Transcript
If you’re attending an interview, whether for work or for an English speaking examination, it’s vital that you answer the questions you’re asked as fully as possible in order to showcase yourself or your English skills in the best possible light.
This podcast features Ekaterina from Bulgaria and Teodoro from Chile, who both met for a ‘getting-to-know-you’ interview in Skype.
Both Ekaterina and Teodoro were asked to focus on responding to questions fully with thoughtful answers. As you listen decide how well both Ekaterina and Teodoro respond to each other’s questions and the extent to which they managed to hold a natural conversation. Finally, make a note of their use of English, which we’ll look at in the feedback section.
Let’s listen to Ekaterina and Teodoro.
Peter: OK, …. starting with you Ekateria … Where do you … where do you live?
Ekaterina: Well I am from Bulgaria, and I live in a town **** in south west of Bulgaria …. I’m living with my family And how long have you been studying English. I don’t know… maybe about 7 or 8 years.
Peter: OK. And Teodoro. Tell me something … tell us something about where ..where you live.
Teodoro: I live in Santiago … it’s the capital of Chile it’s more or less in the centre of the country. And my profession I am a medical technologist. And … and … the activities I usually perform are related with my profession
Peter: OK and how long have you been studying English Teodoro
Teodoro: I’ve been studying English more or less15 years. But most of the time I have studied English as a self-learner.
Peter: OK … OK, Teodoro, I’d like you to ask … Ekaterina some questions and vice versa Ekaterina, I’d like you to ask Teodoro some questions. I’ll give you a few ideas first and then maybe you can think of others once you’ve started. So Teodoro if you could start by asking Ekaterina. Maybe you could find out more about the country that she’s living in.
Teodoro: Yes, I would like to know … how a person of Bulgaria … is. I am curious about the environment … the general environment in your country because it’s far away of my normal activities.
Ekaterina: Yeah, well Bulgaria is … I think somewhere in the near the Mediterranean … climate. I don’t know how to say it exactly. Here we have four seasons and now it is … autumn and … actually we have really beautiful nature and especially in my town it is not so polluted and … you can go for walks you know among nature … there are … Bulgaria has really beautiful mountains and also seaside and … if you … if you like nature and being near it you can really have a good holiday and I think you’d be happy to live here.
Teodoro: OK Thanks
Ekaterina: It’s a nice place
Teodoro: OK, so what I can tell you about my country is more or less similar in something and unfortunately dissimilar in another. It is similar in the context of we have beautiful landscape we have mountains … mountains as well, we have the Andes range and this is one of the longest countries in the world. We have … we have landscape of beautiful scenery in Patagonia in the south of our country but unfortunately the … the central region of Chile like Santiago is very polluted … so you are very lucky to live in a … clean atmosphere. So do want to know another thing of my … my country or my city?
Ekaterina: Yeah, yeah … I’d like to … to know how you … how you spend your … your free time. What activities are typical of young people there or just people … I don’t know how old you are. How do you spend your free time?
Teodoro: My free time? Well, first of all I read a lot. I like to read in English. And I swim … I use to swimming … I used to go swimming. And … I am very fond of movies and because I have discovered that by watching movies at cinema or TV you can learn a lot of things especially about languages. I don’t know what is your perception about that?
Ekaterina: Well, I … like listening to music very much … unfortunately I am not so good at singing and I can’t play musical instruments but I really like to meet some artists and in some way to work with them. I like art generally, also I like watching movies from time to time. I also adore swimming but … the sport that I am practising usually it is martial arts karate but unfortunately now I don’t have lots of time … you know … near he exams.“
Feedback
First of all a big ‘Thankyou to both Ekaterina and Teodoro for agreeing to be recorded. I’m sure they’d appreciate any comments you’d like to make on their talk. Let’s give them both some feedback. They both did an excellent job of giving full and interesting answers to questions. For example, having been asked about their country, they gave thoughtful, detailed responses and as you will see from these extracts, also very skillfully signalled the end of their contribution with clear concluding statements:
“… if you like nature and being near it you can really have a good holiday and I think you’d be happy to live here …”
“…Santiago is very polluted so you are very lucky to live in a clean atmosphere …”
Ekaterina and Teodoro’s English was of a very good standard but can you spot the mistakes in these extracts:
“…how a person of Bulgaria is …”
“…the general environment in your country because it’s far away of my normal activities …”
“…near the Mediterranean … climate …”
“…actually we have really beautiful nature and especially in my town…”
“…So do want to know another thing of my country or my city?” … I use to swimming … I used to go swimming …”
“…I don’t know what is you perception about that?”
OK Here are the corrections:
Not ‘how a person from Bulgaria is’. A literal correction would be, ‘What a person from Bulgaria is like’ but in the context of this question, Teodoro could have said ‘What life is like for someone from Bulgaria’.
“…the general environment in your country because it’s far away of my…”
Not ‘far away of’ but ‘far away from’
“…near the Mediterranean … climate …”
I’m not quite sure what Ekaterina was trying to say here … possibly a ‘Mediterranean climate’ but I could be mistaken.
“…actually we have really beautiful nature and especially in my town…”
Although it’s clear what Ekaterina means here, we wouldn’t normally say ‘beautiful nature’ but rather, perhaps ‘beautiful scenery’.
“…So do want to know another thing of my country or my city?”
Not ‘do you want to know another thing of my country’ but ‘would you like me to tell more’ or ‘would you like to hear more about my country’
“… I use to swimming … I used to go swimming …”
Not ‘I used to go swimming’ (unless of course Teodoro means he once went swimming but no longer does.) Better here I think to say ‘I usually go swimming.’
“…I don’t know what is your perception about that.”
Here, I think Teodoro is asking Ekaterina if she agrees with what he has just said about using TV and Film to learn more about language. So a better question would have been, ‘What do you think?’ or ‘Do you agree?’
OK, That’s the end of this podcast. It’s ‘goodbye’ from me Pete Travis. Come back soon for another episode of ‘Splendid Speaking’. Bye!