Hi everyone! Welcome back to English with Max. This video is all about improving your listening. I'm
going to give you my top six tips to help you improve your English listening skills for free.
These are basic principles which you can actually apply to any language you're learning. Before we
get started I'd like to thank the sponsor of this video which is the video player app Woodpecker
Learning. This app is specifically designed for people who wish to improve their listening and
work on their vocabulary at the same time. When you're watching a video with subtitles,
have you ever wished that you could touch a word in the subtitles to see its meaning? With
the Woodpecker app you can do exactly that. Okay, I'm just going to quickly show you how it works.
First, you need to select the languages that you're learning. I'm going to select English
and I'm going to say that I know French.
Then you need to wait for the dictionaries to download and then you can start watching videos.
Now, here you can see the subtitles
and if you click on a word, the definitions come up and you can scroll down to see more definitions.
If you click the 5, you can go back 5
seconds. And if you click .75 here, you can slow it down.
You can also watch it horizontally and still click on the words.
What I've just shown you are things that you can do for free, but you can upgrade for
extra features. For example, if you have an iPad and a Netflix subscription, you can upgrade the app to
watch anything on Netflix with the same language learning tools. The app was built by language
learners for language learners, so it's a great free resource to improve your English listening
skills and confidence. If you would like to try it out, you'll find the link in the description below.
Okay, let's get started with the listening tips. Tip number one: listen to what you like.
I know some language teachers say that when it comes to listening practice,
variety is the most important thing. But I don't really believe that.
Yes, it is good to have some variety, especially if you want to learn a wide range of vocabulary,
but if, for example, you choose a podcast that doesn't interest you, but you think you
should listen to it, there's a good chance that you won't listen to it. Or you might start listening to
it, and then get bored and start thinking about something else. You'll tune out, in other words.
If you choose something that you like, you're more likely to listen carefully (because you really want
to understand the information) and you're more likely to continue listening or to listen more
often. Maybe because it's something a bit funny, or maybe you like the people's personalities, or
maybe you find the subject interesting. It doesn't really matter, but if you find yourself thinking "Oh
gosh, I should listen to this" or "Gosh, this is boring", then look for something else. Nowadays
there's a lot to choose from on the internet and a large percentage of it is absolutely
free. Don't worry if it's not intellectual or if it doesn't seem like the most useful thing,
Just try to make your listening practice enjoyable so it doesn't feel like a chore.
And please don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that you shouldn't have any variety.
And if your aim is to pass a very hard English exam, then of course you need some variety. What
I'm saying is that it shouldn't be your guiding principle. What usually happens anyway is that you
kind of get tired of listening to the same things over and over, and you'll probably naturally
start looking for different material. Okay, tip number two: listen to different accents. Now I know
I just said "don't worry too much about variety", but I mainly meant that in terms of subject matter.
When it comes to accents, I do think that it's a good idea to listen to a variety of accents.
You don't necessarily need to do it every day or even every week, but, for example, if you're used to
listening to British English and you find American English difficult, then I think it's a good idea to
sometimes listen to American English. And you, of course, also need to take into account
that accents differ within countries. Sometimes you might be in a situation where you need to
"prioritise", so to speak. For example, if you're living in Australia and even after many months, you
find it very difficult to understand Australians, then you should probably do things like:
watch more Australian TV, or listen to more Australian radio, or listen to Australian podcasts,
etc. Because, after all, you need to understand what people are saying to you in real life. That might
sound obvious, but it's not uncommon for people to come to Australia and not consume any Australian
media. Yes, they might interact with Australians sometimes, but in their spare time they'll watch
American TV series and American movies. I'm certainly not offended -
I don't consume a lot of Australian media, and it's for the simple reason that there's
much more American and British stuff available. So yeah, if there's not a lot to choose from in
a specific accent, it might just require a bit more of an effort to find something interesting.
Tip number three: listen to your level. Now, obviously if you have quite an advanced level,
you're probably not going to listen to things that are aimed at beginners.
If it's too easy, you're probably not going to progress very much. But similarly, if you have
a low level, I don't think it's a good idea to always listen to very advanced audio. Yes,
listening to something that's too hard is better than listening to nothing at all, because at least
you're listening to the rhythm and the sounds of English. But it's never a lot of fun if you
don't understand very much. You'll probably get bored (remember what I said earlier, you don't want
to get bored), you might get frustrated, and it won't help you get used to sentence structures because
you're mainly just hearing sounds. So try to find resources that are at your level, or a bit above
your level. I think it's good if you can understand at least 70 to 80 percent. Of course, if you
love movies and you really want to watch lots of movies in English, even if you don't
understand much of the audio, by all means, do that too. But don't only listen to things that are
very difficult for you. This can be a bit difficult if you have a beginner or intermediate
level, because there just isn't as much material to choose from. Once you reach an advanced level,
it becomes a lot easier to find material because you can usually just listen to things that are
aimed at native speakers. So sometimes you need to think outside the box a little.
For example, when I was learning Spanish, I actually watched a lot of makeup tutorials
in Spanish on YouTube. I did that because I thought: Well, the language itself is still very hard for me
and requires a lot of concentration, so I don't want to watch something that also has
difficult subject matter. When I'm more advanced I'll start listening to the political debates.
It meant that I learnt some very useful makeup vocabulary in Spanish like "párpado móvil" and "ahora vamos a disfuminar"...
But those makeup tutorials, at least in the beginning, actually helped me quite a lot. Like
I said, you don't need to listen to intellectual stuff. Tip number four: listen with and without text.
If you're not sure what that means, listening with text is reading subtitles when you watch
a video or reading a transcript when you listen to audio. Listening without text means
listening without reading anything. In language teaching people have different opinions on this.
Some people say that you should listen with text and some people say that you shouldn't. I think
that you should do both, if possible. Both methods have benefits. The main benefits of listening with
text are: it can be easier to learn new vocabulary, and it can be good for your pronunciation because
it's easier to connect sounds to words. The thing is, though, in real life situations you won't have
a text to read. Um... while you're talking, could you just, like, write down everything you're saying?
Ah no. And that is why it is also important to practise listening without text. As I said, I think
the ideal situation is to do both. If you're really trying to improve your English, dedicate some time
a few times a week to listening with text, and some time to listening without text.
Tip number five: study English pronunciation and speech. Obviously it's helpful to know how
individual words are pronounced. You should particularly be aware of minimal pairs like
ship and sheep, and piss and peace, as well as homophones like beach and...
beech.
But it's also important to be aware of how words are pronounced when they are surrounded
by other words. I'm mainly talking about connected speech and reductions.
At the moment I don't have any videos on connected speech, but I do have a couple on reductions and
I'll link those in the description. An example of a reduction is the word "of" becoming "eh" or "ehv".
For example, we don't usually say "a cup of tea". We usually say "a cup eh tea" or "a cup ehv tea".
In summary, having a better understanding of English pronunciation should help you improve your
listening comprehension. And now my final tip. This one is very simple. My final tip is to make the
most of "dead time". That's when, for example, you're waiting for the bus, or sitting on a train, or
waiting in queues. I know a lot of people say that they don't have much time to sit down and study
English, so those moments are great for practising your listening. There are also moments which
aren't exactly dead time, but you might be doing things that don't require a lot of concentration.
Like cleaning, or ironing, or doing the dishes. For some people that might also include driving. I'm
not a great driver, so that doesn't apply to me (I need to concentrate a lot when I drive), but you're
probably a better driver than I am. In any case, those are also great moments to practise your
listening. So that you can take advantage of those moments, I recommend always having a device (like
a smartphone) that has audio on it with you when you go out. I don't know the exact percentages, but
lots of people have smartphones nowadays. It's just that sometimes we forget to look for
and download audio before we leave the house. That is it for today, guys.
I'm curious to know what you do to practise your listening, so please let me know in the comments.
If you liked the video, don't forget to hit the thumbs up. Also remember that if you want to check
out the Woodpecker Learning app, you will find the link in the description. See you next time, guys!