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Learning English Conversations

Reinvent the wheel

Learning English Conversations

BBC

Language Learning, Education

4.61.2K Ratings

🗓️ 14 February 2017

⏱️ 2 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Wasting time doing something that's been done before? There's a phrase to explain this

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

This is a download from BBC Learning English.

0:03.0

To find out more, visit our website.

0:06.0

The English we speak.

0:09.0

From BBC learning English.

0:11.0

dot com.

0:12.0

Hello and

0:15.0

Hi, uh, hi there. I'm Faye Faye and hi there. I'm Neil

0:27.0

uh, Neil could we have your attention please? Sorry Faye Faye I'm still trying to finish the script for this program.

0:30.0

What? You're still writing the script for this program. So what's going to happen today then?

0:37.0

Well, I thought that you could pretend to arrive late. I've lost my coffee. I just need to think of an authentic real English

0:44.4

phrase to use now. Oh, come on, Neil. There is no need to reinvent the wheel.

0:49.4

Faye, you're amazing. To reinvent the wheel. That's a great English phrase. I'll use that in my script

0:55.8

To reinvent the wheel means to waste time trying to create something that has already been made

1:01.9

So I'm saying don't waste time writing a script that has already been written.

1:07.0

All your ideas have been written before.

1:10.0

Really? I'll show you, but first let's hear some more examples of this phrase.

1:15.0

Don't reinvent the wheel. We already have a plan that seems to work well.

1:22.0

He spent days working out the new course syllabus when we had

1:25.3

planned it already. He's just reinvented the wheel. Nancy's new idea is just

1:31.2

the same as the old one. She's just reinvented the wheel.

1:37.0

So to reinvent the wheel means to waste time and effort doing something that someone has done before. Now let me show you that old

1:46.2

script. Oh yeah let's have a look. Arrives late, drinks coffee, I tell a joke. You're right Faye, this is almost the same script.

...

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