What's up, everyone? I'm Andrea your RealLife English fluency coach. And in today's lesson we
are going to be learning words and expressions to describe your English level. So if you love
learning English then you're probably talking about it a lot and chances are you have many
friends and acquaintances that are also learning it. So it's something you have in common and
something you're probably likely to talk about. This means that learning new words to describe
your English is a good idea, don't you think? So rather than just using the usual words like good,
bad, beginner, intermediate and advanced, today we're going to learn some more colorful language and
vocabulary that's going to help you to describe your English and the English of others. But before
we get into it and in case you're new here, we are here to guide you beyond the classroom
to live and learn and speak English in the real world. So be sure to hit that subscribe
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So first of all let's start off more at the beginner stage or maybe where you are someone that
needs to work on your english a little bit more. You shouldn't describe your english as bad and
you definitely shouldn't describe anyone else's English as bad, I mean first of all English we are
known for being very polite and speaking in a way that's very polite with good manners too. So it's
not really something that we would do and there are better words to describe this kind of level.
If you need to work on your English so rudimentary is another way of saying basic or not so developed.
So if you were to describe someone's English in this way we would tend to think of someone with
maybe more of a strong or thick accent. Now, what we mean by having a thick or strong accent
is someone that is speaking English with more of a tone and the sound of their native language.
So one person that springs to mind who speaks excellent English but she does have more of
a strong accent is Sophia Vergara. - We were talking very good about you. - But aside from
accent rudimentary also means that this person maybe is less able to express their ideas and
their thoughts so they have more of a basic level to express some basic ideas and thoughts here. So
you could say, "When I started speaking English my speaking was rudimentary." Now, if someone has poorly
spoken or written English then we might describe it as broken English. However, it's important to
consider that this isn't used as much because some people might take offense to it. I can
imagine you and many other people would not really want someone to describe their English as broken.
However we use this as a way to describe when the speaker is not really connecting their sentences
very well, they might be using grammar rules from their own their native language and so this is why
it's described more as broken it's like piecing some parts together to be able to communicate,
but not really speaking fluently. Another way to describe your English is to say that you're rusty.
So rusty literally means oxidized so you might think of some metal rusting when it's been left
out for a very long time or it gets wet and then is left out and it gets oxidized, but it is a way
of describing your language speaking where maybe you haven't really been practicing very much.
So for example, sometimes when I don't speak greek very much, my greek gets rusty because
I'm now living in Barcelona and I speak English most of the day, and then I also speak Spanish so
then when I speak to family members on the phone in greek I'm actually thinking in Spanish a lot
more so my greek is a bit rusty, and it takes me a little time just to get back into the practice
with it. So when you don't practice enough you can start to get rusty meaning that you forget
words. Sometimes you can become tongue-tied and this goes for anything not even just language
learning, if you're really good at something but then you're out of practice so you're not
really doing it that much anymore then you become rusty at it. So it could be any type of activity,
really. You might also describe your English as limited or poor which are quite self-explanatory,
but basically means that you still have some work to do. Now, if it's really bad, it sucks or it's
terrible could also be ways to describe it but as I mentioned before English is a polite language, so
you really have to think about the context here and whether or not it's the right time to use
one of these words. For example, you might say "When I first moved to the US my English sucked
or my English was terrible" and if you want to say the opposite you might say that it was terrific.
Okay, so moving on to some ways to describe now where your English is a little bit better,
we are going to have a look first at alright. So alright is used to describe something that is not
so good and not so bad, so it's somewhere there in the middle. You probably do okay but it maybe could
be better. You might also describe your English as conversational so that means that it's good enough
for conversation. How about you? Is your English conversational? let me know down in the comments
below. An expression to describe this is that you can get your point across, so if your English is
conversational it means that you can somewhat communicate so you can get the meaning across,
you can get the point across, but maybe it's not so clear and it's not so well thought out.
But what it does mean is that you can understand what someone is trying to say to you and they can
probably understand what you are trying to say to them so you can hold a conversation,
which is a really great achievement. Another great way of describing your English is to say that you
get by. So if you move to an English-speaking country you'll probably need to know enough
English to just get by at least. So that means again that you can understand certain things and
you can communicate certain ideas that's just enough for you to get things that you want to
get done. A word that would express the total opposite of this would be hopeless, so if for
example you suddenly found yourself living in an English-speaking country and you knew no
English at all you might say that your English was hopeless meaning you had no hope of communicating
Now, to hold one's own means that you are competent. So if you say that I held my own it means that
you were able to communicate what you wanted to maybe with little instruction as well and practice.
So you have enough knowledge to get by in a way and also to have the confidence and the security
to hold your own to be able to communicate what you want to say.
Now, if you want to take your English from rudimentary or just from holding your own
to excellent then I highly recommend our RealLife Native Immersion course.
This 41 week course will take you on a real-life adventure of the English language each week
exploring a different topic connected to our goal to help you understand and use real native English
and make it a permanent part of your life in a way that is fun natural and convenient. And the best
part is you can try it right now for free with our three part power learning series. All you have to
do is click up here or down in the description box below to learn more and sign up now.
So now we're moving on to describing your English more as excellent, so this is where you have some
great English skills that you want to share and the first way to describe this is impressive.
So something impressive is quite extraordinary really and something that you might want to share
with people and show off and communicate. You might even describe your English as
proficient or highly proficient meaning that you have a really good command of the language.
So you probably don't have any problems in communicating or doing anything that you
want to do with the language. If your English is proficient and you're an advanced speaker then you
are probably fluent in all four areas and by that I mean in speaking, listening, reading and writing.
Now, if you've mastered English it means that you feel totally comfortable with the language in all
situations that you might come across. And if your English is flawless it means that it's probably
nearly perfect or very very close to perfect meaning that you make hardly any mistakes.
Now, if you're articulate or eloquent it means that you can express your ideas clearly in speaking and
in writing. Now, even some native speakers are not eloquent or articulate, so these two words mean
the same thing and it means also that you might be really fluent in English, but that
doesn't necessarily mean that you are articulate or eloquent. So these words really go beyond the
context of language, because it's not just about being a fluent English speaker or writer, it's
all about the way that you speak, the way that you communicate and doing that clearly and effectively.
Another one is native like. So this one is quite self-explanatory because if your English is
native-like it means that it's as good as that of a native speaker. So if you have ambitions to speak
more like a native or you even want to understand natives better I highly recommend this lesson
that I made all about connected speech which really is the key to understanding natives.
So you can click up here or down in the description box below to watch that lesson next.
Now, someone might ask you how is your English coming along and you might say, "It's coming along
well" or "It's come a long way" and that means that you've made a lot of progress along the way. So
maybe not so long ago or however long you've been studying the language, you know you started off
right at the beginning maybe, but you've put in the effort, you've put in the work and it's come a long
way. So, that means that you've made really good progress and you've come to a really good point.
Now, whenever you start a learning endeavor you're going to make a lot of progress in the beginning,
but then what usually happens at some point is all learners reach a plateau. So this is the way that
we pronounce this word plateau. So this means that your progress will stop or really slow
down, so most people get to this level sometimes even before they reach the conversational level
and maybe they give up and stop. But if you have that fight in you or you have a great teacher
or you find more creative ways of learning you definitely can pass that plateau to keep
making progress. Another great way to describe your English is to say that you need to brush up on.
So if you need to brush up on your English it means that it's probably a little bit rusty
and you need to do some things quickly to make some quick progress to get it back to the level
that it should be or that you were at before. So for example, you might say, "Oh I need to brush up on
my English before I move to Ireland." Some ways that people describe their English as well is that they
say, "I picked it up." So if you pick up a language it means that when you immerse yourself in the
language you pick it up very quickly so just by listening and being immersed in the language you
pick things up and you don't necessarily need to study very thoroughly. So I know for example in my
first year here in Spain, when I first moved here I focused on my new job the new country I was living.
But as I was immersed in the culture and immersed in the language I picked up lots of vocabulary,
grammar points and other things as well. So this is a great way to describe this aspect
of learning as well, so if you are out and about you pick up lots of vocabulary, lots of language,
lots of cues as well and this can also help you in your language journey so there you have it lots of
ways to describe your English. And now I'm really curious, so how would you describe your English? Let
me know down in the comments below. And I'll see you all soon. So there are four topics of connected
speech that we are going to take a look at in today's lesson. And they are weak forms, intrusion
and linking, illusion and assimilation. Now don't worry if you don't understand any of these words
I think as a learner it's important to be aware of them but you don't have to know these exact terms.