Learn how to use the future real conditional
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Kellie: What’s Wrong With Working for a British Bank? |
| John: In this lesson, you’ll learn about the future real conditional with “if” and “when”. |
| Kellie: The conversation takes place at a pub and is between Lucy and John. |
| John: They’re boyfriend and girlfriend, so they’ll be speaking informally. |
| Kellie: Let’s listen to the conversation! |
| DIALOGUE |
| Lucy: The curry here is pretty good, to say it’s just a pub and not a balti house. Now I know why everyone at work is always raving about it. |
| Jack: My uncle is a big fan of their real ales. He’s here on the first of every month, ready to try the new special. |
| Lucy: Oh? Which uncle is that? Have I met him? |
| Jack: No, and you’re not going to anytime soon, either. |
| Lucy: Why not? |
| Jack: He’s a hardline socialist and unionist who believes that all of society’s problems are the results of fat cat businessmen and greedy banks. If he finds out that you work for a bank, he’ll disown me. |
| Lucy: (laughs) He can’t be that bad, surely! |
| Jack: When they next increase the tax on booze in the Budget, he will demonstrate outside the Barclays branch in the high street. Signs, megaphones… everything. |
| Lucy: If I see him, I will tell him I work in the Co-op. |
| Jack: Wise choice. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Kellie: Hm, lots of discussion in that dialogue about tax and financial matters. |
| John: Yeah, there was. It’s an important subject for everyone. |
| Kellie: Can you explain what John was talking about when he mentioned the Budget? |
| John: Sure. The Budget is an annual statement that is usually delivered in the spring. It’s given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer – the politician in charge of all things financial. |
| Kellie: It tells us about the state of the country’s finances and how poor we will all be for the next year. |
| John: (laughs) that’s right! The Chancellor will announce new tax rates and the amount of duty on items such as alcohol, cigarettes and other taxable goods. He will also announce government spending on things such as education and health, and also the amount of benefits paid to people. |
| Kellie: Somehow I always end up poorer after a Budget. |
| John: It’s quite an event to watch and full of tradition. The Chancellor always carries his speech to the Houses of Parliament in a red briefcase and all of the members of parliament are present for the speech. |
| Kellie: It’s always broadcast live on TV and then dominates the media for the next couple of days. |
| John: It does. It gets slightly annoying after a couple of hours. |
| Kellie: Just a little! Let’s move onto the vocab now |
| VOCAB LIST |
| John: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. The first word we shall see is: |
| Kellie: balti house [natural native speed] |
| John: a restaurant that serves a type of curry that is served in a “balti” bowl |
| Kellie: balti house [slowly - broken down by syllable] balti house [natural native speed] |
| John: Next |
| Kellie: to rave [natural native speed] |
| John: to be excited and overly impressed with something |
| Kellie: to rave [slowly - broken down by syllable] to rave [natural native speed] |
| John: Next |
| Kellie: real ale [natural native speed] |
| John: a type of beer that is usually brewed in traditional ways inside a wooden cask |
| Kellie: real ale [slowly - broken down by syllable] real ale [natural native speed] |
| John: Next |
| Kellie: hardline [natural native speed] |
| John: uncompromising and firm |
| Kellie: hardline [slowly - broken down by syllable] hardline [natural native speed] |
| John: Next |
| Kellie: socialist [natural native speed] |
| John: a supporter of socialist systems where the economy and politics are managed via equality and co-operation |
| Kellie: socialist [slowly - broken down by syllable] socialist [natural native speed] |
| John: Next |
| Kellie: unionist [natural native speed] |
| John: a supporter of trade unions and workers rights |
| Kellie: unionist [slowly - broken down by syllable] unionist [natural native speed] |
| John: Next |
| Kellie: fat cat [natural native speed] |
| John: a wealthy and powerful businessman that is usually seen as earning more money than is needed |
| Kellie: fat cat [slowly - broken down by syllable] fat cat [natural native speed] |
| John: Next |
| Kellie: booze [natural native speed] |
| John: slang term for alcohol |
| Kellie: booze [slowly - broken down by syllable] booze [natural native speed] |
| John: Next |
| Kellie: Budget [natural native speed] |
| John: the annual financial statement delivered by the UK government |
| Kellie: Budget [slowly - broken down by syllable] Budget [natural native speed] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Kellie: Our first vocab item for this lesson is “balti house”. |
| John: I’m getting hungry already! “Balti house” is the name for a restaurant that serves a specific type of Indian style curry known as a balti. It’s one of the most popular foods in the UK these days. |
| Kellie: Yeah, I’ve eaten many times at my local balti house! You say that it’s Indian food, but it may not have been created in India, right? |
| John: There is a little disagreement about whether baltis were originally created in Pakistan or whether they are actually an English creation, but either way they taste good. |
| Kellie: That they do! Next is “fat cat”. |
| John: This is an American colloquialism that has entered regular usage in the UK too. It refers to high powered businessmen that have all of the wealth and power and grow richer from the hard work of others, such as the businessmen John refers to in the dialogue. |
| Kellie: So the very, very top tiers of management in very successful companies? |
| John: That’s right. |
| Kellie: And finally we have “budget”. I don’t like this one. |
| John: (laughs) I don’t think many people do! We spoke about this earlier, but just to recap, the Budget is the annual financial statement that is delivered by the Chancellor of the Exchequer – the politician in charge of the country’s finances. It sets things such as taxes for the forthcoming year. |
| Kellie: Ok, let’s move onto the grammar. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Kellie: In this lesson, you’ll learn about the future real conditional. |
| John: The future real condition is used to describe what you think will happen in the future. It’s different to other real conditional forms, as we can’t say 100% what will happen or what we will do in the future. |
| Kellie: That’s right. The future is hypothetical and open to change, whereas the past and present have happened, or are happening. |
| John: Yep. To demonstrate this, we use the words “if” and “when” when we form future real conditional sentences. |
| Kellie: But they aren’t interchangeable, are they? |
| John: Of course not, that would be too easy! We use “if” when we are not sure if something will happen at all. |
| Kellie: Do you have an example? |
| John: In the dialogue John says “if he finds out that you work for a bank, he will disown me”. He uses “if” here because he doesn’t know if his uncle ever will find out. They could possibly keep Lucy’s job a secret forever, if they tried and are lucky. |
| Kellie: I could also say “if it rains tomorrow, I will stay at home”. |
| John: Good example. We can never be sure about tomorrow’s weather as even the best predictions can be wrong, so we would use “if”. Another example is “if I win the competition, I will be happy.” We can’t know if we will win the competition so we use “if”. |
| Kellie: We do know we’d be happy though! |
| John: Right! The other construct uses “when”. This refers to something that you know will happen, but you just don’t know the date or time it will happen. |
| Kellie: Give us an example. |
| John: John says “when they next increase the tax on booze in the budget, he will demonstrate outside the Barclays branch in the high street”. He uses “when” there because as much as we don’t want to admit it, it’s inevitable that at some point the tax on alcohol will increase. |
| Kellie: Taxes on everything always increase! |
| John: They do. Another example is “when I have a day off work, I will go shopping.” Again, it’s inevitable that there will be a day off work when the speaker can go shopping, but at the time of speaking they don’t know when that will be. |
| Kellie: How about “when they ask for volunteers for the new project, I will volunteer for it.” |
| John: In this case the speaker knows that there will be a new project and that volunteers will be asked for, but doesn’t know the date when either will happen. |
| Kellie: Okay. Thanks for the explanation! |
| John: You’re welcome! |
Outro |
| Kellie: That’s all for this lesson, so make sure to check the lesson notes, and we’ll see you next time. |
| John: Bye! |
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