Walk ‘n’ Talk Essentials #12 – Popular Christmas traditions in English. What are your family’s Christmas traditions?

Welcome to another episode of Walk ‘n’ Talk! Today we are talking all about Christmas traditions in English. This is great English conversation practice to hear how native speakers communicate and speak with each other. Follow along and enjoy this lesson by Kally, teacher from Fluency Academy!

The Dialogue:‍

A: Hey, what are you going to do for Christmas?
B: Oh, nothing special. My family doesn’t have many traditions. How about you?
A: We are going to have a big Christmas dinner, then a Secret Santa. It’s super fun!
B: Sounds nice! Do you have any food traditions?
A: Yeah, we always have turkey, rice and potato salad.
B: Stop talking, I’m getting hungry.
A: I won’t tell you our plans for dessert, then.
B: Thank you! But the big question is: rice with or without raisins?

‍Expand your Vocabulary:‍

‍Secret Santa
Secret Santa is a Christmas tradition in which each person in a group buys a Christmas present for one other person, without the person knowing who bought the present. After opening their present, the person has to guess which member of the group was their Secret Santa. It’s a holiday classic where guessing is as much a part of the fun as receiving the gift. Here are some examples:

I wonder who my Secret Santa was!
This awesome book was a gift from my Secret Santa.
Martha is organizing our office Secret Santa.

‍Raisins
A raisin is a dried grape. It’s tradition to eat white rice with raisins (and almonds) as a side dish with meals for a Christmas feast. Look at some examples:

I eat raisins with my lunch every day.
She likes to eat a slice of raisin bread for breakfast.
Do you want some raisins in your oatmeal?

‍Going to
We use “going to” to talk about future plans and intentions. We can also use it to make a prediction about the future. Check out some examples:

We are going to have dinner together tomorrow.
Is Chris going to buy a new car soon?
The radio said it was going to be cold and rainy tomorrow.

We hope you enjoyed learning more about Christmas traditions and if you are listening during that time of year, have a wonderful holiday season! Don’t forget that you can listen to it as many times as you want and that the more you practice, the more confident you will feel. See you next time!