1. Conversation: Talk about the
following questions with your partner for about 3 minutes. The pictures are
there to help you.
1. What was the most important thing your parents
taught you?
2.
Are
friends the new family? Discuss.
3.
What
are the main problems affecting families in your country/region at the moment?
Is family breakdown an issue?
4.
Nowadays
more and more people meet online. Do you think online dating can be successful?
How is it different to traditional dating? Do you think you could meet your other half or significant other online?
5.
Is
marriage a thing of the past? Why/Why not? Why are fewer and fewer people tying the knot nowadays? Why is the divorce rate so significant? What do
you think can be done about forced marriages? What do you think about arranged
marriages?
6.
What
differences has technology made to people's ability to keep relationships going
over long distances?
7. Describe the personalities of your family
members. Are there any characteristics that run in your family?
8. What would you do if you found out that your
partner was cheating on you?
9. When you detect a conflict, how do you usually cope with it?
10. Do you tend to "take the bull by the horns" or do
you tend to walk away and hope that time will solve everything?
2. Monologue: Below there are some
issues related to the topic. You must talk about at least two of them for 2
minutes approx. You may be asked further questions about the topic when you
have finished.
STUDENT A
1. How has the idea of family size changed since the past century?
2. How has the concept of family structures changed over the last 30 years? Are nuclear families still the norm? What about same-sex families? Or childless families? What is your opinion regarding jigsaw or blended families?
3. The trouble with most children nowadays is that their parents are too easy with them. Do you agree? What's the best way to raise your children?
STUDENT B
1. What
kind of problems can put a great strain
on a relationship?
Think
about someone who got divorced or split up. What turned their relationship sour?
2. Are there more benefits or drawbacks to living
alone nowadays? Is it possible to be unattached and happy?
3. What is the best environment to raise a family
in?
PICTURES
·
jigsaw family/blended family:a family in which one or both partners have children
from a previous relationship, in addition to any children they have together.
E.g. Smash is staying with her mother for the holidays because her dad is on
honeymoon with his new young wife. So I have a very modern blended/ jigsaw
family.
·
adoption: the act of adopting a child.
·
birth parents: biological parents of a child.
·
custody: the legal right or duty to take care of or keep somebody/
something; the act of taking care of something/ somebody
·
foster care: a situation in which for a period of time a child lives
with and is cared for by people who are not the child's parents.
·
pass a law: make something legal
·
extended family: it extends beyond the nuclear family, consisting of parents like father,
mother, and their children, aunts, uncles, and cousins.
CONVERSATION
·
breadwinner /ˈbredwɪnə(r)/: a person who supports their family with the money they earn
·
provider:a person who
supports their family with the money they earn
·
black sheep:a person who is different from the rest of their family or another group,
and who is considered bad or embarrassing
·
role model:a person that you admire and try to copy
·
the apple of my eye:one's favorite person;
the one you love most
·
close-knit: consisting of people who do a lot of
activities together and look after one another. E.g. a close-knit family/ community/
team.
·
nuclear family: a family that consists of father, mother and children, when it is
thought of as a unit in society. E.g. Not everybody
nowadays lives in the conventional nuclear family.
·
breakdown/ˈbreɪkdaʊn/:a failure of a relationship, discussion or
system. E.g. she moved to London after the breakdown of her marriage.
·
other half/significant other:one's wife,
husband, or partner
·
tie the knot/get hitched:get married
·
empty nest syndrome: sadness or emotional distress affecting parents whose children have grown up
and left home.
·
apron strings: influence or control that someone has over you because you are afraid of
making your own decisions or of not doing what they say. E.g. be tied to
someone’s apron strings (=be influenced or controlled by someone). Even at 25
Jenny was tied to her parents’ apron strings. cut the apron strings: to stop providing support. E.g. Sending
kids to summer camps has been in decline in recent years, as parents have
become less and less inclined to cut the apron strings
·
a match made in Heaven: A marriage that is likely to be happy and successful because the marital
partners are very compatible.(idiomatic) A very successful combination of two
people or things.
·
blood is thicker than water: family relationships
and loyalties are the strongest and most important ones.
·
head over heels in love with: madly in love
·
to have a falling out with someone: to have a disagreement which ruins a relationship
with that person.
·
rule the roost (Sp. nido): /ruːst/ (informal) to be the
most powerful member of a group. E.g. Liverpool ruled the roost in English
football for a decade. Ultimately, men still rule the roost and make more
money. You just need to accept that your daughter is going to rule the roost
for most of her childhood.
·
born with a silver spoon in their mouth: they were born into a wealthy and privileged family.
·
child support: Money that a non-custodial parent pays to the custodial parent for their child(ren)'s
support.
MONOLOGUE
·
put great strain: to burden or overload someone or something
·
run in the family: to be a common feature in a particular family
·
turn sour /ˈsaʊə(r)/:become less pleasant; turn out badly
·
cheat on:to have a
secret sexual relationship with somebody else
·
hit on sb:to start talking to somebody to show them that you are sexually attracted
to them. E.g. Are you hitting on me? You're a married man!
·
hook up with sb: to meet somebody and spend time with them
·
take the bull by the horns:deal decisively with a difficult or dangerous
situation.
·
dump sb /dʌmp/:to end a romantic relationship
with somebody
·
have a crush on:a strong desire for
another person
·
kiss and make up:to become friendly again
after a fight or disagreement
·
on the rocks: a relationship or business that is on the rocks is having difficulties and is likely to fail soon. E.g. Sue's marriage is on the
rocks.
·
whisper sweet nothings in (someone's) ear:to murmur words of affection to someone in a
flirtatious manner. These words may be genuine or less serious. E.g. My
ex-boyfriend used to whisper sweet nothings in my ear and then sneak out with
his mistress later!
·
a chip off the old block: a person who is very similar to their mother or father
in the way that they look or behave. E.g. Jimmy
was a chip off the old block with his grey eyes and his dad’s smile.
·
like father, like son: said when a son takes after his father in mannerisms, interests, behaviour,
etc.
·
cope with: To endure something, usually something unpleasant or undesirable.
Student A
Sample answer
The topic I
would like to discuss with you today is the one of family and
relationships. More specifically, I
would like to focus on an area that I consider particularly interesting. It is how the concepts of family and
relationships in general have changed in our lifetime.
To start
with, I would like to reflect on how families have evolved
since the times of our grandparents. As
strange as it might seem today, our grandparents' generation believed that
having children meant an increase in their workforce and therefore they embraced the
idea of having many of them. So,
the more children they had, the more work could be carried out in the fields. As a matter of fact, my grandparents were farmers and all family
members were supposed to lend a helping
hand and shoulder the burden of the daily farm chores.
Nowadays,
however, we tend to have fewer children. Evidently,
we no longer see them as workforce. Quite
the opposite, we have become aware that they need our constant attention and
a lot of TLC (tender, loving care). Additionally,
we also enjoy an extended life expectancy. People live definitely longer
and this has of course influenced
family structures. We even have coined a new term, the so-called "Beanpole family", which describes a multi-generational family
that is thinly stretched over
several generations, with fewer family members in each generation and with growing numbers of single-parent
families.
In addition to family size, a further point
to discuss is family types. At the
time of our grandparents you would just find the most traditional families. Our
generation, on the other hand, has witnessed the emergence of a much wider range of family structures. A case in point is the single-parent families, which have become more common in recent years. Another family type to consider is the rainbow families, which include same-sex families and gender-diverse families. Apart from these, there is also the blended family, a family consisting of a couple, the children they have had together, and their children from previous relationships. Finally, another family type that has gained prominence recently is the foster family, which takes a child into their home for a while and takes care of him or her. In any case, what we should bear in mind is that there is no such thing as 'normal' or 'abnormal' family structures – we are all equal and love is what really makes a family.
Another area to consider, is our children's upbringing.
There are mainly two types of parenting, helicopter
parenting and free-range parenting. In
The former parents pay extremely close attention to their children's
experiences and problems. And the latter
advocates encouraging independence in
children. These parents believe that over-protectiveness
is a danger in itself. Indeed, a
child who thinks he cannot do anything on his own eventually can't. As the
popular saying goes "either if you say you can or you can't you are always
right.
Obviously, these two types of parenting
lead us to a dilemma. Are we living
in a risk-averse culture where we stifle our children's ability to deal
with danger by never allowing them to take reasonable risks? Does our society mollycoddle its children? Or do
free-range parents expose their children
to real and unnecessary danger? What do you think?
In conclusion, our generation has witnessed a major shift in not only the area of family size and structure but also in the emergence of
unconventional family types. Likewise, today's parents are in a quandary over whether
in our modern times they should rear their children in a protective or permissive way. In any case,
at this moment in time, we have all become
perfectly aware that we are
propelling our children to an unpredictable future. So, as
long as they have the skills to fend
for themselves, we as a society should feel proud and contented.
