5 Simple Steps How To Improve Your English Listening Skills

you know what there’s something that I

hear on a regular basis students message

means students just like you and say

teacher I understand about 80 or 90% of

what you say it’s so amazing but how

come I can’t understand other English

speakers or what about this one teacher

your videos are great I love them I can

understand you but how come I can’t

understand English movies you probably

have asked the same question now I’m so

happy you can understand me but I

realized this is a big issue one of my

students last week actually asked the

same question she said TIFF how can I

improve my English listening skills so

you know what I did I came up with a

simple five-step plan that’s right five

steps that will help you improve your

English listening skills now I’m gonna

tell you these five steps but I need you

to do something for me I need you to

like share and also subscribe to this

channel now why do I need you to do this

because my goal my main goal is to help

students around the world gain

confidence in their ability to speak in

English and also enjoy the process but I

need your help because I can’t do it

alone I really want to help 1 billion

students I know it’s a big number but

together we can make it happen

and all you have to do is like this

video share this video with someone else

who’s learning English and then

subscribe to this channel I would

appreciate it so much because that will

help me spread the word and help other

students gain confidence so again like

share and subscribe I am teacher Tiffany

let’s jump right in

[Music]

all right so five steps we’re going to

look at five different steps that will

help you improve your listening skills

now the first step is find a video or

podcast something you are interested in

now I mentioned this in last week’s

video the importance of actually finding

something you’re interested in because

your brain is awesome you already kind

of have this this storage room of words

connected to your interests and all you

have to do is translate those words to

English so find a video or podcast about

a topic you’re interested in now again

let me describe it for you look for a

video or podcast that is connected to a

topic you enjoy why because learning

about topics you already enjoy makes it

easy for your brain to make connections

as you listen you know it’s so funny

quick story time I was teaching a class

last week and two of my students were

having a conversation and I was

listening to them and one of the

questions was related to a challenge

they faced in life now one of my

students she’s an architect you know who

you are

hey Daisy and my other student Roberto

he works in Brazil and he works with

Caterpillar there’s a company that makes

these machines that are used in

construction and they’re Caterpillar

Hagee Berto so they were having a

discussion about challenges and I was so

amazed as I watched them speak

confidently and comfortably about the

challenges they faced related to their

jobs and related to things connected to

their jobs now when they stopped I said

you know what guys do you realize that

you were able to speak confidently about

this topic they said yeah we do and I

told them it was because they had

already formulated ideas about the topic

in their own language so when I asked

them the question in English it was very

easy for them to translate it into

English because they already had kind of

the storage room makes it so again find

a video or podcast be

it’s gonna be easier for you to connect

the information in English now so after

you do that again it needs to be your

interests you’re going to move on to

step number two listen and mark the

timestamps the parts you don’t

understand so here we go listen to the

video or watch the video or listen to

the podcast and write down the time

stamps of the parts you don’t understand

now again remember you’re only writing

down the timestamps sometimes as a

student you feel like you have to write

every word or every single part that you

want to go back and look at or look in

the dictionary and sometimes you’ll say

teacher if I look in the dictionary for

every single word I won’t finish in time

and I get it that’s why the second step

is literally just write the timestamp so

let’s say for example I’m gonna take out

my headphones you find your podcast you

find the video and you are ready to

watch the video or listen to the podcast

and then you start and from the very

beginning you don’t understand anything

put my headphones on listening oh I

don’t know what that is

pause write the time stamp but you don’t

have to write anything else again for

step two all right

now why is this important reason jotting

down quick notes is good because it

doesn’t stop you from listening to the

remainder of the program

oh now real quick you see there’s

another new one second gonna fix this

right here I’m gonna make sure okay

all right so you’ll notice I said

jotting down now jotting down that

expression just means to make a quick

note you got it so not like when you’re

studying for a test and you have to

write extensively nope quick notes we

say jotting down in English all right so

you’re going to jot down very quickly a

time stamp so let’s say for example I

said I listen to something this is what

my notebook would look like one minute

and five seconds second two minutes and

56 seconds and you see I just wrote the

timestamps this is all you have to do

for part two as you

listen now we’re gonna progress to step

number three the third thing is you’re

gonna go to the time stamp and listen

again and guess so again listen to the

portions at the time stamps one more

time and guess what is being said that’s

right so you’ve listened to it all the

way through then what you’re gonna do is

you’re gonna go back this is step three

and you’re only gonna look for those

parts that you didn’t understand not the

entire thing just go to one minute and

say 25 seconds listen to that short

portion and try to figure out what’s

being said and then guess it’s okay just

guess what you think is being said now

why is this important here’s the reason

this will help you focus on small

portions instead of the entire program

many times as an English Learner you get

frustrated and overwhelmed because

you’re trying to see everything at once

whereas this is saying hey you’ve

already listened to the full program now

go back to that little part and see can

you understand that portion right there

so let’s see how it would look for

example I listen to something this is my

notebook one minute and five seconds

I heard prec was it ah but the word is

prerequisite now prerequisite let me

kind of explain it to you so

prerequisite is something that must

occur before something else happens the

easiest way to understand it imagine

when you were in university right and

you are majoring in biology right it’s

your freshman year though your first

year they say ah before you take let’s

say organic chemistry you need to take

chemistry you need to take the basic

chemistry chemistry 101 chemistry 101 is

a pre or before requisite right you need

to have this class before you take

organic chemistry in English we say

pre-requisite alright ok so then two

minutes and 56 seconds on clad knife and

then realize ah on cloud 9 now again you

guys are getting a lot of expressions

today on cloud 9 just means you feel

awesome

you feel amazing everything is a-okay we

say on cloud nine now for me personally

when I’m on cloud nine y’all I usually

sing and dance for students in my

academy I kind of sang a lot last week

for one of our QA episodes but yeah when

I’m really excited and really happy and

I’m on cloud nine I usually like to sing

alright so let’s go on to the next one

number three let’s say back on d-day

well oh that’s actually back in the day

back in the day just means a long time

ago I taught that I think I taught that

on Instagram you can check out Instagram

I teach every day a new word and the new

slang term alright next I said call

fiber was actually all nighter all that

it refers to studying all through the

night you have to work or study all

through the night we say all-nighter

I pulled an all-nighter I did an

all-nighter it means I worked or studied

all through the night all right now

let’s say the last one I found was

sucked Mike what is sunked eye it’s

actually Zonk t' all right so

pronunciation after me Zonk t' one more

time

Zonk now some just means extremely

exhausted or really tired now I want to

pause really quickly because you see

sometimes when you’re on this step

you’re on step three and you hear the

words or expressions you may not be able

to find out the correct expression or

words or you want to ask some a question

someone a question well that’s where

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your English to the next level alright

so again we’re on step three and this is

the step where if you need to ask

questions you can ask questions to your

tutors just like the tutors at Camp Lee

so again we’re gonna keep going on now

so we’ve looked at the timestamps and

now we have to go on to the fourth step

figure out the context before after and

overall so listen to the portions before

and immediately after the portion you

didn’t understand then think about the

video as a whole so you see what

happened in step number three when I was

explaining you know back in the day

all-nighter

I explained those to you but we couldn’t

listen to the same program right so even

if you figure out back in the day our

all-nighter you may not understand how

that connects to the actual program you

listen to this is when you have to

figure out the context what are they

talking about

at that point before that point after

that point and what’s the whole focus of

what you’re listening to that program

what’s the topic or what’s the focus now

why is this so important this step is so

important because it will help your

brain start to connect the information

and understand what you miss so let’s

see how I would do it so for example

four minutes and 11 seconds they said

back on d-day that’s what I heard but

it’s actually back in the day now you

on the left and the right the context

before and the context after these two

pieces of information are going to help

me kind of guess the real meaning of

back in the day all right so here we go

talking about all of the new technology

available today that happened from 3

minutes and 30 seconds to four minutes

and ten seconds then they started to

compare it to old technology looking at

the context before now what happened

after the 4 minute an 11-second mark

they start to speak about childhood

excuse me memories so they’re suddenly

going from talking about present-day

technology to childhood memories and

right in the middle there’s this

expression back in the day ah they’re

talking about old times or the past

context clues this can help you

understand things when you’re listening

to things in English all right now this

helps us move to step number five

alright so step number five is listen

one more time to make sure you

understand you’re going to listen to the

program or watch it one more time and

make sure you are able to understand the

portions you went over this is so

important because it will help you feel

more confident and give your brain one

last time to recognize what you learned

this is so important so step one two

three and four that’s where you’re going

to actually process and understand the

information to try to guess what’s going

on then Step five kind of solidifies I

understood my listening is improving and

that’s all you need to do these five

steps are gonna take your English to the

next level now I have part two as I

always do and part two is for my Academy

students if you’re not a member all you

have to do is go to let’s jump right in

comm and become a member right now and

you can watch part two in part two I

really help you by giving you a

worksheet where you can use the

worksheet as you listen to programs to

write times

and I explained to you how to use the

worksheet as well so I really hope you

enjoyed this episode and I want you to

take your English to the next level and

improve your listening skills so don’t

forget when you get to step three and

you’re trying to guess what is actually

being said you may need a tutor and

that’s where it came Billy again comes

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Kaylee thanks again response during this

video guys I love you guys I really want

to help you improve your English

remember to Like share and subscribe so

that you can help somebody else take

their English to the next level I’ll see

you next week but as always remember to

speak English oh yeah you know what time

it is it’s story time

hey I said it’s story time

okay now whoo I’ll be very honest

today’s story is gonna be a many funny

and interesting so I will never forget

this so growing up I was a good child I

was a good kid I I wasn’t disrespectful

I followed the rules you know I had fun

but I was a good kid I listened to my

parents but I remember this one time my

mom and I were home my dad was at work

and we were in the kitchen and my mom

said something and I got a little bit

irritated but I wasn’t crazy now I will

tell you this about my mom my mom is

short we say sometimes short people are

very spunky

oh there’s Spitfires so I watched to

imagine you know fire is hot right and

you spit like you spit so spit fire is

someone who may jump on you real quick

or they can be aggressive sometimes and

my mom is loving but she can be a

Spitfire sometimes so anyways

I’m not sure exactly what was said or

what the situation was but for some

reason my mom got upset and she told me

to go upstairs to my room now I was

upset too but again remember I told you

she was a spit

I wasn’t crazy I wasn’t going to talk

back now talk back is when you know

parents tell their child something and

the kid says well I don’t want to do

that why do I have to never-never did

not do that did not do that my mom is a

Spitfire my dad my parents raised us to

never be disrespectful so we weren’t

disrespectful my sister and I we were

not disrespectful

anyways but this situation something

happened in the kitchen my mom told me

to go upstairs and I was a teenager so I

was a little bit you know when you’re a

teenager going through your adolescent

phase he kind of you know you get upset

you want to kind of show your emotion

but I was not crazy because my mom was a

Spitfire so she said go upstairs to your

room so I said yes ma’am now I even in

my eyes my facial expression I couldn’t

show any any measure of disrespect I

couldn’t say nope you better not you

better not you get popped

so she said go to your room and again so

I had to go upstairs to my room now my

kitchen from my kitchen to my room

honestly to walk maybe it took I would

say 30 or 40 seconds like it’s not close

it’s not far but it’s not close so you

know we live in the same home right so I

walked up the steps and again I in my

head I’m just mad but my facial

expression yes ma’am yes ma’am so I walk

up the steps my mom’s still in the

kitchen I get upstairs and I get to my

door and I’m just about to open my door

very quietly I said I kid you not it was

that it was that quiet now I have the

mic right here so it loud to you but it

was very quiet like I literally did that

before I could get it out of my mouth my

mom downstairs says you bet not security

okay she said you better not suck your

teeth I the level of fear that came over

me

I said there’s no way in the world she

could have heard me suck my teeth it was

so low so blind so quiet she was

downstairs in the kitchen and she heard

it she said you better not suck your

teeth needless to say I never sucked my

teeth ever again

my life ever again in my life and I

realized oh my mom’s crazy but no again

so we’re talking about being able to

listen so we say my mom can hear

everything she can hear everything so if

you have children sometimes you need to

try that even if you don’t hear them

suck their teeth call them out oh you

better not suck your teeth oh yeah

anyways I never sucked my teeth ever

again I continued to be scared of my mom

thinking that she could hear anything

anywhere and yeah so yeah we say you

know sometimes you have to put the fear

of God into your children so that they

can respect you and I can guarantee when

I have children I will do the exact same

thing I will not tolerate sucking of

teeth or any disrespect but I really

never forgot their situation let me know

in the comments section if you guys ever

experienced the situation where your mom

or your dad kind of got upset or they

heard you do something that you thought

they couldn’t have possibly heard you

doing alright I hope you guys enjoyed

this story I’ll talk to you next week

have a good one