Public Transportation: Some Useful Verbs
| This is an entry in the “Public Transportation” series. You can find more information at the series’ main page.
This entry is available as a Adobe Acrobat file for printing or use in a class. This entry includes a listening exercise. You can dowload the MP3 or play it using the button below. (MP3) |
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I like public transportation because it’s more passive than driving the car. I can read a book while I ride into work, and I can relax after a long day’s work as I come home. But riding the tram isn’t completely passive, there are many things I do connected to using public transportation, and today we’re going to focus on learning the English verbs associated with these actions.
Before You Start The Recording
You’re going to hear me describe several verbs that we use in conjunction with public transportation. Think for a moment about what you think they might be. If you can’t think of English verbs, think in your own language about the verbs you use in public transportation. Start the recording now. The following is a list of the verbs I will be talking about.
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Drive
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Ride
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Get on
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Get off
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Change
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Show
After the Recording
How clear is the difference between ‘ride’ and ‘drive’ now? Where do you get on your public transportation? Where do you get off? How often do you have to change before you get to work?
Vocabulary
Drive: To ‘drive‘ a car, bus or tram means to ‘controll’ the car, bus, or tram. That means that, if you can’t make the bus go faster or slower, you aren’t driving it. When you talk about public transportation, you’ll want to use the verbs ‘ride’ and ‘take.’
Ride: To ‘ride‘ a car, bus, or tram means to be a passenger on the car, bus, or tram. If you can’t control how fast the tram is going—or where it stops—then you’re riding the tram. This is the verb we use the most with public transportation.
Get on: I’m lucky to have a tram that stops in front of my apartment. The tram can’t take me to work, though, unless I’m inside of it. When I go from the outside of the tram to the inside, I get on the tram.
Get off: Once, when I was coming home from work, I read my book and the tram and forgot that I had to leave the tram! The tram went past my house and I was still reading. I forgot to get off the tram, because my book was so good! That meant I had to get on another tram and ride it back to my apartment. I felt a little stupid telling the story to my wife.
Change: Two different trams stop near my apartment. But those two trams can’t go everywhere in the city. If I want to go to Ikea, for example, I have to take one tram into the city, get off that tram and get on another. I change trams in order to get into a tram that goes to Ikea.
Show: When the controller on the tram wants to see my ticket, I have to hold it so that he can see it. I show him the ticket. You can also show your friends photos, or papers, or even your apartment. If you help someone to see something, you ’show’ it to them.
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