Zapp! English Colloquial 3.30 - Shopping
Taught by Katie Wood — Cambridge CELTA · Cambridge DELTA · Cambridge-accredited Teacher Trainer
Recorded and taught by a team of British and North American English teachers, based in Oxford (UK) and Barcelona (Spain).
Katie offers the phrase on the never never and Amanda doesn't recognise it at all: "I have never never heard that before." A moment later Tom cuts in with "Plastic fantastic!" and the three of them agree that every way of buying a sofa you can't yet afford is a bad idea. Katie tells us at the start that they're sitting in Tom's living room, and that Amanda is going to guess expressions from her descriptions. The topic this time is shopping.
What you'll hear in this episode
Katie describes a meaning, Amanda works out the phrase, and then they talk about whether either of them actually does it. The first one comes quickly once Katie gives the clue "It's got the word shop in it." — to shop around — and the two of them agree people compare prices far more than they used to. One of the speakers describes a friend who buys dairy products in one supermarket and fruit and veg in the greengrocer's, against "the time saver part of us all" that just wants one trip.
Then comes credit: on the never never, on credit, Tom's "Plastic fantastic!", and the awkward part afterwards — you have to pay it off. One of the speakers mentions a brother who, at thirty-nine, is still paying off his student loan.
Katie asks Amanda to imagine dinner with three other yoga teachers, which produces to talk shop and a confession that the group has "a bit of a rule" about it. Window shopping gets no love from either of them: "Welcome to my life," says Amanda, before admitting "I don't even let myself go in the shop anymore." There's a bull in a china shop (Amanda immediately adds "Subtle as a sledgehammer."), a shopaholic, the rude one — a knocking shop — and finally to shop someone, which stops Amanda in her tracks: "And this is to do with shopping?"
Quick facts
| Episode | Colloquial 3.30 – Shopping |
| Pack | Colloquial 3 |
| Level | 3 |
| Duration | 17 minutes 01 seconds |
| Voices | Katie, Amanda and Tom |
| Expressions taught | Ten colloquial expressions |
| Workbook | Glossary with register ratings, two practice exercises, answer key |
What you'll learn
Because Amanda has to guess, Katie spends the episode defining phrases out loud — "that process of going to this place, seeing what they've got, how much it is, then going to the next place" — which is exactly the skill you need when you don't know a word: explain around it until someone hands you the phrase. You'll hear that strategy modelled a dozen times.
You'll also notice how "shop" detaches from shopping. Half these expressions have nothing to do with buying anything: talking shop is about work, a bull in a china shop is about clumsiness, a knocking shop is a brothel, and shopping someone means reporting them. Katie flags each one as she goes, which is a useful habit to copy — knowing an idiom is not literal matters more than knowing its translation.
Two small pieces of real British speech worth catching: Katie's agreement with a negative, "No me neither.", which learners often produce as a positive by mistake; and Amanda's use of full stop to mean at all, in "now I don't go shopping full stop". Neither is in a textbook chapter on shopping, but both come up constantly.
The two teaching sections in the middle and at the end recycle all ten expressions with example sentences and gaps for you to repeat.
The expressions
- to shop around – to go to different shops, checking the price until you find the best price. The one Amanda gets first.
- to talk shop – to talk about your work, especially with other people who do the same work as you.
- on credit – to get the products now and pay for them later.
- on the never never – buying things on credit — get the products now and pay for them later.
- to pay something off – to repay over time. Amanda supplies this one when Katie hesitates.
- window shopping – looking but not buying.
- a shopaholic – a person who cannot stop shopping. Neither speaker claims to be one.
- like a bull in a china shop – someone who acts without care and can damage things or feelings.
- subtle as a sledgehammer – not subtle, not able to say something in a gentle or indirect way.
- to shop someone – to report someone for doing something wrong or illegal.
- a knocking shop – a brothel, a place where prostitutes work. Rated 3: handle with care.
- drop someone in it – get someone into trouble usually by accidentally saying something.
- tell on someone – to tell someone that another person did something wrong, that you know will get the first person into trouble.
In the workbook
The workbook for 3.30 comes with the paid all-in-one pack. It contains the full transcript of the conversation, so you can read back the moment Amanda hears on the never never for the first time, plus the complete glossary above with a register rating on every entry: 1 for most situations, 2 for people you know well, and 3 for the ones the workbook warns you not to use with your mother-in-law. A knocking shop is the only 3 here.
Practice Exercise 1 asks you to correct five sentences where the idioms have been broken in the way learners really break them — a bull in a Chinese shop, window looking, on the never ever. Practice Exercise 2 joins five sentence halves into discussion questions you can answer yourself: would you buy anything on credit, do you talk shop with friends from work, would you shop a friend if they did something illegal? Answers to both are included.
The pack gives you the workbook for every episode, at every level, for €39 in total.
Get the complete courseAll workbooks and audio — €39
Common questions
Is the conversation scripted?
No. Amanda genuinely doesn't know some of these expressions, and you can hear her working them out. The teaching sections that set up the tasks and give the answers are scripted, so the instructions stay clear.
Which of these can I actually use?
All of them are informal. The glossary rates each one, and a knocking shop is marked 3 — very informal and likely to offend some people. The rest are safe in relaxed conversation with friends.
Do I need the workbook to follow the audio?
The English conversations work on their own. The workbook is for the transcript, the glossary and the two exercises that make the phrases stick.
What level is this?
Level 3, from the Colloquial 3 pack. Idiom-heavy and spoken at natural speed, with plenty of overlapping speech and hesitation.
Where does the audio come from?
The English conversations are free to download from Zappenglish.com. The workbooks are the paid part.
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