This is an English lesson designed to help you practice and improve your English listening and pronunciation skills. The listening lesson is a short story about something that happened in my life in Canada. There is also a short pronunciation explanation about a word or sound I used in the story.

Story: A bathroom renovation that took forever!
Pronunciation explanation: the vowel r ‘er’ sound in an unstressed syllable!

If you have trouble with your listening skills, here’s something that may help:
How to practice listening

Listen to the podcast:
*Try to listen at least once without looking at the words!

Download the podcast in .mp3 from Podbean.com or itunes!

Listening Comprehension questions:

1. How big is the bathroom that was renovated?

2. Who did my parents hire to renovate the bathroom?

3. When did the workers start?

4. What has gone wrong so far?

5. What do I think of the bathroom?

Transcript:

(*Click on the links to learn more about the grammar, vocabulary and expressions used in the story!)

My parents decided to renovate one of the bathrooms in their house. It’s the smallest bathroom in the house, measuring only 5’ x 9’, but it was really worn-out and dated. Everything needed to be replaced. In most North American homes, the toilet, sink, bathtub and shower are all in the same room (and usually the shower is part of the bathtub).

They decided it would be easier to hire a contractor to do the renovations instead of doing it themselves. They found a local company that specialized in bathroom renovations, and they heard from a few neighbours that this company did good work.

Usually, companies want to do their best work in as little time as possible to minimize the disruption in the house. This company? Not so much! Three workers showed up on June 22nd to start taking everything out of the bathroom. It’s now August 31st and the bathroom still isn’t finished. You’ve never seen anyone work so slow in your life. There were at least 4 different people working on the bathroom … remember it’s only 5’ x 9’! Only one person can stand in the room at a time, so I don’t know what they were all doing.

The technician who put the tiles on the wall and floor seemed to take most of July. I got the feeling that he dragged out the work just so he could spend more time at the house. He seemed to really enjoy talking to my parents. He later admitted this was the first project he had done by himself. When he was done, more workers returned to install the vanity. Nobody was paying attention to where they put the vanity, so nobody noticed that it was too close to the window frame. Now, they cannot put the top drawer in. It took another two weeks to put the toilet in. The lights are still missing, so someone has to come back and install the light fixture.

If I were my parents, I would ask for a discount on the cost of the renovations!

Other than that, the bathroom looks great! It’s so bright in there now!

Discussion Questions:

Have you ever tried to renovate something in your house?

Did you do it by yourself or did you hire someone?

Let me know in the comments below!

Pronunciation – ‘er’ sound in an unstressed syllable

In last week’s listening lesson I told you about the vowel r sound ‘er.’ Now, let’s focus on the / ɚ/ sound in an unstressed syllable.

Listen to some words from the story:
measuring
contractor
neighbours

None of those words have the letters er at the end of the word, but all have the ‘er’ sound.

Whenever a vowel – any vowel – comes before an r in an unstressed syllable, particularly at the end of a word, it’s pronounced / ɚ /

Words that end in –ure:
future
culture
injure
failure
pressure

Words that end in –ar:
grammar
sugar
popular
backward

Words that end in –or
color
doctor
actor
major

Vocabulary:

5’ x 9’
It’s the smallest bathroom in the house, measuring only 5’ x 9’…
= the size of the bathroom
= five feet by nine feet (the ‘ is the symbol for feet)
In Canada we use the metric system, but we often measure things in feet and inches, like the Americans.

dated
…it was really worn-out and dated
= out-of-date, looking like it comes from a time in the past
(not to be confused with ‘dating someone’)

to drag (something) out
I got the feeling that he dragged out the work just so he could spend more time at the house
=purposely make something take longer than it should

technician
The technician who put the tiles on the wall and floor…
= a worker with special skills; usually it’s a worker in the fields of science and engineering, but in this case it’s specializes in house renovations

the vanity
…more workers returned to install the vanity.
= a small structure in a bathroom that includes the sink and cupboards