Listening test: Hair washing

Listen to a report on hair washing and complete the blanks in the sentences below with up to THREE WORDS. 0 is an example.

source: Gerry's News Digest

0 Example:
Queen Elizabeth I of England took a bath about 4 times a year

1. In the 16th century bathing wasn’t considered to be a _________________ thing to do.

2. When the narrator grew up, they didn’t have _________________ for their clothes.

3. Gary Barlow tweeted that he hadn’t washed his hair for _________________ .

4. The narrator’s _________________ also agrees that washing your hair isn’t necessary.

5. The anti-washing people say that after ten days the grease goes, the skin calms down and the hair _________________ .

6. According to the National Hairdressers’ Federation, shampoo is not harmful and it can make your _________________ .

7. The narrator _________________ using a normal deodorant some years ago.

Portrait of Queen Elizabeth I at the Royal Museums Greenwich

Queen Elizabeth I of England took a bath about 4 times a year, they say, even if she didn’t need to. At that time, in the 16th century, bathing was not considered a very healthy or safe thing to do. It wasn’t so much that people didn’t like to be clean; it was more a fear of immersing yourself in water. You might catch something from the water. People, or rich people at least, preferred to wipe their bodies with clean, wet cloths. When I was growing up, many people used to bath and wash their hair only once a week. And people didn’t change their clothes nearly as often as they do today. There were practical explanations for this. The bathroom in the house where I grew up, for example, was freezing in the winter. And we didn’t have modern washing machines for our clothes.
I was thinking of all this the other day, when I was reading about Gary Barlow, one of the members of the famous Take That boy band, along with Robbie Williams. He tweeted that he had just washed his hair for the first time in 14 years. This produced a lot of reaction, as you can imagine. A number of other celebrities then revealed that they too have given up washing their hair. There’s a group of people who think that washing your hair is not necessary. And my daughter is one of them. They say that not washing your hair is good for both your hair and the skin on your head. But if I don’t wash my hair for a week, my head gets itchy and my hair gets greasy. These anti-washing people say, however, that you have to be patient and that after about 10 days, the greasiness goes, the skin on your head calms down and your hair starts cleaning itself.
The story was on the BBC website, and of course, the BBC always has to be balanced in its reporting, so they asked somebody from the National Hairdressers’ Federation what they thought. ‘There’s nothing wrong with washing your hair,’ they said. ‘Shampoo does not harm your hair or the skin on your head, and it can make your hair look better. Hair cannot clean itself.’ Well, perhaps, we might expect a hairdresser to say that.
So what should I do? Follow the no-wash trend? I probably won’t, but you never know, I did give up using a normal deodorant some years ago. I switched to using what’s known as a crystal deodorant, and I’m very happy with it.

KEY:
1 healthy or safe
2 modern washing machines
3 fourteen years
4 daughter
5 starts cleaning itself
6 hair look better
7 stopped / gave up / did give up

Pavlok: A gadget to break bad habits

Pavlok is a wrist-worn motivational device designed to help break bad habits by administering an electric shock every time the wearer shows weakness or succumbs to temptation.



More than 40% of our lives are spent in habit. For most of us, that time is wasted. The secret to transformation is not to try harder, it’s to replace bad habits with the habit of excellence. If you wanted to transform yourself, how would you start?
First, identify the habits that hold you back. Pair them with a negative stimulus like electric shock. Each surge of voltage trains your brain and weakens the neural connection until the bad habit is severed. Next, we place the bad habit with a positive one. Reward yourself when you complete your daily goal. Commit to a penalty if you fail. The fear of loss stimulate your basal ganglia, while the chance of reward motivates your prefrontal cortex. In fewer than 30 days the action becomes a habit.
Pavlok is the first system designed to help you build good habits and break bad ones. Earn rewards when you succeed. Pay the price when you fail. And experience the electric shock that keeps you on track.
Contribute to the crowdfunding campaign today.
Hi. I’m Maneesh Sethi, founder of Pavlok. Now I know that electric shock sounds crazy, but sometimes crazy works. Like many revolutionary ideas, ours started off just as a fun project, but it turned into something much more. Together with my co-founder Jim Lynch we set out to create Pavlok, the world’s first device that just doesn’t track what you do but actually changes what you do.
Here you see Pavlok in it’s wrist band form, but at its core Pavlok is a small module, it’s small enough that it can stick it anywhere on your body. Now, Pavlok is able to vibrate, beep and even electrically shock you on command. But what Pavlok can do is much more.
Instead of me telling you what Pavlok can do, let me show you what Pavlok has already done.
Hi, my name is David Goldstein and I’m hoping to use Pavlok to get me into a better exercise routine. I’m a cancer survivor. I had a heart attack. I was in a wheelchair for a while. I still have some paralysis in both legs. As you can see I’ve put on a great deal of weight and I’m hoping that Pavlok can help me address all of these issues.
I’m at 65 days out of the past 71 of using the Pavlok system. I am down 7 pounds. My arms have got noticeably stronger and my legs are actually the strongest they’ve been since I was paralysed in 2001. I go and play with my kids more during the day. It’s now just part of who I am and what I do.
You see, most of us just don’t know what greatness feels like. We assume we’re going to do what we’ve always done but users like David tell a different story. When they begin to fall back on their old routine, Pavlok jolts them out of it. In most cases, the old routine can be replaced in fewer than 30 days. People are already using Pavlok to begin writing every day, learn new languages, to exercise, to journal, to begin and form dozens of new habits. In fact, there’s infinite capabilities thank to Pavlok’s open developer API.
I know first hand how powerful small habit changes can be, and I’m excited to share Pavlok with the world. That’s why in we go for supporters like you, come in. We’ve built the Pavlok prototype. We’ve begun testing on users. Now we need your help to begin setting up manufacturing, so we can deliver Pavlok. I hope it change the habits that matter most to you.

Madrid Teacher: Pub closures

This week's Madrid Teacher entry is intended for intermediate students. It is a bit dated, from when new smoking regulations in pubs and restaurants had been passed in the UK but not in Spain. Anyway, the video is another great opportunity to listen to authentic snippets of conversation between native speakers of English and see the way they interact.

Watch the video through and enjoy these nice bubbly Madrid Teachers discussing pubs both in Spain and in their home country. What different pub-related topics do they mention?

Let's pay attention to some of the expressions for agreement that we can hear on the video:
Yes, sure.
That's right.
Yeah.
Absolutely, yeah.
It certainly is, yeah.
They are, yeah.
A lot, yeah.
Definitely.

At the beginning of the clip the boy gives us an example of how we can give emphasis by using the auxiliary verb. We usually do so when we wish to show listeners that we feel strongly about what we are saying:
I do enjoy the occasional country walk to a pub.

There are no other examples of this kind of emphasis in the video clip, but here are some other examples:
You do look good today!
I did play a lot of football when I was at school.
You have grown.
You must believe me.

In the sentences with no auxiliary verb, we add do/does/did. We stress the auxiliary verb to make the whole sentence sound more emphatic.




Now it's over to you. Discuss your pub-related habits using some of the topics mentioned on the video or some others you can  think about. In your conversation, try and use some of the expressions for agreement you could hear on the video and use auxiliary verbs to emphasize some information.

I’ve heard recently that there are lots of closures to pubs in England, or there have been over the past year. And I’m a little bit worried because I do enjoy the occasional country walk to a pub, find somewhere unusual in the countryside and have a strange pint.
That’s a part of the culture of England.
Have you visited a country pub in England?
Yes, sure, and what I love about them is now, ‘cause, smoking is banned there isn’t it? So, . . .
That’s right.
. . . to me, well, it’s perfect. Just compared to Spain, where you go to pubs and it’s, there’s smoke everywhere. It’s not nice.
And unhealthy, yeah. What about the, the drinks? Do you enjoy a pint of beer? Do you enjoy that?
I’m a wine drinker.
Oh!
You can have a glass of wine in a pub, as well.
Absolutely, yeah. But the wine in the UK isn’t really as good as the wine in Spain. And it’s very overpriced comparatively. Yeah..
It certainly is, yeah. Yeah, it’s become more and more popular, hasn’t it, to have a glass of wine at the pub, as opposed to a proper pint of beer.
Yeah. Well they’re heavy, you know?
Yeah, heavy. They’re large, they’re filling. But now they’re cheaper than a glass of wine as well, which is an advantage.
They are, yeah.
What about the, the rules of engagement when you go to a pub in the UK?
What is that?
What are the rules when you approach the, the bar, what do you do? What do you do when you get there?
Elbow your way to the front. Stand on your tip toes.
Biggest, broadest smile, off you go.
And get a beer as soon as you can.
In Spain, for example, do you have rounds?
Yeah, sure we do. I think it’s more common in England, isn’t it? But yeah, we, and you go with your friends, and you go to the bar, and you ask a round for everyone, and then the next person, and, and you can keep all night long.
Absolutely. What about in Canada?
Not many pubs, not, at least not in Quebec. I think in, maybe in Ontario they have more pubs but, there’s not really a pub culture. People aren’t known . . . and in Quebec, in the summer especially, people, people like terraces, you know? They take, try to take advantage of the little, the few months of, you know, nice weather and, you know, sit on the terrace. Rather than being closed in a pub, you know?
Yeah.
So there’s not much of a pub culture, to tell you the truth.
Well, yeah. I’d, I’d hate to think that it was dying out in England but it appears to be. And, Scotland as well?
Well . . .
Never.
I think, in Glasgow, there are more than . . . eight hundred bars and pubs, so . . .
Nice.
Glasgow’s quite a small city. And I have heard that there have been a lot of closures . . . Something like, in the UK fifty-two bars are closing a month or a week or something?
A lot, yeah. It’s worrying.
A lot. But I can’t see the culture ever dying out.
I suppose the strong ones will survive.
Definitely.
And we’ll keep visiting them.
Oh absolutely. There you go. We have the attitude.

Talking point: Food rituals and food issues

Today's talking point is a follow-up from last week's about your favourite restaurant. We continue talking about food, but this time we are going to focus on food rituals and controversial topics around food.

The idea came to me when I watched The New York Times video clip below about food rituals. Just watch the video and read the accompanying article by Catherine St Louis, Rituals Make Our Food More Flavorful to get acquainted with idea. If you want to fully understand everything on the video, you can read the transcript below.



Now before getting together with the members of your conversation group, go over the questions below so that ideas flow more easily when you meet your friends and you can work out vocabulary difficulties beforehand.

Do you have any food rituals or know anyone who has?
Do you agree with the idea that rituals make our food tastier?
If you were a food, what food would you be? Why?
Were there any foods you particularly loved or hated as a child? Do you still love/hate them?
What kind of food or drink would you associate with the following situations? Why?
being in love - waiting at an airport - rainy days - summer - your grandmother’s house

Food issues
How do you feel about slow food (also called 'free range food' or 'organic food' or 'biodiversity food')?
How do you feel about 'fast food' and 'ready-made food' (or processed/convenience food)?
What's your take on the controversy between 'sustainable organic farming' versus 'industrial agriculture'?

What do you think about the following?

• Healthy drinks
• Low fat options
• Labelling of ingredients
• Fraud in food
• Traditional cuisine
• Cuisine globalization
• Nouveau cuisine
• Fair trade products
• Local food suppliers
• Danger of food additives and preservatives for health
• Popularity of cooking TV programmes
• Celebrity chefs
• World-famous restaurants

Do you feel like it tasted different to you?
I’m Catherine Saint Louis from The New York Times. My story is about new research about food rituals. Four experiments show that the little things we do before eating our food enhances its flavour and help us savior what we eat and drink.

In this study, participants were asked to knock on a table, take a deep breath before eating a baby carrot. It turned out that those people reported enjoying their baby carrots more than the group that didn’t perform the ritual. Science may just be catching up with what many of us have known for a long time.

These things, or oysters or anything, I don’t necessarily chew them, I just shallow them.
I used to, as a kid, drink milk and soda, I can’t believe I’m telling you this, milk and soda, which was made popular by Laverne, on “Laverne and Shirley”
One milk, one Pepsi.
Excuse me.
Milk. Pepsi.
Half milk, fill it with Coke. But no ice. You have to put the milk first. If you do it any other way, [it] just doesn’t taste the same. It’s like mixing a martini, you know, just throw things into a shaker and shake it up. You know, it has to be done in a certain order sometimes and stirred in a certain way, and if you do it the right way it’s gonna taste better than what it would doing it in the glass. Sometimes it’s a mental perception. It might not always physically make the food taste better, but if you believe it tastes better that way, then it will.
How do you eat your eggs?
I take my fork and I cut it all up and mix it all together.
How long have you done that?
My dad taught me to do that when I was very young and I still do it that way.
I have a…
Ritual?
Not a ritual.
Yes, it is.
It’s a schedule. It’s really more of like a how I eat. The first time I see all the different sauces that I like I have to put them in the top of the sushi container and mix them together with the chopsticks, ok?, and then I deconstruct every single piece of sushi as I eat it, from the top to the bottom.
What about barbecue? Do you eat barbecue?
I love barbecue, but I will not touch it with my fingers.
So how do you eat barbecue?
Knife and fork, and there’s nothing left on the bone when I get done.
Are there any other foods that you eat in a particular way or a particular order?
You know what else Dad you eat bagels like a sandwich.
I plead the fifth amendment on that one.
What do you mean he eats them like a sandwich?
Like when I’m just getting ready. When I eat an egg sandwich I take it apart a hundred per cent, I take the eggs off, the cheese and…
You deconstruct them!
And then I eat each piece of bread separately.
I don’t eat them as halves I eat the whole bagel, with the filling and that way you don’t need…
Wait, wait just second, egg sandwich just when there’s cream cheese on it?
Yes, exactly, then you don’t touch the cream cheese, you’re just touching the bagel
I’m sensing a theme here?
Yes, I have some issues.

International Women's Day

8th March is the International Women’s Day. Last year we published this video by Kronos and Xplane which I think lends itself to a nice conversation lesson on the topic of change, women’s role in society today and in the past and the use of would to express habits in the past.

Lesson idea:
Before watching the video, discuss the way women’s lives in your country have changed in the last 100 years. Give some examples of the ways life for a woman today is different/similar to the life of a woman 50 or 100 years ago.

Now you can watch the video and check if any of your ideas are mentioned. You can also note down and discuss any details that may have drawn your attention.



Note the way modal auxiliary would is used to express past habits. We can only use would  to express past habits if we are talking about actions: She would drive her children to school

whereas we can use used to to express past habits both to talk about states and actions: She used to drive her children to school; her family used to have a house in Hertfordshire.

You can read more about this grammar point on Grammaring.com or English page.

At this stage you may like to go back to what you mentioned about a woman’s life 50 or 100 years ago and rephrase some of your ideas using would to express typical actions and habits.

Now some more questions to talk about changes in today’s world. Remember to use would for past habits to refer to actions and activities if you want to practise this grammar point.

Your city
How has your town changed in your lifetime? Is it a lot bigger?
Have a lot of immigrants moved into your town?
Have a lot of new houses been built? If yes, where and what kind of houses?
Have the shops and shopping areas changed?
Can you think of any other changes?

Work, family and free time
How have people’s lifestyles changed in your country during your lifetime?
Do people still do the same kinds of jobs?
Have any new industries developed? Have any old industries disappeared?
Has family life changed?
Do people still do the same kinds of things in their free time? Do they spend their money on the same things? Are their hopes and dreams the same?
Can you think of any other changes?

If you want to do a listening activity around International Women's Day, Are we equals?, a video starred by Daniel Graig comes in handy. Here we can see James Bond's femenine side. He teams up with Judi Dench to highlight the need for gender equality.

Self-study activity:
Complete the transcript of the video with the missing facts and figures. I think Básico 2 students can give the activity a try.





We're equals, aren't we 007? Yet it is (1) ... and a man is still likely to earn more money than a woman, even one doing the same job. You have a far better chance of entering political office or becoming a company director. As a man you are less likely to be judged for promiscuous behaviour, which is just as well, frankly. And hardly any chance of falling victim to sexual assault. And unlike the (2) ... women in the UK who lose their jobs annually due to pregnancy, there would be virtually no risk to your career if you chose to become a parent ... or became one accidentally.
For someone with such a fondness for women, I wonder if you have ever considered what it might be like to be one? The world has changed, but the numbers remain stuck against us. Women are responsible for (3) ... of the work done worldwide, yet earn any (4) ... of the total income and own (5) ... of the property. It’s not just about money and power. Every year (6) ... million girls are deprived of even a basic education and a staggering (7) ... million are sexually assaulted on their way to school. We are afraid to walk the streets at night, yet some of us are even more afraid to return to our own homes. At least (8) ... are victims of domestic violence. And every week, (9) ... women in the UK are killed by a current or former partner.
So are we equals? Until the answer is yes we must never stop asking.

If you want to find out more about the topic of International Women's Day, The Guardian published the online series Top 100 Women to commemorate Women's Day on 8th March.


Key:
(1) 2011 (2) 30,000 (3) 2/3 (4) 10% (5) 1% (6) 70 (7) 60 (8) 1 in 4 (9) 2

Hong Kong series: My daily routine

This is the last installment in the Hong Kong series of videos. Kim, Sam and Clare, three teachers at The British Council in Hong Kong, answer the questions below about their daily routine.

Listen to what they say and note down the answers they give. Then answer the same questions about your daily routine.

What’s your daily routine?
What’s your favourite part of the day?
What would be your dream day?

Talking point: Talent or hard work

In late November last year The Learning Network of  The New York Times posed a question in the Student Opinion section: Which Is More Important: Talent or Hard Work?


These are some of the questions they wrote about the topic to jog their readers' mind, which you can also use as a springboard to discuss the topic with the members of your talking group.


Have you experienced the power of talent over hard work? 
Or have you found that success comes from putting in the most time and effort to achieve it?
How have you seen the talent/dedication equation play out in studies, sports, work or any other field in which individuals are compared?

Did the person with the most real or perceived “natural talent” also work the hardest?
How did a person of average ability improve over time?
Did the improvement make him or her “the best” or did those most naturally gifted still prevail?
What do you think of the idea that “practice makes perfect”?

To gain further insight into the topic, you can also read The New York Times article by David Z. Hambrick and Elizabeth J. Meinz Sorry, Strivers: Talent Matters,

David Plunkert

How we have changed

8th March was the International Women’s Day. I had meant to post some activity to commemorate the day, but everything I came across fell short of my expectations. Eventually I found this video by Kronos and Xplane which I think lends itself to a nice conversation lesson on the topic of change, women’s role in society today and in the past and the use of would to express habits in the past.

Lesson idea:
Before watching the video, discuss the way women’s lives in your country have changed in the last 100 years. Give some examples of the ways life for a woman today is different/similar to the life of a woman 50 or 100 years ago.

Now you can watch the video and check if any of your ideas are mentioned. You can also note down and discuss any details that may have drawn your attention.



Note the way modal auxiliary would is used to express past habits. We can only use would  to express past habits if we are talking about actions: She would drive her children to school

whereas we can use used to to express past habits both to talk about states and actions: She used to drive her children to school; her family used to have a house in Hertfordshire].

You can read more about this grammar point on Grammaring.com or English page.

At this stage you may like to go back to what you mentioned about a woman’s life 50 or 100 years ago and rephrase some of your ideas using would to express typical actions and habits.

Now some more questions to talk about changes in today’s world. Remember to use would for past habits to refer to actions and activities if you want to practise this grammar point.

Your city
How has your town changed in your lifetime? Is it a lot bigger?
Have a lot of immigrants moved into your town?
Have a lot of new houses been built? If yes, where and what kind of houses?
Have the shops and shopping areas changed?
Can you think of any other changes?

Work, family and free time
How have people’s lifestyles changed in your country during your lifetime?
Do people still do the same kinds of jobs?
Have any new industries developed? Have any old industries disappeared?
Has family life changed?
Do people still do the same kinds of things in their free time? Do they spend their money on the same things? Are their hopes and dreams the same?
Can you think of any other changes?

If you want to do a listening activity around International Women's Day, last year we posted the video below,  and you can do a related comprehension task by clicking here.

Speakout upper-intermediate: Annoying habits (beginnings)

Self-study activity:
What's your experience of sharing a flat with people other than your family?
Do you have any annoying habits?
What habits or qualities in a flatmakte would you find most annoying?

Now watch this short video clip from Speakout Longman and try to understand the answers the interviewees give.



You can read the transcript here.

Go over the habits the people on the video have mentioned. What is your experience of those habits? Which ones do/would you find annoying?