Talking point: Scientific advances for the future

This week's talking point deals with scientific advances for the future. Before you get together with the members of your conversation group, think about the predictions below and rank them from 1 (the soonest) to 14 (the most distant).

• There will be a permanent undersea city.
• Companies will have workers aged from 18 to 75 due to the late retirement age.
• We won’t need to eat meals. We’ll take nutritional pills instead.
• Everybody will buy e-books or audio books instead of paper books.
• No one will smoke.
• We will be able to control the weather.
• People will take space holidays on the Moon – if they can afford it.
• 3D TV will be the norm.
• There will be one currency used throughout the world.
• All edible fish will have disappeared from the ocean.
• Super-planes will cut travel times by half, and there will even be flying cars.
• Organ donors will no longer be necessary. We’ll be able to get an artificial heart, liver or other body part if needed.
• The ageing process in humans will be stopped.
• Everybody will be driving a hydrogen-powered vehicle.

What other advances, inventions and innovations would you like to see in the future?

To have a peek at how close some of the above-mentioned advances are, watch this video which I think I discovered on English on Target.We miss you, Irma.



Today I'm making history. I'm driving from the Midlands to the Isle of Wight. Ahh, I hear you say, nothing very historic in that. But just hang on a minute. I'm doing it in the world's first commercially available hydrogen car. By the end of this year, we will be able to lease Hyundai SUVs like this that are powered entirely by hydrogen. And the Isle of Wight connection? Well that is the UK's biggest green energy collaboration project EcoIsland. Now to get to the Isle of Wight I'm going to run entirely on hydrogen so I'm going to need to top up which is why I'm in Nottingham where the University of Nottingham has bought a mobile hydrogen refuelling station from ITM Power in Sheffield.
Gavin... Hello...
Hi Quentin.
Now you are a professor of Sustainable Energy here at Nottingham University. Tell me about EcoIsland. 'cause that's a really significant project.
This is a huge set change in the hydrogen infrastructure development in the UK. On the Isle of Wight they're looking at four times the size of this refueller providing sustainable hydrogen for a local fleet of vehicles that the community can all use.
In the next few years, Hyundai will be rolling out ten thousand of these ix35 SUVs every single year. ITM Power can pluck down hydrogen refuelling stations literally wherever you want. So that means we won't just be getting cheaper, cleaner fuel, we'll also be able to light and heat our houses with hydrogen. I'm off now to the Isle of Wight to have a glimpse at the future. And what's it going to mean, this EcoIsland project for the Isle of Wight? Well, there is the small question of 400 new jobs. 142,000 people here, that it'll directly influence, plus 60,000 homes. And let's not forget this is a globally big deal, so much so that it's attracted the attention of the UK Minister for Energy, who I'm going to pick up from the ferry terminal right now.
Hello... Good to meet you...
Good to meet you, too.
So perfidy to the orthodox: utterly carbon neutral. You can fill it up in three minutes, like a petrol car.
And how long will it run for?
300 to 350 miles.
And how expensive to run?
On renewables, it's half the price of petrol.
Really.
So convincing the consumers, you don't have to try and talk to them about saving the planet. You just talk have to tell them, it's going to cost you only half the price.
Yeah, that's why I asked.
And you can use platforms like this which is a conventional Hyundai that would have had an internal combustion engine and put the fuel cell in it.
Welcome everybody. This is the first global EcoIsland summit where island communities all over the world are coming together to find a long term solution to the greatest human challenges of the day.
We are deploying 100-kg-a-day refuelling station and a 15-kg-a-day refuelling station on the island and we'll have its fleet of 20 vehicles, including marine vehicles.
The ITM Power technology is groundbreaking. It's not just about just turning water into hydrogen and oxygen, it's about the portability of it. I mean, they walked up here in the middle of the week with a couple of small containers, they plug it in and they played. And here we have a generator unit that has now got enough juice in it to run a fleet of say ten cars. And once you get to that stage, you can put it anywhere.
I believe this project deserves the support which you've given it and it will certainly get my support, too. Thank you so much.
EcoIsland means that the Isle of Wight, by 2020 will be completely sustainable when it comes to energy. And this is hugely important. I've just come out from the Minister's keynote address, the Minister for Energy, John Hayes, MP, said that this is quite simply the most advanced sustainability project in the entire world. And hydrogen is going to play a major, major part. The Isle of Wight, we wish you well.

Speakout Advanced: Music and fashion

This week the Speakout video podcast revolves around the topic of trends in music and fashion. Passers-by answer the following questions about the topic:

Are you interested in music and fashion?
Tell me about a music trend or style that you love or hate.
Tell me about a fashion trend that you love or hate.




Now it's over to you. Answer the questions above about yourself. Try to use some of the expressions and vocabulary you heard on the video.

You can read the transcript here.

Surviving the recession communist-style in Spain

The economic crisis has made unemployment reach unprecedented levels in Spain, with record numbers of homes repossessed after the property market crashed.

However, Marinaleda, a small communist-style town in the south, claims to have no unemployment and no repossessions.

Self-study activity:
Watch the short BBC video clip by clicking on the link here or the picture below and answer the questions about it.

The activity is suitable for Básico 2 and Intermediate 1 students.

1 What is the unemployment rate in Andalucia?
2 What does the town hall give David for free?
3 How long do houses take to be finished?
4 What does '15€ a month' refer to?
5 How many people work in the agriculture sector?
6 What did Gordillo's followers do last summer?

You can check your answers by reading the transcript below.

Marinaleda is a small town in Andalucia, a region where more than one in three are out of work and record numbers of homes being repossessed after Spain’s property bubble burst. But in this town they’re working to make mortgages a thing of the past.
Residents like David Gonzales Molina are building their own homes. David tells us the situation in his town is much better than in places nearby. People there are claiming state benefits because there’s no work, he says, especially now the construction industry in places like Malaga has ground to a halt.
The town hall here gives David 190 square metres of land for free. The cost of the materials is initially covered by the regional government and professional builders employed by the town hall help out. When the houses are finished in about two years’ time,  they’ll look something like this, and then the owner will have to pay just 15 euros a month to the town hall to pay back the cost of the bricks and mortar.
When you finish building your house, what are going to do for work?
David says he’ll work in the countryside or in metal work in which he’s trained. There’s always crops to harvest, he says.
Agriculture employs about half of the population. The town has a collective farm, so work is shared out meaning no one has no work. The graffiti here shows the ideals and politics of this place. The town hall is run by Spain’s United Left Party, and the mayor hopes to create some type of communist-style utopia.
Juan Manuel Sánchez Gordillo sparked controversy last summer when he and his supporters stole food from supermarkets to hand it out to the poor. But could his formula for this town really work in other parts of Spain?
I think we need to rethink our values, the consumer society, the value we place on money, selfishness and individualism.
On the streets of the Spanish capital protest continue against austerity. There are signs that the ideas of the left are gaining support. What they are building in this town is a small challenge to capitalism. Because of Spain’s crisis the credibility of the current system here has taken a knock.

Extensive listening: Interview with Beyoncé

This is an interview of Beyoncé with the CBS programme 60 Minutes in early 2010. I know that the interview is not the most recent one, but given that Beyoncé's stardom keeps growing by the day, I thought it would be a good idea to check the way she saw herself when she was already a well-established personality in the music world and the way she talked about her family and childhood.

I am embedding here the full  CBS programme 60 Minutes of 31 January 2010. You will find the interview with Beyoncé at 28'.







You can also read a full transcript of the interview here.

I managed to find this YouTube video with the same interview, but you may find the publicity a bit annoying.



Finally, if you wish to do a listening activity based on the interview, Cristina Cabal has devised this listening comprehension for her students. Well, as a matter of fact it was through Cristina that I bumped into the video.

Omnilexica

Omnilexica is a free online dictionary.  Omnilexica defines itself as "search in all dictionaries at once".

I think this description makes justice to Omnilexica  as it provides definitions for all English words and expressions in both mainstream and specialised dictionaries together with examples, pronunciation, videos, quotes.

 

 Drop by  Omnilexica and type in any word or expression in the search box at the top and you will discover a dictionary with a difference.

H/T to Teaching English.

Our oceans animation

This short film by oceanographer Sylvia Earle highlights the urgent need to protect our oceans from pollution and overfishing. It was released to coincide with World Oceans Day in early June this year.

Self-study activity:
Watch the video and complete the blanks in the transcript with the missing words.

The activity is suitable for Básico 2 and Intermediate 1 students.



The world is blue. If you look at it from (1) ..., that image should alone inspire us to think that we, too, are sea (2) ... . We are as dependent on the ocean as any (3) ... or any coral reef. Take away the ocean, and there is no us. We have looked to the ocean as a place to put things that we don't want, and a place to take things that seemed in (4) ... quantity... We’ll never run out of fish, it was thought.
We’ve lost on the order of  (5) ... of many of the big fish like tunas, swordfish, sharks, marlin, cod. Some of the techniques for fishing should definitely be (6) ...  . That includes bottom trawling. They are so destructive. It’s like using a bulldozer to catch some (7) ... . You shake up a few pounds of protein but you’ve destroyed the (8) ... and everything that is in it.
What can you do? Think about what you're eating. Make better (9) ...  . Know where the fish come from. I think of the ocean as the blue (10) ... of the planet. But how much of your (10) ... do you want to protect?

Key:
1 space 2 creatures 3 whale 4 infinite 5 90%  6 banned 7 birds 8 forest 9 choices 10 heart

Royal baby clothing at the Museum of London

July has seen the arrival of a new member of the Royal Family. The Museum of London has on display royal baby clothing. Fashion curator Timothy Long has selected some of the pieces and he shows them on this video.

Self-study activity:
Watch the three-minute video and answer the questions about it.

The activity is suitable for intermediate students.



1 When did the London Museum open?
2 Where were the items from the Royal Family originally shown?
3 What material is the robe made of?
4 Who was Prince Albert Edward?
5 What is special about Princess Alice's shoes?
6 What name did Prince Albert Eward use as a monarch?
7 What does PW stand for?
8 What items belong to Princess Alice and Princess Beatrice?
9 What items belong to Princess Louis and Princess Victoria?

To check your answers, you can read the transcript below.

Hello, my name is Timothy Long. I am curator of fashion and decorative arts at the Museum of London. The arrival of the newest member of the Royal Family is a momentous occasion that has captured the world's attention.
The Museum of London has quite a rare connection to the Royal Family because prior to the formation of the Museum of London in 1976 the museum was two different institutions. One was the Guildhall Museum and the other was the London Museum, which opened in Kensington Palace in 1912.
Kensington Palace accumulated an impressive collection of material that documents both the city of London, but also very unique items from the members of the Royal Family. Today we're going to focus on the material related to Queen Victoria's children. 
This is a robe that was made for one of Queen Victoria's children and what becomes quite apparent when you look closely at the pieces, the tremendous skill and craftsmanship that went into its production. It's a cotton child's robe that has a great deal of cotton thread embroidery and that lays all the way across the front of the piece.
This infant cap was worn by Prince Albert Edward, who was born in 1841. It was the second child of Queen Victoria and it is made of a very, very fine cotton fabric that has been embroidered with cotton thread across the front as well as a floral scene at the center back.
These shoes were worn by Princess Alice. The significance here is that these were actually made by her mother, Queen Victoria. Alice was born in 1843 but these were made for her a few years later and are made of a very fine white wall that have been embroidered and verifying silk thread in a floral pattern across the front throughout the sides and also at the center back.
These shoes here document two different generations of the Royal Family in the 19th century. If you look closely at a few of the pairs you can get some clues about the individual member who wore those items.
This pair in particular, if you turn over, you can see that someone has written Prince of Wales across the front, so you know for certain that this was worn by Prince Albert Edward when he was a child before eventually becoming King Edward VII.
We have a bed sheet that was used by Prince Albert Edward when he was a child. This piece was made in 1842. We can see that by the date above which you have PW for Prince of Wales, and above that we have the embroidery of a small crown in red thread.
Additional accessories in the collection related to the Royal Family are pieces that we have here from a few pairs of stockings worn by Queen Victoria's daughters, Princess Alice and Princess Beatrice, very finely embroidered both with the initials of the wearer as well as the royal crown, as well as two kid leather gloves worn by Queen Victoria's granddaughters, Princess Louis and Princess Victoria.
As the capital prepares itself for the newest royal arrival, we here at the Museum of London are looking forward to seeing what the next generation of royal baby clothing will be.