FLASH_ON_ENGLISH2_1_2012

TEEN for 速

Your English Monthly

FLASH on English 2

1-2012/2013

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速

Around the World Treasures of American Cinema

Culture and Society

The River Thames Liquid History

People Jennifer Lopez

Green Living 12 ideas For Sustainable Living

Find TEEN online (see page 2 for details)

www.elimagazines.com

Common European Framework Intermediate Advanced (B2 – C1)

Contents 3 4 6 8 10 12 14

Welcome Hello everyone! In the second issue of TEEN we focus on London, with articles on the history of and the latest additions to the UK’s capital city. You will also read about some amazing research into the science of music, get to know J Lo, find out about the UK’s most famous brands, and discover 12 practical ideas for living a more eco-friendly life. Happy Reading!

Liz

People Jennifer Lopez UK Today The Shard – Changing London’s Skyline Report Hitting the Right Note Money Money, Money An A-Z of UK Brands Green Thinking 12 Ideas For Sustainable Living Culture and Society The Thames – Liquid History Games and Activities NEW

In this issue look out for: • superlatives • conjunctions and modifiers • present perfect • compound and complex adjectives • infinitive constructions with +ing • language of advertising and business • language of music • false friends

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Around The World

Treasures of American Cinema

Every year the US Library of Congress, the largest library in the world, chooses 25 films to add to its National Film Registry. Some of the films added over the years are well known, such as Bambi, Forrest Gump and The Silence of the Lambs. Others are more surprising, such as El Mariachi or A Computer-Animated Hand – a one-minute film made in 1972 by the founder of Pixar. It is the world’s first computer-generated 3D animation.

The National Film Registry was started in 1988 to preserve “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant films”. It now has over 600 “national film treasures”.

Film Quiz These three films have won more Oscars than any other film – they have each won 11! Match the film with its director and the year of release.

1

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

a. William Wyler

X. 1997

2

Ben Hur

b. Peter Jackson

Y. 2003

3

Titanic

c. James Cameron

Z. 1959

The answer is on page 15.

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People

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Jennifer Lopez Forbes Magazine recently placed Jennifer Lopez as the most influential person in entertainment and the most sought-after* celebrity. She’s a singer, an actress, a dancer, a designer and a film producer: there seem to be no limits to her success!

Jennifer Lopez has beaten Lady Gaga to the top of the Forbes list of most influential stars of the moment. In a single year she earned $52 million – that’s even more than Oprah Winfrey.

Jennifer is of Puerto Rican origin and was born in the Bronx, and at 43 years old she continues to wow* her fans. From music to acting, from film production to fashion: she is one of America’s most creative and energetic stars.

“If you focus only on making money,” Jennifer says, “then you won’t get anywhere. You might look successful, but in the end, if your main goal is to make money, if you are only interested in superficial success, then you will become a hollow person, an empty person. If your only goal is money then there is no passion in what you are doing and there is nothing that guides you towards the heart of things.”

Woman of the Year

Last year Jennifer Lopez was named “Woman of the Year” at the Carnegie Hall in New York. This prize is awarded to women whose ideas, courage and action help to change the world.

Jennifer does a lot of work in support of children, especially children suffering illness at the hospital in Los Angeles, where she is a frequent visitor. She is a supporter of UNICEF and a number of other organisations, and in 2007 she was recognised by Amnesty International for her work as producer and actor in the film Bordertown, inspired by true events in the Mexican border town of Ciudad Juárez

superlatives

Music, Cinema and Television Since 1999 she has released seven albums, and each one has become an international hit. To date she has sold over 50 million records!

Jennifer Lopez, often known by her nickname J Lo, made her first TV appearances in telefilms and sit-coms, and in 1995 appeared in her first film, My Family, the story of the struggles of an immigrant family over three generations. Her performance was good enough to get her noticed by a number of top directors, including Francis Ford Coppola. Jennifer was nominated for a Golden Globe for her role as the lead character in Selena (1997). This was the true story of a Texas-born tejano* singer-songwriter killed when she was only 24.

Recently, Jennifer has starred in a number of romantic comedies and has started to produce her own film and television shows. It is rumoured that her next step is to direct her own films.

Today she is one of the highest-paid actors in Hollywood and she is the bestpaid South–American star in history.

Fashion

Jennifer Lopez is regarded as one of the most beautiful women in the world, and her perfect features and figure have helped her become one of the most successful women in fashion and advertising. In 2011, when she was 42 years old, US magazine People voted her the world’s most beautiful woman!

Jennifer is also a well-regarded clothes designer. The recent launch of the

Jennifer Lopez Collection has had some positive reviews and is full of her trade mark feminine style. She also has a best-selling perfume collection which outsells other celebrity perfumes and at the moment makes her more money than her music does!

Baby Love

In an interview for Vanity Fair, Jennifer said, “I believe in love. It’s still my biggest dream. I am positive – determined to move forward with my life, bring up my babies, and do the best job I can as a mother, entertainer, and person. I now look forward to new challenges. I feel strong.”

Jennifer adores her two children, fouryear-old twins Emma and Max.

Queen of Entertainment

It is thanks in great measure to her appearance as a judge on the American talent show American Idol, that after 10 years at the highest levels of entertainment, she has reconfirmed her position at the very top. And what does J Lo say about staying at the top? “I don’t want anyone thinking it’s easy. It does take time and it’s hard work.”

Jennifer has always been the queen of publicity and now she is queen of social media: she has nine million followers on Twitter and 14 million fans on Facebook.

Glossary sought-after: (compound adjective) in demand, looked for tejano: term used to identify a Texan of criollo or Mexican heritage wow: (neologism, verb) this is an informal use of the word ‘wow’ – an expression of surprise and wonder

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UK Today

contrast between present tense and present perfect; passive constructions; challenging adjectives

The Shard

Changing London’s Skyline* New buildings often cause controversy, but when they have a radical design, are the tallest building in the whole of the European Union, and have been built slap-bang* in the centre of one of Europe’s great capitals, then you are asking for trouble*! We look at the latest addition to London’s skyline and find out what people are saying about it.

Facts First

View From the Top

The architect behind The Shard is an old friend of controversy. He is Renzo Piano, the Italian architect famous for causing a row in Paris with the Pompidou Centre he designed with Richard Rogers in 1977. The futuristic Shard is 309 metres tall, has 72 floors and uses 11,000 glass panels, covering an area the size of eight football pitches. It has 44 lifts, 306 flights of stairs, and 95% of the materials used to build it were recycled.

However, because there are good public transport links nearby, there are only 48 car parking spaces for the entire building.

The Shard was officially unveiled* in July this year with a spectacular laser show, but you could hardly have missed it since it started rising above the rest of London 12 years ago!

From February 2013 you will be able to buy a ticket to the Shard’s public viewing platform* – as you would expect it’s the highest in Europe! On a clear day you should get the most breath-taking view of London and see as far as sixty miles away. The Shard is one of very few skyscrapers to allow public access, though you will need to book and pay for tickets in advance, and this panoramic view of London isn’t cheap.

Vertical City Renzo Piano said he wanted to “build a vertical city, with capacity for 12,000 people, a five-star hotel [to be called the Shangri-La], luxury restaurants, 600,000 square metres of office space, and shops”. If you have a spare £50 million pounds, and you don’t suffer from vertigo, then you could buy yourself one of the Shard’s ten penthouse* apartments.

Criticism There has been a huge amount of criticism of the building from traditionalists. Even UNESCO has expressed its concern about The Shard dominating some of London’s most iconic buildings, such as the Tower of London and St Paul’s Cathedral. Opponents see it as the physical representation of the arrogant and aggressive capitalism that has characterised the City* of London over recent decades. Some have even said that it ‘stabs* London right in the heart’, or that it might look good somewhere like Dubai, but that it doesn’t fit* here.

Praise Many people though are more positive about it, put simply, they like its audacity and its spectacular, modern design. They see The Shard becoming a potent symbol of London’s financial power and influence in the world, as iconic as the Eiffel Tower in Paris or New York’s Chrysler Building.

The Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, is keen to point out that The Shard will be the focus for the redeveloped London Bridge area. ‘The Shard is an astonishing addition to the London skyline,’ he said.

‘To me, it is an exclamation mark* that London and Britain are open for business.’

Renzo Piano is well aware of the risks he is taking with this building. He says someone once told him not to watch a new building, but to watch the faces of the people looking at the building. Love it or loathe* it, those faces are unlikely to remain indifferent to London’s newest skyscraper.

5 The Name It was Renzo Piano who named the building. He said it looked like a shard of glass rising up from the ground. Its design is meant to represent London’s great history of cathedral and church spires and ships masts.

One of the least high-tech aspects of this ultra-modern building is that the windows all have to been cleaned by a real, live person in a cradle* hundreds of metres above the ground. It’s not a job that everyone would enjoy, particularly in a strong wind!

True or False

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1 London has been the capital city of the UK for more than 800 years.

2 On the other side of the river from the Shard is a tower known as the Gherkin.

3 London has more skyscrapers than Lower Manhattan.

4 The Shard is Piano’s fifth building in London.

5 St Paul’s cathedral was London’s tallest building from 1710 to 1910.

6 Most of London’s tallest buildings are in the financial district of Canary Wharf.

7 The new observation tower in front of London’s new Olympics district is 115m tall.

8 London has 60 skyscrapers of 150+ metres.

The answers are on page 15.

Glossary asking for trouble: deliberately do something that is going to cause problems City: the business and financial heart of London cradle: (here) a suspended basket for working on the outside of a building exclamation mark: punctuation mark to express surprise etc. fit: (here) be the right shape or size for loathe: synonym of hate penthouse: luxurious apartment at the top of a building skyline: shape of a city against the horizon slap-bang: (informal, onomatopeoic) right, directly stabs: force a knife or dagger into someone/something unveiled: (here) public/official opening viewing platform: an area high up from which you can see the view

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Report

conjunctions and modifiers – vocabulary: false friends

Hitting the Right Note The Adele Effect

Science is uncovering what ingredients make the perfect song by examining the music of the multiaward winning* Adele.

In this TEEN report, we discover what music does to us and how this great gift* has made the human race what it is today.

Adele won six Grammys with her album 21, which in the USA alone sold over 6 million copies in 2011. But the ‘Adele effect’ is not only confined to the world of music, scientists have also become interested in her and what makes her songs so universally popular.

One of the people interested in this is Daniel J. Levitin, who used to be a sound engineer for rock guitarist Carlos Santana, and is now Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. He says the winning formula can, at least in part, be explained by science. “Adele’s music has the perfect combination of predictable elements and

surprise,” he says. “Adele balances all the things that go to make up a song – lyrics, melody, rhythm, tone and performance – both in terms of her voice and the musical accompaniment* to it. Her songs start off predictably and safely, which is what most of us want to hear, but then she comes in with something completely new and unexpected.”

And it is this that seems to be the winning formula. Our brain’s natural tendency is to rearrange our experiences, putting them into an order that we can understand. This is why repetition is so important in songs and therefore why the chorus* is almost always the most popular part of a song – it’s the predictable, ordered part, acting like an anchor for our emotions.

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The Beatles Miracle When the Beatles first started out, their music was seen as revolutionary, even a little shocking, compared to the music that was around at the time.

Now, their songs are regarded as classics of pop music. The Fab Four from Liverpool created their own ‘miracle’ – music that sounds simple but is in fact complicated and multi-layered. If you listen to I Want to Hold Your Hand for example it sounds easy enough, but if you ever try to play it yourself you will see that the song’s simplicity is deceptive.

Musical Taste

Musical taste is influenced by many things: our age, whether we are male or female, our personality, our friends and contemporaries, and to some extent how much we know about music. Some people love the challenge of improvised jazz or modern experimental classical music, some love the feeling they get listening to heavy metal or electronic dance music and others love singing along to an emotional ballad.

Many musical styles have their roots in social or political protest, like rap or hip hop, for example. It is through this kind of music that a whole generation is able to express its alienation from society and create a distinctive group identity. Classical music tends to have a more complex structure than much popular music and can be an acquired taste* – meaning that you might have to think about the music a bit more to get into it. For many people, though, the rewards make it worth the effort.

Someone Like You

Adele’s massive hit, Someone Like You, has been described as the perfect tear-jerker*.

Daniel Levitin analyses the song for us. “It begins with a very simple, traditional arpeggio played on the piano, the kind of thing we have heard a thousand times in the songs of Céline Dion or Coldplay. Then the melody starts and it is made up of only four notes.

So at first the song doesn’t hold any surprises musically. Then after the first verse, the rhythm changes completely, it starts speeding up and takes us to the chorus. At this point, Adele’s voice suddenly rises by a full octave. It’s a total surprise and serves to highlight the intensity of the emotion being expressed.” The song talks about a relationship that has ended, something many people have experienced and can therefore identify with. We see our own lives reflected in the song and this is another reason it has been such a hit.

Musical Emotion

Music activates the part of the brain

Secret Code E = Q H = J I = H L = _ R = F T = D

Use the secret code to find the biggest-selling single of all time. This song has sold over 110 million copies since it was released in 1982 – that’s an average of 500,000 copies every year!

D

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H

responsible for memories, and it also stimulates the release of dopamine into our bodies. This is why it is so good at creating an emotional response in us. But, perhaps surprisingly, it isn’t always the sad or more serious songs that are always the most powerful, songs that don’t really mean anything, or are about having fun can have an equally strong effect on us.

In 2011, an experiment carried out in Finland demonstrated that instrumental music is good at bringing out positive emotions in us, while music with words often causes us to feel sad. Rhyme and repetition of sounds (as in ‘you-too’, for example) are other important elements in creating a song we want to listen to again and again. A good way of getting an emotional response from your audience is to put in an appoggiatura.

An appoggiatura is a musical device. It is where an extra, slightly dissonant, note is added just before the main melody begins.

Twenty years ago, British psychologist Dr John Sloboda, discovered that songs with an appoggiatura will very often get an emotional response from people, such as tears or a shiver* down the spine*.

Creative Ingredients

Scientists in the US have been investigating a measurable drop in creativity among American children over the last couple of

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decades. They have concluded that there are two main ingredients needed to stimulate creativity (which is not necessarily the same as being artistic). The first is curiosity, and the second is the ability to switch off the rational, rigid parts of our brain, associated with selfcontrol. This is something that the world’s best jazz musicians do instinctively when they improvise. The development of music has played a crucial part in the evolution of our species for at least the last 4000 years, which is the date of the earliest musical instrument – a flute – found in a cave in Divje Babe in Slovenia. Listening to or performing music can stimulate our emotional development and our creativity. Music is both reassuring*, because it is familiar to us, but, in its endless variety, it also challenges us to be openminded and flexible.

Glossary accompaniment: something that goes with another, more important, thing acquired taste: something you have to learn to like chorus: the repeated, central part of a pop/blues song gift: (here) special talent multi-award winning: (compound adjective) describing someone who has won several awards reassuring: comforting shiver: shake, tremble spine: spinal column, line of bones running down your back tear-jerker: that makes you cry, full of strong emotion

Money, Money, Money

An A-Z of

UK Brands

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phrasal verbs - vocabulary of retail and business

Welcome to a few of the UK’s most famous brands.

Some of them are known around the world, others are better known inside the UK, but they have one thing in common – they are all “Superbrands”, trusted and respected by UK consumers.

Andrex It might seem strange to start our list with a toilet-roll* manufacturer, but Andrex is the UK’s favourite brand of something we all use every day. The company is now American owned, but the original, twoply* roll was first made in east London in 1972. Andrex created a loyal following with some clever advertising, using the famous Andrex Puppy.

BBC The BBC is one of the few national broadcasting organisations in the world funded* entirely by the public through a TV licence – and this means there are no adverts to interrupt your favourite programme. The BBC brand is its most valuable asset*, and the BBC is known around the world for making goodquality programmes.

Burberry Harry Potter star, Emma Watson, has been the new face of Burberry since 2011.

Burberry is the luxury British fashion house that for many people epitomises the idea of English style. Its most famous design, the instantly recognisable check* pattern, was originally designed as a lining for its famous waterproof trench coat*.

Dulux Dulux is our second brand to use a dog in its advertising. This paint manufacturer has used an Old English Sheepdog as its mascot* since the 1960s, and the dog has become so synonymous with the brand that it is often called a ‘Dulux Dog’ instead of its breed name.

Fairy Liquid Most people in the UK can tell you the advertising slogan for this washing-up liquid – “For hands that do dishes can feel soft as your face, with mild green Fairy liquid”. The name Fairy was first used in 1898 on a bar of soap, and the liquid was sold from 1960.

Heinz “Heinz Meanz Beanz”. Heinz is a British food manufacturer best known for its tins of baked beans (1.5 million cans sold every day). It also makes the UK’s bestselling brand of tomato ketchup, and tinned soup – during the cold winter of 2010, Heinz sold over 57 million cans of tomato soup in one month.

Jaguar This year’s ‘Best Car Manufacturer’ reckons* its drivers are the happiest on the road. Jaguar have recently seen a 50% increase in sales of their cars even though these high-performance, luxury vehicles will cost you between £55,000 and £100,00 (€67,000-€123,000).

John Lewis John Lewis is a chain of department stores known for good quality. Their Christmas advert in 2011 showed a 7-year-old boy giving a badly wrapped present to his mum and dad, and had the whole country sobbing*. It helped John Lewis have one of their best Christmases ever.

Did you know…?

The UK’s oldest brand is Lyle’s Golden Syrup, a thick liquid made from sugar and used in cooking. On the front of their famous tin is a picture of a lion with bees coming out of it. This refers to a riddle, or word puzzle, told by Samson in the Old Testament – ‘Out of the strong came sweetness’.

Most companies spend 3-5% of their gross annual sales on advertising. According to the Advertising Association, British businesses spend a total of about £15 billion a year on advertising. Last year spending on online advertising reached almost £5 billion, its highest-ever figure.

Maltesers A favourite snack product in the UK, these malty* sweets are sprayed with chocolate to give them a shiny, smooth coating. Advertised as a “lighter” snack, the product also became ‘Fair Trade’ in 2012.

PG Tips Not a dog, this time, but a monkey. If you get offered a cup of tea in Britain, chances are* it will have been made with tea bags from PG Tips. A number of humorous adverts featuring chimpanzees in clothes have been making us buy this brand of tea since 1953. Now, the company has one of the highest profiles on Facebook and, with concerns about animal welfare, the real monkeys have been replaced by a knitted* one!

Slogan Quiz Match these advertising slogans with their product or company.

A

I’m lovin’ it

B

Just do it

C

Connecting people

1. Nokia 2. Macdonald’s 3. Nike

The answers are on page 15.

Pret a Manger Sandwiches have become super trendy with this relatively recent addition to the UK high street (which is British in spite of its French name). The company says it doesn’t use the “obscure chemicals, additives and preservatives” present in much fast food these days. They give their left-over food to feed the homeless and, with profits rising, they plan to open 44 new branches.

Walkers Crisps The Brits cannot get enough crisps and Walkers are their favourite brand, and they are advertised by Gary Lineker, one of the UK’s footballing heroes. The most popular flavours of crisp are Ready Salted, Salt and Vinegar and Cheese and Onion, but there are plenty of others, from Pickled Onion to Prawn Cocktail!

Glossary asset: property or thing that is useful or worth money chances are: (informal) it is likely that check: pattern of small squares funded: paid for knitted: made from wool (using thin sticks to interlock the woollen string) malty: flavour derived from barley mascot: symbol (usually seen to bring luck) reckons: (informal) thinks, believes sobbing: crying violently and noisily toilet roll: toilet paper trench coat: raincoat with two rows of buttons down the front two-ply: two layers

10 Green Living

infinitive constructions with +ing; hypothetical constructions

12 ideas For Sustainable Living We are coming to the end of the UN’s 2012 International Year of Sustainable Energy For All. In this article we look at 12 ideas everyone can put into practice to make our future a better one.

Trying to live as sustainably as we can should be something we all do automatically by now. To help these aims become a reality, the UN has developed an initiative called “Sustainable Energy For All”. The objectives of this are to ensure universal access to modern energy sources*, as well as increase the use of renewables and improve energy efficiency right across the planet. The UN SecretaryGeneral, Ban Ki-moon, has stated the UN’s aim to guarantee access to clean and sustainable energy sources to everyone on earth by 2030. The 12 ideas in this article were launched by the Worldwatch Institute at a recent World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi.

1 RECYCLE

Think about your rubbish! You can separate glass, paper, plastics and metal from the rest of your rubbish and recycle it. Recycling does make a big difference to the environment – it means we use

fewer natural resources, and reduces the amount of rubbish we each send to landfill sites*.

hour to remove the taste. Bottled water is expensive and incredibly wasteful. A lot of energy and resources go into making plastic and glass bottles and to dispose of the bottles when you have finished with them, and it takes fuel to distribute them to our shops and supermarkets.

2 TURN OFF THE LIGHTS

5 TURN DOWN THE HEAT

Get into the habit of turning off the lights when you leave the room, it might not seem that this will make a difference but it does in the long term. It is also a good idea to turn off the stand-by lights on stereos, TVs, computers, microwaves and other electrical appliances. These waste a surprising amount of electricity (and money!)

3 CHANGE THOSE LIGHTBULBS

The old-fashioned incandescent* lightbulbs we grew up with are inefficient, don’t last very long and have a big carbon footprint*. New rules from the European Union mean they have to be phased out completely by the end of this year. By 2016, all halogen bulbs will also be phased out and all lightbulbs will have to have an energy rating of B or above!

4 TURN ON THE TAP

Due to strict water-quality regulations, tap water is perfectly safe to drink. If your tap water tastes of chlorine put a bottle of it in the fridge for half an

You really don’t need to heat your house above 20° C. During winter, every degree you go above 20 increases your energy consumption by 8%, but turning your heating down by just one degree can help reduce your annual CO2 emissions by 300kg.

6 STOP WASTING FOOD

If you are careful about the amount of food you buy and keep an eye on what is in the fridge, then you will avoid having to throw food out and you will save money. But it’s not only us, supermarkets and restaurants throw out millions of tonnes of food every day. According to the FAO (the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN), a staggering one third of the world’s food gets wasted every year, that’s enough to ensure everyone in the world’s poorest countries has enough to eat!

7 BUY LOCAL

Try to buy seasonal* food that has been produced locally to reduce your food miles. This might mean you have to change your habits a bit so that you stop buying strawberries in January that have been flown over from* Chile! If you can, try and buy directly from producers and farmers near your home and at increasingly popular Farmer’s Markets.

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8 GET ON YOUR BIKE

Riding a bike is good for your health and the environment and it will save you a fortune in transport costs. If everyone in cities used their bikes instead of their cars the air would be a lot cleaner, and they would save hundreds of pounds/euros a year by not having to buy petrol or pay for car parking.

9 SHARE A CAR

If you really need to use a car then try local, car-sharing schemes where you rent a car for a short period, even for a few hours at a time. This kind of scheme means that you only use a car when you really need it, helping to cut down on wasteful journeys.

Another idea is car pooling where you buy one car between several people. If you fancy something less radical, then you could try to arrange a lift share. Ask your friends and neighbours, or there are lots of local and internet-based schemes. You can share the cost, and going to work with someone might make a boring commute more interesting.

10 PLANT A GARDEN

If you don’t have a garden where you live, you can still grow quite a lot of produce* on your balcony. Salad plants, tomatoes and herbs are particulary good. According to the FAO over 200 million people across the world grow their own produce and sell the surplus to 800 million neighbours!

11 START COMPOSTING

You can turn organic waste into compost which you can use in the garden. Compost made from kitchen waste and food scraps, old coffee grounds* and weeds* from the garden provide the soil with nutrient-rich

E = Q I = J M = H P = _

R = F S = D U = R Z = T

Secret Code Use the secret code to discover the name of the American documentary film released in 2004, that showed how bad eating too much fast food can be for your health.

The answer is on page 15.

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humus*, which is good for drainage and has the micro-organisms and minerals plants need to grow. If you don’t have room for your own compost heap, you could find out about wormeries* and other composters such as bokashi.

12 EAT LESS MEAT

Meat consumption is going up right across the globe. Meat production accounts for 23% of all water used in agriculture and a large percentage of the world’s grain production. Try to reduce your meat consumption to two days a week, it will also be good for your own health, especially if you have stopped growing!

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Glossary carbon footprint: amount of carbon dioxide released through use of fossil fuels coffee grounds: what is left after you make coffee flown over from: transported by plane from humus: organic part of soil, from the decomposition of leaves etc by microorganisms incandescent: bulb that uses heat to create light landfill sites: area where waste and rubbish is buried underground produce: fruit and vegetables seasonal: grown at the ‘natural’ season, eg spring/summer etc where you live sources: (here) thing that you get energy from weeds: plants that you don’t want in your garden wormeries: containers with special worms that digest food waste

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Culture and Society

superlatives; present perfect

The River Thames

Liquid History You cannot think of London is longer, it starts in Wales). Its total length is 346 km. without picturing the great tidal* river that runs through A Short History Lesson the centre of it. The Thames We have archaeological evidence of has been the scene of many people living on the banks of the Thames since Neolithic times, over five thousand important historical events. years ago. But it was the Romans (of Since the last decades of course) who saw its true potential in the twentieth century the AD43 when they invaded Britain under Thames has become an the Emperor Claudius. Things quietened increasingly important down* then for the next few hundred years, apart from a few raids* by Vikings focus of the capital, but it wasn’t always like that. Let’s in the ninth century, until the next invasion of Britain, this time by Norman find out a bit more about king William the Conqueror, in 1066. the river that one British William built a number of important historian* called ‘Liquid fortifications along it, including the Tower History’. of London.

Historic River The River The Thames starts off life some 160 kilometers to the west of London and travels through Oxford, Reading, Henley-on-Thames and Windsor before getting to the UK capital. The river becomes tidal here, with the difference between the lowest and highest tides around 7 metres. It flows out* into the North Sea to the east of London at Southend-on-Sea, and is the longest river in England (though the river Severn

One of the most significant events in the history of Britain was King John’s signing of the Magna Carta in 1225. This first step towards democracy in Western Europe happened on an island in the river at a place called Runnymede.

During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Tudor and Stuart kings and queens of England built some spectacular palaces along the river, many of which you can still see today. The most famous of these is undoubtedly Hampton Court.

From those days to early Victorian times we have paintings of the famous Thames ice fairs*. Ice fairs were held when the river used to freeze over during the winter, there were stalls* and entertainment*, fires(!), horses and on one occasion even an elephant.

The Great Stink As the seventeenth century moved into the eighteenth the Thames became the hub* for a vast trading network* of sailing ships

13

Mirror Use a mirror to read how seventeenth-century poet, Matthew Prior, described the Thames.

Bazalgette

Joseph Bazalgette

that helped the rapid expansion of the British Empire. This meant more jobs were created in London and the city began to get a lot bigger. Unfortunately, it also resulted in the creation of increasing amounts of human waste and sewage* which all ended up in…? You’ve guessed it, the Thames. For many centuries the Thames became London’s open sewer*, and as a result, the city turned its back on its river. In the hot summer of 1858 the smell from the river was so bad it became known as The Great Stink*!

It wasn’t just about the smell though.

Untreated sewage was a dangerous source of diseases, such as cholera, which caused epidemics throughout the city. Enter brilliant engineer, Joseph Bazalgette. Bazalgette was asked to come up with a solution and he created the first sewer network in central London, which the city still relies on* to this day. He also strengthened the banks of the river, making it half as wide. These river walls, known as embankments, are what you walk along today through central London towards the Houses of Parliament, or the South Bank to the London Eye. Bazalgette’s changes to the river had an unexpected consequence though. Because the river was narrower*, the water flowed along it more quickly, and that meant the end of the ice fairs because the river didn’t freeze over any more.

The Heart of London Now, the Thames is cleaner than it has been for centuries, and London has begun to make the most of it once more. There are river walks and river cruises, and many of London’s most spectacular buildings can be seen from it. There’s even a brand new cable car* across it with some great views up and down the river.

CITSEJAM ,GNORTS TEY ENERES TUOHTIW TFIWS ,ETADES TEY .ECNELOIV

Odd One Out Which of the following is not a bridge across the Thames A

Tower Bridge

B

Golden Gate Bridge

C

Millennium Bridge

D

London Bridge The answer is on page 15.

Glossary cable car: small cabin suspended above the ground, often used for travelling up and down mountains entertainment: shows, theatre, comedy etc fair: (here) event with things to buy and watch, organised for people’s enjoyment flows out: (of a liquid) moves into historian: somebody who studies history hub: (here, figurative) the central part of a wheel is a hub narrower: became less wide quietened down: became quieter/calmer raid: violent attack to steal objects, cattle, people etc relies on: needs sewage: water and solid excrement – waste produced through digestion of food sewer: large tunnel or tube for carrying sewage (above) stall: large table where things are sold eg in a market stink: terrible smell tidal: (adjective) affected by the rise and fall of water due to the pull of the moon

14 Games and Activities

Crossword 1. The USA’s most famous music prize.

2. The country where the world’s oldest flute was found.

3. This type of music can be an acquired taste.

4. The family name of neuroscientist David.

5. The singer-songwriter whose music is being studied by scientists.

6. Music composed and played spontaneously is…

7. Psychologist John who found out that an appoggiatura can make us cry.

8. Group of eight notes.

9. Loud rock music with a strong beat: ………… metal.

According to the Guiness Boook of World Records, which is the most covered song of all time? Fill in the crossword and find out!

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Compound Adjectives There are a number of compound adjectives in the article on brands. Choose the right words from the box to make compound adjectives for each noun. Do you know when you need hyphens and when you don’t?

• • • •

best ever good high

• • • •

highest instantly left old

1. …………………………………..

2. …………………………………..

3. …………………………………..

4. …………………………………..

5. …………………………………..

6. …………………………………..

7. …………………………………..

• • • •

over performance quality recognisable

car pattern brand food programmes figure boy

• selling • seven • year

15

Landmark Thames Wordsearch Quiz Which of the following iconic buildings can you not see from the Thames?

Bankside power station – home of the Tate Modern art gallery Buckingham Palace Houses of Parliament Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre St Paul’s Cathedral The Tower of London

Find 15 words in the wordsearch below to do with the River Thames and discover the name of a gate that leads from the river directly into a notorious prison!

N E T W O R K O H C

L E R C S I I R U A

I T S R E T S B B B

Q B H U W I L A A L

Answers P 3 Film Quiz: 1bY; 2aZ; 3cX. P 4-5 1. T; 2. T (a gherkin is a type of pickled cucumber, which is similar to the shape of this skyscraper!); 3. F (Lower Manhattan has hundreds more 150+ metre buildings than London); 4. F (it’s only his second, his first, Central Saint Giles, was completed in 2010); 5. F (it was the tallest until 1962); 6. T; 7. T; 8 F (as of 2012 it has only 12, though more are planned in coming years).

U R I I E D A N F E

I I P S R E N K R C

D D S E S T D S E A

T G A T I D E S E R

H E P A L A C E Z T

C H O L E R A G E E

The answers are at the bottom of the page.

P 6-7 Secret Code: Thriller. P 8-9 Slogan Quiz: a). 2; b).

3; c). 1. P 10-11 Secret Code: Super Size Me. P 12-13 Odd One Out: b). P 14 Crossword: 1.Grammy; 2.Slovenia; 3.classical; 4.Levitin; 5.Adele; 6.improvised; 7.Sloboda; 8.octave; 9.heavy: Yesterday. Compound Adjectives: 1. high-performance car; 2. instantly recognisable pattern; 3. best-selling brand; 4. left-over food; 5. good-quality

programmes; 6. highest-ever figure; 7. seven-year-old boy. You don’t put a hyphen when you are using an adverb, eg instantly.

Landmark Quiz: you can see all of them except Buckingham Palace. Thames Wordsearch: banks, bridge, cable car, cholera, cruise, freeze, hub, ice, island, liquid, network, palace, sewers, ships, tide: The Traitor’s Gate (it leads straight into the Tower of London).

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