Learn & Remember MORE Vocabulary

hey what's up Stefanie the English coach here from EnglishFullTime.com

in this video we are going to talk about how to learn and remember more

vocabulary so you guys can start speaking more fluently and just feel

more comfortable with English now I have many methods to share with you guys but

what I want to say is that we all learn a little bit differently so there's not

one way that will work for everybody you really have to test and see what works

for you what you enjoy because when you enjoy the way that you're learning you

learn more and you learn faster okay let me give you a quick example of this my

husband loves studying languages he goes crazy he studies everything basically

French Italian Russian I can't even keep track of all the languages that he

studies and you know how he likes studying them he uses apps like duolingo

and mango languages he loves using these apps and you know you can find him at

any point of the day just sitting there with the app learning new vocabulary

learning new words and then when he meets people that speak these languages

he actually can talk with them but for me I don't like that method I cannot

just sit and play with an app it's not my learning style it does not work for

me and I'm just not interested in that kind of learning so I have other methods

that work for me but maybe that method will work for you so it's something to

consider if you're trying to learn more vocabulary okay before I tell you what

will work and what has worked for me and what is amazing I want to tell you what

doesn't work okay or at least what doesn't work for me

cramming never works you guys should know this right we're all adults here or

most of us are all adults we've all been through traditional education systems

and we all know what happens when you cram maybe you're able to pass the test

but then you don't remember anything the next day this happened to me all the

time when I was in high school because in my history classes every Friday we

would have a vocabulary exam we had to learn 10 new words each week and then

take a test on those words and I never studied I was super lazy when it came to

learning new vocabulary because I hated this learning method I was I was just so

against it I hated it so basically what I would end up doing is right before the

test when our teacher would give us ten extra minutes to prepare I would just

read through all the words really quickly I would memorize the definition

and I think you know because my brain was in survival mode like you have to

pass this test then I was able to memorize all the definitions

word-for-word it was incredible and then you know we would do the test I would

get ten out of ten right every single time I had the words down the

definitions everything memorized 100% but guess what the following week I

never remembered what those words were okay so cramming like that does not work

it's not a good method you want consistent exposure to English over a

long period of time that is literally the best method okay so now I want to

tell you guys about a youtube video that I saw years ago that was phenomenal and

it's about the way that our brain works if I can find it I'll link it in the

description for you guys to watch because it's truly really incredible so

first in this video the narrator shows you a list of words ten words and says

okay try to see how many of these words you can memorize and then after you see

the list you have to write down as many as you can remember and I was able to

write down like four maybe five I could not remember all the words and then the

narrator told a story using those words and showed you images of the words as he

was telling the story and then at the end of it he was like okay now how many

do you remember and I was able to remember every single word and the

reason is because that word was placed in a story there was context there was

an image there was something for me to relate to and identify with so that is a

big key for you and for me when we're learning languages and when you guys are

trying to improve your English that the best way to really learn new vocabulary

is one in context okay in a story because we remember stories and then

using imagery as much as possible so for me this is why when I

learn a new word in Spanish or something and I'm like oh man I keep forgetting

what this word is I need to see it I need a visual

I literally just go to Google Images I typed the word and then I see all these

pictures and this is a fantastic way to learn new vocabulary you don't have to

write it down and sit there memorizing it day after day trying to get that

definition in your mind because words and definitions are all abstract okay

they're taking something concrete they're making it abstract and then

they're you're trying to memorize that in your mind and it's just not as

efficient so trust me on this try it out next time you hear a word when you're

like oh my gosh what does that mean or I don't understand it go look it up on

Google Images okay even if it's a feeling or a word that is abstract like

disappointed for example let's pretend you learn this word for the first time

there's not really an image like ball you can see a ball right you can't see

disappointed but you can because Google Images is going to show you pictures of

people who are disappointed and you're gonna recognize the expression on their

face because that's an expression we make in any language okay so that's just

a quick example of how you can use imagery and use the fact that your brain

remembers things better when it sees images to learn new vocabulary and

remember it in English okay the next thing I want to talk to you guys about

is social media because as you guys know it's already been proven that social

media is highly addictive Facebook Instagram etc so what we can do is we

can actually use this to our advantage all of your Facebook all of your

Instagram account everything it should be in English but not just the account

itself you know where it says settings and friend requests and all this stuff

not just that okay but all of the content that you're seeing inside of

Facebook all of the content that you're seeing inside of Instagram all of that

should be in English so if you focus on a deeper motivation that you have not

just English but something that you're really passionate about this could be

related to your career related to your hobbies whatever it is but some

that you love just follow pages and content related to that in English and

because Facebook and Instagram is already so addictive in and of itself

you're gonna be scrolling through your newsfeed for at least five minutes every

day you're gonna be getting new words in English and it's just a really easy way

to build your vocabulary so I'm gonna give you two examples of pages that I

love following on Instagram all in English and if you guys follow pages

like this you're gonna be learning new sentences and new words every single day

so one type of page that I love following on Instagram is quotes like

uplifting inspirational motivational quotes you can find pages where they

post quotes every single day multiple times a day and if you're following 20

pages like this first of all you're gonna be feeling a lot more positive I

think on a daily basis and you're gonna feel a lot more encouraged with whatever

goals you're trying to achieve but you're also gonna learn new sentences

new words new ways of structuring phrases etc okay and to find these pages

just use the hashtag search function and go to hashtags and then type in

motivational quotes or inspirational quotes and you'll start finding a bunch

of pages that publish this kind of content the other kind of page that I

love following on Instagram is pages about memes

okay memes and jokes and funny things they make me laugh every single time and

this is a really great way also to stay up to date on slang or to learn slang if

you're following pages on Instagram that are nothing but memes your vocabulary is

gonna increase without a doubt and your slang you're gonna start

learning a lot more slang too and you're gonna laugh more because they're so

funny okay so the next thing I want to say about this is that it takes time for

the brain to process new information okay so you're not going to be able to

learn hundreds of words every single day and you shouldn't even try because even

if you learn the definition of a word you have to hear that word in context

many many many many times before you really truly understand

that word and can use it on autopilot so a lot of times I see

students that hear a word for the first time and they start trying to use it but

they're misusing it they're using it out of context because they don't really

understand how to use it so sometimes I think it's better to just listen a lot

more first and analyze how words are used and then once you feel like okay

yeah I totally understand how this word should be used then you can incorporate

it into your vocabulary and start using it now with all of that said there are

times where you're gonna have to memorize a lot of words in a short

amount of time and this happened to me when I had first come to Argentina it

was my first year in the country and I decided that I wanted to start working

as an independent beauty consultant and I was going to start selling and

marketing different beauty products well it wasn't until that point when I

realized oh my gosh I don't know how to say these basic words in Spanish that

are related to makeup and you know doing your makeup like how do you say lipstick

how do you say eyeliner how do you say blush how do you say eyeshadow these are

all words that are related to makeup and doing your makeup and I didn't know any

of them so what did I do I had to go look up all of this

information and start memorizing like crazy and I remember that I printed a

bunch of material I watched youtube videos in Spanish I

was taking notes about how the girls were describing their makeup and

describing how they were applying it I was taking notes and then I would

practice I would do presentations in front of the mirror I would make people

listen to me and I was basically like hey this is my job now I have to know

these words I can't not know these words so that was really frustrating because

even though I was studying every day I kept forgetting words and it felt like I

was making no progress but you know what it took me about one week maybe or two

weeks or a few days I don't remember but it was not actually that long it's just

like when you're studying those new words that's when it feels like it's

taking forever but then you look back and you're like hey you know it didn't

that long so that method of writing words down studying their definitions

looking them up etc and trying to cram as much into your brain in as little

time as possible again it can work but it's not a good long-term strategy

that's like if you're desperate and you're like okay I need a certain set of

vocabulary terms ASAP that I don't know then of course that will work okay and

my last tip here on how to learn and remember more vocabulary is to just

start being more observant right we have active vocabulary and passive vocabulary

what happens with a lot of you guys is you understand everything that I say so

my vocabulary is in your passive vocabulary because you understand it but

then when you want to speak a lot of times you don't have the actual words

you don't have the fluency that's because you don't have my vocabulary

built into your active vocabulary okay you have just a base vocabulary of

whatever you're working with right now and maybe you've been incorporating a

few extra words a week but if you really want to start improving faster you have

to really listen to what I say and ask yourself what words is she saying that I

don't use ask yourself that question and you'll start realizing oh she always

says this phrase or she always says these words and I don't use them how

does she use them and then once you start making those observations you'll

be able to incorporate it into your speech and of course start having a

bigger vocabulary and with that said the idea here is not to have a huge

vocabulary it's just to be able to express yourself well you guys might

notice that I don't use a ton of big words because I don't care about using

big words I want people to understand me and I want to communicate what I'm

thinking and what I'm feeling and in order to do that you don't need a huge

amount of words okay you just need basic words okay though you can do this even

without having an extensive vocabulary just remember that you should be

focusing on chunks okay not necessary individual vocabulary words but chunks

and phrases focus on one type of English because if you're trying to learn

British English Irish English and American English or different types of

American English and British English or whatever all at the same time you're

going to drive yourself crazy it's better to just focus on one area so you

can master that vocabulary and then move on so for example British English a lot

of their vocabulary that's in my passive vocabulary I understand it but I don't

use it okay so for you you can understand American English but speak

British English or you can understand British English but speak American

English or whatever you feel more comfortable with okay guys so hopefully

those tips were helpful please let us know in the comments what tips you'd

like to add based on your personal experience what works for you what

learning styles you enjoy to improve your vocabulary we look forward to

reading what you have to say and of course don't forget to check the

description because I leave lots of links and lots of other information in

the description for those of you who always ask no I don't offer private

classes I'm so sorry but I do run several online programs that you might

be interested in so again check the links in the description and you'll

learn more about them there that's it you guys and I'll see you in another

video bye