IELTS Preparation Series 1, Episode 11: Recount in the Past

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Hello. I'm Margot Politis. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation.

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Today we're going to look at ways to talk about something that's happened in the past,

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and we'll also have a look at ways to form compound and complex sentences.

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First, we're going to listen to a woman talk about a dramatic event in her past. Four years

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ago, she had a stroke - a blood vessel burst in her brain.

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Here's what happened to her:

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A stroke is whereby the blood supply to the brain is cut off. The major signs of having

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had a stroke that most people would equate with is weakness, so paralysis of an arm,

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leg or face. In others it can be a loss of speech or inability to communicate. Others

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may have loss of vision or a combination of all those things.

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I was just so physically fit and also emotionally I was on top of the world. I had a really

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good job at that time, and I was getting married.

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I just felt terribly nauseous and I woke up with pins and needles down one side of my

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leg, and then it worked its way up towards my arm and across.

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I was just immobile. I couldn't move. I couldn't walk. I was paralysed on this side of my body.

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Simone is telling her story. She is giving a recount of what happened to her and how

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she was affected.

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A recount is a story about past events, usually in the order in which they occur.

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Let's take another look at a clip from today's episode. Listen for the past tense verbs in

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Simone's story.

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I was just so physically fit and also emotionally I was on top of the world. I had a really

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good job at this time, and I was getting married.

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She says: I was so physically fit, I was on top of the world. I had a really good job.

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Here, 'was' and 'had' are past tense verbs.

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They're irregular verbs.

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Let's compare the three forms of these irregular verbs.

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From the infinitive form of the verb 'to be', we can form the simple present forms: am,

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is and are; and we can also make the simple past forms - was or were.

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Notice that the verb to be is the only verb in English that has two past tense forms.

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All others just have one.

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Let's do the same for the verb 'to have'.

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What is the simple present for of the verb 'to have'?

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Has, or have.

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And the simple past form?

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Had.

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When you learn new verbs, it's important to learn them with all their different forms,

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so make sure you write verbs down in a notebook, and work out all their different tenses as

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well.

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When you are recounting a story that happened in the past, you'll need to use all these

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simple past tense forms of verbs.

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You'll also need to use a variety of 'transition signals' - words that help to order the events.

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Using transition signals will help the reader or listener follow the order of events in

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the story.

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Listen for the transition signal in this clip.

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I just felt terribly nauseous and I woke up with pins and needles down one side of my

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leg, and then it worked its way up towards my arm and across.

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She uses the word 'then'. 'Then' is very common in informal spoken language, so are other

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more informal transition signals like 'next' or 'after that'.

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Simone said she had a feeling of pins and needles in her leg. Then it worked its way

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to her arm.

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In more formal language, you might find transition signals like 'at first' or 'subsequently,

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or 'after a while'.

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If we wanted to make Simone's story clearer, we could add some transition signals to her

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story.

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If we were writing her story, we might use more formal transition signals.

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Simone had a feeling of pins and needles in her leg. Then it worked its way to her arm.

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We might say:

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At first, Simone had a feeling of pins and needles in her leg. After a while, it worked

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its way to her arm.

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Notice that transition signals like this are often followed by commas.

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Adding transition signals has made Simone's story clearer. You can more easily see the

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order of events. This is very important in more formal language.

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Try to make sure you learn and use a number of different transition signals.

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Now let's have another listen to a clip of Simone talking about her illness.

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Pay attention to the type of sentences that Simone uses. Are the sentences simple, compound

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or complex?

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It worked its way up towards my arm and across. I was just immobile. I couldn't move. I couldn't

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walk. I was paralysed on this side of my body.

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Most of the sentences that Simone uses are 'simple' sentences.

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If we wanted to write an account of Simone's illness, we could join up some of these sentences

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to make 'compound' and 'complex' sentences.

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We form 'compound' and 'complex' sentences by joining simple sentences and phrases together.

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Simone says:

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I was just immobile. I couldn't move. I couldn't walk.

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But we could edit this to say:

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I was just immobile. I couldn't move or walk.

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Or:

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I was just immobile. I could neither move nor walk.

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OK, now let's finish with a quick look at the words used in the clip. Listen to the

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clip one more time, and then we'll talk about a quick way to build your vocabulary.

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Listen again. I was just immobile. I couldn't move. I couldn't

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walk. I was paralysed on this side of my body.

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Simone says she was 'immobile'.

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The prefix im- is used to make the opposites of words beginning with 'm' or 'p'.

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Im- means not, so immobile is the opposite of mobile - it means not mobile.

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So we can have: mobile and immobile

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mature, and immature

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polite and impolite

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patient and impatient

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Knowing the opposites of words is very important.

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Many words just have a different word that means the opposite, like:

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hot, cold happy, sad

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in, out up, down

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but other words take prefixes that mean not, like un-, de-, dis, in-.

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Listen to some of the clip again. Then we'll look at a how a few more opposites are formed.

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The major signs of having had a stroke that most people would equate with is weakness,

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so paralysis of an arm, leg or face. In others it can be a loss of speech or inability to

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communicate.

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I was just so physically fit and also emotionally I was on top of the world.

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He says a sign of a stroke can be an inability to communicate.

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He uses the in- prefix meaning 'not'.

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'Inability' means not having the ability, and here's a few more opposites.

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She says she was physically fit, emotionally on top of the world.

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The opposite of fit is unfit.

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The opposite of emotionally is unemotionally.

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A great tip is to try to find words with opposite meanings. Some words have several meanings,

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so they have several opposites as well. A good thesaurus will really help you with this.

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And that's all from me today. Don't forget to practice forming compound and complex sentences.

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And remember to practice reading and writing in English every day. I'll see you next time

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on Study English. Bye.

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