How to Learn English - Listening

Listen to me read this post


Hello and welcome.  Today we are continuing on the topic of How to Learn English.

Yesterday we talked about listening to music but listening to spoken English in general is a really good way to learn English.

This is something I truly believe. The more you listen, the more you will improve your English.  Listening to native speakers will improve your comprehension, your speaking, your pronunciation, everything. And all you have to do is sit back and listen.  That is why I started this blog and why I record all of the posts.  So, you can listen to an American speak English. 

It doesn't even matter what you listen to as long as it's in English.  You can listen to TV shows, Movies, Cartoons, podcasts, audiobooks, etc.

Here are some tips for picking materials:
1.  Choose a topic you are interested in.  If you like Gardening, then listen to a gardening podcast such as the one in the show notes from the Victory Garden.  If you like history, go to history.com and watch all the videos.  And If you don't like cars, then don't watch the BBC show, Top Gear.  Although I have to tell you it is hiliarious.  The point is if you are interested in the topic you will watch it or listen to it over and over again and you will keep listening longer.  Because if you are having fun you will be motivated to keep learning. 

2.  Try to find materials that are just above your comprehension level.  In other words, try to listen to something you understand about 80% of.  If it's too hard you will give up or tune out, if it's too easy you won't get anything out of it and you will get bored.  Even if that means watching Children's shows or cartoons, that's ok. 

3.  Find something you are already familiar with the story.  If there are TV shows that have been translated into English from you native language, these would be excellent to listen to because you already know the story.  Then you will know what's going on and you can get more meaning out of the English.
 
One last thing, the other day I was reading  the website AntiMoon, you can find the link in the show notes. They had a post on how to find everyday English to listen to if you don't live in an English-speaking country.  They mentioned in the article that sometimes movies and fiction books can't help you learn eveyday English.  The types of phrases that you need for basic commnunication because a story needs conflict and drama to be interesting,  not to mention unusual characters or settings.  For example, vampires and werewolves in the Twilight series.  So, One of their suggestions was to listen to podcasts because it's a great way to hear how people talk to each other naturally. And I have to tell you that podcasts are my new favorite thing.  There are podcasts on just about any topic you can think of.  I mean there are literally thousands of different podcasts. So try a few until you find ones you like.  You can download them onto an mp3 player and listen to them anywhere.  So, now you have no excuse for not listening to more English!

That's all for today.  Thanks for listening to me, Cassie Brenn at fastfoodenglish.blogspot.com 
          
Show noteswww.history.com
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/victorygarden/ask/index.html
www.podcastalley.com
www.podcastpickle.com
http://www.antimoon.com/blog/2012/03/learning-everyday-english-without-living-in-an-english-speaking-country/