Unit 21: Welcome to your new job
Indirect questions
Select a unit
- 1 Nice to meet you!
- 2 What to wear
- 3 Like this, like that
- 4 The daily grind
- 5 Christmas every day
- 6 Great achievers
- 7 The Titanic
- 8 Travel
- 9 The big wedding
- 10 Sunny's job hunt
- 11 The bucket list
- 12 Moving and migration
- 13 Welcome to BBC Broadcasting House
- 14 New Year, New Project
- 15 From Handel to Hendrix
- 16 What's the weather like?
- 17 The Digital Revolution
- 18 A detective story
- 19 A place to live
- 20 The Cult of Celebrity
- 21 Welcome to your new job
- 22 Beyond the planets
- 23 Great expectations!
- 24 Eco-tourism
- 25 Moving house
- 26 It must be love
- 27 Job hunting success... and failure
- 28 Speeding into the future
- 29 Lost arts
- 30 Tales of survival
Session 4
How can being polite get you a cheaper cup of coffee? Read an article about a French cafe where they reward customers who say 'please' when they order a drink. We also want to hear from you - tell us how to be polite where you live. And have you ever wanted to be a famous sporting celebrity? News Report is about the lives of sports stars.
Activity 3
News Report
Work after sport
Lots of people dream of becoming a famous sports personality like the Wimbledon-winning Williams sisters, Venus and Serena. Fame and money make people think life is easy for international sportsmen and women, but the reality can be far from perfect.
News Report looks at what life may be like for less successful athletes - their struggles to make a living and what problems they may face when they hang up their sports kit.
Listen to the audio
Have you ever wondered what it's like to be a professional tennis player? The glamour, the travel, the adulation, the money.
It sounds like a fantastic lifestyle but this only comes to the most successful. For many struggling professionals life is very different.
When Li Na retired from tennis in 2014 she had earned $24 million in the twelve months before her retirement. Compare this to the British player Jamie Baker. In his nine years as a professional he earned a more modest $550,000.
Without big sponsorship deals less successful sportsmen and women often have to pay for everything themselves. If they are not winning, they can find themselves living in their cars and travelling around to small tournaments just to make enough money to pay for the petrol.
Some have to give up the sport they love and start a new career. What opportunities are there for ex-tennis-players? The game's governing body, the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) has a Senior Performance Lifestyle Advisor who says that most tennis players have few qualifications. Many have sacrificed their education to devote all their time to the sport.
Without academic qualifications it can be hard to find a new job but professional sports people do have skills that are transferable. Skills like motivation, commitment, drive and focus. These attributes are highly regarded by employers and have led many to successful new jobs away from the tennis court.
Download
You can download News Report on our Unit 21 Downloads page (size: 4.4MB).
Vocabulary
glamour
attractive and exciting
adulation
strong support and admiration from lots of people
lifestyle
way of life
struggling
not very successful
more modest
not so impressive
sponsorship deals
contracts with companies who pay for someone to use and advertise their products
tournaments
competitions
opportunities
possible jobs
governing body
organisation that controls a sport
sacrificed
gave up
to devote all their time to
to use all their time to concentrate on one thing
transferable
can be taken from one role or job and used in another
drive
strong determination to do something
focus
ability to concentrate on a goal
attributes
skills and personal qualities
End of Session 4
That's it for this session. You've learnt that being polite really does pay! And a good way to be polite is to use the indirect questions we've seen in this unit. In the next session, you can hear our brand new drama, Alice in Wonderland. You'll also be able to test what you have learnt in the weekly quiz.
Session Vocabulary
glamour
attractiveness and excitementadulation
strong support and admiration from lots of peoplelifestyle
way of lifestruggling
not very successfulmore modest
not so impressivesponsorship deals
contracts with companies who pay for someone to use and advertise their productstournaments
competitionsopportunities
possible jobsgoverning body
organisation that controls a sportsacrificed
gave upto devote all their time to
to use all their time to concentrate on one thingtransferable
can be taken from one role or job and used in anotherdrive
strong determination to do somethingfocus
ability to concentrate on a goalattributes
skills and personal qualities