Episode 61 English Listening & Vocabulary Analysis of Dara McAnulty's - Diary of a Young Naturalist

This episode is shot on location in Workington. It is great listening practise for you and after the reading I'll go into detail about some of the vocabulary. The main connecting feature of the readings from Episodes 60, 61 and 62 is the weather. Three British writers, with totally different styles and situations describe the sea and the weather for us. This second reading is from a non-fiction book about nature, Diary of a Young Naturalist by Dara McAnulty. In this book Dara (18) writes a diary of one year of his life. We follow his family as they move house and as they explore nature, both in Northern Ireland where they live and elsewhere in the UK. Dara is Autistic and an environmental activist, however in this book what stands out is his love of nature. His writing is beautiful and very detailed so we get a clear picture of what he sees and his experience of it. Like yesterday, have a think about what is the writer doing to help us imagine the place they are describing? See you tomorrow! (Additional Vocabulary in the YouTube Description) Ok let's look at some of the vocabulary from the reading: Eddying - coming and going Slick Boardwalk - a wooden path that is slippery Compacted - squashed down or close together Dunes - long hills of sand Sea Fret - Sea Fog - in the UK we have many words for this including: sea roak, sea hoar, haar and dreich.Frothing and Spewing - froth bubbles, spew comes out or overflows quickly Whacking - hit hard Giggling hysterically - hysterical means out of control, so they are giggling uncontrollably Smothering - covered so you can't breathe Wispy tendrils - wispy is soft and light and tendrils are long and knotty Vastness - big, very very big Huddle - Often used when we crowd together, but here he is crouching down and tucking into the ground and his coat. Let's look at some of the imagery from the book: The sky feels as if it's pressing against our heads. So we have this idea of a very low and probably dark cloud. The wind whips our ankles and our faces and punches our stomachs. Just like yesterday the wind is powerful and quite painful, we can easily imagine how it feels. Lorcan and Blaithnaid have found some dead seaweed and are whacking each other with it, giggling hysterically. Totally different to yesterday, where Harry felt very sad and depressed, here Dara feels happy and content, this kind of scene, where his brother and sister are having fun helps us feel that feeling too. Mist envelopes me. This is comfortable but also means covered completely, so his family has disappeared into the fog and he feels alone. I can feel the vastness of what I can't see and huddle down to take shelter by a perfect, intact dune. We can tell he feels comfortable here. He likes the environment, even the weather. He is aware of how big the sea feels, but it isn't scary like in Harry Potter where it feels quite dangerous. He feels good here and he encourages us to feel good too. The Book Today's reading was from page 198 of Dara McAnulty's Diary of a Young Naturalist, printed by Penguin and Witness Books in 2021.