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  • Hi, my name is Emma and [today]. We are going to talk about

  • conversation

  • Expressions, we're going to talk about three very important conversation expressions that will help you to organize

  • Your conversation as well as help people listening to what you're saying

  • Know where you are going to go with what you are saying so these are very good conversation devices that

  • Are everyday expressions we use you will hear them a lot?

  • And the other thing to know about these expressions is they never change

  • You memorize them as a chunk so you memorize each of these words and you use it always together

  • Okay, so let's get started

  • the first

  • Expression we are going to learn today is if you ask me if you ask me now

  • [I] quite like this expression because I have a lot of opinions and when you say if you ask me

  • What you are saying is this is my opinion

  • [so] for example. I love comic books. I love reading about superheroes

  • I like Batman Superman

  • but if

  • You ask me

  • Wolverine is the greatest superhero of all time

  • Now some of you watching may be in

  • Complete disagreement with me maybe you think Spider-Man's cooler or Batman is way better

  • And so what you could respond is if you ask me

  • Wolverine isn't the greatest superhero of all time Batman is and I would have to disagree with you

  • If you ask me if you ask me

  • Toronto is a great city to live in if

  • You ask me

  • The government should spend more money on Health care

  • So this is a very useful expression

  • Because anytime you're giving your opinion you can use it and remember

  • Even though it says ask me you don't need to be asked your opinion to use this

  • Even if somebody doesn't want to know your opinion. You can still use this in a conversation

  • if you ask me

  • [alright] number two

  • speaking of

  • speaking of is very important because in English we really like to link things we like conversation to

  • flow very smoothly

  • we like to know where somebody is going in the conversation, [so]

  • [speaking] of what it does is it links a

  • new topic to [an] old topic

  • So I'll give you an example

  • We were just talking about Wolverine as a superhero [I]

  • Said if you ask me, I think Wolverine is the greatest superhero of all time

  • Now maybe I want to talk about something else about Wolverine. [I] have a new topic. I want to talk about I

  • Can use speaking of [to] link?

  • Wolverine as the greatest Superhero to a new topic

  • So here's an example

  • Speaking or if you ask me Wolverine is the greatest superhero of all time

  • Speaking of Wolverine did you know he's Canadian?

  • interesting back isn't it so speaking of Link's the old topic with the new

  • another example is

  • Maybe I'm at a party and somebody is talking about [a] hockey game. They just saw the other night

  • Maybe I could say speaking of hockey

  • Did you read about wayne Gretzky's daughter in the newspaper some interesting news has just happened with her

  • So speaking of what it does is it links again a new topic to an old topic

  • our third example

  • this one is very useful as well as I was saying [as]

  • I was saying

  • What this does is it helps you to go back to an earlier point in the conversation?

  • Sometimes maybe you're having a great conversation you're talking about

  • Movies for [example], and then suddenly there's an interruption

  • Maybe somebody knocks at the door

  • Maybe your phone goes off and you have to answer it and then

  • Your friends are talking and when you come back you want to continue talking about what you were talking [before]

  • So what you can say is as I was saying so if I'm talking about movies, but there's a knock at the door

  • [I] leave

  • When I come back I can say as I was saying about movies. [I] really want to see J

  • Edgar Hoover a new a new movie. That's just come out

  • [another] example

  • It's not just for interruptions. We use it often for interruptions in order to keep the conversation flowing smoothly

  • But people during presentations use this a lot as well

  • maybe I'm giving a presentation on government and

  • I'm talking first about the environment, and then I move on my second point might be

  • economics and then maybe a third point might be

  • education

  • So I talk a lot about education, but now I want to go back. I want to go back to environment

  • I can use as I was saying as

  • I was saying or as I was saying earlier

  • The environment is very important to Canada

  • So again this is to go back to an earlier [point] in the conversation

  • I forgot to mention one thing about speaking of this is actually quite an important point

  • [so] [as] I was saying earlier about speaking of that um

  • some people they don't really get the art of conversation so well and

  • So what they tend to do is they'll be talking about something like for example Ufos

  • The conversation is talking about aliens and ufos and suddenly somebody wants to talk about shoes

  • Now these two things don't really link up well in a conversation

  • so when you use speaking of you want to use something that kind of links to

  • two the initial thing you were talking about so don't

  • don't

  • say

  • If you're talking about aliens, oh speaking of aliens, I want to go shoe shopping this weekend

  • Because it won't make sense

  • You really want to link some?

  • Aspect of what you were talking about

  • originally to the new Topic

  • so a better example would be

  • speaking of aliens

  • I

  • Want to I?

  • Want to read a book?

  • [it's] it's all about Aliens or I want to see the x-files

  • It's a show about aliens, so it's good to have a link to keep the the topic consistent

  • Okay

  • so

  • if you ask me

  • Everyday expressions such as these are very useful

  • as

  • I was saying [earlier]

  • we use these expressions often and

  • It will really help you in terms of both your speaking and your listening

  • speaking of speaking and listening if you want to

  • become a better

  • conversationalist, [I] highly recommend checking out our website at

  • wwlp.com

  • Take care. Thanks

  • you

Hi, my name is Emma and [today]. We are going to talk about

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