SBS Learn English تساعدكم على التحدث والفهم والتواصل مع الآخرين في أستراليا بحلقاتها العديدة التي يمكن متابعتها عبر هذا الرابط.
هذا الدرس مفيد للمتعلمين من المستوى المتوسط. بعد الاستماع للحلقة اختبروا معلوماتكم من خلال هذا الاختبار.
ملاحظات التعلّم
أمثلة على عبارات يمكنك استخدامها عند التحدّث عن كميات صغيرة:
There are a few presents waiting to be wrapped.
هناك بعض الهدايا بانتظار أن تُغلَّف.
I have some friends coming over.
لديَّ بعض الأصدقاء سيزورونني.
I bought a couple of different flavours.
اشتريت نوعين مختلفين من النكهات. (a couple = اثنان تقريبًا)
There are several questions I want to ask.
هناك عدة أسئلة أرغب في طرحها.
أمثلة على عبارات يمكنك استخدامها عند التحدّث عن كميات كبيرة:
I saw loads of bags on the table!
رأيت كمية كبيرة من الحقائب على الطاولة! (loads of = الكثير جدًا)
We’ve got plenty of time.
لدينا متّسع كبير من الوقت.
She’s got heaps of clothes.
لديها كمية هائلة من الملابس. (heaps = الكثير جدًا بطريقة غير رسمية)
We’ve got tons of work to do.
لدينا كم هائل من العمل لإنجازه.
There are dozens of shops in that mall.
هناك عشرات المتاجر في ذلك المركز التجاري.
تعبيرات عاميّة
- “A few” تعني عددًا صغيرًا.
- “Quite a few” تعني أكثر مما تتوقع، أي عدد لا بأس به أو عدد كبير نسبيًا رغم أنها تحتوي كلمة few.
تركيز لغوي
في اللغة الإنجليزية نستخدم تعبيرات مختلفة—وأحيانًا قواعد مختلفة—عند الحديث عن الأشياء القابلة للعدّ (countable) والأشياء غير القابلة للعدّ (uncountable).
لكن التمييز بينهما ليس دائمًا سهلًا، فبعض الكلمات يمكن أن تكون قابلة للعدّ وغير قابلة للعدّ بحسب المعنى الذي نريده.
كما أن بعض العبارات تُستخدم مع النوعين، سواء كانت الأشياء معدودة أو غير معدودة.
أمثلة من النص على أشياء قابلة للعدّ (countable):
- presents هدايا
- flavours نكهات
- questions أسئلة
- bags حقائب
- shops متاجر
- clothes ملابس
مثال:
- There are a few presents
- I bought a couple of different flavours
- There are several questions I’d like to ask
- I saw loads of bags
- There are dozens of shops
- She’s got heaps of clothes
أمثلة على أشياء غير قابلة للعدّ (uncountable):
- food طعام
- time وقت
- work عمل
مثال:
- We’ve got loads of food
- We’ve got plenty of time
- We’ve got tons of work to do
لكن!
بعض الكلمات يمكن أن تكون قابلة للعدّ أو غير قابلة للعدّ حسب المعنى:
- foods (أنواع الطعام)
- times (مرّات)
- works (كتابات أو أعمال فنية)
مثال:
- I like all the foods that are bad for me
- I’ve seen that movie three times
- I haven’t read all the works of Shakespeare
المعنى يحدّد الاستخدام.
النص
SBS acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country and their connections and continuous care for the skies, lands, and waterways throughout Australia.
This is a special episode for us. Know why? It’s our 100th episode! To us...that’s a big number! So we decided that for this episode we will talk about numbers.
I’m Josipa and I’d like you to imagine the city’s buzz fades as you close the door, bags of Christmas shopping in hand. It feels good to be home after all the walking. The thought of Christmas...
Claire
I need to wrap these.
...make you smile? Claire has just got back home. She puts some music on, makes herself a cup of tea, and is ready to start wrapping her presents, when Allan arrives.
Claire
There are a few presents waiting to be wrapped.
Allan
Just a few? I saw loads of bags on the table!
Claire
True, but for roughly half of them I’ll use the same wrapping paper. That will speed things up.
Allan
That’s still plenty to wrap!
There are a lot of English expressions for talking about quantities, and the words themselves are pretty simple. The key is knowing when to use each one. So today, we’re focusing on how much each phrase really means and when to use it.
Let’s begin… We will start small and get bigger.
When talking about small quantities of something, we can use Claire’s phrase when she said,
There are a few presents waiting to be wrapped.
We use ‘a’ when we are referring to a small number of things that you can count – we say countable things. We use it when we want to say that there is a small quantity of whatever it is, but enough to matter.
We can also use the phrase ‘a couple of’, which technically means only two, but can be used in some contexts for ‘about’ two, if we are not exactly sure how many but it is a small number
I bought a couple of different flavours, so you can choose.
When it’s a bit more than ‘a few, we can use the word ‘several’.
There are several questions I’d. like to ask.
But let’s say we want to talk about ‘a lot’ of something. We could use Allan’s example,
I saw loads of bags on the table!
If you say you’ve got loads of something, you mean you have a lot — a big number or amount. It’s a really common, informal way to talk about a quantity that you think is large, or large enough. So you could say,
Please stay for dinner. We’ve got loads of food.
You could also say plenty of, which means pretty much the same thing.
We’ve got plenty of time.
Other casual phrases we can use to mean the same thing are ‘heaps of’ or ‘tons of’.
She’s got heaps of clothes.
We’ve got tons of work to do.
But if you want to stress that you really do have quite a few of whatever it is you can say gazilion of.
There are gazillion of shops in that mall.
Now, remember we said that “a few” refers to a very small, countable number of something. Well, if we want to talk about a slightly larger amount, we can say “quite a few, ”, which actually means the opposite!
There’re quite a few presents on your table.
We often use ‘quite a few’ when we think the number is a little larger than we might expect.
True, but for roughly half of them I’ll use the same wrapping paper.
We can use‘roughly’ to describe an amount, number, or time that is approximate, not exact. It’s often used when you want to give a general idea rather than a precise measurement.
I’ve already spent roughly half of my budget for presents.
And how about you? Do you have a lot of presents to buy at this time of year? Some people buy heaps of presents when they go to visit their families, while others only buy a few. What about
