Shadowing Practice: Vanessa Carlton - A Thousand Miles - Learn English Speaking with Video
B1a thousand years (speed up + lyrics)
![Michael Bublé - Home [Official Music Video]](https://img.youtube.com/vi/lbSOLBMUvIE/mqdefault.jpg)
B1Michael Bublé - Home [Official Music Video]
B1Hey Mom
B1Taylor Swift - Cornelia Street (Lyric Video)
B1Nico - These Days (Visualizer)
B1So Far Away (Acoustic) - Martin Garrix & David Guetta (Cover by Adam Christopher)
B1Shawn Mendes - When You're Gone
B1Electric Light Orchestra - Last Train To London (Audio)
B1Marc Anthony - You Sang To Me
B1california // lana del rey
B1张妙格-Not snow, but U (cover by SevenY七元）
B1How Far I'll Go ( from Moana) | Shania Yan Cover
Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This B1 speaking lesson is built on the video “Vanessa Carlton - A Thousand Miles”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: thousand, sky, wonder, miles, walk. This video has 23 sentences and 271 words to shadow. The speech runs for 4:16. The speaker talks slowly, about 64 words per minute, so there is time to copy every sound. 82% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start. 4 of its 23 sentences are questions, so it is good practice for question intonation and short answers.
Key vocabulary in this video
The 11 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| downtown noun | /ˈdaʊ̯nˌtaʊ̯n/ | The main business part of a city or town, usually located at or near its center. |
| belong verb | /bɪˈlɒŋ/ | To have its proper place. |
| drown verb | /dɹaʊn/ | To die from suffocation while immersed in water or other fluid. |
| homebound adjective | /ˈhoʊmbaʊnd/ | Being on one's way home: being homeward bound. |
| blackly adverb | /ˈblækli/ | With a black appearance. |
| blankly adverb | /ˈblæŋk.li/ | in a blank manner, especially showing no emotion or expression. |
| miles noun | /maɪlz/ | A great distance in space or time. |
| wonder noun | /ˈwʌndɚ/ | A sense of awe, astonishment and curiosity, inspired by unexpected events, novel experiences and inexplicable circumstances, sometimes accompanied by surprise… |
| memory noun | /ˈmɛm.ə.ɹi/ | The ability of the brain to record information or impressions with the facility of recalling them later, usually at will. |
| path noun | /pɑːθ/ | A trail for the use of, or worn by, pedestrians. |
| crowd noun | /ˈkɹaʊ̯d/ | A group of people congregated or collected into a close body without order. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| go past verb | To elapse. (said of time) |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 13 contractions and reduced forms, such as don't, I'd, I'm. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Shadow it sentence by sentence at normal speed, repeating each one until your rhythm matches the speaker.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like downtown, belong, drown.
¿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.