The environment under threat
Exercise 1: Discuss
Look at the words/phrases below and match them to the pictures.
a c
Photograph by Tim Norris
[Link]
Photograph by Anthony Mayfield
[Link]
b Photograph by Chiara Marra
[Link]
Photograph by marinephotobank
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1. acid rain
2. household waste Photograph by ionntag
[Link]
3. water pollution /
4. overfishing
5. genetically modified crops
In class, discuss the following questions:
Which do you think is the greatest threat to the global environment today?
What can we do to reduce this threat?
Are you doing anything yourself? If so, what?
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Exercise 2: Share what you know
Look at the expressions below. Tick the ones you don't know. Then ask your partner if he/she can
help you understand them. If he/she can’t, ask other students in your class! If there are words
nobody knows, don't worry – you'll have a chance to guess the meaning later.
1. fossil fuels 6. biodegradable
2. (non)-renewable 7. the greenhouse effect
3. solar energy 8. global warming
4. (non)-finite 9. melting
5. to recycle 10. flooding
Exercise 3: Guess from the text
The words/expressions you've just been discussing appear in the text below. Read the text and
discuss whether you now have the same, or a different, understanding of the words/expressions. If
you're still not sure what a word/phrase means, ask another student.
For many years we've relied on ‘fossil fuels’ to heat our homes and power our industries.
Examples of fossil fuels are oil, coal, and gas. Such fuels are ‘non-renewable’ and ‘finite’.
Meanwhile, energy may come from other sources, such as solar energy. Such a source of
energy is ‘renewable’ and ‘non-finite’. Maybe by using these latter forms of energy we can help
preserve our valuable resources.
But what else can we do to help our environment? Firstly, we can all learn to ‘recycle’ our
waste. Secondly, we can make sure we buy more things in ‘biodegradable’ packaging (this will
rot away and does not need to be burnt or dumped).
In any event, we need to act now, because our world is changing fast. Perhaps the most
difficult problem is that of the ‘greenhouse effect’ (this means that the radiation of the sun's rays
is trapped in the earth's atmosphere). The result of the greenhouse effect is ‘global warming’.
And if global warming continues, we may see the ‘melting’ of the Arctic and Antarctic ice packs
– which could lead to terrible ‘flooding’.
Exercise 4: Check the meaning
Answer the following questions in class.
1. Will fossil fuels last for ever?
2. Where does solar energy come from?
3. Give examples of things that people can recycle.
4. Give an example of something that you can buy in a supermarket that is a) biodegradable and
b) not biodegradable.
5. Explain why we use the term ‘greenhouse effect’.
6. In global warming, what happens to the temperature of the earth?
Exercise 5: Use your dictionary
Look up the following words in your dictionary and fill in the chart below.
• to renew • to recycle
Word/phrase Meaning Type of word Word stress Sample sentence
e.g biodegradable e.g. which decomposes e.g. adjective e.g. biodegradable e.g. Cardboard boxes are
naturally biodegradable.
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Exercise 6: Fill the blanks
Study the definitions of the words very carefully. Then fill in the spaces using the words and
phrases from the box. You can use more than one phrase in each space.
in a different
deliberate human replaced reused natural
way
Renewing is a .................................................... process, whereas recycling is a
.................................................................. process. In renewing, something is
................................................................., whereas in recycling something is
................................................................................................. .
Exercise 7: Build new words
Some of the words you saw at the beginning of the unit appear in the chart below. Where you see
an asterisk, try to fill in the necessary word. If you can't do all of them, use a dictionary.
Noun Verb Adjective Adverb
* * renewable
* finite
*
recycling * *
energy * * *
effect * * *
* * global *
*
Exercise 8. Find collocations
Collocations are words that typically go together. Choose a collocation for each of the words
below. Tick one of the three words in brackets.
1. RENEW (a licence; a lesson; a window)
2. RECYCLABLE (resources; packaging; power)
3. GLOBAL (likes; economy; store)
4. HAVE A (remarkable; strong; heavy) EFFECT ON
5. (huge; tremendous; enormous) ENERGY
6. INFINITE (intelligence; wisdom; cleverness)
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Teachers’ notes and key
Aims:
• understanding the meanings of ten lexical items related to the environment
• recording target vocabulary systematically
• careful use of a learner dictionary
• expanding lexis through word-building and collocation work
Topics: the environment, in particular global warming
Timings: exercise 1. – 12 mins; exercise 2. – 15 mins; exercise 3. - 7 mins; exercise 4. – 8 mins;
exercise 5. – 8 mins; exercise 6. – 6 mins; exercise 7. – 7 mins; exercise 8. – 6 mins Total time: 69
mins
Exercise 1
1. acid rain - e 4. overfishing - a
2. household waste - d 5. genetically modified crops - c
3. water pollution - b
Exercise 4
1. No – they are limited.
2. the sun
3. cans/tins, newspapers, glass, plastic, cardboard…
4. a) anything made of natural fibres e.g. food, paper, cardboard… b) anything made of plastic
5. In a greenhouse, the sun's rays go through the glass, and the heat remains in the greenhouse.
Similarly, in the ‘greenhouse effect’ the sun's rays are not ‘reradiated’ out of the atmosphere
(because of increased CO2).
6. It increases.
Exercise 6
Renewing is a natural process, whereas recycling is a deliberate human process. In renewing,
something is replaced, whereas in recycling something is reused in a different way.
Exercise 7
Note that some of these are used outside the context of the environment.
renewal/renew
infinity/infinite
recycle/recyclable
energise/energetic/energetically
effect*/effective/effectively
globe/globalisation/globalise/globally
*Note the difference between ‘to effect’ and ‘to affect’: ‘to effect’ means ‘to make happen’, e.g. ‘to
effect a change’; ‘to affect’ means ‘to influence’, e.g. ‘The bad weather affected farmers.’
Exercise 8
Note that some of these collocations, particularly number 6, are very difficult because the right
word does not depend on the meaning, but simply on convention.
1. a licence 4. remarkable
2. packaging 5. tremendous
3. economy 6. wisdom
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