5x Mini Lectures Book 2 (new for 2021)

Lecture Content:

  1. Health & Medicine: COVID-19 Pandemic [04:20].

The 4-minute lecture starts with an introduction to COVID-19 and its possible origins. The lecturer provides a basic description of how COVID-19 infects the body by preventing the interferons from recognizing it is a danger. He then discusses how the virus mutates and provides two examples of a UK and South African variant. The lecture also highlights how the virus spreads and its longevity in the air and on surface. The listening test includes: open questions, table completion and summary gap fill.

  1. Business / Environment: The rise in zero waste shops [03:23].

The 3.23-minute lecture discusses the issue with waste and explains what zero waste shops are and why people have set them up. It illustrates the benefits of zero waste shops and also explains the criticisms. It finishes with a range of questions that the lecturer proposes and attempts to answer about zero waste shops. The listening test includes: open questions & gap fill exercises.

  1. Retail / business / environment: The true price of fast fashion [04:35].

The 4.35-minute lecture discusses what fast fashion is and its purpose. It focuses on three serious environment impacts caused by the fast fashion industry. 1) materials 2) manufacturing 3) waste. The lecture provides examples and data to support the claims. It finishes by suggesting that we (the consumers) are the problem and we should support companies that follow a circular economic model. The listening test includes: open questions, table completion, multiple choice & gap fill exercises.

  1. Finance / technology: Fintech payment systems: PayPal & Stripe [04:05]

The 4-minute lecture explains what Fintech is and illustrates some the Fintech services, paying particular attention to payment systems. It compares two of the biggest payment services: PayPal and Stripe in terms of finances, users and security. It finishes with deciding which one is a better system. The listening test includes: gap fill exercises, open questions and multiple choice.

  1. Sociology / psychology: Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy [03:48]

The 3.52-minute lecture starts by providing some important statistics connected to mental health: number of people affected, causes, demographics and economic costs. It then defines MBCT, mindfulness and cognitive based therapy and explains how they work. It finishes by looking at briefly at the success rates of this treatment. The listening test includes:  gap-fill exercises, open questions & multiple choice.

 

 

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