How Many Words Do I Need To Know

hi i’m vanessa from speak english with

vanessa calm today i’m going to answer a

question that one of my students asked

me in an email

how many english words do I need to know

before I start speaking English let’s

talk about it my first question is how

do you know how many words you know in

English do you keep a list of them do

you count how many words are in your

vocabulary if this question is kind of

difficult to answer because it’s almost

impossible to know how many words you

know but my answer is no matter how many

words you know there’s no magic number

there’s no magic number of words that

you need to know in order to start

speaking English just start but today I

want to give you some advice to help you

feel comfortable getting started

speaking English especially if you feel

like you are a beginner or you are a

very low English speaker I want to tell

you a success story from my Japanese

student tour oh let me tell you about

him when I first met Toro he had never

spoken English with a native speaker

before he said that our skype lesson was

his first time speaking with a native

speaker

I felt very privileged to be able to be

the first native speaker to talk with

him because I hope that I could give him

a positive first experience so that he

wouldn’t feel nervous or frustrated so

before the lesson I sent him a basic

video a basic English video from YouTube

talking about morning routines first I

drink some coffee then I read the

newspaper something like this that is

very basic with some normal vocabulary

words that we could use to talk about

his morning routine during our lesson

and then we talked about his morning

routine what do you do first then what

do you do then what do you do and over

time over the lesson he felt more

comfortable using some of those words

that he learned

right there and if there was a word he

didn’t know what to say he didn’t know

how to say in English he looked it up on

an online dictionary the Internet is

your friend when you’re learning English

it’s okay if you need to look up

something in the dictionary especially

if you are a very low beginner you’re

going to need to look up some words in

the dictionary if you are an

intermediate speaker I recommend trying

to explain the word so that your teacher

whoever you’re talking with can

understand better so for example if you

don’t know the word monkey for example

you could say oh that animal it lives in

the trees it makes a sound like and

maybe the person you’re talking with can

say Oh monkey and that way you can

describe use English to describe what

you’re talking about

but if you are a low beginner maybe

you’ll need to look up some words in an

online dictionary in a physical

dictionary don’t feel bad it’s okay now

it’s been about three months since the

first time that I talked with Toro and

we talked maybe one two sometimes three

times per week we had 30 minute

conversations together where he could

use as much English as possible we based

it around basic topics so that he could

grow his vocabulary and feel more and

more comfortable and you know what for

the last few lessons that we’ve had

together it has been completely

unstructured free talking time he has

just spoken and tried to explain

anything that he possibly could with

energy and passion and you could see

that he was growing confident in his

English ability because his vocabulary

was growing but he didn’t wait until his

vocabulary was a certain level before he

started speaking he grew his vocabulary

while he was practicing and speaking so

there’s no excuse you can start speaking

in 24 hours on skype with me or you can

open your door and speak with your

in English try to find someone who you

can speak with don’t wait to start

speaking don’t wait until your

vocabulary is a certain level just

trying to say anything you can and have

a patient calm conversation if you feel

nervous or frustrated just start

speaking so now it’s your turn in the

comments below I will have a question

for you

when was the first time you spoke

English with a native English speaker

I’m curious to hear what you all have to

say maybe some of you spoke English with

the native speaker when you were very

young maybe some of you have never

spoken with a native speaker I’m curious

so leave a comment below and I’ll see

you there

talk to you later goodbye