Intro
1. Learn Vocabulary - Learn some new vocabulary before you start the lesson.
2. Read and Prepare - Read the introduction and prepare to hear the audio.
Black gold. Texas Tea. Bubblin’ crude. Whatever you call it, oil is the lifeblood of the modern of the world. It flows through our factories, cars and airplanes. It heats our homes. It keeps our lawn mowers and refrigerators in tip-top shape. Without oil, where would we be?
The diminishing supply of oil around the world has many people afraid that life as we now know it is about to change. Some people think that nations will collapse, that people will go back to riding horses and reading by candle light. Others, such as musician and actress Lindsay Lohan, are searching out alternative sources of energy.
Lindsay Lohan is one of a growing number of people who have had their vehicles adapted to run on vegetable oil instead of regular gasoline.
Listen to Kevin and Erin talk about the world’s oil problems.
Dialog
1. Listen and Read - Listen to the audio and read the dialog at the same time.
2. Study - Read the dialog again to see how the vocab words are used.
Kevin |
Kevin: I was reading, ah, the other day that Lindsay Lohan has had her car converted, in L.A. of course, um, to run on vegetable oil.
Erin: Yeah, I know, I heard about that, too, and actually, kind of, respect her for that.
Kevin: I think that’s very cool.
Erin: I think that’s really cool, and I heard that there’s this car place down in L.A. where that’s all they do. Like, you bring your car in and they replace the engine with a vegetable oil-running machine. And, I think it’s really smart because this country’s going to run out of oil eventually.
Kevin: Yes.
Erin: And there’s a lot of pressure, and there’s all this tension about who’s going to have the oil, and so we need to find alternative sources.
Kevin: It’s really unbelievable, but I do hope people begin to understand that, you know, it will run out eventually.
Erin: Right.
Kevin: And there’s no reason for the current situation.
Erin: I wonder, cars that run on vegetable oil, if it smells a little weird.
Kevin: It could be a little bit funky, but maybe it’ll smell like fried chicken, which is kind of cool.
Quizzes
Lesson MP3
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Discussion
The global price of oil is getting higher and higher. Some people say that oil is getting more expensive due to the laws of supply and demand. That is, because fewer oil reserves are being found, there is increasing competition for the oil that has already been discovered.
Since 2003, the price of oil has more than doubled. When oil gets more expensive, so does everything else in our lives: the cost of driving goes up, the cost of public transporation goes up, the cost of shipping goes up, causing price increases for food, clothing and other products.