Why cant I understand native English speakers but you can understand me
Vanessa: Hi, I’m Vanessa from SpeakEnglishWithVanessa.com.
Can you understand me but not other English
speakers?
Let’s talk about it.
Can you understand my speaking voice?
I get a lot of comments from English learners
that say, “Wow, I could finally understand
a native English speaker.
I’ve never been able to do this before.
Amazing.”
But then the next sentence is always “Wait,
why can’t I understand other English speakers?”
It’s a good question.
It would be great to understand every English
TV show, and movie, and your American coworkers,
and every English conversation you’re part
of, but first let’s talk about why you can
understand me and then we’ll talk about how
you can understand other English speakers
as well.
Why can you understand me?
Well, the topic is comfortable.
This probably isn’t the first time that you’ve
learned English, right?
So you’re familiar with the words and the
expressions and the ideas in general about
what I’m talking about.
If I started talking really fast about specific
tools that you need to carve a pumpkin, for
example, maybe it would be a little bit tougher
for you to understand because that topic isn’t
comfortable.
Number two, I speak clearly but fast.
When I first started this YouTube channel,
my husband Dan said, “Oh, I think you’re speaking
way too fast.
People are not going to understand you.”
But do you know what?
That’s not the case.
A lot of you can understand me and you can
understand me clearly.
I’m not speaking slowly like this for a small
child.
No, I’m still speaking quickly, but I do speak
clearly, because it’s my goal 100% for you
to understand as much as possible in this
topic.
For example, in this video I made about how
to pronounce the word the, I want you to understand
every explanation that I give.
If you don’t understand those explanations,
then you’re not going to understand the idea
which is how to pronounce the word the.
I want you to understand this topic, this
tutorial so that you can improve your English.
Number three, it’s just one person talking.
To me this is the key.
You’re only listening to my voice.
You’re only focusing on my voice.
When more than one person speaks together,
they cut off each other, they interrupt each
other’s sentences, they speak quickly, they
link words together in different ways, so
listening to one person compared to listening
to two or three people is much different.
Now let’s solve this problem.
It’s great that you can understand me, wonderful,
but I want you to be able to understand your
coworkers, movies, TV shows, every English
conversation that you encounter.
But do you know what?
In those situations, sometimes the topic is
not comfortable.
They’re usually not speaking clearly and there’s
often more than one person who is speaking
at a time.
So how can you take what you’ve learned, my
lessons, understanding my voice, to the next
level, and taking it to a more challenging
situation?
To understand other English speakers, you
need to start with what you know.
So my first tip is, if you can’t understand
my voice, well, you need to continue watching
my YouTube videos specifically with subtitles.
You can click CC for any of my videos and
you can watch the subtitles.
This is going to help to train your eyes and
train your ears so that you can hear a new
word and you see it at the same time and you
realize, “Oh, that’s how she said it.”
So subtitles in English can be really helpful
if you’re at this first starting point.
If you can’t understand my voice, 80 to 90%
without subtitles, okay.
It’s fine to start at the base and listen
to me with subtitles.
Let’s take a look at this clip to kind of
test your listening skills.
Can you understand this real natural lesson
that I gave?
A couple of months ago I started to volunteer
in an organization called the Free Forest
School.
If you live in the US and you have kids, you
should check it out, check it out online to
see if there’s a branch near you.
It’s a lot of fun.
The basic idea is that kids and parents go
to nature and have free play for a couple
hours.
It’s just a chance to be in nature.
The kids can play together and build their
sense of curiosity and independence.
If you could understand about 80 to 90% of
that clip, great.
It’s time to move on to step number two, which
is to challenge yourself to listen to me plus
the same speaker, so you’re listening to two
people, but the second person is the same,
so you’re getting used to a second person’s
voice instead of getting used to 20 different
people’s voices.
I have a lot of videos with my husband Dan,
and this is a good way to train yourself because
you already know my voice and then you’re
trying to train yourself to get to know one
other person’s voice.
Hopefully you’ll already understand 50% of
the conversation, me, and then you’re going
to slowly test yourself to understand more
and more of what he says.
Let’s take a look at this clip where my husband
Dan and I are speaking together and if you
can understand 80 to 90% of what we’re saying
without subtitles, great test yourself.
Let’s see.
What about you?
What would you miss most about your home if
you moved?
Dan: Ironically, we probably are moving soon.
Vanessa: We definitely are moving soon.
Dan: We’re definitely moving soon.
Vanessa: So what would you miss most about
this home when we move?
Dan: I think everything in the new home is
better, on the inside, everything is better.
I’ll miss this homes location.
Vanessa: Did you understand?
Pretty much everything we were saying, maybe
90% without subtitles.
Awesome.
It’s time to move on to step number three.
After you can understand a conversation with
me plus the same person, maybe Dan, it’s time
to move on to more speakers.
You could jump right into an English TV show,
but a slower way to do that is to test yourself
with my voice.
Plus someone else who you’ve never heard before.
You already feel comfortable with me plus
Dan, so maybe test yourself with me plus someone
else who you’ve never heard before.
I have a lot of videos on my channel where
I’m speaking with someone else.
So let’s take a look at this clip here with
Gayle, who’s a yoga teacher.
Maybe you can understand a my portion, 50%
of the conversation, but can you understand
her voice?
It’s a good test.
Did you just go in full force after that or
was there just a slow progression because
you’ve been doing yoga for-
Gayle: A long time.
Vanessa: A long time.
Gayle: It was like I dabbled, you know, when
I was in New York city, I dabbled, like sometimes
I would go to class, but I’d never completely
committed like I did later on.
So I dabbled in New York and then I moved
from New York to Bryson City, North Carolina
and got into whitewater paddling.
And so-
Vanessa: How did you do?
Could you understand everything that both
Gayle and I said without any problems or did
you have a little bit more difficulty?
If you had a little more difficulty, no worries.
It’s a great way to start here.
You know that this is the step for you to
help you really understand more English speakers.
If you have a favorite TV show, you can jump
right in and do this with an episode that
you’ve already watched.
So this is my recommendation.
Let’s say that you like the TV show Friends,
this is a really common TV show.
Let’s say that you liked this show and there’s
an episode that you’ve already seen.
Great.
Watch it with English subtitles.
Make sure it’s in English and English subtitles.
Read while you hear them speaking.
You’re probably going to catch expressions
that you don’t know, maybe expressions that
you didn’t hear before, maybe you understood
the general meaning but there was specific
words that, “Oh, I didn’t know they said that.”
The subtitles can be really helpful.
Then watch it a second time with subtitles
again.
This should be a lot easier because it’s the
second time and then that final third time
that you watch the episode, watch it without
subtitles.
This is testing your ears.
Can you hear those expressions that you learned
by reading the subtitles?
Can your ears hear that a little bit more
naturally?
Now with a TV show, it’s usually 30 minutes,
sometimes longer, so it can be challenging
to do this in just three tries.
If you need to do it more, that’s fine or
watch a different episode because often they
use similar expressions in other episodes
too.
This type of training will help you graduate
from understanding only me, to understanding
other English speakers too.
Next Friday, December 20th, 2019 my yearly
course, the 30 Day English Listening Challenge
will open for 30 days in January, you can
use the exact technique that we talked about
today.
Challenge your ears to go beyond understanding
just me, to understanding other English speakers
as well with short daily lessons that you’ll
be able to fit into your life.
You’ll be really amazed at how your listening
skills improve over this 30 day challenge,
but you’ll have to wait until December 20th
to get some more information about the course.
And now I have a question for you in the comments
let me know, can you understand 90% of my
voice?
I’m really curious what you have to say.
Let me know in the comments and thank you
so much for learning English with me.
I’ll see you again next Friday for the start
of the 30 Day English Listening Challenge.
For a new lesson here on my YouTube channel.
Bye.
The next step is to download my free ebook,
Five Steps to Becoming a Confident English
Speaker.
You’ll learn what you need to do to speak
confidently and fluently.
Don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel
for more free lessons.
Thanks so much.
Bye.