Zapp! English Listening 3.7 - Entertainment
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).
Tom ends this episode by saying he'd be "very happy to throw my television off the balcony". Before that, we hear three people describe what they actually do with their free time — one of them "attempting to play the guitar" alone in the house, another listing eleven different outdoor activities without pausing for breath, and a third selling clothes at a flea market with a beer in hand. Then the conversation turns to television, two hundred channels, and why nobody wants to be home at eight o'clock any more.
What you'll hear in this episode
We start with three short monologues on the same question: how do you entertain yourself?
Pam talks about drinks and dinners with friends, the cinema she likes but rarely visits, and films watched at home instead. Most television programmes, she says, are "rubbish, basically". She also mentions the guitar, which she prefers to practise alone because she's "not very good".
Kami gives us the long version: wakeboarding, snowboarding, skiing, camping, sledding, soccer, swimming, surfing, boogie boarding, cycling and rollerblading. She admits she does enjoy a series or two — Friends is "one of those feel-good shows" for a bad day — and sums herself up with "I'm kind of a kid like that".
Laura describes changing what she does constantly: painting, cooking, baking, writing, always music, going to see bands. Yesterday she had a stall at a flea market, which turned into "quite a cool day, with beers, selling clothes, drinking beer".
The main segment is a longer, unscripted conversation between Tom, Kami and Pam about television. Tom complains about "option paralysis" and "channel surfing or whatever they call it"; Kami describes getting "hooked on" new series and deliberately avoiding them; Pam argues the quality of TV has "deteriorated" because of reality television. Talent shows come up — Idol, American Idol, Operación Triunfo — and Tom finally asks: "So could you live without a TV forever?"
Quick facts
| Episode | 3.7 |
| Pack | Listening 3 |
| Level | 3 |
| Topic | Entertainment |
| Duration | 15 minutes 31 seconds |
| Workbook | Included in the €39 all-in-one pack |
What you'll learn
This unit trains two different skills. The first three tasks are gist listening: you're not asked to catch every word, only to decide whether Pam mentions shopping or sightseeing, to count how many outdoor activities Kami lists, and to spot what all three speakers have in common. The answer to that last one is worth noticing — TV, going out with friends, staying at home with friends and going to the beach — because it's the kind of question that forces you to hold three recordings in your head at once.
Task 4 moves you to detail: two true/false statements across a fast four-minute conversation with overlapping turns and people finishing each other's sentences.
Along the way there's a genuine vocabulary lesson in the differences between speakers. You'll hear soccer and movie theatre in one monologue and telly and cinema in another, all describing the same things. You'll also hear how much natural speech is made of "erm", restarts and half-finished thoughts — "I'm not...I like going to the cinema" — which is exactly what textbook audio removes and what makes real conversation hard until you're used to it.
Vocabulary from the workbook
- flea market (noun) — a market where you can buy old, interesting and unusual things. Laura had a stall at one the day before recording.
- cool (adjective) — good, enjoyable, positive. As in Laura's "quite a cool day" — note that here it has nothing to do with temperature, which is what one of the extra questions tests.
- obsessed with (adjective + preposition) — cannot stop thinking about, cannot think about anything else, thinks about it all the time. Kami uses it about people and their television.
- paralysis (noun) — the state of not being able to move. Tom's "option paralysis" in front of too many channels.
- interruptions (noun) — things that happen in the middle of something that is not finished. Tom's reason for watching on demand instead.
- chained to (adjective + preposition) — connected to something by metal so that you cannot leave / move away. Pam's image for having to be home when a programme starts.
What's in the workbook
The accompanying eBook has the four listening tasks with the questions set out clearly and the answers explained — including why Pam doesn't go to the cinema (it isn't the price; she simply doesn't think of it). Then there's an Extra Materials section with nine further true/false statements, two or three per recording, so you can go back and listen again with a sharper focus. One of them catches most people out: Tom couldn't live without films and the odd documentary, so the statement about him is false.
After that comes Vocabulary – Getting the meaning from context, where you take five expressions straight from the recordings — getting a tan, hooked on, flicking, rubbish, deteriorated — and work out the meanings before matching them to definitions. Full answers are at the back, plus the glossary of six terms above and the complete transcript of everything said.
The workbook for this unit is part of the Zapp! English all-in-one pack, which covers every episode across all levels for €39.
Get the complete courseAll workbooks and audio — €39
Common questions
Is the audio scripted?
The conversations aren't. Pam, Kami, Laura and Tom are speaking off the cuff, which is why you hear so much hesitation and self-correction. The teaching sections that set up each task and give the answers are scripted, so the instructions stay clear.
Can I follow the episode without the workbook?
Yes — the audio is free and the tasks and answers are all spoken aloud. The workbook adds the extra true/false questions, the vocabulary exercises and the full transcript, which is what you need if a fast exchange goes past you.
How hard is this one?
It's Level 3, and the fourth task is the challenge: three people talking at natural speed, agreeing, interrupting and cutting in on each other's sentences.
What language will I actually take away?
Everyday vocabulary for hobbies and sport, plus the informal expressions people really use about television: hooked on, flicking through channels, chained to a schedule.
How long does it take?
The audio runs 15 minutes 31 seconds. With the extra questions and vocabulary work, expect around half an hour.
Get this episode
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