5 Ways to Get More English Speaking Practice & Why You Need to Do This

hello this is jack from tofluency.com and welcome to this lesson where we're

going to talk about how you can get more speaking practice and I want to start

this lesson off by asking you a question and you can answer this question by

clicking the card somewhere on your screen now and the question is just

simple how often do you speak in English? So take your time pause the video if you

need to and answer that question now once you've done that welcome back

to the video we are going to talk about how you can get more practice because

I'm pretty certain that a lot of you answering this will say I don't get

enough speaking practice I get emails all the time from people saying ok I'm

doing certain things to improve like watching YouTube videos but I can't find

anybody who wants to help me with my English and help me get more speaking

practice and this is a problem for a lot of people and without that speaking

practice the language doesn't feel real it doesn't feel like you're improving

your English for the right reasons because you're not actually using it in

the way that you want to use it - a lot of you watching this will want to improve

your English so that you can have more conversations and if you're not having

those conversations then it starts to become a little bit boring and it

doesn't feel very real - but also a lack of speaking practice means that your

speaking won't be improving now I've talked about different methods that you

can use to improve your speaking and your English in general for example

listening more using the to fluency method writing so that you can formulate

sentences in your head but actually speaking will help you too - it's a little

bit like when somebody is training to become a soccer player or they... or

they are a soccer player and if they just train all the time

that's great they're going to improve but they also need that much practice

they need to play in a competitive way in order to know where their weaknesses

are in order to practice playing in a normal environment and it's the same

with speaking - so speaking practice is important so with that in mind let's

talk about how you can get more practice if you live in an English-speaking

country then this should be quite easy for you and one of the things that might

be holding you back from actually getting that practice is due to your

your confidence so sometimes it is about a lack of confidence that you're not

getting enough practice because you don't want to be able to speak with

somebody or you don't want to speak with somebody and make mistakes - you don't

want people to laugh at you when you speak so that might be holding you back

from getting the practice that you need and this is true if you're living in an

english-speaking country or a non-english speaking country so think

about that think about if a lack of confidence is holding you back is

stopping you from getting the practice that you need but again if you live in

an english-speaking country then there are opportunities all around you just

interacting with people in everyday life should give you enough opportunity to

practice however I have lived in a Spanish-speaking country and I didn't

practice my speaking enough because I was surrounded by English speakers I was

surrounded by fellow English teachers and my wife who is an English speaker so

that could cause a problem to think about ways that you can integrate

yourself more and meet native speakers so that you can just interact with

people on a daily basis the majority of you watching this however won't live in

an english-speaking country so you need to find alternative ways to practice

your English and luckily there are many apps and ways

that we can do this online now there is an argument saying that online speaking

isn't the same as in person speaking but it gives us the opportunity to to

practice in a certain way and the application

I recommend which I haven't used but a lot of people have used and tell me

about is something called hello Talk Hello Talk I'll leave a link to their

website in the description so you can check it out so you can take a look but

Hello Talk is an app where you can meet people and find language exchange

partners and a language exchange partner is where you speak half the time in the

language you want to learn and half the time in your native language so you

learn in English let's say you are from Spain you speak Spanish you find

somebody who's from the UK or from America who wants to learn Spanish

so it's an exchange it's a deal you're not spending money on this but instead

you're spending your time helping that person - and again hello talk I think

from my research is the best app out there for that it allows you to make

friends on this application to find somebody who fits your criteria and to

speak with people in real time it's a good idea to take your time finding the

right type of person so it can be frustrating for certain people and they

give up very early in this process because they say ah I did this once oh I

tried this once and it didn't work the person didn't show up but it's worth

taking the time and making the effort to find the right partner for you because

once you have this relationship established then you're going to benefit

so much from it language exchanges are just an online thing you can find them

in most cities around the world too so again when I lived in Spain there were

so many opportunities for others English speakers who wanted to learn Spanish to

go to a local bar and meet people in a organized language exchange so we went

to all these different language exchange nights and just talk to people openly

sometimes in English sometimes in Spanish and especially in the early days

mainly in English for me but again this is just a way to meet people and to

practice your English in a real way another way to get more practice is to

use sites such as couchsurfer and air B&B now how far you want to go with this

depends on your situation because if you don't have a spare room or a spare sofa

that you can offer to somebody then you're limited here but you can use

these sites in a in a variety of ways I do know that couch surfer allows you to

post a profile where you can say I can meet you for coffee and show you around

my city and this again it gives you the opportunity to meet English speakers who

you want to tour your city and speak to them in English so you can show them

around your city and it's a fantastic way to practice now you can go as far as

you want with this depending on where you live again there might be some

regulations here there might be a lack of ability to give up your sofa or a

spare room but having people stay with you is an option to get more speaking

practice too so that's another way to think about meeting new people who want

to connect with you for whatever reason and therefore you can practice your

English another way to practice is to find a teacher - to pay for a teacher

to give you lessons again this could be online or offline but the benefit of

having a teacher is that they are going to give you feedback on

mistakes that you make so if you are looking for feedback in addition to just

being able to practice then I recommend finding a teacher now there are so many

different ways you can find a teacher you can look for a teacher in your local

area you can look online on sites like iTalki or Lingoda or you can get in

touch with a youtube teacher and see if they offer lessons again the benefit are

finding a teacher is that they can give you feedback on mistakes you make so if

that is important to you then find a teacher who can do this you might be

able to find a language exchange partner who can do it too but you're more likely

going to find this in a teacher and finally another way to practice is to

speak to yourself so to practice sentences to think about role plays or

situations in which you can actually speak English now I know a lot of people

do this a lot of people practice their speaking by putting themselves into an

imaginary situation so it could be any type of situation or you could just

simply describe things that are happening around you you can describe

what you see you can go into a park and talk about what you see or you can just

process your thoughts in your own head in English like I said before having the

ability to practice your speaking is important and with most things to

stronger the context the better for you so having a real-life situation in which

you need to use your English is very strong and that could be more beneficial

for you whereas just talking about things in your own head isn't as strong

it doesn't have the same type of context so think about ways that you can get

more practice and build this into your daily routine it's going to help your

English in general especially if you combine this with other methods such as

getting as much input as possible and doing things like the to fluency method

and also just reading in English and writing things

out so you can process the thoughts in your head let me know if I have missed a

way in which you can practice your English and just let me know your

thoughts and tips for anyone who wants to get more speaking practice if you've

enjoyed this video then please like and share it and also if you are new here

subscribe to the channel and get my book the five-step plan for English fluency

it will give you advice on the goals that you can set to think about why

you're learning English and then it also talks about the methods that will help

you improve our fast rate so again thank you so much for being here and for

spending this time with me while you're here why not check out another one of my

videos okay speak you soon bye bye