Speak More and Believe More!

Ryan Abraham - Owner of CIACI VIP ENGLISH

I know, I know that improved English fluency seems to be a nearly impossible task, but please do hang in there and it will all be worth it for sure. Keep in mind that this is a game of endurance and only the strongest survive, so make yourself even stronger. In order to build your English speaking muscles, you certainly need to exercise them. Slow but steady is the key when going from passive English skills to better speaking skills. The more time you spend exercising and practicing, the more muscle memory you are going to have. Your mouth will start to feel more and more comfortable pronouncing English words and your facial expressions and body language will start to be more on cue whenever expressing yourself due to less brain time being used to figure things out. So, let's get those muscles working. 

Warning, it's going to get hot in here. 

Remember to do all the exercises out loud so that you get practice actually saying the words and sentences in a normal voice with normal expression!

Set 1 

Look at your body, what you are wearing, and anything around you and challenge yourself to describe everything you see in complete sentences. For example, " I have two very strong arms" or " I see a rather large clock hanging on the living room wall". Try to make your sentences as descriptive and complex as you can just so you can get out of your comfort zone. In this case, feeling uncomfortable is good because it means you trying something new and challenging.

Set 2

Jump into that time machine you have laying around and practice going back in time. Think about every single activity you did yesterday, person you met, things you saw, feelings you had, and etc. As you recall it, recite it! Practice talking about the past and again try to make your sentences as complex as possible. Now, let's mix things up. Practice going from positive structure to negative structure and then question structure. For example, "I met a very tall and beautiful woman at the big grocery store around the corner yesterday" . "I didn't meet a very tall and beautiful woman at the big grocery store around the corner yesterday". "Did I meet a very tall and beautiful woman at the big grocery store yesterday"? 

Set 3

Think of something that you absolutely know how to do well. Now, picture yourself training someone else on how to do it. Practice using words such as first, second, next, after that, and so on. Talking about things we know how to do and love to do is pretty important especially as we meet new and interesting people. Practicing giving instructions is very useful which goes without saying when giving directions on how to get somewhere. Again be as descriptive as possible when doing this.

Take a 20 minute break

Set 4

Plan your next day out loud including activities, goals, and times. For example, "Tomorrow, I will go to school at six o'clock in the morning". "I will have lunch around noon". "After having lunch, I will have English class with that really super exciting and interesting English teacher, Mr. Ryan at one in the afternoon". :) Try to come up with at least 20 future plans for tomorrow.

Set 5

Take a look outside or simply turn on the television and say whatever it is that you see people doing. For example, "There is a man walking down the street". There is a woman walking up the street". "There is a weird looking guy standing on the corner next to some trash". Now focus on things and not people. For example, "There is a dirty cat eating rotten fish across the street".

Set 6

Pretend you are somewhere else like an airport or on a bus, and have a conversation with another person. Try to make the conversation as natural as possible and really put yourself in character here. Ask the person questions and ask follow up questions too. Remember that this is not an interrogation but in fact a conversation. Make it light and interesting. Throw in some small talk to start it up. 

If you want to practice some new expressions or questions, please download  Speak Like Me list 1

Please like my Facebook page if you found this at all useful. :)

Confidence Goes a Long Way!

Learning how to speak a new language especially English can be quite tough. This gets even tougher when you don't live in an English speaking country. Where to begin? How to start? These are questions that may come to mind. There is such a big gap between being able to read and write and SPEAKING. Remember when you were just learning how to talk? Well, I am sure you may not remember, but the truth still remains the same. You learned how to talk or speak much before you could read and write. So, what does all this mean? Basically if you want to be able to speak a language, if you want to be able to be fluent in English, you need to go back to the basics. Pretend you are just learning how to talk for the first time and just go out there in the brave world with courage and challenge yourself to interact with others in English. That is the only way to really gain a natural way of speaking English. Learn as you go along and enjoy meeting new and interesting individuals. If you happen to live in Bandung, check out my website and come and visit! Just remember that confidence goes a long way!

The Best Way to Learn Speaking

Workshop at Itenas Bandung led by Mr. Ryan from CIACI VIP ENGLISH

If a basketball player wants to improve his basketball skills, what should he/she do? If you answered learn how to weave baskets, then you would probably be wrong. How did you learn how to speak your own language? I would venture to say that you just might have been in an environment that supported you learning. You grew up listening to a certain language being used all around you and eventually tried to mimic what you heard. In essence you were learning by doing and that is absolutely one of the most effective ways to learn how to speak. So, what if you are living in a non-English speaking country like Indonesia? How would you put yourself in an English speaking environment or at least an environment where there are plenty of people speaking in English? You should find the places that Native English Speakers go.  You might be less than confident at first to practice your English in public places but it really is the best practice that you will ever get. You would be exposed to a variety of accents which would develop your listening skills and you get to try and use new expressions that you hear. You should also consider enrolling in an English course that has Native speakers in order to get error correction. Generally in normal conversations with native speakers, you won't really get corrected as long as the people you are talking to can understand. So, having a teacher to correct your mistakes can be quite handy. Make sure that the English course school that you attend implements solid methodology in the classroom.