How to set achievable English goals and resolutions? | English January Review

Hey everyone welcome to your monthly review the monthly show on language

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lifetime account and start speaking in minutes okay today's topic is how to set

achievable language goals and resolutions your new year's resolution

solution so for those of you that have set a language goal for 2019 what is it

leave a comment and tell me and for those of you that laugh at new year's

resolutions because they just don't work this is for you stick around today

you're going to learn number one the top three reasons why language goals fail

and number two what you can do to succeed with your resolution in other

words how to set successful language goals

let's jump into today's topic how to set achievable language goals and

resolutions and speaking of New Year's resolutions it's almost like a joke

nowadays isn't it you set a resolution you try to do it in January by February

there's no progress and doing it isn't fun anymore

you quit and put it off until many years later when you start regretting all the

things you've never done so what's the problem with setting resolutions and why

do we keep failing let's jump into part one the top three reasons why language

goals fail first of all regardless of what most

people say setting resolutions or goals is a good thing you have to know where

you're going and what you want to achieve right otherwise you'd spend days

months years watching YouTube and have nothing to show for all the time you put

in but the problem with most resolutions is it's usually something like I want to

master Chinese I want to lose weight I want to be fluent in Japanese people

set very big vague goals and that's the first reason why resolutions fail

resolutions fail because they are nonspecific and unmeasurable what do I

mean by that take a goal like I want to be fluent in English Korean or Japanese

this year the problem is that's a very vague goal right what do you mean by

fluent and how can you measure how much progress you need to be fluent in the

language you can't it doesn't tell you anything about how much Japanese you

should learn today tomorrow or how many minutes of Japanese to speak by month 1

by month 2 what resources to use and when to stop and take a rest so again

the first reason is resolutions fail because they are nonspecific and

unmeasurable the second reason is New Year's resolutions fail because they're

unrealistic and you might say but isn't it good to aim for the stars and set

huge goals sure it's not bad to want to go far but if you say I want to be

fluent by September and you've just started learning a language today it's

not impossible but are you ready to commit yourself to nothing but language

learning six to eight hours a day non-stop if

not you need to be a little more realistic about your goals the third

reason is resolutions fail because there's no action plan the problem is

you'll still fail even with a specific and realistic goal if you don't know

when and how you're going to do it for example when will you study how long

will you study for every day and how will you study so resolutions fail for

three reasons one they're nonspecific and unmeasurable two they're unrealistic

and three there's no action plan now how do you set new year's resolutions and

actually succeed your goals should be one specific and measurable too

realistic and three have an action plan so the complete opposite of the mistakes

most learners usually make and there are two more rules for you need to set a

deadline and 5 break down your yearly goal into smaller monthly goals so how

would this work let's say my New Year's resolution is to have a 30 minute

conversation in Japanese by December 31st and not I want to learn Japanese

one day hopefully already you can see that it's one specific and measurable

you can measure 30 minutes right - it's realistic I'm aiming for 30 minutes not

fluency there's a clear deadline December 31st before we get into the

action plan there's another important part I break my resolution down into

smaller monthly goals so let's say my goal is to speak two minutes of Japanese

conversation by January 31st 2019 again it's small and measurable just two

minutes I can time myself and see how far along I am there's a clear deadline

it's realistic I'm not looking to master the whole language just reach the

two-minute conversation mark now what about your action plan for that you just

need to answer these questions when will you study how long will you study

everyday where do you plan to study how will you study what's your study

schedule this is the most important part because this tells you when and how to

study so when will you study I'll study at 9:00 p.m. on weekdays so five days a

week how long will you study everyday I'll

study for 15 minutes where do you plan to study I'll study at home in the

living room on my computer how will you study I'll listen to one or

two lessons a day to fill up the 15 minutes

what's your study schedule Monday through Friday for 15 minutes a day this

makes a lot more sense now doesn't it instead of saying hopefully I'll learn

that language someday and never taking action on your goals by setting these

small measurable goals you know what you need to do okay let's recap to set

successful language goals your goals should be one specific and measurable to

realistic 3 have an action plan for a deadline and 5 be broken down into small

monthly goals so instead of saying I want to be fluent in 2019 try I want to

speak 30 minutes of conversation by December 31st 2019 and then go even

smaller and set a small monthly goal so everyone it's your turn

leave a comment and tell me what's your small measurable monthly goal and what's

the deadline here are some examples you can steal for yourself learn 100 words

in one month speak one minute of your target language

in a month or do 20 audio lessons in one month deadlines January 31st

now speaking of lessons

here are this month's new lessons and resources first the ultimate listening

video master course honest question how sharp are your listening skills with

this video master course there'll be a sharp as a razor download it right now

next the talk about your body PDF cheat sheet with this cheat sheet you'll learn

words for parts of your body in the target language then there's the most

common texting slang word list if you want to text in the language you're

learning you'll love this you'll learn how to say lol and other words in your

target language and finally the how to express quantity vocab list where you

learn how to say if there's a lot a few or a little bit of something to get

these free lessons and resources just click the link in the description below

I'll write everyone in the last monthly review we asked you to submit a video or

audio file of yourself speaking the language introducing yourself in the

language so thank you to all of you that sent in submissions you've all received

a premium plus subscription as a reward now let's take a look at some of the

videos

okay I'm gonna play the submissions that we received this month I'm very excited

begin play hi Alicia my name is Ahmed and I'm from Jammu and Kashmir India hi

I'm Ana I think you might know that the Jammu and Kashmir is the place called

the paradise on earth and I wish you would whiz it here someday and I will be

happy to host you and why I'm learning English is just because I want to make

new friends I want to explore the world being a global citizen I want to know

about the different cultures know about the different people make a lot of

friends and how better career opportunities and I'm loving this

English 101 calm and this is a very good initiative for learners like us who

can't afford to just go like for the coaching classes or something like that

I have been learning from home from a lot of time and thank you thank you for

everything I thank everyone there thanks a lot

awesome that was a really nice message about being a global citizen and like

the importance of having like something online where anybody can learn so that

was really cool thank you so much for that message that was great

all right I'm gonna go to the next one this one Leigh hello there hi how you

doing hi I'm Andy hi I'm from Indonesia Oh learning English is one of the things

that I've been doing since January 2015 whoa thank God I can make this learning

English as a routine you know what I believe

having proficiency in English will provide me a lot of opportunities as a

matter of fact I'd really love to get a job in one a native English speaker

country oh cool and also well this is kind of

embarrassing but somehow I need to play it out I want to be a professional

youtuber someday really think to use English as a main language and my

youtube videos youtuber that's all I can tell right now have a nice day good bye

thank you that was an interesting message he sounds like a really super

confident person and he wants to be like an english-speaking youtuber like I

think is the confidence part for sure for sure that's awesome thank you thanks

for sharing your goal - nice all right on to the next one hi Aisha hi my name

is a real errand from China oh I'm really grateful that I found you an

English class 101.com on YouTube about a 1 year ago you've

helped me so much on my English especially on vocabulary and grammar um

I've been learning English for a really long time for the purpose of passing

different tests in order to enter go to university but I never try to improve my

speaking skills before because the Thais doesn't have a requirement of speaking

all right after I enter the university I there are so many foreign students

around me and I want to communicate so I worked really hard on my spoken

English and one day I want to study abroad so I have to try my best to

improve my English in the future cool cool that's awesome

yeah so never really practicing speaking because tests don't often require like

any kind of speaking exam but yeah having the experience of studying with

like University students from other countries motivated her so that's really

cool thanks for that message and good luck continuing to improve your speaking

skills that's cool okay let's go to the next one play hello Alicia how are you

my name is Arjun Singh and I am from India but now I live in UAE and I have

been living in you way since 2016 and I speak English because I am fond of

speaking English and I have been speaking English since many years and

nowadays I am watching your videos and learning many things from your videos so

firstly thanks to you and secondly your teaching method is really and really

awesome and my so many doubts have been cleared through your videos what is that

what are the differences among all whole and what are the differences between

stomach tummy and belly many videos that is just because of you and please

providing us mood English thank you very much

cool thank you so much for this message I'm so happy that there were like

specific points that like were cleared up through the videos that is awesome so

thank you so much for that that was really really cool

ok onward I think this is a video hello video person

it's waiting hallelujah hello my dear friends my name

is Thiago Thomas and I'm from India I would really like to thank you

and his former one Oh such a great guy who helped me a lot cause hearing Tiger

scoring I am serious nice we are here to speak about myself

as I mentioned earlier my name is Tina Thomas currently I'm working as an entry

level employee ok Pournami fruition private temperature and I'm working as a

customer relation excavator mm-hmm my hobbies are reading books playing

cricket and I would also love to think also about mini pop stars my family

consists of my parents and siblings cool cool nice yeah that's cool we don't get

a lot of video submissions but this one was really cool I'd like he spoke so

clearly and like he had like such a cheerful way of communicating so that's

cool thank you very much for sending this awesome all right I'll go back to

the next one

play hello everybody hi I am like free gum ah excuse my English I only start

learning it rationally okay I am absolutely beginner an English language

I from Colombia my native languages punished okay I want

to learn English because he's important but for my career and interaction with

angles a home culture mm-hmm thank you bye bye

thank you that's cool yeah so that's awesome he said you know I'm a like

absolute beginner and yet he took the time to prepare this message so thanks

so much and good luck with your continued studies that's awesome okay

I'll go to the last one for this month Hey hi Alicia hi how's it going good hi

Marcelo I'm from Brazil I've learned English for two years and I've learned a

lot with your side English class 1 over N dot-com thank you I need to improve my

speaking skills I'm leasing a lot and worked hard to get fluent in English

yeah so another person talking about like working hard to improve speaking

skills I think that's something lots of people are probably working on so I hope

that you all continue and I don't that everybody can continue working towards

their goals thank you all so much for sending these in this week this month

actually that's really really cool so it's so cool to actually see and hear

from you guys that's awesome so thanks so much this month and I hope

to see some more from you guys next month cool

so which entry did you like the best leave a comment below or do you think

you can do better here's the challenge for you yes everyone watching this

record a 30 second to 1-minute video or audio clip introduce yourself in the

language share your name where you're from and why you're studying this

language and you'll win a 3 month premium plus subscription to submit

click on the link in the description sign up for your free lifetime account

then fill out the form attach the audio or video file and press submit we may

feature you in next month's episode so a lot of learners will see you and your

progress and will hopefully get inspired to improve and master the language to

submit a recording click the link in the description and follow the instructions

on the page so thank you for watching this episode of monthly review next time

we'll talk about the 7 tested timeless ways to learn a language in the meantime

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learning tactics you'd like us to talk about see you next time light