Eleutério Gouveia Sousa
Hi. How are you today? We hope you are doing well!
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We have another interesting question from a Learn Real English learner today.
Here's his question:
"It's great to receive all the emails from you.. And yes, I agree that we need to listen, listen and listen in order to improve our English speaking skills. And it's true that we cannot just listen but must really listen carefully to the listening materials and make sure we understand.My situation is I have been listening to English movies, songs, and dramas most of my life but unfortunately I still have speaking problems... I am not confident enough to say my opinions. When I am speaking English words, I feel like I have a burden inside of me. I'm stressed because I want to speak without making too many grammatical errors. So, the sentences come unnaturally."--Weimar
Answer:
It sounds like you are generally doing the right thing. You say you have been listening to English movies, dramas, etc. most of your life, yet you still have a lot of problems when speaking. We understand your frustration.
While you are correct to focus on listening, you have been making a big mistake-- which is probably the cause of your speaking problems. Your mistake is that you have not been listening to EASY English.
Movies and dramas and songs are very very difficult. The speaking is very fast. They are full of slang and strange phrases. Movies and dramas contain extremely ADVANCED English speaking.
Here's the problem: When you listen to English that is too difficult, your brain simply cannot learn. Instead, you become frustrated, confused and stressed. If you continue to do this, you will eventually teach yourself to be frustrated, confused and stressed EVERY TIME you listen to or speak English! You don't want that!
Our general rule is that you should understand 90-98% of the English you are listening to. It should feel very easy. When you understand 90% or more, it's easy for you to guess the meaning of the other 10%. This will happen automatically, without effort. In this way, you will improve quickly and effortlessly.
So the answer to your problem is simple-- stop listening to such difficult material, and instead listen to very easy English. Listen to easy podcasts. Listen to easy audio books.
And when you want to listen to more advanced Real English,.. be sure that you have lessons that make the material very easy for you to understand.
In this way, you'll learn very quickly... without stress.
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