Speak With Me: English Speaking Practice

970,484 views ・ 2021-02-19

Speak English With Vanessa


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

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Hi, I'm Vanessa from SpeakEnglishWithVanessa.com.  
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Are you ready to practice speaking  English today? Let's do it.  
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Hey, wha’tch up to this  weekend? Yes? What do you say?  
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If I asked you, Hey, whatch up to this weekend?  Would you freeze and panic, because you don't  
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know how to respond to this question easily and  naturally? Never fear. Today I'm going to help  
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you to naturally have a conversation about  your weekend plans which is a really common  
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conversation topic. Maybe you're leaving school  or work on a Friday and someone asks you, "Hey,  
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whatch up to this weekend?" And they ask you  about your weekend plans, instead of freezing  
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and panicking, today I want to help you learn  the most important conversation question that  
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you can use in these situations. Also some common  vocabulary for talking about your weekend plans.  
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And then at the end of this lesson, we're going  to practice a little exchange back and forth. 
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I hope that you can get your pronunciation and  speaking muscles ready so you can really use what  
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you've learned during today's lesson. Are you  ready to learn the most important conversation  
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question of all time, at least according to  me? Is that question, what's your name? No.  
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Is that question, will you give me money? No. Is  that question, do you love me? No, no, no. The  
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most important conversation question is, there's  actually two parts, what about you? How about you?  
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When someone asks you about your weekend plans  and you say a little reply, I'm going hiking,  
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I'm not doing much, there might be an incredibly  awful awkward pause. What happens next?  
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Well, this is where the most important question  comes in. You can ask them, what about you? How  
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about you? You can imagine tossing a ball back and  forth. The other person has asked you a question. 
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What are you doing this weekend? They throw  you the ball. Now you reply and you say,  
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I'm going hiking, or I'm not doing much. You need  to throw or toss the ball back to that person. And  
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this question does that, how about you? It means  you are asking the same question back to them.  
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What are you doing this weekend? How about you?  I want you to remember this wonderful question,  
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either of them, actually, they have  the exact same meaning, how about you?  
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What about you? Remember these questions, because  later when we practice this at the end of this  
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lesson during our conversation speaking time,  remember these questions and use them. All right,  
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let's go to some common vocabulary that  you can use to talk about weekend plans.  
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Brunch, many Americans love brunch.  The word brunch is a combination of  
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breakfast and lunch. And that's because we usually  eat this on the weekends, maybe a Saturday morning  
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or a Sunday morning between 10:00 AM and 2:00 PM. It's a time when you could eat either breakfast  
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or lunch, and it's usually a long social event.  So you might go out to brunch with your friends  
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or have your friends to your house to eat  brunch. My friends and I are meeting at our  
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favorite brunch spot on Sunday. Great. It's  a restaurant where you can eat breakfast type  
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foods. Usually with some kind of alcoholic drink  like a mimosa or something with fruit in it,  
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or maybe some champagne in the morning. And you  can eat this in the company of your friends.  
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Another common weekend word is social butterfly.  A social butterfly refers to someone who makes a  
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lot of plans. They are flying around to event, to  another event, to another activity. They're always  
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doing things usually involving lots of other  people. They are a social butterfly. If you are  
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a social butterfly, probably the year 2020 with  lockdowns and all of these things were probably  
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really difficult for you, because you love to get  together with other people and always be active. 
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So we can use this in a sentence like  this. My friend is a social butterfly.  
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She has invitations to three brunches  and four afternoon teas. Amazing.  
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What if you are not a social butterfly. What  if you are the opposite? Are you unsocial  
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caterpillar? No. It means you are a homebody.  Your body likes to stay at home. I'm a homebody.  
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She's a homebody. Someone who enjoys just doing  things slowly and staying at home. They feel most  
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comfortable in a comfortable place at home. You  could say, "My friend is a social butterfly, but  
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I'm more of a homebody. When I get together with  friends, I would rather have dinner at my house  
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and then play games here." I think this is true  for me personally, as I get a little bit older  
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I prefer these intimate group  settings. Instead of lots of people,  
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I prefer just a couple of friends at home. Maybe having a bonfire outside, roasting  
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some food or some marshmallows and this kind of  intimate setting. I enjoy doing activities at home  
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more often than when I was a little bit younger.  To stay in, unfortunately that has been probably  
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a lot of our weekend plans for the past year. And  it means that you're just going to stay at home.  
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It doesn't mean you're going to do nothing.  It just means you're not going to go anywhere.  
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I'm going to stay in. You might say, "It's  supposed to be cold and rainy this weekend, so  
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I'm just going to stay in and read a book," or  "I'm just going to stay in and do some things  
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around the house." To binge watch. This means that  you watch a lot of movies or TV shows usually back  
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to back without stopping. So several hours, maybe  you watch four seasons of a TV show in one day. 
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This is binge watching. You are watching a lot.  This expression comes from a term we usually use  
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with alcohol. To binge drink, this means  that you drink a lot of alcohol at one time,  
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not a very healthy thing to do. But when we  say to binge drink, that has that same idea,  
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is you're doing a lot back to back. Or you could  binge watch TV. So you might say, "Last weekend,  
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my husband and I binge watched all of the Star  Wars movies." This isn't true. When you have  
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young children, you do not have time to binge  watch TV. But you might say this about your life,  
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"I binge watched that new TV show that just  came out." Our final expression that you can  
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use to talk about your weekend plans is, to  catch up on some chores. This phrasal verb,  
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to catch up on, is a beautiful phrasal verb that  you can use to talk about some kind of necessary  
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activity that you haven't done for a while. And now there's more and more and more,  
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and you need to finish all of this. So we can  imagine laundry, dishes, sweeping, cleaning, maybe  
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some home repairs, tidying up, maybe even yard  work. If you don't do those things for one week  
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or two weeks, Oh, there's so many you have to do.  So that means you need to catch up. You need to  
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do what you haven't done for a while. You need to  catch up on some chores, and chores are just those  
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activities that I mentioned, laundry, dishes,  these necessary activities that involve cleaning  
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up, helping to make your home a wonderful place  to live. So maybe this weekend, you just need to  
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catch up on some chores. You might say, "I was  so busy all week and finally I'm going to catch  
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up on some chores this weekend." Maybe not very  fun, but when your house is clean it feels good. 
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All right, now that we have some common vocabulary  you can use to talk about your weekend plans,  
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let's talk about some introduction  questions that you might hear  
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and that you can also ask other people.  These have varying levels of reductions and  
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fast ways that you will hear them. So I want  to help you understand and recognize what other  
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people are saying and also be able to use  it. So let's talk about our first question.  
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What are you up to this weekend? What are you up  to this weekend? You might know the expression  
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what's up. This just means, how are you? So  we're using that same word, up to talk about,  
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what are you doing this weekend? What are  you up to this weekend? But do you think  
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that we usually say it like this? What are  you up to this weekend? So clear. So lovely. 
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No. Instead we're going to reduce this a  little bit and then we can reduce it a lot  
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more. Let's talk about that first one. What  are you up to? What are you up to? What're.  
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So here the word, what and are, are creating  a spoken contraction. Usually when we write,  
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we don't write this type of contraction. It's only  in spoken English, but oftentimes be verbs like  
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are, is, will be contracted with a question  word. Whatda you up to this weekend? Whatda,  
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whatda you up to? We can reduce this a little  bit further. Whatch up to? Whatch up to?  
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Whatch up to this weekend? There are a lot of  reductions happening at the beginning. Whatchh,  
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what-cha up to. So here we have, what are you,  being reduced to just, whatch, the chh is you.  
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And what are has just been smashed  together, and we can say whatch  
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up to, whatch up to, whatch up to, whatch up to. This is really fast. If you say this slowly,  
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whatch up to, it sounds really weird. So  we only use this in really fast English.  
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So if you're going to say this, it needs to  be quickly and reduced and linked together.  
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Most likely you're going to hear this. So I want  to make sure that you can understand when someone  
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says, "Hey, whatch up to this weekend."  Whatch up to this weekend. You can say,  
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"Oh, Vanessa taught me that. I know what that  means. What are you up to this weekend? Yes."  
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So let's go on to our next expression where we're  going to also reduce this a bit and help you to  
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understand it. What have you got going on this  weekend? What have you got going on this weekend? 
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These all mean the same thing. What are you doing  this weekend? But you might hear this expression  
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with the word gut. What have you gut going  on this weekend? When you actually hear this,  
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we don't say it clearly. What have you got going  on this weekend? Wouldn't that be nice though?  
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Instead, you're going to hear a reduction or a  contraction of the first two words, just like  
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we saw with the previous example. What've. So what  and have are going to be pushed together. What've  
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you gut goin on? That final G in the word going  is going to be cut off and we'll just say,  
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goin. So let's try to say that altogether.  You want to try to say it with me? What've  
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you gut goin on? What've you gut goin on this  weekend? What've you gut goin on this weekend? 
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Do you think we can reduce this further? Oh yes.  Whatda ya gut goin on this weekend? Whatda ya gut.  
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Here the beginning of, what have you got, is  just really like you threw it in a mixing bowl,  
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stirred it up and threw it out on a cookie  tray. Well, let's try to break it down so  
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it's not quite so messy and complicated. At  the beginning we have, what have you got?  
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But it sounds like, whatda, whatda, this is, what  have. Whatda ya. Ya is you. Whatda ya gut goin,  
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again, we're going to drop that  G at the end of the word going.  
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Goin on, whatda ya gut goin on? Whatda. Notice  what's happening at the end of the word, what?  
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Do you hear a clear, T, Whatda ya, whatda ya.  
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Nope. That at the end of the word,  what is going to change to a D sound? 
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This is really typical of American English,  where a T that's surrounded by vowel sounds  
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is going to change to a D. It's called a flapped  T and it just rolls off your tongue in a smooth  
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way. Whatda ya gut goin on? Can you say it  with me? Whatda ya gut goin on this weekend?  
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Whatda ya gut goin on this weekend? All right,  let's go to our last question. You doin anything  
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fun this weekend? You doin anything fun this  weekend? What's happening at the beginning of  
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this question? Should there be another word? Yep.  Are you doing anything fun this weekend? Are you,  
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but the word, are it's on vacation. It's just gone  somewhere. So we're going to start this question  
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with the word you. You doin anything fun this  weekend? It makes the questions seem a little  
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more casual and less like an interrogation,  or you're asking someone out on a date. 
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It's just a casual question. You doin anything  fun this weekend? But we can reduce this question.  
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We're not going to reduce it an awful lot, but we  will hear this reduced a little bit. When we say,  
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you doing anything fun. Instead, you're going to  hear it, ya doin. Ya, the word you is reduced to  
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ya. Ya doin, listen to that G at the end,  ya doin, it's gone. It's also on vacation.  
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Maybe it's on vacation with the word are. So  let's say, ya doin anything fun this weekend,  
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ya doin, that's the main reduction that's going  to happen in this question. Ya doin anything fun  
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this weekend. Ya doin. Try to say that with me. Ya  doin anything fun this weekend? Ya doin anything  
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fun this weekend. All right, let's go onto some  other common things that you will hear in these  
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types of small talk, easy casual conversations. If someone tells you about their weekend plans,  
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and it sounds interesting or fun, how can you  reply? You might say, "That sounds like fun," or,  
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"How interesting," or just simply, "Nice." If that  person is doing nothing, they're just sitting at  
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home, maybe they're going to binge watch some  TV and stay in. Well sometimes it's nice to  
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still say something positive in response. So you  might say, "Sometimes it's nice to do nothing."  
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And that's true, especially if you've been  doing a lot, sometimes it's nice just to stay in  
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and relax for the weekend. So you might say,  "Sometimes it's nice to do nothing." All right.  
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Before we practice our sample conversation  together. What can you say at the end?  
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Well, if you're talking about weekend plans, it  is before the weekend. So you could just say,  
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"Have a good weekend" or "Enjoy your weekend."  Simple, great way to end the conversation. 
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All right, let's take a deep breath. Are you  ready to put all of this together? What I  
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would like you to do is, first, I would like  you to listen to this sample conversation.  
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Think about the different parts that  are happening. You're going to hear  
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our key beautiful question. What about you? How  about you? You're going to also hear some of the  
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key vocabulary that we talked about, and also just  some of the questions, the introductory questions,  
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what you got going on this weekend? Great  things like that, that we'll put together.  
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And then I'm going to put some pauses  and it's going to be your turn to have  
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the conversation with me. So first  let's watch the conversation sample.  
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"Hey, whatch up to this weekend?" "Not that  much. I'm just going to stay in and catch up on  
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some chores on Saturday. But on Sunday, I'm going  to meet up with some of my friends for brunch." 
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"That sounds fun. Where's your  favorite brunch spot?" "I usually go to  
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Sunday Morning Cafe." "What about you? What  have you got going on this weekend?" "I'm  
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kind of a homebody. So I'll probably just read  a book in my hammock." "That sounds nice. Well,  
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have a good weekend. Enjoy your book." "Thanks.  You too. Have a good weekend." All right. Are you  
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ready to take this to the next level? I'm going  to be asking you a question and then pausing. And  
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I would like you to reply in that pause. Take a  moment. Tell me about your plans. You can do it.  
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Let's go. "Hey, whatch up to this weekend?" "How interesting. How often do you do that?"  
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"Oh, me? Oh, I'll probably go hiking  since the weather's going to be so warm."  
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"Well, nice talking to you. Have a good weekend."  
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Well, how did you do? If you would like you can go  back and practice that little sample conversation.  
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You can take a deep breath, enjoy yourself.  That's part of learning English. Because I  
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want you to enjoy the process, enjoy the  journey. So now I have a question for you,  
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in the comments below this video, let me  know, whatcha gut goin on this weekend? What  
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are your weekend plans? Try to use some of the  expressions that you learned in this lesson and  
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thank you so much for learning English with me. I will see you again next Friday for a new lesson  
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here on my YouTube channel. Bye. The next step is  to download my free ebook, 5 Steps To Becoming A  
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Confident English Speaker. You'll learn what you  need to do to speak confidently and fluently.  
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Don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel  for more free lessons. Thanks so much. Bye.
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