Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 977, Parts of the Body.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 977.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
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On this episode we are going to listen to a dialogue between Sonia and and Nadir about parts of the body.
Let's get started.
What in the world is that?
It's a life-size figure of George Washington.
Then why are you making it?
I'm not.
I'm just helping him.
Uh-huh.
Why does George Washington have really big hands and flat palms?
He cut down the family's cherry tree.
Remember?
He probably needed big hands to do that.
And why does he have little tiny feet with six toes on each foot and no ankles?
I made a little mistake with those, but they'll be covered up with shoes so no one will see them.
And why is George's head shaped like an egg?
His ears are lopsided, and his earlobes are disproportionate to his other facial features.
That's why I made the forehead and chin bigger, so no one will notice those ears.
We'll probably put a hat on him anyway.
But his legs look really thin on top and thick on the bottom with kneecaps that stick out.
I'll put pants on him so no one will see those either.
So it won't matter if he's not anatomically correct, right?
Right.
Good thing this isn't for science class.
We begin our dialogue with Sonia asking Nadir a question.
She says, what in the world is that?
When someone uses that expression in the world, they are trying to give you the idea that they are shocked or surprised about something.
What in the world are you doing?
You might say to someone.
Your child, for example, if he is doing something that you don't want him to do.
Or if you are simply puzzled.
You don't understand why someone is doing something, you may say what in the world are you doing?
There's an implication in this question that you find what they are doing is strange or unusual.
Nade responds, it's a life-size figure of George Washington.
It's for Leon's school project.
When we say something is a life-size figure and you might also hear people say life-sized with a D at the end figure.
Either one is correct we mean that they have some sort of statue or object that is the same size as the person that the object represents.
So a life-size statue or a life-size figure of George Washington would be something that looks like George Washington and is as big as George Washington was.
You may know that George Washington was the first president of the United States.
Nadir, for some reason, has a life-size figure of George Washington.
Why?
He says it is for Leon's school project.
We're guessing that Leon is Nadir's son.
Sonia says...
Then why are you making it?
Why isn't Leon making it since it's for his school project or assignment?
Nader says, I'm not.
I'm just helping him.
Sonia doesn't believe Nader.
She says, uh-huh.
But she says it in such a way that we know she doesn't really think that Nader is telling the truth.
She then asks Your hand?
H-A-N-D is at the end of your arm and is used for grabbing things and picking things up.
Palm, P-A-L-M, is the area of your hand... which is between the bottom of the hand and the fingers.
So between basically, your wrist, which is the part of the body that connects the arm to the hand, and the fingers of your hand.
That flat area on the front of your hand is called your palm.
Sonia wants to know why George Washington has really big hands and flat palms.
Flat means there aren't any bumps in it.
It's completely straight, if you will.
Nadia says he cut down the family's cherry tree, remember?
He probably needed big hands to do that.
Nada refers to an old story about George Washington who, when he was a boy, apparently cut down a tree, a cherry tree.
The story is that when his father asked him if he cut down the tree, George was honest.
He admitted, yes, I cut down that cherry tree.
This story was meant to demonstrate the honesty of George Washington, how he was a good man.
Nader thinks that since Washington cut down a tree, he must have had really big hands.
Makes sense, I think.
Sonia then says...
Why does he have little tiny feet with six toes on each foot and no ankles?
Sonia says that this life-size figure of George Washington has tiny feet, meaning very small feet.
Your feet, of course, are the things that you walk on.
The figure also has six toes.
Your toes, T-O-E-S, are the digits we might call them that are at the ends of your feet.
They're sort of like your fingers, but they're on your feet.
We call those toes.
There are normally five toes on each feet, just as there are five fingers on each hand.
However, this figure of George Washington has six toes, and it doesn't have any ankles.
Your ankle A-N-K-L-E is the part that connects your leg to your foot, just as your wrist W-R-I-S-T connects your arm to your hand.
Nader says, I made a little mistake, a small mistake.
But they'll be covered up with shoes so no one will see them.
Sonius then asks, and why is George's head shaped like an egg?
Your head is the part of your body that contains your brain right or, in the case of my neighbor, no brain your eyes, your nose, your ears and so forth.
And your hair, if you have hair.
Sonia is asking why George Washington's head is shaped like, or in the form of, an egg.
The ears, Sonia says, are lopsided, and...
The earlobes are disproportionate to his other facial features.
Your ears, E-A-R-S, are the things that you hear out of.
When we say something is lopsided, L-O-P-S-I-D-E-D, we mean it is uneven.
One side is longer than the other in this case.
Ear lobes E-A-R-L-O-B-E-S are the bottom parts of your ears, the part that is below the ear opening, where you have the sound go into your ear.
Below that part, there's a small... piece of flesh that we call the earlobe.
It's where you would put earrings, for example, if you have earrings.
I don't have any earrings myself.
Maybe I should.
Maybe I should get earrings.
What do you think?
Well, back to our story here.
The earlobes, according to Sonia, on George Washington's figure are disproportionate to his other facial features.
When we say something is disproportionate, D-I-S-P-R-O-P-O-R-T-I-O-N-A-T-E, we mean that they look too big or too small compared to the other things in this case on the figure.
When something is disproportionate, it is bigger than it should be.
For example, if you draw someone's face and you make the nose five times bigger than the eyes, we would say the nose is disproportionate to the eyes.
It's too big compared to the size of the eyes.
Dis, D-I-S, here means not.
So disproportionate means not proportionate.
The earlobes then are not the right size compared to the other facial features.
Facial F-A-C-I-A-L features are the parts of your face that are used to basically identify you, the parts of your face that make you look the way you do.
So your eyes, your nose, your mouth, your eyebrows, which are the lines of hair above your eyes, all of these would be considered facial features.
Nadir says, that's why I made the forehead and chin bigger so no one will notice those ears.
The forehead F-O-R-E-H-E-A-D is the part of the head that is above your eyebrows and below where your hair begins.
Below the top of your head, if you will.
It's the flat part of your face above your eyes.
The chin c-h-i-n is the part of your face that is below your mouth and above your neck, formed by your jaw J-A-W, which is where you find your teeth.
That bottom part of your face then is called your chin.
Many men, for example, grow beards that cover their chins.
I don't have a beard.
Maybe I should get a beard.
A beard and earrings.
Yeah, why not?
Sonia continues in, but his legs look really thin on top and thick on the bottom, with kneecaps that stick out.
Your legs connect your feet to the rest of your body, we could say.
You have two of them.
Kneecaps K-N-E-E-C-A-P-S are small round bones found in the middle of your leg, towards the front of the leg, above your knee, which is the part of the leg that bends.
You could think of it as the part of the leg that connects the top part with the bottom part.
On your arms, you have what's called an elbow E-L-B-O-W which connects the top part of your arm to the bottom part of your arm.
Sonia says that George Washington's legs are thin on top and thick on the bottom.
Thin is the opposite of thick.
Thin would be very narrow and thick in this case would be very wide.
Nada says, I'll put pants on him so no one will see those either.
Sonia says, so it won't matter if he's anatomically correct, right?
Anatomically comes from the word anatomy, which is the study of the human body, the physical aspects of the human body.
Anatomically refers to the parts of the body, the physical nature of your body.
It could be a human body.
It could be a body of an animal.
To say something is anatomically correct means that it is just like a real body.
We would use this in describing perhaps, a painting or, in this case, a life-size figure, where it's supposed to represent exactly what the body contains.
That's why Sonia is saying that it won't matter if George is not anatomically correct.
Nida says, yes, that's correct.
That's right.
Sonia says, good thing this isn't for science class.
Sonia says good thing, meaning it is a good thing or it is fortunate that.
This isn't for science class.
In a science class, of course you would want the figure to be anatomically correct, so that you know the student understands the different parts of the body and where they go and how big they are.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
Then why are you making it?
I'm not.
I'm just helping him.
Uh-huh.
Why does George Washington have really big hands and flat palms?
He cut down the family's cherry tree, remember?
He probably needed big hands to do that.
And why does he have little tiny feet with six toes on each foot and no ankles?
I made a little mistake with those, but they'll be covered up with shoes, so no one will see them.
And why is George's head shaped like an egg?
His ears are lopsided and his earlobes are disproportionate to his other facial features.
That's why I made the forehead and chin bigger so no one will notice those ears.
We'll probably put a hat on him anyway.
But his legs look really thin on top and thick on the bottom with kneecaps that stick out.
I'll put pants on him, so no one will see those either.
So it won't matter if he's not anatomically correct, right?
Right.
Good thing this isn't for science class.
Our scriptwriter uses her ten fingers to type out the wonderful scripts that we listen to here.
Thank you, Dr. Lucy Say.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcasts.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2014 by the Center for Educational Development.
