4KTJ5[1]

The players are determined to win the championship.

They are sure that they are strong enough to do so.

They have trained hard and have shown good results.

I. The mountain climbers did their best to reach the top in spite of the terrible weather conditions and the snowstorm.

2.The rain might prevent the cyclists from showing good results in the race. But their enthusiasm was so great that they decided to do everything possible to cycle at top speed.

3.The scientists could not say that they had achieved good results, but they were ready to carry out as many experiments as was necessary.

4.The boy was not strong but he believed that physical exercises could help him to develop a strong and healthy body. So he made up his mind to play sports regularly.

5.Every summer English swimmers make attempts to cross the English Channel and to reach the French coast trying to prove that it is quite possible.

Sport in our life

People all over the world are fond of sports and games. Sports makes people healthy, keeps them fit, more organized and better disciplined. It unites people of different classes and nationalities. Many people do sports on their personal initiative. They go in for skiing, skating, table tennis, swimming, volleyball, football, bodybuilding, etc. All necessary facilities are provided for them: stadiums, sports grounds, swimming pools, skating rinks, skiing stations, football fields. Sports are paid much attention to in our educational establishments. Gymnastics is a part of children’s daily activities in the kindergartens. Physical culture is a compulsory subject at schools and colleges. Professional sport is also paid much attention to in our country. In city, where I live, there are different sporting societies, clubs and complex. Practically all kinds of sports are popular in our country, but football, gymnastics and tennis enjoy the greatest popularity. As for me, I go in for table tennis. It needs mobility, liveliness and much energy. It keeps a person in a good form. I have been playing tennis for five years, but the more I play, the more I like it. I get a real joy taking part in competition or simply playing with my friends. Sometimes, I go to tennis courts. Certainly, there is a great distance between my manner of playing and such favorites as JIM Courier, Stephan Edberg, Pete Sampras, Boris Becker, Per Korda, but I do my training with great pleasure and hopes as well as our best players do.

Questions:

1.Why are people all over the world fond of sports and games?

2.What necessary facilities are provided for people?

3.What kinds of sports are popular in our country?

4.What is your favorite kind of sport? Why?

101

My favourite sport

We all need exercise. This is true for young people as well as for adults. Even if you don’t plan make sports your main occupation. This is my opinion and I like it is true.

As long as I can remember myself I was always keen on tennis. I love this sport with its old noble traditions, though myself never dreamed of becoming anything more than an amateur.

I watch closely all tennis competitions and championships. There are a lot of them, but my favorite championships are Wimbledon because old tennis traditions remain there as they are. Some of the most wellknown Wimbledon champions: John Mc Enroe, Boris Becker, Steffi Graf, Monica Seles. My dream is to get a chance to watch at least one of them playing.

And meantime I play tennis with my friends. It is also a great opportunity to socialize with people who have similar interest.

At the doctor’s

There is a proverb: Health is the greatest wealth. We know that good health is better than the best medicine. To be healthy and in a good mood you must take care of yourself. The English proverb says: Medicines are not meant to live on. It is not pleasant to take medicines and for this reason you should go in for sports and keep yourself fit.

But still if something is wrong with our health we must consult the doctor. The doctor will examine us thoroughly. He will listen to our heart and chest, feel the pulse, take the temperature and measure our blood pressure.

After that he will prescribe some treatment, pills, tablets or some other medicine, which we can buy at the chemist’s. Probably, he will recommend to stay in bed for some time to avoid serious complications.

To treat our teeth we go to the dentist. To treat our eyes we go to the oculist and he treat our sight.

For the serious illness people need an operation, and they consult a specialist in a hospital where they have all the necessary equipment.

The widespread illnesses are a cough, a cold, influenza, sore throat. Children may have measles, mumps, and scarlet fever.

Old people suffer from heart troubles, flood pressure, rheumatism there are infectious and contagious diseases. Healthy people may catch them from ill people. That is why people who have these illnesses should be careful not to pass them on to other people.

The question is « How to prevent all this? » The answer is simple – go in for sports, eat much fruit and vegetables, rest as much as you can, spend more time outdoors, make your life more active, take long walks, eat health food and always think positively. In other words: «Eat at pleasure, drink with measure and enjoy life as it is».

102

Unit 7

The Theme: Describing character and physical appearance Grammar: Adverbs. Degrees of comparison.

Text: a) About family members’ appearance

b) You never get a second chance to make a first impression

Grammar exercises:

I. Write the correct adverbs from the following adjectives.

Safe, quick, comic, stupid, tragic, horrible, cosy, sleepy, sensible, witty. Note. Most adverbs are formed by adding “-ly” to an adjective.

eg. quick → quickly

Adjectives ending in “-ic” add “-ally” to form adverbs. Eg. dramatic – dramatically

Adjectives ending in “-le” drop “-le” and add “-ly”. Eg. terrible – terribly

Adjectives ending in “-e” form adverbs by adding “-ly” without dropping “-e” Eg. rare – rarely

Exceptions: whole – wholly, true – truly

II.Make up sentences of your own to show the difference between the

adverbs.

Note. Some pairs of adverbs have different meanings Eg. hard – hardly

late – lately near – nearly close – closely wide – widely

Model: He worked hard.

I could hardly recognize you.

III. Some adverbs have the same form as their corresponding adjectives. Make up sentences of your own using the words below first as adjectives, them as adverbs.

Model: It is a bad mistake. She feels bad today. Fast, early, late, hard, long, far, low, well, quick.

IV. Give the degrees of comparison of adverbs and translate them.

Note. Most adverbs are invariable. But some adverbs change for degrees of comparison, which are formed in the same way as adjectives.

Monosyllabic adverbs and the adverb “early” form the degrees by adding the suffixes “-er”, “-ers”.

eg. soon-sooner-soonest early-earlier-earliest

103

The degrees of comparison of other adverbs are formed with the help of “more” and “most”.

The comparative degree is used more widely and can be used with the word “much”.

eg. beautifully-much more beautifully.

A few adverbs have irregular degrees of comparison. eg. well-better-best

badly-worse-worst much-more-most little-less-least

slowly, fast, hard, badly, early, far, near, often, late, quietly, warmly, seriously, comfortably, hard.

Text №1

Read these quotations about family members’ appearance.

My father has a round face, with chubby (1) cheeks and a droopy(2) moustache. My mother has a more pointed face and a straight nose. My younger sister is more Line my father. She has an oval(3) face and an upturned nose. My older sister is like a model. She has a slim figure and a slender(4) waist. She has a lovely complexion(5) and beautiful sleek(6) , shoulder length hair, and she’s always immaculately groomed(7). I feel so ordinary next to her -I’ve got coarse(8) hair and rather broad hips, but she always says I look nice.

Vocabulary

1 fat in a pleasant and attractive way

2 long and hanging down heavily

3 shaped like an egg

4 attractively slim (a rather formal, great care poetic word) 5 the natural color and quality of a persons skin

6 smooth and shiny

7 her appearance is always tidy and looked after with 8 rough, and not smooth or soft

Text №2

My father and my two older brothers are all well-built(9) with broad shoulders. Myfather is going bald but he still has a very youthful appearance for someone who is over forty. My brothers both have thick hair and bushy (10) eyebrows. My younger brother is only two he’s just a tiny tot(11), but he’s very cute. My mothers side of the family mostly have dark hair in fact my mother had jet-black hair(11) when she was younger, before she went grey but on my fathers side some have fair hair and some have ginger(13) hair.

Vocabulary

9) have strong, attractive bodies

104

10)very thick

11)a small child

12)completely black

13)a red or orange-brown co lour; used of peoples hair

More collocations describing appearance

A short, dumpy woman was selling flowers at a stall on the Street corner. [short and quite fat woman; used more often of women than of men]

A portly gentleman answered the door. [fat and round; usually used of middle-aged and older men]

A lanky youth was standing at the street corner. [tall and thin and tending to move awkwardly]

I wouldn’t like people to see me with disheveled hair and dirty clothes. [very untidy; used of peoples hair and appearance]

He bears a striking resemblance to his father. [looks remarkably like]

The lady who entered the room had a very striking appearance. [unusual appearance, in a positive, attractive sense]

Tip

Sometimes words are very restricted in what they can collocate with. The colour adjectives blonde, ginger and auburn only used of people’s hair (dot, for example, their clothes or other objects). When a word has restricted collocations, make a special note in your vocabulary notebook. Reddish brown

Text №3

You never get a second chance to make a first impression

When two people meet for the first time, physical impressions are immediate. Before they have a chance to say a word, their senses are in overdrive; they are picking up and storing information about each other. They register looks, smell and body language. They use eye contact to support the process and to establish a relationship. Within a few seconds, they have made a mental picture of each other. On the basis of this tiny amount of data, they form opinions which they use in the future.

But just how reliable are first impressions? Take the story of Jake and Caroline. Jake didn’t like Caroline when he first met her. “She seemed cold and distant. She made almost no eye contact and she didn’t seem to listen to me”. Six months later, they met again. “Caroline was a completely different person. She was warm, friendly and smiled a lot. When she told me that her farther had died two days before we first met, that explained everything. It taught me to be more careful about making assumptions about people based on first impressions”.

However wrong they can be, first impressions are necessary survival mechanism. Thousands of years ago they helped people decide how to react in potentially dangerous situations. That is still true today, although in most cases it is

105

not a question of life and death. According to some, we can learn to read first impressions better. We can also learn to create more powerful first impressions. Professor Helen Trent. A specialist in interpersonal relations has studied the practice of good communicators. “Research shows that people who can make others feel good about themselves are excellent at creating positive first impressions. We call these people “Powerful Communicators” or PCs. You can tell when you meet one; you feel really good afterwards and you think “What a nice person.” PCs immediately get in sync with the other person; they coordinate their body language and smiles with their partner. They also maintain eye contact and sound and look as if they are interested, although sometimes they are not. These actions make the other person feel good about the experience.” PCs are the winners in the first-impressions race. So if you want to be a PC, start training and remember, you only get one chance to make a great first impression!

Exercises:

1. Read the article. Complete the sentences 1-5 with the best answers a-c.

The moment two people first meet they a) look and talk to each other. B) look at each other. C) they look at each other and build a picture of each other.

The story about Jake and Caroline shows that a) problems stop communication. B) we can make mistakes based on first impressions. C) they liked each other in the end.

Studying good communicators tells us that they a) make us feel positive. B) make us feel friendly. C) make us feel like good communicators too.

Powerful communicators a) do not always know the effect they have on the other person. B) are never honest. C) are not always honest.

PCs are a) the best at running. B) the best at winning. C) the best at creating positive first impressions.

2. Match the words and phrases 1-6 to the definitions a-f. the line numbers are in brackets.

A

are in overdrive (02) data (06)

reliable (8)

get in sync (23-24) survival mechanism (15) assumptions (14)

B

a make two or more things happen at the same time

b something that helps you stay alive

c be very active or too active

d information

106

 e something (or someone) that you can depend on

F things that you think are true, but you cannot be certain

Exercise 3.Put the words from the box into the ‘fat’ or ‘thin’ column, then answer

1 Which words could be used to describe someone’s waist?

2 Which word is likely to be used of a rather physically awkward young person? 3 Which word means fat but in a pleasant way?

4 Which word is more likely to be used to describe a man rather than a woman? 5 Which word is more likely to be used to describe a woman rather than a man?

Exercise 4. Match the adjectives in the first box below with the nouns in the second

Exercise 5. Fill the gaps with appropriate collocations. You are sometimes given the first letter(s)

I hadn’t seen Will since he was just a (1) t_____ t_________, so I was surprised to see that he was now a tall young man. He was (2) im___________

gr_____________ , smart and elegant. He was with a pretty young woman with (3) j____________-black, (4) shoulder hair and a (5) I ____________ com

____________ . She could have been a model, she had such a (6) str_________

ap__________ . He had his arm round her (7) s____________ wa____________ . With them was a (8) po___________ g_________, who looked as though he enjoyed good food, and who was probably her father. When I introduced myself to Will, he smiled. ‘Of course, I remember you,’ he said. ‘You used to work with my father. But you haven’t aged at all! You have a much more (9) y________

a__________ than my father now does. Dad has (10) ______________ very grey.’ I felt very pleased when he said that; he obviously didn’t notice I was beginning to (11) ___________ bald. Everyone likes to think they look young when they get older.

Exercise 6. Use the words from the box to fill the gaps to give contrasting meanings.

107

1)Her hair’s not _________________ , its quite , in fact its almost black.

2)She has an _________________ nose but her brother has a ____________ nose.

3)Her mother has a __________________ face but her father has a ___________

face.

4 ) My hair is so _____________ and ugly; Sally’s is so ____________ and lovely.

Behaviour: verb + noun collocations

Exercise 7.

1.Which of the collocations describe negative aspects of character?

2.Add the missing s words in these letters to a magazine where readers are discussing their and others characters. You arc sometimes given the first letter.

1.I know that I ____________ a tendency to ___________ a grudge, but I just can’t forget something bad a friend did to me recently. She has a selfish s____________

and doesn’t care sometimes how much she _____________ my feelings. I am finding it increasingly hard to k____________ my temper with her. But perhaps it might be better to _____________ I ____________my temper and let her know how I really feel?

Silvia M.

2.I have always tried to ___________ others first and not to think of myself. I believe you should not lose your p___________ with your friends, but if someone

108

seems to enjoy ____________ a tool out of you in front of other people, do those rules of friendship still apply?

Stefan R

3.I’m a little shy, though not p____________ shy, but sometimes I think I

____________ the impression that I’m unfriendly. How can I convince people that I’m good c___________ and worth getting to know?

Tom W.

4.Should I talk about personal matters to my closest colleague at work? She is not very good at __________ secrets and she has a very v____________ imagination. She always promises not to tell other people, but I’m not sure she always

_____________ her word. Jan H.

5.My boyfriend has a really friendly, o____________ personality and a great

___________of humour. He’s ____________ intelligent and has a ____________

sharp mind. The perfect man. We’ve been together now for a year and I like him a lot, but don’t love him any more. Should I be b___________

honest with him and tell him? Lydia T.

6.I think a friend is destroying himself with drugs. I feel a _____________ of responsibility towards him. He has always been f____________ loyal to me in good and bad times, which is a wonderful a ___________ of his personality. I feel I ought to contact the police or social services, but I don’t want to make a s_____________

decision which I’ll regret later. Gary J.

3. Complete B’s remarks in these conversations so that they mean more or less the same as A’s, using collocations from the opposite page.

1 A: Bobs found it hard to accept psychologically the fact that he’s now divorced. B: Yes, he’s found it hard with his new situation.

2 A: Kevin’s problem is he can’t laugh when people play jokes on him. B: No, it’s true. He just can’t, can he?

3 A: Well, Sara’s behavior last night certainly showed the truth about her. B: Yes, it certainly

4 A: She always has very high expectations of both herself and her children. B: Yes, she always

5 A: Sam started screaming and stamping his feet when I tried to put him to bed.

B:Well, two-year-olds often

4.Look in your dictionary. Can you find any other collocations

1... where word has the meaning of promise?

2... where temper relates to behaviour?

3... where sense of... relates to an aspect of character?

109

5. First impressions

It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.

Oscar Wilde

Fact: People form 90% of their opinion of someone in the first 90 seconds. What conclusions can draw from the following information?

A man who wears an earring in one ear. A woman with an earring in her nose A man with a beard or moustache.

A woman who wears heavy make-up. A 60-year-old man with long hair. Someone who wears lots of jewellery. Someone who’s always laughing. Someone who bites their nails. Someone who has tattoos.

Someone with red hair.

2 Beauty and the beast. “Beauty in the eye of the beholder”.

1.Do you think this proverb is true or are there certain norms of beauty?

2.Are we born with an innate sense of beauty or do we acquire it?

3.Is physical attractiveness easier to identify and more important in women or men?

4.Do most people overestimate or underestimate their own beauty?

5.What influence does someone’s physical appearance have on their personality? And vice versa?

6Is beauty only a physical quality? Aristotle said that beauty was a greater recommendation than any letter of introduction. Which of the following do you agree with?

If you’re good-looking you’re more likely to:

7Have a pleasant personality and have more friends.

8study humanistic/ artistic subjects

9be treated more leniently if you’re in the wrong.

10get a job with higher status.

11find a partner and get married.

12be generally happier.

110