How to Start Thinking in English English Hacks

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hi everybody welcome back to ask Alicia

the weekly series where you ask me

questions and I answer them

maybe first question comes from Isaac

Alexandria hi again Isaac Isaac says hi

Alicia what’s the difference between by

chance by accident and accidentally by

chance tends to be used in more positive

situations you can think of it as like a

happy accident

when you have a happy accident you can

use by chance I was out shopping and I

ran into a co-worker by chance by

accident is probably the least used of

these three that you’ve introduced so by

accident you might also hear on accident

we use this for negative coincidences

things that are not so good I sent my

boss the wrong files on accident the

last one that you introduced

accidentally is the most common one that

we use for negative situation negative

coincidences I accidentally deleted my

portfolio and with this pronunciation

I’m saying it really clearly

accidentally accidentally but in fast

speech we say accidentally accidentally

I accidentally deleted my portfolio so I

hope that that helps you thanks very

much for the question let’s move on to

your next question the next question

comes from Jehan v hi honey

Jehan B says what is the difference

between in spite and despite the two

have the same meaning in spite and

despite just have to be kind of slightly

changed to fit into a sentence let’s

look at two examples in spite of her

sensitive stomach my friend ate ice

cream every day despite her sensitive

stomach my friend ate ice cream every

day so when we make a sentence with in

spite we say in spite of a noun phrase

when we use despite we say despite

followed by a noun phrase I want to

connect this question to a similar

question that we got for this week this

is from Moe add heat on high mu’adh

morad said I want to ask about the

differences between despite although

though and in spite of so we talked

about despite and in spite of we tend to

use all

a little more often at the beginning of

a sentence like although it’s kind of

like a formal but and though might be

more like at the middle part of a

sentence so like a though be so that’s

kind of how we might use these two I

hope that that answers both of your

questions I hope that that helps you

I’ll try to make a whiteboard video

about this topic as well thanks very

much for sending these questions okay

let’s move along to your next question

next question comes from Satish hi sati

Satish says hi Alicia how are you I’m

good when I lived in English I am

translating it to my country’s language

in my mind how can I stop that and was

using present continuous tense in the

above sentence correct so 1 your present

continuous tense no it is not correct in

that I’ll come back to that a little bit

later for now though your question about

translating to your language in your

head I’ve talked about this a couple

times here and there and other videos so

I’ll just review again by sharing the

things that helped me to stop

translating in my head one thing that

really helped me was making an

environment making a place where I could

not escape into my native language so in

my case that meant I found like a hobby

group something that I wanted to learn

how to do I found that in my target

language I found that in Japanese I

would go to that once a week there was

no option for me to do that in English

the teacher didn’t speak English the

other students didn’t really speak

English like I had no choice but to

learn and it was hard at first so over

time I learned the vocabulary words I

met people and I got to chat a little

bit with people and then I also just

kind of like built my listening skills

as well so that was really helpful for

me

following that then I would often like

go out with people from that group so I

would make friends there and then maybe

we’d go out for drinks so we’d go to get

something to eat together and that was

another situation where I could not

escape into English so I had to use

Japanese I had no choice if I didn’t do

that I couldn’t talk to anybody

so that was really helpful for me and

this leads to my second tip for stopping

this sort of translation problem which

is try not to rely on your diction

like I know that we all now have a phone

and like there’s a dictionary in here we

can check when we don’t know word but my

problem with this with using this too

much is that it stops the flow of

conversation like when you’re talking

with someone and you don’t know exactly

the word you want to use instead of just

reaching for your dictionary try to

think of a different way to explain the

thing that you’re trying to say you want

to say turn on the light like you can’t

think of turn on so what are some other

ways that you could explain that motion

like how do I say like the light is not

bright and then the light becomes bright

what’s this what’s this action like

think of the tools that you have in your

head to explain the idea and then your

friend can teach you the word so use

that as an opportunity to one use the

words that you already know and then so

to get a new word using those tools

three it’s just a really great

communication tool because even

sometimes like in our native language we

forget a word or we don’t know the right

word to use so just think about using

the tools that you already have the

other thing that I would recommend and

that I recommended a lot on this channel

is consuming media so that means TV and

movies books comics whatever trying to

use the language as much as possible in

your day to day life like listening to

it and reading it because you’re kind of

absorbing the natural ways that people

use that language like textbook language

and real world language are different so

you need to make sure you have a chance

to experience that real world language

so media is great of course you can

check out the stuff we have on our

channel and our website but you can just

watch movies watch TV shows find

podcasts as well so there are lots of

different ways to check out media but

basically just try to get your brain

used to listening to and experiencing

the language so that you don’t have to

like really work at translating every

single sentence in your head and then

over time and with practice you’ll

eventually stop translating and one day

you’ll just be able to do it and you

probably won’t realize it that’s what

happened to me actually like I just one

day as I call I don’t have to translate

anymore it just was it just was done so

I hope that that helps you those are

few tips for translating in your head

your other question was about your use

of present continuous tense in your

first sentence you said when I listen to

English I am translating it to my

country’s language we would not use the

present continuous tense here because

you’re talking about a regular action

that you do this is a regular thing that

you do we use the present continuous

tense for temporary actions so in this

case you should say I translate it in my

head use the present tense there okay so

thanks very much for those questions I

hope that it helps you let’s move on to

our next question next question comes

from Eric hi Eric Eric says hi what does

get wild mean in this phrase for example

he’s getting wild with the letters to

get wild means to be crazy like to go

crazy to do something like surprising or

shocking I’m not sure exactly about your

example sentence situation to get wild

with the letters I’m not sure what that

is but it’s like it means to become

crazy to do something crazy ly graffiti

ah to get wild with the letters like

drawing the letters could be maybe he

has like a stack of letters in his room

and he’s just throwing them all over the

place I don’t know like if I could get

wild with the lesson and just start

running around the studio he would be

like she’s getting wild listen

tear down the green screen get wild with

the lesson and read end so I hope that

that helps you understand the expression

get wild thanks very much for the

question let’s move along to your next

question next question comes from Joey

Joey hi Joey

Joey says what’s the difference between

envy and jealous envy is a noun and a

verb so for example I envy you or envy

is dangerous

jealous is an adjective like you got the

best seats in the theater I’m so jealous

you got a long vacation I’m super

jealous all right so I hope that that

helps you things for the question all

right

that’s everything that I have for this

week thank you as always for sending

your questions remember you can send

them to me at English class 101.com

slash ask - Alicia of course if you

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not already and check us out at English

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thanks very much for watching this

week’s episode of ask Alisha and I will

see you again next week bye bye

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