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BEC : Presentations -Vocabulary

Hi, this is AJ. Welcome to the vocabulary lesson. Let’s get started.

The first phrase is ‘keynote speech’, keynote speech. You might give a keynote speech. A keynote speech is sort of the main speech or the starting speech usually of a seminar or a convention. It might not always be the first speech, but it’s the main speech. So kind of the big speaker does the main big speech. That’s called the keynote speech.

The next phrase is ‘get the hang of’, to get the hang of something. To get the hang of something means to become good at it, to become comfortable with it, so we usually use this with a skill. So, for example, if I’m learning how to surf and I’m struggling, I’m not good, I’m not good, I’m not good and then suddenly I start to get better. My skill increases. I’m starting to be good at it. Then I might say I’m getting the hang of it. I’m getting the hang of surfing, meaning I’m starting to get good.

‘Accustomed to’, accustomed to something. If you’re accustomed to something it means you’re used to it. You’re used to it. You’re comfortable with it.

The next phrase is ‘get me over the hump’, or to get over the hump. To get over the hump means to get past the most difficult part. You can imagine ‘hump’ means like a hill, a hill or even a mountain. If you’re going up a mountain ah, you’re climbing, you’re climbing, you’re climbing and then you get over the hump, you get over the top of the mountain, over the top of the hill, well then you’re going down the hill it’s much easier.

So the hump is kind of the top part of the hill. So to get over the hump, you can imagine again then the hump is kind of the most difficult part, getting over the top. Then after you get over the top, after you get over the hump, now everything becomes much easier.

Okay, ‘the kiss of death’. If something is the kiss of death it means it will cause a disaster. It’s something that will destroy you or destroy something. So I said memorizing a speech word for word that’s the kiss of death. It means if you do that it will destroy your speech. It will make it terrible. It will make it really boring.

‘To have a message to get across’, a message to get across. To get across means to communicate. So if you have message to get across to people it means you have a message to communicate to people.

‘Know your stuff’, you need to know your stuff. It’s a little bit of an idiom here. To know your stuff means to know your subject. So in this situation, in this case, stuff means subject. Know what you’re talking about. Know your stuff. Know your subject.

An ‘analogy’. An analogy is a symbolic story usually used to teach some idea, so it’s a symbolic story. You know probably the story about the rabbit and the turtle or tortoise, right? They have a race and the rabbit runs really fast, but then he stops because he’s kind of lazy and he takes a long break. Then he runs a little bit more and then he stops.

Then the turtle just slowly walks at the same speed all the time and eventually the turtle wins because the rabbit falls asleep. That’s an analogy, right? It’s not really about rabbits and turtles. It’s about the idea of slowly moving forward to accomplish a goal. It’s a symbolic story that teaches you something.

‘To come off the top of your head’, like oh, that idea just came off the top of my head.

It means something that just comes into your head quickly. It means a quick thought. It’s not something you planned it’s something that’s spontaneous. It’s a spontaneous thought or a spontaneous idea. So if you said oh, that just came off the top of my head, it means that was a spontaneous thought. It was a spontaneous idea.

Finally, to have a ‘vested interest in something’. I have a vested interest in this football game. To have a vested interest means you have some kind of committed interest. It means you have a serious interest in it, right? It means there will be some kind of result to you so, for example, the football example. I have a vested interest in this game, this football game. Maybe you bet money. You bet that one team would win.

Well, now you have a serious interest in that game because if your team wins you’ll make money, if your team loses you’re going to lose money. So it’s a very serious interest, it’s not just a relaxed, casual interest. You have a very practical reason to be interested in it. That’s called a vested interest.

And that is all of our vocabulary this time. So, as usual, I want you to listen to the vocabulary lesson every day for 10 days or more, 10 to 14 days or more and I would like you to listen to the basic conversation every day in this set for 10 to 14 days and listen to each of the commentaries every day for 10 to 14 days. That repetition is so important.

I know that sometimes you might feel it’s boring. Oh, I already know this. After seven days maybe you feel like it’s easy and you want to go to the next lesson set. Don’t. I encourage you to go for at least 10 days, maybe even 14 days using the same lesson set. You’ll really learn deeply. This is how you master something.

This is what athletes do if they’re practicing a golf swing, for example. They’ll practice the golf swing hundreds of times, thousands of times. They learn it very deeply. So listen, listen, listen a lot and learn this deeply even when it feels easy, especially when it feels easy. Keep on repeating.

All right, see you next time. Bye-bye.

The End.