Welcome back to the Learn English Podcast, the podcast teaching English in context so you can learn naturally.
On today's episode, I want to walk you through a day with me.
It is the beginning of the school year here in the United States.
If you have not listened... to our previous episodes, you might not know that I am a public school teacher here in California And our school year starts at the beginning of August.
So we are back in the classroom. And on today's episode, I want to do some real life English, walk you through the average day. that I have, what I do during the day.
And that way you can learn some common words and phrases that we use when we talk about our daily routines.
So if you're interested in learning about what it's like to be a high school teacher here in the United States, states, and also, of course, practice your listening comprehension and build your English vocabulary, then follow along because we're about to begin.
Before we get started I want to remind you to look at the description of this podcast episode.
There you will find a list of the words and phrases that I used in the episode so you can take them, study them, and build your English vocabulary.
Now let's talk about my daily routine. I'm actually going to start with the night before the day we're going to talk about.
So my daily routine actually starts the night before before I go to bed.
I have to pack my lunch for the next day.
This is the lunch that I take to work with me and I also have to make my breakfast.
So my breakfast is actually not that much food.
I don't usually eat food in the morning.
But I do drink a protein shake. So I mix some protein powder and water and some chocolate milk, which is milk with chocolate. flavoring in it.
I mix that all together and I put it in my refrigerator and I put that with my lunch.
And the next day when I wake up, that is what I need to grab and take with me.
Now let's talk about my daily routine. This is going to be for the weekdays, the days that I actually have to go to work, which is Monday through Friday.
On the weekends, I don't really follow this routine, but every working day when I have to get up and drive to the high school that I teach at, this is what I do.
So my alarm goes off at about 7, 10 in the morning, 10 minutes after 7 o'clock.
That gives me enough time to get ready and and to leave for work and i am also one of the types of people who does not like to get up early I have a couple of coworkers who work at the same high school that I do, who get to work around the same time that I do.
But they get up much earlier, maybe even an hour before I do because they like being up early. early in the morning and they like going to bed early at night this is called a morning person someone who likes being up early in the morning i am not a morning person.
I am a night owl. A night owl is someone who likes to stay up really late at night and sleep in during the day.
And I will say that on the weekends, this is usually more of my routine.
And during summer breaks when we don't teach, this is definitely my routine.
I am someone who can stay up very late. into the early hours of the morning and I would much rather sleep in.
So getting up at 7 a.m., Maybe it's normal for you.
Maybe you like that. I do not. If I do not have to go to work, I would never ever wake up at 7am on my own because it is just too early for me.
So tell me, are you a night owl like me?
Or are you a morning person, someone who likes to get up early?
When my alarm goes off in the morning, it is a struggle to get up, but I force myself to because I have to go to work.
I have to get paid. So I turn off my alarm and then I get dressed.
Get dressed means that you are changing your clothes.
You are dressing yourself for the day. So I get dressed.
Then I go and I brush my teeth. I brush my teeth for a few minutes.
And after that, I go downstairs because my house is two stories.
So there are stairs in the middle of my house.
My bedroom is on the second floor. And in the mornings, I have to go downstairs because that's where my kitchen is.
That's where the door to go outside is. So I have to go downstairs.
I also have a dog. She's this cute little Pomeranian.
I have a backyard. So in the mornings when we go downstairs, I open up the door so she can go into the backyard and she can go and do her business.
Do her business is a very polite way of saying that she needs to go use the restroom.
This is usually what we say when we're talking about dogs because dogs, They're not actually using a restroom, right?
They're not using a toilet like a human would.
They are going outside. So you might hear people say that they're taking their dog outside or they're taking their dog outside to do their business or their dog is going to go do their business.
That's just a polite way of saying that your dog needs to go outside so it can relieve itself.
While my dog is outside doing her business, I go to the second restroom in my house, the restroom that I have downstairs, and I brush my hair and I put on some makeup and And I put on some sunscreen.
When people are putting makeup on their face, you might hear them say that they're putting their face on.
So I can say I go to my restroom downstairs and I put my face on.
That just means that I'm putting some makeup on.
It does not mean that I am taking someone's face.
Every time I hear that, I always think of that episode of The Office where Dwight, if you've seen the show, Dwight cuts the face off of a dummy and puts it on his face. face that's not what we're talking about here we're talking about putting on some makeup so I put some makeup on very quickly I put some sunscreen on to protect my skin from the Sun because I
I live in Southern California and almost every single day is sunny here.
So I put some sunscreen on and That process usually takes me about five minutes, brushing my hair, putting my face on, putting some sunscreen on.
It takes about five minutes. When I walk out of the restroom, I have my cats sitting and waiting for me.
I have two cats and they are siblings. They are litter mates.
When an animal like a cat or a dog gives birth to kittens or puppies, that is called a litter.
So my cats are litter mates because they were from the same litter.
They are brother and sister. I have both of them.
I've had them since they were babies. Literally, they were a day old.
I had to feed them with bottles. And they were very, very, very tiny when I first got them.
So I've had them for over 10 years now. And every morning when I come out of the restroom after I get done getting ready, they are sitting waiting for me because they are waiting for their breakfast.
I give them some of their food. I let my dog back inside after she is done using the yard.
And then I get my stuff ready to go to work.
So I go to my refrigerator. And in my refrigerator, I have the lunch box.
I'm going to take to work that day. And I also have my breakfast.
And so I drink my protein shake very, very quickly.
And after that, I'm almost ready to leave my house there are a few more things I have to get.
I get my purse which has my wallet and my driver's license.
And then I also grab my backpack, which is what I actually take into school every day.
And I also have to grab some things for my dog because my dog goes part of the way to work with me.
She doesn't actually go to work, but she goes to daycare.
She goes to a woman's house who watches dogs during the day while their owners go to work.
So I grab my dog's things. I grab her food, her bowl, her leash, the things that she'll need when she is at daycare.
And I... Take that, I take my purse, my backpack and my dog.
And we go into my garage where my car is.
We go into my garage. I put all of my stuff in my car, including my dog.
And we drive to her doggy daycare. Once we get to her daycare, I leave her and I leave her things with the woman who watches her.
And then I continue on my commute to work.
A commute means you're traveling for something. usually for work.
So when someone says that they have their morning commute, that means the distance and the time it takes for them to get from their house to their work.
In my case my morning commute actually isn't that bad.
It usually takes me about 25 minutes from when I leave my house to when I get to work.
My work is 11 miles from my house, which I know in the United States, we're one of the few places that uses miles.
That's about 17.7 kilometers. I do have to take the freeway for part of my commute.
A freeway is not just a regular street. It is a place where you drive faster and there are no stop signs or stop lights.
It's for high speed travel now i live in southern california and there is a little bit of a rush hour A rush hour is when people are traveling at the same time.
This is usually in the morning when everyone is going to work. and then later in the afternoon when everyone is off work and going back home.
There is a little bit of a rush hour. I don't live in a major city.
So it's usually not that bad, but there usually is some traffic on the freeway.
So normally it is for high speed travel, but a lot of times I'm actually not going that fast.
Because there are a lot of other cars. There are a lot of other people who are commuting to work.
I usually pull into my school around 8, 10 in the morning.
So you'll hear that phrasal verb pull in.
That usually means when someone is arriving at a destination.
So in my case, I can say that I pull in to work.
I pull into my staff parking lot at 8.10.
I park my car and then I walk into my school's main administration building.
And I scan my badge to kind of check in and say that I'm there in the morning.
And then I walk home. to my classroom. My school has multiple buildings.
I am in the science building because I teach science at my high school.
It takes a few minutes to walk there. The school is relatively large.
I don't know how it compares to schools in other countries because I've never seen a high school in another country.
I will say my high school has about 1800 students, which is 1800 students. about that many.
That is actually relatively small for my area.
The other two high schools that are in the same city that I teach at are larger.
And the high school that I teach at actually used to be larger.
When I first started there years ago, we had about 2000 students.
We've actually lost. Some students in recent years, I don't know if 1800 sounds like a lot or sounds very small to you or normal to you, but for where I am, that's actually relatively small.
So I go to my classroom and then I turn on my computer and really just get everything ready for my students.
At my school, we have six class periods during the day.
The first class period starts at 8 30 in the about 55 minutes.
Our second class period of the day is a little bit longer because they do morning announcements.
Last year, I did an episode about how American high schools are like what they show in the movies.
And I know in the movies they show those announcements where they come over the loudspeaker and they talk to the students or they play a student-made game. kind of news video.
We do that at my school. They do have the student-made news videos that they show every week.
We do the morning announcements every single day.
So Our second period is a little bit longer because it has time for that.
We have four class periods before lunch.
So our bell for lunch rings at, I believe, a little bit before one o'clock in the afternoon.
And then we get 30 minutes for lunch. 30 minutes might sound like a lot, might sound like a little.
Again, I'm not sure how this compares to other countries.
I will say that 30 minutes is a little bit difficult.
The reason is, is that Usually there's some students who take a while to pack up their things to actually leave your classroom.
So you get stuck kind of standing there waiting for them to leave.
And then, of course, I have to wash my hands and get my lunch out.
So usually by the time I actually sit down to eat my food, I usually only have about 20 minutes left, maybe a little bit more, but about that amount of time in my science department.
All of us eat in the same classroom. So I have to go walk over to another teacher's room and we sit together and we eat lunch together every day.
This is usually our time to be kind of free of students.
It's the time that we're not obligated to teach anything.
But again, usually you have students. in this room with us because there's always some student who needs to turn in an assignment or Maybe they missed a quiz or an exam and they need to take it or they need to retake it.
So usually we do have students with us. And that 25 minutes or 20 minutes by the time I sit down, it goes very, very quickly.
After our 30 minute lunch, I go back to my room and then we have two more class periods to end out our day.
The final bell for the day when school is actually over is at 3.20 in the afternoon.
Once my students leave, I kind of get everything set up for the next day.
I try to have everything prepared when I come in in the morning so I don't have to do very much.
I try to prepare as much as possible. I can.
And then I pack up my stuff and I leave.
So I usually leave about 15 minutes after the bell rings.
I get in my car and then I drive back home.
Now I usually don't leave right after the bell rings because there is a lot of traffic.
We have 1,800 students, like I said. Some of them are older and can drive themselves and have their own cars.
A lot of them are being picked up by their parents or some other family member.
And then some of them walk. So there is a lot of traffic in front of the school after the bell rings.
And it takes a while to leave if you get stuck in that traffic.
So I try to wait. To prepare my room, but also to let a lot of the people leave so it doesn't take me so long to get out of the parking lot.
Once I leave school, I just do my commute, but in reverse.
I drive to my dog's daycare, I pick her up, and then I drive home.
I usually get home a little bit after four o'clock because in the afternoon, the traffic is usually a little bit more than it is in the mornings.
Usually it takes me about a half hour, maybe a little bit longer to get home.
So I get home usually around four o'clock and by then I'm done.
Usually a little bit tired and a little bit hungry.
I might have another protein shake or some type of light snack, something to eat.
And then I work out. So I've talked about this before on some previous podcast episodes.
Last year I was working out and I actually injured my back.
There were a lot of things that went into that injury, but working out definitely made it worse.
Prior to that injury, I was... working out, exercising, lifting weights about five days a week, five to six days a week.
But I also have a stationary bike that A stationary bike is a bike that is stationary, which means it doesn't move.
You usually see these in gyms. I have one.
I own one in my house. It's a good way for me to exercise to make sure that i don't injure my back or re-injure my back usually after this i also walk my dog Like I said, my dog is really little.
She's really cute. But because she's very little, she doesn't like to walk very far.
If you've ever had a Pomeranian, you know they have a very... unique personality they are very strong-willed which means they want to do what they want to do and Sometimes they don't want to listen to you.
One thing about my dog is that she really loves to go for a walk at the beginning.
But after about five minutes, she's done.
She will just lie down on the ground and refuse to move.
And then I have to pick her up and carry her back home or I have to really, really coax her into moving.
Coax means trying to convince, maybe trying to beg a little bit.
So I coax her and ask her and tell her to get up and walk back home with me.
So she's a little bit stubborn with that.
She doesn't like to walk very far. Usually we only go about a block. about five minutes maybe 10 minutes and then she's done so I do walk my dog but they're very quick walks because she really does not like to walk very much I don't blame her though.
She also had surgery. She had surgery on both of her back legs.
And since the surgery, she really has not liked to walk.
She used to walk more before, but after her surgery, she doesn't really like to, so...
I understand. I don't force her to walk more than she really wants to.
And I stay very close to my house so when she is done, we can just quickly go back home.
After I get home, I shower because I have worked out.
I have walked my dog. I need to shower. So I shower and then I make dinner.
So So usually by this point, it's about six o'clock and I figure out what I'm going to have for dinner, if I need to cook something, if I'm going to go get dinner from a fast food place or a restaurant.
And usually by seven o'clock or eight, I have eaten dinner and then it's my free time to relax.
By about 10 o'clock I start getting ready for the next day.
So about 10 o'clock at night I start packing my lunch for the next day.
I make my protein shake for the next morning and put that in the refrigerator.
I pack my dog's food for her trip to daycare.
I feed my cats their dinner, I make sure my dog goes outside one last time, and then by about 11 o'clock, I go upstairs, I brush my teeth, I change my clothes, and I go to bed.
That is my daily routine, Monday through Friday, 184 days of the year, because that is how many school days we have here, at least in Southern California.
I hope you enjoyed the episode I hope you learned how we talk about these things in English or at least in American English because that's the type of English that I speak.
If you are unsure about any of these words or phrases, please look at the description of this podcast episode.
You will find the vocabulary list of the words that I used in this podcast episode so you can take them, study them, and start using them in conversation yourself.
And try. Try. Leave a comment. Tell me about your morning routine.
What is something that you do every day?
What is your commute time? How do you get to work?
Do you drive like I do? Do you use some other type of transportation?
Leave a comment. Try to use some of these terms in English.
If you enjoyed this type of episode, if you want more episodes like this in the future where...
We talk about everyday English. We walk through a certain subject.
Please let me know. Tell me if you would like more episodes like this.
There are a lot of things that we could cover in the future if you are interested in learning more about them.
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Until then, keep learning English.
