Lexical and grammar test 1

The Way Teenagers Speak

Teenage speech is changing all 1) ___ (a/the/ -) time. Even parents sometimes have 2) ___ (a/the/ -) hard time 3) _______________ (understand) their children. Is it the influence 4) ___ bad friends or bad television?

If you 5)_____________never (use) or fail to understand, expressions life “large salads”, then 6) ___ (a/the/ -) British teenager is likely to think that you are either a studious schoolkid or simply too old (probably 7) ___ least 35). In both cases, such a person may 8) _________ (consider) a “doughnut” by the young.

British linguists admit that a huge linguistic gap is opening up at present to separate a 9)_________ (young) generation – brought 10)_____ on a mixture 11)____ US television, films and music, soap operas and rave culture – from the rest of the population.

Teenage speech 12) _______ (abound) in the so-called “fillers”, or unnecessary words (like “yeah”, “key”, “man”). 13)____ (a/the/ -) traditional British phrases such as “you know”, or “sort of”, 14)___________ commonly(replace) by “like” as in: “I’m like, interested 15) ___ reading, but not like – that much”, or 16) ___ reported speech: “She said to me, “you idiot”, and I’m like “what did you call me?”. This can infuriate parents, among them the writer Anthony Holden, father of three teenagers. “It really bugs me when one of the kids says, “I’m like going down the pub, Dad, like, with 17) ___ (a/the/ -) few of my friends”. It’s so lazy, I think”.

The young are more inclined to use Americanism they 18) ___ (hear) on TV than other people. At present they are more likely to say “there you go”, instead 19) ___ “who’s speaking?”. Yet, it is wrong to think that TV is the number one influence 20) ___ teenagers. The number one influence is the people you “knock around with”. If you are in a group in which you can gain something, you 21) _______ (use) the terminology which will make you 22) _____ (её) member.

Younger people are not only more keen to be accepted by their peers but try to exclude their elders by their slang. Jane Bynner, a local government officer, recalls, when everything her children spoke of was “lame” or “wicked”. “It 23) ______ (be) a problem when they were younger and we 24) _______ (have) arguments about 25) ____ (a/the/ -) way they spoke. I felt it was part of a general attitude that was quite nasty to us, parents, and grown-ups 26) ___ general – that we are not 27) ____________(interest) and not worth listening to”. Mrs. Bynner 28) __________(worry) about the strong influence the environment of her children had on them. And she is not alone. 29) ____ (a/the/ -) most parents face 30) ____(a/the/ -) same problem.