Messaging through time…
1 Read the article and check which forms of communication…
• make it easier to stay in touch nowadays.
• were a good way to quickly spread the message that an enemy was coming.
• can carry a message over a long distance.
• can be used to convey a short and simple message.
• could be a good way to make contact if you were stuck on a desert island.
2 Make more collocations with the nouns contact, message and touch, using the verbs from the box. You can use one word twice.
deliver establish lose maintain pass on
1 / / contact
2 / a/the message
3 touch
3 Discuss in pairs. How can a means of communication change someone’s life? Find examples in the text.
Since the dawn of time, people 1 have been using different ways of communicating at a distance.
In ancient times, they used smoke signals and after writing developed, they 2 invented more ingenious methods of delivering messages; for example, sending a message in a bottle. At the turn of the 20th century, bottles were found which had been sent by people who 3 were travelling on board the Titanic. Happier stories have also come to light. In 1956, Ake Viking, a Swede, tossed a letter into the sea, hoping it would reach his future wife. Two years later, he received a letter from a Sicilian girl, Paolina, who 4 had found his bottle and soon after they were married!
The invention of the telegraph in 1837 sped up communication dramatically. A criminal, John Tawell, was caught after he had escaped on the train to London. A telegram was sent to the London police, and they 5 were waiting for him when he arrived there.
In Jordan, there are over six million mobile phones in use by the population. But you can still send telegrams through the Jordan Post Company!
Since the invention of the mobile phone and the Internet, the world 6 has become a different place. People 7 are still sending messages and it usually 8 takes only seconds to deliver them. But 9 are we now forgetting how to communicate face-to-face? Without a doubt there are some challenges, but there are also examples of when the Internet 10 has changed someone’s life for the better. Look at Tara Taylor’s case, a mother who 11 lives in the USA: when she uploaded a photo of her daughter on social media, a friend spotted a problem with one of the child’s eyes.
It turned out that the girl had a rare disease, but her sight was saved!
4
LESSON 1A VOCABULARY AND GRAMMAR
01 Get the message VOCABULARY Collocations with contact, message and touch, phrasal verbs, emotion adjectives (see the word list on page 72)
GRAMMAR Present and past tenses, question tags, echo questions Use of Englishpage 91
LISTENING Understanding a radio interview about emotional intelligence
SPEAKING Expressing emotions
READING Understanding an article about how animals communicate
WRITING An analytical essay
VIEWING AND PRESENTING grammar, animals, conversations, emotional intelligence, emotions