full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Cady Coleman: What it's like to live on the International Space Station

Unscramble the Blue Letters


dirtmy and Paolo and I are circling the Earth in our tiny spacecraft, apchrioanpg the scpae saiottn carelufly. It's an icrnatite dncae at 17,500 miles an hour between our capsule, the size of a Smart Car, and the space station, the size of a football field. We arrive when those two craft dock with a gnlete thunk. We open the hatches, have sloppy zero-G hugs with each other, and now we're six. We're a space family, an instant flamiy.

My favorite part about living up there was the flying. I loved it. It was like being Peter Pan. It's not about floating. Just the touch of a finger can actually push you across the entire space station, and then you sort of tuck in with your toes. One of my favorite things was drifting silently through the space station, which was humming along at nihgt. I wondered sometimes if it knew I was there, just silent. But sharing the wonder of that with the crew was also part of what was important to me.

Open Cloze


______ and Paolo and I are circling the Earth in our tiny spacecraft, ___________ the _____ _______ _________. It's an _________ _____ at 17,500 miles an hour between our capsule, the size of a Smart Car, and the space station, the size of a football field. We arrive when those two craft dock with a ______ thunk. We open the hatches, have sloppy zero-G hugs with each other, and now we're six. We're a space family, an instant ______.

My favorite part about living up there was the flying. I loved it. It was like being Peter Pan. It's not about floating. Just the touch of a finger can actually push you across the entire space station, and then you sort of tuck in with your toes. One of my favorite things was drifting silently through the space station, which was humming along at _____. I wondered sometimes if it knew I was there, just silent. But sharing the wonder of that with the crew was also part of what was important to me.

Solution


  1. dance
  2. intricate
  3. space
  4. carefully
  5. gentle
  6. family
  7. station
  8. approaching
  9. dmitry
  10. night

Original Text


Dmitry and Paolo and I are circling the Earth in our tiny spacecraft, approaching the space station carefully. It's an intricate dance at 17,500 miles an hour between our capsule, the size of a Smart Car, and the space station, the size of a football field. We arrive when those two craft dock with a gentle thunk. We open the hatches, have sloppy zero-G hugs with each other, and now we're six. We're a space family, an instant family.

My favorite part about living up there was the flying. I loved it. It was like being Peter Pan. It's not about floating. Just the touch of a finger can actually push you across the entire space station, and then you sort of tuck in with your toes. One of my favorite things was drifting silently through the space station, which was humming along at night. I wondered sometimes if it knew I was there, just silent. But sharing the wonder of that with the crew was also part of what was important to me.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
space station 3
supply ship 2


Important Words


  1. approaching
  2. arrive
  3. capsule
  4. car
  5. carefully
  6. circling
  7. craft
  8. crew
  9. dance
  10. dmitry
  11. dock
  12. drifting
  13. earth
  14. entire
  15. family
  16. favorite
  17. field
  18. finger
  19. floating
  20. flying
  21. football
  22. gentle
  23. hatches
  24. hour
  25. hugs
  26. humming
  27. important
  28. instant
  29. intricate
  30. knew
  31. living
  32. loved
  33. miles
  34. night
  35. open
  36. pan
  37. paolo
  38. part
  39. peter
  40. push
  41. sharing
  42. silent
  43. silently
  44. size
  45. sloppy
  46. smart
  47. sort
  48. space
  49. spacecraft
  50. station
  51. thunk
  52. tiny
  53. toes
  54. touch
  55. tuck
  56. wondered