How to learn Spoken English on your own at home 8 step action plan
Hello everyone.
And welcome back to English With Lucy.
Today, I am going to teach you how you can
improve your spoken English at home on your
own.
Whenever you look online to find out top tips
for improving your spoken English, the number
one tip is always talk to native speakers,
talk to speakers of English, practise conversation.
And that just isn’t a realistic possibility
for all of us.
I know that so many of you will find yourselves
in situations where conversing with native
speakers or speakers of English in general
just isn’t an option.
It’s not widely available.
Sometimes it’s to do with money.
You don’t have the finances available to do
that.
It could be a confidence thing where actually
you don’t feel ready to speak to people yet.
You want to practise a little bit on your
own first.
It could just be that you don’t know where
to start.
So I’ve got lots of tips in today’s video,
and I hope to help each and every one of you.
As always, I have created a free PDF for you
that goes along with this lesson, it contains
the full transcript, everything I say, and
I have highlighted key vocabulary.
So you can use that to improve your understanding
even further.
If you’d like to download the PDF, all you’ve
got to do is click on the link in the description
box and your name and your email address.
You sign up to my mailing list.
This is completely free.
I will send the PDF directly to your inbox.
And then every week after you will automatically
receive all lesson PDFs, plus all my news,
offers and updates.
Right.
Let’s start with tip number one.
This tip is learn full phrases, not just individual
vocabulary words.
Now there is a place for studying individual
vocabulary words.
That helped me a lot with my own learning
journey when I was learning Spanish.
But if you are particularly focused on improving
your spoken English, then try learning entire
phrases.
When we say a word on its own, we say it in
a very flat way.
Amazed, amazed.
When I say that word as part of a sentence,
I was amazed.
I had a different tone, some inflexion, some
emphasis, more stress.
Listen to speakers of English.
When you’re watching the TV or watching a
YouTube video or listening to the radio, whatever
you’re doing to try and immerse yourself in
English, try and pick up on those individual
phrases and work out where in the phrase they’re
pushing the pitch up, or they’re saying it
slightly more loudly.
Pause it if you can imitate it, it’s going
to help you sound really natural when you
speak English.
Another part of this is if you do pick up
on an individual vocabulary word that you
want to remember, make sure you also include
an example of it used in a sentence as well.
That’s why with the majority of my vocabulary
videos, I always include an example.
If you write it down, make little notes and
dashes to try and remember how the speaker
said that sentence or phrase.
Tip number two.
This tip actually comes as thanks to the sponsor
of today’s video: Busuu.
Now in general, my students mention two key
problems when it comes to improving their
spoken English on their own at home.
Motivation and access to feedback.
And that last one especially.
It all links in to not having the opportunity
that I mentioned at the beginning.
That’s where Busuu comes in because they have
a solution to both of these problems.
If you haven’t heard of Busuu before, it’s
a global language learning community and it’s
available on both mobile and desktop.
And I know that’s very important to many of
you.
They have loads of language courses that you
can take to improve your spoken English and
your reading and listening, and writing, and
many other languages like Spanish and Japanese.
Here’s the best bit.
On the Busuu platform, you can connect with
speakers of the language that you’re learning
and receive feedback.
It’s like gold dust.
Feedback is one of the most valuable tools
when it comes to learning a language.
But it’s so hard to find.
Why is it always that way?
It’s especially hard to find if you’re learning
a popular language like English, there are
so many people across the world who would
love to receive feedback, but there’s a shortage
of people willing to give that feedback.
Busuu also has this amazing study plan tool,
which you can use to keep you motivated.
I love this.
I love having everything planned out and organised.
It really does keep me on track.
I do it with planning my videos, planning
my work life and with planning language learning
as well.
The study plan tool breaks the language down.
It reminds you what to study and when, and
this allows you to set realistic goals, which
are so important.
To sign up to Busuu and explore what they
have to offer, just click on the link in the
description box.
You can sign up for free, or you can choose
to get a premium membership, which has lots
of additional features.
They are offering my students an extra 30%
off all memberships.
Just use code Lucy 30.
Right.
Tip number three.
Let’s go back to analysing and listening to
what speakers of English say and how they
say it.
But I’m not talking about pronunciation and
tone of voice this time.
This time, I want to look at what they say
grammatically.
I know that grammar and spoken English don’t
tend to go hand in hand, but I think it’s
important here.
Now, let me make this clear.
I do not think that learning grammar is the
most important part of learning a language
at all.
Now you would never teach a baby grammar ye.
They grow up to be fluent in a language.
But you need to bear in mind.
A baby is immersed the entire time.
Lots of people say, learn English like a baby.
But what they don’t bear in mind is that babies
are immersed in English or their mother tongue
the entire time.
They have the most wonderful opportunity to
pick up on all the spoken English and all
the grammar and all the vocabulary without
even realising it.
Bless them.
Even then it takes them a couple of years
to speak fluently.
Yes, of course their brains are still developing.
But the point I want to make is there is a
place for grammar, but it’s not the be-all
and end-all.
I really don’t see the value in going through
a grammar book cover to cover.
I really don’t see the value in that.
And it’s something that I have never done
in my own language learning journey.
What I did do was essentially fill in the
gaps.
I was constantly on the lookout for holes
or gaps in my grammar knowledge.
I think you should go through time filling
those gaps bit by bit, rather than approaching
grammar as this big textbook that you have
to work through.
It goes back to looking at full phrases again,
look at those phrases.
Is there something that you can’t explain
or that doesn’t sound right to you in your
head?
That should be the topic that you research.
That should be the topic that you bring to
the table with your conversation partner or
your English teacher, or you search on an
online forum.
There are some amazing language forums with
some really, really enthusiastic teachers
who seem to give up their time for free.
I can’t believe the quality of answers that
I get from language forums.
I doubt grammar all the time.
I’m constantly looking it up.
This brings me on to tip number four, which
is don’t let anything go.
Don’t drop anything.
I know the feeling.
You hear a word or a phrase that you don’t
understand and you think, ugh, I can’t be
bothered.
I’ll remember it.
I’ll remember it and do it later.
You won’t.
9 times out of 10, you will not remember it.
It’s like when you come up with a really good
tune in your head and you think, oh, I’ll
remember that tomorrow.
How could I ever forget something like this?
And then you just can’t the next day.
It’s gone.
It’s lost potentially forever.
Every time you have a doubt, don’t let it
escape you.
Just don’t let it escape.
Write it down immediately.
If you can’t write it down because you don’t
know how it’s spelled use the recording voice
notes function on your phone.
If it’s not possible for you to see a teacher
every single week, save up all of these doubts
and book in one hour a month and see how many
of those doubts you can clear up with them
in that session.
But please look into my eyes and tell me,
Lucy, I will not let my next doubt go.
But don’t stress yourself out at the same
time.
Obviously you have to take everything with
a pinch of salt.
You’ve got to make it work for you.
But I find if I come up with a fantastic video
idea and I don’t write it down immediately,
that video will never be made.
And it’s the same with your grammar and vocabulary
doubts.
Let’s move on to number five.
The previous tips were more about theory.
Now I’m going to talk about putting it into
practise.
When I was learning Spanish, living in Spain
and conversing with lots of Spaniards, there
was one topic that at first caused me a lot
of anxiety.
And then over time it caused me a lot of joy
and excitement, and I just loved it.
And that is telling anecdotes and telling
stories, especially funny ones.
I really think there is no better feeling
than making someone laugh in the language
that you’re learning, it’s such a good feeling.
There are very few people in this world that
can just launch into a story and have everyone
engaged and interested.
Some people are blessed with this skill.
I am not one of them.
If I want to tell a good story, I have to
prepare it in advance and have it up my sleeve,
have it ready.
I have to do this in English, let alone in
another language.
If you want to feel funny, interesting, and
engaging, I really urge you to practise and
sort of perfect, but I’ll talk about that
more, your anecdotes and your personal stories,
things that you are going to want to tell
to lots of different people.
I have maybe five or six entertaining stories
that I have ready in case there’s a gap in
conversation.
And if I meet someone new.
My poor friends and my poor, poor fiance have
probably heard these stories 20 times each.
I encourage you to write your stories down,
to try and do as best a job you can of correcting
the grammar, of making sure it flows and then
potentially bringing it to a speaker of English
to correct for you.
Stories don’t have to be perfect when you
tell them.
In fact, it looks weird and sounds weird when
you read it out like a robot.
On your own at home, practise the story, read
it aloud a couple of times, then have a go
reading it with no prompts.
If you have this preparation, you’ll feel
so much better when you finally talk to another
speaker of English.
Great topics you could use are funny mistakes
that you’ve made in English.
I know that I always love hearing my students
laugh about the mistakes they’ve made.
It shows that you’re a really chilled and
funny person.
And it’s entertaining for me to hear.
In the UK, we love self-deprecating humour,
which shows that you can laugh at yourself.
You could almost mock yourself, put yourself
down.
We love that.
We also love irony.
I’ve actually created an entire video on British
humour.
I’ll put it in the description box.
It’s called British humour explained with
examples, which sounds like the least fun
video ever, but I think it might be able to
help you.
So I hope that’s clear.
Practise your anecdotes, practise your stories.
And even if your goal is to not be funny,
practise, the things that you know you will
have to repeat again and again and again.
How did you end up in your job?
What were your school days?
Like?
How did you meet your partner?
Practise those stories so that they just roll
off the tongue.
It might seem like cheating, but if it is
then I’m a cheat because that’s what I do.
Number six is listen to chatty podcasts.
There has been a podcast revolution all across
the world, especially in the UK.
We absolutely love podcasts.
And there are a lot of people who aren’t necessarily
famous already starting podcasts with their
friends and they just chat.
This is the perfect spoken English improvement
opportunity.
Finally, you get to eavesdrop, you get to
listen in on other people’s conversations.
This is something that I absolutely love.
You might not have the opportunity to be in
a conversation with lots of English speakers.
Even if you did, it might be too nuanced or
fast paced for you to understand and participate
in.
Well, loads of lovely people have recorded
their chatty conversations and you can pause
them.
You can check their transcripts if they have
one.
People who add transcripts to podcasts, they
are the best.
These chatty podcasts really fill a void.
Even for me, I don’t have a big group of female
friends.
So I feel that I miss out sometimes on the
gossip and talking about girls stuff, but
I’ve got a couple of podcasts that I listen
to and they fill that gap for me.
As sad as that might sound, I hope you can
relate with that when it comes to learning,
spoken English and practising your conversation.
Stop them, start them, slow them down, replay
them.
You can do whatever you want with them, but
they are a fantastic learning tool for you.
There are so many with so many different niches.
One really good place to start is to look
at the UK charts for podcasts, especially
for episodes.
That gives a really good vibe on what’s good
and what’s not.
If you’re interested in football, the Peter
Crouch Podcast is meant to be absolutely fantastic,
wide variety of accents.
There are lots of comedy podcasts, like No
Such Thing As A Fish.
There are quite a few with rude names that
I don’t want to put on my channel.
Do you know what?
I’m going to list them in the description
box.
If you have any other chatty podcast recommendations,
please do put them in the comment section.
We can all learn from each other and hopefully
you can recommend me a good way to procrastinate.
Number seven, make sure you always have good
topics to talk about.
When we talk to people, we often talk about
current affairs.
A lot of the current affairs are very depressing
and most people don’t want to talk about how
terrible the year has been.
So I have some solutions for you.
I was feeling really down last year from about
June onwards, and I actually got to the point
of despair where I thought the world was just
an awful place.
And one of my friends sent me a newspaper
and it’s called The Happy Newspaper.
This wonderful girl called Emily Coxhead writes
it, and this opened my eyes to the world of
positive news.
I absolutely love these and they are the most
amazing tools for creating really good positive
conversation.
Newspapers have always been teachers' favourite
tools for learning English and for creating
dialogue, inciting conversation.
And what better than to have a newspaper that
is just full of the best stories of the quarter.
I now have two happy news subscriptions.
One is called Positive News.
One is called Happy News.
They’re both written in different ways, so
there’s not too much overlap.
They both come out every three months and
I like to get a physical copy.
Although there are websites as well, which
I will leave in the description box.
They’re very inexpensive.
I highly recommend them for a fantastic mood
boost, something you can pick up and then
use to talk about with people.
I’ve checked for you and they do both offer
worldwide delivery.
I think the most wonderful English speaking
club idea would be the happy new speaking
club or something like that.
If you could get a group of people to meet
on Zoom every quarter and discuss your favourite
stories from these newspapers, I would want
to join them.
Whenever I create a video about English speaking,
I look at my comment section and there are
just so many people who are desperate to practise
with other people.
If you want to join a conversation club and
you can’t find one, create one, just create
one, take something like Positive News or
Happy News as a prompt.
It’s not hard to run and it would be so much
fun.
My last point is number eight and it is chill
out.
No it’s don’t stress.
And in particular don’t stress about your
accent.
Accents can unfortunately be such a massive
source of shame.
So when you’re looking to improve your pronunciation,
I want you to do exactly that.
Look at improving your pronunciation.
Please just don’t stress yourself out with
trying to reduce or get rid of your accent.
Unless it’s something you really want to do,
there’s just no point.
I understand the charm of it when I was learning
Spanish and you’ve got to understand I was
in a fantastic position.
I was going out with a Spanish guy living
with a Spanish family.
I really had all the opportunities there for
me.
And it was so amazing when I was mistaken
for a native speaker from time to time.
So I do understand the charm and there are
loads of options for people who do want to
achieve that, but just try and analyse why
you’re doing that.
But in general, the most important thing is
improving your pronunciation to speak in an
understandable and clear way.
You want to speak so that other people can
understand you easily.
If learning about other accidents and mimicking
other accidents is something that you really
enjoy, and it brings you a lot of pleasure
then by all means do that.
But if it’s stressing you out or making you
feel bad about yourself, don’t do that.
It’s a really, really hard thing to do.
An example of how unimportant accents are
nowadays is my experience with Google.
I spent a lot of time with people who work
at Google and YouTube.
I visited lots of Google offices in different
locations, such a high percentage of the people
who work in this massive, amazing company
with fantastic salaries have very strong,
very clearly non-native accents.
And has it affected them?
No.
Does it affect what I think of them?
Yes.
It makes me really impressed that they speak
another language to such a high standard every
day in their workplace.
Wow.
I don’t know.
That’s food for thought.
I’m sure each of you will have your own individual
opinion on what’s important and what’s right
for you.
I just wanted to put it out there because
I have seen some comments that have made me
sad about people trying to lose a bit of their
identity.
And that’s what an accent is, it’s a part
of your identity.
Right.
I think that brings us to the end of this
video.
I really hope you enjoyed it.
And I hope you learned something.
Don’t forget to check out Busuu.
The link is in the description box and you
can get 30% off all memberships with my code
Lucy 30.
You can also download the PDF of this lesson.
It’s got the full transcript, plus some key
vocabulary.
If you’d like to improve your listening skills
and expand your vocabulary even further, I
highly recommend my vlogging channel, where
I vlog our lives here on a farm in the English
countryside.
Every single vlog is fully subtitled so it’s
specifically designed with English learners
in mind.
Don’t forget to connect with me on all of
my social media.
I’ve got my Instagram and my website, englishwithlucy.co.uk,
where I have a fantastic pronunciation tool
where you can click on all the different phonemes
and you could hear me pronounce them.
I love it, even though I made it myself.
E. No.
I will see you soon for another lesson.
I feel like my voice is lower today.
Problems.
Give the feedback.
Did I say that right?
But please look into my eyes and tell me,
Lucy … Sorry.
Please look into my eyes right now and tell
me … Will, do you have the battery?
Okay.
Thank you very much.
Oh, that’s perfect.
Amazing.
Okay.
Even if you did, it would probably be … You
can actually … Peter Crouch.
Peter Crouch.
Is his name Peter Crouch?
Peter Crouch.
Yeah.
Have very strong, very … Have very strong
… Have very strong.
There has been a podcast revelation.
Revelation?
Revolution.