How to talk about sports in English

The people of Gotham. Sorry. James from EngVid. I just saw the new Batman movie, so depending

on when you see this, you might recognize this voice or think I've gone crazy, but I

haven't. And today, what I'd like us to work on, because I want to, you know, it's you

and I. We're always together, right? So you and I, I want us to work on something about

playing. Right now, you might hear a little bit of music, because in Toronto, we have

a festival. It's called Catabana. Or if I recall rightly now, it's the Toronto Dominion

Caribbean Festival. But what the most important thing you have to remember is they play music.

Often students, well, you know, often we make mistakes, right, when we speak and we're learning

English. We use some things incorrectly. So today, I want to talk about what do you like

to do. And what I mean by that is playing. Often when we do things, we play sports and

whatnot. "Whatnot" in English just means whatever, okay? But a lot of students make a mistake

because they think play in English is the same as in their language. Or you might think

play is the same in your language. But in English, we have several different words for

kind of playing, okay? So I want to go over that today. And I hope you'll be, you know,

you'll learn a lot and you'll be very clear when you're done. So let's go to the board.

So what do you like to play? I erased it. But play is here, because play in English

means play games or sports. These are usually fun activities. I'm having fun. It's not serious,

okay? So when I play, I play sports. Some of you play soccer. Sorry, soccer in North

American is what you would call football, footyball with the leg, right? Kick, all right?

So soccer or baseball, especially if you're Japanese. And I think in Mexico, you play

baseball. But we play baseball. It means to have fun in the activity, not be serious.

We also play other games. So sports, I play sports. I play games. These games are things

like chess, right? Or some people play cards, solitaire. So you play a game for fun, okay?

Now it's the 21st century. Many of you play video games, right? Call of Duty, where you

get to pretend to be a soldier. You're playing, yes? So I've got StarCraft, Call of Duty,

Portal. Some of you might be DDR. Yeah, if you're from those countries, you'll go, "Oh,

DDR, fun." It's a game, something you play to have fun, okay? So that's why we say "play".

Now, the opposite of "play" is to actually "compete". "Compete" is a verb to mean to

do, to find a winner. It's and can be fun, but what we do is it's serious, okay? It's

much more serious. It's not just you and a friend going outside and kicking a ball and

running and laughing. You're serious because you train. Now, we have words up here, and

I'll explain "train" in a second. But opposite of "playing" is "competing". That is when

one or more people are working hard to see who is the best person. Now, in this case,

we have two things. When we compete, we either have "amateur" or "professional". An amateur

is someone who does the sport, like the Olympics. Right now, it's 2012, but we have an Olympics.

There are many people across the world competing to see which country has the best athletes,

and an athlete is a person who practices sports. So they're physically -- body is strong, okay?

Now, those are "amateur". They don't get any money, no money. So "amateur" can mean you

are a high, high level in sport, but you do not get money. Sometimes, you pay to play.

So you pay to play. "Professional" sports are different. Maybe you've heard of Michael

Jordan. Maybe. Okay? Or you've heard of David Beckham. Yes. Or Mike Tyson. That's really

old, okay? But if you've heard of those, they're professional. They get money. So when people

aren't playing, if they are high level, we call them "amateur" athletes, or we say "professional",

their money is in.

Now, how do you get to go from playing to competing? Well, you have to train. "Train"?

Yeah. A lot of students go, "I play -- I -- you know, I -- I practice soccer." And we're like,

"What does that mean?" It means nothing to us, because for us, you're either playing

or competing, and the difference between the two is training. What do I mean by "training"?

Well, "training", you need to get -- to go from playing to compete, you need to be stronger.

Strong, okay? Because "train" means work hard. "I train. I work hard." And one way to train

is to run, right? You run. That gets your cardio. "Cardio" means heart. Your heart and

your lungs get stronger. They get better, so you can do more work. So you train to do

more work, okay? Now, sometimes at your work -- at your job, you train, because you can

do more work. Wow, sports and work, yeah? Okay. Now, "strong" -- "strong" -- "fuerte"

in Spanish. No muscle. I have nothing. That's why I wear big shirts, okay? But when you

get strong, you work out, lift weights. Sorry. Okay? You work out to get strong. And "flexible"?

Yes? You can bend and move. So we train to get strong, fast, and flexible, and we must

work hard. So if you want to go from playing to competing, you must train. But if you train

and you don't practice, you won't be very good. So we need to practice. What do you

mean? Well, practicing -- we practice to get better skills. Actually, first, we practice

to learn skills. You learn to do something, and you keep practicing it so you can make

it automatic. That means you don't have to think. And then we keep practicing to make

the skills even better, okay? So if you want to learn how to do karate, you have to do

this many, many times. First, you go, "Why not?" And then you practice until your hand

is straight, and you go, "Ah, okay." Then better. Yes, you need to practice to learn

new skills -- 100% new -- and get better at those skills.

And finally, we say "study." What is studying? Well, different things. For instance, games

-- you'll notice I said games and sports you play. But if you need to get a special, special

skill which requires lots of work, and usually that includes more of your mind, we talk about

studying because you study martial arts. Study. You do practice to get better, but you study.

You do not play martial arts. And martial arts include karate, Muay Thai, and MMA, whatever.

So we study martial arts. We also study, like in school, for music and art. For example,

the piano -- you study. It is physical because you use your hands, but it is mental because

you use your mind. So we must study. You must study ideas, and then you can practice to

get better, okay? If you get very good, you can compete as an amateur or a professional.

Training is required, which means working very hard. But if you don't want to work hard

and you just want it to be fun, just play. Playing is fun.

So this is what I said, "What would you like to do?" Mr. E -- I'm sorry, I almost forgot

-- he's been trying to play soccer, but the ball's a little too big for him, you know?

But it's his world. It's his world. But if you want to learn more about his world and

you want to get better -- and I would like to see you again because, you know, we work

well together, I think, yeah? Okay? I would like you to go to, well, www. -- yes, I still

say it -- www.engvid.com, where you can complete the quiz that comes with this and learn more

about what you'd like to do. We've got grammar. We've got vocabulary. We've got slang. We've

got idioms. We've got understanding. Well, you get the idea. Come on back. We'll play

some more, okay? Bye.