Reading and translation

 

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Unit 1. career planning

Start up

Exercise 1. Look at the pictures. Guess the job in each picture. Why do these people work? You may use the reasons from the box below.

to need money	to change the city environment	to care about people
to like to be active	to enjoy working with papers	to enjoy helping others
to like to be creative	to want to use his/her education	to prefer to be outdoors

A.	B.
C.	D.
E.	F.

Exercise 2. Make a list of your own reasons for working. Use the list from exercise 1, or make up your own. In small groups, discuss about your reasons of working. Talk about the perfect job for you. Answer these questions:

1) Do you have a job now? What is it?

2) What is your ideal job?

3) Why do you want to work?

4) Do your reasons for working match the job that you have now? Explain your answer.

5) Do your reasons for working match your ideal job? Explain your answer.

 

Exercise 3. Answer this question: What is your ideal job? Speak for 2 minutes.

 

Vocabulary

Exercise 1. Professional texts contain many new words. Some of them have definitions right in the passage. Sentences with definitions usually follow the verb be (is or are) or means. Read the sentences below and find the definitions.

Example: Data (a new word) are (the verb) information or facts (the definition).

1) Prominent means easy to see.

2) Marital status means being single or married.

3) An entry-level position is a job at a beginning or low level in a country.

4) Prospective means something that is possible in the future.

5) Context is the sentence or paragraph around a word.

6) Pristine means to be in perfect condition.

7) Brainstorming is thinking of ideas about a topic and writing them down.

8) Self-editing is checking your own work.

9) Peer editing means giving your work to a classmate to check. It helps you write better before your teacher sees your work.

10) An attitude is a feeling about something.

Exercise 2. Using dashes and parenthesis () is another way to guess the meaning of new words. In the following text written by Dorian Soul, an Engineering Apprentice, try to explain the words in italics.

When I left school, I started work for a railway company, one of the biggest in the country, as a railwayman (a person who works on a railway). My apprenticeship – a way of combining work with practical training – lasts for four years. I’m in my final year now. It’s a good mix of work, which I get paid for, and study at the local university. I have day release – the system of allowing employees days off work to go on educational courses – to attend university. I learn things like working in teams, problem-solving, communication skills, using new technologies at work, and engineering subjects. I like learning while working, but it’s quite hard. Once I’m fully qualified and have a bit more experience, I hope to get promoted to the team leader (a person who is in charge of a team of six) – more responsibility and better pay.

	Did you know? A railwayman is chiefly British. Another term – a railroader – is used in America.

 

Reading and translation