Your English Five a Day #36.1

E315: 🎙️ Welcome to The English Like a Native Podcast with me, your host, Anna! In Week 36, Day 1 of Your English Five a Day, we're diving into vocabulary to boost your skills and confidence in English.

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🕒 Today, we've got lots of nouns on the list, and we start with "hearsay" and "dozen". Then there's "bribe" and "tale". Finally, to wrap up, we have the phrasal verb "drag on".

🌍 🚯 Don't forget to stay tuned for pronunciation practice and a quick recap before we dive into the story section. In today's tale, the people of Wellingbrook are faced with a heavily polluted river. Determined to get to the bottom of the real reason why, journalist Emma investigates, and even though she faces danger and resistance along the way, Emma digs her heels in and eventually uncovers the truth.

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Transcript

0:01

Hello and welcome to The English Like a Native Podcast. My name is Anna and you're listening to Week 36, Day 1 of Your English Five a Day. This series is all about expanding your vocabulary, improving your listening skills, and making you feel more confident when using English in general. So, let's start this week and today's list with a noun, and it is hearsay, hearsay. We spell this H E A R S A Y. Hearsay. Hearsay. Hearsay is information received from someone else, especially when the information is unverified or considered unreliable. So, this is a story you might hear down at the pub, told to you by a drunken friend. And you're not sure if it's true or not. It's hearsay. Here's another example,"The detective dismissed the witness's testimony as hearsay, as it was based on what someone else had told them." Next on the list is another noun and it is dozen, dozen. We spell this D O Z E N. Dozen. Dozen means 12 when talking about quantities. So you might ask for a dozen eggs. That's probably the most common use of the word dozen. I need to buy a dozen eggs because I'm going to make some cakes and I'd also like some eggs left over for breakfast. A dozen eggs. Twelve eggs. Or you might ask for half a dozen. Six."How many cupcakes would you like from my stall today?""Oh, half a dozen will do. That will get me through to bedtime." I bought a dozen eggs at the supermarket today. Next on the list, we have another noun and it is bribe, bribe. We spell this B R I B E. Bribe, bribe. A bribe is money or a present, a gift that is given to someone so that they do something for you. Usually, it's something dishonest. So, if I'm asking someone to lie for me, and they don't want to lie to protect me, so I decide to give them something, like a large sum of money, or something that I know they can't refuse, something they really want or need and that thing that I give them is the bribe. And they agree to my terms. They can have the thing as long as they lie for me. They cover up for me. Have you ever accepted a bribe? To be honest, I often have to give my children a bribe when I need them to behave at very difficult times. Perhaps I have them at a wedding service, and it's the point where everyone has to be quiet and listen to the bride and groom exchanging vows, or it's after the ceremony and it's during the speeches that are often given in the after-dinner part of the wedding ceremony. I need the children to be quiet, so I give them a bribe in the form of ice cream, usually. Here's another example,"The paper revealed that the politician had taken bribes from a businessman." Next on the list is the noun tale, tale. We spell this T A L E, tale. A tale is a story, especially one that is fictional or based on folklore. So, I often say to the children stop telling tales, and this is when they're telling me something that I believe to be a lie, or if they're telling tales, they're saying that someone did something:"Mummy, Mummy, Jacob did this!" Because they want the other child to get into trouble, and I say,"Stop telling tales, stop telling me stories, I don't want to hear it." OK, so here's another example sentence,"My great-grandma used to tell us captivating tales about a brave knight and a magical dragon." Last on the list is a phrasal verb. Haha, you thought it was going to be all nouns today, didn't you? No, we're finishing with a phrasal verb. This is drag on. Drag on. Not dragon, but drag on. Drag on. Two words. D R A G. On, O N. To drag on. If something drags on then it continues for an extended period. Often we use this when that extension is quite boring. So for example, if someone's giving a speech and it starts off well, and maybe by five minutes you're thinking,"Okay, that's enough now. I hope he's going to finish speaking soon." And then 10 minutes later, you are struggling to keep your eyes open because you're so bored. This speech is dragging on. When will it end? Some days we feel like the day drags on, especially if we're doing a long shift at work. I did night shifts at one of my many jobs when I was younger, and the night shifts could be really tough. There'd come a point around 2 am where it got really, really tiring. It was dull, we were tired, it was an unnatural time to be awake, especially if you weren't drinking. And yeah, and you still had so many hours to go before you could get the bus home. Those night shifts really dragged on. Here's another example,"The meeting dragged on for hours, oh, leaving everyone exhausted." OK, so that's our five. Let's do a very quick recap. We started with the noun hearsay. This is information that's received from somebody else and that information generally can't be relied upon or it can't be verified. Then we had the noun dozen. This means 12 in quantity. We had the noun bribe, which is money or a gift that you receive in exchange for doing something that you probably shouldn't be doing. We had the noun tale, which is a story that's often fictional or based on folklore. And we had the phrasal verb drag on, which is to continue for an extended period in a boring way. Alright, let's do this now for pronunciation. Please repeat after me. Hearsay. Hearsay. Dozen. Dozen. Bribe. Bribe. Tail. Tail. Drag on. Drag on. Very good. Okay. What's the noun that is money or a gift that you give to someone when you want them to do something for you? A bribe. And what's another word for a story, especially a fictional story? A tale. What's the noun that represents information that you receive from someone else? Hearsay. That's hearsay. And how do we say twelve in a different way? Dozen. Yes, I'd like a dozen eggs, please. And finally, what's the phrasal verb that means to continue for an extended period? Drag on. Fantastic. Listen out for these items once again in today's storytime. The people of Wellingbrook weren't allowed to swim or fish in their town river as it was too polluted. They had heard the same tale over and over again the pollution came from using cleaning products and laundry powder. So they needed to use less to clean it up. But Emma, a local journalist, didn't believe that story. She was determined to investigate. Emma didn't realise what a big and difficult job it would be. Her reporting dragged on for months. She interviewed over a dozen people. It took a long time to organise her notes and see the connections. Many people didn't want to talk though. Some would only speak anonymously. Things even got dangerous. One night, she noticed a car following her home. Another time, she got a strange phone call from someone warning her to stop. Emma was starting to get scared. She soon found out why people didn't want her to investigate the pollution in the river. An anonymous source from one of the local farms spoke to Emma. The person explained that the mayor was accepting bribes from a local farmer. In exchange for money, the mayor let the farmer dump animal waste directly into the river. That's what was causing all the pollution, not cleaning products. That was just a story the mayor made up to hide the truth! The next day, Emma went to the editor of the local newspaper with the evidence. He decided to publish the story. At first, the mayor denied taking bribes, saying the paper's story was based on hearsay, not solid evidence. But then the police decided to investigate. They found proof of several meetings between the mayor and the farmer and evidence of bribes. When Emma found out the police had arrested the mayor and the farmer, she cried tears of relief. She had worked so hard, and for so long and had even risked her safety. But she was glad the river would be cleaned up, so the people of Wellingbrook could enjoy it once again. Now you can find the vocabulary from today's episode on The Master Sheet. This is available for everyone. It includes all the vocabulary from the entire Five a Day Series. I'll leave a link to The Master Sheet in the show notes. Until tomorrow, take very good care and goodbye.