LEARNING TIPS: ENGLISH PART OF DAILY ROUTINE

Hello everyone. I hope you had a good weekend.

On Friday we came to the conclusion that if you want to advance quickly, you have to make English a part of your daily routine, just like brushing your teeth.

Almost every day I hear potential Ziggurat clients say things like "call me in a month, I'll have more time then" or "I really want to learn English, but I don't have time." The reality is that in today's world we will never have the quantity of time that we would like to have for things like English; so why wait?

The "secret" is to immediately organise English into your daily routine. To guarantee success, English must become a priority in your life, just like keeping your teeth clean and healthy. And priority doesn't necessarily mean lots of time.

There are hundreds of very effective activities that you can do in 5 minutes or less, which will help you to improve your English and maintain what you have already learned, even on days when you have no time. Here are a few simple examples:

Read aloud to improve pronunciation
Read aloud ('en voz alta') for 3 to 5 minutes a day and you will notice an incredible improvement in your pronunciation and your general abilty to speak English. The objective is not to understand what you are reading, but to pronounce as correctly as possible! Even if your pronunciation isn't perfect, you will be exercising the muscles in your mouth that are necessary to pronounce English correctly. Speaking a language is a very physical activity, and you have to "exercise" if you want to improve.

Listen to English to improve comprehension
Improving your comprehension ability will give you confidence and the ability to learn more (since you will understand what other English speakers are saying). In general, listening is the activity that English students practice the least. In my opinion, it's the most important skill to develop. You can listen to songs, old CDs from English textbooks that you have, the radio (by way of Internet), podcasts, etc. Get your ears accustomed to hearing English!

Watch films to improve comprehension and conversational skills
Many believe that the general English level in Spain is low because it historically wasn't popular to watch original-version movies on television. The general English level in Portugal, for example, is much better than the level in Spain, and it may be because the Portuguese are more accustomed to watching original-version films (with subtitles). You don't have to watch complete films; you can watch 5 minutes, or 1 or 2 minute segments various times until you reach 100 percent understanding.

Tomorrow is a bank holiday in Spain, so there will be no Daily Vitamin. We'll be back on Wednesday with a lesson about learning vocabulary. 

Have a good day!