What we do

Spotlight magazine helps you to improve your English and keeps you up to date on what’s happening in the Englishspeaking world.

This magazine has two parts. The first has news stories, travel reports, columns and interviews, some with exercises. Part two is the language section, in which useful vocabulary and grammar are explained. Many of these pages include exercises.

British spelling and punctuation are used in all texts except those marked as being in US English with this symbol: US

Every text has been written or adapted to one of three language levels.

These correspond to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. The level is given at the top of the page. This text, for example, is Easy (see above). Choose texts at your level of English or try difficult ones that challenge you.

Difficult words and phrases are underlined, and the German translations of these words are given in a list on each page. Words that are hard to pronounce come with phonetic symbols. After some of these words, you’ll find a US tag, indicating that the word is used mainly in the United States. Words marked with a N. Am. tag are used in both the United States and Canada.

Better at English with Spotlight

Here are some tips on how to use the magazine effectively:

• Interesting and useful words and phrases are highlighted in yellow and explained.

• For every article you read, mark the words that are useful to you. Write down five to ten words from every issue in a notebook and test yourself regularly.

• You’ll find recordings, for example of Everyday English and Britain Today, on the Spotlight Audio Cd/download. Look for this symbol:

• Support your learning by doing exercises in our Spotlight plus booklet. Grammar, vocabulary and cultural extras are all covered in plus. Look for this symbol: +

What we write about

In the first part of Spotlight, we report on events and people from the English-speaking world. So, we cover countries where English is the main language, or where English is an important language. Those countries include: the United Kingdom Ireland Canada India

Australia the United States South Africa Pakistan