Hey, I have some exciting news! Oh yeah? I have decided to quit my job and travel all
over the world. yeah? yeah! Oh, yeah! Are you interested at all in what I'm saying?
If you want to sound more interested in conversations in English, you have to watch this video and
learn my top 3 ideas to help you sound more interested in conversations in English. Hey,
guys! teacher Prix here to help you talk to anyone anywhere anytime.
Please consider subscribing if you haven't already. I post weekly videos about several kinds of subjects, English grammar,
common mistakes, listening tips, speaking tips, all kinds of stuff. But here we go!
I'm pretty sure that you know how to show people in your own language that you are interested
in what they have to say, but sometimes because we are learning a second language, it gets
a little bit hard for us to do that, so that's what I wanna show you today: my top 3 ideas
to help you sound more interested in a conversation in English. Now, it is important that you
understand that to show interest in English you don't necessarily have to just say words.
Many people come to me and say: Priscila, what expressions can I use, what expressions
can I say and it is not just that, it is not just expressions, there are even sounds that
you can make that will show interest in a conversation. Now, one thing we need to be
extra careful about is how much emphasis we give to these sounds when we make them and
even the expressions which I'm going to show you. It is very important that we balance our emphasis
so that we don't sound too superficial or not interested at all, ok? It is all about
the intonation, rising intonation, falling intonation when you are having a conversation
in English, if I just go "plain" and not make any different sound, people are not really
gonna feel that I'm interested. That's why I have to go up and down, sometimes, in my
sentences, with my words, so that people feel connected, so that people feel that I'm there,
really wanting to talk to them. Idea number 1: question tags. What is a question tag?
For example I’m going to Thailand next year! Are you? This is a question tag. Basically,
what is a question tag? It is a short question at the end of the sentence to confirm what the
person said, ok? You can say the entire sentence and then use a tag question at the end, or
you can listen to someone and then use the question tag to show interest, to show encouragement
that you are participating in the conversation and that you are paying attention to what
the person said. I will use the auxiliary verb of the time of the sentence, and then
you will use the pronoun of the sentence, Jack -
he, my mother - she, the children – they
So if I said something to you in the present you will confirm, you will show encouragement,
you will show agreement in the present as well. Now, usually, the biggest rule explains
that if I say something in affirmative, my tag is in the negative. If I say something
in the negative form, my tag is in the affirmative form. However, here I'm using the question
tag to show interest, so you will agree with the sentence because here the purpose is different;
you just wanna show that you are surprised, that you are interested in what the person
is saying, ok? I will explain more about question tags, if you have not learned this yet, this
part of the video may sound a bit confusing to you, so I'd suggest reading a little bit
about questions or tag questions and then get back to the video, but I will also make
a video just to talk about questions in the future. Idea number 2:
words and expressions. Yes! There are expressions, there are words you can say that in the middle of a conversation
will be perfect to show that you are interested or not in a conversation, remember, the intonation
is important. If you just say really? yeah, right! Uhum, that doesn't show a lot of interest
or excitement, so it is important that you use the right intonation to show interest,
ok? So the most common words you can say are "really" "wow", "no way". No way is a good
thing you can say if you use the right intonation, so if someone asks you: hey can you help me?
No way! It is a bad response, but if I say: Hey, I got a new job! NO, way! That's a happier
intonation, a little bit exaggerated here, but it just proves that the intonation is
key. Oh, that's interesting, how awful! Now, how awful, awful means bad, terrible, something
really bad. So you are not going to use this for good news, ok? so, be careful with how
much intonation you put in it, when you are saying the sentences, this expression. Oh,
my boss just fired me. Hey, how awful! That sucks bro! So, be careful, ok, with the "how
awful". If someone tells you good news and you say how awful, that's awful! ok? So you
are gonna use this for negative, for sad conversations, sad subjects, because it is something bad.
Oh, there was an accident near my house and it was terrible. Oh, how awful. how sad! ok?
Oh no! Oh no, so simple and so flexible, you can use oh no for so many things and you are
going to show interest as well. If someone says and then I lost, to make my day worse
I lost my wallet. Oh no! Man! But it is usually for negative sad situations, not sad but annoying,
sometimes stressful not necessarily just sad, but for the happy ones, I would find it a
little bit difficult to use. Oh no! Just doesn't make sense! You' re joking! You're joking
can be used for good situations or in moments of stress. You're not going to the party.
You're joking right! I won the lottery! Oh, you're joking! ok? So, they are both used
to show surprise or to show a little bit of anger, you don't believe someone said something
to you, but it shows interest in the conversation, the person will definitely know that you are
paying attention. That's great! No kidding! So, these are some expressions guys, I could
go on and on and on and give you several more other expressions, but take notes on these
ones and try to use them in conversations. Even the word "right" with the correct
intonation is already a good word to show interest in the conversation, to show interest
in what the person is saying, ok? Number 3 sounds and noises. I'm actually very good
at this one, I'm so good that I become bad at this because I used to exaggerate at this a lot.
I made too much, too many sounds and noises probably because of my native language, I'm
from Brazil! I'm happy, so it is not cool, ok? So when I went to Boston and started to
take classes there, my teacher just looked at me and said: No, girl, just no! Just, less,
Less is more, come on, you can do this! well, not as nicely as I'm saying right now, but
he made several observations and he was right. With the sounds, you have to be very careful
so that you don't exaggerate and sound stupid and silly or worst of all, too fake. You can
sound fake if you exaggerate the sound, so instead of sounding interested, you will sound
completely the opposite, so that's important. So, the most common sounds are like: hmm,
aham, oh, yeah. You may have this sound in your native language, I don't know what language
you speak, I don't know where you are from, but in several languages that I’ve heard
I noticed that there is some kind of sound code, we see that people use some kind of
sound to show interest. So these are the common ones in English, however as I said, be careful,
you don't wanna sound fake, Yeah this is totally fake and they don't do it. All in all, guys
these are my top 3 ideas, the question tags, the expressions, words, sometimes individual
words will help you sound more interested and the third one the sounds, sounds we make
to show interest, but all of these things will mean nothing if you don't have a good
intonation, knowing when to rise, knowing when to fall, this is key, guys. Do you have
any questions for me? If so, let me know in the comments. I would love to hear your comments
and see your suggestions, ok. From these top 3 ideas, which one do you think is the most
challenging for you? Let me know in the comments. I hope you liked this video, don't forget
to subscribe and like this video. Thanks guys and I'll see you next time. Bye!