Placeholder Image

Subtitles section Play video

  • he's a review from BBC Learning English Hello and welcome to News Review.

  • The program where we give you the language You need to talk about the news.

  • Hi, I'm Neil joining me in this program.

  • Today's Sean.

  • Hello, Sean.

  • So what is our story today?

  • We have a story about an animal that is dying mysteriously on animal dying mysteriously.

  • Okay, well, let's find out some more about that from this.

  • BBC World Service News Bulletin.

  • The Peruvian Environmental agency is investigating the deaths of about 10,000 frogs whose bodies have been found in a river in the south of the country.

  • A local campaign group says pollution in the River Kuwata is to blame for the deaths.

  • Okay, so 10,000 frogs have been found dead in Peru, and it's a bit of a mystery.

  • They're investigating why, but local residents believe that it's due to pollution in the river, and they're desperate for the government to clean it up.

  • So you've been looking at this story how it's being half reported on the news websites.

  • What the words and expressions and phrases being used to talk about this story.

  • Okay, so I've picked out four expressions we have endangered species.

  • Get to the bottom off.

  • Turn of events, Andi.

  • Plea.

  • Okay.

  • Endangered species get to the bottom off.

  • Turn of events and plea.

  • How are these appearing in the headlines and in the articles.

  • Okay, so the 1st 1 endangered species is in this BBC news story, and we have the Titicaca water.

  • Frog is an endangered species that is found only in the huge freshwater lake shared by Peru and Bolivia and its tributaries.

  • So endangered species, that's, ah, type of animal or plant that might stop existing because there are only a very few of that type left.

  • So it is in danger status, the word endangered with any.

  • This time they Yeah, and this is what we call akal occasion words that go together very often in English.

  • Endangered species always goes together or endangered.

  • Animal animal also can't endangered plant species is a type of animal.

  • So here, for example, it's not all frogs that are endangered.

  • Just this special Titicaca water frog.

  • Yes.

  • On another reason why the word species is interesting.

  • Listen to the pronunciation species in the middle.

  • But why?

  • Because there's no S h in the spelling.

  • Normally or quite often in English when we want to produce the sound or represent it with letters we use S H no.

  • Here it's See I species with a c I Same with my name.

  • Sean.

  • Yeah, There's no essay.

  • Yes, it just goes to show the rules and spelling and pronunciation have a very strange relationship.

  • Exactly.

  • Makes it difficult.

  • Toe.

  • Look for us to learn how to spell, but also for learners to pronounce words.

  • Absolutely.

  • So you just have to learn it.

  • Yes, exactly.

  • Ok, let's get to the bottom of the next one.

  • Yeah, okay.

  • Appropriately, this is get to the bottom off And we have here in this story by sea nets.

  • Researchers are trying to get to the bottom off this tragic turn of events.

  • Yes.

  • So to get to the bottom of something, to discover the truth about something or find the cause of something, it's not literal.

  • They're not getting to the bottom of the lake or anything like that.

  • Just finding the truth.

  • Yes, but you can imagine kind of digging for an answer.

  • So yes, particularly something bad.

  • Often, often bad isn't so.

  • For example, three university had a problem with plagiarism people copying Andi.

  • They were keen to get to the bottom of it, to discover why it was happening.

  • So they stop it.

  • It's not always bad, though, is it?

  • You have that love letter on Valentine's Day a few months ago.

  • You have to get to the bottom of who sent it to you.

  • Yes, I did.

  • You ever get to the bottom of it?

  • Yes.

  • Yes, I did.

  • And I've told my mom to stop sending things to.

  • Of course, your mom.

  • We suspected that right then there's a sad turn of events for you.

  • It was a sad turn of events, which is the next Hoechst word.

  • So here, in the same same story we have researchers are trying to get to the bottom of this tragic turn of events.

  • So turn of events, turn of events means change in a situation.

  • I mean, turn is quite obvious.

  • Imagine a car going along a certain direction and then suddenly turns goes in a different direction.

  • Turn of events means a change in a situation and is often used with adjectives like tragic, dramatic, unexpected.

  • Yeah, Strange.

  • Yes.

  • Um, for example, recently, this week Last week Bob Dylan, who is a songwriter singer songwriter.

  • He was given an award for literature, sailors and literature.

  • The Nobel Prize for literature on day.

  • For some people, that was a strange turn of events because he's a singer.

  • Yeah, this is an award for a writer.

  • It was an unexpected situation.

  • Yes, Okay.

  • We also say that events take a turn so often news with worse.

  • So events took a turn for the worse, which means they suddenly became bad.

  • Finally, we have the last word we have.

  • It's please, which is not the same as please thank you.

  • It's the singular plea on its we have here.

  • In the same story from BBC News, it says the government has ignored pleas for the construction of a sewage treatment plant in the area.

  • Right.

  • So please our requests for something often serious and emotional s.

  • So it's not just a request for a coffee, for example, or very serious, very emotional of a dramatic Yeah, for example, those terrible stories.

  • When a child goes missing, you'll see the parents sometimes making an emotional plea for information.

  • And that's a call occassion, isn't it?

  • To make a plea?

  • Also use the verb.

  • So the parents plead for information.

  • Yes, and that's also something that you hear in court cases.

  • It is illegal to em for its way as well.

  • Yeah, somebody might plead guilty, put in a guilty plea or not guilty.

  • Be so if I say I am guilty, I plead guilty or plead innocent.

  • Yes.

  • Okay, let's now hear some more about this story about the frogs from the BBC's Leonardo, Russia.

  • Listen out for his use off the expression endangered species.

  • The Titicaca water frogs are endangered species that lives exclusively in the huge freshwater lake shared by Peru and Bolivia and its tributaries.

  • The number of residents around South America's largest lake has increased sharply in the past two decades, while the number of frogs there is estimated to have declined by 80%.

  • Residents say the government has done too little to deal with the impact of humans in the area.

  • They're calling for a sewage treatment plant to be built near the regional capital.

  • You know, the BBC's Leonardo Roger there with that report now in our program today we've been talking about endangered species, and a connected word is extinct, but what does it mean we have three options that we gave you on Facebook?

  • They were a not many exist.

  • Be None exists or see.

  • Many exist.

  • So what was the response?

  • Sean?

  • Very good, actually.

  • Almost everybody got it.

  • Correct.

  • For example, we have Emery Elton who says B and that's the correct answer.

  • So none exist.

  • And, for example, dinosaurs Alex Liu also says extinct, meaning none exist or endangered means not many exist.

  • So which is true?

  • There we go.

  • Well done to everyone who got that right now.

  • Sean, if you could just recap the words that we've heard today, please.

  • Yes, so we had endangered species, a type of animal or plant that might stop existing because there are only a few of that type alive we had gets to the bottom off.

  • So to discover the truth about something or find the cause of something and we had a turn of events, which is a change in a situation, and finally we had plea.

  • So that's a serious and emotional request for something, right?

  • And I'm gonna make a serious and emotional request now to our audience to check out our website.

  • BBC Learning english dot com for any help with their English.

  • Thanks for joining us and good bye, good bye.

  • He's a review from BBC Learning English.

he's a review from BBC Learning English Hello and welcome to News Review.

Subtitles and vocabulary

Click the word to look it up Click the word to find further inforamtion about it