. You really need a global integrated
observing system, and the Argo program is the first real big ocean attempt to do that,
and it’s the float technology that’s allowed us to even think about doing this.
And here’s another rule. We also use ‘the’ with oceans, seas, rivers and deserts.
We say ‘the Indian Ocean’, ‘the Yangtze River’, ‘the Gobi Desert’.
We also use ‘the’ for points on the globe – ‘the Equator’, ‘the Tropic of Capricorn’,
‘the North Pole’.
Choosing the right article can be very confusing, but if you follow the general rule that
you use ‘the’, the definite article, to refer to a particular thing or things, and ‘a’ and
‘an’, indefinite articles, to refer to one of a number of things, you shouldn’t go too
wrong.
OK, so now we’ve seen how to use ‘definite’ and ‘indefinite’ articles, but sometimes
we don’t use articles at all before nouns.
Let’s look at when to use no article.
We’ve already seen that you can leave the article out when talking about ‘plural
generic nouns’.
‘Monsoons are unpredictable.’
But this is true for uncountable generic nouns too.
‘Coffee is delicious’.
‘Happiness is hard to find.
“Balls are round.”
OK, so let’s look at some sentences…
‘I would like a cake.’

[I would like one cake, any cake.]
‘I would like the cake.’

[I would like that particular cake.]
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‘I like cakes.’
[I like all cakes].
Here, ‘cakes’ with no article is generic. It refers to cakes in general, all cakes.
Well that’s all for today. Don’t forget to practice those articles!
I’ll see you next time for Study English. Bye Bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 10: SOLAR HOUSE
Today we’re going to look at ways of connecting ideas. There are many ways of
doing this using ‘conjunctions’, words that join.
First, let’s listen to Paul Gibson, an architect, while he takes us on a tour of his new,
environmentally friendly solar house.
Well we completed it about 2 years ago, and I guess one of the interesting things
about it is that it’s a fibro house and most houses I guess these days are brick
veneer, whereas this is fibro on the outside, timber on the outside, but there’s bricks
on the inside.
Well I guess the very high windows along the north

side going down to the lower ceiling height on the
south basically allows you to get a lot of sun in
through these windows in winter, and the louvres,
which go out, actually go to a point where the sun
can be shaded completely in summer, but they can
be opened to let the sun right back into the house
though winter.
This house actually has 2 north faces. There’s the

north face of all the living rooms, 3 actually, and then the master bedroom has a
north face and the other bedrooms also have a north face. So it’s trying to maximise
what we call the aperture of the house, which is how much sun you actually get in
winter.
OK, now we’ve listened to Paul, let’s look at the way he connected his ideas.
Good communication, especially in an academic setting, is all about expressing and

connecting both simple and complex ideas.
There are many ways to do this.
Simple sentences express a single, simple idea.
The most simple sentence consists of just a

‘subject’ and a ‘verb’.
‘The door opens.’

‘The woman enters.’
The easiest way of connecting ideas is using

‘coordination’.
That’s taking 2 simple sentences, and linking them

with a ‘conjunction’ or joining word.
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The most common conjunctions are ‘and’ and ‘but’.
Other common ones are ‘yet’, ‘or’, ‘for’, and ‘so’.
We use the most simple conjunctions in place of a ‘full stop’.
‘The door opens.’ ‘The woman enters.’
‘The door opens and the woman enters.’
‘The door opens.’ ‘The woman doesn’t enter.’
‘The door opens but the woman doesn’t enter.’
Listen to an example here.
Well we completed it about 2 years ago, and I guess one of the interesting things
about it is that it’s a fibro house and most houses I guess these days are brick
veneer.
It’s a fibro house and most houses are brick veneer.
‘It is a fibro house.’
‘Most houses are brick veneer.’
These are 2 simple sentences.
They can be linked together to form a longer sentence called a ‘compound sentence’.
‘It is a fibro house and most houses are brick veneer.’
Compound sentences have 2 ‘independent clauses’, 2 clauses that can be separate

sentences.
Here’s another one.
The ceiling height on the south basically allows you to get a lot of sun in through
these windows in winter, and the louvres, which go out, actually go to a point where
the sun can be shaded completely in summer, but they can be opened to let the sun
right back into the house though winter.
He’s talking about the louvres.
He joins together two sentences.
‘The louvres go to a point where the sun can be shaded completely in summer.’
‘They can be opened to let the sun back in through winter.’
Page 2 of 5
He joins these sentences together using ‘but’. Notice we use a ‘comma’ as well.
‘The louvres go to a point where the sun can be

shaded completely in summer, but they can be
opened to let the sun back in through winter.’
The conjunctions ‘and’ and ‘but’ can also be used to

join words and phrases in lists.
We separate words with ‘commas’, and then use a

final ‘and’.
‘The house is made of fibro.’
‘The house is made of fibro and timber.’
‘The house is made of fibro, timber and bricks.’
Listen to this example.
Most houses I guess these days are brick veneer, whereas this is fibro on the
outside, timber on the outside, but there’s bricks on the inside.
He forms one compound sentence from simple sentences.
‘The house is fibro on the outside.’ ‘It is timber on the outside.’ ‘It is bricks on the
inside.’
Notice that ‘and’ is used to list similar things, ‘but’ is used to contrast different items in
a list.
So we could also say:
‘The house is fibro and timber on the outside, but bricks on the inside.’
OK, so that’s an introduction to ‘coordination’,
Remember ‘coordination’ is ‘linking independent clauses with conjunctions’. This

forms ‘compound sentences’.
Another way to join ideas is using ‘subordination’.
‘Subordination’ is linking an independent clause with a dependent clause to make a

complex sentence.
‘Dependent clauses’ are clauses that cannot exist separately, in separate sentences.
They need or depend on each other.
We can form ‘complex sentences’ in two ways.
Page 3 of 5
We can use ‘relative pronouns’: who, whose, which, where;
or we can use ‘conjunctions’: because or whereas.
When writing or speaking, it’s important for you to

practise using a variety of sentences. You’ll need to
use simple, compound and complex sentences.
Here’s another example.
Trying to maximise what we call the aperture of the

house, which is how much sun you actually get in
winter.
He uses an independent and a dependent clause here.
Look at these 2 sentences.
‘They are trying to maximise the aperture of the house.’
‘The aperture of the house is how much sun you get.’
He joins these 2 sentences together with a relative pronoun.
‘They are trying to maximise the aperture of the house, which is how much sun you
get.’
Now let’s practice that.
Join these simple sentences to make compound sentences using ‘coordination’.

Here, try to use ‘and’ and ‘but’.
‘The master bedroom has a north face.’ ‘The other bedrooms have a north face.’
‘The master bedroom and the other bedrooms have a north face.’
And here’s another one.
‘The house is warm in winter.’ ‘The house is cool in summer.’
‘The house is warm in winter, but it’s cool in summer.’
Now let’s practice ‘subordination’. That’s making 2 sentences into one complex
sentence.
Try using ‘whereas’.
‘The house is warm in winter.’ ‘Most houses are cold in winter.’
Page 4 of 5
This can become:
‘The house is warm in winter, whereas most houses are cold in winter.’
And here’s another one. Here, try to link the sentences using ‘which’.
‘The house is made of fibro.’ ‘Fibro is a cheap, building material.’
‘The house is made of fibro, which is a cheap building material.’
You’ll need to practise forming simple, compound and complex sentences. There
are many ways to do it, and many different ways of punctuating. This is very
important for your written work.
And that’s all for today.
I’ll see you next time on Study English. Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 11: RECOUNTING THE PAST
Today we’re going to look at ways to talk about something that’s happened in the
past, and we’ll also have a look at ways to form compound and complex sentences.
First, we’re going to listen to a woman talk about a dramatic event in her past. Four
years ago, she had a stroke – a blood vessel burst in her brain.
Here’s what happened to her.
A stroke is whereby the blood supply to the brain is cut off. The major signs of
having had a stroke that most people would equate with is weakness, so paralysis of
an arm, leg or face. In others it can be a loss of speech or inability to communicate.
Others may have loss of vision or a combination of all those things.
I was just so physically fit and also emotionally I was on top of the world. I had a
really good job at that time, and I was getting married.
I just felt terribly nauseous and I woke up with pins and needles down one side of my
leg, and then it worked its way up towards my arm and across.
I was just immobile. I couldn't move. I couldn't walk. I was paralysed on this side of
my body.
Simone is telling her story. She is giving a recount of what happened to her and how
she was affected.
A recount is a story about past events, usually in the order in which they occur.
Let’s take another look at a clip from today’s episode. Listen for the past tense verbs
in Simone’s story.
I was just so physically fit and also

emotionally I was on top of the world. I had
a really good job at this time, and I was
getting married.
She says ‘I was so physically fit, I was on

top of the world. I had a really good job’
Here, ‘was’ and ‘had’ are past tense verbs.
They’re irregular verbs.
Let’s compare the three forms of these irregular verbs.
Page 1 of 5
From the infinitive form of the verb ‘to be’, we
can form the simple present forms: ‘am’, ‘is’
and ‘are’; and we can also make the simple
past forms – ‘was or were’.
Notice that the verb to be is the only verb in

English that has two past tense forms. All
others just have one.
Let’s do the same for the verb ‘ to have’.
What is the simple present for of the verb ‘to

have’?
‘Has’, or ‘have’.
And the simple past form?
‘Had’.
When you learn new verbs, it’s important to

learn them with all their different forms, so
make sure you write verbs down in a
notebook, and work out all their different
tenses as well.
When you are recounting a story that

happened in the past, you’ll need to use all
these simple past tense forms of verbs.
You’ll also need to use a variety of ‘transition signals’ - words that help to order the
events.
Using transition signals will help the reader or listener follow the order of events in
the story.
Listen for the transition signal in this clip.
I just felt terribly nauseous and I woke up with pins and needles down one side of my
leg, and then it worked its way up towards my arm and across.
She uses the word ‘then’. ‘Then’ is very common in informal spoken language, so
are other more informal transition signals like ‘next’ or ‘after that’.
Simone said she had a feeling of pins and needles in her leg. ‘Then’ it worked its
way to her arm.
In more formal language, you might find transition signals like ‘at first’ or
‘subsequently, or ‘after a while’.
Page 2 of 5
If we wanted to make Simone’s story clearer, we could add some transition signals to
her story.
If we were writing her story, we might use more formal transition signals.
Simone had a feeling of pins and needles in her leg. ‘Then’ it worked its way to her
arm.
We might say:
‘At first,’ Simone had a feeling of pins and needles in her leg. ‘After a while,’ it
worked its way to her arm.
Notice that transition signals like this are often followed by commas.
Adding transition signals has made Simone’s story clearer. You can more easily see
the order of events. This is very important in more formal language.
Try to make sure you learn and use a number of different transition signals.
Now let’s have another listen to a clip of Simone talking about her illness.
Pay attention to the type of sentences that Simone uses. Are the sentences simple,
compound or complex?
It worked its way up towards my arm and across. I was just immobile. I couldn't
move. I couldn't walk. I was paralysed on this side of my body.
Most of the sentences that Simone uses are ‘simple’ sentences.
If we wanted to write an account of Simone’s illness, we could join up some of these

sentences to make ‘compound’ and ‘complex’ sentences.
We form ‘compound’ and ‘complex’ sentences by joining simple sentences and

phrases together.
Simone says:
‘I was just immobile. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t walk.’
But we could edit this to say:
‘I was just immobile. I couldn’t move or walk.’
Or :
‘I was just immobile. I could neither move nor walk.’
OK, now let’s finish with a quick look at the words used in the clip. Listen to the clip
one more time, and then we’ll talk about a quick way to build your vocabulary.
Page 3 of 5
Listen again…
I was just immobile. I couldn't move. I couldn't walk. I was paralysed on this side of
my body.
Simone says she was ‘immobile’.
The prefix ‘im-’ is used to make the opposites of words beginning with ‘m’ or ‘p’.
‘Im-’ means not, so ‘immobile’ is the opposite of ‘mobile’ – it means not mobile.
So we can have ‘mobile’ and ‘immobile’,
‘mature’, and ‘immature’,
‘polite’ and ‘impolite’,
‘patient’ and ‘impatient’.
Knowing the opposites of words is very important.
Many words just have a different word that means the opposite, like:
‘hot, cold’, ‘happy, sad’, ‘in, out’ ‘up, down’;
but other words take prefixes that mean not – like ‘un-’, ‘de-’, ‘dis’, ‘in-‘.
Listen to some of the clip again. Then we’ll look at a how a few more opposites are
formed.
The major signs of having had a stroke that most people would equate with is
weakness, so paralysis of an arm, leg or face. In others it can be a loss of speech or
inability to communicate.
I was just so physically fit and also emotionally I was on top of the world.
He says a sign of a stroke can be an ‘inability’ to communicate.
He uses the ‘in-’ prefix meaning ‘not’.
‘Inability’ means not having the ability, and here’s a few more opposites.
She says she was physically fit, emotionally on top of the world.
The opposite of ‘fit’ is’ unfit’.
The opposite of ‘emotionally’ is ‘unemotionally’.
Page 4 of 5
A great tip is to try to find words with opposite meanings. Some words have several
meanings, so they have several opposites as well. A good thesaurus will really help
you with this.
And that’s all from me today. Don’t forget to practice forming compound and
complex sentences. And remember to practice reading and writing in English every
day. I’ll see you next time on Study English. Bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 12: CARBON CYCLE
Hello, I’m Margot Politis. Welcome again to Study English, IELTS preparation.
Today, we’re going to look at cycles, at phrasal verbs, and then we’ll finish with a bit
of punctuation.
But now, here’s a man who is a microbiologist and a mushroom grower.
He’s talking about mushrooms, and the part they play in the carbon cycle.
They occur naturally in the forests as wood

degrading fungi. That's their job. When trees
die, they grow on the tree. They break down
the lignin and the cellulose, which is the most
resistant form of carbon, and they break it
down, produce mushrooms and, in turn, you
end up with organic matter going back into
the soil, and so the carbon cycle in the forest
goes on.
The speaker, Noel Arrold, is talking about

how mushrooms grow ‘naturally’.
They are an important part of the carbon cycle, but what is a ‘cycle’?
A ‘cycle’ is a process that is repeated over and over. It goes around and around.
But how do we know this from listening to Noel?
When trees die, they grow on the tree. They

break down the lignin and the cellulose,
which is the most resistant form of carbon,
and they break it down, produce mushrooms
and, in turn, you end up with organic matter
going back into the soil, and so the carbon
cycle in the forest goes on.
He says ‘and so the carbon cycle in the forest

goes on.’
By saying ‘the cycle goes on’ he is telling us

that this process happens again and again.
At the end of the description, you need to signal that the process goes back to the
beginning again.
We can say:
‘The process goes on.’
Page 1 of 5
‘The process begins again.’
‘The process repeats itself.’
In a cycle, there is no real end or beginning, because the process just keeps going.
When describing a cycle, we need to start somewhere, then describe, in order, each
part of the cycle.
There are many different ways of describing the stages of a cycle. We can use
transitional signals like ‘when’, ‘once’, ‘then’, or next’. When speaking, you can also
use pauses and intonation to describe a cycle. In written language, this becomes
punctuation.
Listen to Noel Arrold again describing the different parts of the cycle.
When trees die, they grow on the tree.
He says:
‘When trees die, they grow on the tree.’
‘When trees die comma, they grow on the

tree.’
The first part of the cycle is that the trees die.
The second part is that when the trees die,

fungi grow on the trees.
That’s the next stage.
They break down the lignin and the cellulose, which is the most resistant form of
carbon, and they break it down, produce mushrooms.
OK, he says that the fungi break down the lignin and the cellulose. They break down
the tree.
So the third stage is that the fungi break down the tree.
Fourth, they produce mushrooms.
carbon, and they break it down, produce mushrooms and, in turn, you end up with
organic matter going back into the soil.
Page 2 of 5
He says ‘in turn’ organic matter goes back into the soil.
‘In turn’ signals the next stage of the process. ‘In turn’ means ‘next’, or ‘because of
that’.
That’s the fifth stage. The organic matter goes back into the soil.
And then what happens?
They break down the lignin and the cellulose,

and, in turn, you end up with organic matter
The carbon cycle in the forest goes on.
The organic matter helps new trees to grow again, and then those trees die. We’re
back to the first stage again. This is the carbon cycle.
OK, now we’re going to look at some ‘phrasal verbs’.
‘Phrasal verbs’ consist of a verb followed by a preposition. This forms a new verb,
one sometimes related to the original verb, but sometimes not.
‘Phrasal verbs’ are idiomatic. There’s no pattern to the meanings they take, and they
often have a number of different meanings.
You often can’t just guess the meanings of phrasal verbs, you have to learn them.
Let’s look at the phrasal verbs in this clip.
They break down the lignin and the cellulose

and, in turn you, end up with organic matter
There were four phrasal verbs.
They were:
‘break down’, ‘end up’, and two using go – ‘go back’ and ‘go on’.
Page 3 of 5
Notice that sometimes the preposition will give you an indication as to what the
phrasal verb might mean.
Let’s look at these four.
See if you can match the meanings.
‘Break up’, ‘end up’, ‘go on’, ‘go back’,
and ‘finish’, ‘continue’, ‘decompose’, ‘return’.
Well ‘break up’ means to ‘decompose’, ‘go back’ means to ‘return’, ‘go on’ means to
‘continue’, and ‘end up’ means to’ finish’.
But notice that ‘break up’ can sometimes mean ‘finish’ as well – we can ‘break up’
from school.
In formal writing, we would be more likely to use words like ‘continue’ or ‘return’, than
phrasal verbs, which tend to be less formal.
Phrasal verbs are difficult to learn because there are so many of them.
Look at ‘go’. We’ve already seen it with ‘go back’ and ‘go on’, but there’s many,
many more, and remember, most of these have more than one meaning.
It takes a lot of time to get used to all the phrasal verbs and what they mean. You
need to listen carefully to people speaking, and the way they use phrasal verbs.
Another important thing to do is to write them down in groups – and buy a good
phrasal verb dictionary.
So pay attention to those phrasal verbs. Learning them in groups can be fun, and
your spoken English will sound much more natural.
Now we’re going to look at some writing tips.
For variety, it’s important that you use a lot of different of sentence types, of different
lengths. The difficult thing is finding the balance.
You can join together short sentence using ‘conjunctions’, but what do you do with
sentences that are too long?
This sentence has many ideas, all joined together with ‘and’.
How many ‘ands’ are there in the sentence?
carbon, and they break it down, produce mushrooms and, in turn, you end up with
organic matter going back into the soil, and so the carbon cycle in the forest goes on.
Page 4 of 5
There are four ‘ands’. This sentence is too long, and should be edited. The ideas
can be broken down into smaller groups and shorter, clearer sentences.
There are several ways of doing this. We can use ‘punctuation’, ‘conjunctions’ and
‘connectors’.
So let’s have a look. Here’s the full sentence.
We can start by using ‘punctuation’.
Use a ‘comma’ to separate clauses.
Use ‘full stops’ to separate complete ideas and you can replace some of the ‘ands’
with full stops, but remember the new sentence must now start with a capital letter.
Now we have a clear paragraph, expressing a number of ideas with different kinds of
sentences.
And the carbon cycle goes on, but we can’t go on – it’s time to end this episode of
Study English, but I’ll see you next time. Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 14: JUNK DNA
Today we’re going to look at ‘conditional sentences’. They’re sentences that use ‘if’.
‘If’ you listen carefully, you’ll be able to hear Dr Malcolm Simons talking about junk
DNA, the parts of DNA that people used to think were just rubbish. Listen to the
different types of sentences he uses.
Under Darwinistic notions, you would think that junk would drop off under the theory
of natural selection, just like species drop off if they hit ecological niches, which is
incompatible with survival. If they can adapt to those niches, then those that can,
survive, and those that can’t, die, is the notion. If you apply that to the DNA
sequence, then the coding region genes, which survive, have a function, and by the
way the non-coding sequences have survived as well. So the proposition would
have to be that if they’re there, they’ve got a function.
In listening to Dr Simons, you can hear that he uses a variety of sentences. This
makes for much more interesting language. You should practice using sentences of
different lengths and types, especially complex sentences.
Today we’re going to look at one of the ways you can create complex sentences
using an ‘if clause’.
An ‘if clause’ is a phrase that gives a condition that’s necessary for something else to
happen.
They’re often called ‘conditional clauses’.
‘If’ means ‘when’, ‘provided that’, or ‘on condition that.’
There are a few basic patterns for the ‘if’ clause.
Listen to this.
If they can adapt to those niches, then those that can, survive, and those that can’t,
die.
So the proposition would have to be that if they’re there, they’ve got a function.
‘If’ they can adapt, ‘then’ those that can survive.
The pattern here is: ‘if’ + simple present tense verb, then …’.
‘Then’ introduces a clause describing the consequences.
Look at the second example in the extract.
‘If they are there, they have got a function.’
Page 1 of 5
Notice that the ‘then’ is left out in this example. ‘Then’ is optional.
He could have said ‘if they are there, then they have a function’.
Let’s look at some more.
‘If you have a university education, then you have more opportunities.’
But the ‘then’ is optional – you can leave it out.
‘If you have a university education, you have more opportunities.’
Notice that this pattern can be reversed.
‘You have more opportunities if you have a university education.’
We never include ‘then’ when the pattern is

reversed like this.
Let’s try with the example from the story.
‘If they’re there, they have a function.’
‘They have got a function, if they’re there.’
OK, now here’s the second pattern for ‘if’

sentences.
This is for when the suggestion is less definite, or less likely.
‘If you had a university education, then you would

have more opportunities.’
The pattern here is: ‘if + past tense, then + would

+ verb’.
‘If you had a university education, then you would

have more opportunities.’
We use this pattern when we are talking about

the future, and about something that may not be
as likely to happen.
Compare these 2 patterns.
‘If you study hard, then you will pass your test.’
‘If you studied hard, then you would pass your test.’
Page 2 of 5
In the first example, it’s a bit like making a useful suggestion.
The second sentence is less definite, and less polite. It suggests that the person
doesn’t study hard now.
So that’s 2 ways of making the ‘conditional tense’ – how to say that one thing will
happen, or might happen, if something else happens. There are other forms of the
conditional tense too.
If you learn them, then your English will improve!
OK, now we’re going to look at ways of making opposites by using prefixes.
Listen to Dr Simons again.
of natural selection, just like species drop off if they hit ecological niches, which is
incompatible with survival. If they can adapt to those niches, then those that can,
survive, and those that can’t, die, is the notion.
If you apply that to the DNA sequence, then the coding region genes, which survive,
have a function and by the way the non-coding sequences have survived as well.
In the passage we heard the words ‘survive’ and ‘die’. They have opposite
meanings.
‘To survive’ means to keep on living and ‘to die’ means to stop living. We call words
with opposite meanings ‘opposites’.
Sometimes opposites are formed from the same word stem using prefixes. Two of
the prefixes he uses are ‘in’ and ‘non’.
Listen
And by the way the non-coding sequences have survived as well.
He calls the junk DNA the ‘non-coding sequences’.
‘Non-coding’ means not coding. Notice that we

use a hyphen with the ‘non-’ prefix.
‘Non-’ usually forms adjectives.
It means ‘not in the group of’, so we have ‘non-

European’, ‘non-Aboriginal’ or ‘non-government’.
‘Non-’ can also just means ‘not’, giving a negative

sense to a word - ‘non-fiction’, ‘non-smoking’ and
‘non-stick’.
Page 3 of 5
The prefix ‘in’ is used with adjectives as well. It also makes opposites, and means
‘not’.
It forms words like: ‘insignificant’, not significant; ‘inexpensive’, not expensive;

‘intolerant’, not tolerant.
Another common opposite prefix is ‘un-’.
We can have ‘unfair’, ‘unattractive’, ‘unusual’,

‘unnatural’.
But ‘un-’ can also be used with verbs. It means

that an action is reversed.
So we have ‘undo’, ‘undress’ or ‘unbend’.
There aren’t many rules about what sorts of

words take these prefixes. You’ll have to learn
most opposites one by one.
A good way to do this is to try to find out the opposite every time you come across a
new word.
Finally for today, let’s have a look at how you can form adjectives from people’s
names.
of natural selection.
He says ‘under Darwinistic notions’.
‘Darwinistic’ here is an adjective, but it’s got a capital letter – do you know why?
Well, that’s because It comes from the name ’Darwin’ – referring to Charles Darwin,
who developed the theory of natural selection.
But it’s got 2 suffixes – ‘-ist’, and ‘-ic’.
The ‘-ic’ suffix forms adjectives that mean belonging to, or like. So ‘Darwinistic’
means ‘like a Darwinist’.
But a ‘Darwinist’?
Well the suffix ‘-ist’ forms adjectives too, but it forms an adjective that describes a
type of person with a certain set of beliefs.
When ‘-ist’ is added to people’s names, it means someone who follows that person,
or who believes in what they wrote or said.
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So we can have a ‘Darwinist’, someone who believes in Darwin’s theories, or a
‘Marxist’, someone who follows the writings of Marx, or a ‘Buddhist’, someone who
follows the teachings of the Buddha.
Well, we’re out of time for today. Remember to watch out for those opposites, and
try using ‘if’ clauses.
See you next time. Bye Bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 15: SEA FLOOR
Today on Study English we’re looking at ‘adjectives’. How do you use them, how do
you order them, and how do you use them to compare and describe things?
First, let’s listen to some descriptions about the world under the sea, in the Gulf of
Carpentaria, off the north coast of Australia. It’s quite an amazing place.
We know more about the surface of the moon or the surface of Mars, than we do
about the sea floor. The sea floor remains the last unexplored frontier. This is
because it's covered by this impenetrable ocean layer that we can't see through. The
only way we can see the sea floor is using sonar.
The largest reef they mapped is about 10 or so kilometres across. It's an oval-shaped
feature, so it covers around 100 square kilometres. Because of the fact that they are
submerged in 30m or so of water, the reefs are very hard to see. No one had
realised that the Gulf contained reefs just like the Great Barrier Reef.
Being able to describe things properly is an important communication skill.
You need ‘adjectives’ for descriptions.
They usually come before the nouns they are describing.
‘The red car.’
But when you want to accurately describe something, you often need to use more
than one adjective in a row.
What if the car is big, red, and made of plastic?
We call it ‘the big, red, plastic car’.
Notice that the adjectives are usually separated

by commas.
But why don’t we call it the ‘red, plastic, big

car’?
How do you know which order to put the

adjectives in?
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Well, for native speakers, it’s just that it sounds right, but luckily, there are some
rules.
It’s called the ‘royal order of adjectives’.
Let’s have a look at it.
First we have the ‘determiner’. That’s ‘articles’

[a, an, the], ‘numbers’, or the word that
describes the amount of something. It can also
be the ‘owner’, the person or thing who the
noun belongs to.
So determiners can be ‘a’, ‘the’, ‘many’, ‘some’,

or a name, like ‘John’s’.
So we have ‘a car’, ‘many cars’, ‘John’s car’.
The second type of adjective is ‘opinion’ or ‘observation’. This tells you something
about the quality of the noun - useful, cheap, ugly, beautiful.
Then we have ‘size’, for example enormous, tiny, huge;
followed by ‘age’, it could be old, modern, 7-year-old;
then ‘shape’, perhaps oval, circular or flat;
a ‘colour’, like white, black or blue.
Then we have adjectives that describe ‘origin’, where the noun is from, for example
Thai, Indonesian, Australian;
followed by ‘material’, what the thing is made of, like copper, plastic or wooden.
Lastly, is the ‘qualifier. This is something that’s an integral part of the noun.
Examples might be a rocking chair, a wedding ring, an electric oven.
There are of course a few exceptions to these rules, but it’s important that you learn
them, and practice them whenever you can.
Have a look at these words, and see if you can turn them into a phrase:
‘wooden’ ‘square’ ‘useful’ ‘box’ ‘Lily’s’
Well, ‘box’ is the noun, but what comes first?
The ‘determiner’. Whose box is it? It’s Lily’s box.
So ‘Lily’s’ comes first.
Page 2 of 5
Then that’s followed by the ‘observation’ – the box is ‘useful’.
Then, the ‘shape’. It’s ‘square’.
Then, finally the material. It’s a ‘wooden’ box.
So we have ‘Lily’s useful, square, wooden box’.
Good. Now let’s listen to some strings of adjectives from the clip.
The sea floor remains the last unexplored frontier. This is because it's covered by
this impenetrable ocean layer that we can't see through. The largest reef they
mapped is about 10 or so kilometres across.
He calls the sea floor ‘the last unexplored frontier’.
Let’s look at that phrase.
‘Frontier’ is the noun. The others are all describing the noun.
First, we have the determiners ‘the’ and ‘last’
‘Last’ expresses a number, so it goes second.
Then ‘unexplored’. That’s an observation. It’s a quality of the frontier.
OK. Now what about ‘this impenetrable ocean layer’?
Well, ‘layer’ is the noun. All the other words are ‘adjectives’.
‘This’ is the determiner.
‘Impenetrable’ is an observation. It describes a quality of the ocean layer.
‘Ocean’ here is the qualifier. Almost part of the noun, it’s not just a ‘layer’, it’s an
‘ocean layer’.
OK, now you try one.
Look at these words. They form a phrase that he used: ‘largest’, ‘reef’, ‘the’.
Well, ‘reef ‘is the noun, so it comes last.
The’ is a determiner, so it comes first.
‘Largest’ describes the size, so that comes after ‘the’.
So we have ‘the largest reef’.
OK. There’s another way adjectives can be used as well.
Page 3 of 5
They can stand alone. They describe nouns by following the verb ‘to be’.
When used in this way, adjectives are ‘complements’.
Listen to one here.
The Gulf of Carpentaria is very flat and

featureless.
‘The Gulf of Carpentaria is very flat and

featureless’.
In a phrase, this would be ‘the very flat,

featureless Gulf of Carpentaria’.
But used as a ‘complement’, the phrase

becomes a full sentence.
‘The Gulf of Carpentaria is very flat and featureless’.
We can take the phrase ‘the big red car’ and turn it into a sentence.
‘The car is big, red and plastic’.
Notice that the order of adjectives still stays the same.
Now, let’s look at how you go about describing things. It’s often necessary to focus
on particular features, such as shape, size, dimension, weight, colour or texture.
The more you have built up your vocabulary of adjectives, the better your ability to
describe things accurately.
So you might write up adjective lists according to groups.
To describe shapes we can say:
‘circular’, ‘triangular’, ‘rectangular’, ‘spherical’, but we just say ‘square’.
It’s also possible to describe something by saying it’s ‘like’ something common.
So we can say something is ‘egg-shaped’, or ‘kidney-shaped’.
Listen.
The largest reef they mapped is about 10 or so kilometres across. It's an oval-
shaped feature, so it covers around 100 square kilometres.
When you’re writing, you should always aim to make your descriptions as accurate
as you can.
Page 4 of 5
But sometimes you can’t be exact, and you need just describe something
approximately.
The largest reef they mapped is about 10 or so kilometres across. It's an oval-shaped
feature, so it covers around 100 square kilometres. Because of the fact that they are
submerged in 30m or so of water, they reefs are very hard to see.
Dr Harris uses the words ‘about’, ‘around’, ‘or so’ with numbers.
‘About’ 10 kilometres or so.
‘Around’ 100 square kilometres.
30 metres ‘or so’.
Notice that the phrase ‘or so’, always comes after the number, but the others all
come before.
You might also hear people say ‘around about’.
In formal language, we’d probably say ‘approximately’.
These are all signs that the amount is not exact.
And now, it’s around about time for me to go. I’ll see you next time for more Study
English.
Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 16: DVT
Hello, and welcome again to Study English, IELTS Preparation. I’m Margot Politis.
If you’ve been on a flight recently, you will have heard about the danger of sitting still
for a long time in an aeroplane, apart from the danger of boredom that is!
The danger is from a condition called ‘deep vein

thrombosis’, or ‘DVT’.
Today on Study English we’ll listen to a doctor

talk about DVT, then we’re going to look at how
to talk about things that might happen in the
future.
Deep vein thrombosis is where a clot forms in

the calf veins and occasionally in the veins of
the leg, sometimes in the veins of the pelvis,
and this is a great concern because the clot may dislodge, travelling with the flow of
blood into the right side of the heart and from there into the lung.
When we’re travelling on long haul flights, several things happen. First of all, we’re
stationery. We’re not moving our legs, so there’s no physiological compression of
the calf muscles. Blood tends to sit in the veins and may clot.
Number two, the environment is dry. We dehydrate, we may drink some alcohol. We
dehydrate even further. Alcohol’s a diuretic agent, and it results in us actually drying
out, and that makes the blood a little bit thicker and stickier, and these factors lead to
clotting.
Sometimes, in perhaps particularly the economy section of an aeroplane, we may be

a little bit cramped and our leg may be slightly compressed on the seat. This could
further prevent blood flow back to the heart and trap blood in the leg, where clotting
may occur.
Dr Crantock was talking about things that that ‘could’ happen, ‘may’ happen, or
‘perhaps’ will happen in the future.
‘Perhaps’ is an adverb. It is a word like maybe

or possibly. It gives a statement the sense that
the speaker is not sure if the thing will happen.
‘Perhaps I will’ means the same as ‘possibly I

will’, or ‘maybe I will’.
‘May’ and ‘could’ are modal verbs.
‘May’ has a number of meanings. The most

common use is when you are asking
‘permission’.
Page 1 of 5
‘May I come in? Yes you may.’
But the other use of ‘may’ is to talk about possibilities in the future.
‘I may come in tomorrow’ means in the future, I will possibly come in, but it’s not
definite.
‘Could’ has a number of meanings too.
The first is ‘ability’.
‘When I was little I could swim’ means when I was young, I was able to swim.
But ‘could’ is also used to express future possibilities.
‘It could rain tomorrow’. It’s not definite, but it might rain.
Dr Crantok is talking about what can happen sometimes on flights, but it won’t
definitely happen. Listen again.
Sometimes, in perhaps particularly the economy section of the aeroplane, we may be

a little bit cramped and our leg may be slightly compressed on the seat. This could
further prevent blood flow back to the heart and trap blood in the leg, where clotting
could occur.
So for speculating, or thinking about what will happen in the future, we can use
adverbials like ‘possibly’ or ‘perhaps’;
we can use modal verbs like ‘may’ and ‘could’;
and we can use phrases like ‘I guess’, ‘I imagine’, ‘I suspect’.
So in the clip he says ‘blood clotting could occur’.
We can also say:
‘Blood clotting may occur.’
‘Blood clotting will perhaps occur.’
‘Blood clotting will possibly occur.’
‘I suspect blood clotting will occur.’
Notice that the adverbials can occur in a number of places in the sentence.
‘Blood clotting will perhaps occur.’
‘Perhaps blood clotting will occur.’
Page 2 of 5
‘Blood clotting perhaps will occur.’
‘Blood clotting will occur perhaps.’
Listen to Dr Crantock and the way he structures his argument. Listen for a topic
sentence, and for the way he lists the different ideas.
clotting.
The first sentence is the topic sentence. He said ‘When we’re travelling on long haul
flights, several things happen’.
So we know from this topic sentence, that he is going to tell us about traveling on
long haul flights.
But there are lots of things you can say about travelling on long haul flights. So he
says something else in this sentence that gives us more information. He says
‘several things happen’.
This phrase is called the controlling idea. Every

topic sentence has a controlling idea. It tells us
what the focus of the paragraph will be.
So he’s going to be discussing several things

that happen on long haul flights.
In the rest of the paragraph, he lists some of the

things that happen. He raises the points one by
one, and discusses them in detail.
clotting.
Dr Crantock says ‘first of all, we’re stationary’.
This is the first factor in his argument. People are stationary, or sitting still.
Page 3 of 5
He says ‘Number two, the environment is dry’. This indicates it is the second factor in
his argument.
Moving on through the argument, you can keep discussing factors by using transition
signals such as:
‘another factor is’;
‘in addition’ or ‘additionally’;
‘furthermore’;
‘above all’.
You could also use ‘next’, but this is quite informal as well.
The last reason or item in the list could be introduced by ‘lastly’ or ‘finally’.
It good practice to watch out for these transition devices when listening to someone
talk. They’ll help you follow an argument more clearly.
Finally for today, let’s look at some definitions. Doctor Crantock gives a definition of
the condition he is talking about, because it’s an unusual medical term.
Deep vein thrombosis is where a clot forms in

the calf veins and occasionally in the veins of
the leg, sometimes in the veins of the pelvis.
He says: ‘Deep vein thrombosis is where a clot

forms in the calf veins’.
This is common pattern for giving a definition.
First, name the thing being defined. In this

case, it’s:
‘Deep vein thrombosis …’.
Secondly, use the verb to be – ‘is’ or ‘are’.
Here, we’d say:
‘Deep vein thrombosis is …’
Thirdly, we can write the class. What kind of thing is it? In this case, DVT is ‘a
medical condition’.
Page 4 of 5
So we might have:
‘Deep vein thrombosis is a condition …’.
Next we use a word like which, who, where, or that.
‘Deep vein thrombosis is a condition where …’
And finally we give the characteristics of the thing. This could be a physical
description, or a description of behavior. In the case of a medical condition, this
would most commonly be the symptoms or effects of the condition.
‘Deep vein thrombosis is a condition where blood clots form in veins.’
Let’s try a couple of examples.
What is a ‘computer’? It ‘stores and processes information’.
‘A computer’, ‘is’, ‘a machine’, ‘that’, ‘stores and processes information’.
What is an ‘accountant’? Well we have the phrase ‘analyse and deal with finances’.
‘An accountant’ ‘is’ ‘a person’ ‘who’ ‘analyses and deals with finances’.
And what is the time? The time is something that we have run out of for today.
See you next time on Study English. Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 17: WATER AND AGEING
Hello and welcome to Study English. I’m Margot Politis.
Today on Study English, we’re going to look at some of the features of formal, written
English.
In our clip, we’ll hear from a man who believes that drinking water is the key to being
healthy and living a long time.
He’s going to talk about how he came to his conclusion, and how he tried to get
some support for his project.
How does nature do it? What keeps body cells going and how can we improve on
that process so that we eliminate disease altogether and we live a long and healthy
life? I don’t think death and disease is inevitable.
We stumbled on the fact that they weren’t actually getting rid of carbon dioxide out of
their bodies, they were neutralising the carbon dioxide in their bodies, and we found
out it was from the water they were drinking.
When we looked at these animals and saw what they were doing, it was exactly as
we’d hypothesised and that was a great feeling. A real feeling of elation.
I tried and I tried and I tried to be conventional in that sense. I went to one hundred
people. I wrote one thousand letters. I spoke to the Australian Academy of Science.
I spoke to the American Academy of Science. I spoke to hospitals. I spoke to
professors of medicine, because I wanted to do work independently. I couldn’t get
anywhere, so I had to do it other ways.
This is a food substance, this is something

that’s been drunk for thousands of years. This
is probably where the mythology of the fountain
of youth came from. There would have been
natural springs somewhere bubbling out
magnesium bicarbonate at an alkaline pH
value. And people that drank these springs
lived longer.
But I want everybody to have the opportunity to

live a long and healthy life, and that’s been my
life’s work, and we’re getting somewhere, we’re getting somewhere.
One of the most important areas for students to master is the difference between
informal spoken language and formal written English, including academic language.
Page 1 of 6
There are many differences between formal and informal English.
Firstly, in written language, all words must be

spelt correctly. There should be no words in
written English that you can’t find in a
dictionary.
Another important difference is that contractions

are not used in formal written English. We only
use contractions in written English if we’re
trying to represent the way that people speak.
The clip we’ve heard today is, of course,

spoken English. Listen to part of it again and see if you can identify the features of
informal English.
But I want everybody to have the opportunity to live a long and healthy life, and that’s
been my life’s work, and we’re getting somewhere, we’re getting somewhere.
When Dr Beckett is speaking he uses a number of contractions.
He says ‘That’s been my life’s work’, and ‘We’re getting somewhere’.
‘That’s’ is short for ‘that is’, and ‘we’re’ is short for ‘we are’.
So if we were writing these statements, we’d write:
‘That has been my life’s work.’
‘We are getting somewhere.’
There are many common contractions. By using them in your spoken language, you
will sound more natural. But be careful to write them out in full in formal situations.
Watch for ‘not’ words like:
‘couldn’t, could not’,
‘wouldn’t, would not’,
‘shouldn’t, should not’,
‘won’t, will not’,
and ‘don’t, do not’.
Page 2 of 6
Another common feature of informal English is
the use of phrasal verbs, or two word verbs.
Phrasal verbs consist of a ‘verb’ and a

‘preposition’. They are commonly used in
spoken English, and their meanings are
idiomatic, giving the verb a special, new
meaning.
Listen for some phrasal verbs in this clip.
We stumbled on the fact that they weren’t actually getting rid of carbon dioxide out of
their bodies. They were neutralising the carbon dioxide in their bodies, and we found
out it was from the water they were drinking.
This is probably where the mythology of the fountain of youth came from.
He uses the phrasal verbs “stumbled on’, ‘get rid of’, ‘found out’ and ‘came from’.
In formal written English, it’s best to use single word verbs.
So instead of saying:
‘They weren’t getting rid of carbon dioxide’,
we would write:
‘They weren’t eliminating carbon dioxide’,
and then we’d get rid of the contraction, so it would read:
‘They were not eliminating carbon dioxide.
Instead of saying:
‘We found out it was from the water’,
we would write:
‘We discovered it was from the water’.
‘This is probably where the myth came from.’
‘This is probably where the myth originated.’
Page 3 of 6
Let’s look at some other examples of common phrasal verbs.
Instead of ‘look into’, we would write

‘investigate’.
Instead of ‘cut down’, we would write ‘reduce’.
‘Keep on’ could be ‘continue’.
‘Point out’ could be ‘indicate.’
All of these words are more formal than using

phrasal verbs.
Another important part of formal written English, is understanding how to use

conjunctions.
‘Short sentences’ are less formal than ‘compound or complex sentences’. If you can,
it’s good to try to link short sentences together.
Listen to this clip, then we’ll try to turn it into good formal English using coordinating
conjunctions.
I went to one hundred people. I wrote a thousand letters. I spoke to the Australian
Academy of Science. I spoke to the American Academy of Science. I spoke to
hospitals. I spoke to professors of Medicine, because I wanted to do work
independently. I couldn’t get anywhere.
He uses a number of simple sentences in a row.
I spoke to the Australian Academy of Science.

I spoke to the American Academy of Science.
I spoke to hospitals.
I spoke to professors of Medicine.
These could become:
‘I spoke to the Australian Academy of Science, the American Academy of Science

and hospitals.
I also spoke to professors of Medicine.’
There are some rules to be aware of when you’re using conjunctions.
In formal English, we don’t start sentences with coordinating conjunctions.
Words like ‘and’ and ‘but’ are joining words. They are not used to begin sentences.
Listen to Dr Bechett again. Notice how he uses conjunctions to start his sentences.
Page 4 of 6
There would have been natural springs somewhere bubbling out magnesium
bicarbonate at an alkaline pH value. And people that drank these springs lived
longer. But I want everybody to have the opportunity to live a long and healthy life,
and that’s been my life’s work.
He uses the word ‘and’ to begin a sentence.
If we were writing a formal report or essay, we would have to find other words to
replace ‘and’.
We could begin the sentence with:
‘Furthermore’,
‘In addition’, or
‘Moreover’.
We could replace the word ‘but’ with the word ‘however’.
You should make lists of these alternative words, so you use a variety of them in your
written language.
It’s important to avoid repetition in your formal written English.
Of course repetition can be used to add emphasis in spoken English.
You might hear people say things like ‘I really, really like that’.
But in formal academic writing, you should find other ways of adding emphasis.
Listen to the way Russell uses repetition.
I tried and I tried and I tried to be conventional

in that sense. I went to one hundred people. I
wrote one thousand letters. I spoke to the
Australian Academy of Science. I spoke to the
American Academy of Science. I spoke to
hospitals. I spoke to professors of medicine,
because I wanted to do work independently. I
couldn’t get anywhere.
Russell says ‘I tried and I tried and I tried.’
To make this sentence more formal, you could either just drop the repeated verb, or
use an adverb like ‘repeatedly’.
We could just write:
‘I tried.’
Page 5 of 6
or,
‘I tried repeatedly.’
Another way you can make your language more formal is to use the prefix ‘re-‘ to
indicate a repeated action. This doesn’t apply to all verbs.
Look at this sentence.
‘He played and played the song again and again.’
We could write formally:
He replayed the song repeatedly.
And why don’t you try practising ways of making spoken language more formal, or
looking at ways that you can take formal, written language, and turn it into
conversational English!
That’s all for today, I hope I’ll see you next time on Study English. Bye bye.
Page 6 of 6
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 18: SALINITY
Hello, I’m Margot Politis. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation.
Today we’re going to see an animation about a process called ‘salinity’, that’s where
land becomes damaged by too much salt.
We’ll be looking at language you can use to describe processes, including transition
signals. Listen for how the process of salinity is described here.
One of the main causes of salinity is waterlogging. First, land is cleared for crops to
grow. Now, instead of trees pumping the water out of the ground, and keeping the
salt stored, whatever water the crops don’t use percolates down into the soil.
Gradually, over a number of years, the earth gets

wetter and wetter, and eventually it waterlogs.
Then, the water table starts to rise to the surface.
As it rises, it dissolves the tonnes of salt stored in
the soil.
Once the water table comes to within two metres

of the surface, it begins to evaporate. Lastly, the
sun extracts the moisture from the ground,
leaving the salt concentrated on the surface.
The first casualties of this dramatic land change, and the dry land salinity that it
causes, are ecosystems.
We heard a description of a process. A process has a number of steps from

beginning to end.
When describing a process, the first sentence, or ‘topic sentence’, should tell us what
the main idea of the paragraph is, and what the process is leading to.
Listen to the topic sentence.
One of the main causes of salinity is

waterlogging.
‘One of the main causes of salinity is

waterlogging.’
This topic sentence tells us that the paragraph is

about ‘salinity’, that is, land becoming salty.
And the sentence tells us that one of the main causes of this problem is
‘waterlogging’.
So from this sentence, we expect that the paragraph will be about the process of land
becoming waterlogged, leading to salinity.
Page 1 of 5
When we describe a process, it is important that the reader understands when each
part of the process happens, what order things happen in.
Listen again to the passage, and watch for the words that order the stages of the
process.
First, land is cleared for crops to grow. Now,

instead of trees pumping the water out of the
ground, and keeping the salt stored, whatever
water the crops don’t use percolates down into
the soil.

the soil.
Once the water table comes to within two metres of the surface, it begins to
evaporate.
Lastly, the sun extracts the moisture from the ground, leaving the salt concentrated
on the surface.
She uses a range of transition signals to order the stages of the process.
One type of transition signal is ordinal numbers. Listen.
One of the main causes of salinity is waterlogging. First, land is cleared for crops to
grow.
The ordinal numbers are ‘first’, ‘second’, ‘third’,

‘fourth’ and so on.
These ordinal numbers can be used as adjectives

to form phrases describing order.
We can either just start the sentence with:
‘First,’
‘Second,’
or we can use them in phrases like these:
‘The first step is’;
‘The second stage begins when’;
‘The third part is’.
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We can also add ‘ly’ to ordinal numbers to make adverbs:
‘firstly’, ‘secondly’, ‘thirdly’, ‘fourthly’, etc.
Using these words is a very common and simple

way of ordering stages in a process.
You can also use them to organise any group of

ideas, examples or points in an argument.
Another type of transition signal is time phrases

she uses is time phrases.
Gradually, over a number of years, the earth gets wetter and wetter,
‘Gradually, over a number of years, the earth gets wetter and wetter.’
The phrase ‘Gradually, over a number of years’, tells us that this part of the process
takes place ‘gradually’, ‘slowly’, ‘over a number of years’, ‘over many years’.
It is a long, slow process.
‘Over a number of years’ is a time phrase. Using time phrases helps to make the
descriptions of processes clearer.
Other useful time phrases you might come across are:
‘At this stage,’
‘During this process,’
‘After several days,’
All of these phrases tell us when, or for how long, that stage in the process takes
place.
Listen again.
Then the water table starts to rise to the surface. As it rises, it dissolves the tonnes
of salt stored in the soil.
She says ‘as it rises’.
The word ‘as’ tells us that two actions are taking place together, or simultaneously.
While the water table is rising to the surface, it dissolves the salt.
Other phrases indicating two actions taking place at the same time could be ‘at the
same time’, ‘meanwhile’.
Page 3 of 5
There are some other adverbs you can use as transition signals. Which ones were
used in the passage?
Listen.
Now, instead of trees pumping the water out of the

ground, and keeping the salt stored, whatever water
the crops don’t use percolates down into the soil.

the soil.
She uses the adverbs ‘now’, ‘eventually’, ‘then’ and

‘lastly’.
These all help to order events.
There are many other adverbs to choose from. Make sure you use a wide variety of
them in your writing and speaking, rather than just repeating the same ones.
Others include: ‘finally’, ‘subsequently’, later’, ‘afterwards’.
OK. We’re going to finish today by looking at some pronunciation.
There are a number of English words that can be used as both nouns and verbs.
However, in many cases, the pronunciation of these changes. This can be quite
difficult to get used to.
Listen to the word ‘extracts’ in the passage.
Lastly, the sun extracts the moisture from the ground, leaving the salt concentrated
on the surface.
‘The sun extracts the moisture.’
‘Extracts’ here comes from the verb ‘to extract’.
Where is the emphasis, or stress in this word?
It’s on the second syllable ‘exTRACT’.
But ‘extract’ is also a noun.
When it’s a noun, it’s pronounced ‘EXtract’. The emphasis is now on the first
syllable.
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And this pattern of first syllable emphasis for the noun form, and second syllable
emphasis for the verb form, is repeated with other words.
We have:
to ‘exTRACT’ and an ‘EXtract’;
‘to conTRACT’ and a ‘CONtract’;
to ‘consTRUCT’ and a ‘CONStruct’;
and there are lots of others.
We have ‘PROduce’, that you eat, and ‘to proDUCE’, to make.
We have ‘SUBject’ and ‘Object’, but ‘subJECT’ and ‘obJECT’.
Let’s test you. Try reading these sentences.
‘He objected to the subject of the lesson.’
‘The farm produced fresh produce.’
So you can see how the stress in words can change meaning. You’ll have to practice
whenever you can!
And after all that, it must be time to go. See you next time on Study English.
Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 19: WEATHER REPORT
Today we’re going to listen to a ‘weather report’.
We’re going to listen for numbers, and practise saying and spelling them.
Listen to the weather in Sydney.
Good morning. It looks like being another glorious

summer day in Sydney.
Temperatures will range from a minimum of 16°C

in Richmond and 17°C in the city, with maximum
temperatures reaching the high 20s, with 29 in
Richmond and 27 in the city by early afternoon.
This summer promises to be the warmest since
1987. The average minimum for this time of year
is 15°C and the average maximum is 22°C.
Humidity will be high again today, ranging from 80-90% across the metropolitan area,
and possibly for the next 5 or 6 days.
Sunrise will be at 5.45 am and the sun will set at 7.43 pm. The next full moon will be
on December 9th.
For those interested in fishing and surfing, windy conditions will prevail all day with
winds gusting from the southeast from 10-15 knots, then easing to 10-11 knots by
late afternoon. Swells along all Sydney beaches will range from 1 – 1.5 metres.
So counting and numbers are a very important part of language. You need them to
talk about how much things cost, what you earn, telephone numbers, visa cards,
passports, addresses and dates.
Being able to listen for and understand numbers is an important academic skill.
There are some conventions you need to learn, and you’ll need to do a lot of practice
listening for and saying numbers.
Let’s get started.
Listen to these pairs of numbers:
‘13, 30’,
‘14, 40’,
‘15, 50’,
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‘16, 60’.
Now you try these ones:
‘17, 70’,
’18, 80’,
’19, 90’.
They sound very similar. You’ll need to listen carefully so you don’t get these mixed
up.
Temperatures will range from a minimum of 16°C in Richmond and 17°C in the city.
Humidity will be high again today, ranging from 80-90% across the metropolitan area.
The temperature in Richmond is ‘16 degrees Celsius’.
The humidity is ‘80 – 90%’.
Did you hear these numbers correctly?
If you don’t understand what someone’s said, ask

them to repeat, and stress the key syllable.
‘And that will be 16 dollars.’
‘Did you say sixTEEN, or sixTY?’
Usually the first syllable in a number is stressed.
‘16, 60’
Notice that it is the final ‘n’ in teen that you have to be careful with.
‘teen’, ‘ty’
But, of course, when you’re listening for numbers,

you can often work out the correct amount by the
context. Try to always be aware of what seems
right, even if you didn’t quite hear properly.
Pronunciation of years can sometimes be difficult

as well.
Listen to the clip.
This summer promises to be the warmest since 1987.
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‘1987’. ‘NINEteen EIGHty seven’.
Notice where the stress comes.
‘NINEteen NINETY nine’.
Let’s practice some more:
‘2001, two thousand and one’;
‘1932, nineteen thirty two’;
‘2040 twenty forty’, or perhaps this will be read as ‘two thousand and forty’. I guess
we’ll have to wait and see!
Notice 40 is spelt ‘forty’, not like ‘four’ and ‘fourteen’.
OK, now let’s look at temperatures.
Temperatures will range from a minimum of 16°C

in Richmond and 17°C in the city,
Temperatures will range from 16 degrees

Celsius.
We write that as ‘16 degrees Celsius’, with a

capital C. If it was in Fahrenheit, we’d write ‘16
degrees Fahrenheit’, with a capital F. But in
Australia, we use Celsius.
So when giving a temperature range it is written ‘16-17°C’, or ‘16 to 17°C’.
These are both read out the same way. Notice that the ‘to’ is unstressed.
‘16-17 degrees Celsius’.
Now we’re going to listen to a different weather report.
Look at it written, and see if you can work out what should be written in the blanks.
Here is the weather report for Sydney today, Tuesday 14th November.
The sun will rise at 5:15 and set at 6:45.
The minimum temperature for metropolitan Sydney will be 13, rising to a maximum of
30 degrees Celsius.
Humidity today promises to be high at 70-80 per cent
OK, let’s have a look at that.
Page 3 of 6
‘The weather report for Sydney today, Tuesday the 14th November.’
She said: ‘Tuesday the 14th November’.
‘The sun will rise at 5:15 and set at 6:45.’
‘The minimum temperature for metropolitan Sydney will be 13, rising to a maximum
of 30 degrees Celsius.’
‘Humidity today promises to be high, 70-80 per cent’
How did you go with that?
Remember, pronouncing final consonants will help considerably in hearing and

understanding numbers. This is very important so that listeners understand what you
say.
Listen to the pronunciation of numbers here.
Humidity will be high again today, ranging from 80-90% across the metropolitan area,
and possibly for the next 5 or 6 days.
She says five or six days.
By linking final consonants with the first vowels of the following word, your speech
will be much clearer.
We say:
‘5 or 6’
‘7 and 8’
‘9 or 10’.
OK. Now let’s listen for some times.
Sunrise will be at 5.45 am and the sun will set at

7.43 pm. The next full moon will be on December
the 9th.
She says: ‘sunrise will be at 5:45 am’.
‘Sunset will be at 7:43 pm’.
Notice the way we say the time. We say the

‘hour’ and then the ‘minutes’ as a whole number, and we add ‘am’ for morning, ‘pm’
for afternoon.
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‘5.45am, five forty five am’
‘7.43pm, seven forty three pm’
But there are a number of different ways of saying the quarter hours.
We have:
‘7am or 7 o’clock’,
‘7.15 or quarter past 7’,
‘7.45, or quarter to 8’,
‘7.30, half past seven’.
Now let’s listen to some more of the weather

report.
For those interested in fishing and surfing, windy conditions will prevail all day with
winds gusting from the southeast from 10-15 knots, then easing to 10-11 knots by
late afternoon.
Notice that she says ‘for those interested in

fishing and swimming’.
‘Interested’ here is a past participle, but it’s used

as an adjective.
English verbs have 2 sorts of participles, ‘present’

and ‘past’.
So the regular verb ‘to interest’ has ‘interesting’,

‘interested’.
‘bore boring bored’
‘tire tiring tired’
‘excite exciting excited’
When we want to say how we ‘feel’ about

something, we can use the past participle.
‘I am interested in science.’
‘I am bored with reading.’
‘I felt tired after that walk.’
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But when we’re describing the ‘qualities’ of a person or thing, we use the present
participle.
‘Science is interesting.’
A good way to remember these is to make sure you always write a table with the past
and present participles together.
You’ll notice that the present participle usually ends in ‘–ing’, and the past participle
ends in ‘–ed’. But, of course, there are always irregular verbs to watch out for as well.
And that’s all for Study English today. Hope you keep practising those interesting
participles. They should keep you interested!
See you next time, bye bye.
Page 6 of 6
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 20: TORRES STRAIT
Hello. I’m Margot Politis and this is Study English, IELTS preparation.
Today on Study English, it’s geography. How do we talk about places, locations and
directions?
Listen to this clip about the history and geography of the Torres Strait.
JOHNNY HARDING: The Torres Strait is situated

above Queensland, between the Arafura Sea and
the Coral Sea, Cape York Peninsula and Papua
New Guinea. Darnley Island, also known as
Erub, is the largest volcanic island in the eastern
Torres Strait, with a population of around 375. It
is surrounded by some of the deepest water in
the world, known as the Darnley Deep.
Though we are a seafaring people, 75% of Torres

Strait Islanders today are living on the mainland.
This is because we were displaced from our island homes since colonisation.
Life for Torres Strait Islanders has been an endurance test ever since colonisation.
During the Second World War, hundreds of Torres Strait Islander men were shipped
off from their homes to fight for their country, of which they were still not citizens.
Uncle Bill Sailor who has gone back to live on his land of Erub and remembers, all
too well, the war.
So that was Johnny Harding talking about his home, the ‘Torres Strait Islands’.
When we want to talk about a place, or where something is in relation to other

places, we need to use function words called prepositions.
Some common prepositions include ‘in’, ‘on’, ‘near’ or ‘between’.
Prepositions can also be made up of two or even three words, for example, ‘next to’,
‘surrounded by’, or ‘in front of’.
These are called prepositions of place.
Listen for the prepositions of place in this clip.
The Torres Strait is situated above Queensland,

between the Arafura Sea and the Coral Sea,
Cape York Peninsula and Papua New Guinea.
Now, let’s go back over the clip and see if we can

figure out where the Torres Strait is.
Johnny says that ‘the Torres Strait is situated above Queensland’.
Page 1 of 5
Here’s Queensland.
The islands are situated ‘above’ Queensland, and ‘between’ the Arafura Sea and the
Coral Sea, Cape York Peninsula and Papua New Guinea.
So the Torres Strait Islands can be found here:
The Torres Strait is situated above Queensland, between the Arafura Sea and the
Coral Sea, Cape York Peninsula and Papua New Guinea.
Learning how to use prepositions correctly can be difficult, because most of them
have more than one function.
There are not many rules to help you choose correctly, so you need to learn each
expression separately.
Look at the use of the prepositions in the following:
Meet me ‘at’ the front door ‘of’ the department store ‘in’ George Street ‘on’ the corner.
In English we say:
‘at a location’,
‘in the street’
but ‘on the corner’.
The general rule is that we use ‘in’ to talk about large areas, for example:
I live ‘in’ an apartment block, ‘in’ Sydney, ‘in’

Australia.
Use ‘at’ for particular locations:
I live ‘at’ number 2 West Street.
Use ‘on’ to say things like:
My house is ‘on’ the corner’
or
‘ I live ‘on’ the second floor’
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And here’s a quick exercise on prepositions. Try describing the position of things in
the picture.
Choose from ‘in’, ‘on’, ‘near’, ‘between’, ‘above’, ‘next to’, ‘in front of’.
The chair is __________ the table.

The chair is ‘in front of’ the table.
The orange is ___ the bowl.

The orange is ‘in’ the bowl.
The cup is ________ the vase and the book.

The cup is ‘between’ the vase and the ‘book’.
And why don’t you try more of these exercises at

home?
Listen for some more prepositions.
Darnley Island, also known as Erub, is the largest

volcanic island in the eastern Torres Strait, with a
population of around 375.
It is surrounded by some of the deepest water in

the world, known as the Darnley Deep.
Though we are a seafaring people, 75% of Torres

Strait Islanders today are living on the mainland.
This is because we were displaced from our
island homes since colonisation.
OK, so we can use spoken and written descriptions to talk about a number of
different subject areas.
In social settings we can describe ‘people’,

‘family’ or ‘relationships’.
In physical settings, we can describe ‘geography’,

‘landscapes’ and other places.
But whatever you’re describing, it’s important to

organise and structure your language. You need
to carefully plan what you’re going to say and the
order you want to say it in.
If you’re describing a country, it’s helpful to list the features you want to concentrate
on.
Page 3 of 5
They might include the ‘location’ and ‘size’ of the country, the ‘physical features’, the
‘climate’ and even the ‘population’ and ‘language’ of the people.
Listen to all the information in the clip about Torres Strait.
Can you hear what type of information the speaker is giving us?
The Torres Strait is situated above Queensland between the Arafura Sea and the
Coral Sea, Cape York Peninsula and Papua New Guinea. Darnley Island, also
known as Erub, is the largest volcanic island in the eastern Torres Strait, with a
population of around 375.
It is surrounded by some of the deepest water in the world, known as the Darnley
Deep. Though we are a seafaring people, 75% of Torres Strait Islanders today are
living on the mainland.
We heard information about the ‘location’ and ‘physical features’ of the islands as
well as about the ‘population’.
He could have included information about the ‘economy’, ‘customs’, ‘festivals’ or

‘food’.
There are many choices.

If you’re writing about a place, the first step is to decide which features you want to
describe. The next step is to organise the description.
When writing about a place, punctuation is another important tool to help organise
your writing and give it meaning.
The rules for punctuation are different in all languages, and knowing which letters to
capitalise is a key part of punctuation.
The rules about which words to capitalise need to be learnt.
Let’s review some of these rules, then we’ll go back to the clip and look at how some
of these rules apply.
We always capitalise:
‘the first word in a sentence’;
‘the pronoun I’;
‘specific places on a map’, for example, the Torres Strait, or Australia;
‘names of people or nationalities’, like Torres Strait Islanders, or Australians;
‘periods of time, like the Second World War;
and the ‘names of people’, including their title, for example Uncle Bill Sailor.
Page 4 of 5
‘Compass points’ are not capitalised, unless they form part of a formal name for an
area.
So the ‘eastern Torres Strait’ doesn’t need a capital on the compass point, but
‘Southeast Asia’ does.
Let’s take another look at the clip, focussing on the use of capitals.
JOHNNY HARDING: The Torres Strait is situated above Queensland between the
Arafura Sea and the Coral Sea, Cape York Peninsula and Papua New Guinea.
Darnley Island, also known as Erub, is the largest volcanic island in the eastern
Torres Strait, with a population of around 375.
Life for Torres Strait Islanders has been an endurance test ever since colonisation.
During the Second World War, hundreds of Torres Strait Islander men were shipped
off from their homes to fight for their country, of which they were still not citizens.
Uncle Bill Sailor has gone back to live on his land of Erub and remembers, all too
well, the war.
Remember, if you’re not sure which words to capitalise, check the dictionary.
And that’s all for today.
Don’t forget to practice organising and structuring your written language, and always
edit your writing to make sure all your capitals and other punctuation are right.
I look forward to seeing you next time on Study English, bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 21: WATCHING BIRDS
Hello, I’m Margot Politis. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation.
Today we’re going to look at the continuous tense, and then we’re going to practice
some sentence stress.
Our clip today is of a birdwatcher named Margaret. A birdwatcher is someone who

loves watching and listening to birds.
Let’s start by listening to Margaret talk about watching birds.
Some people think it's a bit of a strange pleasure,

but you know, it's always interesting. It's
interesting to see what they're doing. You know,
we saw them sheltering under the banks as we
came round and so on, and they have to live in it,
so why shouldn't we?
What I'm doing is looking to see what's outside

this hide because I'm doing a sheet for the 'Bird
Atlas' of a radius of 500 metres from here to see
all the species that are in it.
I use my binoculars and I'm using a telescope,

and I use my ears because I was recording birds
by call as I walked down the track here – wrens
and little grass birds and stuff. In fact, if you do a
lot of bird watching in the bush, you do a lot by
call.
A day like today's not much good, but normally

you do a lot by call, and the idea is to make sure
you get all the species that are here in the area
that you're surveying.
Margaret is talking about the time she spends watching birds.
When describing actions that happen for a continuous period of time, we need to use
a continuous tense. In English, there are several continuous tenses.
Continuous tenses are formed by using the verb ‘to be’ plus the present participle,
the ‘ing’ form of the verb.
Today we’re going to look at the present and past continuous tenses.
Let’s begin with the present continuous tense.
The present continuous tense describes things that are in progress.
Page 1 of 6
Listen to Margaret again and see if you can hear some examples of the present
continuous tense.
What I'm doing is looking to see what's outside

this hide because I'm doing a sheet for the 'Bird
Atlas' of a radius of 500 metres from here to see
all the species that are in it. I use my binoculars
and I'm using a telescope.
Margaret uses the phrases ‘I’m doing’ and ‘I’m

using’ to describe things that are happening now.
We can use the present continuous tense in 3

ways.
Firstly, we use it to describe actions that are

happening now.
For example, Margaret says, “I’m using a

telescope”.
We also use this tense to refer to actions that are

happening soon. This is the future aspect.
Thirdly, the continuous tense can describe actions that are happening
simultaneously, or at the same time.
In this case, the continuous tense follows the words ‘when’, ‘while’ or ‘as’.
Listen to the following sentences and see if you can identify which of these three
rules is being used.
“I’m going bird watching today. What are you doing?”
This is an example of ‘rule 2’. Here, we use the present continuous tense to talk
about things that are happening soon.
“The birds are singing while they are flying.”
This is an example of rule 3, because we are describing two things that are
happening at the same time – ‘singing’ and ‘flying’.
It’s a good idea to practice recognising these.
Page 2 of 6
But now, let’s take a look at the past continuous tense.
And I use my ears because I was recording birds

by call as I walked down the track here – wrens
and little grass birds and stuff. In fact, if you do a
lot of bird watching in the bush, you do a lot by
call. A day like today's not much good, but
normally you do a lot by call, and the idea is to
make sure you get all the species that are here in
the area that you're surveying.
Margaret says that she ‘was recording’ birds as

she walked down the track.
This is the past continuous tense. We can use it in 2 situations.
Can you identify which one applies to Margaret?
We use it to describe an action that was in progress at a specific time in the past,
or to describe a continuous action that was interrupted by something else.
So when Margaret says, “I was recording birds as I walked down the track”, she is
using rule 1. She is talking about a continuous action that she was doing in the past.
Here’s another sentence.
“I was walking down the track when the rain started.”
This is rule 2. ‘Walking down the track’ was interrupted by the rain.
Notice that the second clause, is introduced by the word ‘when’ - ‘when the rain
started’.
Words like ‘as’, ‘when’ or ‘while’ are often used to begin the second clause.
And the second clause takes the simple past tense.
Look at our sentences again.
“I was recording birds as I walked down the track.”
“I was walking down when the rain started.”
Page 3 of 6
OK, now let’s have a look back at the clip, this time we’ll highlight all the present and
past continuous tenses.
Some people think it's a bit of a strange pleasure, but you know, it's always
interesting. It's interesting to see what they're doing. You know, we saw them
sheltering under the banks as we came round and so on, and they have to live in it,
so why shouldn't we?
I'm doing a sheet for the 'Bird Atlas' of a radius of 500 metres from here to see all
the species that are in it.
I use my binoculars and I'm using a telescope, and I use my ears because I was
recording birds by call as I walked down the track here – wrens and little grass birds
and stuff. In fact, if you do a lot of bird watching in the bush, you do a lot by call.
A day like today's not much good, but normally you do a lot by call, and the idea is to
make sure you get all the species that are here in the area that you're surveying.
Today’s clip is about bird watching.
We’ve seen that the ‘–ing’ can be used for continuous tenses, but ‘–ing’ words can
have lots of other uses too.
‘-ing’ forms the present participle of a verb. Some ‘ing words can also be adjectives,
and they can act as gerunds.
A gerund is a verb that acts as a noun.
Let’s look at an example.
Here’s the sentence “I love swimming.”
The word ‘swimming’ is the present participle of the verb ‘to swim’.
But in this sentence, ‘swimming’ is a noun.
So the word ‘swimming’ is called a gerund.
Listen for a gerund in the clip.
In fact, if you do a lot of bird watching in the bush, you do a lot by call.
‘Bird watching’. ‘Watching’ is a gerund. It is a verb that’s used as a noun.
There are many phrases that use gerunds with the verb ‘to go’.
They are mainly used with recreational activities, or things you do for fun.
For example, we say:
Page 4 of 6
‘go swimming’;
‘go bird watching’;
‘go dancing’.
“On the weekend, I usually go swimming.”
“This weekend, I’d like to go dancing.”
Finally today, we’re going to look at some sentence stress and rhythm.
When we talk about rhythm in English, we mean the ‘beat of the language’.
The beat of the language comes from the pattern of stressed and unstressed
syllables or words in a sentence.
Some words usually have a strong stress.
These are ‘content words’, the nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs. They’re usually
strongly stressed and carry the rhythm.
Then there are the words that have a weak stress.
These are usually the articles, pronouns, prepositions, and conjunctions. They’re
spoken quickly between the strongly stressed words.
As well as the different stress on words, the number of pauses you make in your
speech will affect the rhythm of your language. It helps listeners tell what is
important and what is secondary information.
You should practice reading using different beats, and see how this affects the
meaning.
Notice how I can read the numbers:
1 2 3 4
or
1 and 2 and 3 and 4
Here, the words I’m stressing are the numbers - 1,2,3,4.
The less important words are squeezed in between the beats. The more squeezed
in, the shorter they become.
1 and a 2 and a 3 and a 4
1 and then a 2 and then a 3 and then a 4
Page 5 of 6
And that’s all for Study English today. Make sure that you listen out for the rhythm of
people’s speech. Copying native speakers is the best way to learn the stress and the
beat.
And I’ll see you next time on Study English. Bye.
Page 6 of 6
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 22: FINANCE REPORT
Hello. I’m Margot Politis. Welcome to another episode of Study English, IELTS
preparation.
Today we’re going to listen to a finance report. It’s filled with numbers and amounts,
expressed in a variety of ways.
It’s important to be able to understand and describe numerical data using decimals,
fractions and currencies.
Listen to the day’s finance report.
The Australian dollar, today Tuesday the 11th of

November, continues to rise against the US
dollar, buying just over 70 cents, a 15 year high.
Against other currencies, however, the trend is a

little different, falling against the pound, closing at
0.425, a slight drop on yesterday, and 0.61 euros.
The yen is also strengthening at 71.95, and
considerably higher against the greenback at
111.03 yen.
The Dow Jones Index closed today at 9809.79, a

fall of 47.18 on yesterday’s trading.
The Sydney Stock Market doubled its trading

yesterday with BHP Billiton trading heavily.
The latest retail figures showed that turnover

grew by 3.2% in the June quarter, the fastest
quarterly growth rate for five and a half years. At
the same time, unemployment fell to its lowest
level in twelve and a half years.
OK, first we’re going to look at decimals, and how you express them. Listen carefully
again.

111.03 yen.

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In English, decimals are written with a point, not a comma.
So we write 4.25, 6.1.
When you say the numbers after the decimal point, you say them all separately, as
individual numbers.
So we have:
71.95 [seventy one point nine five]
47.18 [forty seven point one eight]
9809.79 [nine thousand eight hundred and nine point seven nine]
Notice that a zero is often spoken as ‘oh’.
Practice saying these numbers.
326.01
[three hundred and twenty six point oh one]
4.897
[four point eight nine seven]
902.308
[nine hundred and two point three oh eight]
Listen again.

111.03 yen.

The Sydney Stock Market doubled its trading

yesterday with BHP Billiton trading heavily.
Page 2 of 6
You can hear that when using numbers, there are often alternatives, and many
choices you can make.
111.03
So conversationally, we would usually say ‘one hundred and eleven point oh three’,
but will also often hear ‘one hundred and eleven point zero three’.
0.425
Here, we could say
‘zero point four two five’,
‘nought point four two five’,
or even just ‘point four two five’.
Notice that in North America, people usually say ‘zero’, not ‘nought’ or ‘oh’.
OK, now the other way of expressing numbers less than one is using fractions.
Listen to the fractions here.
The latest retail figures showed that turnover

grew by 3.2% in the June quarter, the fastest
quarterly growth rate for five and a half years. At
the same time, unemployment fell to its lowest
level in twelve and a half years.
She uses the most common fraction – ½ (a half).
Listen to how we say common fractions:
½ a half,
1/3 a third,
¼ a quarter
2/3 two thirds,
5/8 five eights,
¾ three quarters.
Notice that once you understand the pattern, you can express any fraction you want.
Try these:
7/18
seven eighteenths,
16/30
16 thirtieths,
Page 3 of 6
14/40
14 fortieths.
OK, now listen again to some of the report. Listen for different currencies.
Against other currencies, however, the trend is a little different, falling against the
pound, closing at 0.425, a slight drop on yesterday, and 0.61 euros. The yen is also
strengthening at 71.95, and considerably higher against the greenback at 111.03
yen.
There were a number of different currencies mentioned in that clip: the pound; the
euro; the yen; the greenback.
Let’s have a look at them.
Lots of countries use a dollar.
In Australia, the Australian dollar is usually expressed with the dollar sign $.
But internationally, it’s written like this ‘AUD’. We read this ‘the Australian dollar’.
In United States, they use the dollar as well. It’s the ‘USD’, ‘the United States dollar’.
But often called ‘the greenback’, because it’s green.
In Great Britain they use the pound. It is written ‘GBP’, but it’s often called ‘the pound
sterling’.
In the European Union, they use ‘the euro dollar’, written like this – ‘EUR’.
In Japan, it’s the ‘yen’, written ‘JPY’.
In China, it’s the ‘yuan’, written ‘CNY’, and the ‘renminbi’, ‘RMB’.
Notice that we write the currency before the number, but we say it after the number.
So we read:
Page 4 of 6
$2.00
two dollars.
or
£4.15
four pounds fifteen.
Notice also how we read longer numbers.
3,470 JPY
three thousand, four hundred and seventy
Japanese yen
192 AUD
one hundred and ninety two Australian dollars
Notice that when spoken naturally the one often becomes 'a' and the ‘and’ becomes
squashed’. We don’t say ‘one hundred and ninety two’ but ‘a hundred n ninety two’.
Try this one:
127,322 HKD
a hundred and twenty seven thousand, three hundred and twenty two Hong Kong
dollars
OK, now let’s listen to the report again, and then we’ll look at another important use
of numbers.
The Australian dollar, today Tuesday the 11th of November, continues to rise against
the US dollar, buying just over 70 cents, a 15 year high.
Notice that she says ‘Tuesday the 11th of November’.
Saying simple things like the date can be confusing in English, as the way they’re
said varies.
In Australia, we say the ‘11th of November’, or ‘November the 11th’. Notice that it’s
written without the words ‘the’, or ‘of’.
For the 13th of February 2005, Australians would write this: ‘13.05.2005’.
But in North America, they’d write it: 02.13.2005.
You’ll need to learn these to make sure you don’t turn up somewhere on the wrong
day!
Page 5 of 6
So remember that in Australia they write the date ‘day dot month dot year’,
but in North America, they write ‘month dot day dot year’.
And there is an international standard that says the format should be ‘year dot month
dot day’.
With numbers, dates, times, there are all sorts of variations. Just make sure you
understand the currency, the time and the date, or you could find yourself in all sorts
of trouble!
And I’ll see you soon for more Study English!
Bye bye.
Page 6 of 6
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 23: OCTOPUSES
Hello and welcome to Study English, IELTS Preparation. I’m Margot Politis.
Today we’re going to talk about how to describe the appearance or character of
animals and people.
Here’s the clip. Listen to some descriptions of a very strange octopus.
You couldn’t get an animal that’s sort of more

different or more alien to us.
They’ve got such a weird shape. They’ve got

eight arms coming off their mouth. When they
walk around it’s like they’re running round on
super lips. They’ve got a head in the middle of
their body. They’ve got a doughnut shaped brain.
They’ve got three hearts, blue blood and jet
propulsion, and they’ve got a bag on the back
that they stick all the body bits in.
So octopuses have weird forms, and they have lots of really unusual behaviours as
well, like high speeds and camouflaging. I think the reason that octopuses have
ended up having such weird forms, and all these different sorts of behaviours is
because they are a really good meal. They have no bones, no armour, no poisons
and no spines. They’re popular prey, so they have to be very fast and clever at
squeezing through tiny holes, and really good at hiding from animals that want to eat
them. So having to get away from their predators in the sea has made them evolve
into amazing creatures.
So they certainly are very strange creatures.

Let’s begin today by talking about how we order
descriptions.
When you write something down, you will have

already thought about what you want to say.
The next step is to decide how you want to

structure your description.
Today’s description of an octopus starts with an

interesting statement telling us how strange and unusual the octopus is compared to
humans. This is to attract the attention of the reader or the listener.
Let’s listen.
You couldn’t get an animal that’s sort of more different or more alien to us. They’ve
got such a weird shape.
Then the description focuses on the ‘appearance’ of octopuses, the way they look.
Page 1 of 5
They have ‘a weird shape’.
Which of the octopuses’ characteristics is described next?
So octopuses have weird forms, and they have

lots of really unusual behaviours as well, like high
speeds and camouflaging.
He talks about the ‘behaviours’ of the octopus.
So he begins by talking about the way an octopus

looks and then he talks about its behaviours – the
way it acts.
There are many other headings we could use to

organise a description of something.
For example, if you want to describe a person, you might think about their ‘age’,
‘height’, ‘hair’, ‘eyes’, ‘face’, ‘skin’ or other features.
For example, how would you describe this

person?
She has ‘brown hair’ and ‘brown eyes’. Her ‘face

is long and narrow’.
‘Her skin is tanned’.
We could also say that she is of ‘average height’

and has a ‘slim build’. You might even want to
guess how tall she is.
In Australia, we use centimetres to measure height, but many people still use feet
and inches to describe height.
So we might say she is ‘5 feet 6 inches’, or ‘167 centimetres’ tall.
Have a look at these pictures. Which person has

brown hair, blue eyes a round face and freckles?
Well, they both do.
Which person is a teenager with long, straight

hair and big eyes?
Which person is middle aged with frizzy hair and

glasses?
Page 2 of 5
You can see that the same person can be described in different ways, depending on
what you want to focus on. The more vocabulary you know, the better your
descriptions will be.
Now, listen for another way of describing a person or animal.
They’ve got a head in the middle of their body. They’ve got a doughnut shaped
brain. They’ve got three hearts, blue blood and jet propulsion.
The octopus has a ‘doughnut shaped’ brain.
There’s not many people you could say that about!
But when describing things, it can be useful to

compare something with a common shape.
So a person might have an ‘oval shaped face’,

‘almond shaped eyes’ and a ‘pear shaped body’,
like this.
But what if you don’t want to describe the way a

person looks? You might want to someone’s
personality or character.
Let’s hear more about the octopus.
They’re popular prey, so they have to be very fast

and clever at squeezing through tiny holes, and
really good at hiding from animals that want to eat
them. So having to get away from their predators
in the sea has made them evolve into amazing
creatures.
He describes the octopus as ‘fast’, ‘clever’, ‘good

at hiding’, and ‘amazing’.
When we are describing someone, or something,

it’s a good idea to make a list of headings to help organise the description.
We can talk about intellect – a person might be ‘clever’, ‘wise’, ‘bright’, ‘smart’,
‘foolish’ or even ‘stupid.’
We can also talk about a person’s attitudes towards life.
We could say a person is ‘sensible’, ‘introverted’, ‘extroverted’, ‘optimistic’ or

‘pessimistic’.
Or we might talk about their attitudes to people. Are they ‘polite’, ‘generous’ and
‘kind’, or are they ‘impolite’, ‘greedy’ and ‘mean’?
Page 3 of 5
And we can describe someone’s behaviour too. Are they ‘positive’, ‘interesting’ and
‘confident, or are they ‘negative’, ‘boring’ and ‘shy’?
When learning to describe people, it’s a good idea

to be familiar with opposites like these.
This will help you build your vocabulary very

quickly.
Do you know the opposite of these words?
‘cruel’, ‘extroverted’, ‘courteous’, ‘generous’, ‘bright’
The opposites are:
‘kind’, ‘introverted’, ‘rude’, ‘selfish’ and ‘stupid’.
Sometimes, it sounds better to use one of the more positive words to describe
someone.
“Mary was really cruel.”
You could say: “Mary was not very kind.”
“I think Kylie is rude.”
“I think Kylie is not always polite.”
Now let’s work on building up your vocabulary about body parts.
We’ll begin by listening to the clip again. Listen for words that describe the body parts
of the octopus.
They’ve got such a weird shape. They’ve got eight

arms coming off their mouth. When they walk
around it’s like they’re running round on super lips.
They’ve got a head in the middle of their body.
They’ve got a doughnut shaped brain. They’ve got
three hearts, blue blood and jet propulsion, and
they’ve got a bag on the back that they stick all the
body bits in.
He uses the words ‘mouth’, ‘arms’, ‘lips’, ‘head’,

‘body’, ‘brain’, ‘heart’, ‘blood’ and ‘back’.
These all refer to parts of the body that you might want to describe, so it’s important
to know them.
The easiest way to remember large families of words like these is to have a system.
You should organise the words by association.
Page 4 of 5
For example, you could begin with the face and remember all the words that relate to
the face – ‘eyes’, ‘mouth’, ‘nose’.
Then you could work on the body and all the words
that go with it – ‘spine’, ‘blood’, ‘bones’.
You can then do this for the head, the legs, the
arms.
Rhymes can also be helpful when you’re trying to

remember new words.
A rhyme that Australian children learn in school is:
Head and shoulders, knees and toes

Eyes, ears, mouth and nose.
Or, maybe you could try to find words with similar sounds and group them together.
Practicing them can also help with pronunciation.
Some good examples are:
ch-words
‘chest’, ‘chin’ and ‘cheek’.
or:
k-sounds
‘ankle’, ‘skull’, ‘back’ and ‘knuckle’.
or words that start with h

‘head’, ‘hip’, ‘heel’, ‘hand’, ‘heart’.
In this way, you’ll be able to practice body parts, and pronunciation at the same time.
And make sure you learn the more unusual body parts as well!
And that’s all for today. Don’t forget to practice all the things we’ve learned today,
and I’ll see you next time. Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 24: PERFECT SIESTA
Hello, and welcome again to Study English, IELTS Preparation. I’m Margot Politis.
Today we’re going to look at intonation– how we use a rising or falling tone of voice
to convey meaning – and we’ll also have a quick look at how to use commas.
But first, let’s watch a clip about sleep. We’ll see a researcher doing some tests on a
subject, to see just what the benefits are of an afternoon nap.
Researchers at Flinders University say a short

sleep in the mid afternoon could actually increase
a worker’s productivity.
Each subject performed a series of tests before

and after their mid afternoon sleep.
Some subjective tests of alertness, fatigue,

vigour, and also some cognitive performance
tasks, some which are pencil and paper and
some that are done on the computer, and also an
objective measure of alertness, which is how long it takes someone to fall asleep. So
if it takes them a long time to fall asleep, that would suggest that they’re quite alert,
and a short time to fall asleep would mean that they’re quite sleepy.
“Do you think you were asleep?”
“Yes, hard to tell but I think so. I think I did for a

bit.”
“For how long?”
“It felt like probably a couple of minutes, I reckon.”
“I want you to do exactly the same thing now. I

want you to start here and want you to go as
quickly and as accurately as you can until I tell you to stop.”
So in that clip we heard a researcher talking to

the subject of her tests.
You’ll notice her intonation changed a lot.
Intonation refers to the changes in pitch in our

voice as we speak – whether our voices go up, or
down.
Intonation is very important to learn. It has many

functions in a language.
Page 1 of 5
It ‘conveys emotion’. We can tell immediately listening to someone how they feel.
Someone can sound happy, or sound sad.
“Hello, how are you?”
“Hello, how are you?”
Intonation also ‘conveys meaning’. It let’s the listener know whether something is a
question or a statement, or it can indicate different levels of certainty or uncertainty.
“Hello, are you well?”
“Hello, are you well?”
Learning intonation is especially helpful for learning to ask questions, and indicating
what sort of answer we expect.
Watch part of the clip again, and listen closely to the intonation as the doctor talks to
her subject.
“Yes, hard to tell but I think so. I think I did for a

bit.”
“For how long?”
“It felt like a couple of minutes, I reckon.”
The doctor says to the subject, “Do you think you

were asleep?”
Does this have a rising or falling tone?
Listen again.
Her voice goes up at the end of the sentence.

We call this a rising tone.
The rising tone is used for ‘yes/no questions’ –

questions that need a yes or no answer.
Listen now to the second question. Does it have a

rising or falling tone?
Page 2 of 5
“For how long?”
“It felt like a couple of minutes, I reckon.”
The doctor says, “For how long?”
This is a question too, but it has a falling tone.
A falling tone is used with ‘information questions’.
They’re questions that need information as an answer, not just a yes or no answer.
The man answers with a ‘statement’: ‘A couple of minutes, I reckon’. This takes a
falling tone.
In English, statements usually end in a falling tone.
The falling tone at the end tells the listener that the statement is finished.
Listen to the intonation used to give instructions.
I want you to start here and I want you to go as

quickly and as accurately as you can until I tell
you to stop.”
Did you hear the falling tone at the end?
She said, “until I tell you to stop”.
This tells the listener that this is the end of the

instruction.
So, let’s look at when to use rising and falling tones again.
A rising tone is used at the end of ‘yes/no

questions’, and a falling tone at the end of
‘information questions’.
Falling intonation is also used with ‘statements’.
These are very general rules, but they can help

you to work out what you, as a listener, are
expected to say, and can help you, as a speaker,
to convey your meaning.
Now, let’s look at one last example of intonation.
Listen to what happens when we have a list in a sentence. Here’s a very

complicated list.
Page 3 of 5
Some subjective tests of alertness, fatigue, vigour, and also some cognitive
performance tasks, some which are pencil and paper and some that are done on the
computer, and also an objective measure of alertness, which is how long it takes
someone to fall asleep.
So she uses a variety of intonation. She uses rising and falling tones, and a tone
that’s neither rising nor falling – just a flat tone, for the items in the list.
This tells the listener that she hasn’t finished her list of tests.
And then, for the very last item in the list, “how long it takes someone to fall asleep”,
she uses falling intonation. This is how we know the list is finished.
We use generally use falling intonation for ‘the last item in a list’.
So you can see there are some rules for intonation, but of course it varies according
to the situation, and our attitudes to the topic.
OK, so when we’re talking, we use intonation, pauses and body language to convey
meaning.
But what about when we’re writing?
Well, we need to use punctuation.
Let’s look at one of the most common but difficult punctuation items – the ‘comma’.
Commas are used to help readers understand the exact meaning of a sentence.
They’re like pauses in speech.
A comma in the wrong place can give the wrong meaning to a sentence.
For example, look at these two sentences:
“Stop, Jane!”
“Stop Jane.”
In the first sentence, the comma shows where there is a pause in speech, “Stop,
Jane”, and this tells us that the speaker wants Jane to stop.
In the second sentence, there is no pause and no comma - “Stop Jane.”
With no pause, we know that the speaker is telling someone else to stop Jane.
Let’s look at some rules about using the comma.
First, commas are used ‘to separate items in a list’.
Page 4 of 5
Look at the way commas are used here
Some subjective tests of alertness, fatigue, vigour, and also some cognitive
performance tasks.
OK, so notice that when we write down her speech, we put commas where she uses
pauses and we use intonation to separate the items in a list.
We write “alertness, fatigue, vigour”. We read this as “alertness fatigue vigour.”
Adding a comma between items in a list tells us clearly how many different items
there are.
A second use of commas is ‘to separate clauses in a sentence’.
We use a comma to separate dependent and independent clauses, but only when
the dependent clause is first in the sentence.
This sounds complicated, but it’s not really. Here’s an example of a dependent
clause:
‘because he was very tired’,
followed by an independent clause:
‘he went to bed’.
Notice that we use a comma.
“Because he was very tired, he went to bed.”
But let’s swap the clauses around:
“He went to bed because he was very tired.”
In sentences like this, with the independent

clauses first, we don’t need a comma.
Listen to the different way they’re read out, and

you can hear why.
“Because he was very tired, he went to bed.” Notice the pause.
“He went to bed because he was very tired.” There’s no pause.
So sometimes when you’re writing, it helps to think that if there’s a pause, you might
need a comma.
And that’s where we’re going to pause today. Hope you enjoyed Study English, I’ll
see you next time. Bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 25: COPYRIGHT
Hello. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation. I’m Margot Politis.
Today we’re going to talk about simple present tense, definitions and technical
vocabulary, all the things you need to know and use to write a report.
First, we’ll listen to someone talking about ‘copyright’ – the rights people have to their
own work.
It’s structured like a simple information report.
Copyright's a passion of mine. Copyright is the

exclusive bundle of rights, which is awarded to
the author or a creator of work, to entitle them to
market it, to get economic reward for their
creative endeavour and to entitle them to say
when, how and on what conditions their work may
be used.
Once I put my book on the internet anybody can

access it at the push of a button, or click of a mouse. Anybody can download it, copy
it and transmit it without my knowledge, without my consent a hundred times over to
every country in the world without me knowing.
There is a misconception about work, which is

submitted to the internet, and it's that if you've
given it to the internet, it's gone to a public
domain, therefore anyone can use it as they will,
when they will, and that is a very seriously ill-
founded misconception. The fact that you submit
work to the internet does not affect your legal
rights in relation to that work.
OK, so we heard Celine McInerney present an

‘information report’.
An information report presents information about a subject.
Its purpose is to ‘classify and describe’ a subject

using a range of facts.
The subject is usually a general topic or area,

rather than a specific person or place.
For example, the general subject of today’s

information report is ‘copyright’.
Page 1 of 5
But whatever the subject, there are a few common features that all information
reports have.
You might notice that the report is in the simple present tense.
Listen again.
Once I put my book on the internet anybody can access it at the push of a button, or
click of a mouse. Anybody can download it, copy it and transmit it without my
knowledge, without my consent a hundred times over to every country in the world
without me knowing.
The simple present tense is used in information reports to ‘describe qualities and
features’ of the subject.
This is one of the key features of an information report.
Let’s look at some other key features.
Information reports often begin with an opening statement that introduces the
subject. This is the topic sentence.
Listen to the Celine’s first sentence.
Copyright's a passion of mine.
She uses the simple present tense to introduce

the subject of the report.
“Copyright’s a passion of mine.” “Copyright is a

passion of mine.”
It’s in this topic sentence that we learn what the

subject of the report is, what the text is about.
This is also called an orientation.
What comes after the orientation?
Copyright is the exclusive bundle of rights, which is awarded to the author or a

creator of work, to entitle them to market it, to get economic reward for their creative
endeavour and to entitle them to say when, how and on what conditions their work
may be used.
The next step in creating an information report is to give an explanation or a definition

of the topic.
So Celine begins by telling us what ‘Copyright is …’
Page 2 of 5
She needs to explain what copyright is, so that she can go on to talk in more detail
about it.
The definition will be followed by a short description.
In this case, she goes on to give a description of the topic ‘copyright and the internet’.
There is a misconception about work which is submitted to the internet and it's that if
you've given it to the internet, it's gone to a public domain, therefore anyone can use
it as they will, when they will, and that is a very seriously ill-founded misconception.
The fact that you submit work to the internet does not affect your legal rights in
relation to that work.
So, let’s go back over the main features of an

information report.
It’s written in the ‘simple present tense’.
It has an ‘opening statement’ to introduce the

subject.
It then gives an ‘explanation or definition’ of

the subject.
This is followed by a ‘short description’ of the

subject.
You should always follow this pattern when presenting any type of information report.
Reading or listening to any text is a good opportunity to extend your vocabulary.
In this text, there are a lot of technical words related to the topic of copyright.
Let’s review some of the words connected with this topic.
When talking about copyright, the speaker uses the following nouns:
‘copyright’, ‘author’, ‘conditions’, ‘work’, ‘book’, ‘internet’, ‘knowledge’, ‘consent’.
She also uses a number of noun phrases:
‘bundle of rights’, ‘creator of work’, ‘economic reward’, ‘creative endeavour’, ‘public

domain’ and ‘legal rights’.
And she uses these verbs:
‘awarded’, ‘entitle’, ‘market’, ‘access’, ‘download’, ‘copy’, ‘transmit’,
To understand all the information in this report, you’ll need to know all of these words
and phrases, or be able to work them out from the context.
Page 3 of 5
Listen to the full clip again to see where and how these words are used.
Copyright's a passion of mine. Copyright is the

exclusive bundle of rights, which is awarded to
the author or a creator of work, to entitle them to
market it, to get economic reward for their
creative endeavour and to entitle them to say
when, how and on what conditions their work may
be used.
Once I put my book on the internet anybody can

access it at the push of a button, or click of a
mouse. Anybody can download it, copy it and
transmit it without my knowledge, without my
consent a hundred times over to every country in
the world without me knowing.
There is a misconception about work, which is

submitted to the internet, and it's that if you've
given it to the internet, it's gone to a public
domain, therefore anyone can use it as they will,
when they will, and that is a very seriously ill-
founded misconception. The fact that you submit
work to the internet does not affect your legal
rights in relation to that work.
OK, notice that she used the verbs ‘submit’ and its past tense form ‘submitted’.
We’re going to finish today with some pronunciation practice on words that end in ‘–
ed’ like this.
Regular past tense verbs end in ‘-ed’, but there

are three different pronunciations.
After consonants ‘t and d’, ‘-ed’ is pronounced ‘id’

or ‘ud’, for example:
‘awarded’ or ‘submitted.
After voiceless consonants ‘p, s, k, f, sh, ch, or

th’, the final ‘–ed’ is pronounced ‘t’, for example:
‘tip’ and ‘tipped’
But after voiced consonants ‘b, g, j, l, m, n, z, v, th, and ng’, plus ‘all vowel and
diphthong sounds’, the final ‘–ed’ is pronounced ‘d’.
For example, we have ‘fill and filled’.
Page 4 of 5
Here are some more examples:
‘measure’ becomes ‘measured’,
‘direct’, ‘directed’,
‘dip’, ‘dipped’,
‘pick’, ‘picked’,
‘drain’, ‘drained’,
and ‘use’ becomes ‘used’.
Now let’s test you. Do you know how to pronounce each of these?
‘omitted’
‘walked’
‘arrived’
‘calculated’
‘stopped’
‘washed’
A good way to learn these sorts of endings and pronunciations is to practice reading
whole paragraphs. This will give you a feeling for the rhythm of the words.
Try this one:
I overslept and missed my train

I slipped on the road in the pouring rain,
I sprained my ankle, skinned my knees,
Shattered my glasses and lost my keys.
And you can practice that one at home!
That’s all for Study English today.
I hope to see you next time for more IELTS

preparation, bye bye.
Page 5 of 5
TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 26: URBAN ARCHAEOLOGY
Hello and welcome again to Study English, IELTS Preparation. I’m Margot Politis.
Today we’re going to look at classification - how things are sorted into classes or
groups.
We’ll listen to an archaeologist talking about artefacts, things left behind from the
past, and what sorts of groups they belong to.
And we’ll finish by doing some pronunciation practice on final ‘s’ sounds.
Well, these are all artefacts from the cesspits at

Casseldon Place and there's a real assortment of
different types.
Some of the artefacts we've got relate to, I guess,

the leisure time activity, the pastimes, people
might've had.
There are some gaming tokens. This is a lead

disc with a horse figurine on it as well. It would've
been used as some sort of betting token.
The dice there, the bone dice as well. There's a

couple of dominoes – one's made out of bone,
one, we think’s made out of slate.
Some of the other pieces, we've got a lead rifle

that would've been part of a child's toy soldier set.
Yeah, these bones, again, from the cesspits of

Casseldon, and quite clearly, it's been cut. These
aren't natural breaks at all. These are what we
refer to as butchering marks.
So we're not just learning what sort of animals were eaten at Casseldon, we're also
learning about the cuts of meat being provided, whether it's been done locally by
individual house owners, or whether they're going to a local butcher.
I think the artefacts from Casseldon Place and the other results of the archaeological
process are important because they give us a really rare insight into the way
Melbourne operated in its early years.
The speaker, Jeremy Smith, is discussing the artefacts he’s found in Melbourne.
Let’s look at how he classifies or sorts out these artefacts for us.
First, the ‘opening statement’ tells us what is being classified. This is an orientation.
Then the ‘things are classified according to certain criteria’. They’re put into groups.
Page 1 of 6
Finally, at the end of the classification, there’s a ‘summary’, or a comment on the
groups and their significance.
Let’s listen to Jeremy’s opening statement or orientation.
Well, these are all artefacts from the cesspits at

Casseldon Place and there's a real assortment of
different types.
So the topic of this classification is ‘the artefacts

from Casseldon Place’.
We are told that there is ‘a real assortment of

different types’.
From this opening statement, we would expect

the rest of the passage to be about the different types of artefacts found there, and
that’s exactly what’s given.
Listen to how the first type is introduced.
Some of the artefacts we've got relate to, I guess, the leisure time activity, the
pastimes, that people might've had.
The first category is of ‘artefacts relating to leisure time activity’, or pastimes.
This is the first ‘group’ or ‘class’ of the classification.
To make this clearer to the reader or listener, he could have used signals to show
this was the first category.
He could have said:
“Firstly, we have artefacts that relate to leisure time activities.”
What’s the next group?
Some of the other pieces, we've got a lead rifle that would've been part of a child's
toy soldier set.
So the second category is ‘children’s toys’.
Again, he could have introduced this by saying ‘second’, or ‘secondly’.
“Secondly, we have children’s toys.”
And what about the third, or final category?
Yeah, these bones, again, from the cesspits of Casseldon, and quite clearly, it's been
cut.
Page 2 of 6
The third category is to do with ‘bones’, evidence of what people ate.
So, “Thirdly, we have bones.”
So after describing the different classes or groups, Jeremy summarises by saying

why the artefacts are important.
I think the artefacts from Casseldon Place and the

other results of the archaeological process are
important because they give us a really rare
insight into the way Melbourne operated in its
early years.
This is a summary statement. He finishes by

giving a comment on the importance of the
classification.
Here he is saying the artefacts are important

because of the rare insight they give us. They show what life was like in Melbourne
many years ago.
OK, now we're going to look at something completely different- the pronunciation of
the letter 's' at the end of words.
But first, let’s look at when you’ll find an 's' on the end of words.
Well firstly, there’s the ‘natural ‘s’’. Some words

are always spelt with a final s.
Secondly, the letter 's' is added to 'plural nouns',
thirdly, it's added to '3rd person singular verbs in

the present tense’,
Finally, it's added to the ‘possessive pronoun it,

and possessive nouns.’
OK, so there are lots of times when you'll see and 's' on the end of words. For words
where it's added on, it has three different pronunciations. Let's classify them!
The first pronunciation of the final -s is ‘uz’.
It's pronounced this way after sounds such as 's', 'z', 'sh', 'ch' and 'j'.
Listen for an example in the passage.
toy soldier set.
Page 3 of 6
Did you hear it? The example was ‘pieces’, ‘pieces’.
The ‘s’ on the end is pronounced ‘uz’ because it followed an ‘ess’ sound.
Other examples are:
‘buzzes’
‘wishes’
‘churches’
‘judges’.
The second way ‘s’ is pronounced at the end of a word is ‘sss’. It’s pronounced this
way after voiceless consonants ‘puh’, ‘tuh’, ‘kuh’, ‘ff’ and ‘th’.
Some examples from the text are:
‘artifacts’
‘types’
‘breaks’
‘marks’
and ‘cuts’.
The rest of the time, that is after voiced consonants such as ‘buh’ ‘duh’ ‘guh’ ‘lll’, ‘r’,
‘v’, ‘th’ [hard] ‘m’, ‘n’ and after ‘vowels and diphthongs’, the final ‘s’ is pronounced
‘zzz’.
Examples from the text are:
‘there’s’
‘pastimes’
‘tokens’
‘dominoes’
‘child’s’
‘bones’
‘animals’
‘years’.
Page 4 of 6
Now listen to the clip again, and try to hear the difference between these different
final ‘s’ sounds.
Yeah, these bones, again, from the cesspits of Casseldon, and quite clearly, it's been
cut. These aren't natural breaks at all. These are what we refer to as butchering
marks.
‘Its’ is a word that even native English speakers have a lot of trouble with.
‘Its’ can be written without an apostrophe, and

with an apostrophe.
But what’s the difference?
Well, with an apostrophe, ‘it’s’ is a contraction of

‘it is’, or ‘it has’.
Without an apostrophe ‘its’ is a possessive

pronoun.
The other possessive pronouns are: ‘my’, ‘your’, ‘his’, ‘her’, ‘our’ and ‘their’.
These are used to show possession. For example:

“Is that your dog?”
“What is its name?”
Remember that possessive pronouns NEVER have an ‘s’ added to them, but
possessive nouns do.
“Is that Simon’s dog?”
‘Apostrophes’ can often cause trouble for English language learners.
They are used with contractions and with possessives.
Don’t EVER use an apostrophe to make nouns plural.
“There are many students at school.”
NOT
“There are many student’s at school.”
And don’t confuse the contraction of a noun and ‘is’ with the possessive form of the
noun. They look the same, but they mean very different things.
“Mary’s dog is ill” means the dog that belongs to Mary is ill.
Page 5 of 6
“Mary’s ill today” means Mary is ill. Here, ‘Mary’s’ is a contraction of ‘Mary is’.
OK, now let’s listen to one last clip, then we’ll see if you can add some apostrophes.
toy soldier set.
He says:
“Some of the other pieces weve got are a lead rifle that wouldve been part of a childs
toy soldier set.”
‘We’ve’ is a contraction of ‘we have’, so that needs an apostrophe.
‘Would’ve’ is a contraction of ‘would have’, so that needs one too.
And the last one?
‘A childs toy soldier set’. The toy soldier set belongs to the child. It’s a ‘possessive
s’, so that needs an apostrophe too.
And don’t forget to practice your pronunciation and punctuation at home whenever
you can. You’ll get the hang of it quickly, I’m sure.
And thanks for joining me for Study English, IELTS Preparation. Bye bye.
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TRANSCRIPT EPISODE 1: ELECTRONIC CRIME

Hello. I’m Margot Politis. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation.

Listen carefully to this police officer.

Then we’re going to look at word families, and do some spelling.

OK, so let’s have a closer look at that clip.

The keyword is ‘crime’. That’s what the sentence is about.

We say that a crime is committed, or done.

To commit a crime is to do something illegal.

Let’s have a closer look at the word ‘crime’.

Learning words groups is an excellent way to build your vocabulary.

Let’s have a look at the crime word group.

Crime is a noun. It’s a thing.

A ‘criminal’ is a person who commits a

Criminal is also the adjective.

And we have the adverb criminally.

There’s no verb from crime.

OK. We’ll come back to our table a bit later.

He says there are old forms of crime being committed electronically.

Electronically is an adverb. It means in an electronic way, or using electronics.

Listen to the way electronic is used here

He uses the phrases ‘electronic crime’, and ‘committed electronically’.

You’ll notice that not all words take all

For example look at the adverbs

They both end in '-l-y', '-ly'.

OK, so we’ve looked at electronic, and

These days, electronic is often used to

We have e-mail – electronic mail, e-business, electronic business.

So we could call these electronic crimes e-crimes – crimes committed using

An offence is another word for a crime.

An offence is a crime, and offenders are criminals.

OK, now let’s have a quick look at some spelling.

They have all got doubled letters.

Harassment - h-a-r-a-s-s-m-e-n-t - harassment

Electronically - e-l-e-c-t-r-o-n-i-c-a-l-l-y - electronically

See if you can find other words that

Don’t forget that it’s very useful to keep

And that’s all we’ve got time for today.

Hello. I’m Margot Politis. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation.

We’re going to listen to a scientist talking about Vitamin D and cancer.

So he was talking about the links between vitamin D and cancer.

But how can you tell the difference?

First, let’s look at some phrases.

These vary from formal to informal.

If I was talking with my friends I might say “I think” or “I believe”

If I was in a class or tutorial, I might say “In my opinion”, or “in my view”.

Here’s the clip again. Listen for some of those phrases.

Another way we can express opinions is by using modal verbs.

They can also be used for recommending and advising.

Here are the modal verbs used for opinions:

These words signal that the speaker is giving an opinion.

Fifty thousand will die.

The second statement uses might - it is an opinion.

Here’s another one…

I do not think small amounts of sunlight increase the risk of cancer.

Small amounts of sunlight do not increase the risk of cancer.

Now look at these 2 sentences:

The first is an opinion - 'I believe', 'might become'.

The second is a fact - 'will affect' 25% of adults.

But now we’re going to look at some pronunciation tips.

Listen to this sentence closely for word and sentence stress…

I don’t think we should blame moderate, intelligent exposure to sunlight throughout

For example, we say: intelligent, increasing, and markedly.

Listen to: 'moderate', 'intelligent', 'exposure', 'culprit', 'markedly', 'developing', 'cancer'.

I don’t think we should blame moderate, intelligent exposure to sunlight throughout