Tips for Students - Practice!

Me:  Did you practice speaking English with anyone since your last lesson?

Student:  Yes.

 Me:  Great!  Who did you practice with?

Student:  My dog.

Ideally, I would like students to practice English with someone who can provide more meaningful feedback than a dog.  However, the most important thing is to practice any way you can.  As an English language student, the biggest factor in determining your success is not the teacher you select, your intelligence, or your natural ability to learn languages.  The primary factor in successfully learning a language is practice.

My eight year old son studies piano and violin.  He practices both instruments every single day.  This by no means will ensure that he will reach high levels of success in either instrument, but by practicing every day we know that he will continue to improve.

I studied Spanish from the 7th grade through the 12th grade.  I enjoyed learning the language and I was a good language student.  However, my fluency really became much better when I worked in a restaurant with number of coworkers from Mexico.  For 5 or 6 days a week, and for 8 to 10 hours each day; I was able to practice conversational Spanish.  In fact, it was easier for me to speak Spanish to my Mexican coworkers than it was for them to speak English to me.  Unfortunately, when I went to college I stopped studying and speaking Spanish regularly.  Today, my Spanish skills are very poor.  While it would be much easier for me to pick up Spanish than it would be for a complete beginner, I would truly have to re-learn the language.  The vast majority of the skill level that I developed over those many years has been forgotten.

If you are serious about achieving a high level of English, you must practice as much as possible.  Even a short practice session for just 30 minutes a day will help prevent you from forgetting the skills you improved in class.  Most of my students study for one of two days a week.  If you neglect to practice during the other five days in the week, the rate of improvement will be much slower.

All of my students are either serious school students or adult professionals with jobs and families.  Setting time aside to practice English when there is so much else going on in life can be difficult.  However, practice does not have to be tedious or boring.  In fact, I recommend the opposite.  I think practicing English should be fun and entertaining.

There are many fun ways to practice English between lessons.  Again, you don't have to dedicate huge amounts of time for these activities, but English practice can be in the form of emailing or Facebook chatting with a friend in English instead of Thai.  You may choose to watch TV shows or movies in English.  YouTube videos in English that are about topics that interest you or excite you are great.  You may consider reading English websites about subjects of interest, or you can learn about a subject you are studying in school in English on the internet.  If you have a friend or family member that can knows some English, you can try and practice English conversation with them each day.  If you are a music lover, you could listen to English pop songs and try and write down the lyrics.  This is very difficult, but it could be rewarding because you will be able to sing along in English the next time you hear it.

This type of fun activity will also help you with many of the standard English exams such as TOEIC, TOEFL, and IELTS.  All of these exams have a listening portion, and almost all of the activities that I have listed above include listening to English.  Many of my students who are preparing for one of these tests are most concerned with the listening and/or speaking portion of the test.  Thai students tend to be well trained in English grammar and vocabulary.  Many Thai students lack confidence when it comes to actually speaking and understanding spoken English.  These fun English language activities are a great way to gain confidence and improve on these listening and speaking skills.