Shadowing Practice: The Best Books to Learn ANY Language FAST - Learn English Speaking with Video

Most of the time, people get into trouble with novels because they're just far too hard for them.

They end up spending their whole time with their head in the dictionary looking up words.

If you need a translation to understand, it's too hard.

Read something that's at your level and you won't need translation.

I've had a lot of questions come in about different ways to learn vocabulary from reading

and the best books to use if you want to read to learn a language.

I do quite a lot of episodes on reading.

This is going to be a rapid fire one.

I'm gonna very quickly go through a bunch of different types of books

that you can read and if they're helpful or not.

So, questioners in this order.

So Salomon asks, Holly, I'm really lazy and I want to avoid learning vocabulary.

Is it possible to learn a language solely through reading?

For example, building up rudimentary vocabulary through reading children's books or comics.

Then Restless Falcon asks, would comic books be more effective than a novel?

And would reading a favorite book in your chosen language help?

And then Gary Miller asks, It sounds familiar.

I've been attempting Duolingo for too long.

Okay, finally, you're ready to be converted.

And it feels like I'm getting nowhere.

Yeah.

How would I know what level of book do I need?

Do I need to try a children's book, or should I move up to another age group level?

Help!

All right, Gary, we're going to help.

So, what types of books should we read?

Should we be reading children's books, comic books?

Okay, let's go through this step by step.

First of all, if you do any reading, you've got to make sure that you are following a process that makes sense.

I have a very specific six-step process for reading.

There's a link in the description.

You can download the whole process in one PDF for free.

Do read that.

Make sure you understand how to read properly because there's really no point.. well, there's always a point.

Reading is always good, right?

But you're going to learn so much more if you just read according to a specific process.

So before we get into the rapid fire, what do the experts say?

So So there's a big meta study that was conducted in 2025, so last year as of the time of recording,

from Sanger's Vandersander-Vellier, I'm not quite sure how to pronounce that, et al.

Learning a language through reading a meta-analysis of studies on the effects of extensive reading on second

and foreign language learning from the Education of Psychology Review.

So big meta studies, a serious study,

and they found that encouraging learners to engage in individual silent reading of longer target language texts of their own choice,

but attuned to their proficiency level, promoted a variety of second and foreign language skills.

Okay, so we know that reading helps you get better at foreign languages.

What has been found in this meta study, which is a study of studies,

is that the key here is that it's text of your own choice and it's attuned to your level, right?

Which means to make this really, really simple, you've got to choose what you want to read and it's got to be at the right level for you.

And long-time listeners will understand that this is basically compelling input and comprehensible input, meaning that we have to read stuff we're interested in, not what our teacher gives us to read,

and it's got to be not too easy, not too hard.

If we do those things and we do it by ourselves with quiet so we're focused, then we will improve.

So can I read children's books?

Generally, I would say no. Avoid children's books.

Why?

Because so much of the vocabulary is just irrelevant to you.

If you have kids and you've read storybooks to your kids, you'll know what I'm talking about here.

You don't need to know about super worms and squiggly, wiggly worms and all these crazy, useless vocabulary.

Best to avoid that.

Now, when we get onto things like Harry Potter, I think it's a slightly different story.

Harry Potter is like, is it a kid's book?

Yeah, maybe.

But there's also plenty of adults that enjoy that, right?

So I know lots of people that have learned foreign languages using Harry Potter.

I met one lady in Japan, she was English, and she spoke fantastic Japanese.

She told me how she learned Japanese by having two versions of Harry Potter, the English book and the Japanese book, side by side.

And she just literally read through the entire series and taught herself Japanese that way.

The point about Harry Potter is that if you love it as much as many people do, doesn't matter, the difficulty doesn't matter,

you will find a way to learn it and read it and learn a language from it.

So if you love something the way that many people love Harry Potter, absolutely go for it, knock yourself out.

Comic books, nothing wrong with comic books other than the fact that there isn't actually that much text in there.

If you think about how much text there is on the page of a comic book versus an actual narrative book, there's just a lot less stuff.

And so, by all means, but just be aware that there's less text, and also it can be very, very truncated, people speaking in very short sentences,

power language, it's not particularly natural.

So comic books wouldn't be my first choice, but hey, if you love comic books, like Japanese learners love manga, for example, then by all means go for it.

What about graded readers?

Graded readers are fantastic because they are written specifically for the language learning purpose.

Now, obviously I'm biased, I publish books of short stories, in fact, I just published, here's my latest one, Ukrainian, just recently came out a couple of weeks ago.

Actually, I don't know if it is out, I think I just got an early copy myself.

I really like this one with the cover.

So Grady readers are...

I'm sure you don't need me to repeat at this point, but the thing about Grady readers is that if they are interesting stories and you pick the one at the right level,

then that's all you can ask for, really.

Parallel texts.

Now, parallel texts are where you've got the target language on one side

and then on the opposite page you've got the English translation.

Don't read those because.. so people like to use parallel texts because they say, well, it can help me understand.

To which I would say, well, that means you're reading something that's far too hard for you.

If you need a translation to understand, it's too hard.

Read something that's at your level and you won't need the translation.

And it's far better to operate purely in the target language because that way you're having to struggle.

And struggle is what promotes learning, so ditch the parallel texts.

What about non-fiction?

Yes, non-fiction is fantastic.

Non-fiction can actually be easier than fiction because the language tends to be simple.

Again, the key here is read something that you are interested in.

If you love reading about medieval torture, I don't know how this came to mind.

I was looking at something recently.

Then read about medieval torture.

Oh, my God.

100

Pick something you're interested in.

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Can I read novels?

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I guess by this we mean native speaker level novels.

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I would say avoid unless you're at the level where you can really understand and appreciate it.

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Most of the time, people get into trouble with novels because they're just far too hard for them,

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which means that they just end up spending their whole time with their head in the dictionary looking up words.

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Or they just, there's so much they don't know that they're unable to just glean much benefit from the process.

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It's far better to read at your level, and that way you can just soak up a lot more.

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With that said, again, I know many people that have learned a language by reading Harry Potter in parallel texts,

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which is like a native speaker level parallel text, like breaking all my rules.

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Like, if you love something, that trumps everything.

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You can disregard all of my rules if you're reading something that you love, right?

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So I'd say native-speaker novels, no, unless you just can't help yourself, in which case go for your life.

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What about screenplays or books with dialogue?

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Yeah, I really like these.

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I mean, I've got in my bookshelf behind me, I've got a lot of books of Japanese screenplays, so to be clear, that's books where you have,

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like it's taken from a movie and you just have script of the movie, the dialogue, so there's no or very little narrative text in there.

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It's all just what the characters say.

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In fact, we have some books called 101 Conversations, we'll put a link in the description, which are exactly that.

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Stories told through dialogue formats.

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So yeah, dialogues, I think, are great.

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And then lastly, can I read translations of books I've already read?

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Yes, that's a really great thing to do, actually, because when you're reading a translation of a book you've already read, so let's say you've read a book in English and now you're reading the translation in Japanese.

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The big advantage you've got in this scenario is that meaning is taken care of, which means that you understand what's going on.

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That's going to help you interpret the target language a lot more easily.

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Now, it's still going to be very difficult for you

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if you are at a lower level and the book is at native level.

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That's not ideal, but it's better than picking up some random novel

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that you've never read before and trying to read that for the first time.

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Now, what if it's boring?

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If it's boring, you're reading the wrong thing.

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Read something you enjoy.

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How do I know that it's time to move on to something harder?

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I'd say if you're getting bored because it's all a bit too easy and you understand everything, then yeah, you can probably move on to something harder.

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But generally though, do remember

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that the ideal spot to be reading in is where you understand 80 to 90 percent of the text that's already there.

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So even if you understand, nine out of every ten words, that doesn't mean it's too easy.

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In fact, that's ideal for you to be able to pick up a bunch of new stuff.

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So I think you'll know when it's time to move on to something harder.

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Honestly, as long as you are reading to your interests and you're engaged by what you're reading, then the level, I think,

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is probably less important just because you're going to naturally know.

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So anyway, I hope that is useful for all of you guys, Salomon Restless and Restless Falcon and Gary Miller.

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Again, for my six step reading process, check the link in the description.

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That will be helpful for you.

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And I'll see you back in the next episode of the podcast.

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Vocabulario y notas de pronunciación para esta lección

Este vídeo tiene 144 frases y 1910 palabras para practicar shadowing. La parte hablada dura 9:56. El hablante habla rápido, unas 192 palabras por minuto, así que espera sonidos enlazados y reducidos. El 86 % de las palabras está entre las 3.000 más comunes del inglés; conviene repasar el resto antes de empezar.

Vocabulario clave de este vídeo

15 palabras del vídeo que vale la pena aprender, con su pronunciación y significado:

Palabra	Pronunciación	Significado
comic sustantivo	/ˈkɑmɪk/	cómico, comediante
translation sustantivo	/tɹænzˈleɪʃən/	traducción, transmisión
parallel adjetivo	/ˈpæ.ɹəˌlɛl/	paralelo
vocabulary sustantivo	/vəˈkæb.jə.lə.ɹi/	vocabulario
fiction sustantivo	/ˈfɪkʃən/	ficción
reader sustantivo	/ˈɹi.dɚ/	lector, lectora
dialogue sustantivo	/ˈdaɪəˌlɑɡ/	diálogo, conversación
meta adjetivo	/ˈmɛtə/	metaconceptual
ideal adjetivo	/aɪˈdi(ə)l/	ideal, idóneo
bore verbo	/boɹ/	aburrir
helpful adjetivo	/ˈhɛlp.fl̩/	servicial, adyuvante
narrative sustantivo	/ˈnæɹ.ə.tɪv/	narrativa
rapid adjetivo	/ˈɹæp.ɪd/	rápido, raudo
engage verbo	/ɪnˈɡeɪd͡ʒ/	embebecer, embelesar
input sustantivo	/ˈɪnpʊt/	aportación, aporte

Phrasal verbs que vas a escuchar

Palabra	Pronunciación	Significado
end up verbo		terminar, ir a parar
go through verbo		atravesar
look up verbo	/ˌlʊk ˈʌp/	mejorar
pick up verbo		coger, asir
come out verbo	/ˌkʌm ˈaʊt/	revelarse, salir a la luz

Pronunciación a tener en cuenta

El hablante usa 63 contracciones y formas reducidas, como you're, you've, I'm. Dilas en su forma corta, tal como las oyes.

Los sonidos de “sh” y “zh”: translation /tɹænzˈleɪʃən/, fiction /ˈfɪkʃən/, dictionary /ˈdɪk.ʃəˌnɛ.ɹi/, publish /ˈpʌblɪʃ/, bookshelf /ˈbʊkˌʃɛlf/
Palabras largas — cuida el acento: vocabulary /vəˈkæb.jə.lə.ɹi/, dictionary /ˈdɪk.ʃəˌnɛ.ɹi/, naturally /ˈnæt͡ʃ.(ə.)ɹə.li/, difficulty /ˈdɪfɪkəlti/, irrelevant /ɪˈɹɛləvənt/

Cómo practicar con este vídeo

Escucha el vídeo entero una vez sin hablar y anota las palabras que no conoces.
Empieza a velocidad 0,75×, haz shadowing frase por frase y vuelve a la velocidad normal cuando te resulte fácil.
Grábate y compara con el original, prestando atención a palabras como comic, translation, parallel.

Gramática en este vídeo

Las estructuras que más usa el hablante, con las palabras exactas del vídeo:

Estructura	En el vídeo
Present perfect have/has + participio pasado — una acción pasada que sigue importando ahora	has been found · you've read · have learned
Voz pasiva be + participio pasado — importa lo que ocurre, no quién lo hace	be converted · was conducted · has been found
Oraciones de relativo who / which + oración — información extra sobre una persona o cosa	study, which is · description, which are

¿Qué es la Técnica de Shadowing?

Shadowing es una técnica de aprendizaje de idiomas respaldada por la ciencia, desarrollada originalmente para la formación de intérpretes profesionales y popularizada por el políglota Dr. Alexander Arguelles. El método es simple pero poderoso: escuchas audio en inglés nativo y lo repites en voz alta de inmediato, como una sombra que sigue al hablante con solo 1-2 segundos de retraso. A diferencia de la escucha pasiva o los ejercicios de gramática, el shadowing obliga a tu cerebro y músculos de la boca a procesar y reproducir simultáneamente patrones de habla reales. Las investigaciones muestran que mejora significativamente la precisión de la pronunciación, la entonación, el ritmo, el habla conectada, la comprensión auditiva y la fluidez al hablar, convirtiéndola en una de las metodologías más efectivas para la preparación del IELTS Speaking y la comunicación en inglés en el mundo real.

Técnica de shadowing: lee la guía completa paso a paso →

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