Breakdancing
I will send out some handy tips and useful exercises for adults learning to navigate and use the English language each week. Please feel free to share this newsletter with friends and colleagues.
Breakdancing was added to the recent Olympic games in Paris but it’d been around for more than 50 years. It is a form of street dancing that was created in the 1960s in New York City. It highlights stylized footwork and athletic moves such as back spins or head spins.
Reading Tip
Language Level – B1
Breakdancing is largely improvisational, made up of variations of “standard” moves or steps, including freezes, powermoves, downrock, and toprock. The emphasis is on energy, movement, creativity, humour, and an element of danger. It is meant to convey the rough world of the city streets from which it is said to have sprung. It is also associated with a particular style of dress that includes baggy pants or sweat suits, baseball caps worn sideways or backward, and sneakers (required because of the dangerous nature of many of the moves).
Read more about the history of breakdancing here: https://www.britannica.com/art/break-dance
Listening Tip
Language Level – B1
Watch this video of the Bronze Medal battle at the Paris Olympics. Listen to the commentators with the CC to practice listening and reading.
Grammar Tip
Language Level – B1
Noun Clause – a multi-word clause that plays the role of a noun in a sentence and like all clauses, it has a subject and verb.
For example:
- I know that patience has its limits.
Lots of noun clauses start with “that,” “how,” or a “wh“-word (i.e., “what,” “who,” “which,” “when,” “where,” or “why”). For example:
- I know that it happened.
- I know how it happened.
- I know why it happened.
A great way to check whether a phrase or clause is functioning as a noun is to have a go at replacing it with a pronoun. If you can, your phrase or clause is functioning as a noun.
(Pronoun test: “It is true.” This proves that “What I say” is functioning as a noun.)
(Pronoun test: “Show me them.” This proves that “how they work” is functioning as a noun.)
The Function of Noun Clauses
Like any noun, a noun clause can be a subject, an object, or a complement. Here are some more easy examples of noun clauses as subjects, objects, and complements.
- Whoever smelt it dealt it.
(Here, the noun clause is a subject.)
- My command is whatever you wish.
(Here, the noun clause is a subject complement.)
- I will give what you said some thought.
(Here, the noun clause is an indirect object. That’s pretty rare.)
Let’s Practice!
Combine each pair of simple sentences into one complex sentence containing a noun clause.
- You cheated him. That is his complaint.
- The train will arrive at a certain time. Do you know the time?
- He will win. It is certain.
- He is mad. That makes him more dangerous.
- He may be innocent. I don’t know.
- The game was lost. It was the consequence of his carelessness.
- Where have you put my hat? Tell me.
- We have been deceived. That is the truth.
Vocabulary Tip
Language Level – B2
We continue to add to our vocabulary words from the Oxford 3000.
A list of 3000 words someone should know if they are taking the CEFR (Common European Framework Reference) language tests.
- Cite (v)
- Citizen (n)
- Civil (adj)
- Classic (adj, n)
- Close (n)
- Closely (adv)
- Collapse (n, v)
- Combination (n)
- Comfort (n, v)
- Command (n, v)
Study these words with this quizlet.
Each week new words are added to the same quizlet, so all of the B2 level words will be in one list for practice.
Weekly Challenge
Language Level – C1
Find the errors in the paragraphs below. There are five errors in each paragraph.
Steve Jobs
Born Abdul Latif Jandali in San Francisco in 1955, Steve Jobs would grow to be one of (if not the) greatest entrepreneurs of our time. His ability to leadership and innovate as well as communicated his vision has made him an icon. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak founded Apple in 1976 from Jobs’ family’s suburban garage. The original name was Apple Computers inc, and it’s primary goal was to developing computers. By 1981, Apple went public and becomes a Fortune 500 company.
Oprah Winfrey
Unlike many of the other women billionaires in America who inherited their wealth through marriage or inheritance, Oprah Winfrey are a self-made billionaire. Very hard to do. Especially for a African American woman raised in the segregated South during the 1950’s. Born in rural Mississippi, she were raised by a single mom and grown up so poor that she often wore dresses made out of potato sacks! After a series of traumatic and tragic events, Oprah moved to Nashville, went on to become an honors student and after that working her way up the media ladder and became what she is today.
Read the original article The 40 Greatest Entrepreneurs of Our Time.
Questions?
