How to Learn ANY Language
If you’re trying to learn a foreign language (and if you're reading this, my guess is that you're trying to learn at least one) 😉 this is a conversation that you NEED to listen to. My guest this week has reached a high level of fluency in multiple languages. He knows what it’s like to go from being a complete beginner to being able to speak a foreign language fluently. He’s also an English teacher and an expert when it comes to explaining difficult grammatical concepts. His name is Terry, and he's part of the team at EnglishTVLive.
UPDATE: Terry left the EnglishTVLive team for personal reasons. We wish him all the best and thank him for his contribution to EnglishTVLive!
In this episode, Terry and I discuss:
- Terry's journey as a linguist and where his passion for learning foreign languages came from.
- Some of the things you should do when you're a COMPLETE beginner. When you make the decision to learn a foreign language, it can be intimidating to think of how much you need to learn. Terry offers some tips both in terms of the mindset you should have and the kinds of things you should be studying as a complete beginner.
- How you should conceptualize the time you spend studying a foreign language. You'll hear Terry discuss why he hates the word "studying" and why he prefers the word "training" instead.
- What you should do once you reach an intermediate/advanced level in a foreign language.
My challenge question for you:
Terry offers A LOT of tips in this episode, and I'm curious to know what you think about his approach to learning languages. Are you already doing some of the things he suggests? If not, are you curious to try some of things he talks about? Do you have any tips that have worked for you that Terry and I didn't mention? Let me know in the comments 🙂
Make sure to follow Terry online!
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLQBVPqwqsIdLJbrdECA3Hw/videos
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/englishwithterry/
Listening Strategies (FREE COURSE): https://englishwithterry.teachable.com/p/english-listening-strategies
I love this episode too^^. Regarding your questions: 1) I think Terry has trained himself every single to approach new languages. 2) Yes, I have taken some tips as Terry advise, for example, listen to podcast or something I love. Honestly, I have never tried to do everything in my life in the language that I want to improve. I think I have to try this tip as well. I like Terry’s thoughts about learning new language, he seems avoid to use “learning” but use “training” instead that I like. I also agree we do not need to be a perfectionist about grammar if we can communicate and everyone can understand what we want to say. 3) talk about tips from my side, I like to write new words/idioms down on my book and try to make sentence. Normally, I try to write on online teacher comment and they will give me feedback and correct it that I love to hear from them too. I like to speak with both native and non native speakers 3 to 4 times a week because I want to understand different accent that is benefitial for me and my career. As Terry said, we must forget perfect grammar and don’t beat ourselves too much. Thanks so much for this podcast ^ ^
This is such a great comment, Nim 🙂 Thank you for sharing your own tips, and I’m glad you enjoyed the podcast. I think it’s great that you meet so frequently with others to practice your speaking skills! Nice work!
thank you very much
You’re welcome!
Thank you so much ,really its helpful.
Glad you like it!
Thank you for explaining of the useful consepts.
It is a key to knowledge!
You’re very welcome 🙂
Terry’s tips are very useful)and his approach to learning languages is very practical. I use some of them in learning English), I listen to Ted talks almost every day. And as I’m interested in psychology very much, I read a lot of articles, listen to audiobooks on this topic)
Nicely done, Irina! 🙂 I think that’s great. I’m a big fan of Ted Talks too.
Jacob , the podcast episode was very useful. I like your music and your beginning way as well. Terry is linguist I want to congratulate him for this well done work!
The most effective way to learn the language is to be in the country in which this language is spoken. Only then you will have big progress because every day you learn new things without any struggles. I learn Turkish in this way durnig my university years and after three months I began to speak and understand everything. But when you don’t have opportunity to be in a country among native speakers the best way to learn English is Englishtvlive private community 😙. Thanks to all teachers in the community for this that you make our brains to be more active and truly said after I joined to the group I began to think in English. And now I speak alone in English it is very useful as Terry suggested. Besides repetition and practice I can suggest when we learn vocabulary we can do assossiation with something other word and in this way we can remember it easily. We need of long time to speak grammatically corectly and fluently so I can say to me and all others who want to speak English: encourage yourselves, keep going and do your best! And after a while our English will be better😊👌
Thank you so much for the comment, Fiki! It was really great to read 🙂 Very happy that you’re enjoying your experience at EnglishTVLive! You rock!
After 07.55 I heard: “their faces light up”? 11.11 and repeating “along”? speaking along or alone? after 16.15 I heard “blend”. Blend means a mix? My voice is “dryly” ? (Can you please clarify (or confirm) these “hearings”?
Thank you for many useful tips, like short clips, looking for material that interests you and repeat it again and again and again…until you can say: -“Now I know this!” Also, I agree that you should have a feeling of ease, not like hard work
I try to use “lost time” for example when I’m driving.
See you guys!
1. If someone’s face lights up, it usually means a big smile suddenly appears on their face in response to something.
2. I think you heard “speaking alone”? We spoke about that quite a bit.
3. Blend means a mix, yes!
4. I think I said, my voice is a little “dry”.
Hope this helps! Thanks for the comment Jorgen 🙂 And I think it’s great that you use the time you spend driving to study. Nice work 🙂
“” Wow!” This Podcast is just amazing. Thank you so much Jacob for picking Terry´s brain and for recording such a great episode. I truly believe that this Podcast is a masterpiece. You both are so professional, and I think this is one of those episodes in which every single non-native English speaker should listen to, because it mentions everything what we need to do every day in order to be successful in mastering the English language. By the way, when I was listening to this Podcast, I tried to do “a real deep dive into it” because there is an excellent content that must be analysed in great detail, of course, I have to mention that I was surprised a lot when I knew that Terry speaks more than 4 languages fluently, and there are other four “hobby languages” that he speaks, that´s awesome! Congratulations Terry, I know for sure that as you already said it does take a lot of time, and you´ve trained a lot. It´s a great story of success, and who knows, if you hadn´t been a teacher, you probably would have been a rock star now. Ha-ha! Well, I´m going try to answer the following questions.
1. Are you already doing some of the things he suggests?
Some of the things that I´ve been doing for a while are; I sometimes try to speak alone when I´m walking on the street, or when I´m going back home from work, or when I´m doing my housework, specially at the weekend, and I think this is a very important activity that everybody should do it, because it helps a lot in order to be able to speak better, due to, this is a skill that needs be practiced and trained constantly. Another thing that I´m totally agree with you is the fact that you must listen to an English podcast, or something you just love, something that you are really interested in, and then it becomes part of your daily routines and part of your life, so that you can feel that your learning process is a lot easier. I have tried to do this for a long time, and I think it has worked out very well for me, and contrary to other people´s arguments which say that your learning process must be hard and painful, personally speaking I don´t agree with that vision, and I hate the word “study” too. I am inclined to believe that one of the most important things that you mentioned in this episode is the fact that is extremely important to believe in the power of visualizing yourself achieving your goals. I try to do that every single day, I enjoy that image. I always see myself having good conversations in English, thank you so much for explaining that part, without doubt that was one of my favourite ones. Finding out the balance between patient and impatient I think this is the real challenge for non-natives English speaker, because we are used to getting results immediately and when you see that learning a new language, it does take a lot of time, it can be frustrating. But, as you explained it´s normal, it´s does take time, it´s a process and in fact it´s a healthy thing. I liked that phrase.
I love this excerpt Jacob and Terry something you were explaining in this Podcast “There is nothing really wrong if just speaking to another student, and they are just practicing together, because a lot of people suffer with this perfectionist, so, we want to be perfect all the time, so, we don´t want to say any sentence wrong, but they (students) must forget perfect grammar, it almost doesn´t exist, it would take it between 15 and 20 years to accomplish something like that, so, communication is really the objective” Wow! This conversation was simply amazing! Thank you, teachers.
2. If not, are you curious to try some of things he talks about?
Something that I think I will try to do more often will be going back to review fundamental rules, because sometimes I think that I have learned most of them, but I have seen over the last few months that I have forgotten some of them, that´s probably the next big thing I will have to do.
3. Do you have any tips that have worked for you that Terry and I didn’t mention?
If I have to mention one technique that I think it´s great, and this is something I have learned recently, it´s something called “Mnemonics” is a memory aid, such as an abbreviation, rhyme or mental image that helps to remember something quickly through images. I have read that apparently you can improve your memory up to 80% when you use this technique. So, I think this is definitely something that we need to learn more about and how to develop that technique successfully.
In my view, your questions Jacob are specific, and they do have the perfect timing, Thank you so much again. By the way, I think this Podcast was recorded before Terry´s travelled to Porto. Ha-ha!
Thank you for the wonderful comment, Tony 🙂 Really happy that you enjoyed this episode so much. I think it’s great that you visualize yourself communicating fluently in English every day. I’ve known you for a little while now, and it seems like you practice quite a few of the things that Terry speaks about in the podcast, which is great 🙂 Keep up the awesome work, Tony!
Thanks Terry and Jacob for this helpful interview!
But I’d like to ask a question you hadn’t answered in this talk,
The question is : how it is important to practice our writing skills from the beginning,
Is it okay to practice our listening skills and talking skills first,
And when we begin to understand how the language works then ,at this point, we begin to practice our writing skills.
I don’t think you need to wait to develop certain skills. I’m just thinking about the time I spent studying Korean. Everything kind of happened together (listening, writing, speaking, and reading). Maybe people would disagree with me, but I can’t see any benefit in waiting to practice one skill until other skills are more developed. Thanks for the comment 🙂
Thanks alot Jacob n Terry…
This podcast is amazing.really amazing but I am Egyptian n my native language is Arabic so I cannot understand English
very well..
I hope, I will be good in English as native speaker…
Thanks Jacob for helping me..
You’re very welcome! Happy to hear you enjoyed it Soha 🙂
I am one of those people who hates the word of studying so much, and gets me feeling sick, and remind me of examination, I even hate to mention it 😣 that is one of reasons helped me made up my mind to join your community 😄.no test.
Training is the key for any thing we are fond it.
Thank you for you information’s Terry and Jacob
You’re very welcome!! And thank you for the kind words Aurora 🙂 Glad you’re enjoying being a member of EnglishTVLive!