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Improve your Speaking online Episode 12, Introduction:

This week we bring new current topics in Episode 12 so you can improve your online speaking from home.

Topic 1: Healthy food

«Limited availability of healthy food options can contribute to poor health outcomes

“Limited availability of affordable and healthy foods can contribute to poor health»

Article
Limited availability of affordable and healthy foods can contribute to poor health outcomes, especially for residents of rural and low-income regions.

That is one of the conclusions of a study conducted by an agricultural economist at Penn State who examined the food environment for residents in the Mississippi Delta, a region that has one of the highest obesity rates in the U.S.

The findings have important implications not only in the Mississippi Delta, but for other regions of the country where convenience stores and dollar stores generally comprise the highest proportion of stores available, noted Linlin Fan, assistant professor of agricultural economics in the College of Agricultural Sciences.

This food environment is associated with household food choices and the ability of consumers to access and afford healthy diets, said Fan, who collaborated on the study with Elizabeth Canales, assistant professor in the Department of Agricultural Economics, Mississippi State University

Mississippi has a large rural population and is among the states with the highest obesity rates in the country, the scientists noted. The Delta region of Mississippi has some of the greatest income inequality, highest rates of poverty and highest prevalence of preventable, nutrition-related chronic diseases in the country.

In 2019, the researchers used the Market Basket Assessment Tool -; a retail environment audit instrument -; to evaluate differences in prices and availability of healthy foods in the eight counties with the highest obesity rates in the Delta region.

These counties were Holmes, Humphreys, Issaquena, Leflore, Quitman, Sharkey, Sunflower and Washington. Of the counties evaluated, three had a supermarket, one had only a convenience store, and the remainder had a small number of grocery stores. «The predominant food retail format in all counties was convenience stores,» Fan said.

She added that 24% of the population in those counties are low income and around 10% receive SNAP benefits, which limits the stores where they can purchase food. Additionally, approximately 36% live 1-10 miles away from a supermarket or a grocery store and often do not have access to transportation.

The team collected information from 71 SNAP-authorized stores in the eight-county region. These stores included four supermarkets, 17 medium-sized and small grocery stores, 14 dollar stores, and 36 convenience stores

To determine a healthy food availability and quality score across food outlets, the scientists documented the number of items available in six food groups -; grains; fruit; vegetables; meat; dairy and eggs; and dried beans, seeds and nuts. They also evaluated food prices across store formats based on dollars per ounce.

Their findings, recently published in Preventing Chronic Disease, showed that supermarkets provided the healthiest assortment of foods, followed by grocery stores. The healthy foods availability and quality score for convenience stores, which comprise the highest proportion of store formats in the region, was 70% lower than for supermarkets.

Compared with the prices at supermarkets, the prices at convenience stores were 48% higher for grains, 35% higher for fruits and vegetables, 73% higher for meats, and 95% higher for beans, seeds and nuts. The healthfulness of foods available at dollar stores also was lower than the healthfulness at supermarkets, but prices were generally similar.

For all food groups, the scientists found a significant gap between scores for convenience stores and scores for supermarkets and grocery stores, and the difference was most striking for fruits and vegetables. This gap is explained by the lack of fruit and vegetable options, Canales said.

For example, she explained that none of the convenience stores carried frozen fruit, and only a few carried fresh fruits and vegetables. Convenience stores and dollar stores generally sold eggs and milk -; albeit in smaller packages than at supermarkets or grocery stores -; but low-fat cheese and yogurt were rarely available.

Fan and Canales said their results have important implications because they affect a considerable segment of the population, specifically those who acquire foods at retail outlets other than supermarkets and grocery stores. These residents must resort to convenience or dollar stores to meet their food needs because of the limited access to supermarkets or full-service grocery stores.

«We suggest ways to promote healthy food environments including marketing and educational efforts about the importance of healthy food choices, and SNAP subsidies to purchase fruits and vegetables,» Fan said. «Initiatives such as these could go a long way in making a difference in health outcomes for those who need it most.»

Also contributing to the research were David Buys, associate professor, Department of Food Science, Nutrition and Health Promotion, Mississippi State University, and Marven Cantave, project lead, Feeding America, Lexington, Mississippi.

The project received funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

We will focus the conversation on the following questions:

  1. Which are the benefts of healthy food?
  2. Do you think that healty food is more expensive than the trash food? Why?
  3. Which is th largest rural area in united states? a. Florida b. Mississippi. c. Nevada.
  4. Does pooverty have relation with obesity? Why, Why not?
  5. Do you eat healthy food?

 

Here we leave you some vocabulary you can use during the talk:

  • affordable– something that you can have, you have money to buy it.
  • outcome– result of something.
  • to promote – encourage or to advice
  • inequiality – lack of equility
  • prevalence of preventable -is very dominat, and have an great importance.
  • collected information– brought together a lot of infomation.
  • convenience store – a retail that carries out an limited selccion of basic items.
  • preventing chronic disease– stop form develeping an long lasting sickness

Topic 2: Lifestyle habits

«Healthy lifestyle habits that can help avoid obstructive sleep apnea«

Obstructice sleep apnea (OSA) is a common sleep-related breathing disorder that causes people to repeatedly start and stop breathing.

Article
Civilians will start leaving the besieged Ukrainian city of Sumy Tuesday under an agreement with Russia on the establishment of a “humanitarian corridor”, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said. “It has been agreed that the first convoy will start at 10 am (1.30 pm IST) from the city of Sumy. The convoy will be followed by the local population in personal vehicles,” she said in a televised statement. Russia said that humanitarian corridors have been opened from Cherniakhiv, Kharkiv, Kyiv and Mariupol as well, reported news agency Interfax citing Russian defence ministry. The Russian announcement came hours after a third round of talks between Ukraine and Russia in western Belarus

 

We will focus the conversation on the following questions:

  1. Do you know what an apnea is?
  2. Which is the most common cause of the sleep apnea? Name factors that are written in the article.
  3. Can apnea be lethal?
  4. Can apnea be overlooked as something that is not important?
  5. Do you believe that is important to have an healthy lifestyle? Explain.

 

Here we leave you some vocabulary you can use during the talk:

  • overlook – fail to notice, donnot give importance.
  • noticeable– attracting atention
  • pressure– force of an certain action, feeling of harassment. 
  • ensure- to makessure of something
  • sedative medicines- a substance that makes you feel sleepy and calm
  • restorative sleep – a great sleep that makes you feel new after wakeup.
  • breathing disorder– a kind of disease that affects lungs and other parts of ypur respiratory system.
  • Obstructive sleep apnea – occurs when the muscles the supports the muscles of the soft tissues in the thorat temporary relax.

Topic 3: Music as Therapy

«Art and music therapy seem to help with brain disorders.«

Is it possible to overcome an mental trauma or disease by using music?

Article
When Michael Schneider’s anxiety and PTSD flare up, he reaches for the ukulele he keeps next to his computer.

«I can’t actually play a song,» says Schneider, who suffered two serious brain injuries during nearly 22 years in the Marines. «But I can play chords to take my stress level down.»

It’s a technique Schneider learned through Creative Forces, an arts therapy initiative sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts, in partnership with the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs.

It’s also an example of how arts therapies are increasingly being used to treat brain conditions including PTSD, depression, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.

But most of these treatments, ranging from music to poetry to visual arts, still have not undergone rigorous scientific testing. So artists and brain scientists have launched an initiative called the NeuroArts Blueprint to change that.

The initiative is the result of a partnership between the Johns Hopkins International Arts + Mind Lab Center for Applied Neuroaesthetics and the Aspen Institute’s Health, Medicine and Society Program. Its leadership includes soprano Renée Fleming, actress and playwright Anna Deavere Smith, and Dr. Eric Nestler, who directs the Friedman Brain Institute at Mt. Sinai’s Icahn School of Medicine.

One goal of the NeuroArts initiative is to measure how arts therapies change the brains of people like Schneider.

«I had a traumatic brain injury when I was involved in a helicopter incident on board a U.S. Naval vessel,» he explains. That was in 2005.

Later that same year, he experienced sudden decompression – the aviator’s version of the bends — while training for high-altitude flights. The result was like a stroke.

«On my right side of my body I lost all feeling,» he says

Schneider recovered from both incidents. But they took a toll on his brain. And in 2014, he began having serious problems.

«I had this progression of really bad seizures,» he says. «At one point I was having 20 to 40 seizures a day.»

He also developed symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, known as PTSD, and depression. Schneider went to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda for treatment. But he wasn’t getting better.

«I’d lost hope,» he says. «I didn’t really believe that I was going to make it through the next couple of years. My brain was just shutting down.»

 

 

We will focus the conversation on the following questions:

  1. Can a brain injury be overcomed? why and why not?
  2. what about menal health can it be overcomed?
  3. How would you take care of your own mental health?
  4. Do you believe that music is really helpful to overcome any of those circumstances?
  5. What other creative meathoods would you use to help people who has some kind brain condition?

 

Here we leave you some vocabulary you can use during the talk:

  • PTSD – post taumatic stress disorder
  • flare up– a sudden outbrust of something
  • brain condition – also called brain disorder, like alzheimer, seizures, parkision and so on.
  • bad seizure – a sudden attack that can cause loss of consciousness and volent muscle attacks
  • leatherwork – make things out of animal skins or hair of animal.
  • sientific evidence – this will help support an hypotesis or theroy.
  • discompensation – state of a breakdown
  • new pathways – a way that constitutes or serves a track.

Topic 4: festivals in seville

«Seville Events & Festivals»

All information about activities, national holidays, celebrations, events and festivals in Seville.

Article
January 6th

Epiphany or Twelfth Night: Epiphany is an important holiday in Spain. In the evening on January 5th, the three kings (Balthasar, Caspar and Melchior, representing Arabia, the Orient, and Africa) arrive on horseback, camel and elephant with a large parade. There will be lots of candy handed out in the city. ‘Día de los Reyes Magos’ on January 6, is celebrated with a lot of presents within the family circle.

February

Los Carnavales: During Carnival, plenty of people dress up and participate in singing and dancing activities throughout the city

March – April

Semana Santa: This is the holy week before Easter, in which Jesus’ struggle to the cross is remembered. Seville is one of the cities in Spain with the most fanatic celebrations and processions with holy statues and traditional robes with pointed hats.

April 26th – May 2nd 2020

Feria de Abril: The festival week of Seville, with flamenco, horses and many food stalls and wine. The festival week takes place every year two weeks after the Semana Santa. The Feria de Abril takes place on the site of the Los Remedios festival, southwest of the city, near the Guadalquivir River.

1st May

Labour Day: This is a bank holiday all over Spain. Please note that many shops and some attractions are closed.

June

Corpus Christi: Corpus Christi the second Thursday after Whitssuntide. The festivities last almost a week. A special mass is celebrated in the cathedral and processions are organized.

September – October

Bienal de Flamenco: Prestigious flamenco festival.

September

Feria de San Miguel: Cultural festival with flamenco shows and horses.

1st November

Fiesta de Todos los Santos, or All Saints’ Day, a national holiday.

December 6th

Día de la Constitución, the day of the constitution. This national holiday in Spain is mainly celebrated in the family circle.

December 8

La fiesta de la virgen de la inmaculada: The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Perfrorming choirs at Plaza de Triumfo and extra services in the cahedral.

31st December

New Year’s Eve: The best place to celebrate ‘La Noche Vieja’ in Seville is at Plaza Nueva. Many people gather in this square to eat 12 grapes at 12 o’clock in the Spanish tradition—one at every stroke of the bell. This is meant to bring good luck.

 

We will focus the conversation on the following questions:

  1. What festivals are very important in Seville?
  2. Which is your favorite festivity?
  3. Can you explain which are the most important festivities in Spain? Why?
  4. What is the most relevant feature in Sevillian festivals?
  5. What is the most fun festivity? Give me your arguments.

 

Here we leave you some vocabulary you can use during the talk: 

  • Bank holiday – refers to day that all financial instituations are closed because of a certian event.
  • cultural festival– a festival that features art and other diffrent cultutal forms of expression.
  • National holiday– one commemorating the birth or independence of a nation
  • performing choirs– A hymn that is composed in order to be sung by a church choir is an example of something that would be described as a performence of a group of people that sing a song in same tone at same time.
  • labour day– a public holiday or a day that is helt in honour of working people.
  • Traditional robes-Woollen vestment worn by some religious under their habits
  • pointed hats- A cardboard cone covered with cloth used by penitents in Holy Week processions.
  • food stalls-mobile food vending service set up on the street for the sale of food products

Topic 5: E- commerce

 

«Global Ecommerce Explainded: Stats and Trends to Watch in 2022«

“Global ecommerce is many things: cross-border commerce, borderless business, international online retail. But more important than what it is, is what it isn’t.’’

Article

What is global ecommerce?

First things first: global ecommerce is the selling of products or services across geopolitical borders from a company’s country of origin, normally defined as its founding or incorporating location. Products or services are sold into non-native markets via online sales and marketing.

Cumulative data anticipates a 16.8% increase in worldwide ecommerce sales over the most recently tracked period.

Numbers of that scale are hard to wrap our heads around. They’re at once invigorating and daunting. If your company is staring down that $4.9 trillion barrel and wondering, “Where do we begin?” rest assured, you’re not alone.

The advantages of international ecommerce are:

  • Easier expansion into foreign markets
  • Easier-to-find product-market fit
  • Shorter B2B sales cycles
  • Quicker building of international presence
  • Lower barriers to entry

As Harvard Business Review wrote: “Business leaders are scrambling to adjust to a world few imagined possible just a year ago. The myth of a borderless world has come crashing down. Traditional pillars of open markets—the United States and the UK—are wobbling, and China is positioning itself as globalization’s staunchest defender.”

We’ll unpack that quote, and more, below. For now, the big idea is simple: the shadow of global ecommerce looms too large to ignore.

How big is the global ecommerce market?

The global ecommerce market is expected to total $5.55 trillion in 2022. That figure is estimated to grow over the next few years, showing that borderless ecommerce is becoming a profitable option for online retailers.

Two years ago, only 17.8% of sales were made from online purchases. That number is expected to reach 21% in 2022, a 17.9% increase in ecommerce market share over two years. Growth is expected to continue, reaching 24.5% by 2025, which translates to an 6.7 percentage point increase in just five years.

Global ecommerce sales growth

Global retail sales growth will continue to rise and take up more retail market share. According to eMarketer, online retail sales will reach $6.17 trillion by 2023, with ecommerce taking up 22.3% of total retail sales.

Although retail had a tough year in 2020, every national market covered by eMarketer saw double-digit ecommerce growth. The trend continues:

China continues to lead the global ecommerce market, accounting for 52.1% of all retail ecommerce sales worldwide, with total online sales just over the $2 trillion mark in 2021. It also has the world’s most digital buyers, 824.5 million, representing 38.5% of the global total.

The US ecommerce market is forecasted to reach over $875 billion in 2022, a little over a third of China’s. After China and the US, the third-largest ecommerce market is the United Kingdom, taking up 4.8% of the retail ecommerce sales share. The UK is followed by Japan (3%) and South Korea (2.5%).

The top five ecommerce markets haven’t changed since 2018. Trends from eMarketer suggest that these markets will stay in the top five until 2025.

Casey Armstrong, CMO at ecommerce fulfillment brand ShipBob, adds, “While a lot of focus in ecommerce centers around the United States and Canada, there is a lot to learn from other large international players who are seeing an even more accelerated growth rate in ecommerce.”

He adds, “Merchants can shift where they sell based on this data and the demand on ecommerce from these countries. At ShipBob, it’s why we have opened fulfillment centers in Canada and the UK and are about to open another in Australia.”

We will focus the conversation on the following questions:

  1. What is e-commerce?
  2. How big is the E-commerce market?
  3. Why online shoppig got so important?
  4. Do you know when this started?
  5. Is there any information in the article that can tell you how large this platfom is?

 

Here we leave you some vocabulary you can use during the talk:

  • cross-border commerce– selling goods from a national shop to another country using a website.
  • retailers– a person or a buisnedd that is selling goods.
  • daunting– that discourages or is difficult to deal with.
  • invigorating-adjective giving strength, vigour and encouragement
  • BFCM– Black Friday Cyber Monday
  • DTC– Direct-to-Customer
  • borderless – without borders between countries.
  • BNPL– Buy Now Pay Later

 

Topic 6: Free topic

Do you find these topics boring or uninteresting? Don’t worry. Dilo gives you the opportunity to choose your own topic for a conversation class.
Think of some vocabulary you would like to learn related to your topic and send us some information about it with the subject «Free topic». We are sure your ideas will be very good 😁
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