Are you familiar with the story
about the tortoise and the hare?
Well, I'll tell it to you in just a moment,
and I'll explain how it relates to your English learning.
Well, hello, and welcome to this English lesson.
I'm going to give you some advice today about
how fast you should go when learning English.
But I did promise to tell you a story first, right?
The story of the tortoise and the hare.
Well, the tortoise and the hare decide one day to
have a race, and as you know, a tortoise is
very slow and a hare is very fast.
They start the race, and the
hare goes off at lightning speed.
The tortoise just starts walking slowly.
But about halfway through the race, the hare,
thinking they're going to win, easily decides that
it's time to have a nap.
And then the tortoise just slowly walks by them and
eventually gets to the finish line and wins the race.
I think this story, the tortoise and the
hare, is the origin of the English saying,
slow and steady wins the race.
And this is the first of seven phrases I want to
teach you today that we say in English about how you
should do your work or how you should study something.
When you do something slow and steady,
it means you're doing it carefully.
It means you're doing it in a way,
if it's your English learning, where you'll remember
more things, sometimes you can feel rushed.
You can think that you have to study English quickly.
You have to learn a lot, really, really fast.
But sometimes going slowly at a
very steady pace is actually better.
You'll end up learning more and remembering more.
So that's the first phrase.
Slow and steady wins the race.
You could use this to talk about any kind of work
or project or homework or learning that someone is doing.
Hey, take it easy.
Slow and steady wins the race.
One of the hardest things to convince students to
do is to go back and check their work.
In English, we have this little saying,
cross your t's and dot your i's.
So the letter t obviously needs to have a line through it,
and the letter i needs to have a dot on top.
So when we say, make sure you cross your t's
and dot your i's, it means make sure you go
back and look at something you've written in particular and
make sure there are no spelling mistakes.
Make sure the t's and i's, the t's
are crossed, and the i's are dotted.
But it actually refers to more than that.
Make sure the verbs are conjugated correctly.
When you make sure to cross your t's and dot
your i's, it means you do a thorough job.
Now, this, of course, applies to English learning,
but this is a common English phrase that
we use for all kinds of things.
When someone does some work, we might say, hey,
before you show it to the boss, make sure
you cross your t's and dot your i's.
So when you cross your t's and dot
your i's, it simply means to be very,
very thorough and careful when you do work.
The third English saying I wanted to teach
you today is the saying haste makes waste.
Now, haste refers to doing something quickly,
and waste refers to making mistakes,
and then there's garbage or trash
or you're not doing anything productive.
When it comes to English learning, if I was
to say, hey, slow down, take it easy.
Haste makes waste.
What I'm saying is, if you're writing
something, just go slowly and carefully.
Do a good job.
If you go quickly, you'll probably
make mistakes. In an English conversation
take your time responding.
I know sometimes you feel the pressure to speak
quickly in an English conversation, but hopefully you're talking
to someone who is patient and relaxed and doesn't
mind if you take a little extra time to
say what you want to say.
Because haste makes waste.
If you try to write quickly or speak quickly, you'll
probably make mistakes, and that's just not a good thing.
So saying number three, haste makes waste.
Just try to do things slowly and carefully.
The fourth thing I wanted to teach you
today is the phrase slowly but surely.
When you do something slowly but surely, it means you do
it slowly, so you don't do it fast, and you do
it with thought put into every step of the process.
Let's say you were going to do a puzzle.
You can't do a puzzle quickly.
You can't just try to jam the pieces together.
You have to take each piece and look at it
carefully and figure out what piece it could connect to.
And then slowly but surely and
confidently put those pieces together.
So with your English learning, please do the same.
Do things slowly but surely.
Plan out your week.
Do a little bit every day.
Do everything each day with
confidence and with purpose.
Try to make sure that you're not
just doing things randomly along the way.
So the next phrase, slowly but surely.
Do something in a slow, methodical, confident way.
This will greatly benefit your English learning.
So I really like this next saying.
It's the saying, Rome wasn't built in a day.
Are you familiar with the city of Rome?
It probably took a long time to build the city of Rome.
In fact, they're probably still
building parts of it today.
So when you say to someone, hey, Rome wasn't built
in a day, it means you see them doing something
really quickly and maybe not carefully, and you want them
to take their time and do a good job.
So, hey, Rome wasn't built in a day.
Slow down a bit.
Haste makes waste.
Do something slowly but surely.
So again, if you say, Rome wasn't built in
a day, to someone who's learning English, what you
mean is that you can't learn English in a
week, you can't learn English in a month.
You need to take time because you're
building something of great beauty and quality.
Your ability to speak English is a beautiful
thing, and it's going to take time.
So Rome wasn't built in a day.
The English language wasn't learned in a day.
The 6th thing I wanted to teach you
today is the saying, measure twice, cut once.
Now, this is a phrase that
we use in the construction industry.
Or anytime you're building something where you need
to measure something before you cut it. Maybe
you're making something out of fabric.
You want to measure twice and cut once.
What this means, simply, is that you
should be careful before you do something.
If you measure twice and cut once, you
reduce the chance that you'll make a mistake.
So how does this apply to English?
Well, I think if you're writing an English
test or if you're doing anything where your
speaking or writing is being evaluated, you should
make sure that you think before you speak.
I know this might add a delay.
You should think before you write.
Don't quickly write without thinking hard about
how you should conjugate the verbs.
So measure twice, cut once.
Simply good advice if you're making something, but I
think you can kind of create a version in
your head that applies to English as well.
Maybe think twice before you speak
or think twice before you write.
So the last saying I want to teach you today
is the saying, good things come to those who wait.
When we say this to someone in English, we mean
that if you are patient, if you work hard at
something for a long time, eventually you will succeed.
Sometimes people get impatient when they're
doing something like learning a language.
It can take a long time.
But I will tell you this from experience.
Good things come to those who wait.
I remember spending long hours working
on the French language, but eventually
I could understand French TV shows.
Eventually I could write a little easier,
and eventually I could read French novels
and understand them.
So I know you're learning English and not
French, but I'm sure you will have the
same experience. If you are patient,
if you work hard, good things come to those who
wait, and I'm sure you will benefit from this learning.
Hey, thanks so much for watching this English lesson.
Seven phrases and sayings that you can
use to kind of motivate yourself and
boost your confidence when you're learning English.
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What else do I usually say? Oh, leave a comment.
And of course, if you have time, why don't
you stick around and watch another English lesson? Bye.