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Lesson 126 / Creativity & products
5 phrases · 12 minutes · Look, listen and try.
Experiment with ideas, choose an audience and invest in a quality magazine.
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A randomly assigned, fixed male or female synthetic voice for each phrase or sentence · Slow playback at 0.7× preserves pitch.
He played around with different cover designs.
He played around with different cover designs.
We can play around with the colours before choosing.
We can play around with the colours before choosing.
An informal way to describe experimenting without making a final choice.
Cambridge Dictionary · play around
He cranked out rough drafts without checking them.
He cranked out rough drafts without checking them.
The team cranked out pages, but many needed changes.
The team cranked out pages, but many needed changes.
Informal, often critical of quality when producing large amounts quickly. It is not simply efficient work.
Cambridge Dictionary · crank out
He geared the magazine to younger readers.
He geared the magazine to younger readers.
The activities are geared to beginners.
The activities are geared to beginners.
Often used in the passive “be geared to”. The intended audience or purpose follows “to”.
He invested in a set of good drawing pencils.
He invested in a set of good drawing pencils.
We invested in sturdy storage boxes for the club.
We invested in sturdy storage boxes for the club.
Here it means buying something useful for lasting benefit, not investing in shares.
The club puts out a magazine every term.
The club puts out a magazine every term.
They put out a special issue for the festival.
They put out a special issue for the festival.
Here it means publishing content. “Put out a fire” is a different sense: extinguish a fire.
The examples were written for this course. Pages 97, 30, 49, 66 and 102 of Matt Errey’s book locate the expressions; the senses of experimenting, buying something useful and publishing are checked against the dictionaries below. A2–B1 is the course’s editorial target.
Additional references for the senses used in this lesson: play around with — Cambridge · invest in — Oxford · put out — Collins.
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OBSERVE · UNDERSTAND · MATCH
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Read the picture descriptions for more context. Similar expressions are accepted when they fit the particular scene.
Duy experiments with colours and arrangements on three paper cover drafts.
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Duy rushes through many repetitive rough drafts, leaving visibly crooked shapes that need revision.
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Duy adapts the magazine for two younger children using large clear pictures.
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Duy uses saved money to buy durable drawing pencils to replace worn short ones.
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Duy releases a new magazine issue and places matching copies on a public reading display.
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Choose a phrase to begin.
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Read the conversation and find the expressions you have learned.
Let us play around with the cover before choosing a design.
Let us play around with the cover before choosing a design.
Agreed. I do not want to crank out pages without checking them.
Agreed. I do not want to crank out pages without checking them.
We can gear the final version to younger readers.
We can gear the final version to younger readers.
“Play around” with ideas explores possibilities; “crank out” produces many things quickly, often carelessly. Deliberate experimentation differs from rushed mass production.
Try answering before revealing the suggested answer. This practice is not scored.
The answers below are models. Other answers can also work if they preserve the facts, meaning and structure requested in the task.
A magazine team tests several layouts before deciding. Another team produces many unchecked pages very quickly.
Describe the deliberate testing.
The team plays around with several layouts.
The team tests layouts to explore options, so “plays around with” describes experimentation.
Replace “the rough drafts” with “them”: Crank out the rough drafts.
Crank them out.
“Them” replaces the drafts being produced rapidly, so use “crank them out”, not “crank out them”.
Write a quality-focused request.
Play around with the layout, but check it before putting out the magazine.
“Check it before putting out” reviews the layout before publication, avoiding rapid production without checks.
The usage comparisons are checked against the Cambridge Dictionary entries linked beside the compared expressions. The additional conversations and exercises are written for this course.
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