1.Share your ideas about taking opportunities that life offers(Miss Opport)

This story is about James Graham, who had been working in the government service all his life. Now he is retired. He sure that he choose the right profession. He thought about his brother, who run away from the family at the age of 17, and they did not get in touch with him for a few years. Some years later, his brother sent a postcard, to say that he had got married and decided to become an actor. The author said that his brother changed many jobs, and invested money in different business. He risked all his life, but now he is a millionaire. He retired and lived in one of the richest places in America. And the James said when he was young he believed that his brother had missed all opportunities in his life, but now James think that his brother was the one who did that.

Analyze: This text is written in literary style. The language of this text is neutral both in style and expressiveness. The vocabulary is not emotionally colored. Yet there some features as idioms (the black sheep), set expressions and word combinations (a crazy scheme), which conveys the author’s opinion.

2. Talk about the relationships between the members of the Garstin family and Mrs Garstin's ambitions. (An extract from "The Painted Veil" by S.Maugham).

In my opinion, having a good family is an essential thing for a person. So, we can't be completely happy if we don't have a family or if the atmosphere in it is negative. For me home is the place where I can really relax, talk about my troubles, and feel really loved and important. However, not all people realize and appreciate it.

Such a thing happened to Mrs. Garstin who was a hard, cruel, ambitious, parsimonious and stupid woman. She despised her husband and nagged him without mercy. She discovered that if she wanted him to do smth she had only to give him no peace and eventually he would yield. Poor Bernard Garstin was painstaking, but had no will to advance himself to his ambitions. He was really scored of her, so he was always silent at home. Even for his daughters Mr. Garstin was only a source of income. They took it for granted that he led a dog's life in order to provide them with money. Of course, nobody thought about the feelings of the subdued little man who worked from morning till night.It was her daughters whom Mrs. Garstin put her hopes on. Her silver dream was to provide them with everything by arranging good marriages for them. One of her daughters, Kitty, was a real beauty, so Mrs. Garstin dreamt of a brilliant match for Kitty. When Kitty reached 25 and was still unmarried, her mother was angry. She understood that Kitty had missed her market. Doris, Kitty's younger sister, at the age of 18 became engaged to the son of a rich surgeon who had been given a baronetcy during the war. Kitty in panic married a young doctor who took her to Hong Kong.

Mrs. Garstin really puts me off because she spoiled the lives of her closest people: her husband whom she nobody respected, her elder daughter, having married a man whom she didn't adore, her younger daughter to whom she would always say she was ugly.

This woman really puts me off because she herself was a loser: she didn't have a career and could not be a good wife and mother.

Analyze: This text is full of idioms, comparisons and metaphors which are used to give specific expressiveness. The author describes the characters, their behavior and feelings by using emotionally coloured words and phrases. These language devices are used to convey the author’s attitude to the events and to produce the specific effect on reader.

3. Talk about the frustrations and rewards of teaching as seen by an American university teacher. (“Why I teach”).

Well, I guess everyone would admit that teaching is a vocation and if you are not cut out for it, it is better not to take it up. it is not an easy task as it may seem at first sight. The narrator, an American university teacher, proves my words!

He says that teaching is not at all easy for him, he adds that teaching is the most difficult of all the ways he has attempted to earn his living: mechanic, carpenter, university administrator, writer. For him it’s a red-eye, sweaty-palm, sinking-stomach profession. Red-eye, because he never feels ready to teach no matter how late at night he stays up to prepare. Sweaty-palm, because he is always nervous before he enters the classroom. Sinking-stomach, because he usually walks out an hour later convinced that he was even more boring than usual.

But at the same time there are many rewards of teaching!

• He teaches because he likes the pace of the academic calendar and teaching is built on change. Even when the material he teaches is the same he changes, and, more important, his students change.

• He also likes the freedom to make his own mistakes, to learn his own lessons, to himself and his students.

• As a teacher he is his own boss.

• He likes to ask questions that students must struggle to answer.

• His job gives him variety and challenge and, what is the most valuable, the opportunity to learn by himself.

• In conclusion he admits that being a teacher is being there, being present at the creation, when the clay begins to breath. So, being around people who are beginning to breathe, he occasionally finds himself catching his breath with them.

• Having read this story, I realized that teaching is a very difficult profession to follow but worth to be taken up as a great deal of rewardings covers all the struggles!!!

The text is written as a first person narration and laid out as an answer to the underlying questions Why do you teach/On the whole the text is written in a literary style.At the same time the vocabulary of the taxt varies from stylistically neutral and conversational to formal and lofty word(condemn,praise)and from emotionally neutral to very expressive and colourful vocabulary.It includes: compound word some of which will not be found in a dictionary as they are created by the author himself to express his idea vividly(sweaty-palm,red-eye,sinking-stomach);repeated inverted constraction Nor do I teach;metaphorical adj+noun collacations(an ivory tower);an idiomatic expressions(college material)

4,5. Talk about the business of teaching English to foreihners in England (An English Language Teacher in Bath)

When I was reading the story "An English Language Teacher in Bath” I saw that the author had used two different language features in the text. The first one is the language of description. Bath which is located in the county of Somerset is a very popular destination for tourists in the England and from all over the world. Bath boasts some of the most spectacular architectural buildings and sights in the world. As author notices "Bath like Venice and other beautiful cities, was a little like a museum."

So in this story Nick McLiver who writes articles "about people who work in every day jobs in various parts of Britain" visits Julian, an English language teacher, who works in "fairly small school." And here author uses the second feature - the language of conversation from which we can understand what is the business of teaching English to foreigners in England.

So this is a very big and popular business. From different countries students come for training of foreign language. Also, there are summer programs for students who just can come in the summer. In addition to studying the schools do summer camps and other activities for students. There are also programs for adults who come for holidays or live here and work for local companies. In this case, for the teacher is enough to know just English. As Julian Gobdard notices, today teaching English in schools has improved, and when people come to his school, they already have a sufficient level of English "to communicate to a certain extent". If he would even know two or three languages, it would not help him much, because in a group can be "Swedes, an Italian, a Spaniard, a Japanese, a Russian and a Hungarian."

The main point is if you want to learn English well, you need to find as more ways as possible for study like radio, TV, books and what is more important to be not afraid to talk.

Analyze: This text is written in a literally style and it abounds an adjectives and set expressions. There is a good number of spoken phrases in this text. All these devices are used to express the author’s attitude to the text.(idioms-a mixed bag,a varied back,target language)

6. Talk about some typical unpleasant childhood memories that people might have. Describe an episode from your or someone else's childhood that changed to a certain extent your vision of the adult world. ("The snowdrops").

This story tells us about a boy who is waiting to see the snowdrops in his school yard. His teacher promised the class that they could all go outside and look at the snowdrops.While the children are looking at the miraculous flowers, they can see a funeral procession passing the school. In this morning, earlier, boy’s parents were talking about a twenty years old man that killed in a motorbike accident, and it is his funeral. The author tells us that the boy’s teacher knows the young man that has died and loves him.

I would say that snowdrops in this story symbolize the renewal of life that comes in the spring and help describe Miss Webster's mood. The boy is so naive and does not want to see out of the box. He heard a talk between his parents about a motorbike accident and his teacher and after that he was thinking that Miss Webster was upset about her finger and during a funeral procession he was looking for her to explain these flowers. There is another example, he notices that Miss Webster is so brave because she did not cry when she trapped her finger in the cupboard door and he seems so frightened when he sees her crying because he does not expect it. He does not feel the difference of pain.

However, like these flowers are growing up after the winter, the boy grows to understand the adult world, the reality of death and grief by seeing his teacher standing at the gate and crying.

Also I think that the main idea is that we often imagine things or people that are not what they are made out to be. The boy had great expectations about the flowers, but it turned out that they are not anything special. In this story the snowdrops are described as being fragile flowers that “shake, and straighten gallantly'' and this description fits Miss Webster. She was in a very fragile state after losing her boyfriend and tried to stay strong by coming to work and smiling. “she was dressed in black frock, without any jewelry, but smiled at them…” and on other hand “ …she was standing right at the gate, holding the iron bars with her hands. Her shoulders were shaking.”

In conclusion I would say that in everyone's life there are events that are changing our world view and make us more mature. We gain experience and evaluate the past we go into the future more and more mature and that is life!

Analyze: the specific feature of this text is that the author describes the event from the boy’s view and feelings. The boy seems to be live and kind and he is sorry for his teacher who lost her dear friend. The author uses a lot of different adverbs and adjectives to intensify the meaning of the word combinations and to describe the emotional state of the boy more presizely.