a quarter to

Welcome to English as a Second Language Podcast number 378: Talking About Time.

This is ESL Podcast episode 378. I’m your host, Dr. Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.

Our website is eslpod.com. You can download a Learning Guide for this episode. You can also take look at our ESL Podcast Store, which has some additional courses in business and daily English I think you may be interested in.

On this episode, we’re going to talk about time; common time-telling expressions will be our focus today. We’ll listen to a dialogue between Juanita and Chuck about the time. Let’s get started.

Juanita: What time is it?

Chuck: It’s a quarter to 12. Why?

Juanita: At noon, on the dot, I’m supposed to meet James.

Chuck: On the dot? What if you don’t get there until a few minutes past four? Will you turn into a pumpkin?

Juanita: Knock it off. I have good reason to be on time. I was supposed to meet him at the movies at 8:30 last Saturday and I didn’t turn up until 10 ‘til 9:00. We missed the first 10 minutes of