Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 1,262, Failing a Driving Test.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 1,262.
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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This episode is a dialogue between Oleg and Daria about taking a test and examination in order to get your driver's license.
Let's get started.
I failed.
I got nervous and I did everything wrong.
When I accelerated, I ground my gears and raced the engine.
The car jerked so hard that the examiner nearly fell off her seat.
Yeah, I know.
I failed to stop at a traffic light and changed lanes in the intersection without signaling.
Yikes!
The examiner told me to back off because I was tailgating the car in front of me.
She also pointed out the speed limit because I had been speeding.
Oh yes, it could have, and it did.
When she warned me about my speed, I got so flustered that I slammed on the brakes and nearly caused an accident.
What did she say when that happened?
She cried uncle and told me to take her back to the office as fast as humanly possible.
Oleg says to Daria at the beginning of our dialogue, I failed.
To fail F-A-I-L means not to pass some test or examination, or simply to not obtain the result that you wanted to get, to not reach the goal you wanted to reach.
I failed to lose 20 pounds in one week.
If your goal was to lose 20 pounds in one week and you didn't, you would say you failed, though that is probably not a very realistic goal.
We usually think of the verb to fail as being opposite of the verb to pass, especially in school or related to some sort of test or examination.
Oleg failed.
Daria says, We learn now that Oleg failed his driving test.
A driving test is an examination you must take in order to get a license to drive.
In the United States.
Each state has its own exam, its own test, and when you move from one state to another You often have to take the exam again, or at least the written exam, because there are actually two parts of the exam in most states.
There is a test that you take, I suppose, nowadays on a computer.
I'm so old, I remember taking the test using a piece of paper.
If you pass that test, then you have to take what's called a behind-the-wheel test, which means you get into a car with someone from the government and you have to demonstrate, show that you know how to drive.
It sounds as though Oleg failed the behind-the-wheel test, or the test in the car.
Oleg says, I got nervous and I did everything wrong.
Daria says, like what?
Meaning, what did you do wrong?
Oleg explains, when I accelerated, I ground my gears and raced the engine.
The car jerked so hard that the examiner nearly fell off her seat.
To accelerate, A-C-C-E-L-E-R-A-T-E, means to increase in speed, especially when you put your foot on what's called the gas pedal, P-E-D-A-L, in order to make the car go faster.
We call that accelerating the car, making the car go faster.
The opposite of accelerate is decelerate.
Well, in Oleg's case, when he accelerated, when he tried to make the car go faster by putting his foot on the gas pedal, he ground the gears.
To grind, G-R-I-N-D, ground is the past tense of grind.
The gears G-E-A-R-S means to cause the car to make a loud noise as you change the gears from one to another or go from one gear to another.
I should say
There are two basic kinds of cars.
There are cars that have what is called a manual M-A-N-U-A-L transmission and cars that have automatic transmissions.
In a manual transmission, you have to change Gears as the car goes faster or slower, and you have to do that each time you accelerate or decelerate.
In an automatic transmission, you don't have to do any of those things.
At least, you don't have to change gears from first gear to, say, fourth or fifth gear.
Most American cars nowadays have automatic transmissions, but I used to own a manual transmission, which we sometimes refer to as a stick S-T-I-C-K.
A stick refers to the... pole or stick that comes out of the transmission into the center of the car that you use to change gears so if someone asks you if you know how to drive a stick or a stick shift s-h-i-f-t the person is referring to a car with a manual transition Oleg was driving a stick shift or manual transmission car, and he didn't know how to shift or change gears properly, so when he accelerated, he ground the gears.
Basically, he failed to put his foot properly on another gear or piece of metal near your feet called the clutch.
C L U T C H.
You put your foot on the clutch in order to change from one gear to another.
If you don't do that correctly, you will end up grinding the gears, which is a very ugly sound.
Oleg says he raced the engine When he accelerated.
To race, R-A-C-E, the engine, E-N-G-I-N-E, means to take your car out of gear, we would say.
That is, put your car in neutral, N-E-U-T-R-A-L, so that...
The car isn't in any gear.
And then put your foot on the gas or your foot on the gas pedal, we would say.
If you do that, the motor or the engine of the car will move very fast.
It will make a loud noise, but the car won't move, because in order for the car to move, you have to be what we would describe as in gear.
That is, you have to be or put the transmission in to one of the gears first second third, fourth or, if you want to go backwards, reverse gear.
See, I'm teaching you how to drive as well as teaching you English today.
In any case, Oleg didn't do a very good job.
He says, Here it means to move suddenly or unexpectedly.
So if the car jerked, it's moved quickly without you being ready for it.
The examiner is the person from the government who decides if you pass or fail the driving test.
This poor examiner nearly, or almost, fell off her seat, meaning she almost went from her seat to the floor of the car.
Daria says, oh, that's bad.
Oleg says, yeah, I know.
I failed to stop at a traffic light and changed lanes in the intersection without signaling.
A traffic light is a light that tells you whether you should stop where two streets cross or go.
In the US and in many countries, the color red means you stop and green means you can go.
If you don't stop at a traffic light when the light is red that, of course, is very bad and dangerous, as well as being against the law.
When Oleg says he failed to stop at a traffic light, he means the traffic light was red and he was supposed to stop.
He also says he changed lanes in the intersection.
Lanes are the different sections of the street or the freeway in which the cars move.
The lanes are usually separated by painted lines on the street or highway.
To change lanes means to go from one lane to the next.
The intersection I-N-T-E-R-S-E-C-T-I-O-N is where two streets cross, usually at a right or 90 degree angle.
You're not supposed to change lanes when you are in the middle of an intersection.
Oleg also says that he changed lanes without signaling.
S-I-G-N-A-L-I-N-G.
To signal means to turn on the lights in your car that blink or go on and off quickly, telling the other drivers what direction you're going to move.
If you are going to move from one lane to another, you are supposed to turn your signal on so that a light goes on and off at the back and front of your car, telling other drivers that you are going to move lanes.
Oleg says he changed lanes without signaling.
By the way, it doesn't matter if you signal your lane change in the middle of an intersection or not.
It's illegal in most states to change lanes in an intersection, even if you signal.
Daria says yikes, which is an expression of surprise, usually at a bad thing.
Oleg continues, the examiner told me to back off because I was tailgating the car in front of me.
To back off is a two-word phrasal verb that here means to increase the distance between you and the person or in this case, car in front of you.
If you are too close to the car in front of you, we sometimes call that tailgating.
T-A-I-L, G-A-T-I-N-G.
To tailgate means to follow another car too closely so that if the other car were to stop quickly, you might cause an accident by hitting that car because you can't stop quickly enough.
Here in Los Angeles, if you drive too slowly, cars will often tailgate you.
They will come up right behind you to try to get you to move faster or to move to another lane so they can drive around you.
Oleg was tailgating the car in front of him.
The examiner also pointed out, or told him...
The speed limit of the road on which they were driving.
The speed limit is the maximum speed you can drive.
In most freeways in the United States, you can drive between 60 and 70 miles per hour.
In most city streets, the speed is much lower from 25 to 40 miles an hour typically.
The examiner pointed out the speed limit to Oleg because he had been speeding.
To speed, S-P-E-E-D, means to be driving faster than the speed limit.
To be driving too fast.
Daria says, it couldn't have gone much worse, could it?
Meaning, this was probably the worst that Oleg could have done.
Oleg says, oh yes, it could have and it did.
Meaning, things actually got worse than what he has so far described.
He says, when she warned me about my speed, I got so flustered that I slammed on the brakes and nearly caused an accident.
To get flustered F-L-U-S-T-E-R-E-D means to get confused or worried, usually because you are in a very stressful or difficult situation.
Oleg got flustered and slammed S-L-A-M-M-E-D on the brakes, B-R-A-K-E-S.
The brakes are what causes the car to slow down or stop.
To slam on the brakes means to put your foot very quickly and with a lot of pressure on what is called the brake pedal.
There are basically three pieces of metal called pedals on the bottom of your car near your feet.
In most cars, there's a gas pedal and a brake pedal.
And in a manual transmission or stick, there is also a clutch pedal.
Oleg slammed on the brakes.
He put his foot on the brake pedal very suddenly and this nearly caused an accident, because the car stopped quickly and no doubt the car behind him had difficulty stopping quickly as well.
Daria says.
Oleg says She again.
The examiner cried uncle and told me to take her back to the office as fast as humanly possible.
To cry, C-R-Y, uncle, U-N-C-L-E, is a somewhat unusual phrase used It means to end an activity suddenly or to end a game suddenly, usually allowing the other person to win.
To cry uncle or to say uncle is, some people think, a very old expression that comes from the Romans.
It's used when you are basically giving up, when you are saying to the other person, you win.
It's used especially if the other person is forcing you to do something or you are doing so badly that you simply want to give up.
Oleg said that the examiner cried uncle.
She gave up on this exam and told Oleg to take her back to the office as fast as humanly possible, meaning very quickly.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
I failed.
What?
How could you have failed your driving test again?
I got nervous and I did everything wrong.
Like what?
When I accelerated, I ground my gears and raced the engine.
The car jerked so hard that the examiner nearly fell off her seat.
Oh, that's bad.
Yeah, I know.
I failed to stop at a traffic light and changed lanes in the intersection without signaling.
Yikes.
The examiner told me to back off because I was tailgating the car in front of me.
She also pointed out the speed limit because I had been speeding.
It couldn't have gone much worse, could it?
Oh yes, it could have and it did.
When she warned me about my speed, I got so flustered that I slammed on the brakes and nearly caused an accident.
What did she say when that happened?
She cried uncle and told me to take her back to the office as fast as humanly possible.
If you're interested in accelerating your English, try listening to more of our wonderful dialogues written by our wonderful script writer, Dr Lucy Say.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thanks for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language Podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2016 by the Center for Educational Development.
