Shadowing Practice: Does Your Family Tree Outgrow Earth? 🤯 - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
1
This is you, and these are your two parents.
2
They each have two parents as well, who are your four grandparents, who each have two more parents.
3
With every generation, the tree grows, meaning by the time you go back to the year 1400, you'll have over 16 million ancestors.
4
And if you go back a few centuries more, your family tree will include more humans than the population of Earth at that time.
5
But that's because the further back you go, the less people there were on Earth.
6
So the more likely it is your ancestors were already related, with distant cousins marrying each other.
7
And that means one ancestor will show up more than once in different places on your family tree.
8
Meaning it's not that big after all.
📺 Same Channel
B1How Your Brain Filters What You See 🤔
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B11
The Boy Who Lived In Walmart 😳
TeensDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B11
What If The World Only Had Two People? 🤔
University StudentsWorking Adults
B11
The 10-Second Time Machine
TeensDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B24
The Hidden Danger Of Bionic Vision 😨
IELTS PrepTOEFL PrepUniversity Students
B14
How A Cookie Fits Through A Tiny Hole 🤔
High School StudentsUniversity Students
B12
How The Multiplane Camera Works 🤔
University Students
B22
How Scammers Fake Solid Gold Bars 😮
University StudentsWorking Adults
B12
Can You Taste Garlic With Your Feet? 🤨
High School StudentsUniversity Students
B14
How To Make Gummy Bear S’mores 🤤
TeensDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B12
How An Alter Ego Helps You Focus 🤔
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B15
13 Unreleased Videos I Thought Would Go Viral
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B13
The Best Way To Dice An Onion 😮
Daily ConversationHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B13
How To Extract Your DNA At Home 😮
University Students
B13
This Is Why It's Called "Bluetooth" 🤔 (EXPLAINED)
University StudentsWorking Adults
B12
How Pool Chalk Works 🤔
University StudentsWorking Adults
B13
He Turned A Coin Into A Beating Heart 😮
High School StudentsUniversity Students
B22
The Puber 😣 (Patent Pending)
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B13
How The Barney Suit Worked 😮
High School StudentsUniversity Students
C14
How Fossilization Works 🤔
University StudentsWorking Adults
✨ Recommend Video
B15
33 sentences
How are families around the world the same and different?
Daily ConversationHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B18
32 sentences
Level 3 Book 1 B11 When an Apple Falls
Daily ConversationHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B142
22 sentences
Nature Is Speaking – Robert Redford is The Redwood | Conservation International (CI)
Daily ConversationHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B13
14 sentences
A World Without... Death
Daily ConversationHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B114 sentences
English in a Minute: In Your Blood
American AccentTeensDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B12
10 sentences
The Grand Canyon
High School StudentsUniversity Students
B14
15 sentences
The Role of Grandparents and Extended Family
Daily ConversationHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B11
173 sentences
Real English Conversation with MY MOM 💛 (talking about family, parenthood, and growing up)
TeensDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B21
216 sentences
Life Lessons Old People WISH Young People Knew
Business EnglishTeensDaily Conversation
B115
6 sentences
IELTS Speaking Part 1 | Topic: Family | Band 9 Answer
IELTS PrepHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B18 sentences
Google Earth Helped Him Find His Lost Family 😌
Travel EnglishTeensHigh School Students
B16
19 sentences
Reading Explorer Foundation, Unit-6 Giants of the Forest
IELTS PrepTOEFL PrepHigh School Students
Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This video has 8 sentences and 129 words to shadow. The speech runs for 0:49. The speaker talks at a natural 157 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. 92% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is easy to follow.
Key vocabulary in this video
8 less common words from the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
- cousin /ˈkʌz(ə)n/ (noun) — Chiefly with a qualifying word: Any relation (especially a distant one) who is not a direct ancestor or descendant but part of a person's extended family; a…
- marry /ˈmæɹi/ (verb) — To enter into the conjugal or connubial state; to take a husband or a wife.
- distant /ˈdɪstənt/ (adjective) — Far off (physically, logically or mentally).
- ancestor /ˈæn.sɛs.tɚ/ (noun) — One from whom a person is descended, whether on the father's or mother's side, at any distance of time; a progenitor; a forefather; a forebear.
- grandparent /ˈɡɹæn(d)pɛəɹənt/ (noun) — The parent of someone's parent.
- tree /tɹiː/ (noun) — A perennial woody plant taller and larger than a shrub with a wooden trunk and, at some distance from the ground, having leaves and branches.
- grow /ˈɡɹəʊ/ (verb) — To become larger, to increase in magnitude.
- generation /ˌd͡ʒɛnəˈɹeɪʃən/ (noun) — The act of creating something or bringing something into being; production, creation.
Phrasal verbs you will hear
- go back (verb) — To return to a place or state after having been there at a previous time.
- go back to (verb) — To stem from; to originate in.
- have over (verb) — To host (a visiting guest) at one's house.
- show up (verb) — To appear, arrive, or attend, especially suddenly or erratically.
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like cousin, marry, distant.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | were already related |
| Comparatives -er than / more … than — comparing two things | more humans than |
| Future with “will” will + verb — a decision, promise or prediction | you'll have · will include · will show |
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.