Shared knowledge
Task A – Our answer
After finishing their meal and before leaving the restaurant they will
have to pay for what they have eaten. This is normally done by calling
the waiter and asking for the bill. The waiter then brings the bill and
the couple pay (perhaps with cash, perhaps by cheque or credit card).
They will probably give the waiter a tip. Then they will get up, perhaps
put on their coats, walk to the door and leave, probably saying ‘thank
you’ and ‘goodbye’ as they do so.
If they arrive at the block of flats in a taxi, they must have hailed
one outside the restaurant, or telephoned for one, probably from inside
the restaurant. They will have told the taxi driver where they wanted
to go just before, or just after, getting into the taxi. They will almost
certainly have sat next one another on the back seat of the taxi. When
the taxi arrived at the destination it must have stopped and they must
have got out. If they are walking away from the taxi they must already
have paid the bill and tipped the driver.
You may not have picked up on exactly the same aspects as us, because
there are many others that could be spelled out, depending partly on how
much detail you decide to go in for (they must have put one foot in front
of another in order to walk away from the taxi, for example!). But you
are likely to have a fair amount of agreement with our account.
Finally, it is important to notice that what we assume is not guaranteed.
They might not have paid the restaurant bill (perhaps they ran away without
paying!). Similarly, they might not have paid the taxi driver (perhaps
the taxi driver is afraid of them because he knows they are vicious gangsters).
But scenarios like this are unlikely (they go against what we expect from
our shared knowledge) and so would be marked. They would need explicit
evocation and an explanation within the world of the drama (the dramatic
equivalent of something like we have said inside the brackets above).
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