Real English Show Ep 2 notes

THE REAL ENGLISH SHOW

Lesson 2

16/9/2018

Talking About Childhood Memories

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Listen to my memories of childhood and notice the grammar tenses that I use.

USED TO and WOULD to talk about past memories, habits and routines.

1. USED TO

We use ‘used to + verb’ to talk about actions or states that happened often in the past.

These are repeated actions; things that we ‘usually’ did in the past, but we don’t do now.

• “I used to live in a country town, but now I live in a big city.”
• “We used to go camping in the summer holidays.“
• “My brother and I used to ride our bikes down to the beach.”

IN THE NEGATIVE:

• “We didn’t use to use computers or mobile phones.”

AND THE QUESTIONS:

• “Did you use to go camping on holidays?”
• “Where did you use to live when you were growing up?”

2. WOULD

We can also use ‘would + verb’ to refer to something we often did in the past, but not now.

It’s more common to use ‘would’ when talking about memories in the distant past, from a long time ago.

So ‘used to’ and ‘would’ can be used in the same way, but ‘would’ is more often used to go into more detail about distant past memories.

You can start with a ‘used to’ statement to introduce what you’re talking about:

• “We used to go camping every summer”. (a general statement)

And then use ‘would’ to reflect on more detail.

• “We would pitch a tent by the beach and have barbecues in the evening.” (a more specific statement)NOTE:

‘Would’ can only describe past events and actions. It is not usually used with states.

‘Used to’ can be used for both events and actions and states.

For example, we can’t say “Tom would be really funny when he was younger.” X

We must used ‘used to’ here for this kind of general statement:

“Tom used to be really funny when he was younger.” √ Correct!

——————

3. USING THE PAST PERFECT

Listen to my story and notice how I used the Past Perfect tense.

• “I hadn’t been out so far on a boat before.”

Subject + had / hadn’t + verb (no. 3) ….

PAST PERFECT SIMPLE:

We use the Past Perfect for events or actions that are completed BEFORE a second event / action in the past.

Past perfect adds more interesting detail to a story.

• “We had packed our lunches for the trip.”

This happened before we left for the boat trip.

— —- —> —- —-> packed lunches —— ——> —-> left for boat trip —- —-> NOW

PAST PERFECT CONTINUOUS:

We use the Past Perfect Continuous for longer actions that continue over a period of time, BEFORE the second event / action in the past.

• “We had been fishing for a few hours (before we saw the shark).”
  

How to practice and use the Past Perfect naturally in conversation?

1. Listen to and read short stories and notice the past tenses used.
   
2. Practice writing true stories about particular incidents in your past. Remember to use the Past Perfect to include more background detail in your story, that happened before the main event.
   
3. Now practice telling these stories to someone. Don’t use your notes. Try to remember the timeline and details of the story.
   Keep repeating the story over and over until it becomes familiar to you to use the past perfect._________________________

4. THREE FEATURES OF AUSTRALIAN PRONUNCIATION

1. /əʊ/
   The ‘oh’ sound is more open and wider than the British and American dialects.
   We drop the draw lower and open the mouth more. The jaw is more relaxed.

For example:

• don’t
• know
• home
• no one
• though
• hopeless
• slow
• lonely

• I don’t know.
• It’s time to go home.
• No one goes there though.
• This is hopelessly slow.
• He seems lonely.

2. The /t/ sound, when it comes between two vowels in a word, sounds like a /d/.

• better
• water
• lot of
• eating
• sit up
• writer

• I feel better today.

• He drinks a lot of water.

• Sit up while you’re eating.

• She wants to be a writer.

This is also the same for the American accent.

3. The /a/ sound or schwa /Ə/ when a word ends in these vowel sounds:

Note: To make the typical Australian sound like this, the draw drops quite a lot and the mouth is quite wide open.

• a – sofa / area / coma
• re – centre / metre / fire
• or – actor / doctor
• ure – pure / cure / nature
• our –  hour / neighbour / sour
• er – mother / another / letter

• Come and sit on the sofa next to the fire.

• He’s a doctor and part time actor.

• I love the pure air in nature.

• My mother got a letter from her neighbour.