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In this episode of The A to Z English Podcast, Jack explains why it’s not really possible to learn English alone. Interacting with other English speakers should be your goal and is a necessary part of the process of learning English.
Transcript:
00:00:01
Jack
Welcome to the agency English podcast. My name is Jack, and today I have another solo episode, and today’s episode is a topic talk episode.
00:00:12
Jack
The question we’re trying to answer today is.
00:00:16
Jack
How can I learn English alone?
00:00:20
Jack
How can I learn English alone?
00:00:25
Jack
And my answer to that.
00:00:28
Jack
I’m going. I’m going to answer that with a an English expression or an English saying. It’s very. It’s a very old expression.
00:00:38
Jack
And it goes like this. We say no man is an island, OK? No man is an island.
00:00:49
Jack
And I think what that means is that we are all connected or.
00:00:57
Jack
No one person can completely disconnect from.
00:01:03
Jack
Other everyone else, you’re always connected to some person through your work, through your family, through your friendships, whatever it may be, we’re we’re all connected.
00:01:19
Jack
We can’t. We cannot help it.
00:01:23
Jack
It’s just one of and I think that’s why you know, we use those expressions on social media, you know, making connections on Facebook.
00:01:33
Jack
How many can you know how many friends do you have? Oh, I connected with this person on Facebook and then and then that person connects to another person who connects to another person that connects to maybe somebody else that you know and.
00:01:47
Jack
And it’s all about connections, right? So when students ask me, you know, Jack, how can I learn English alone?
00:01:59
Jack
My answer is you can’t.
00:02:02
Jack
UM, you can’t learn English alone.
00:02:08
Jack
Any better than you could learn how to be a friend.
00:02:14
Jack
Without talking to any people you know, like reading a book called how to be a friend.
00:02:21
Jack
Chapter one.
00:02:23
Jack
Be kind.
00:02:26
Jack
Chapter 2. Listen to your friend.
00:02:29
Jack
You know chapter 3. I mean, it’s ridiculous, right? Trying to, you know, learn to learn how to be a friend. I I think learn to how to learn, you know, learning English alone is almost as ridiculous as.
00:02:50
Jack
Learning how to be a friend alone. I mean you learn how to be a good friend by.
00:02:57
Jack
By befriending people and having relationships and experiencing those things.
00:03:06
Jack
And the exact same thing.
00:03:08
Jack
Can be said about English. It’s about.
00:03:13
Jack
Interacting and using the language with other people.
00:03:17
Jack
Creatively trying to communicate, trying to be understood. Now, obviously there are times where you could.
00:03:27
Jack
Study certain things by yourself, like you could learn some new vocabulary, or you could do some reading by yourself. You could listen to a podcast by yourself. You could do some grammar exercises, but if you don’t, if if you don’t take all of that, work those.
00:03:47
Jack
That homework type stuff, you know, grammar exercises, listening to the podcast, and you don’t apply that to some kind of actual real life speaking situation where you’re talking with other people. It doesn’t have to be native speakers, it could be other language learners if you don’t.
00:04:07
Jack
Take that next step and actually use the language creatively. Then all the other stuff is pointless. There’s.
00:04:16
Jack
No, there’s no point in.
00:04:19
Jack
Practicing grammar if you’re not going to go out and use the language and that’s, you know, the hardest part, and we’re making that easier here at the edges. The English podcast, because we are associated very closely with something called World English.
00:04:40
Jack
And world English is a a community that I that I started with a YouTuber, Robin Shaw.
00:04:51
Jack
And we started this, this community, so that students can join the WhatsApp group. They can come in there and they can talk to each other. Now, talking to each other doesn’t necessarily mean you’re you’re talking using your voice. You could be typing and communicating that way.
00:05:09
Jack
Through text messages or voice notes. But we also have Google meets classes and you’re allowed to go to the Google meets class classes for several weeks for.
00:05:21
Jack
Free and we have Google meets classes almost every day, so at 1:00 PM GMT.
00:05:32
Jack
That’s Greenwich mean time.
00:05:35
Jack
UM, we have a free class. Uh, Sunday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday every day, every week. The only days we don’t do our Fridays.
00:05:49
Jack
And then we also have Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. We have another class that is that that takes place at. That would be 1:00 AM.
00:06:05
Jack
Greenwich mean time.
00:06:07
Jack
OK. And so we’ve got these two you know, so that’s 44 classes that you can attend and what we do in these classes is students get together in Google meets on Google meets. So you have to have a Google account, you have and you need a smartphone.
00:06:28
Jack
And then in the Google meets you get together and you join other other members of our of our community in breakout rooms and you discuss a topic.
00:06:40
Jack
And sometimes the native English speakers are in there. Sometimes I’m in there.
00:06:46
Jack
Sometimes our teachers are in there and you’re, you know, talking and having a conversation. And and this is the final piece of the puzzle that’s the most important part that so many people.
00:07:00
Jack
Ship. They OK? I’m gonna study for my IELTS test. I’m gonna study for my Duolingo Duolingo test and I’m just gonna memorize this grammar. I’m going to memorize this vocabulary. I’m going to but. But when it comes to speaking, I’m just going to say, oh, it’s too hard. I.
00:07:19
Jack
So how can I?
00:07:20
Jack
Find anyone to talk to. So I’m just not going to do that part. Well, that’s the whole point of the of all of the work that you’re doing is to speak with other people. That’s it.
00:07:31
Jack
Like I said, no man is an island. You cannot be a language learner.
00:07:38
Jack
And be an island, you need to be connected to other people. You need to use the language creatively in a social setting. That’s it. It has to be that way. And if you’re not doing that, then you’re not really learning English.
00:07:56
Jack
You might be studying some of the rules you might be picking things up, but you’re never going to actually be able to communicate and function as a bilingual speaker until you actually put yourself in social situations where you’re using.
00:08:17
Jack
English as the target language to communicate ideas.
00:08:23
Jack
And listen to other people’s ideas and share opinions and go back and forth and do that. You know that tennis match, which is a conversation.
00:08:33
Jack
That’s it. That’s what. That’s the ultimate.
00:08:37
Jack
You know that’s the ultimate goal, or that’s what your ultimate goal should be, not some score on an exam. Not getting some kind of grammar questions correct.
00:08:52
Jack
It’s a totally different ball game when you’re actually using the language to communicate with other people. So.
00:09:00
Jack
I gave you if you’re interested in joining our WhatsApp group and want to learn more about our Google meets classes, you can. You can contact me. You can leave a comment on our our website A-Z englishpodcast.com. You can send me an e-mail A-Z englishpodcast@gmail.com.
00:09:21
Jack
You can join our WhatsApp group. I’ll put the link right in there and that’ll take you right to our Google meets classes.
00:09:30
Jack
Or if you are using WeChat, you can communicate with me that way and I will point you towards the Facebook link for the Google meets class. So you still need a Google account if you want to participate in our online classes because we’re using.
00:09:50
Jack
Google meets to have these classes, but like I said, you can do it free for several weeks and see if you like it. If it’s, if it’s good for you. If the time works, then you may want to think about joining, joining costs $10 a month. That’s it.
00:10:07
Jack
$10 a month and you get almost 5050 classes a a month. So you do the math. It’s it’s such a good deal.
00:10:18
Jack
Uh, it’s amazing. So alright guys, with that said, I will see you next time. So thanks everybody.
00:10:27
Jack
Bye bye.
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Intro/Outro Music: Daybird by Broke for Free