BBC 英语学习 News Review 有史以来最温暖的一月

New year, new record high temperatures already.

This is news review from BBC Learning English.

I'm new, and I'm that make sure you watch to the end to learn vocabulary to talk about the story.

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Now the story The

hottest January day ever in Europe.

At least seven countries reported the warmest New Year S Day on record.

One village in Poland recorded 19 degrees Celsius, compared to its usual temperature of around one Climatologists are calling it the most extreme heat wave ever seen in Europe.

You ve been looking at the headlines, beth, what's the vocabulary?

We have Toples Go downhill and shattered.

This is news review from BBC, learning English.

Let's have a look at our 1st headline.

This is from The Independent. The most extreme heat wave ever seen in Europe, warm January, topples Records.

So there is a heat wave in Europe, which it's a bit strange because it's in the middle of winter, but temperatures are unusually high.

The word we're looking at from the headline is topple.

Now, beth, you know that game where there's a stack of bricks, and you have to take one from the bottom and put it on the top, over and over again.

Eventually at CAM Yeah, you have to pull them out, and then it kind of gets unbalanced and it topples over.

Yeah, that's right. So topple means fall.

But as we can see in the headline, it can be used metaphorically as well, to mean, break, break a record.

Yeah, that's right. So that our headline is saying that January has toppled the record, so the temperatures have broken any previous records that there were.

Now, are there other things that topple apart from games with stacks of bricks and records?

Yeah. So physically, imagine there's a storm, there's a lot of wind, and then a tree might topple.

Also, a baby, when it learns to walk, they're quite unsteady and balanced on their feet, so they might topple over.

Yeah. And these are all things that are unbalanced.

You can actually actively topple something, knock it over.

Yeah, you can. So again, if we've got that game full of bricks, and you just decide to push it over, then you topple it.

But we also use this metaphorically to talk about removing someone from power, e.g., you can topple a leader?

Yes. And when you topple a leader, often it's used in the passive voice, so we can say that someone has been toppled.

Let's look at that again. Let's have a look at our next headline.

This one comes from The Times Ski Holiday Hopes Go downhill as Alpine snow melts away.

OK? The headline is saying that the snow is melting.

That is obviously very bad if you have planned a skiing holiday.

But we are looking at the expression Go downhill.

I know go. I know down I know hill.

But together, beth, what is the sense?

Well, if something goes downhill, then it becomes worse.

So the headline means that people's real chances of going skiing are becoming less and less possible.

Yes, temperatures are so high that the snow is melting.

Um. This is a bit of a clever headline, though, isn't it?

There's a double meaning, which we often see.

Yes. So obviously, when people go skiing, they actually go downhill.

So the headline writer has use this expression to be a bit clever.

It's got a double meaning. Yeah?

So generally speaking, go downhill means that something is getting worse.

Let's think of some other examples of things getting worse.

A business could go downhill. Yes, your health might go downhill as you get older.

Yeah, your English could go downhill if you don't study regularly.

So stick with us. OK, let's have a look at that again.

Our next headline, please. This is from the Washington Post.

Thousands of records shattered in historic winter warm spell in Europe.

The headline says that temperature records have been shattered.

Now, beth, when I hear the word shatter, I think a glass breaking, smashing everywhere.

Yep. And that's not that surprising, because

when glass shatters, it breaks into lots of tiny pieces, and it's very dramatic.

So when we hear about a record being shattered again, we're talking about something

dramatic. Yeah? So think about the Olympics.

Athletes often shatter records,

they break them dramatically. So we've got this word shatter with records, and earlier we heard topple with records.

Is there a difference? They're basically the same, but shattered is always quite dramatic.

Now, we can also use shattered to describe big emotions.

So, e.g., if you hear something really terrible, then you might say that you are shattered by the news.

You might feel shattered. That just means you're really upset.

Yes, and chateau can also mean extremely tired.

We've just finished our Christmas and New Year holidays, lots of traveling, visiting people, late nights, early mornings.

Be if I was shattered, well, I hope you're not too shattered to finish these, really, I think I can just about manage.

Let's look at that again. We've had topples, falls go down hill, become worse, shattered, broken, dramatically.

Don't forget, there's a quiz on our website at bbc learning english dot com.

Thank you for joining us. And good bye bye.

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