Shadowing Practice: BMW got it right with the E28... so I bought another one. - Learn English Speaking with Video

Now, for anybody that knows me personally, this isn't going to be a surprise, but I have bought yet another E28.

I bought this car in November of last year and I've been waiting for the right time to talk about it, but unfortunately this week, we're stuck in a bit of a cease and desist situation with Ferrari.

We got a letter from them

and now I'm waiting on my lawyer to tell me what we can and can't do about it. So...

In the meantime, I'm bringing it back to one of my favorites.

I'm introducing the latest and honestly the cheapest car in the Stance Works collection.

But more than just talking about this car, I want to talk about why I've owned 15 of these cars at this point because

I genuinely think that the E28 is the single greatest car of all time, hands down.

And along with that, I built my entire career with these things, and these things deserve this episode, so let's dive into them.

Now let's get the elephant out of the room first things first.

This is not the E28 I used to own, that you've seen on the channel before, that I said is the dream spec, that I said I'd never sell.

This is a different car that just happens to be identical.

Unless you know E28s, then you've already spotted the differences.

which is also a white E28 that's been on this channel quite a few times, and that now more than a million of you have watched, our E28 episodes do pretty well, which inspired me to say,

hey, maybe you guys actually do wanna see this.

So first things first, I'm excited to share my latest purchase, 'cause this is also one of the best purchases I've had in a long time,

and it reminds me why I think E28s are still one of the all -time greats.

Now, I know everything in California is expensive, especially gas at the moment, and we can't control the prices,

cash back on the things that we spend most often on.

That's where today's episode sponsor, Upside, comes into play, because with the Upside app, you can actually get cash back on dining, gas, and groceries.

And I don't know about you, but those are the three most common things I'm spending money on.

And if you have a credit card that gives you cash back, you can actually get cash back on top of your cash back.

Here's how it works.

Open the app, find a participating location, claim an offer, pay with your card like normal and get paid.

That's it.

You can link a card or upload a photo of the receipt.

And yeah, it's cash back, not points you'll never use, not credits that expire, money you transfer straight into your bank account.

You have a ton of flexibility and control when redeeming your rewards.

Upside offers multiple options and no minimums.

So I just check the upside out before I even pull up to the pump as part of a habit.

Upside has given back more than a billion dollars to its users, and if you want to find out how much money you can get back, download the free Upside app using my promo code STANCEWORKS,

and you can get an extra 25 cents back on every gallon of gas for your first fill up.

That's an extra 25 cents back on every gallon of gas for your first tank if you use my promo code STANCEWORKS.

Now, let's get back to the episode.

This is my 1988 528E and if you're really into BMWs you know that the 88 means it's a super ETA, but what that truly means is just

that it's a slightly special version of the slowest E28 we got here in the United States.

The 528E does have a six cylinder under the hood and it is The zipper sounds really good,

but in reality, BMW developed this engine solely to get good fuel economy.

It only revs to like 5000 RPM, it doesn't make a whole lot of horsepower, it doesn't really go anywhere in a hurry.

But it is alpine white, and that's probably my favorite color for BMWs, as evidenced by the BMWs you've seen on this channel.

And this particular car had a full glass out respray done just a few years ago.

So the paint on it is genuinely perfect.

This one has a black comfort interior, which means that it doesn't have those really cool bolstered sport seats in it.

But otherwise, it has all of the amenities that you could want.

It's also a manual transmission, which is a huge plus given that the car is otherwise pretty slow and not that fun to drive.

This livens it up a lot.

This example does have a lot of really nice subtle and mature upgrades, such as a Blaupunkt head unit, a really clean sub install in the trunk, it's got upgraded shocks with H &R springs,

nice wheels and tires, and even an Emtek wing on the rear deck lid, which I think really improves the look of these cars, but more important than that is the complete Euro conversion.

Now, the American versions of E28s come with what they call diving board bumpers.

These bumpers that stick way off the front of the car, and you kind of have to run them into a wall in order to compress them and make these things look better.

But if you have the budget, or if you live anywhere other than the US, they got these beautiful chrome bumpers that we call Euro bumpers, and it drastically changes the way the car looks.

Along with these upgraded headlights that are different in size versus the American counterparts, E28s were designed to look this way,

and once you see them like this, the US models just look horrible by comparison.

Every E28 needs this upgrade, and thankfully this one's already been done, and it was done the right way.

Now another really cool feature of this E28 is the fact that it has a glass moonroof in it.

I have never owned one of these and I don't even know

that I've seen one in person because this is considered the single rarest E28 option of all.

I don't even know that this car actually came with this one from the factory, it probably didn't and it's converted, but given that somebody converted it They included all of the correct parts from a donor car,

and the install is perfect.

Now this particular example only has 166 ,000 miles on it, and that might sound like high mileage to some folks, but out of all 15 E28s that I've owned,

this is the first one that I've had with less than a quarter million miles on it.

166 ,000 is hardly broken in.

So I think this is going to last a long time when it comes to daily driving duty.

because these cars basically go forever.

And E28s make great daily drivers because they have basically every amenity that you could want in a car, despite their age.

Even with this one being the lowest trim model that they sold, it still has ice -cold air conditioning.

It's got power windows, power door locks.

It's got like 30 -way power adjustable seats.

It can do basically everything that a new car can, but still gives you that old car experience.

This thing will even tell you when stuff on it breaks.

identify things like low coolant, low oil, it'll tell you if your washer fluid is low, it'll tell you if any of your lights go out, even your headlights, taillights, brake lights, You name it.

It'll tell you it all.

And then it has a toolkit in the trunk because this car is actually serviceable, and that's one of the things that I love about them.

Now between the upgrades this car has, the overall condition, the fact that literally everything works, and just look at it, it's beautiful, you're probably thinking that this is an expensive classic car.

And yes, some versions of it are, but if you're willing to hunt for deals and you're patient and you don't mind getting one of these 528 E's, they're genuinely cheap.

It's one of the best deals of any cool classic car that you can get.

It's not like that $35 ,000 535 that I sold two years ago, so let's talk about what makes them different.

The only meaningful difference between a 528E and that 535 I had is under the hood.

This one has this 2 .7L which, again, sounds like it should be good, but this one's anemic, and it doesn't make for the sportiest drive,

in comparison to the 535's M30 3 .4L, which makes quite a bit more power and a whole lot more horsepower.

This one's not a 535, but if I had a 535 before, why do I keep selling them?

Why am I on car number 15 and will this one be the last one?

Well, No, it won't, because none of these are the M5, which in my opinion is the greatest car of all time.

Now before I get too carried away about the M5 and E28s in general, I want to be clear that while I think this is the greatest car, it's not my number one, the top of the list.

That position is reserved for the E26 M1.

And specifically speaking, I'm in love with the M1 Pro car.

It's really the best BMW if you're asking me.

It's the best car on earth, but the problem is that even the cheapest M1 on the best day is still half a million dollars, and I'm not getting one of those anytime soon.

This is, if you're asking me, the best car on earth.

Now before we dive into the specifics of the M5, let's talk about E28s in general.

I think part of what makes the E28 special is

that it represents a confluence between the last era of analog cars and the first era of digital cars.

It's a car that benefits from technology and from its past.

From behind the wheel, there's nothing truly digital to interact with.

It's still all old school buttons and interfaces.

But, on the other hand, it does utilize technology to make ownership and the driving experience better.

All of those power amenities and accessories, or even the onboard computer and check control panel, make it feel more modern.

I think it's about as old as a car can get

while still feeling like it offers everything that a current car does, although the driving experience is still a bit antiquated, but in the best way.

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It feels like a classic with the McPherson front struts, but with a semi -trailing arm rear end.

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It's a car that, with its bright work and chrome trim, is the last of its kind before we went to plastics

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and bumpers and things like that that make all these new cars look so different from cars of old.

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But on the note of technology, the cars here in the US are all fuel injected.

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Their Bosch Motronic system works really well.

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It's super simple, super reliable, and really easy to work on.

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It doesn't take a lot of know -how to diagnose these cars and keep them on the road, and that's why so many of them are still on the streets today.

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Under the hood, we got those famous BMW inline sixes, which is what BMW built their name on.

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The power curve is so smooth, the cars run so well, and even an ETA model like the one I'm driving in this episode is still fun.

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These cars hold up really well, they've withstood the test of time.

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And don't even get me started on the way that they look.

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Now I know I'm gonna lose some of you here.

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Some of you will see these cars and just see a boring family sedan.

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And I get it, but I think that's part of what I like.

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It's so understated.

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It's so simple.

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It's so classic.

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And those sharp lines and that shark nose front are just quintessentially BMW.

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I don't think it gets more true to the brand I envision

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when I think of those three letters than any other car.

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Ok, so now let's talk about the M5 and why it is the best of the best, because some of you I'm sure are still not sold here.

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What I know had to happen was a group of engineers stood around the BMW M1

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and its incredible M88 inline -six And they somehow convinced each other and the bigwigs to stuff that engine in a sedan.

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A family sedan, meant to carry your family.

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And suddenly, the world's first true high -performance sedan, the fastest car on earth with four doors, was born.

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They gave it bolstered sport seats, an incredible GetTrag G280 manual transmission,

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stiffened the suspension, and made this thing a high -performance car that rivaled anything else in the era, and was capable of blowing the doors off of it.

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So when you have one set up in the correct configuration, like my last car, I think that this is one of the best looking,

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best performing cars of the era with just the right amount of classic and vintage feel, with enough modernity to be able to drive it.

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So, I know what most of you are wondering at this point.

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If these cars are so great and I love them so much, Why have I had 15 of them?

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Why do I not have an M5 yet?

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What's really going on here?

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How does any of this actually make sense?

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Now to understand that, you have to understand my history with E28s.

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And if you only know me through this YouTube channel, you might not be familiar with my E28 known as Rusty, but that car put me and Stanceworks on the map all the way back in 2009.

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My friend Andrew Sovia and I did a cross -country road trip in a car that no one thought could make it.

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Now, this isn't going to be an episode that covers my entire E28 history, nor the history of Rusty, but this was my fourth E28.

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It was a reasonably nice black 535, until a friend was in an accident with it, at which point I took all the paint off of it and decided to have some aesthetic fun.

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In 2009, my friend Andrew Sylvia

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and I decided to take this car on a cross -country road trip and document the entire thing.

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This was back in the blog era, before YouTube was really a thing, but this journey took off and it put us on the map.

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This car was famous at the time, and only a number of years later did it eventually become the crazy tube chassis version of Rusty

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that most of us know today.

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This car is really sentimentally important to me.

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It represents the genesis of Stanceworks all the way back in '09, and it really represents the car I learned to cut my fabrication teeth on.

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This car was so many firsts for me, and while it doesn't represent my current skill level or the way I'd build something today, I'm still really proud of what it was.

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Rusty debuted at SEMA in 2015 in that final form, and for the following year I took what we called the Stanceworks parts car.

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This particular E28 was a Group A homologation tribute car that blurred the lines between a normal 5 series and an M5.

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It had all the cool parts and an M5 driveline, but this one, as cool as it was, was just a straight up race car.

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There's been a lot of other cars that have been between these, obviously this is three of 14 in the past,

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but most of them have been kind of boring daily drivers or parts donors or whatever.

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My last 535 that was here on the channel really was my favorite that I've had.

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This car, honestly, was perfect.

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I'm confident in saying it's one of the nicest E28s in the United States, and the only reason I sold it was to get funding for the F40 project.

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It was a necessary sacrifice to achieve a bigger dream.

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or the correct engine, well, it hit the chopping block.

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And if you're wondering, no, a swapped car doesn't quite cut it for me.

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I still really want the real deal.

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Now all of these E28s have just been stepping stones to the car I want more than basically anything else, a Euro M5.

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I want one more than I can put into words And every other E28 that I've had so far,

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including this one, just feels like It's kind of half -assed.

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It's not the real deal and I gotta have it someday.

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So that's where this episode comes full circle.

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I made myself a promise when I started this YouTube channel that someday I will get a Euro M5.

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And I'm stating that promise publicly that at least by the time I hit a million subscribers, and hopefully a lot sooner than that, I will

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Own one and I know

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that a lot of you guys are probably thinking like dude

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you have Ferrari projects There's an f40 in the shop like how is a euro m5

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that crazy like this this doesn't make sense to me and But all these other projects, including, yes, the F40, someday will leave.

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The funds from each of these projects goes into the next one to make this channel possible, but if I buy a Euro M5, I'm not selling it.

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I gotta have the money to park in this project forever.

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It's never going anywhere.

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It's got to stay.

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And so, That means in order to pull that off, it's a different kind of purchase than anything else I've done on this channel before.

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save for maybe the bump side forward, which I also promised isn't going anywhere.

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I've got a build update on that soon.

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When it comes to this Euro M5, someday we're going to go to Europe and we're going to buy one.

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I want to do another cross -country or in that case cross -continent road trip in an E28.

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to solidify and bring this whole E28 journey full circle once again.

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So I hope you guys hold me to it.

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I don't know whether it's going to be

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Next year years from now who knows when

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but at some point we're going to Europe We're gonna drive across the whole thing in my Euro m5.

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So just be patient.

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We're gonna get there and As always, I hope you guys enjoyed this episode.

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I enjoyed making it because I love these cars so much.

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I know this content's a little bit different than what we're normally doing on this channel, but we're trying to put stuff out that's worth watching.

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So if you enjoyed it, let us know in the comments.

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Of course, thank you to all of our Patreon supporters.

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You guys help make this channel possible, and we're stoked to be putting this stuff out with your guys' support.

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To everyone else, thank you for watching, and we'll catch you in the next one.

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Thank you.

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Thank you.

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About This Lesson

In this lesson, you will practice your English listening and speaking skills using a transcript from a YouTube video focused on a passion for classic cars, specifically the BMW E28 model. By engaging with the content, learners will enhance their vocabulary related to automobiles and experiences, while also refining their pronunciation through the shadowing technique. This approach will help you learn English with YouTube in an enjoyable and relatable context.

Key Vocabulary & Phrases

Cease and desist - A legal term indicating a demand to stop an activity.
Spec - Short for specification, often used to describe the features of a car.
Cash back - A rebate or percentage of money returned from a purchase.
Fuel economy - A measure of how far a vehicle can travel per unit of fuel.
Manual transmission - A type of vehicle transmission that requires the driver to manually shift gears.
Upgrades - Improvements made to a product, often enhancing performance or appearance.
Ammenities - Features that provide comfort or convenience within a vehicle.
Euro conversion - Modifications made to a vehicle to align with European standards, often enhancing aesthetics.

Practice Tips

To effectively use the shadowing technique, start by listening to the video at a moderate pace, repeating sentences just after you hear them. This helps you mimic the natural rhythm and intonation of the speaker. Given the conversational tone and the moderate tempo of the video, you can pause frequently to catch up if needed. Make sure to focus on the unfamiliar terms and phrases mentioned in the Key Vocabulary & Phrases section. By incorporating these into your practice session, you will not only expand your vocabulary but also boost your English pronunciation. Aim to practice regularly, letting your brain and mouth get accustomed to the shadow speech involved. Remember, improving takes time, so be patient and persistent. As you become more confident, increase the playback speed to challenge yourself further and refine your speaking finesse.

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:

Structure	In the video
Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on	I've been waiting · have just been stepping
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now	have bought · I've owned · you've seen
Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it	were designed · been done · is considered
Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing	interior, which means · transmission, which is · sixes, which is

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

Shadowing technique: read the full step-by-step guide →

Shadowing Practice: BMW got it right with the E28... so I bought another one. - Learn English Speaking with Video

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