CELTA Pre-Interview Task - Help Needed

Status
Not open for further replies.

Invictus

New member
Joined
May 10, 2010
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
I find the majority of the questions in the CELTA pre-interview task fairly easy but I am at a bit of a loss for the following four examples. I don't expect anyone to do my homework for me, but I would be so very grateful if someone could give me a few pointers to help me figure this out. I really don't think I'm on the right track with these. My answers are in blue.

Odd One Out

a) rice b) egg c) milk d) cream

My first thought was these could all make a nice desert of some sort but then I was left stumped. In all seriousness, when all these words are taken as nouns (and I assume they should be), "egg" is the only one which forms the plural with an 's' (no one says, "we have a lot of creams," at least not in the culinary context which, to me, seems implied). Would this be correct?

a) to need b) to play c) to bring d) to open

It seems to me the odd one out is "to need," but why? My only attempt at an explanation is that it is the only verb expressing a personal state as opposed to external action. If this is actually correct, what would be the technical (grammatical) way of explaining this distinction?

a) He was interesting. b) He was smiling. c) He was smoking. d) He was reading.

He believe here a) is the odd one out because "interesting" is an adjective, whereas in the other three it's a past participle. Also, the verb in a) is a linking verb, while in the other three it is a helping verb. (Incidentally, you could say the same about c, i.e. "He was smokin'!" but I wouldn't go that far.)

I also have one small problem with the following task pronunciation task:

Pronunciation

Pronunciation
What sort of pronunciation problems do you think learners may have with the following words and phrases? e.g. word stress, sounds, missing / adding sounds, intonation.

fish and chips, bread and butter, now and then (what problem do these have in common?)

I have no bright ideas... Pronunciation, perhaps. In "now and then," the 'd' in "and" might present problems with the 'th' in "then." Any help here is highly appreciated.


Thank you very much for looking this over.



 

MASM

Member
Joined
Dec 16, 2009
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Spanish
Home Country
Spain
Current Location
Spain
I find the majority of the questions in the CELTA pre-interview task fairly easy but I am at a bit of a loss for the following four examples. I don't expect anyone to do my homework for me, but I would be so very grateful if someone could give me a few pointers to help me figure this out. I really don't think I'm on the right track with these. My answers are in blue.

Odd One Out

a) rice b) egg c) milk d) cream

My first thought was these could all make a nice desert of some sort but then I was left stumped. In all seriousness, when all these words are taken as nouns (and I assume they should be), "egg" is the only one which forms the plural with an 's' (no one says, "we have a lot of creams," at least not in the culinary context which, to me, seems implied). Would this be correct?
Egg is the one that is countable, the rest are uncountable nouns
a) to need b) to play c) to bring d) to open

It seems to me the odd one out is "to need," but why? My only attempt at an explanation is that it is the only verb expressing a personal state as opposed to external action. If this is actually correct, what would be the technical (grammatical) way of explaining this distinction?
"bring" is the one with irregular past form, the others have regular past forms.

a) He was interesting. b) He was smiling. c) He was smoking. d) He was reading.

He believe here a) is the odd one out because "interesting" is an adjective, whereas in the other three it's a past participle. Also, the verb in a) is a linking verb, while in the other three it is a helping verb. (Incidentally, you could say the same about c, i.e. "He was smokin'!" but I wouldn't go that far.)
He was interesting. "interesting" is a subject complement. The others are past continuous

I also have one small problem with the following task pronunciation task:

Pronunciation

Pronunciation
What sort of pronunciation problems do you think learners may have with the following words and phrases? e.g. word stress, sounds, missing / adding sounds, intonation.

fish and chips, bread and butter, now and then (what problem do these have in common?)

I have no bright ideas... Pronunciation, perhaps. In "now and then," the 'd' in "and" might present problems with the 'th' in "then." Any help here is highly appreciated.

It could be linking the two words with "and" as a weak form. Pronuncing the "schwa"
Thank you very much for looking this over.

I hope that helps
xxx
 

Invictus

New member
Joined
May 10, 2010
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
Wow, thank you so much. These seem fairly uncomplicated in hindsight. I'm sure as I gain experience teaching I will begin to break down language in better and more intuitive ways.

Thanks again.
 

Tdol

No Longer With Us (RIP)
Staff member
Joined
Nov 13, 2002
Native Language
British English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
Japan
With the second, you could also argue that need is the odd one out because it is a semi-modal verb- it can behave like a main verb (I need a coffee/I need to go) or a modal (You needn't do it)
 

MASM

Member
Joined
Dec 16, 2009
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Spanish
Home Country
Spain
Current Location
Spain
Wow, thank you so much. These seem fairly uncomplicated in hindsight. I'm sure as I gain experience teaching I will begin to break down language in better and more intuitive ways.

Thanks again.

You're welcome!:-D
 

MASM

Member
Joined
Dec 16, 2009
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Spanish
Home Country
Spain
Current Location
Spain
With the second, you could also argue that need is the odd one out because it is a semi-modal verb- it can behave like a main verb (I need a coffee/I need to go) or a modal (You needn't do it)

Yes, that's true. I think they ask you to distinguish senses in sentences using modals (semi or quasi), tenses... in other exercises, so I thought they'd like to know if the "candidate" is able to differenciate regular/irregular verb forms.:)
 

Tdol

No Longer With Us (RIP)
Staff member
Joined
Nov 13, 2002
Native Language
British English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
Japan
Oh definitely, I was just chucking in another possibility. With this sort of question, it's often the case that the people who wrote it had one thing in mind, but you can come up with other possibilities. You could argue that for question one egg is the odd one out because the verbs formed from the others all have an association with the foodstuff of the noun, but I doubt that's what they had in mind. ;-)
 

rx-f

Junior Member
Joined
Jun 29, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
In the first question Invictus was looking for help with, the thing that jumped out at me was not the countable/uncountable distinction: it was the fact that three of the objects are dairy and one is not. Is this question definitely probing grammar rather than an awareness of semantic links in vocabulary?
 

Tdol

No Longer With Us (RIP)
Staff member
Joined
Nov 13, 2002
Native Language
British English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
Japan
I am not sure about that because the strict definition of dairy is, I believe, restricted to milk and products derived from milk, though it is common to see them described as dairy products.
 

shroob

Member
Joined
Jul 15, 2010
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
English
Home Country
England
Current Location
England
Yeah, I wouldn't class rice or eggs as dairy - just done a quick check on the internet and it seems dairy only applies to those products from the mammary glands of mammals eg. milk, cream etc.
 

MASM

Member
Joined
Dec 16, 2009
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Spanish
Home Country
Spain
Current Location
Spain
I'm afraid we won't have more information about the correction they've given to the original poster :roll:
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top