Unit 2 Friendship
Part I Warming-Up Exercises,
I.wise sayings of friendship,
"Books and friends should be few but good."
"A friend in need is a friend indeed."
- Latin Proverb
"The best of friends must part."
“A friend to all is a friend to none.” -- Aristotle
II.Draw an analogy to describe friendship,
for example,A good friend is the medicine
Of life,You can draw as many analogies possible,
A friend is like ______;_______; ______,
College English integrated course 1 NCE-B1
Part II Background Information,
* Writer,
John Foster Furcolo (1911 -1995) was born
in New Haven,Connecticut,In 1948,he was
elected to the U.S,House of Representatives,
and served in Congress from 1949 to 1952.he
also served as Governor of Massachusetts
from 1957 to 1961,He is the author of several
books,including "Masacre At Katyn",an
account of the Soviet massacre of Polish
citizens in the Katyn Forest during World War
II,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
?Halloween,
Halloween is celebrated annually,It
is on the night of 31 October,when
people once believed that ghosts could be
seen,Now,in Britain and America,it is a
time when children have parties,dress up
as witches,make lanterns out of
pumpkins from which the inside has
been removed,and play,trick or treat”,
which is a traditional activity at
Halloween,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
Children dress in costumes and visit houses,
At each house they say, Trick and treat”,
This means that they will play a,trick”,or
joke,on the people in the house unless they
are given a,treat”,Most people prefer to
give treats rather than having tricks played
on them,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
?Abstract
The passage develop a letter around a
letter.The author wanted to take a taxi while the
taxi driver was reading a letter,so the
conversation began,Because the driver always
postponed writing a letter to his life-long friend,
until one day he learned that his friend has passed
away before he posted the letter,He is full of
regret and can’t help recalling their beautiful,
sweet childhood,After having read the story,we
know that we should never delay expressing our true
feelings to our friends
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
Part III,Vocabulary,
1.available for\ to,
e.g,The university is trying to make more
accommodation available for students,
estimate,v,form a judgment about
( a quantity or value),
e.g,I estimate that the total cost for the
treatment of the disease will go from $5000 to
$8000,
n,a calculation of the value,size,amount etc of
something
That seems a conservative estimate to me,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(1) the act of writing,receiving or sending
letters
e.g,His interest in writing came from a long
correspondence with a close college friend,
(2) the letters that sb,receives
e.g,Mary really never mentions her step-
mother in her correspondence,
4.practically; almost,but not completely or
exactly
e.g,He’d known the old man for practically
ten years,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
5,neighborhood, v,
in the neighborhood,the area around the point
of the place
e.g,They planned to meet somewhere in the
neighborhood of the station,
6.tough, adj difficult; strong
e.g We won the game through the tough
competition,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
7,shrug,v,lift(the shoulders) slightly
e.g He shrugged his shoulders without
giving me a definite reply,
8,urge,v,try very hard to persuade
e.g The captain urged his team to make more
efforts,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
9,postpone,v,delay (usually followed by n,
\ gerund )
e.g,The chairman postponed making a
decision,
10,reference,the act of talking about sb.\
sth.,or mention of things that----
His recent book makes reference to any work
experience in his resume,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
11,absolutely,totally and completely
e.g,There is absolutely no difference
between the two oil-paintings,
12,reunion,n,a party attended by
members of the same family,school,or
other group who have not seen each other
for a long time
e.g,Before she went abroad for further
study,the whole family had a big family
reunion,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
13,awful,(informal,used to add force) very
great; very bad or unpleasant
e.g I have got an awful lot of work to do,
14,destination,n.the place to which sb.is going
or being sent
e.g,Beijing is still the most popular holiday
destination,
15,skip,pass from one point to another,
Because of the limits of time,the teacher
skipped some of the exercises,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
Part IV,Language points,
1,Be lost in / lose oneself in
(sth,/ doing sth.),
be absorbed in,be fully occupied with
e.g,He was lost in playing computer
games,
I had lost myself in my thought,
He sounded as if he had a cold or
something,
(1) as if / as though, in a way that
suggests that something is true or not true
e.g,You look as if you’ve had a good
time,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(2) or something,used when you are not very
sure about what you have just said
e.g,Get yourself a sandwich or something,
He said he was going shopping or something,
(3) go ahead,continue,begin (sometimes
followed by with +n.)
Henry will be late but we will go ahead with
the meeting anyway,
The board of directors will vote today on
whether to go ahead with the plan,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(4),I guess I almost know it by heart.”
(Para.Four)
know\ learn sth,By heart, recite sth,
e.g,You have to know all the music by heart is
you want to be a concert pianist,
(5),At least they do with me because I am on
the road so much.”(Para,5)
Paraphrase,At least letters from home mean a
lot to me because I travel a lot in a car for
long distance,
(6) This isn’t a family.(Para.6)
Paraphrase,This isn’t a letter from my family,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(7),----,it might just as well have been family.”
Might\may (just) as well,
If you say that you might as well do something,
you mean that you will do it although you do
not have a strong desire to do it and may even
feel slightly reluctant about it,
e.g,The post office is really busy – we’ll have
to queue for ages to get served,We might as
well go home,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(8) I am not much of a hand at writing.,
Paraphrase,I am not good at writing,
Not much of a, not a good
e.g,He is not much of a father; but he is an
outstanding professor,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(9) keep up,continue without stopping
e.g,They risk losing their homes because they
can no longer keep up the repayments,
(10) But I take it he is someone-----,But I
expect that he is someone-----
The sentence pattern,I take it (that)” is used to
say that you expect someone will do something,
know something ect,
e.g,I take it that you have heard that all the
students in my class have done a very job in
CET Band 4,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(11) kind of (AmE)/ sort of (BrE),a little bit,in
some way or degree(used before v,or after a link
verb)
e.g,She was beautiful,But she was kind of cute,
(12) lose touch with sb.,meet and contact sb,
less and less often,
e.g,I lost touch with my former classmates after
graduation,
lkeep/stay in touch with
e.g,The old man kept in touch with his children
while living in a nursing home,
lBe in touch with; get in touch with ; Put sb,in
touch with sb,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(13) But I realized that Old Ed was still on his
mind when he spoke again,almost more to
himself than to me.( Para,16)
Paraphrase,But I realize that the taxi driver was
still thinking of Old Ed when he spoke again,It
seemed that he spoke more to himself than to
me,
On one’s mind,on one’s mind,in one’s
thoughts; of concern to one
e.g,The plan has been on my mind all the time,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(14),But things come up and we just don’t
seem to find the time.”(Para17)
come up, (1) happen,occur,esp,unexpectedly
e.g.,Sorry,I am late – something came up at
home.”
(2) be mentioned or discussed
e.g,The issue of safety came up twice during
the meeting,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(15) It had reference to things that----,(Para.21)
Paraphrase,The letter made mention of things
that------
(16),Like it says there,”---“about all we had to
spend in those days was time.”
Paraphrase:,As the letter says there,” ----
though we didn’t have much money we had a
lot of free time.”
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(17) ----there are fewer and fewer still
around.:---
Paraphrase,----fewer and fewer of us are
left alive,
(18) go by,(of time) pass
e.g As each month goes by,the economic
situation gets better,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(19) hang out, stay in or near a place,for no particular
reason,not doing very much
e.g,I often hung out in coffee bars while I was
unemployed,
(20) every now and then,sometimes,at times
Every now and then I have a desire to quit my tedious
job,
(21) Bur for the last 20 or 30 years it is been mostly
just Christmas card.,
But generally speaking we have sent only Christmas
cards to keep in touch with each other for the last 20 or
30 years,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
(22),Your friendship over the years has
meant an awful lot to me,more than I can say
because I’m not good at saying things like
that.” (Para.29)
*Your friendship over the years has been very
important to me,more important than I can
say because I’m not good at expressing my
feeling,
(23) Choke up, become too upset to speak
e.g Losing my job left me completely choked
up; I was so upset that I didn’t know what to
say,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
Part V,Grammatical points,
1,Degree of possibility for present time,
must\ can\could\may\might\can’t + verb
Degree of possibility for past time,
must\may\might\couldn’t\can’t +have+PP
e.g,We must have been playing tennis in the
yard when you phoned,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
Might have done
(1) guess what happened in the past
(2) Sth is likely to happen in the past but not actually,
e.g,But presently she grew calmer,It might have been
worse,She might have flared up
Could not +have +PP (guess what was impossible in
the past)
Could+have +PP (more probably to happen in the past)
e.g,They cannot have gone out because the light’s on !
We could not have heard them because of the noise
from the river
|should/ ought to+have +PP means an unfilled
obligation
E.g,American Revolution (1775-83) is regarded by
military historians as a war Britain should never be lost,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
18.Your friendship over the years has
meant……saying things like that
2,more than
e.g,They were more than glad to help,
She is more shy than unsocial与其说她性情孤僻，
倒不如说她害羞
Part VI Stylistic feature of the text
Most of this text is actually a re-creation of the
conversation between a taxi driver and the narrator,
Therefore it provides lots of examples to show stylistic
feature of oral English,
In this text,sentences tend to be short and simple,
Some sentences are incomplete,For example,(You)
Went to school together?,Enjoyed talking with you.”
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
Besides,some words and phrases are
not used in written English,For example,
sort of,kind of,I take it well,hang out----,
Therefore,This article is a good
demonstration of stylistic feature of
spoken English,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
Part VII,Assignments;
1.Review Text A
2.Study Text B by yourselves
3.Finish exercises after class
Key to Translation
It is not easy to keep in touch with friends when they
are far away,This is certainly true in my case,
It has been a couple of years since I left my old
neighborhood and all the friends I had there,I’ve been
meaning to write to them but something or other comes up
and I just don’t seem to find the time,Now I have kind of
lost touch with them,They are always on my mind,
however,and I think I will certainly make an effort to
keep up correspondence with them in the future,
NCE-B1 Unit2 friendship
