Speak Better English with Harry | Episode 530

This English vocabulary lesson helps you learn natural words and phrases for describing movement — ideal for speaking fluently and improving your English for conversation, writing, or exams. It’s designed for intermediate and advanced learners who want to build stronger vocabulary, understand how native speakers use everyday English, and prepare for exams like IELTS, CAE, or TOEFL. You’ll explore real-life language that boosts fluency and helps you sound more natural in spoken and written English.

Transcript

Hi there, this is Harry.
Welcome back to Advanced English Lessons with Harry, where I try to help you to get a better understanding of the English language, to help you with your conversational skills, your business English skills, interview skills, whatever your goals are, we're here to help.
And for those of you and your friends or family who want one-to-one lessons, well, you know what to do.
Just get in touch, www.englishlessonviaskype.com and you can apply for a free try lesson and we'll be very happy to hear from you and very happy to help you.

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And in the advanced English lesson today, we're looking at different verbs about movement.
Okay, now these will be really important, particularly for those of you who are preparing for exams, whether it be the FCE or CAE or the IELTS exams.
There are 18 actually in this particular list, so we'll go through them.
So first one is soar, S-O-A-R, so.
And when something soars, it goes up very quickly and usually very suddenly, okay, like rockets soar up into the sky.
So when you hear the countdown, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, etc.
And then boom, the rocket will soar up into the sky very, very quickly.
Or prices can soar when there's rampant inflation.
So if the price of petrol goes from $2 or 2 euros for a litre up to $3 or 3 euros in the space of a few days or weeks, we might say prices at the petrol pumps have soared recently.
They've gone up really, really quickly.
Number two is this word hurtle.
So to be careful with the pronunciation, you'll see the spelling appearing on the screen here, H-U-R-T-L-E, hurtle.
So this is when something is falling, but a little bit out of control.
So for example, if you're like me, not such a good skier, and when you get to the top of the blue run, you look down and go, uh-oh, and then you make a mistake, and then you hurtle down the slope, a little bit out of control, like a big snowball.
Yeah, okay, so to hurtle means to fall very, very fast.
Yeah, so he hurtled down the slope when he lost his balance trying to stand up and ski properly.
He just missed his turn.
Okay, so to hurtle.
And it can hurtle out of control.
Perhaps it's an aeroplane that the pilot has fallen asleep at the controls or he's had a heart attack and the plane hurtles out of control.
So it's going in lots of different directions, but falling very, very quickly until the co-pilot is able to take over and get control to hurtle.
Number three is to zoom.
Okay, so lots of things can zoom.
Okay, you can zoom in with your telephoto lens on your camera so that you make something really close and you get very, very close to it, even though you are quite a distance away.
So you can zoom to bring you closer to the animal or piece of wildlife that you're trying to photograph without frightening it away.
Okay, zoom.
Or trains can zoom through the station when they don't stop.
If you've ever stood on a platform and a train goes by without stopping and wow, you can feel the pull of the wind as the train goes by and it zooms.
Yeah, one minute it's there and the next zoom, it's gone.
Or watching a Formula One race on the TV and you hear this noise of all of these wonderfully high-performing engines, zoom, zoom, zoom, as they pass by the camera on your screen.
Okay, to zoom.
Number four, whiz.
Whiz is another good movement sound and verb.
To whiz through something means to go through something very quickly.
So perhaps you are a speed reader.
Yeah, you can read very quickly and it doesn't take you long to get an understanding of what an article is or a book is about.
So you can read it quickly.
So you've just got some books from the library and after a couple of hours, you finish one of the books already and your mother or father turns to you and say, wow, you whizzed through that really, really quickly, meaning you read with great speed.
Okay, so to whizz means to go quickly.
You can whiz around the shops if you're in a hurry.
You're going to the supermarket to buy the weekly groceries, but you're in a little bit of a hurry.
So you've got a good idea of what you want.
You've got a mental note of the things you bought the last time or the things you usually buy.
So you whizz up and down the different lanes in the supermarket with your trolley, boom, boom, up and down, whizzing around, and you eventually get back to the starting point, back to the checkout.
Okay, so to whizz through something.
So watch out for the preposition, to whizz through, or you can whizz around the supermarket.
Number five, roll across.

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Well, this is what happens when something is usually a round, circular shape.
It will roll like a football or a can or a table tennis ball or a tennis ball.
A car, if you take the handbrake off the car and push the car, it will roll across the street.
Okay, so anything that rolls end after end, something that's circular like a globe.
Or if you have a roll of carpet that you're getting ready to put down in your new living room or hall and you drop it, it will roll across the floor.
Or the roll of wallpaper that you're going to use on the walls, it will roll across the floor if you drop that.
Okay, so anything that is circular, anything that is round, the action, the movement will be to roll across the floor.
Number six, this is the word plunge.
And number one, we use the word soar.
So this is the exact opposite.
So when something goes up very quickly, we talk about soar or soaring prices.
When something falls really quickly, we talk about plunge or plunging prices.
So if the gas crisis is ever over and the supply far outstrips demand, then we might see an end to rising gas prices.
And in fact, they may plunge on the market.
The reports in the papers will say, oh, crisis in the gas market.
Prices have plunged for the second week in a row.
Okay, so to plunge means to fall very quickly.
Or you can plunge into the water.
So you jump off a very high cliff into the water below.
You plunge the depths of the sea.
You go down and down and down.
And eventually, then the force of gravity will bring you back up.
So to plunge means to go down, but to go down really, really quickly.
Number seven, whirl around.
Well, whirl means to go around almost in circles.
Okay, so if I look outside, I will see bits of paper, bits of twigs from branches whirling around with the strength of the wind.
So they are almost going in circles because the wind is blowing constantly from all different directions.
So that's to whirl around.
Or if you go to the old-fashioned dance clubs and dance halls, people used to enjoy whirling around the dance floor with their partner.
They whirl around the dance floor.
Or a boyfriend or partner speaking to his or her partner might say, come on, let's go for a quick whirl around the dance floor one more time and then we'll go home.
So to whirl around, to dance around.
Okay, so it means to spin around or to move very quickly.
Okay, to whirl around.
Number eight is this word you might have heard of.
Whoosh.
Yeah, that's the sound it makes.
Whoosh.
And again, look at the screen for the spelling of the word.
Just be careful with the pronunciation.
Whoosh.
And this is the sound the wind makes as it whooshes through the trees.
You hear the rustling of the leaves in the autumn, the dry leaves and the wind blowing through the tree.
You get that whoosh sound.
Or in the winter, when the trees are bare, the wind will blow in an unstoppable way through the trees.
Whoosh, whoosh.
So the movement of the wind.
Whoosh.
Okay, to whoosh through the trees.
Number nine, a little bit slower now, so we'll slow it down a bit.
The word is crawl.
To crawl means to move very, very slowly.
Crawl.
Okay, so if your car is in trouble, it's got some mechanical difficulty and you crawl along the street until you get to the garage looking for help.
Something's wrong with my car.
I can't get it to go.
It's out of first gear, so I had to crawl here.
Or if the traffic is really heavy and your car is fine, but you're just not able to go very fast because there's too much traffic, you get to the office and say, oh, I'm sorry for being late.
The traffic just crawled along today.
I don't know what happened.
So moved really, really slowly.
And crawl is often the first action of a young child just before it begins to walk.
So for several months, the child will crawl along the floor on its hands and knees.
Yeah?
It moves he or she slowly as they crawl along.
And then as they get a little bit more adventurous, they crawl along, but a little bit more quickly.
And when you thought the child was behind you, you look around and she or he is somewhere else in a different room.
But crawling means that action being on the hands and knees or something that moves really, really slowly.
Okay, so that gets us up to number 10.
Now number 10 is all about military steps, marching, okay?
So the marching of the soldiers, you hear the noise left, right, left, right, left, right, as they march in unison along the parade or around the parade under the watchful eye of their corporal or sergeant or whoever is in charge of that particular part of the military at the time.
So they march, okay?
So it's a forced step.
It's a regular beat.
Okay, so march, want to, want to.
And we can also have the marching of a brass band and they march up and down the streets, playing their brass instruments, their horns and whatever it might be.
So the marching of the band.
So it's very musical, very rhythmical.
But it's a little bit like that military step.
They are all marching in line, one behind the other, to march.
Number 11 is to leap.
Leap is a jump, usually leaping into the air, leap from one stone or rock to the other.
One giant step, one leap.
Lots of animals leap.
When you watch them, they don't just run, they run and they leap across the ground.
So helps them to go a little bit quicker to leap.
Number 12, to drift.
Okay, this often refers to water and ships and boats.
Not always, but most of the time.
So you can drift out to sea.
So if you're unfortunate or not so careful and you're lying on one of these airbeds on the sea and then the current or the wind takes you out, you drift out to sea and it could be very, very dangerous.
So you have to be very, very careful.
Or if the boat isn't tied up to the edge of the river or the lake with the current on the water or the tide, it will drift out.
It will drift out into open water.
Or it will drift away, meaning it'll just disappear and you won't be able to stop it or you won't even be able to find it.
So you can say drift out or drift away.
Number 13, creep.
Now this is again is another action, another slow action, but usually it's something when you're trying to do something unseen or unheard or in the quiet or secret.
Okay, so he crept up the stairs as he came in late at night because he didn't want to wake the rest of the family.
But of course, as he tried to creep up the stairs, the stairs were creaking.
Yeah.
And of course, everybody knew who it was and what time it was.
And the next morning, ah, we heard you coming in.
We heard you creeping up the stairs.
Or as the parents do at Christmas, they creep down the stairs to put out all the presents under the tree so the children will get a great surprise on Christmas morning when they wake up.
So they creep up the stairs or creep down the stairs.
Or burglars, they creep around the house not to disturb the residents or the neighbours so that they can steal what they came to steal.
So they crept around the house in darkness, trying to find the jewels or the money or whatever they were after to creep.
Number 14, limp.
If you've got a sore foot, a sore leg, a knee you hurt playing some sport, then you'll know all about this word because it's very difficult to put your weight, your full weight on your foot, your ankle, your leg or your knee because it really hurts.
So you are forced to limp around.
So you can't put all of your weight on that left or right leg.
So you have to almost hop.
Yeah, so you limp, you drag your leg a little bit and somebody says, what happened to you?
You're limping.
Oh, you know, it's one of those silly things.
I told the friends that I'd play football with them.
And I really, I haven't played football for years.
Of course, five minutes in, somebody tackled me.
That was it.
Twisted my ankle.
And I've been limping all over the weekend.
Well, you know what you should do with that?
You should ice it.
Put plenty of ice.
That's what you should do.
Ice it.
Okay.
That's a family joke in this house, to ice it.
Anytime something goes wrong with somebody, ice it.
Ice it.
So when you're limping, you've hurt your leg, then yeah, you need to be careful, but you limp.
Yeah, you can't put all of your weight on that left foot or the right foot.
You have to limp.
Or some unfortunate dogs or cats that have been hit by a car or just old age for the dog, they limp around the house.
They limp around the garden because they are not able to put all of their weight on that leg either to limp.
Number 15, stagger, another interesting movement of the legs.
Yes, we stagger down the stairs in the morning when we've just got out of bed and we're not really with it yet and we really need a cup of coffee to wake us up.
So we stagger down the stairs.
Of course, if you've had one or two drinks more than you should have had, you're definitely going to stagger.
You'll stagger along the street home from the pub.
The morning comes and the partner says, what time did you stagger home at?
I heard the door opening.
I heard the door banging.
I heard you falling about the stairs.
You must have been in an awful state.
You were staggering here and staggering there.
Okay, so stagger can be self-inflicted because you've had too much to drink.
You can stagger because you're sick, not feeling so well.
Perhaps you're going to faint and you stagger over to the chair to sit down.
The temperature outside is touching 38.
You really needed to bring some water.
You can feel the heat and you stagger around the park, not feeling so good.
So you find a park bench and you eventually sit down.
So to stagger.
Number 16 here, slide, to slide down.
When you take the kids to the park, they love playing on the playground.
So you've got swings, roundabouts, all sorts of things.
And of course, you've got the slide.
And the slide is literally, you sit on the top and slide down.
That's the motion.
That's the action.
That's the movement from the top to the bottom to slide down.
And in the past tense, slid.
He slid down on his bum.
Okay, so if you take the kids skiing and you go in one of these little rubber rings down a little slope, you slide down to the bottom or he slid down on his bottom because he couldn't control the wheel or the tire.
Okay, slide, slid, and usually with that preposition down, to slide down.
And you can use it in lots of different ways.
Again, if we use it in a sporting context, if a tennis player hasn't been playing well for several months, he hasn't been winning any competitions or qualifying for the important rounds, then he will slide down the points table.
So he's not winning enough points and the people behind him are overtaking him.
And now he's number 20th in the world rankings when he used to be number eight.
So he has slid down the table and he needs to improve his performance.
Otherwise, he's not going to get invited to the big events to slide down.
Number 17, rush.
Okay, when you're in a rush, you're in a hurry.
When you're in a rush, you are running around quickly, grabbing this, grabbing that.
So you get up late out of bed, you run down the stairs and your partner says, you got time for breakfast?
No, no, I'm in a rush.
I have to rush.
I have to go very, very quickly.
I've got a meeting and, oh my God, in half an hour, I really need to go.
So you have to rush, okay?
Or you're meeting friends for coffee.
I said, look, I can only stay for a few minutes.
I have to rush home.
It's my wife's birthday.
And I promised I would take her out.
Yeah, so to rush means to do something quickly, to do something in a hurry, not necessarily so well planned.
And usually because you're late for something.
You've left it late to get up.
You've left it late to buy that present for your wife.
You've left it late to get to the office.
So inevitably, you have to rush to get there, to rush.
And then finally, stroll.
Stroll around the place as if there's no tomorrow.
Yeah, you just stroll around the park, not in a rush.
You stroll around the shopping centre doing some window shopping.
The impresario who's introducing the theatrical performance comes onto the stage, strolls across the stage.
Ladies and gentlemen, it's my great pleasure this evening to welcome you to blah blah blah blah blah.
So strolls onto the stage and makes the announcements.
Okay, so these are all different verbs connected with movement words and verbs that you can use in all of those proficiency exams, particularly in writing, but also in your speaking tests.
You've got 18 of them, so lots of them to choose from.
I suggest that you pick a few, practice, see what action activity you can associate with them and see how you can use them.
And as always, you know the drill by now.
If you don't understand any or you need some extra help or you need some other examples, yeah, you just drop me a line, www.englishlessonviaskype.com.
Very happy to hear from you.
Very happy to help you.
So this is Harry.
Thanking you for watching, for listening.
And as always, join me for the next lesson.