Hi everybody. This is Todd the teacher from ELLLO, and we are on speaking tip number three. And this tip is kind of fun - it's a challenge, like a puzzle. It's the word count challenge. So, what you will do is you will listen to a short clause and you're going to count the words. Can you count the correct amount of words? Meaning, can you hear every word? This game is a lot of fun and it's a good way, actually, to practice listening and grammar - to make sure that your grammar is accurate and your listening is accurate, too.

So, for example, here is a file on ELLLO - you can do it on any of the files. The best ones to do it are on the gap files, where you have the - the short five second delay. I will play the audio, stop the audio and count how many words. And, then, if I want, I can check the transcript to see if my answer is correct. So, here we go.

'Conversation one. What does your mom do?'

Ok, so, 'What...does...your...mom...do?' Five words. 'What does your mom do?', 'What...does...your...mom...do?'

'She sells women's clothing.'

'She...sells...women's...clothing.' So, apostrophe-'s', we'll just say is one word. So, four words.

'Oh, yeah? Where does she work?'

'Oh, yeah? Where...does...she...work?' Six words.

Now, this is a lot of fun to do with a friend, like, if you do it in class - you both count and make sure you have the same number of words. And, then, slowly, put the sentence back together word by word. It's kind of like a dictation, but you don't have to write anything down. You just do it on your fingers, and it's a lot of fun. And, again, you can check the transcript if you need help.

So, the first one, 'What does your mom do?', 'What...does...your...mom...do?', we said five - that's correct. Number two I said was four, 'She sells women's clothing' - that's correct. And, then, number - the next one was six, 'Oh yeah? Where does she work?' - that was six things.

So, that's the word count challenge. It's a lot of fun. It's an easy way to slow the listening down, and pratice listening and grammar accuracy at the same time. And that's it! I hope you like it, and I think you're really gonna like the really challenging tip which is coming up in tip number four.