Learn English Phrases With UK's Finest Gardens
Join us today in an English Vocabulary Garden Tour 🇬🇧 at RHS Wisley! 🌿 Learn about some cool and famous British gardens while you supercharge your English with real-world English listening practice. 📚
Grow Your English:
- Tutorial & Review: Listen-by-listen learning
- UK Lifestyle & News: Immersive British culture
- New Vocabulary & Phrases: Garden-rich language
- Listening Practice: Hear everyday English
- Adept English Podcast: Learn on the go
✔Lesson transcript: https://adeptenglish.com/lessons/english-phrases-famous-uk-gardens/
To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.
⭐ Audrey Hepburn
This isn't just an English lesson; it's an adventure that enriches your vocabulary and sprinkles your path with the fragrance of learning.
Ready to transform your English and immerse yourself in the beauty of Wisley?
The love of gardening is a seed once sown that never dies.
⭐ Gertrude Jekyll
👩🌾 From beginner to pro, grow your English fluently with us. Visit adeptenglish.com now!
More About This Lesson
Join us on an exciting journey through RHS Wisley Garden, a place where learning English and experiencing British culture go hand in hand. With every step you take, every plant you visualise, and every path you explore, your English skills will blossom. Let's explore a world where language learning meets the beauty of nature.
Nature is not a place to visit. It is home.
⭐ Gary Snyder
Here's what to remember:
- Boosts vocabulary: Learn garden-related English words.
- Introduces British culture: Understand UK's gardening heritage.
- Improves listening skills: Practice with varied English accents.
- Offers immersive learning: Dive into real-life English usage.
- Teaches pronunciation: Hear and mimic correct English sounds.
- Encourages repetition: Listen multiple times to reinforce learning.
- Provides context: Connect English terms with their uses.
- Showcases biodiversity: Learn about plant species and ecosystems.
- Explains scientific terms: Understand basic horticulture concepts.
- Promotes sustainability: Learn environmentally friendly gardening.
If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.
⭐ Marcus Tullius Cicero
Even if you're not that keen on gardening, RHS Wisley isn't just a garden; think of it as a vibrant classroom. Engaging with this lesson offers:
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A Unique Learning Experience: Learn English through a sensory-rich environment that captures the essence of British culture and horticulture.
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Insights into Scientific Research and Conservation: Discover Wisley's role in global challenges like climate change and biodiversity.
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Historical and Architectural Wonders: Explore the garden's historical buildings and structures, enriching your cultural and linguistic knowledge.
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Educational Opportunities: Learn about Wisley's educational programs, which can deepen your understanding of gardening and English.
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Help us make more content with a donation https://adeptengli.sh/donate
Don't miss out on this vibrant journey through RHS Wisley Garden. Follow and subscribe for a colourful path to English fluency with Adept English. Let's grow your English skills together amidst the beauty of nature.
Frequently Asked Questions
Today's English lesson is a linguistic voyage through RHS Wisley's lush expanses, where each plant blooms into a new word and every path weaves through the rich tapestry of British culture.
- What is RHS Wisley and why is it important for learning British English? RHS Wisley is the main garden of the Royal Horticultural Society in the UK, known for its vast variety of plants and gardening expertise. It's a fantastic place to immerse yourself in British culture and learn English vocabulary related to gardens, plants, and the environment. By exploring RHS Wisley, you enrich your understanding of British English through practical examples and real-life contexts.
- How can visiting RHS Wisley help me improve my English? Visiting RHS Wisley offers you the chance to practice listening to and understanding English in a natural setting. You'll encounter new vocabulary related to horticulture, sustainability, and British culture. It's an excellent way to learn language in context, making it easier to remember and use in conversation.
- What types of plants can I learn about at RHS Wisley? At RHS Wisley, you can learn about a wide range of plants, from fruit and vegetables to exotic houseplants grown in the huge glasshouse. The garden showcases various species, including roses, tulips, bluebells, and even plants used in pharmaceuticals, providing a rich source of vocabulary and knowledge.
- Can RHS Wisley teach me about sustainable gardening? Absolutely. RHS Wisley is a center for gardening excellence, where you can learn about sustainable gardening practices. It offers insights into growing food without harming the environment, preserving biodiversity, and even how to create wildlife-friendly gardens, aligning with modern environmental concerns.
- How can I use the experience of visiting RHS Wisley to boost my English language skills? To boost your English skills, listen to English descriptions and explanations while touring Wisley. Note new vocabulary and phrases, and try to use them in sentences. Engage with staff or fellow visitors in English to practice speaking. Remember, repetition is key, so consider revisiting or exploring similar contexts to reinforce what you've learned.
Most Unusual Words:
- HORTICULTURAL: About gardens and growing plants.
- TEMPERATE: Weather that is not very hot and not very cold.
- CLIMATE: The usual weather in a place.
- SUSTAINABLY: In a way that does not harm the environment.
- BIODIVERSITY: Variety of different types of plants and animals in an area.
- SEED: A small object that a new plant can grow from.
- SEED BANK: A place where seeds are kept safe.
- ORCHARD: A place where fruit trees are grown.
- NIRVANA: A state of perfect happiness, an ideal or idyllic place.
- ALLOTMENT: A small piece of land that people can rent to grow plants, especially food.
Most Frequently Used Words:
| Word | Count |
|---|---|
| Gardens | 19 |
| Wisley | 16 |
| Garden | 12 |
| Growing | 12 |
| There | 12 |
| Which | 11 |
| English | 9 |
| Plants | 9 |
| Means | 8 |
Listen To The Audio Lesson Now
Transcript: Grow Your English With Famous UK Gardens
Visit a UK garden called Wisley: Learn English Through Garden talk
Hi there. Today let’s explore one of my favourite gardens, ‘RHS Wisley’. And let’s pick up lots of English vocabulary along the way. Wisley is a place you might visit if you come to the UK in the spring or summer. Less than an hour outside of London is Wisley, that’s WISLEY and it’s the main garden for the Royal Horticultural Society or RHS in the UK. ‘Horticultural’, HORTICULTURAL means ‘to do with gardens and growing plants’.
So the RHS is all about plants and growing. And Wisley is the largest and oldest of the Royal Horticultural Society gardens and a paradise for garden enthusiasts. So if you’re staying in London, it’s quite nice to take a trip out of the city for the day, to somewhere greener and calmer. On a warm, sunny day in the summer, the garden is at its best. And there may be a lot of visitors to Wisley, but it’s such a large site - 240 acres or 97 hectares of gardens - if you want to be on your own, you can find space there. And whatever plants, trees or types of gardening you can think of, whatever type of gardening interests you - it’s there at Wisley. There’s a lot to see - much more than you might imagine. RHS Wisley is also a centre of gardening expertise. So today, let’s go on a journey not just through Wisley's huge acres of gardens but also through some varied English language vocabulary with a bit of British culture thrown in.
Boost Your Learning With Adept English
Don’t forget to listen to this podcast a number of times to practise all sorts of English terms and phrases. And don’t forget - advice on how to use our podcasts to give your English language a massive boost - well, it’s all in our free course, The Seven Rules of Adept English. You can find it on our website at adeptenglish.com. Make sure you’re using these podcasts to best advantage.
Hello, I’m Hilary, and you’re listening to Adept English. We will help you to speak English fluently. All you have to do is listen. So start listening now and find out how it works.
The UK - a gardening nation?
So the UK is famous for its gardens - one advantage of having a rainy but fairly ‘temperate’ climate - we are good at growing things. The word ‘temperate’, TEMPERATE is used of climate and weather and ‘temperate’ means ‘not very hot, not very cold’ - sort of ‘in the middle’. And ‘climate’, CLIMATE is a word for ‘the general weather’ in a place. We can’t grow everything here - sadly not bananas or oranges, coconuts or pineapples unless it’s in a glass house. But there are so many things we can and do grow, especially to eat. At Wisley, there is expertise - know-how, if you like - on all kinds of plants and planting. If you want to garden sustainably, SUSTAINABLY - that means ‘without harming the environment in any way’, if you want to have a pond or a water garden, if you want to grow fruit or vegetables or grapes to make your own wine - it’s there at Wisley. And if you prefer to grow roses, tulips, bluebells, lupins, cacti, maple trees - also all there. And it’s presented in a way which means that you can learn about it.
📷
A lush green garden with a worn wooden bench. Boost your vocabulary with plant names.
So Wisley is not just about admiring plants. As the oldest RHS garden, established in 1878, Wisley serves as a centre for gardening excellence, where scientific research meets practical gardening. Wisley is a garden with a mission, a purpose: to educate, to preserve, and to inspire. Its aim partly is to preserve the future of our planet's biodiversity - that’s BIODIVERSITY, and it means ‘variety in species, variety in types of plants’. Wisley holds the Royal Horticultural Society seed banks. A ‘seed’, SEED is that tiny little thing that a plant grows from. And a ‘seed bank’ means ‘a safe place where seeds are kept’. So a ‘seed bank’ is rather like a ‘bank’ for your money, to keep your money safe in! They also have laboratories at Wisley where plant research takes place. So the gardens are beautiful, but the RHS is also there to do research and to educate and preserve.
So Wisley is the oldest and most established RHS garden in the UK. Though founded in 1878 as I said, it was given to the Royal Horticultural Society in 1903. So this is a garden which is very established and has a long history. The newest RHS garden is RHS Bridgewater, which is near Manchester in the north of England. Also worth visiting, this garden was only opened in 2021. It’s a smaller garden, but still 154 acres, which is 62 hectares. I visited in summer 2021 and it was very beautiful, but like any garden, it will be even better when it’s grown some more.
Wisley: Better than Kew Gardens!
The gardens at Wisley are very popular, second only in visitor numbers to the Botanic Gardens at Kew, KEW in south west London, which you may have heard of. Here’s some practice understanding big numbers. Kew Gardens had in 2023, 1,974,295 visitors - that’s a lot! In 2023 at Wisley, there were 1,361,785 visitors - you can see that these places are popular attractions! The most popular attraction in London for contrast - that means the one with the most visitor numbers at 5,820,860 people in a year? Well, that’s The British Museum. Of the two gardens, Kew and Wisley, I much prefer Wisley. There’s so much more to see there!
So I visit Wisley probably 3 or 4 times a year, because it’s not far from where I live and there’s something different to see at different times of year. It’s a nice place to have a picnic in the summer. There are orchards towards the back where you can spread your picnic blanket under the apple and pear trees. An ‘orchard’, ORCHARD is a field where fruit trees grow. There is the world-famous ‘long border’ - a traditional type of British garden called ‘a cottage garden’ is on display here. In mid-summer, this is nirvana for many gardeners. But there are also rose gardens, herb gardens, Italian gardens, there’s a huge glass house, lakes, water gardens, walled gardens, rock gardens, wildlife gardens. That last one - ‘wildlife’ means ‘animals that are wild’, not farmed or owned, but animals which just arrive in your garden - and the expertise in how to encourage them. We are encouraged generally in the UK to be ‘wildlife friendly’, to welcome all animals into our gardens, even the ones that may do damage to our plants! And in the huge glasshouse? Well, many of those plants which we grow as ‘house plants’ in pots in our homes - you get to see the huge version, growing as a wild plant would, wherever in the world it may come from, all in controlled conditions. There are different areas in the glass house, with different temperatures and growing conditions. I’ve got lots of houseplants, but I’d never really think about where in the world they come from or what they look like when they’re growing native, in the wild. Well, you can see this in the glasshouse at Wisley. And some of them are huge!
Wisley’s World Food Garden - you’ll learn a lot!
A part of Wisley that I’ve learned to love since it opened in 2020 - what they call ‘The World Food Garden’. This is just over an acre of garden, which is devoted to ‘grow your own food’. There are obvious things growing in the garden, tomatoes, chilli plants, peppers, cucumbers, aubergines, salad, onions, potatoes - all the vegetables that you might expect. But what I also like here is that you can see how to grow vegetables that you don’t normally see growing. Like - and here are some more unusual vegetable names for you to practise with - quinoa, which is spelt QUINOA, but pronounced ‘keenwa’ - and this is something you eat in a salad. Other vegetables that you can see growing, which may not be familiar to you - gherkins, capers, artichokes, dates, radishes, lentils, walnuts, Brussel sprouts and rhubarb, RHUBARB. I had no idea what some of those plants look like when they are growing and I’m sure I’m testing your English with that list! So the World Food Garden is an education. And amongst the plants and vegetables that are growing are tables and chairs. So on a warm day in Wisley in the summer, you can sit amongst these vegetables and salads growing at the top of a hill and enjoy a coffee, an ice cream, a cup of tea and some cake. Very civilised!
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Drugs from plants?
Also in the same building associated with the World Food Garden, is a science centre. The RHS don’t just offer gardens for people to visit, but they keep the national collection of seeds and they also do scientific research on plants and growing. We need plants to keep growing - else none of us will survive! There’s also an interesting display about how most of the world’s drugs, pharmaceuticals if you like, come from plants. Like aspirin, ASPIRIN comes from willow trees, heart medications come from digitalis or in English ‘foxglove’ plants and of course opium and morphine come from poppies. Many of our commonly used drugs are from plants and you can learn about it here.
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Fancy growing in an allotment?
Another part of Wisley which I always like to go and look at - the allotments or ‘student gardens’. The word ‘allotment’, ALLOTMENT has a long history in the UK. Traditionally, an ‘allotment’ is a small area of land that you can rent locally, in order to grow food - fruit and vegetables, but people do also grow flowers. Allotments are often rented by people who live in apartments or flats and who therefore don’t have gardens. They’re all across the country and there’s a whole culture around ‘allotments’ and ‘allotment planting’ in the UK. It’s a very sociable thing to do. But at Wisley, you can visit the ‘student allotments’ - so these are areas of land given to horticultural students - those people training to be horticulturalists, knowledgable gardeners in other words. Each student is given the same area of land - a long rectangle and they then experiment with different layouts and growing different food. I’m sure it’s a great learning experience and possibly quite competitive too. But interesting as a visitor to see how different each allotment is - and the success, or not at growing things!
Goodbye
So that’s a lot of information and some good English language vocabulary for you to practise. If it takes you a little while to work through this podcast, don’t worry - it’s normal to need to work at a podcast like this one. But keep going - your brain will be learning a lot! And you never know - on that trip to the UK next time, you may find time to visit Wisley or one of the other five RHS gardens!
Enough for now. Have a lovely day. Speak to you again soon. Goodbye.
Thank you so much for listening. Please help me tell others about this podcast by reviewing or rating it. And, please share it on social media. You can find more listening lessons and a free English course at adeptenglish.com
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