B2 Articles

B2 GRAMMAR: ARTICLES

From The Baltic To The Black Sea

PICTURE

(you add this)

"You go to check the names the maps have given things, and the things politely decline to match."

a / an, the, zero article · institutions · countries, rivers, mountains and seas · city landmarks

Reading

Speaking

A · LEAD-IN

Map quiz, from memory

Which of these need the? Note your guesses - don't check yet. You'll revisit them after the reading.

• ______ Danube · ______ Lake Baikal · ______ Alps

• ______ Mount Etna · ______ Netherlands · ______ Sicily

• ______ Sahara · ______ Oxford Street

• Which one were you least sure about? Compare with a partner.

PICTURE

(you add this)

B · BEFORE YOU READ

Eleven weeks, north to south

A writer crosses Europe without ever moving faster than a river - from the Baltic coast to the Black Sea.

READ ONCE AND ANSWER

1. What route does the writer take?

2. What rule of slow travel does she learn by the end?

3. First: what's the slowest journey you've ever made on purpose?

PICTURE

(you add this)

B · READING

From the Baltic to the Black Sea, slowly

"Fast travel collects places; slow travel is collected by them."

The plan was simple and slightly ridiculous: to cross Europe from north to south without ever moving faster than a river. I started in Gdansk, on the Baltic coast of Poland, on a cold bright morning in April, and finished eleven weeks later swimming - badly - in the Black Sea.

The route drew itself. From the Baltic I went south through Poland, skirting the lakes of Masuria, where I learned that Lake Sniardwy looks like a sea when the wind disagrees with you. I crossed the Czech Republic - one of those countries, like the Netherlands and the USA, that insists on its article, while its neighbours travel light - and gave a week to Prague that Prague converted, effortlessly, into three. In Vienna I stayed near Stephansplatz, ate too well, and spent a morning in the Kunsthistorisches Museum failing to leave the second floor.

Then the river took over. The Danube is less a river than a moving country: I followed it by ferry, by bicycle and once, regrettably, by borrowed kayak, through Slovakia and Hungary, under the bridges of Budapest, where I checked into the Hotel Gellert for one night of magnificent, unaffordable steam. South of the Iron Gates - the gorge where the river saws through the Carpathians - the water turns wide and patient, and so, eventually, did I.

B · READING (continued)

From the Baltic to the Black Sea, slowly

People had warned me about stretches of the journey. Every warning was wrong, and always in the same direction. In a village on the Romanian bank I was adopted for two days by a family because rain is apparently a form of introduction. On Mount Tampa, above Brasov, a retired teacher walked an hour out of his way to show me the path, in exchange for irregular verbs. In the Danube Delta - that final, dissolving maze where the river forgets it was ever in a hurry - a fisherman refused payment for a full day's boat with the phrase, delivered in five languages' worth of gestures, "the birds are free."

I had crossed the Alps years before, by train, in a tunnel, asleep. This time I crossed a continent at walking pace and missed nothing - or rather, I missed things properly, one at a time, knowing what they were. Fast travel collects places; slow travel is collected by them. Somewhere in the delta, the sea arrived without announcing itself: salt in the air, then in the water, then everywhere. The Black Sea, it turns out, is blue. Everything on a slow journey is like that. You go to check the names the maps have given things, and the things politely decline to match.

C · COMPREHENSION

Write the places in the order the writer reached them.

Then look again at the seven names: which of them carry the, and why?

1. ______________________

2. ______________________

3. ______________________

4. ______________________

5. ______________________

6. ______________________

7. ______________________

a) the Hotel Gellert

b) Gdansk

c) the Danube Delta

d) Prague

e) the Iron Gates

f) Vienna

g) the lakes of Masuria

D · GRAMMAR FOCUS

Countries, water and mountains

a) Poland, Slovakia, Hungary - but the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, the USA

b) the Baltic, the Black Sea, the Danube - but Lake Sniardwy

c) the Carpathians, the Alps - but Mount Tampa, Mount Etna

1. Countries and regions. What do the the-countries in (a) have in common? Look at their names: republic, plural forms, initials...

2. Water. Build the rule from (b): seas, rivers, oceans and canals take ______; individual lakes take ______.

3. Mountains. Ranges versus individual peaks in (c): which takes the? What about deserts and island groups?

D · GRAMMAR FOCUS

City landmarks, institutions and fixed phrases

a) Stephansplatz (a square), Oxford Street - but the Kunsthistorisches Museum, the Hotel Gellert

b) I was in hospital for a week. vs I left my umbrella in the hospital.

c) by ferry · by bicycle · at walking pace · in a hurry

1. In (a), which categories of city landmark take the - and which don't? (Think: museums, galleries, hotels, theatres, cinemas / streets, squares, parks, shops, stations.)

2. In (b), what's the difference in meaning? Which other nouns work like this: school, prison, church, university, bed?

3. Find three more zero-article fixed phrases in the text of the at home / by bicycle / go to bed type.

D · THE RULES

Complete the rules

Complete the rules with one word in each gap.

• *No the:* most countries and cities, individual ______ and ______, streets, squares, parks, shops, stations.

• **The:* countries with republic / kingdom / states* or plural names; rivers, seas, oceans, canals, deserts, mountain ______, island ______.

• **The:** hotels, museums, galleries, theatres, cinemas.

• Institution nouns (hospital, school, prison, church, bed): no article when we mean the ______; a / the when we mean the ______.

CAREFUL

Watch the modifier trap: Hyde Park takes no article, but the Hyde Park crowds does - because the belongs to crowds, not to the park.

E · CONTROLLED PRACTICE

Complete with the or - (no article).

1. ______ Mount Kilimanjaro is in ______ Tanzania, not far from ______ Kenya.

2. ______ Rhine flows through ______ Netherlands into ______ North Sea.

3. We stayed at ______ Grand Hotel on ______ Andrassy Avenue.

4. ______ Sicily is the largest island in ______ Mediterranean.

5. She's studying medicine at ______ university in ______ Krakow.

6. ______ Lake Garda is beautiful, but ______ Dolomites behind it steal the show.

7. My brother's in ______ hospital again - I'm going to ______ hospital tonight to visit him after ______ work.

8. Is ______ British Museum near ______ Oxford Street? Close enough to walk, if you avoid ______ Hyde Park crowds. (Careful: one of these three is a trick.)

9. They sailed across ______ Atlantic, through ______ Panama Canal, and on to ______ Hawaii - well, ______ Hawaiian Islands, strictly.

10. He was sent to ______ prison for fraud; his wife visited ______ prison every month for two years.

F · FREER PRACTICE

The slow route

In pairs, plan your own no-flying journey across a series of countries in six stops.

• Include at least: one river, one mountain or range, one lake or sea, one the-country or the-landmark, and one street or square.

• Narrate the route to another pair in ninety seconds, articles perfect.

• Listeners have one job: catch any article error and demand a change of route as a penalty. Longest error-free narration wins.

PICTURE

(you add this)

TEACHER'S REFERENCE · HIDE OR DELETE BEFORE CLASS

Answer key

A MAP QUIZ the Danube · Lake Baikal · the Alps · Mount Etna · the Netherlands · Sicily · the Sahara · Oxford Street.

B GIST Gdansk, the Masurian lakes, the Czech Republic (Prague), Vienna, the Danube through Slovakia and Hungary (Budapest), the Iron Gates, Romania (Mount Tampa / Brasov), the Danube Delta, the Black Sea. The rule learned: slow travel means being "collected by" places - missing things properly, one at a time.

C ORDER 1 Gdansk · 2 the lakes of Masuria · 3 Prague · 4 Vienna · 5 the Hotel Gellert · 6 the Iron Gates · 7 the Danube Delta.

D PART 1 1 Republic / Kingdom / States in the name, or a plural form: the Netherlands, the USA, the UK, the Czech Republic. 2 Seas, rivers, oceans and canals take the; individual lakes take no article. 3 Ranges take the (the Alps, the Carpathians); individual peaks don't (Mount Etna, Mount Tampa). Deserts and island groups take the (the Sahara, the Hawaiian Islands).

D PART 2 4 The: hotels, museums, galleries, theatres, cinemas. No article: streets, squares, parks, shops, stations. 5 in hospital = as a patient (the institution's purpose); in the hospital = the building. Also at school, in prison, at church, at university, in bed. 6 e.g. by ferry, by bicycle, by train, at walking pace, in a hurry.

RULES lakes · peaks (mountains) · ranges · groups · institution or purpose · building.

E 1 - / - / - · 2 The / the / the · 3 the / - (streets and avenues take no article) · 4 - / the · 5 - (university as an institution) / - · 6 - / the · 7 - (in hospital, as a patient) / the (the building, to visit) / - (after work) · 8 the / - / - (Hyde Park takes no article: "the Hyde Park crowds" uses the for crowds - that's the trick) · 9 the / the / - / the · 10 - (to prison, as punishment) / the (the building).