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Bài học ECUBED hôm nay giúp bạn phân biệt được sự khác nhau giữa "holiday", "vacation" và "weekend". Mời các bạn lắng nghe bài học.

TRANSCRIPT
(Click to show transcript.)

Hello everybody. Welcome to E cubed. It is December 24^th, the day before Christmas. Tonight will be Christmas Eve. And I hope that you, if you are celebrating Christmas that you have a lovely day. Happy holidays^^ Today, I want to talk about the word holiday, vacation and weekend. Now remember, my specialty is American English. So I’ll give you the typical American definition.

When we say holiday, we mean Christmas or New Year’s Day. Sometimes we mean a day like Valentine’s Day or the fourth of July also. Those are all holidays. Valentine’s Day, yeah, some people call it a holiday. It’s just a special day. Usually, holidays are red number days on the calendar which means we don’t have to work. Okay?

Now, in America, when we say vacation we think about period of time when we don’t work or study. So school vacation, summer vacation. If you’re working then you can take out a weeklong vacation or a three-day vacation or a four-day vacation. It doesn’t have anything to do with a holiday. However, many people do take a vacation during a holiday or around a holiday. Okay?

And finally when we say the word weekend in America it means Saturday and Sunday. We don’t consider it a vacation. We don’t consider it a holiday. It’s just the weekend. So if we have a Saturday, Sunday and a Monday. Monday’s a holiday. That’s a three-day vacation. Some people will say a three-day vacation or a three-day break, uh, a long weekend. We can say that too. So once again, when we say the word holiday, think Christmas, think red number on the calendar. When we say vacation, think about long period of time with no work or no study. And when we say weekend, think Saturday and Sunday. That’s American English. Okay? Check out this dialog.

What are you up to on the holiday?
Just staying at home. I start my vacation next week.
Why so late?
Holiday traffic. It's too much.

Yes. Tomorrow in America is a holiday. The Christmas holiday. Now we have Christmas holiday and then we have New Year’s Day. So we have to holidays very close to each other. So we call this the holiday season. And in America, many people say, “Happy holidays!” They don’t say Merry Christmas. They don’t say Happy New Year. They can just say Happy Holidays. Okay? How about you? Are you taking a vacation during the winter break maybe from school or because of Christmas or New Year? I know in Russia that the first week or maybe the first two weeks of January, it’s a big vacation season because you have two holidays. Well, starting today in America, a lot of people are having a vacation because of the Christmas holiday and New Year holiday. Me, well, tomorrow is the holiday, so I don’t work. But on Wednesday, back to work. See guys!!

TÓM TẮT BÀI HỌC

Bài học Ecubed hôm nay giúp chúng ta phân biệt các định nghĩa về “holiday”, “vacation” và “weekend” trong tiếng Anh Mỹ.

1. Holiday = ngày nghỉ lễ, kỳ nghỉ lễ: đó là những ngày mà cả nước được nghỉ, như dịp giáng sinh, năm mới, ngày độc lập,…

2. Vacation = ngày nghỉ, kỳ nghỉ: đó là những ngày mà chúng ta không phải đi làm, không phải đi học, ví dụ như kỳ nghỉ hè, kỳ nghỉ ở công ty,…

3. Weekend = cuối tuần: thứ 7 và chủ nhật người lao động không phải đi làm

Ở Mỹ, kỳ nghĩ giáng sinh và năm mới liền kề nhau gọi là “holiday season.” Trong thời gian này, người ta có thể chúc nhau bằng câu “Happy holidays!” thay vì “Merry Christmas!” hoặc “Happy New Year!”

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Have a great day, everybody!

Welcome to E-cubed!!! Chúng ta hãy cùng khám phá một EXPRESSION mới trong bài học hôm nay nhé. Expression đó là KICK IT UP A NOTCH.

TRANSCRIPT (by Quoc Viet Ha)

Hey everybody, Welcome back to E3. Today's expression is pretty cool. It is to kick it up a notch. Now, this has a phrasal verb to kick up and to kick up, to kick up uh...uh… Here's my foot. To kick up, OK? So what does to kick up means? Of course it means to kick up... uh... But also, it means to increase, to increase the intensity, to increase the heat, to increase the volume, to increase the energy. So, if I'm teaching a class and I'm teaching like this, I might need to kick it up, I might need to kick up the energy, kick up the enthusiasm, kick up the power, kick up the passion. To kick something up is to increase. Do you understand? So it can refer to many difference things.

Now, a notch actually refers to one space. So, think about an audio stereo. OK. On the stereo, you have a volume, and this is like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10. Correct? And the volume is at right here, the volume is at 2. Is this loud? No, it's not too loud. So we kick it up a notch, it means kick it up to 3. So this would be 1 notch. And if you feel the volume, sometimes you can feel tup, you can feel like it goes into a notch. A notch is actually a hole. Tup. To kick it up a notch, so ruh pup to 3, ruh pup to 4, ruh pup to 5. So Kick it up a notch kick it up a little. That's the idea. Listen to the dialog and hopefully you can understand.

Oh it's pretty cool in here.
The thermostat's at 24.
Can we kick it up a notch?
Okay. Ooh! That's my favorite song!
Me, too! Let's kick that up a notch, too.

Isn't that a great song? And who is that singer? We need listen again and kick it up 3 notches. Kick it up all the way. Maximum volume. Maybe not. It's not that good.

That's today expression E3. And we will back again tomorrow. See ya.

GHI CHÚ BÀI HỌC

To kick it up a notch = tăng âm lượng lên một nấc

Từ "notch" ở đây có nghĩa là vết khía, khấc, ngấn chúng ta thường thấy trên núm điều chỉnh âm lượng ở các máy stereo, đài phát thanh,... ngày trước. Khi vặn núm điều chỉnh đó, ta có thể nghe thấy âm thanh túc túc tương ứng với từng mức âm lượng khác nhau.

Bạn có thể lắng nghe bài học này thông qua PODCAST^^