[Music]
hello everyone
and welcome back to english with lucy
today we're going to talk about whether
you can learn
english at home on your own i think you
can
and i'm going to give you some tips and
recommendations
it's a pretty weird time isn't it a lot
of
us are suddenly having to spend a lot of
time
on our own at home but this does not
mean that we have to put a pause on what
we want to achieve
like learning a language it is
possible to continue learning a language
on your own at home and i'm not going to
talk about all of the tried and tested
methods
like watching tv shows movies with
subtitles
listening to the radio i've mentioned
all of that before
these are new tips that are more
relevant than ever before let's get
straight into it
the first one is free conversation
classes
if you want to learn to speak a language
you are going to have to practice
conversing i reached out to some of my
students that i consider to be
very very successful and i asked them
what they are doing during lockdown the
one activity that came up
time and time again was online
conversation classes and i thought that
was really
interesting because i expected that they
were paying for them
but it turns out that a lot of them are
doing it for free
this surprised me i didn't think that
there would be people
running online classes for free but
there are
and you can find them and you can use
them to improve
your language skills on your own there
are lots of non-profit
online communities offering zoom
conversation lessons
there are lots of teachers that offer
these group sessions
to advertise their private sessions as
well for all the other tips i'm going to
provide links in the description box
but i'm not for this one because i don't
want to
overwhelm a small group basically
i will leave it to you to search
websites like meetup.com and
facebook and other language forums to
find
these zoom groups sometimes they're run
by teachers
and sometimes they're run by students
learners of english
who want to meet other like-minded
students and practice together
most importantly if you can't find
one of these groups or you can't find
one that suits you
why not try hosting one i'm sure if you
post in language forums
or underneath youtube videos you will be
able to find a group of like-minded
people
who also want to practice conversation
with you you might think well that's
great but how do i access
proper feedback if nobody there is a
professional teacher
well that brings me on to point number
two which comes
thanks to the sponsor of today's video
bassoo
when i was speaking to my students about
learning from home
on their own there were two key problems
that came
up again and again and again motivation
and access to feedback that's where basu
comes in
they have a solution for both of these
problems
if you haven't heard of bassoo before
it's a global language learning
community
on both desktop and mobile which i know
is very important to some of you
they have loads of language courses that
you can take to practice your speaking
listening reading and writing in english
and many other languages like spanish
and japanese
on this platform you can connect with
speakers of the language that you are
learning
and receive feedback feedback is like
gold dust when you're learning a
language it is so
valuable but it's often very hard to
find
especially if you are learning a very
popular language
they also have this amazing study plan
tool
which is going to help you stay
motivated it breaks the language down
and reminds you when and what to study
allowing you to set
realistic goals when i start focusing on
learning a language
i get overwhelmed i don't know where to
start this breaks it down for you
to sign up to pursue and explore what
they have to offer
click on the link in the description box
you can sign up
for free or you can choose to get a
premium account
which has loads of additional features
they are offering my students an
extra 30 discount on all memberships
use my code lucy30 to take advantage of
that offer let's move on to number three
accountability partners or
accountability buddies
this one depends on your personality and
whether you like
working under pressure or not i know
that i work best
under pressure so this tip is one that
i've used a lot in the past
when people embark on a difficult
challenge like
losing weight or running a marathon
they often find it easier to do it with
someone
somebody that's going to act as an extra
push of motivation
because sometimes if you don't feel like
doing something
but you see someone that you're close to
doing that thing
it pushes you and it persuades you to do
what you don't necessarily want to do
this applies to me
if i see my fiance will doing lots of
exercise and going to the gym
i feel far more inclined to join him you
can do this with language learning
too you can find an accountability
partner
i bet there's a nicer name for it
english buddy or something like that or
a motivation
mate somebody that you can be in touch
with
you can check in when you've done your
study session you can share something
new that you've learned you can compare
techniques
this can all be done over whatsapp or
text message
or email but forming a friendship with
someone
and being in the same situation offering
those kind words when you need to
offering those motivational words when
they need them
i had this when i was learning spanish
at school with my friend
tasman she was amazing we always spoke
to each other on whatsapp
in spanish and when i heard that she had
joined a new conversation class or
something like that i felt really
motivated there was a little
element of competition as well it's
whatever you like
maybe you don't like competition maybe
you do maybe you just want someone to
say nice words
maybe you want somebody to tell you off
i don't necessarily recommend that but
everybody learns in different ways
number four
listen to specific podcasts i've
mentioned
podcasts before i've got lots that i
recommend
i absolutely love podcasts because you
can multitask i love running
and listening to something educational
whilst i'm doing
exercise seems like an excellent use of
my time
if you want to improve your listening
and pronunciation the most amazing way
to do it
is to listen to a podcast whilst
reading the transcript at the same time
i always recommend that with audio books
but i'm focusing on podcasts today what
i'm talking about is something that i
think
all podcasters should do adding
transcripts to your podcasts
it's great for language learning it's
also so important for accessibility
if you're hard of hearing you're missing
out on a lot if there aren't
transcriptions provided there is a
fantastic
website that i've found that nearly
solves this problem i think many of you
will find it
very very useful indeed if there is a
podcast that you like one of the popular
podcasts
that does not provide transcriptions
there is a website called podscribe i'll
put all the links in the description box
but basically because there is a cost
associated with generating
transcriptions this website offers you
the opportunity to
pay for a transcription to be generated
it's often between
five and seven dollars per hour-long
episode once you have made that donation
those transcriptions are then there
available for
everyone so it's a real community thing
if
500 people just made that one donation
then there are podcast
transcriptions for 500 episodes out
there
i really recommend taking a look lots of
transcriptions have already been donated
and you can also donate some
other ones so you're not only helping
yourself you're helping other people as
well
and not just people that are learning
languages people that have a disability
as well
what a fantastic idea there are such
marvelous people
on the planet they really are the last
one
number five is imitation a topic i've
spoken about
a lot before it's what i did when i was
learning spanish
it really helped me achieve natural
fluent pronunciation it's no secret that
i used to live in spain and when i
conversed with my spanish friends
i looked at their mouths which sounds
weird but it's not
instead of making eye contact i would
make eye to mouth contact
and i would look at their lips and their
lip position and their
mouth shape and i'd look at where they
put their tongues in their mouth and
how their teeth were in comparison to
their tongues
i probably made them feel a bit
uncomfortable so that is one of the
beauties of studying at home
on your own you can do this without
embarrassment
all you need is a mirror and a smart
device
take a video of somebody speaking slowly
and clearly
if you really like the way somebody
speaks but they speak quite quickly
play around with slowing them down you
can do this on youtube sometimes it
doesn't work so well
make sure it's a video where you can
clearly see their mouth
hold the video up to your face play the
video
hold the mirror up to your face recreate
the mouth movements and the intonation
and the tongue position
if there is a sound that you just can't
grasp this technique will really really
help you
when people try to improve their public
speaking whether they're
learning a new language or doing it in
their own native language
it is often recommended that they
practice in front of a mirror this is
very much the same it's about getting
more comfortable right
that's it for today's lesson i really
hope you enjoyed it
and i really hope you can take some of
these tips and
put them into practice a big thank you
once again to the sponsor of today's
video
pursue remember that you can sign up for
free
or you can get one of their premium
memberships and you can claim
30 off with my code lucy30
the link is in the description box don't
forget to connect with me on all of my
social media i've got my facebook
my instagram and my website
englishwithlucy.co.uk
there you can access my mailing list and
previous lessons and pdfs as well
i'll see you soon for another lesson
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you