Improve Fluency with Reading With Go Natural English Interview

hi i’m vanessa from speak english with

vanessa calm today i have a special

guest for you

it’s Gabby Wallace from go natural

English

she’s been an English teacher online for

a while and today she’s here to tell you

about an English skill that you might be

forgetting about it’s reading how can

reading help you improve your speaking

skills let’s see what she has to say hi

Gabby thanks so much for joining me

today

hey Vanessa I am so happy to be here yes

this is a great chance for English

learners just to have a chance to see

two English teachers who they probably

already know but maybe can learn

something more about yeah absolutely I

love talking with other English teachers

like you it’s such a pleasure yeah

that’s great and I think this is a good

chance for them to get to know some of

the new things you’ve been working on

but before we get into that can you tell

us a little bit more about yourself how

did you get into teaching English what

are you doing now tell us the details

sure so my name is Gabby from go natural

English and go natural English came

about several years ago when I was

teaching English in Japan so I had

gotten my masters in teaching English

and I wanted some adventure I wanted to

travel I wanted to see the world I

wanted to learn about another culture

and I got the opportunity to teach in

Japan and then I started making these

YouTube videos which became the go

natural English Channel and then they go

natural English website because I wanted

to help English learners more and I

realized my students were really busy

they’re also very independent and they

wanted to learn more and more and I

thought well YouTube is a really great

way to do that and I know you have a

great YouTube channel too and I know

that our learners are really happy to be

able to learn in this kind of fresh new

way

yeah this is a great way to motivate

yourself

that’s totally so I’m trying to think

you know you can ask me anything but in

a nutshell in a short story that’s

basically who I am what I’m doing how go

natural English came about yeah and it’s

great they threw this passion that

you’ve had you’ve been able to fulfill

what you want to do with your life -

you’re helping other people fulfill

their English passion but it’s also

something positive for you I think that

shows a lot in your your videos and the

way that you present yourself people

think oh yeah that’s positive thank you

and you know if your viewers want to

know more about my personal story I have

a TEDx talk that I did late last year

that explains my journey and how you

know I wanted to travel and how I

achieve the lifestyle where I can travel

and work by myself so if you search for

TEDx Gaby small steps to reach the world

is the name of the title wonderful I can

even put that link in the description

people can check out more about you

that’s so awesome that you got a chance

to give a TEDx talk and just go for it I

think a lot of people would feel nervous

speaking in front of so many people but

you didn’t totally see a success have ya

success that’s awesome and you’ve passed

that you’ve continued making more

English learning materials and I know

you’ve got something that has just come

out about a topic maybe English learners

haven’t thought about too much but is so

important yeah and that’s reading later

oh yes can you tell us a little bit

about why why should English learners be

interested in reading right well I think

first of all both of us have focused on

speaking and listening skills because

those can be the most challenging for

English language learners who are at the

intermediate level trying to go to

fluency and being able to understand and

speak fluently is is really important

for communication everyday communication

so why reading and that’s a really good

question I hesitated to do something on

reading skills just recently this is the

first material that I’ve made about

reading skills but I was getting a lot

of questions from my English Learner

audience about reading and about how to

become more fluent in English and

reading is a skill that’s going to help

you to become more fluent because it

helps your vocabulary it helps your

understanding of structure and it just

when you can read in English you have

more to talk about in English oh yes

it’s important for everyone I mean for

professionals for students obviously if

you’re going to take the TOEFL or the

IELTS or another English test you have

to be able to read and I remember a lot

of my students when I was teaching in a

university the hardest part of the TOEFL

or the IELTS was the reading part for

them so I wanted to make a resource to

help English learners to read faster

without the pain I know it can be really

painful to read when you you know you

try to read but maybe you forget what

you read or it’s hard to read for a long

time and to me it’s like it’s like

exercise you have to build up your your

stamina you have to build up your

strength little by little so inside the

e-book I offer some tips about how to

become a better reader I mean I’m sure

if you’ve taken any English course you

can read but the question is how well

are you reading right how fast or how

are you understanding or can you

remember what you read or are you just

looking at the words there’s a

difference yeah and are you actually

remembering that vocabulary that you

read so that you can use it in

conversation it’s a really great way to

learn new vocabulary and remember it

because you’re you’re seeing it you’re

not just hearing it and getting the

context you have to focus on each word

exactly yeah and I think that reading

skills I mean this is a book intended

for English language learners but so

many of the strategies are good for

speakers too to be honest because it’s a

skill that you have to learn how to do I

mean reading takes a lot of focus you

have to know like how to get the main

idea how to read for details they’re

different skills yeah for sure for sure

and I know recently I heard you were on

a podcast talking about a book that you

read a nonfiction book talking about

improving your your mornings I think

that’s what you’re talking about

and that’s a great way English learners

can learn English but they can learn

something else through English it’s not

just the language they’re learning a

huge topic that opens a new world for

them I agree I love that you know both

of us have this idea of learning English

through other things because it’s not

just about learning English for a test

or you know you’re not going to just

stop English is a life-long skill that

you can enjoy yes definitely and I think

it helps you to reach other people in

other countries and not just simply

understand what they’re saying but

understand their personality through

their writing or show their your own

personality as you write and read

different things so it’s all about not

showing yourself in that language and

what I love about reading more and more

is that it gives you interesting things

to talk about a lot of English learners

as well I can understand a lot but I

don’t know what to say

part of that might be because you need

to improve your fluency but part of that

might be

maybe you just need something

interesting to talk about so you know if

you can read more news articles or if

you read more books you can talk about

that like hey have you read blah blah

blah book you know have you read this

book about improving your mornings and

it’s a great way to make better

conversations yeah that’s a great way to

put it I think a lot of people feel shy

they don’t know what to say so this is

going to give a context for things that

you can talk about whether it’s you know

reading about different movies or

traveling or news that’s a great way to

enrich your English conversations

definitely and then

it does help you speak and and listen

better I think that that reading it’s so

important to read to enrich your

vocabulary and to you know practice

those new phrases that you read you can

you can incorporate them into your

conversations - yes yes so far you

mentioned it’s great for improving your

vocabulary good for improving

conversations and I know personally in

my experience reading books in French

usually I just read books about the

Harry Potter level I mean of our

elementary level but this was amazing

for improving my vocabulary and grammar

I think this really helped to see it not

just in a textbook but to see those

little conversations in the book to

understand how people actually use this

or maybe how they mix words in a

different way that I didn’t expect from

textbook learning before yeah that’s a

great way to improve absolutely and it’s

something you can do anywhere I mean if

you can read when you’re on your way to

work if you’re on the train not when

you’re driving but if you’re on the

train or a bus or you know if you’re

traveling you can read you can I don’t

know if you use a Kindle or another

mobile kind of reader it’s great great

for travel and audiobooks are great to

audiobooks are a little different you’re

not actually you know reading with your

eyes or reading with your ears but

there’s so much that you can do and so

much you can learn from books and from

readings so I just share like a quick

story I remember when I was teaching in

a university um one of my students he he

never really read much because it just

wasn’t it just wasn’t something that a

lot of people did where he was from and

then he discovered his joy of reading

this like passion for reading when he

was in the United States because he had

another teacher who was very passionate

about reading and he just fell in love

like literally you think about someone

who’s in love with another person this

is how he was feeling about books and it

was so beautiful to see that

just in his eyes when he talked about

books and it sounds strange but it’s not

I mean you can really fall in love with

reading and you can travel through books

you can have different experiences

through books you can find a mentor like

if you want to learn you know for

example everyone wants to learn about

making money and investing well you can

read well actually right now I’m

listening to an audiobook about Warren

Buffett so it’s like you can have these

people in your life even though you

might never meet Warren Buffett you can

you know meet these people through books

that’s a great way to learn about their

lives their strategies whether it’s

fiction nonfiction and I know you’ve

mentioned books a couple times I’m

curious do you think there’s a best

medium medium being type of reading

material like articles blogs magazines

books is there one you think is better

for English learners what’s your opinion

about that I would start with something

short that is just fun and easy and then

each day or maybe each week depending on

how much time you’re devoting to your to

your English Studies try to challenge

yourself a little more so maybe start

out with like a news article from Voice

of America new voanews.com and then

maybe next week look at a longer article

I mean a more challenging article would

be like a New York Times article those

are very long those are actually

challenging for a lot of native English

speakers I they take some time to read

but try to read something that you’re

interested in and if you want to

challenge yourself you could try reading

something totally different than you

normally read like for me maybe reading

something about well I like to read a

you know broad array of things but maybe

something in the sciences because I’m

usually reading about language and

culture and then yeah from there after

you’re comfortable with reading articles

get a book get a book that you enjoy

because books are a little longer

obviously it’s going to take more time

more patience more motivation I think

the worst thing you could do is try to

read

a huge book and then get frustrated and

just forget about it and never open it

again so just little by little make it

easy make it enjoyable one tip that I

want to share is you know set a timer

set a timer maybe four five minutes

starting out and during those five

minutes just focus on reading and then

the next day maybe set it for six

minutes and you know the next week maybe

fifteen minutes and maybe next month

you’re reading it for half an hour at a

time so you develop your your stamina

just like exercise yeah you know that

you’ve accomplished that goal for that

day and even if you just read one page

great you focused on the skill that

you’re trying to improve that’s a great

way to do it set a timer set a timer and

just tests yes oh no social media for

five minutes like hooks a book yes yes

and this seems this method you’re

talking about starting with something

small and going to something larger is

similar to improving your listening or

speaking skills instead of just watching

Star Wars in English you’re gonna go

back and watch short YouTube videos then

maybe TV shows and then you can get to

movies so it’s a good process yes I

completely agree because you want to

have a win you want to feel like you’ve

accomplished something just like you

said so you start with something small

you know you’ve done it you’ve

understood it you’ve finished it yeah

feels good and you actually have done

something too so you’re more motivated

to continue yeah I know I love those

tips we’re on the same page yes oh this

is one great expression for today on the

same page yes have the same mindset yes

we agree elephant thanks for sharing all

these reading tips I think this is a

good place to start but I know you’ve

got a lot more to share can you tell us

a little bit about your new reading book

what’s the name of it what can English

learners learn I’ll put the links in the

description here’s so much it’s called

fast forward reading because the idea is

to help you to read faster and get ahead

in your reading skills so you can find

the ebook and you can actually find

and all my products on the same page go

natural English comm / premium GN e or

if that’s you know a difficult link

there’s the link for the store on the

website I’m gonna show English comm but

yeah it’s an e-book right now and

shortly I’ll be releasing the audio

version so if you want to read and

listen along that’ll be an option as

well excellent so they can learn all of

these tips more details more resources

about how to have fast forward reading

exactly yes yes and there’s practice

exercises so you can see how you’re

doing so yeah yeah wonderful

thank you so much for making that

resource and for having this interview

conversations that write tips about

reading my pleasure it was really great

talking with you thank you so much oh my

pleasure I hope we can talk again soon

the next time see you later see you

later Vanessa bye thanks so much for

watching this interview with Gaby from

go natural English if you’d like to

learn more with her click on the link in

the description below and now I have a

question for you what kind of things do

you like to read or what kind of things

do you often read do you read news

articles books magazines maybe even

comments on social media what kind of

things do you read let me know and I’ll

talk to you later bye if you enjoyed

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me bye

you