A Trip to the Dentist with Teacher Robin

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Hello, welcome to another class. I’m Robin and today we are going to talk about dentist vocabulary because March the 6th is actually Dentist’s Day. So dentists, or doctors for our teeth or mouth, are very important people and so we want to recognize them. And I want to give you some useful vocabulary for when you go to the dentist, especially if you have to go in another country when you’re traveling or in an English speaking country. I’m going to give you some useful dentist vocabulary. 

Okay, so who are the people that you see? You see the dentist and you also see a dental hygienist, so this is the person who cleans your teeth when you go to the dentist. Okay, so these are the two people that you will see at your dentist appointment. I’m going to explain how to make an appointment as well. So let’s say you don’t have any problems with your teeth and you just want to go for your yearly cleaning or checkup. So this could be yearly, it could be every six months, but you need to do this at least once a year. So this is when the dental hygienist will clean your teeth. They might also take an X-ray of your mouth to check for any problems. They will clean the plaque from your teeth. So when your teeth are dirty, the food when you eat food sometimes, even though you brush your teeth, maybe some plaque builds up so they use a special tool that removes the plaque from between your teeth. They will also look at your gums. So the pink part around your teeth, these are your gums. So you could also have issues with your gums if you don’t take care of them. So this is another thing that the dentist and the dental hygienist will look at.

So normally when you go when you go for this cleaning, they will clean the plaque as I said, they will also brush your teeth for you with a special toothbrush, sometimes an electric one. And they will also floss. So floss is like a piece of string that you put between each of your teeth to remove this plaque or this extra food after you after you eat. So they will do all of this for you. And if there are no issues in the X-ray, then that’s it. And they might have you rinse your mouth out with water or even gargle, which is when you put water or mouthwash in your mouth and you kind of you know move it around and then you spit it out. So this is gargling with your, this noise that you make that’s called gargling. Okay, so you might have to gargle with mouthwash. And then they may even give you a toothbrush or some floss to take with you. I know my dentist in the US. I always get a toothbrush to take home with me but it depends on where you go. Okay, so that’s your general cleaning and checkup when you go to the dentist. 

Now let’s say you have a problem. Okay, if your teeth are one of your teeth, so we have one tooth and two or more teeth. This is an irregular plural. If your teeth or one tooth is hurting, it’s called a toothache. Okay, so if you have a toothache, you need to call a dentist because you might have a cavity. A cavity is a small hole in your tooth. Now why do we get cavities? Some people have more than others. This is genetic sometimes, or it can be because of what you eat. If you eat a lot of sweets, foods with sugar, the sugar eats at your teeth and it causes these holes. So that’s why it’s important to always brush and floss. But sometimes it happens and we get cavities. So they can see that in this X-ray, when they scan your mouth. They can see if you have a cavity. So there are some options of what they will do. Sometimes if the hole is very small, they can fill it and this is called a filling. So if you get a filling, it’s filling the hole filling the cavity. Now if the cavity is very bad, and it’s affected the whole tooth, you might need an extraction, where they actually pull or they remove the tooth. Okay, so if this happens, you’lll need to be given some local anesthesia. So anesthesia is when we have some sort of surgery or procedure when we are put to sleep. Now if it’s a big surgery, it’s general anesthesia. For dental work, normally it’s local, which just means only in the mouth. So you’ll be given an injection in your, around the area to numb the area, which means that you won’t feel. If you are numb that means that you cannot feel it. So when they do this extraction, you won’t feel any pain. 

Okay, so that’s one bad thing, let’s say that could happen at the dentist. Another one is a chipped tooth or a broken tooth. So imagine you are eating something and you bite down and you break you hear it or you feel it, you break your tooth, because you have eaten something hard, maybe you weren’t expecting, like a bone or something like that. This could cause a chip. So a chip is when a small piece comes off of a broken tooth. Or you could also have an accident where maybe you’re riding a bicycle and you fall down and you fall on your mouth, or somehow in the gym, or, I mean there are all kinds of different options, you can hurt or break your your tooth or chip your tooth, so you’ll need to go to the dentist. And it’s possible if the chip is small, they can put what’s called a cap which is kind of like a cover to keep the tooth from breaking more. Or if it’s really bad, you might need an extraction or if the tooth has come out completely when you hurt yourself, then you might need a false tooth. Okay, so that’s another option, the dentist can put a false tooth in your mouth. 

Alright, what are some other reasons why we might need to go to the dentist, maybe you want to whiten your teeth. So maybe your teeth are a bit yellow, like a yellowish color because you drink a lot of coffee or because you haven’t taken care of them or some people just naturally have a more yellow color in their teeth because of, again, genetics, your family etc. So you might want to go for a whitening treatment. So this is where they put these kinds of trays in your mouth with whitener. And then it will bleach or it will make your teeth more white. So that’s one possible thing you might want to do at the dentist. 

Also, we go to the dentist to remove our wisdom teeth, or our wisdom teeth or these teeth that come in in the very back of our mouths. And they come in later on when we are older, like teenage to early 20s is when most people get their wisdom teeth and it can be painful when they come in and they can cause your teeth to move around. So we have to have them removed. Okay, so this is another procedure that your dentist can perform. 

And also, if our teeth are crooked, which means they’re not straight the way they should be, maybe one tooth is crooked or they’re out of place, you might need to get something called braces we say in the US or brackets in the UK. These are these things that they put on your teeth and they kind of they tighten them to move them around. But for these braces or brackets you go to a special dentist called the orthodontist. Okay, so if you need braces or brackets you go to an orthodontist, which is a special kind of dentist.

Okay, let’s look at what we do if we need, let’s say you are traveling and you need to make an appointment at the dentist or you have an accident, you have an emergency. So you can say “Can I make an appointment for a teeth cleaning?” Okay, normally you’ll do this at home because it’s not an emergency. So, Can I make an appointment for a teeth cleaning? Okay, if you have an emergency, you can say I have a toothache. I need to see a dentist immediately or as soon as possible. Or I have a chipped tooth or I chipped my tooth. Okay, so these are all ways that you can call or you can go in and ask to schedule an appointment with a dentist. 

Okay, and now let’s look at a few idioms related to teeth. I always like to include some idioms related to our topic. So I have five related to teeth. Okay the first one, long in the tooth. If someone is long in the tooth, it means they are old, older and maybe too old to do something. So if you say someone is long in the tooth, you think they shouldn’t be doing that, they’re too old, they’re long in the tooth. Okay, by the skin of your teeth, this means that you are just able to do something. For example, I passed the exam by the skin of my teeth, so you only just passed. Okay to lie through your teeth, to lie through your teeth means you tell a lie and you know that it is a lie. So you are telling someone information you know is false. A lot of people use this in the context of a politician or someone who is saying something that you know, is not true. He’s lying through his teeth. All right. If something is like pulling teeth, it means it’s very difficult to do so maybe you’re trying to have a conversation with someone and it’s just not going very well you can say “Talking to him was like pulling teeth”. Like there was no, you had nothing to talk about, nothing in common, it was very difficult.

Okay, and my last idiom to bite off more than you can chew. Okay, this means that you try to do something or you agree to do something that is too difficult for you, okay? Because either you don’t have the skills or the strength or whatever it is that you need to really do this well, so you have bit off or you bite off more than you can chew. 

Alright, so I hope that you have learned some new vocabulary today and I want to ask you to tell me in the comments, do you enjoy going to the dentist? I personally do not. And I don’t have any, any problems with my teeth. I said knock on wood, which means I hope I don’t. But I just don’t enjoy going to the dentist but many people do because you go for cleaning and you feel better afterwards your teeth are clean. So tell me in the comments. Do you enjoy going to the dentist? And also if you want to write an example with some of these idioms that I have just taught you related to teeth, then feel free to write an example below. So thanks again for watching this class. If you are a dentist or a dental hygienist I hope you have a wonderful dentist day later this week, and I will catch you next week. Take care. Bye!