My Top 10 Tips for Better English Speaking

hi welcome to ingvid.com 

i'm adam
today i want to talk to you about speaking 

speaking in english and how you can become better speakers 

these are very general tips but
i'll start by saying that i have been teaching english for almost 20 years 

i have taught in four different countries
i have taught students of dozens of nationalities
so i've seen all kinds of things and
i've i discovered all kinds of reasons why people
don't speak well or don't speak at all okay now 

the number one cause of not speaking is fear
so the one of the things we're going to have to work on first is 

getting rid of your fear of speaking
so i'm going to give you a few general tips on what you can do
to become better english speakers 

and keep in mind this applies to any language you're going to learn

if you're learning how to speak spanish
this will help you become better spanish
speakers if you're learning how to speak russian speakers okay

so that's a few things to keep in mind based on
my interaction with students 

now i've put number one out i left it blank for now
because i just want to give you guys a
chance to think what is tip number one 

if you've watched my  videos before 

you probably already know what i'm going to say but
you know say it for yourself say it out loud 

anyway it's good to say out loud
okay tip number one if you want to become a better
english speaker or a better english writer reader etc
relax learn how to relax
when it comes to using a different language okay
when you are relaxed your brain functions more efficiently 

your ideas come mor easily

everything it works when you're in a 

panic nothing really really registers

because everything your brain is again

it's in self-defense mode

when you're in a panic your brain thinks

there's something wrong

and it's sending all kinds of ideas into

your head to try to fix whatever the percieved problems is

you're putting all your ideas together

your thing comes out more naturally 

next part of being relaxed means to be

confident be confident in yourself now

experienced this with

tons and tons of students 

a lot of people think that somebody who's not speaking well 

might be you know a idiot

that's not the case

a lack of language does not equal a lack of intelligence

and i try to speak chinese to people i'm

going to sound like an idiot

does that mean i'm an idiot no it means

i don't know chinese

i can learn chinese i can practice

chinese and eventually i will be a good chinese speaker

but at the beginning i'm gonna sound like an idiot

okay so that's the one thing 

along with being confident

there's one thing i want everybody to

understand and i know you know this

but i will say it to you anyway 

there's only one person on this planet who is qualified

to judge you of course employers can judge your

qualifications for a job 

a sports coach can judge your qualifications or your skills to be on a sports team etc

only one person in the world can judge you as a person

and that one person is you so it doesn't

matter what other people think about you it doesn't matter what

other people think about the way you're speaking

you know who you are you know what you

are you know where you are

in your learning process so don't worry

about what other people think

now another thing when you go and again

this is a part of people's human nature but if you

go to another country

and you will meet some people some locals 

some of them will be patient some of them will not

some of the will look at you like struggling with the

language and not want to talk to you

some of them will try to help you okay

don't worry about what people think if

somebody is not nice to you

go to the next person and try again but

again the very important know your audience

know who you're talking to now if you're going to

try to basically put together a good

sentence if you're going to try to

improve your english

there are people you're going to try

hard to have a good sentence with and

there are people you just gonna try to get a idea across okay 

let me give you an example

if you're getting on a bus you go to new

york city your english is still a little

bit you know high beginner low intermediate

you're getting on a bus in new york city

don't try to tell the bus driver a perfect sentence 

don't try to make your question perfect

just get the idea across let me give you

an anecdote okay a little story from my experience

i lived in tokyo for uh for a bunch of years

and at the beginning i'm a very

adventurous sorry i'm a very adventurous guy

i like to travel around you know i like

to go get lost in a city and find my way back 

so i will go get lost i get very few words then

in japanese and i got lost in this one little town in

you know like one a little suburb of tokyo

i was get a little bit tired and i wanted to go home

so i didn't know where the train station

was i didn't know which way to go

there's no such thing as north east

southwest it's just everything's a big sprawl so i went

looking for a japanese person

one would not run away from me

because they didn't want to practice their english

i found a japanese person who would stop and listen to me

and i would say sumimasen

that's all i would say excuse me train where

and of course this person would point

out the way or even walk me to the train station

i get on the train i go home i take a nap i'm happy right

but if i were so worried about

getting a full sentence like saying the

full sentence perfectly excuse me can

you tell me how i can get to the train station

i would still be lost in that little suburb today

i went i got my message across i got home

so i'm actually going to jump around with all these tips

build vocab first vocabulary is the most

important thing you can do

in terms of learning english a lot of people worry

so much about the grammar that they

can't put together a sentence and they get panic they get nervous

so let me actually stick on to the vocab a little bit

i wanna give you an analogy

okay like i'm going to compare learning english to doing some else

let's say we wanna build a model house

and you have you know those locks the

popsicle sticks like little sticks

you have some glue and you're gonna glue

all your sticks together and you're

gonna build yourself a house

okay i want you to think of the sticks

the little wooden sticks okay they kind of

you know you have all these sticks you

can the doctor has them and your popsicles haven't

you have all these things the sticks are vocabulary

the glue is grammar now

imagine trying to build a house

and all you have is glue and you're

putting glue everywhere and all you have

is like a sticky fingers of sticky hands and

a big mess if all you have is vocabulary and no grammar

you can build you can still build

somewhat something that looks like a house

grammar gets you nothing vocabulary gets you something 

of course you want to have

both together at the end so you can have

good english so

don't worry about just having vocabulary

throw out your few words use your hands

use your face

use things around you get your message across

but be confident and know who you're

talking to if the person

if the person

doesn't seem to be patient okay thank you very much

go to somebody else go to somebody

sitting in a park enjoying the sunshine

hi would you like to talk yeah sure

let's have a conversation

bus driver in new york don't think about it

don't assume anything now what does it

to assume means to think something is true without having the fact

so don't assume that everybody's nice

some people are not nice and that's okay

walk away from the not nice people find

yourself a nice person

don't assume that everybody is going to try to help you

don't assume that everybody is judging

you don't assume all kinds of things

don't make assumptions about people

the only thing you need to understand is

that you know who you are

you know what you need keep going until

you find somebody who will help you okay

now the worst thing you can do and i

don't do this i'm just saying to you now

don't go up to a stranger

and say can i practice speaking my english with you

that's not going to work that person

gets nothing out

of the deal if you go to somebody hi i'm from uh

wherever country i'm from uh you know

can you tell me where something is it doesn't

matter what you say

start a conversation if that person is interested

he or she will continue the conversation

but if you go to somebody can i practice

my english with you

well no i gotta go bye okay don't do that

it doesn't work 

again don't try to be perfect

if you were perfect you wouldn't be an

english learner you would be an english

remember you're an english learner

you're building up to a certain level now

another thing to keep in mind do you

think that my english that when i speak english

with people i speak perfect english i don't

nobody does 

there is no such thing as perfection

i make mistakes other native speakers

make mistakes right

perfect is just not necessary

so when you're trying to create a perfect sentence

all you're doing is thinking too much

and not speaking enough

just speak just get whatever ideas the

most important thing is to be

understood not to be perfect which means that

mistakes are good things

if you're not trying to be perfect

you're going to make mistakes mistakes

will teach you more english than perfection 

if you're perfect you have nothing to learn

if you make mistakes you have something

not to repeat it

perfect perfection doesn't exist doesn't help you

mistakes they're good for you that's how you grow 

and of course the most inportant thing

practice now how do you practice

speaking when there's no when there are

no native speakers around you

first of all find a recording or find a

tv show or a movie or

something like ted.com etc where you can listen to

talks given by native speakers find

transcripts 

see not perfect nobody's perfect

find transcripts for these talks and

then just follow them

and then record yourself speaking then

compare your speech

to the one you heard see where the

intonation is where the pace

changes pronunciation all kinds of things

record yourself again and again and

again until you get as close as possible

to the native speaker's speech also

record yourself and

find out your grammar mistakes if you find

an interview like a news interview or

online interview or tv interview

try to take one side of that interview

so you are the interviewer ask the

person the questions

and sort of pretend you're having a

conversation with this person

then switch 

you that's the interviewer

you are the interviewee

answer the questions and then answer

with your own answers if possible

play speak speak to the mirror stand in front

of the mirror and have a conversation

with yourself

you know it's not very comfortable and

it's not very interesting but it's practice

and as much as possible engage

other people find native speakers speak to them

find non-native speakers speak to them create a group

of your classmates or your friends or your local

people and just putting on speak

now the thing i find very common in language schools

you'll have all the uh brazilian

students and you have all the korean

students and you'll have all the

whatever students and they're all

staying in their little groups and

speaking their languages

that doesn't help 

do not speak your language

when you don't have to when you go home

speak it all you want in school

outside speak the other language

and tying all of this together

be adventurous 

life is an adventure

if you're trying to make everything

perfect all the time

there's no fun once in a while you have

to fall flat on your face

right so that way you can pick yourself

just pick yourself up

dust yourself off 

grow become somebody

new become something new

go to different places if you're going to be afraid

of speaking in english you should

probably just stay home right

you don't want to stay home there's a

reason you're learning english

you want to watch movies and understand

them you want to meet new people you

want to go new places you want to get an education

a job whatever you're going to have to speak

be adventurous be confident

relax okay those are my you know

two cents worth of uh tips on how to

speak better i hope

they helped you a little bit if you do have any questions

please go to inkvid.com and in the forum

this or anything about english speaking

there's also sort of a quiz it's not

really a quiz it's more of like a review understand

the points i've made here i hope you liked this video

youtube channel and

come back for more tips on how to speak

better listen better

be better with english in english with

for english okay see you soon bye