watch this video if you have problems to talk on the phone in English it can
happen to anyone in any level I'll tell you what happened to me a few weeks ago
and how I worked it around and continued the conversation
hey there teacher Prix here to help you talk to anyone anywhere anytime in
English you know I consider myself a fluent English speaker I mean I teach
English I study English everyday I can communicate efficiently but last week I
got a phone call and I didn't feel so comfortable actually for my standards my
I'm I'm very demanding with myself but I didn't think I did a good job but why
did that happen I'll tell you why but first let me tell you my story when I
answer the phone and the person started speaking English to me I must confess I
was not expecting the phone call and the person started asking me some
questions about an email he had sent me a business email so for a moment I
panicked because I must confess I read the email but I read the email I didn't
really pay attention and studied the email so as he started asking me
questions about the email my mind started to wander and I had the worst
negative thoughts you can imagine of course I'm being very hard on myself I
was able to communicate efficiently but it was not the standard that I expect
from myself I just felt insecure about something
that I'm usually very confident about but then I realized something very
important which is what I want to share with you I didn't speak what I wanted I
spoke what I could many English learners have problems to accept that they are
so worried about giving the most appropriate answers and beautiful
correct with proper intonation and pronunciation that they get stuck it has
the opposite effect only when I started to relax and accept that I was not
going to use my favorite verbs or expressions or amazing
adjectives that I was able to communicate I relaxed because I
accepted that I was gonna do what I could to talk to that guy and answer his
questions about the business we were talking about now I have an extensive
vocabulary in English my structure is really good I'm very proud of it but
when you are in the real world in the war zone
you speak what is necessary to communicate and that's different from
the theory that's different from the books you do what you can and you do
what you can to communicate efficiently it's time to use what you have not what
you think would be appropriate for that situation
so my first recommendation is review simple structures that will help you
deal with those kind of situations but other than that don't expect to remember
all those fancy words and expressions that you study now I'm going to show you
two basic expressions and one strategy that I always use when I am on the phone
that helps me communicate when I answer the phone and start to panic so these
are some strategies okay now there are many things about conversations on the
phone that I will not talk about here in this video but if you are interested
make sure to let me know in the comments because then I can make more videos to
talk about more specific situations okay and remember one important thing the
more you panic the less structure and vocabulary you will remember so that's
why it is very important to stay calm now here I want to give you a phrase
that will help you buy some time if you answer the phone and the person starts
speaking and speaking and speaking and you feel lost and you feel overwhelmed and
confused stop the person and say excuse me can you speak more slowly please then
don't say it's because of your English say you are having a bad connection so
excuse me can you speak a little bit more slowly we have a bad connection
now don't focus on your English difficulties focus on something else
okay you don't need to make this conversation
embarrassing for you okay blame technology now if the person started
speaking and you have no idea what they're talking about do this hm I'm
sorry can I call you back in five minutes
why can I call you back in five minutes maybe you have no idea what the person
is talking about maybe you are not the best person to answer that phone call so
five minutes will give you time to read email if you have an email that you didn't
read to ask for somebody's help okay and find a solution to that problem if you
are at work it doesn't matter if you speak English or not you need to find a
solution that's what I tell my business students so in this case if you can't
speak find someone that can if you are the only one five minutes will give you
time to calm down and prepare for the conversation there's nothing wrong about
that you will have to ask for the person's phone number or you will ask
them to call you back you can say can I call you back then you'll need their phone
number or you can tell them to call you back in five minutes when I worked at
the bank and someone called me and I wasn't sure of what I had to say I told
them hm excuse me can I call you in five minutes and they were okay that's better
than saying oh I don't understand what you're saying
I'm sorry, my English, no focus on the result focus on something that will give
you time to calm down and think and finally a strategy if they are asking
you for something is specific and it depends on the conversation okay I like
to repeat what the speaker said and while I repeat his question or his phrase I
start to think about the conversation what is he talking about so if they call
me and said as.. my business partner called me he said Priscilla have you
read the email I sent you this morning I repeat what he said oh the email you sent me
this morning Oh sure I read this second I know it's
seconds two, three seconds but that will give you some time to focus on what you
have to say next because probably the listener will say yes yes I sent you
this morning what do you think of the ideas that I sent you in this email okay
so this strategy may sound silly but it gives your brain time to structure
what you can say next because remember this is not our native language so any
second you can get to prepare yourself is great it's an advantage in a future
video I will show you more extensive expressions and situations of phone
conversations because there are so many possibilities of conversations on the
phone and many possible problems that we may have during those phone
conversations but I wanted to make this video short in the meantime if you want
to receive more lessons about everyday problems that English speakers have when
they are communicating in meetings job interviews at work during trips on
vacation exchange programs or at restaurants I have an email list where
I'm focusing on specific situations like these ones
and creating effective lessons that will help you use the English you already
have so that you can succeed in those situations with the real English not
just school English from the books the materials will be primarily in English
with a little bit of Portuguese for the more basic learners but I'm pretty sure
that these materials will help you a lot if you want to participate it's free and
the link is at the descriptions I hope you enjoyed this video make sure to
subscribe thank you so much and I'll see you next time bye