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HOW I IMPROVED MY ENGLISH SKILLS | Learning English To Improve Speaking Skills Through Self-study
Feb 9, 2024
In this video, you will learn the ways on how I improved my English speaking skills without guidance or help from a native English teacher. I spent much time and effort learning English to improve my speaking skills through self-study because I wanted to speak English confidently and fluently with my colleagues.
I did my best and found effective ways on how I could develop my English communication skills. It was never easy because of so many distractions plus there were times that I felt de-motivated, however, because of my determination to improve my English skills, I made it. I was able to enhance my English speaking skills, as a result, I could speak English with confidence.
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0:00
Hello everyone, this is Julius, and welcome to IELTSdragon, where you can learn IELTS
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speaking techniques and sample answers from the perspective of a non-native English speaker
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who successfully got event 9 in just one take. Today, I'd like to share with you all the things that I did on how I improved my English speaking
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skills without any professional help or guidance from a native English teacher
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But first, I would like to share some pieces of background information of myself
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so you can definitely understand my experience of learning English. Okay, so I'm Filipino, I'm from the Philippines, but currently based in Australia
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In my country, English is one of the official languages, and English is a medium of instruction
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That simply means all subjects are taught in English, except for Filipino subject
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So, we Filipinos are really exposed to the English language. However, not all of us can speak good English
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There are those people who aren't confident or comfortable speaking English. And there are those people who can understand English, but having a hard time speaking English
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because basically, they don't speak English with their friends or with their family
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And I was one of those people who couldn't speak English confidently and fluently
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despite learning English from elementary to college. I even took up Communication Arts as my major in college
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because I wanted to develop my communication skills. But unfortunately, I didn't spend a lot of time learning English
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I mean, I didn't spend time learning the technicalities of the English language
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As a result, I couldn't fully develop my English skills, which caused some problems later on
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And today, I'd like to talk about the problems that I had in learning or in speaking English
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What actions did I take to address the problems? And what were the results after applying the solutions
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This video is all about the things that I did on how I improved my English speaking skills
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without professional help from a native English teacher. Let's begin. So, identifying the main problems on why you can't speak English confidently or fluently
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is very important, because that's your starting point on understanding what actions you can take
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to address the problems, so that you can develop your English communication skills
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And that's what I primarily did. The first problem that stopped me from speaking English confidently was because of poor grammar
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I mean, I couldn't speak English with good grammar in the past, unfortunately
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I remember I was so confused when to use don't, doesn't, have, has
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I can still remember vividly how I got used to saying she have, he have, he don't, she don't
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Yeah, I made those basic grammatical mistakes. When I look back, I can't help myself but laugh at myself
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I never thought I could be so dumb. Perhaps I didn't really pay close attention to my teachers
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my English teachers, when they were teaching basic grammar. And I also reckoned that I got used to listening to songs
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in which that kind of structure is really common. Like this. There are a lot of songs that use that kind of structure
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but basically that is intentional for the sake of rhyming, creativity, or sustaining a musical note
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Maybe I just got used to it to the point that I also
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used that kind of structure to my sentences, which is of course not right
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My solution was I studied grammar on my own. I borrowed my sister's grammar books and learned basic to advanced grammar
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I took notes of the important grammar rules, studied examples, and of course made my own examples so I wouldn't forget what I learned
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Of course, it took time. It wasn't magic, but I was so determined to improve my grammar skills
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During days off, I studied for at least one hour, and I did that for three weeks
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And it really helped me. Once I became aware of the important grammar rules from basic to advanced
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that's when I started to gain confidence. I wasn't shy speaking English anymore because
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yeah, I was confident that I could construct better sentences. So once I improved my grammar, I was confident speaking with my colleagues in English
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However, there were times that I couldn't express myself the way I wanted
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I kept on thinking, what's the right word to use when describing this thing or when describing the situation
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What's the right verb to use? Somehow, I kept on repeating using the same words over and over again
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And that was really hard. I wanted to express myself more, but nothing came out of my mouth
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And that's when I realized that my problem was vocabulary. My vocabulary was limited
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And my solution was, I built my own dictionary. I mean, I actually listed the descriptive words, action words
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and some other new words that I learned in my notebook. That was my way to build my vocabulary
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And so I wouldn't forget the new words that I learned. However, as time went by, I realized it wasn't enjoyable anymore
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It wasn't fun. It was boring. Because basically, learning English vocabulary is not interesting
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Well, at least for me. So I needed to find an effective way on how to build my vocabulary better
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And since I love poetry, I exposed myself to reading lots of poems
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Just to learn new words. Because basically, poems have a lot of descriptive words, action words
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and many other words that are worth learning. That was my way of building my vocabulary effectively
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And honestly, I was not only reading poems to learn new words
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but I was also writing my own poems and applied some of the new words that I learned
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so I would not forget them. And here are some of my works
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These are my poems, which I actually created during the times when I was building my vocabulary
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You know what? The good thing about my way of learning vocabulary is that it developed my creative thinking skills
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So I killed two birds with one stone. I built my vocabulary and, of course, developed my creative thinking skills
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I became more imaginative, and that helped me a lot when I took the IELTS speaking exam
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especially when answering IELTS speaking part 2. I became creative in expressing my ideas
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And if you notice, some of the sample answers I created on my website have elements of poetry
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What I'm trying to say here is find an enjoyable way to learn English vocabulary
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If my way of learning vocabulary is through reading poems, maybe yours is through watching movies
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So what you can possibly do is duck down the words that the actors and actresses use which you think are new to you
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And finally, after watching the movie, summarize the movie in your own words
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In that way, you can surely build your vocabulary and develop your English speaking skills
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I know, it's hard work. It sounds so much. But there aren't any shortcuts
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Addressing those two problems practically helped me speak English confidently with my colleagues
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And I was really happy then. Until I had realized that every time I watched movies in English
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I felt like I couldn't completely understand the movie. Like I could only understand 70%
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Later, I found out that that was because of my listening skills
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My listening skills were below average. I couldn't easily catch the words uttered by the actors
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Because at that time, I felt like they were speaking so fast
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Plus, they have accents like American accent or British accent, which I wasn't really familiar with in the first place
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In order for me to improve my listening skills, what I did first was spend time listening to BBC radio
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To be specific, BBC Radio 1 and Radio 2. Because there were a lot of conversations between DJs and DJs and artists
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I was studying the way they speak English. Also, I listened to ABC radio and VOA radio or the Voice of America radio
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instead of listening to the local radio stations in my country. My main purpose then was to train my ear to get used to the different accents
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May it be British, American or Australian. I didn't do anything special
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I was just listening to those stations. I was training my ear to get used to the sounds of the English language
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And I must say, it was really helpful for me. And during my free time at work, I spent time listening to any of those radio stations
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The second thing that I did on how I improved my listening skills was during my days off
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I spent time watching talk shows like Oprah, reality TV shows like Amazing Race or Survivor
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And if I had more time, I actually watched American TV series like CSI and Justice
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I really picked those programs because those were my favorite. I really made sure that I would watch the show from the beginning until the end
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And that was really helpful. It helped develop my listening skills. During those times, podcasts weren't very popular yet
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So these days, podcasts are mainstream. So maybe you can give it a shot
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Listen to podcasts to develop your listening skills. And so I developed my grammar skills, my vocabulary and my listening skills
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The next thing that I did to improve my English speaking skills was I talked to myself
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Yeah, sounds crazy? Kidding aside. Have you ever heard of impromptu speaking
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It's a speech delivered by a person without any preparation. For example, you are given a topic about love
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You talk about love as much as you can. Anything that you know about love
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So that's what I did. I practiced impromptu speaking. I gave myself some topics and just expressed my ideas about any of those topics
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The reason why I did that was I was training myself to express my ideas spontaneously
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and clearly using the English language. And I must say, it was really helpful because I developed my confidence in expressing my ideas in English
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Yeah, give it a shot. Talk to yourself. Well, there are so many ways on how to improve your English speaking skills
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Those were my ways on how I improved my English speaking skills
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And they really worked for me. However, those ways were useless if I didn't spend so much time and effort
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And if I didn't have the determination to improve my English speaking skills
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So determination and setting goals are very important if you really want to improve your English speaking skills
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So good luck. See ya
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