Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Show 563 Tuesday 27 November


Watch today’s show at YouTube or BlipTV.

Hi, I’m Sarah, welcome to The Daily English Show.

I have an announcement today. We are going to carry out a survey – the first ever survey for The Daily English Show.

There’s a link to that survey next to this video. So I’d like you to go there and cut and paste it into an email and answer it and send it to this address: tdessurvey@gmail.com

The reason why we’re doing a survey is because we’d like to know more about our viewers.

One reason is that it could help us to get some ideas about how to improve the show and another reason is that it could help us to get some funding for The Daily English Show.

As you know The Daily English Show is non-commercial so making money is not our purpose. But we would like to find a way to generate some income so that we can work on the show full-time – and be able to do things like buy some equipment. We don’t need a lot of money, most of what it takes to make the show is just time, but there are some expenses.

So there are some different ways that we could generate income and I have a few ideas of some things that could work. And I have a long list of things that I know for sure that I don’t want to do – like putting a 30 second ad in the front of the video or endorsing some ridiculous product that I don’t believe in ... no way, I’d never do that. So you’re never going to see an ad for something like McDonalds on the Daily English Show. There are a lot of things like I don’t like actually, so it does make it kind of hard to find a sponsor. But there are some things that I do like, like my electronic dictionary for example. Fantastic tool and I truly believe every student should have one of these. And other things like my favourite textbooks, things like that.

And there are other options too, with finding funding, for example grants.

And ... what we did in Canada with Acadia University was perfect. We helped them promote the university to international students so it was good for them – and it was great for us because we got to hang out at this good university and do lots of interesting things and get lots of great material for the show.

And we’re going to continue to do some work with Acadia too which is great. And hopefully similar opportunities like that will arise.

But in any case, people will ask us: Who are your audience? How old are they? Where are they from? Are they all actually real people that are interested in English language study or did they all just accidentally click on your videos?

So that’s a bit about why we’re doing the survey. If you have some free time and you feel like helping us out, please fill it out. It’s good English practice too.

And don’t worry, we won’t do anything dodgy with the information like collect all your emails and start bombarding you with junk mail or something ... that’s not cool and I wouldn’t do that.

I would like to talk about some general statistics on the show because I think people will find that interesting. Like 17% of people watching The Daily English Show come from Malaysia or whatever it is ... I think it’s going to be interesting to see the results.

The survey is going to finish on Tuesday the 11th of December, so please send it back before then or on that day.
Thank you!



STICK NEWS

Kia Ora, this is Stick News. The Nova Scotia government has introduced a road safety bill that would outlaw the use of hand-held cellphones while driving.

In Nova Scotia, Canada, it’s legal to drive while talking on the phone.
That may soon change. The Nova Scotia government has introduced a bill that would make it illegal to use hand-held cellphones while driving. The bill would also prohibit panhandlers and solicitors from stopping or approaching vehicles on the road and double the fines for drivers who fail to stop for pedestrians on crossings.
The Transportation Minister said, "We've seen too many tragedies, too many deaths, too many accidents involving serious injury."
The new law would ban drivers from holding phones to their ears – but they’d still be able to talk on phone if they use an ear piece or speaker phone.
Currently there’s only one province in Canada with a cellphone ban for drivers.


And that was Stick News for Tuesday the 27th of November.
Kia Ora.




conversations with sarah
#342 Have you tried applying for any grants?

Step 1: Repeat Lucy’s lines.
Step 2: Read Lucy’s lines and talk to Sarah.

Lucy Have you tried applying for any grants?

Sarah No, not yet. The trouble with grants is that they are usually country specific – so grants in Canada are for Canadians ... which makes sense, of course.

Lucy Right. So you’d need to apply for something in New Zealand.

Sarah Yeah, well, I’m a New Zealand citizen but I don’t actually live in New Zealand at the moment, so I don’t know if that would work either.

Lucy Have you tried contacting the New Zealand government?

Sarah Yeah, I have actually. The, um, Ministry of Education ... but no luck.
That’s the thing ... I think you really need to have some contacts and some luck, in a way, to find someone who sees the potential in what you’re doing.

Lucy Just keep trying.

Sarah Yeah, yeah, I will. It just takes time. And I don’t have much extra time because it takes a lot of time to make the show so ...

Lucy I’m sure something will come along. There’s a lot of money out there for worthy educational projects like yours.



notes

non-commercial
By commercial, I mean "making or intended to make a profit". We would like to generate some income to cover the expenses of making the show - in the same way that non-profit organizations need money to run their organization.

links

today's news
today's STICK NEWS pictures


music

show start
artist: Anawin
album: A glimpse inside the bubble
track: Little jazzy
from: Arles, France
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo

cws start
artist: San Sebastian
track: Happy Sad
artist site

qa start
artist: ioeo
album: Groovetracks
tracks: groovetracks ending
from: Saint Raphael, France
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo
artist site

qa bgm
artist: OPRACHINA
album: The jazz farm
track: Grigioscuro
from: Roma, Italy
album at Jamendo
artist at Jamendo
artist site
YouTube channel

Did you notice a mistake in this script? Please leave us a comment and tell us! We really appreciate people pointing out our mistakes.Thank you.

Have you translated this script - or part of it - into your language for English practice and published it on your blog? Please leave a comment and a link so other people can read your translation. Thank you.

The Daily English Show Survey

The Daily English Show Survey #1

Instructions

Cut and paste this survey and email it with your answers to: tdessurvey@gmail.com

If you don’t want to answer a question, just leave it blank.

If you would like to answer the income question, you can use this converter to change your currency into Japanese yen.

This survey will finish on Tuesday 11th December. Please send your survey before then, or on that day (in whatever time zone you are in).

Note: We will send you an email to thank you for doing the survey. We won’t send you any other emails. We respect your privacy.

Section 1: Personal

1. Age:

2. Sex:

3. Occupation:

4. Income per year (in Japanese yen):

A: under 1 million yen
B: 1-3 million yen
C: 3-5 million yen
D: 5-8 million yen
E: 8+ million yen

5. What is your native language?

6. What other language(s) can you speak?

7. What country are you from?

8. Where do you live now?

Section 2: Travel

9. How often do you travel overseas?

10. Which country would you like to visit next?

Section 3: The Internet

11. Do you have a YouTube account?

12. Do you have a blog?

13. Do you use social networking site(s)?

14. Which one(s)?

15. Have you ever uploaded a video to the Internet?

16. How long do you spend on the Internet every day?

17. Do you have Internet access at home?

Section 4: The Daily English Show


18. Why do you watch The Daily English Show?

19. How did you find out about The Daily English Show?

20. When did you start watching The Daily English Show?

21. How often do you watch The Daily English Show?

22. Which part of The Daily English Show do you like most?

23. Which part do you like least?

24. How do you think The Daily English Show could be improved?

25. What site do you watch The Daily English Show on?

26. Do you have a video iPod (or other portable multimedia player)?

27. Do you subscribe to The Daily English Show in iTunes?

Section 5: English study
(Native English speakers can skip this section.)

28. Why are you learning English?

29. How often do you buy English study textbooks?

30. How do you choose which textbooks to buy?

31. How much do you spend on textbooks every year?

32. Do you have an electronic dictionary?

33. Do you listen to other English study podcasts /video podcasts / shows?

34. Are you currently studying English at school or university?

Section 6: Studying English abroad
(Native English speakers can skip this section.)

35. Have you studied English abroad?

36. Are you planning to in future?

37. If so, what country would you like to go to?

38. How will you chose where to study?

39. What’s important to you when choosing a school to study at?

Section 7: Teaching English
(This section is for teachers only – if you are not a teacher you can skip this section.)

40. Where do you teach? (EG university, language school etc)

41. Have you ever used The Daily English Show in class?

42. If so, how often?

43. How have you used The Daily English Show in class?

44. Which parts of The Daily English Show are most useful for using in class?

45. What kind of feedback have you had from students?

46. How could The Daily English Show be improved to be more user friendly for teachers?

Section 8: This Survey

47. How long did it take you to answer this survey?

48. How do you think the survey could be improved?

49. Do you have any suggestions for questions to ask next time?

End of Survey

Thank you so much for doing this survey! We really appreciate it.

Note: If you notice any spelling etc mistakes in this survey I would really appreciate it if you tell me.