Commuting

An activity revolving round the theme of commuting to work. Debate and discussion activities about everyday real life commuting situations.

Task 1

Watch this slideshow

Task 2

Answer the following questions in pairs.

How do you commute to your school or your place of work?
How far do you travel and how long does it take you?
How do you travel? Is it expensive? Is it tiring?
What are some of the reasons why people commute?
Would you rather work in a nearer place?
If you work far from your house, why have you chosen to commute a long way to work?
Would you ever travel between countries or states in order to keep a better job? Why or why not?
In your viewpoint, what are the advantages and disadvantages of commuting?
If you didn't have any relatives or wife/husband, would you travel abroad for work? Why or why not?
Would you like to live abroad? Why or why not?
If you moved to another country, what things would you miss about where you live now? Which ones would you be glad to get away from?
Are there certain professions which require commuting?
Would you give up your job if you had to commute frequently?
Would you accept a job that requires commuting two hours a day one way?

Task 3

Watch this video and answer the questions.

Task 4

Discuss these questions in pairs.

Have you ever been in a traffic jam?
Have you ever been stuck in bumper to bumper traffic?
What is your preferred way of travelling in rush hour?
What transportation problems are there in your country?
Have you ever witnessed road rage?
What kind of things annoy you about other people’s driving?
Have you ever been in or witnessed a car crash?
How can traffic accidents be prevented?
How do you think countries can reduce congestion on the roads?
Is parking a problem in your country? (shopping malls, etc)
Do you think that governments should encourage public transportation more?
How could governments’ encourage people to ride bicycles more?
How could the government discourage people from taking their cars into the city?
Is the public transportation in your city efficient?
If public transportation were free, would you use it more?
How could public transportation in your city be improved?
Do you feel safe when you use public transportation?
What are the advantages of using public transport compared to driving?

Task 5

Watch this video and answer the questions below.

Listen for the following expressions in the video. Can you work out what they mean?

Traffic Expressions

Traffic jam - a long line of vehicles on a road that cannot move or can only move very slowly.
Bumper to bumper traffic – when cars are traveling so close together that their bumper bars are almost touching
Hold ups - a situation that stops something from happening or making progress
Road rage - violence and angry behaviour by car drivers towards other car drivers
Rush hour / Peak hour - the time of day when the roads, buses, trains etc are most full, because people are travelling to or from work

Phrasal Verbs

Run out of (gas /petrol) – “I ran out of petrol on the highway and had to wait for 1 hour until help arrived”
Pull over – “I was driving too fast and the police signalled for me to pull over”
Pull out – “the car pulled out right in front of me and I almost hit it”
Run over – “I am so upset because this morning I ran over a cat on my way to work”

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