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BOX SET: 6 Minute English - 'Weird & wonderful' English mega-class! 30 minutes of new vocab! — Transcript

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0:00Six Minute English.
0:02From BBC Learning English dot com.
0:07Hello. This is Six Minute English from BBC Learning English.
0:12I'm Beth
0:13and I'm Phil.
0:14Phil, do you believe there's life on other planets?
0:17Well, there's a lot of other planets, so yeah, I think there must be.
0:22Yeah, I agree.
0:23Well, it's a question that interests American astrophysicist Adam Frank,
0:29who discussed it with his colleague Gavin Schmidt,
0:32director of NASA's Institute for Space Studies.
0:36Here, Adam recalls their conversation for BBC World Service programme Crowd Science.
0:41We know that there's been no other civilization on Earth.
0:44And he stopped me and said, "How do you know that?"
0:47And my jaw just dropped down to the floor.
0:49Adam's jaw dropped, an idiom for when someone looked shocked and surprised.
0:55Could there have been a technologically advanced civilization
0:58before us here on Earth?
1:01It may sound weird, but this idea has a scientific name.
1:05Here is Caroline Steele, presenter of BBC's Crowd Science, to explain.
1:11The Silurian Hypothesis proposes that
1:13if there was a technologically advanced civilization hundreds of millions
1:18of years ago, we wouldn't be able to find traces of it.
1:22A hypothesis is an idea which explains how something happens
1:26and can be tested to find out if it's correct.
1:29In this episode, we'll be discussing the Silurian hypothesis, the idea
1:35that a technologically advanced civilization existed before us on Earth
1:40but vanished without leaving a trace.
1:44As usual, we'll be learning some useful new words and idioms.
1:47And remember, you'll find all the vocabulary on our website.
1:51BBC Learning English dot com.
1:53But first, I have a question for you, Phil.
1:57Human civilization is thousands of years old,
2:00but the planet itself is much older.
2:03So how old do scientists think the Earth is?
2:07Is it A: 3.5 billion years?
2:10B: 4.5 billion years.
2:12Or C: 5.5 billion years.
2:15I'm going to guess C: 5.5 billion years.
2:19Okay. Well, we will find the answer out later in the programme.
2:23To believe a technologically advanced civilization existed on Earth
2:28hundreds of millions of years ago,
2:30Most people would probably want evidence.
2:33We have evidence about other species from the past, such as the dinosaurs,
2:38from fossils, the remains of prehistoric plants
2:42or animals that have been preserved in rock for a very long time.
2:45But according to Adam Frank,
2:47fossils won't help prove the Silurian hypothesis.
2:51As he explains here to BBC World Service programme Crowd Science.
2:55Most things are not fossilized.
2:57It's only a tiny fraction of Earth's life that has ever become fossilized.
3:03So imagine that you have a ten thousand year long civilization,
3:08which is a blink of the eye for geology.
3:12That's too short to really create a lot of fossils.
3:16Adam argues that only a tiny fraction, meaning a very small amount of life
3:21on Earth, has turned into fossil.
3:24In geological time.
3:25Even a ten thousand year old civilization is the blink of an eye,
3:30an idiom meaning a very short period of time.
3:34In other words, older civilizations might have existed on Earth,
3:38but not for long enough to leave fossilized evidence.
3:42However, not everyone is convinced by Adam's ideas.
3:47Evidence of our own civilization,
3:49including plastics and man-made materials like concrete,
3:53is already being layered into the Earth's crust.
3:56And these are going to last a very long time.
3:59So surely a technologically advanced civilization from prehistory
4:04would have left similar marks.
4:06Well, here's Adam Frank again answering these objections on
4:11BBC World Service programme, Crowd Science.
4:15What happens is somebody else will pick up on their work,
4:19either affirming it and showing new evidence for it, or pushing back on it.
4:23And once you get to like 20, 30, 40 papers, then you have a consensus.
4:28You're like, okay, we've really, really looked at this and now we know.
4:31Adam welcomes new evidence, even evidence which contradicts his ideas
4:37as part of the scientific method needed to prove a hypothesis right or wrong.
4:42It's how scientists form a consensus,
4:44meaning a general agreement about the issue.
4:47Personally, I think the idea of prehistoric civilizations on Earth
4:52is so mysterious, it's okay to keep an open mind.
4:56Now, isn't it time you revealed the answer to your question, Beth?
5:01I think it is.
5:02I asked you: how old do scientists think the Earth is?
5:07You said five and a half billion years.
5:09And I'm afraid you were wrong.
5:11Phil, it's four and a half billion years.
5:14Okay, let's recap the vocabulary we've learned.
5:17Starting with the idiom
5:19My jaw dropped,
5:20which is used to say someone looks very shocked and surprised.
5:24A hypothesis is a suggestion that's proposed to explain something
5:28which can then be tested to see if it's true.
5:31Fossils are the remains of prehistoric plants or animals
5:35that have been preserved in rock for a very long time.
5:38A tiny fraction of something is a very small amount of it.
5:42The idiom the blink of an eye means a very short period of time.
5:47And finally, a consensus is a general agreement.
5:51Once again, our six minutes are up,
5:53but if you're keen for more, then head over to our website BBC Learning English dot com,
5:58where you'll find a worksheet and a quiz for this episode.
6:02See you again soon. But for now, it's goodbye.
6:05Goodbye.
6:07Six Minute English. From BBC Learning English dot com.
6:13Hello, this is Six Minute English from BBC Learning English. I'm Neil
6:17And I'm Georgina.
6:19Do you believe in ghosts, Georgina?
6:21Well, I've never actually seen one.
6:23Not even at Halloween.
6:24How about dragons, then?
6:26Or fairies and elves?
6:28Have you been reading fantasy books, Neil? Lord of The Rings?
6:32I have been reading a book, Georgina.
6:33But not Lord of The Rings.
6:35My book is about an amphibious creature: a creature that lives both on land and in water.
6:41Some kind of frogman?
6:43Hmm. You've almost got the idea, Georgina.
6:45But think. Woman, not man,
6:48and fish, not frog.
6:49Half woman, half fish. Hmm.
6:52I've got it! A mermaid.
6:54That's right. Mermaids are magical creatures.
6:57Half woman, half fish, that feature in the myths and legends
7:01of many cultures around the world.
7:03Like the Sirens, whose seductive singing shipwrecked Odysseus and his sailors
7:08in ancient Greek mythology.
7:10The Sirens are perhaps the most famous,
7:12but certainly not the only mermaids we'll be hearing about.
7:16But before we dive into the programme, it's time for my quiz question.
7:20The book I've been reading was, of course, The Little Mermaid.
7:24Yes, I've seen the Disney movie.
7:26The mermaid is called Ariel.
7:29Right, but the movie was based on a fairy tale written by Hans Christian Andersen.
7:33It became so famous that a statue of the Little Mermaid was built in the harbor of Andersen's birthplace.
7:39But where? Was it:
7:40A: Amsterdam, B: Copenhagen, or C: Oslo?
7:45I'm going to say B: Copenhagen.
7:48Okay, Georgina, I'll tell you the answer later.
7:51Disney's defenseless mermaid, Ariel, seems the total opposite to
7:55the seductive, dangerous Sirens in the Odyssey. In fact,
7:59descriptions and stories of mermaids have always changed from place to place.
8:03One mermaid-like character found across Africa
8:06and the Americas is named Mami Wata.
8:09Here's British writer Marcel Matei, talking about the origins of this legend
8:15to BBC World Service programme The Forum.
8:19Even the name Mami Wata, which is Pidgin English for mother water,
8:26so it's loosely translated from Pidgin English as the Mother of Water
8:30and the characteristics that are commonly shared when speaking
8:34about Mami Wata across the West African coast
8:37is that this deity is the protector of the Water Kingdom.
8:42The name Mami Wata comes from Nigerian Pidgin English,
8:46a language which has developed from a mixture of two languages, and is used
8:50as a way of communicating by people who do not speak each other's languages.
8:54Marcel says that Mami Wata means the mother of water when loosely translated.
8:59Translated in a way that carries over the basic ideas,
9:03but using words which may not be so accurate.
9:06Mami Wata is also described as the protector of the Water Kingdom
9:10and a deity: a god, goddess or other divine being.
9:14Another version of mermaid-like creatures called Selkies are found
9:18in the remote Orkney Islands, north of the Scottish mainland.
9:22The Selkies can take human form and marry men,
9:25but every now and then they return to their watery kingdom under the sea.
9:29Christina Bacchilega is co-editor of The Penguin Book of Mermaids.
9:34According to her,
9:35these different versions of mermaids share something in common.
9:38They force us to question our relationship to water and other beings
9:42in the natural world, and even to question how we see ourselves.
9:46Here's Christina explaining more in the BBC World Service's The Forum.
9:51The beings.
9:53Not just mermaids, but Selkies and water deities and other water spirits
9:58are often shapeshifters.
10:01They have a certain kind of fluidity of being.
10:05So do we approach this world with humility?
10:09Or do we really uphold a kind of anthropocentric view?
10:14Human-centered view of life?
10:18Mythical creatures are often shapeshifters.
10:21They have the power to change into a different shape or form.
10:25Moving between the sea and the earth.
10:27Mermaids link to natural worlds.
10:29Christina thinks that as humans, we should approach them with humility.
10:34Someone who has humility is not proud and doesn't think
10:37they're better than others.
10:39Well, Neil, I don't think I'm better than a ghost, a water spirit,
10:42or a mermaid.
10:43It's just that I've never seen one.
10:45But then again, I've never seen electricity, and I believe in that.
10:49Maybe it would help if you saw a statue of a mermaid.
10:52If not the real thing.
10:54Maybe. But where would I find one?
10:56In my quiz question, I asked you
10:58where you'd see the statue of Hans Christian Andersen's Little Mermaid.
11:02What did you say, Georgina?
11:03I guessed B: Copenhagen.
11:06Which was the correct answer.
11:08The Little Mermaid statue is found in Andersen's birthplace of Copenhagen.
11:12And it really is little.
11:14Only one and a quarter metres high.
11:16In this programme,
11:17we've been talking about mermaids: mythical half woman, half fish.
11:21Creatures which are amphibious, live both on land and in water.
11:26In some cultures, mermaids are deities or goddesses.
11:29They can also be shapeshifters,
11:31imaginary creatures with the power to change into different shapes.
11:35One African mermaid is called Mami Wata in Pidgin English,
11:39a mixture of English and local languages which enables people
11:43who do not share a common language to communicate.
11:47Mami Wata means Mother Water, but this is a loose translation.
11:51A translation which carries over the basic idea,
11:53but using words which may not be so accurate.
11:56That's all for this programme.
11:58But the next time you're near the sea.
12:00Keep an eye out for a splash in the waves.
12:02You never know what you might see.
12:04Join us again soon for more discussion and vocabulary here
12:07at Six Minute English and follow us on social media.
12:10Bye for now.
12:11Bye.
12:12Six Minute English.
12:14From the BBC.
12:17Hello and welcome to Six Minute English, the show that brings you
12:20an interesting topic, authentic listening practice
12:23and six new items of vocabulary.
12:26I'm Dan.
12:26And I'm Neil.
12:27In this episode, we will be discussing miraculous survivals.
12:32Hmm. Have you ever had a near-death experience, Neil?
12:35A near-death experience, meaning a situation where I very nearly died.
12:39Well, I once fell off the side of a mountain,
12:42but I was saved by a tree.
12:45That's incredible.
12:46Why do you ask?
12:47Well, I recently heard a story about Alcides Morino.
12:51Who's that?
12:52He's a window cleaner. He cleaned the windows on the skyscrapers in New York.
12:56Except one day he fell.
12:58Oh my goodness.
12:59Yes. And what's more is: he survived.
13:03Wow. How far did he fall?
13:04Ah, well, all will be revealed after this week's question.
13:08According to the BBC,
13:10What chance of survival does a human have when falling to the ground
13:14from around three storeys?
13:16Is it A: 30%, B: 50% or C: 70%?
13:21And by stories, you mean the entire floor of a building,
13:24including all its rooms.
13:26Well, I think it's got to be B: 50%.
13:29Well, we'll find out if you're right or not later.
13:33So, do you want to hear the story?
13:33Of course.
13:34Well, on the seventh of December,
13:37Ecuadorians Alcides Moreno and his brother Edgar went up to the top
13:42of the Solow tower in New York to clean the windows, like they did every day.
13:46And how tall is that building?
13:47It's 47 storeys.
13:49And how did they usually clean it?
13:51Well, they used a scaffold, which is a structure of interconnected pipes
13:55and boards that creates a frame or shape.
13:58Ah. So in this case, there was a platform which was attached by cables
14:03or large metal ropes and hung over the edge of the building
14:07and which the window cleaners could raise and lower.
14:09Exactly.
14:10So, as usual, they filled up their buckets and climbed onto the scaffold.
14:15And?
14:17Well, unfortunately the cables were loose, and the scaffold fell from the building.
14:22Both brothers fell 47 storeys.
14:25That's terrible.
14:26What happened next?
14:28I'll let Joe Feagin, presenter of the BBC show outlook, explain.
14:32When firefighters arrived on the scene,
14:34they found a crowd of distraught onlookers pointing towards an alleyway.
14:38Edgar had landed on a fence and couldn't be helped,
14:41but Alcides was found crouching in a pile of twisted metal,
14:46still clutching the controls of the scaffold.
14:48He was breathing, even trying to stand up.
14:51So, firefighters arrived to find a group of distraught,
14:54which means extremely worried and upset, people,
14:57showing them where the two men had come down.
15:00Yes, and though unfortunately Edgar didn't survive,
15:04Alcides was found clutching, or holding extremely tightly,
15:08to the controls of the scaffold.
15:10Did I hear correctly that he was trying to stand up?
15:13Did he escape the accident unscathed?
15:15Unscathed means without any injury at all.
15:18And no.
15:19He fell into a coma for three weeks and he needed 24 pints of blood.
15:24I'm speechless. I don't understand how he lived.
15:27You aren't the only one. Listen to what
15:29Doctor Philip Barry from New York Presbyterian Hospital
15:32said about the whole incident.
15:34I don't know what adjective you'd care to use.
15:37Unprecedented.
15:38Extraordinary.
15:39If you are a believer in miracles, this would be one.
15:43Wow. So he can't explain it either.
15:46He said it was unprecedented, which means never happened or done before.
15:50Yes. And he also said that it was a miracle,
15:53which is an unexplainable positive outcome
15:55to a bad situation that people say was the intervention of a God.
16:00I guess we'll never know.
16:01But one thing I can know is the answer to this week's question.
16:05Are yes, I asked you.
16:06What chance of survival does a human have when falling to the ground?
16:09From around three stories? A: 30%, B: 50%, or C: 70%.
16:15And I said B: 50%.
16:17And you were exactly right. Well done.
16:19Wow! It's a first.
16:21Shall we take a look at the vocabulary then?
16:23First we had a near-death experience, which is an experience
16:27where a person very nearly or could easily have died.
16:31Have you ever had one, Dan?
16:32When I was 14, I fell out of a canoe into a river
16:35and got stuck between the boat and a rock with my head underwater.
16:39I thought it was the end, but some people pulled me out.
16:41Then we had scaffold.
16:43A scaffold is a structure of interconnected pipes and boards
16:46that creates a frame or shape.
16:48Name a place that you might see scaffolding near.
16:51They are usually put up around houses when builders are working on the roof.
16:55Then we had clutching.
16:57If you clutch something, it means you hold it extremely tightly.
17:01There's a well-known idiom that uses this word.
17:03Sound familiar, Dan?
17:05You're clutching at straws, Neil.
17:07Which means you're trying to find a reasonable hope to succeed
17:10when it's extremely unlikely.
17:12What was after that?
17:13After that, we had unscathed.
17:15If you are unscathed, you are uninjured.
17:18We often talk about escaping something unscathed.
17:21Have you ever escaped an accident unscathed?
17:24Uh, well, when I was six, I fell through a hole
17:26that some builders had made while doing renovation.
17:29I hit the ground in the garage, but somehow I escaped unscathed.
17:33Maybe I bounced.
17:35Then we heard unprecedented.
17:37If something is unprecedented, it has never happened or been done before.
17:41Can you think of an example, Neil?
17:42Well, Neil Armstrong walking on the moon was unprecedented in 1969.
17:47And finally we had a miracle.
17:49A miracle is an unexplainable positive outcome
17:52to a bad situation that people say was the intervention of a God.
17:56The adjective is miraculous.
17:58Do you believe in miracles, Dan?
18:00Well, I've never seen or experienced one,
18:02but when you hear a story like this, it's difficult not to.
18:06And that's the end of today's Six Minute English. Bye bye.
18:11Six Minute English. From the BBC.
18:14Hello, this is Six Minute English from BBC Learning English. I'm Neil.
18:18And I'm Becca.
18:20Neil. What do the following animals have in common?
18:24Zebras, giant pandas and magpies.
18:27That's pretty easy, Becca.
18:30They're all black and white.
18:32Right. But do you know why these animals evolved to be black and white?
18:36Hmm. I'm not so sure.
18:37Probably something about survival.
18:41That's usually the answer isn't it?
18:43It is.
18:43The animal world is full of colour: shiny blue peacocks and bright green frogs.
18:48But in fact, hundreds
18:50of animal species are black and white. In this episode,
18:53we'll try to find out why, while also learning
18:56some useful new words and phrases.
18:58And remember, all the vocabulary from this episode is available
19:02on our website, BBC Learning English dot com.
19:06Okay, time for a question for you, Becca.
19:09According to one theory, some animals are black and white
19:12to warn potential predators that they're dangerous or they taste bad.
19:17But what is the scientific term for this?
19:20Is it A: camouflage, B: mimicry or C: aposematism?
19:28Well Neil, I'm going to go with C just because I've never heard of that word before.
19:34Okay, I like - I like your style.
19:37Some scientists think zebras' distinctive black
19:40and white stripes prevent bites from flies and other insects.
19:44Zoologist Doctor Martin Howe tested this theory
19:48by covering horses, a close relative of the zebra, in stripes.
19:52Here, Martin discusses his experiment with Caroline Steele
19:56from BBC World Service programme Crowd Science.
20:00Do we know what,
20:01what it is about the stripes that's putting them off?
20:04Is it somehow, like, visually confusing?
20:07We originally set out to test whether maybe there were
20:10these optical illusions at play.
20:12So we did a whole bunch of tests where we tried different patterns of rugs,
20:16but it turned out that practically every high contrast pattern,
20:20every black and white pattern we used,
20:22almost every pattern was really effective at stopping flies.
20:25Martin conducted a whole bunch of, meaning
20:28a lot of, tests using different colors and patterns.
20:32Black and white stripes created an optical illusion, a visual trick
20:36that makes your eyes see things differently from how they really are.
20:40As a result, the flies were put off.
20:42They lost interest and didn't bite.
20:44So zebras' stripes confuse insects, telling them to look elsewhere for food.
20:50But are there other reasons
20:52animals are black and white?
20:54Nobody who has seen giant pandas in a zoo would find them hard to spot.
20:58Against a grassy background, they stand out easily,
21:01but seen from a distance in the snowy mountain forest where they live.
21:04Black and white makes the perfect disguise.
21:07Here's Professor Tim Caro, a world authority on animal behavior,
21:11explaining more to Caroline Steele for BBC World Service's Crowd Science.
21:17The giveaway for me was 15 photos of giant pandas,
21:22taken either fairly close up or at a distance.
21:25And in two of those photos,
21:27I was unable to see anything in the picture other than rocks and snow.
21:32And then later on, I realized that, in fact, there was a giant panda
21:36in the center of that picture some distance away.
21:39Immediately that that clicked in my mind.
21:43The pandas were so well camouflaged, Tim couldn't spot them in the photos.
21:47That's when something clicked in his mind, a phrase used
21:50when you suddenly understand something after trying for a long time.
21:54Tim understood that pandas use colour to hide.
21:58He calls this a giveaway, something that makes it easy
22:01for people to discover something secret or unknown.
22:05So. are animals black and white, to repel insects, like zebras
22:09or for camouflage, like pandas?
22:11Let's give the final word to Hannah Rolland, a researcher
22:14into another black and white animal.
22:16Penguins.
22:18Really, science never has a black and white answer.
22:22Excuse the pun about the - with penguins being black and white.
22:27It's often a very complex mixture of reasons.
22:31The answer to why animals are black and white is not black and white.
22:36A situation described as black and white means one
22:39where it's easy to understand what's right and wrong.
22:42In fact, there's no one reason why animals are black and white.
22:46Zebras avoid bites.
22:48Pandas hide from predators,
22:49and some animals, like skunks, warn other animals they're dangerous.
22:54It all depends on the specific animal.
22:56And talking of skunks reminds me of my question, Becca.
23:01According to one theory, some animals are black
23:04and white to warn potential predators they're dangerous or taste bad.
23:08But what is the scientific term?
23:11And I chose see aposematicism because I'd never heard of it before.
23:15Well, that's a great way of choosing.
23:18And it's done well for you because you're correct.
23:21Whew.
23:23Okay, let's recap the vocabulary we've learned,
23:26starting with optical illusion, a visual trick
23:29where your eyes perceive things differently from how they really are.
23:33A whole bunch of something means a lot of something.
23:37If something puts you off, it causes you to dislike it or lose interest.
23:42A giveaway is something that makes it easy
23:44for people to discover something secret or unknown.
23:48The phrase something clicked in my mind is used
23:51when you suddenly understand something at last.
23:54And finally, if you describe something as black and white,
23:57you mean it's easy to understand what is right and wrong.
24:01Once again, our six minutes are up,
24:04but head over to our website, BBC Learning English dot com, for a quiz and worksheet for this episode.
24:10See you there soon!
24:11But for now, it's goodbye.
24:13Goodbye.
24:14Six Minute English.
24:16From BBC Learning English.
24:21Hello. This is Six Minute English from BBC Learning English.
24:24I'm Neil.
24:25And I'm Georgie. Neil. Have you ever. ridden a horse?
24:29Yes I have.
24:30I can't say that I enjoyed it much.
24:33I was a bit scared, to be honest. How about you?
24:35I used to ride horses a lot, actually.
24:38My favourite thing was to ride a horse through the countryside.
24:42I love horses: they're so majestic and lovely.
24:45The relationship between humans and horses has been close throughout history,
24:49but recently this has gone beyond riding horses for fun, or using them for work.
24:54Equine Assisted Services, sometimes called horse therapy,
24:58is a health trend where caring
25:00and interacting with horses is used to heal physical and mental illness.
25:04Here's Datshiane Navanayagam, presenter
25:07of BBC World Service programme The Conversation, to explain.
25:11Equine Assisted Services is now an umbrella term which encompasses
25:14a whole range of treatments involving activities and interactions
25:18with horses to promote better human well-being.
25:22Equine Assisted Services is an umbrella term, a term for a large number
25:27of different things which all belong to a single common category,
25:30so horse therapy includes many activities
25:33from feeling the horse's movement, which can help children
25:36with muscle disorders like cerebral palsy, to simply grooming the horse,
25:41which can help calm anxiety.
25:43Grooming a horse means cleaning and brushing the horse's coat of hair.
25:47Various animals can be used in therapy,
25:49but horses are particularly suitable
25:52as they're very sensitive to human emotions.
25:54Being in contact with them affects the limbic area of the brain
25:58dealing with stress.
25:59In this episode, we'll hear more about the horses helping people work
26:03through mental, emotional, and physical challenges.
26:06And as usual, we'll learn some useful new vocabulary.
26:09And remember, you'll find all the words and phrases from this episode
26:13on our website, BBC Learning English dot com.
26:16But now I have a question for you, Neil.
26:19We've heard some of the special qualities horses possess,
26:22but which of the following about horses is also true?
26:26Is it A: horses always sleep standing up?
26:30B: horses can make over 100 sounds or C: horses have almost 360 degree vision.
26:38Well, I'm sure I've seen a horse lying down,
26:41so I don't know about its vision though,
26:44so I'm going to say B: a horse can make over 100 sounds.
26:47Okay. Well, we'll find out the answer later in the program.
26:51Horse therapist Claudia Nicholson first felt the healing power
26:55of horses as a child.
26:56She now runs her own center for Equine Assisted Learning
27:00in the south of England,
27:01where she spoke with BBC World Service programme The Conversation.
27:05I would spend hours on end sitting in a stable with my pony.
27:12I was going through puberty.
27:15My parents had separated, I had a lot of unanswered questions,
27:20and I would feel met and safe and held with the connection of the pony.
27:29As a child, Claudia spent hours on end with her pony.
27:33Phrases like days or hours on end mean days or hours.
27:37Doing something continuously without stopping.
27:39Spending time with her pony helped Claudia through puberty,
27:43the stage of life when a child grows into an adult
27:45because of changes in their body which allow them to have children.
27:49It was her teenage experiences that led Claudia to start
27:52her own horse therapy center.
27:54She works a lot with teenage girls and children in care.
27:57A child in care is a child who's being looked after by the local authorities,
28:01because they cannot be cared for by their parents or family.
28:05Here, Claudia talks more about her work with children and horses
28:09to BBC World Service's The Conversation.
28:12It would take maybe a few sessions for a relationship of trust to be formed,
28:19and it's quite extraordinary to see a child that's experienced a lot
28:24of trauma, especially these children in care.
28:27They can be brushing the pony's body.
28:32They might want to have a cry which they've been holding onto.
28:35The horse regulates them.
28:37Many of the children Claudia works with suffer trauma.
28:41It takes time for them to build a bond of trust with their horse.
28:44The phrase bond of trust is a strong feeling of reliance and confidence
28:48between two people.
28:49Horses really are special animals.
28:52They sense human feelings like fear or sadness
28:55through breath, heart rate and movement,
28:57and respond with gentleness and calm.
29:00This makes them perfect animal therapists.
29:02And that's not all - right, Georgie?
29:04Let's find out the answer to your question.
29:07Yes, Neil. Well, I asked you which sentence about horses was true,
29:11and you said that horses can make over 100 sounds.
29:16Sadly, that was the wrong answer.
29:19The correct answer was
29:20C: horses have near 360 degree vision, which is surprising.
29:25Wow. That's amazing.
29:26Okay, let's recap the vocabulary we've learned.
29:29Starting with umbrella term.
29:31A term used to describe many different things which all belong
29:34to a single common category.
29:36Grooming an animal like a horse or a dog means brushing
29:40and cleaning its coat of hair.
29:41If you do something for hours on end, you do it continuously without stopping.
29:46Puberty is the stage of life when a child grows into an adult
29:49because of changes in their body which allow them to have children.
29:53A child who is in care is being looked after by the local authorities
29:57because they cannot be cared for by their parents.
29:59And finally, a bond of trust is a strong feeling of reliance
30:03and confidence between two people.
30:06Once again, our six minutes are up,
30:07but remember you'll find a quiz and worksheet for this episode over
30:11on our website, BBC Learning English dot com.
30:14See you there soon,
30:15but for now, it's goodbye.
30:17Goodbye.

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