How to practice this piece
1. Listen without reading
Press play and do not look at the text. You can repeat the audio as many times as you want or slow it down.
2. Do the exercises
Comprehension, true or false, ordering, real speech and a dictation. Each one is checked at the end.
3. Read and listen again
When you finish every exercise the text unlocks, with each word highlighted while it plays.
Comprehension
Choose your answers. They are not graded automatically: when you have answered them all, press “Check answers” at the bottom to see which ones you got right.
Question 1
What is Ms. Hale doing?
Question 2
How will the projects be done?
Question 3
When do the reports have to be handed in?
Question 4
What does Ms. Hale say matters most for the marks?
Question 5
Can students use the internet for background information?
Question 6
What does Ms. Hale think about an experiment that fails?
Question 7
How does Ms. Hale feel about the students' worries?
0 of 7 answered
About this piece
A science teacher explains the rules of a class project and answers a student's questions. Practice following long explanations, conditions and warnings, and notice how a teacher really sounds.
What you will practice
- Comprehension: the main idea and the details you hear (numbers, prices, times, names).
- True, false or not given: precise attention to what was really said.
- Ordering: following the sequence of what happened.
- Real speech: forms and expressions that do not sound the way they are written.
- Dictation: writing the missing words in a sentence from the audio.
Vocabulary from this piece
go over phrasal verb
to explain or check something carefully from start to end
handed in phrasal verb
given to a teacher or a boss
extensions noun
more time to finish something after the deadline
genuine adjective
real, not false
marking noun
the way a teacher gives points to students' work
method noun
the way you do something step by step
provided conjunction
only if; on the condition that
necessarily adverb
in a way that must be true
copied adjective
taken from another person's work without permission
Ms. Hale: Right, everyone, settle down. Before you go, I need to go over the details of the science project, because last year half the class got them wrong.
Ms. Hale: First of all, the projects will be done in groups of three. Should anyone want to work alone, they'll need to ask me by Friday.
Ms. Hale: Next, the reports have to be handed in by the end of the month, and I mean the end, not the first week of the next one. No extensions will be given unless there's a genuine emergency.
Jamal: Does being sick count as an emergency, or does it have to be something more serious?
Ms. Hale: It does, as long as I get a note from home. Now, a word about marking. If I were marking on effort alone, most of you would pass easily. But what matters is the method. It's the quality of your experiment that counts, not how long the report is.
Jamal: Ms. Hale, does that mean a short report could still get top marks?
Ms. Hale: Absolutely, provided it's clear and the results are explained properly, because length was never the point.
Ms. Hale: I'd rather read two good pages than ten confused ones.
Jamal: And what if our experiment fails?
Ms. Hale: Well, that's not necessarily a problem. Some of the best scientists in history are known for experiments that failed. What I want to see is why it failed, and what you'd do differently.
Jamal: What if we use the internet for the background information?
Ms. Hale: That's fine, provided you say where it came from.
Ms. Hale: If I find a copied paragraph, you'll get zero for the whole project, no questions asked.
Jamal: Okay, understood. We'll write down every source we use.
Ms. Hale: Had I known you were all so worried, I would have explained all of this earlier.
Ms. Hale: Right, that's all. Off you go, and please don't leave it all until the last night.