Listening

1. Listen to three people speaking. Concentrate on the way they sound. Are they having a conversation or giving a presentation? How do you know?

II. Discuss with a partner. How is speaking to the audience – even a small one – different from speaking to a group of friends? Think about the following:

III. Look at this famous toast to Albert Einstein by writer, George Bernard Shaw. The extract is unpunctuated. Mark (|) where you think the speaker paused. Then listen and check.

I have said that great men are a mixed lot but there are orders of great men there are great men who are great amongst all men but there are also great men who are great amongst great men and that is the sort of great man whom you have amongst you tonight I go back 2,500 years and how many of them can I count in that period I can count them on the fingers of my two hands Pythagoras Ptolemy Aristotle Copernicus Kepler Galileo Newton Einstein and I still have two fingers left vacant my lords ladies and gentlemen are you ready for the toast health and length of days to the greatest of our contemporaries Einstein

From In Company Intermediate

IV. a. Listen again and underline the stressed words.

b. Is there a connection between what we stress and where we pause?