Exercise 10B, page 3 - English File Studetn's book, pre-intermediate, Oxford

3 LISTENING

a ① 10.7 You're going to listen to a radio programme about getting up early. Listen to the first part. What does Tim Powell do at these times/for these periods of time?

1 5.45 He wakes up at 5.45.

2 30 minutes

3 Just before 9.00 a.m.

4 9.00 a.m.

5 5.20 a.m. on Thursdays

6 70 hours

b Listen again. Complete the sentence about Tim.

Tim gets up early because ________

c ① 10.8 Now listen to the second part of the programme. Complete three reasons why it's good to get up early.

1 The first reason why it's good to get up early is that the early morning is ________.

2 The second reason is that if you get up early, you ________ early.

3 The third reason is that it's better to ________ in the morning, when you have ________.

d Listen again. What examples does the presenter give to explain each reason? What advice does he give to people who have problems getting up early?

e Do you think getting up very early is a good idea? If you got up an hour earlier, what would you do with your extra hour?

10.7

Tim Powell isn't a morning person. Which is surprising, because on weekdays he gets up very early. While most of us are still asleep, Powell wakes up at 5.45, does exercise for 30 minutes in his home gym, and has a big breakfast. Then he gets ready for work and drives to the office. When he gets to the building where he works, he goes for a walk around a local park, then he goes inside to start work at 9. And on Thursdays he gets up even earlier, at 5.20 a.m., to study German.

Powell is a lawyer. He works 70 hours a week, and he says that getting up early helps him to do more during the day. He isn't the only one – many busy, successful people get up very early.

10.8

Experts agree that getting up early is a big help if you have a lot of things to do. There are three main reasons for this. The first reason is that if you get up early, you go to bed early. Nobody phones you at 6.00 a.m. There aren’t any important emails or messages to answer. There aren’t any meetings. There aren’t any people. The morning is your time.

The second reason is that if you get up early, you go to bed early. Most people don’t do anything useful in the evenings. People who go to bed late spend many hours watching TV, seeing their friends, and spending time on social media. So if you want to do a lot, it’s better to go to bed early, and have shorter evenings and longer mornings.

The third reason is that it’s better to do things in the morning, when you have energy. Most people are tired after a day at work or college. And when you’re tired, the last thing you want to do is to exercise, or to study, or to practise a musical instrument.

And if you find it impossible to get up early? Set your alarm five minutes earlier than you usually get up. And the next day set it five minutes earlier again. After three weeks you’ll have nearly two hours that you never had before!