Passive Voice

Intro

1. Learn Vocabulary - Learn some new vocabulary before you start the lesson.

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• criticize
• emergency
• stress
• direction

• co-workers
• boss
• stuck with
• stingy

• demanding
• confident

2. Read and Prepare - Read the introduction and prepare to hear the audio.

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Let’s face it, most of us would rather not work if we didn’t have to. But a job is a necessary part of life for almost everybody. Since we have to work, we at least want to have an interesting job, fun co-workers, and a cool boss.

Unfortunately, some people get stuck with horrible bosses. A horrible boss might be mean stingy, or overly demanding. They can make us hate our job, even when we love what we do.

The new movie Horrible Bosses turns the tragedy of working for a terrible person into a comedy. Hear Jason and Amy talk about the film, and about their own experiences working for horrible bosses.

Dialog

1. Listen and Read - Listen to the audio and read the dialog at the same time.

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2. Study - Read the dialog again to see how the vocab words are used.

Jason

Amy

Jason:  I saw this movie Horrible Bosses about these guys who plot to kill their bosses because they’re making their lives so hard.

Amy:  That’s a common fantasy, I bet, for a lot of people out there.

Jason:  I bet it is. It seems a little extreme, though. It’s like, don’t you think your horrible boss would just be replaced by a new horrible boss?

Amy:  Couldn’t you just get a different job, too? Like why do you have to kill…

Jason:  Or just get your boss fired! Why do they have to die?

Amy:  It’s true. It kind of makes the employees seem like horrible employees, like horrible people.

Jason:  But having a horrible boss can do crazy things to you.

Amy:  It’s true. Have you ever had a horrible boss?

Jason:  I have. It made me question everything about myself. I didn’t want to kill her, I was afraid of her.

Amy:  What did she do, I mean did she just criticize you a lot?

Jason:  Yeah, well, she just made everything into an emergency situation all the time.

Amy:  Oh, just high stress?

Jason:  Yeah.

Amy:  That’s horrible.

Jason:  Everything was harder than it had to be. Every mistake you made was a bigger deal than it needed to be.

Amy:  I think that’s a good point, like the best bosses are the ones who kind of give you the most space, I think, you know? You want some direction, but you also don’t want to be treated like a child. You’ll get your work done without having a boss standing over you putting a lot of pressure on you.

Jason:  Yeah. You want your employees to be confident, so that they’ll grow and get better and better as time goes on, instead of getting less confident and tireder.

Amy:  Or violent.

Jason:  Yeah, or violent.

Grammar Point

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Quizzes

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Lesson MP3

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