Conversation Gambits - Eric Keller, Sylvia T Warner 1988
60. Are you following me?
3. Responding Gambits
If we have to listen to something longand complicated, we may want to ask the speaker to repeat what was said.
And if we are the person giving the information, we may want to check that the other person has understood correctly
Work in small groups of 3 or 4. Take it in turns for one person to read the problems below. That person should use the checking gambits'. The listeners should use the 'repetition gambits'.
Problems
1. Start with 5, multiply by 4, divide that by 2, subtract 3, then multiply by 10, then take half of that. What do you get?
2. If you write with your left hand, but draw with the opposite hand, and kick a ball with the foot on the same side, yet put the phone to your ear on the other side, which is the side where you are shortsighted, which eye is your good eye?
3. So you want go to the stadium. Well, it’s quite a long way, actually. Go straight along here till you get to the traffic lights, not the first set, the second set, then turn right, then the second on the left, then it's a straight road for about a mile till you get to the Odeon Cinema. Just past the Odeon, there's a big roundabout, go straight across it, and the stadium is in the park a couple of hundred yards on the left. It's not difficult to find!
4. Assume you have a tower made up of four building blocks: at the bottom there isa cube, then there is an octahedron (eight-faced solid), on top of which there isa cylinder, and at the very top there isa pyramid. Now suppose you put the cylinder underneath the octahedron. Then you put the cube below the pyramid. Then you put the octahedron at the bottom of the whole pile. What is the sequence of building blocks now?
5. Make up your own problem and present it to your group. Make notes to help you.
Repetition Gambits
Would you mind repeating that?
Sorry, I didn’t catch the last part.
Sorry, you’ve lost me.
Sorry, I don’t follow you.
What was that again?
Checking Gambits
Are you with me?
Are you still with me?
Is that clear?
OK so far?
Have you got it?
Do you understand so far?