Would you like to . . .
- IMPROVE your ENGLISH?
- Build a POWERFUL VOCABULARY?
- Speak English with REAL CONFIDENCE?
Then watch this video . . .
IMPROVE YOUR ENGLISH
with David F. James
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Click here for my FREE Vocabulary Builder Course on Udemy
Learn to Speak English Fluently!
Video Transcript:
I’m David James . . .
I’m here to help you improve your English and speak English with confidence.
The purpose of this video is just to demonstrate to you some of the methods I use because many people who come to me speak English but they have two problems. One, they feel they don’t speak fluently enough. Secondly they have a limited vocabulary so they feel that they are using the same words over and over.
In recent years I’ve taught hundreds of students to improve their English, from something like 20 countries,. Many of them are professionals, university students, those wanting maybe a job with an international company, or taking TOEFL or IELTS exams. I’ve have helped them get good grades and from all that experience I’ve been able to see what the majority of them need. It’s interesting that most of them say I would like to speak English with confidence.
From all the lessons I’ve given I have noticed four key elements that can really affect a person’s use of English.
The first one is using the definite indefinite articles a and the. This is a nightmare for students learning English. When do you use the, when don’t you use the at all I can help you with that.
A second point, prepositions, those little words like for in from up to – again another nightmare for students. Thirty percent of English is made up of those little words so if you learn to use them properly, naturally your fluency increases.
The third one is tenses of course. You’ve got to be comfortable using the past present future tenses and all their different variations.
The fourth area is vocabulary but learning advanced vocabulary. When I say advanced I don’t mean words that nobody’s heard of but words that are on a higher level of English. Words like tantamount sporadic obsolete oblivious. These are the sort of words that are so useful and can expand your command of the English language. Concentrating on these four areas will make a huge improvement to your English.
Some years ago I attended an amazing seminar in Toronto Canada that was teaching accelerated learning methods for teaching English and there’s something I took away from that course that really stuck with me. I got into learning all about how the brain works but there was one very basic principle. The brain thinks in pictures so if you can associate a picture with a word or phrase this makes a deep impression on the mind. So this has become the foundation of my teaching system.
For example, the word sling in English. The verb to sling informally means to throw something but the actual meaning of sling is to hang something usually by straps. The past tense of sling is an irregular verb – slung. Now let’s look at this picture and look at the simplified sentence alongside it. It says she walked quickly up the street carrying a bag on her shoulder but now let’s look at that with more advanced English. She hurried up the street with a bag slung over her shoulder.
Now you notice there we’ve got the word slung but we’ve got it in a collocation. A collocation is a little group of words that naturally fit together. Here it’s slung over her shoulder, so you see the picture, you’ve now got the phrase and you can use that anywhere you’re describing someone who’s carrying something hanging on their shoulder. Pictures, sentence examples and then of course repetition and that’s all part of my course. Can you see how this simple method can really help improve your English?
Partner with me and you’ll be amazed in a short time you’ll greatly improve your English and you will be speaking English with real confidence!
David F. James