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