How to Learn English Effectively - Some Secrets to Learning English

hello everyone good morning good afternoon good  evening i am so happy to be here with you today  

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coming in from bangladesh from afghanistan from  cambodia uh from nigeria philippines laos uh  

wonderful malaysia vietnam egypt hi everyone  thank you so much for joining today so today  

sorry today i'm going to give you guys a lesson  about learning english of course uh so often on  

my live stream i like to give you guys tips and  advice about how to make learning english easier  

what can you do so some of you who have been  watching my live streams for a long time maybe  

some things will sound familiar to you but today  i've put it all together into an easy four-step  

program or path or way of learning english  easily okay so as usual please make sure to  

leave your questions down in the comments  during the live stream during the lesson  

and after i will go through and answer your  questions okay if i am talking too fast or  

anything like that just leave a comment let  me know uh it is important to me that you  

of course understand so i'm going to share my  screen with you just a moment okay here we go  

okay guys so you should be able to  see my screen so today we're going to  

learn this is actually based on a really  good ted talk by the same name uh and in it  

there are some really great tips about how to  learn a language and i'm going to apply it today  

to learning english so the secrets to learning  english how can you learn english effectively if  

you guys are interested the woman's name is lydia  makova so i'll put her name in the comments after  

so you guys can check out her talk but  today i'm going to review the four ways to  

learn english effectively so let's go ahead  and begin teacher how can i learn english  

this is the question we get the most on our  facebook page and on our youtube channel  

so very often on videos posted on live streams  like this or the one with dr don we get a lot  

of questions asking how can i learn english  right how can i be better so we have posted many  

videos and done many live streams like this about  improving your speaking improving your listening  

reading and writing being more confident and  just generally becoming better at english  

so today i'm going to try and take all  that we like to talk about on our channel  

about becoming better at english and put  it together into these four easy steps  

so how to learn a new language how  to learn english there are four steps  

enjoyment methods system and patience so we  will go through and talk about each of these  

one by one how they are important what  does it mean and how can you use it to  

really go to the next level with your english  okay so let's begin with number one enjoyment  

so what does this word mean enjoyment in this oh  let me find my mouse it's somewhere there we go  

we see the word enjoy and in enjoy we see the  word joy right happy so if you get enjoyment  

from something it makes you feel happy you like to  do it right you enjoy it so step one is enjoyment  

this is truly step one it is the most important  so before we talk about any other steps you must  

enjoy what you are doing so if you do not enjoy  learning if you don't like learning english  

or the way that you're learning english you will  not want to do it right you will stop you will not  

be interested or you will feel that oh i have to  study oh i don't want to right we don't want that  

we need to make sure that no matter what you are  finding a way to enjoy learning because again  

if you don't you're not going to want to do it  right so how can you do that what does that mean  

often when we think about studying english or  studying any language we think of things like  

memorizing vocabulary studying grammar rules  things that maybe you enjoy doing i know i love  

learning new vocabulary but not everyone wants  to sit down and memorize 10 words a day or  

20 words a week or what have you or maybe the way  that they're doing it flash cards or oh grammar  

rules right maybe they don't maybe you don't enjoy  that so you have to think about this question  

what do you enjoy maybe you enjoy reading fiction  books meeting new people going to coffee shops  

playing sports playing video  games watching tv watching movies  

photography which is taking pictures  right painting or listening to music  

or maybe there are so many more things right so  right now as you watch think about this question  

what do you enjoy anything what are  your hobbies what do you like to do  

what do you enjoy okay so think about it for a  minute so for me i for example i love to read i  

read almost every day um i love to go to coffee  shops i love uh playing games watching movies  

so on so on what do you enjoy anything right there  are maybe one million more things we could add  

to this list okay so now that you have thought  about maybe three to five things that you enjoy  

now add english to it okay so what does that  mean well that brings us to step two which is  

methods okay so now that you have thought of some  things you enjoy we need to take those activities  

and add learning to them okay a method is a way  of doing something you must use your interests to  

choose your learning methods and notice here  oh sorry guys i always lose my there it is  

your interests your methods what does this mean  your methods will be unique or special to you so  

you will not have the same methods as me  maybe we'll have one similar method but  

they will be different depending on what your  interests are okay so we're going to make some  

another great thing to do if you're having a hard  time is talk to others about how they learn too  

you can also just use a search engine  like google to look up uh how to learn  

methods study methods or maybe  again i gave the example of movies  

you can just search how to study english  using movies how to study english using blank  

right and you can find some interesting  methods and find one or two that works for you  

so next now that you have thought about what you  enjoy let's talk about some methods so here are  

some meth some things that i might enjoy right  i like reading fiction books i like going to  

coffee shops i like playing online games i like  painting and i like listening to music great  

so these are all things that i enjoy so now i  want to add english to it how can i use what  

i enjoy to learn english right add english to my  hobbies and interests so let's take a look at some  

sample methods for each of these and you can think  about your hobbies and interests and how you might  

add english to them so number one i like reading  fiction books well this one's probably easy  

right you can read the english version of your  favorite book for example maybe you really love  

a classic novel and you've read it so many times  and you know it is available in english well  

try reading it in english this is a great  method because you already know the story  

right so because it's not a new story it's easier  to start to learn the language around the story  

when you already kind of know what's happening  who the characters are what the plot is and so on  

okay number two i like going to coffee shops oh  this one's a little more tricky if i love going  

to coffee shops and love drinking coffee  and making it and so on i can always study  

coffee culture in blank speaking countries so  of course if you're learning english you want to  

maybe study coffee culture in english-speaking  countries so learning language is not just about  

vocabulary right culture is language is a part of  culture culture is a part of language so learning  

the language around different parts of culture  like music culture movie culture in this case  

coffee culture can be a great way to learn to  talk about something you really like in a second  

language right great just always start with things  that you enjoy because you want to actually learn  

how to talk about those things you actually  enjoy those things okay number three i like  

playing online games okay so what can i do to use  english if i really just want to play games with  

my free time you can try to play on an english  server like the us server the australia server  

whatever is close to you geographically and easy  to use maybe it doesn't have too much lag and play  

on an english server especially games that have an  open chat section and you can type right chat with  

english speakers read see what they're talking  about though this isn't the best way to learn  

formal english it's a great way to learn slang and  kind of the way people talk to each other in that  

environment and again culture right so you can  see inside gaming culture in different countries  

okay how about painting or really any hobby for  example let's say you really really love painting  

read about your favorite artists art and  lives in english so who do you love what  

what uh which artists inspire you or uh make you  want to paint well one method you could possibly  

use is to read about your favorite artists art  their pieces right and their lives in english  

and finally listening to music you can  explore english music and study the lyrics  

so again each of these also has culture in it  too which is great right we're learning about  

um coffee culture gaming culture paint uh maybe  art art art culture music culture and so on so  

these are all example methods so think about  what you enjoy and how you can add english to it

okay so methods are the base right so number  one enjoy what you're doing number two make some  

methods based on what you enjoy so let's say i've  chosen those five things right so let's say these  

are my five methods okay great um read the english  version of your favorite book that's great to say  

but i need to go farther i need a system  i need to develop a system and so do you  

this means you need a study plan so before  we get to that so we see here a calendar  

right i can't just say i will read my favorite  english book or my favorite book in english  

okay when for how how often how long will you  read for when will you do it how will you fit  

it into your schedule so if you're like me you  love having a plan but maybe this doesn't come  

naturally to you you don't really ah no i'll just  do it when i can so for if that's how you feel  

i need i want to tell you that this is a very very  important step if you do not have a system that is  

doable enjoyable easy to stick to for you  then you you won't get any farther okay so  

let's talk about how to make a study plan your  study plan should be smart so what is this this is  

called an acronym that's when each letter stands  for a different word so the s stands for specific  

m stands for measurable a attainable are  relevant and t time bound so we're going  

to talk about all of these but let's take a look  at what these words mean first so first we have  

specific this means that i shouldn't  just say i'm going to read a book  

specific would be what kind of book which book uh  how many pages how often what what days what times  

and so on measurable to measure something we might  think of like a ruler right oh um it's 10 feet or  

100 kilometers right but here we want to be able  to measure our improvement right so whether that's  

um i will read 25 pages a day until i finish  the book right i can see my progress or i will  

study 15 vocabulary words a week and use  them in my writing okay you can measure  

how many words you use and how many  you're learning right measurable

a is attainable this means you can do it  another word we might use is achievable  

this means it's possible you can do it so don't  say i will study uh i will read a book for three  

hours a day every day because you probably  won't right it probably will be impossible  

for you to do that maybe you will at the start  but a word we would use is sustainable this means  

if it is not sustainable this means you can't keep  doing it it's too much so make sure it is doable  

attainable achievable okay something you can  do even if you only have five minutes a day to  

do something do one of your methods that's okay  even just once a week whatever works for you  

the point is you have a system and you can do  it and for and there's no reason that you should  

have to stop okay the r stands for relevant  so this means that what you choose to do  

is uh it is important it's useful right it is not  something that you'll never use so let's say you  

this goes back to your methods right you want  to choose methods that are uh that interest you  

are based on your interests and that you will  actually use the language for right and finally t  

means time bound so whether that's uh  i will read this book in two months  

or i will give myself 30 minutes every 30  minutes three days a week to do it it needs  

to be time bound so let's take a look a little  bit closer at what these mean okay so specific  

make your goals specific and narrow for good  planning right more effective planning so it's  

again i could say read a book or  i could be specific and say read  

15 pages of harry potter in english every  week and highlight the words and write them  

down that i don't know and write them down on  a separate place to study right measurable so  

you need to choose what your goal is  is it that you want to learn more words  

is it that you want to read faster what is  your goal choose what what you're measuring  

and keep track of it right so if you choose words  learned the number of words you learn let's say  

you start off and then and you're  learning a lot of new words and then  

it stops well now you can change what you're  doing right it means you need to measure  

attainable again make sure you can do your  goal make sure it is possible that your plan  

uh is doable relevant it should match your  goals right don't do something that isn't  

important to you and time bound realistic and  have an end date i want to do this by this time  

having smart goals is very important having a  smart system of learning is extremely important  

and you can do it so let's  look at an example of a smart  

learning goal for studying english  right i've been talking about um  

uh reading so for example i will read harry potter  for 15 minutes every day right that works for  

me in my schedule i will look up words i don't  know and quiz myself on new vocabulary each week  

i will finish the first book in two months okay  great so we have let's make sure we have each part  

specific yes so i say how often 15 minutes  every day vocabulary quiz each week  

measurable well i'm quizzing myself right i'm  checking my learning and if i'm not doing very  

well on my self-made quizzes well i can change  what i'm doing change how i'm reading give more  

time to it attainable well 15 minutes every day is  attainable for me and two months that works i can  

do that are relevant well i always loved harry  potter and i know that there's a lot of really  

good language in there so definitely relevant and  time bound yes i have my daily goal my weekly goal  

and how long it will take me to complete so  use this as an example for how to create your  

learning system okay so of course you have to  enjoy the methods you use to and develop a system  

using them and that's great but the  last step here is patience this means  

being okay to wait right you should not expect to  learn the entire english language in two months  

you can't do that but you can make progress this  is again why that m measurable is so important  

if you are studying and practicing but you are not  measuring your progress it will be more difficult  

to see how you are improving so keep track this  might mean uh something like recording yourself  

keeping a journal let's say you want to work on  your writing keep a journal get a notebook and  

write in it at the end of each week maybe and then  as time goes on you can look back and maybe see  

your earlier mistakes oh i know that that that i  shouldn't have done that now i know what's right  

and maybe you can even fix it right for speaking  maybe try to choose something to describe or talk  

about or a certain topic and record yourself  on your phone or on your computer and then come  

back to it maybe a few three months later and see  oh yes i've gotten better or if not that's okay  

that just means you need to change your methods  right and with reading you can search and find  

uh books the the english level the how hard  different books are to read so maybe start very  

easy right and slowly very slowly work your way  up and that's a great way to keep track of your  

progress as well and to help yourself feel patient  so remember you should enjoy what you're doing  

use your hobbies and interests  to create unique special methods  

take those methods and put  them into a well-planned system  

and be patient with yourself and don't be afraid  to change right if you develop a system and it's  

not working for you change it right you may end  up going back and forth between these two things  

again and again and you may over time find also  different methods that work for you so just  

keep going through this is not a one-time thing  you're going to have to change because you will  

change your interests will change your schedule  or job might change so just be willing to always  

change these steps as you go on as well all right  so those are the main four but there is a fifth  

that i would like to add and that is high  expectations and self-compassion so i think  

that it is very important to set high goals  for yourself but also don't beat yourself up  

if you don't meet those very high goals you set  but you want to make sure you are trying to do  

something you know you can do but that's  going to be challenging right we want to  

challenge ourselves so you should acknowledge  or recognize no yes this is hard english is hard  

learning a second language is quite difficult  especially if you do not live in a country  

where you're hearing that language all the time  so if you are learning english and you live in  

england well it will be it's a little easier  for you because you have to use it every day  

you see it on signs you hear it on the radio  tv movies everywhere you're surrounded by  

english but if you are learning english and you  live in pakistan for example i saw someone on our  

comments today saying that that's where they're  watching from today well you probably don't hear  

as much english right it's it's going to be more  difficult to seek it out learn from it and you  

really are more responsible for your learning so  it really falls on you so it is hard but still set  

high expectations and big goals for yourself  trust that you can do it that you are capable  

but also don't beat yourself up when it  takes longer than you think to reach those  

goals maybe my goal is to pass the um past  a certain level of a toefl test or topic or  

not that ielts or some english test maybe  there's five levels of a test and i want to pass  

level three by the end of the year and i'm working  really really hard really really hard and i don't  

pass well maybe i got to like 2.5 that's still  really good right i'm still making progress so  

make sure to set high expectations for yourself  and if you don't meet it in the time you want to  

be patient right persistence is the key keep going  as i showed you on the last slide you might have  

to change your methods change your system again  and again until you find what works for you  

but you will find something if something isn't  working for you try something new because you may  

be just one step away from finding the methods  and systems that help you to meet your goals

okay guys excuse me thank you so much for watching  

and now i'm going to close my window here so  now that i have finished the lesson please leave  

your comments your questions what are your  english questions i'm gonna exit out here  

okay hi guys so um i'm going to now let's look  through so here karam i really enjoy listening  

to music and photography those are wonderful  hobbies so think about how can you add english  

to those hobbies right so english of course  or music of course listening to english music  

trying different genres of music and listening to  looking up studying the lyrics photography maybe  

learning the vocabulary around photography there's  a lot of it and it's often complex more difficult  

vocabulary as well all right let's see i enjoy  listening to gospel music fishing and swimming  

uh from samuel thank you so again music is an  easy one fishing and swimming those might be  

things that is are it's going to be more studying  vocabulary or let's say you're learning about um  

fishing for example or or swimming learning  about the names of different things  

you can practice talking about  them in english and so on

you enjoyed the live stream  good i'm so glad to hear it  

so nice to see you guys here my hobby is chatting  about the english language well there you go so  

talking to others is of course really great um  the problem speaking english to other people is  

is probably the best way to practice english  but maybe you don't have that opportunity  

or you're not around others who are speaking  english you can always do self-talk things like  

that so we've talked about something we've  talked about in previous videos let's see

i enjoy walking on the hills  here in the philippines oh  

well that sounds beautiful thank you  evelyn for your comment uh let's see

looking through thank you guys this  will this might just take me a minute

hey i see uh my brother made a short appearance  on my on the live stream today uh okay

oh yep there he is that's that's my brother  

how nice of him to stop by thanks  sean um let's see i'm looking through

okay so uh oh i see a question  at 9 26 what does quiz mean  

uh so i mentioned um yes thank you so  much for putting up that comment so  

i mentioned with the example of a smart goal let's  say i choose to read harry potter and i highlight  

or or maybe i have my notebook right and i write  down words and their meaning and i study them  

right so to quiz a quiz is like a small  test right so maybe let's say i have  

on one side i have the words in english and  let's say my native language is spanish so  

maybe i have the spanish over here right next to  it so number one write hello hola right whatever  

your words are so a quiz would be like covering  up the spanish words right and then going through  

the english and okay this means this this means  this this until i really really know the words  

i might also try to write sentences using the new  words to show that i know how to use them or i  

might make flash cards and test myself on uh what  those words mean so a quiz is like a small test  

like that and you can quiz yourself however you  want really um okay thank you for your question

looking through looking through

so um we got a question actually just now how  to speak english fluently uh thanks so much so  

rewind and re-watch so to speak english  fluently again uh the key is to develop a system  

of learning using methods or study ways that  you enjoy and to be persistent it takes time be  

patient be persistent i think another thing that  i want to mention with improving your english  

is to focus on your personal  goals but also know that  

sometimes there are no shortcuts some things  just take time especially something like  

maybe let's say your english is is is good but  sometimes you make some small grammar mistakes  

well that's the kind of thing that comes with time  just like if you think about when you were a child  

and you were learning your native language let's  say you're learning vietnamese right you didn't  

just one day magically speak perfectly right it  took time you made a lot of mistakes as a kid  

and the people around you gently told you like  oh no no this is how you say that right so it  

will be the same way with learning english just  like when you learned your first language when  

you learn your second or maybe it's your third or  fourth or tenth language it will take some time  

to learn what sounds right and uh sometimes people  will say oh do you mean this oh yes that's what  

i meant to say so those small don't be afraid to  make mistakes right it takes time all righty guys

uh so a lot of again i see a lot of things  about how do i improve this one aspect  

speaking listening reading writing so again that's  what this lesson is about make sure that you  

are if you want to improve your reading then  you have to make a system where you read  

something you enjoy regularly right make sure  it's a smart goal so you can rewind back to  

that part of the lesson where we're talking  about a smart goal right smart methods specific  

measurable attainable relevant time bound those  five things make good high expectations good big  

goals for yourself but that are smart doable  achievable and then work towards those goals  

right okay guys on that note i'm going to oh  uh this is a good question so i see at 9 39 how  

to remove a negative mindset for an english for  english learning so um this is a great question uh

i want to really take a moment to  answer this question as well as i can  

so i think there are many reasons why you why  anyone might feel have a negative mindset about  

english learning so let's talk about a few of them  number one you have no choice but to learn english  

so when i lived in korea for example students  start learning english in elementary school and  

they have to take english for their first year in  college at least at the university where i taught  

because they have to do it some students  really like it and they find enjoyment  

in it and they just really want to do well  but some people some students just felt oh  

why do i have to do this i don't want to be  here this is terrible okay so that's one reason  

another reason might be that um you don't  enjoy the learning process right so let's  

talk about those two things there's more but we  only have so much time so number one let's say  

you feel negative about it because you have to  do it you feel that you have to do it right maybe  

you do have to do it like my students in korea  um to move past the negative mindset about this  

this is why this brings me back to the first step  of uh the four-step plan i talked about today  

which is enjoyment so often if you are in a normal  classroom you're probably studying vocabulary  

you're studying grammar right grammar rules  things like that maybe you don't enjoy  

those methods of learning and that's okay so  you don't have to force yourself to like those  

methods right if you have a teacher who's doing  grammar grammar grammar grammar grammar and you  

just don't like it that's okay but don't let  the fact that you don't like studying grammar  

turn into you don't like learning english as a  whole right it just shows you this is not the  

way that i want to do it right so which brings  me to number two the second reason you might  

have a negative mindset which is um you're  just really not enjoying what you're doing  

so what does that mean that means that  you have to find ways that work for you  

so if you maybe let's say you still you have  to learn english maybe it's because of school  

maybe it's for a job or university or what have  you you have to learn it the best thing that  

you can do to remove your negative mindset is to  try to find enjoyment in the process of learning  

right there will probably still be that little  twinge of uh why do i have to do this but if you  

take if you do what you enjoy so  let's say i really love watching um

lord of the rings i don't know i can't think  of anything right now the let's say that that's  

my favorite movie and i love watching it well  something i could do is go and watch that movie  

with english subtitles and with my first  language subtitles and just kick back and relax  

and enjoy watching it and read try to read along  and things like that some passive learning right  

there are many ways that you can find enjoyment  um and the last the last thing here and then we'll  

finish this will be my last question guys because  this is this this is a big one the last one is um

maybe you feel some you feel nervous about  using english right so we call this um the  

effective filter this means that  your kind of your guard goes up  

you don't want to use english you you feel nervous  speaking english you're worried you're nervous  

you don't want to use it this is probably the  number one problem for english or second language  

not just english right people learning second  language the number one problem is fear anxiety  

fear of judgment fear that other people are going  to judge you for not being good at using this  

their language so that's that's a tough one to get  over but a couple things number one is practice  

the more you do it the more you do it even if  you feel nervous if that's why you're you have  

a negative mindset you're feeling oh i don't wanna  i felt that way in korea when i first got there i  

felt nervous about speaking korean because i am  not good at it so i felt nervous about using it  

oh this person and sometimes people did judge me  how long have you been in korea you only know that  

much but at the end of the day that doesn't matter  right as long as i can communicate what i needed  

to then slowly i improved the less i practiced and  the more nervous that i got the lower my level was  

i couldn't grow if i wasn't practicing so even  if you feel nervous make yourself do it and at  

first you'll feel oh uncomfortable or but you'll  find that most people 99 of people smile they're  

happy that you're trying they understand what  you mean and they'll help you along and you will  

learn from it and feel more confident so that's  something you just have to force yourself through  

okay guys that was a great question everyone  has so many good questions i wish i could get  

to all of them but i just want to say thank you  to everyone for coming to the live stream today  

i hope that you enjoyed today's lesson and um i  and and again just like with all other lessons  

you can always go back re-watch review okay  and i do encourage you to do that so remember  

enjoy it develop methods based on things you  personally enjoy make a system that's doable  

time bound works for you and be patient okay  there's no there's no fast forward button okay  

so that's it everyone thank you so  much for joining and i'll see you guys