Shadowing Practice: How English Changed My Life (My Real Story) - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Do you want to study abroad or do you want to know what studying abroad in English feels like from the inside?
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In this video, I am going to share my experience of studying abroad at Polytechnic University of Milan with you guys.
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I'm going to talk about how I applied for four different universities in four different countries, how I got rejected, how I met new people,
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and how, more than anything else, English helped me graduate at the top of my class.
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Along the way, as I am sharing my experience with you,
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I am going to teach you 18 phrases about higher education that you can use in your speaking or
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and your IELTS tests.
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Welcome to my Slow English Podcast.
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I highly recommend that you watch this video until the end
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because at the end of the video I will recap all the new words and phrases for you.
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So let's begin.
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I studied urban planning and that was my undergraduate course.
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I always wanted to study abroad not because I was a fan of higher education or I loved studying but because
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I wanted to broaden my horizons.
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Broaden my horizons, which means I wanted to experience life outside of my comfort zone.
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I wanted to meet new people, to get new ideas, and to add to my life experiences.
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So I started applying for different courses at different universities.
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I applied for NTNU University in Norway, Helsinki University in Finland, Polytechnic University in Milan,
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Italy, and Stuttgart University in Germany, among many other universities.
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And to tell you the truth, my grades from my undergrad were not very good.
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Because while I was a student, I had to work my way through university.
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Work my way through university means I had to have a job in order to finance my studies.
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I needed to earn money as I was a student.
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And because I had to work my way through university, I didn't have enough time to study for my exams.
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So my grades were not very good.
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I applied for four universities and the first university
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which replied back to me was NTNU in Norway and it was a rejection.
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Yes, I got rejected because my grades were not good.
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I fell short of the requirements.
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To fall short of the requirements, it means you did not have all of the things they asked for.
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For me, it was my grades.
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They were okay.
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They were standard, but they demanded very high grades.
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So that was my first rejection.
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And to tell you the truth, when you are rejected for something,
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for anything, you take it personally and it affects your self confidence.
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You feel like you are not good enough.
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And that's a very bad position to be in.
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But honestly, that was my only rejection because after that, the other three universities responded positively.
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I was offered a place in those three universities, but that is not the end.
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That's just the beginning of the hard part because what's next?
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When you get an admission letter, the next step is to pay the fees.
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Universities have tuition fees.
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Tuition fees are the fees you have to pay, the money you have to pay to the university in exchange for tuition, in exchange for studying there.
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And so that was the next step for me.
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For all three of them, I met the entry requirements.
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To meet the entry requirements means you have everything they want from you.
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I met the entry requirements, but it was time to think money.
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Here's something to know.
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When you are applying for universities abroad it's very important
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that you decide whether you want to apply for private universities or public ones because private universities are prohibitively expensive
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prohibitively expensive that is too expensive these universities the tuition fees are very high
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and tuition fee is only half of this story you need
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to think about the cost of living in another city in another country.
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Rent, electricity, food, having fun with friends, public transportation, books and study material.
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You have to think about everything.
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The university I applied for is one of the best in Europe and it's the best in Italy.
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Polytechnic University of Milan.
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And the tuition fees are about 3,500 euros per year.
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That's just that is just the university fee apart from from high living costs of Milan.
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Rent is very high, electricity costs, energy costs in Europe is generally very high.
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Food costs a lot.
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And so as a student, you have four options.
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You can either self finance your studies, meaning you or your parents already have the money to pay for it.
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So just pay for it.
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Or you can apply for grants and scholarships.
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One of them is a merit based scholarship, which is a scholarship given to students on merit.
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On merit means you are so good academically
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or in terms of your job experiences or your CV is so strong that the university is willing to support you.
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So you get a merit-based scholarship or you may be able to get a means-tested grant meaning they will check
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your family's financial situation.
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How much money you have, how much money you earn, how much money your father, your parents, your mother earns.
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And based on that, they would decide whether or not they can offer you financial aid.
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And the last option is taking out a student loan.
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To take out a loan means to get money from the bank, to borrow money from the bank.
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And then when you graduate, you have to start paying back that money.
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And when you're coming from an underprivileged background, self-funding your studies is not an option.
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So you need to apply for a grant or a scholarship or taking out a loan from the bank.
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But I highly advise you to be careful when you're taking out a loan,
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because I've seen a lot of people graduate saddled with debt.
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To graduate saddled with debt means you graduate with a lot of debt to pay back,
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with a lot of money to pay back to the bank.
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So for five, six, seven, God knows how many years after graduation you have to work to pay back the money you borrowed from the bank.
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So be careful about this.
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Now, because of my financial situation, I had to apply for a scholarship.
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And what I did was to apply for merit-based scholarships because yes, my grades were not particularly very high.
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They were standard grades, but I had a lot of work experience and I had a very good level of English, which was quite important.
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They usually expect an IELTS certificate with band score 6 or 6.5.
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In my case for Polytechnic University in Milan it was 6.5
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but back then I had a band score 8 which was way above what they wanted.
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Now if you want to know the story of me
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learning English and getting my first IELTS certificate with band score 8
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and following that getting my second IELTS certificate with band score 9 which is the highest I highly recommend watching
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this video over here in which I've talked about how I learned English as a non-native English speaker.
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Okay, so I had a very good IELTS score, excellent work experience, average university grades.
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So I took the shot.
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I tried applying for a merit-based scholarship and of the three universities of the three positions I was offered,
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I managed to get a merit-based scholarship from Polytechnic University of Milan.
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Okay, so it's 2018.
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I have secured my place at Polytechnic University of Milan.
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Secured my place, meaning I have gotten, I have earned that place to be in that course in that university.
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I have gotten a scholarship and I am ready to, for the first time ever to go outside of my comfort zone to leave my country
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and to experience life in another country with people from other parts of the world.
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That was my first ever experience of speaking English outside of my country.
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I came to Milan.
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I did all the admin work, all the paperwork and stuff.
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And let's go to the part where I entered the university for the first time ever.
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That was our first class.
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I went in and there were 90 people in that class from I think they were from 30 or 35 different countries.
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So people from a lot of different cultures and that was my first experience ever seeing people from other countries.
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And it's not just that you see other people with different faces
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or different skin color or different style or different hairstyle or different eye color and stuff.
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It's that you see people from different cultures with different behavior
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that you cannot expect because you've never met anyone from those countries.
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And that was very exciting for me.
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You're sitting there in a chair in that big hall
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and you look on your right and left and you see people from different parts of the world.
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And you know the only way to communicate with them is through English.
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30 plus countries, they all spoke one language, English.
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And that's the most important thing I want to tell you guys.
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English for me was the key to unlocking a lot of opportunities in life.
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When you speak very good English, suddenly everyone sees you in a different way.
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You feel the confidence yourself when you see that you speak better English than people from other countries.
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So take this seriously for me.
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Improve your English because that helps your confidence.
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That helps opening doors to many new opportunities.
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And that helps with broadening your horizons.
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Now, I was a student for three years.
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Technically, the course was for two years.
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but during the third year I was working on my thesis
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and you know the third year was when we had COVID
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and it was a lockdown situation the classes are all online it was a very weird time
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but I want to tell you about what happened during those two years we had different courses
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and in every course we had there were articles we had to read books we had to read in English
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and so So it is not just reading, but you have to understand it.
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You have to analyze it.
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You have to dissect it.
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It includes critical thinking.
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So you're reading something in another language, but it's not just reading it.
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You have to understand it.
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And the reason why it was a lot easier for me than all other students in
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that class was because my English was very good.
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I was confident.
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it was easy for me to read the article and to understand what the article is talking about.
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It was very easy for me to summarize the article in a notebook.
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People, believe me, back then we didn't have AI.
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So summarizing an article was a very hard thing to do.
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And people would ask me for help to do that.
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So summarizing was very easy for me.
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Reading the article was very easy for me.
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And studying what I have summarized was very easy for me.
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And then there is the exam day.
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You have to go and you have to write in English.
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So it's not just reading.
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It's not just analyzing.
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It's not just understanding, but it's also about producing.
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It's also about writing.
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And one interesting thing at Politecnico di Milano, the University of Milan, was we had not only written exam,
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but also oral exam.
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It was like, okay, one to one, you sit in front of your professor.
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They would ask you an open-ended question and you would have to discuss the articles you have read, you yourself, without them asking you.
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You yourself would have to create links and connections between different articles, 100 plus articles that you have read, and you need to provide that answer at that moment.
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Think about it.
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Imagine yourself in that situation.
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You're sitting in front of your professor who will ask you a deep question about a topic, a subject.
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In my case, it was urban planning.
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They ask you a question and you have to answer.
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Your brain will have to think about the content of the things you have studied, those articles, those books.
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They were in English, but your brain has to analyze what is the correct answer for this question.
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And then at the same time, you were dealing with a lot of nerves.
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You're dealing with a lot of anxiety, stress.
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What if I give the wrong answer?
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That's one part.
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What if I speak with wrong grammar?
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And you may even struggle finding the correct words in English.
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So if your English is not good, which was the case for a lot of people in that class, you would struggle getting good grades,
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even though probably many of them even studied harder than me.
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But for me, it was a lot easier because it was easier for me to speak and communicate in English.
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confident.
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So I was not very nervous regarding my language skills.
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I was nervous regarding the paper content, the content of those articles and the content of those books more than I was nervous about my English.
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And so I think the main reason why I graduated at the top of my class, cum laude, with full marks,
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was that my English was so good and it was a lot easier for me than other people to study.
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We had dissertations and final end-of-term reports.
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We had articles to read as I told you.
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We had oral exams as I told you.
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We also had a lot of presentations.
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So you had to prepare a PowerPoint presentation about a topic which was given to you.
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You would have to stand up, go in front of 90 people from 30 plus countries and your professors there,
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and you had to not only present your research,
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but also defend it and also think about your English skills and also worry about social anxiety.
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Public speaking is something that would make a lot of people nervous.
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So if your English is not good in that situation, you would also have to worry about your English a lot.
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It was very easy for me to present because my English was good.
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And when your English is good, people would look at you differently.
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You would also have to worry about your English a lot.
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It was very easy for me to present because my English was good.
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And when your English is good, people would look at you differently.
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You would feel the confidence.
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The way people look at you will give you a lot of confidence.
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When you are speaking with the correct accent, correct pronunciation, good body language, you're using your hands as you're talking, you're making eye contact as you're talking to other people.
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And it changes the way they see you.
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It boosts your confidence, but also for them, you go on a higher level.
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Probably that was one of the main reasons why I got very good grades from professors,
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because I was able to impress them with my facial expressions,
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body gestures, and body language as well as my English and my fluency.
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And also because I studied really hard.
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But to tell you the truth, generally speaking, studying abroad at a higher level in a good university, it's very academically demanding.
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It demands a lot from you academically.
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The heavy workload will bother you.
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There's just too many things to do.
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And it's very normal for you to fall behind with coursework.
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Falling behind with coursework means there's too many things to do that you cannot keep up with them anymore.
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As a student, you don't usually have a lot of free time to catch up on reading, you know, which means to do the readings you missed.
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Because when you are in your own country, your parents would think about the house,
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the electricity, shopping, cooking, and taking out the trash and things like that.
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But when you are alone in a different country, it is all on you.
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You come back from university, you're tired, you're exhausted, you have a lot of things to do for tomorrow
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but you need to eat
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and to eat you need to go to the supermarket you
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need to shop you need to come back home you need to put it in the fridge
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and you need to then cook something for yourself it is hard
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but it's very interesting it's very challenging so
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if you are the kind of person who's ambitious
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and who's willing to go the extra mile it's a very
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interesting experience now what happened after graduation i finished my studies
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and immediately after i did a three-month internship in a private company here in Milan.
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And during that internship, I realized that this is not what I want to do with my life.
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I don't like being an urban planner.
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I was an English teacher during my undergrad, as I told you.
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And when I came to Milan, immediately after I came to Milan, I became a teacher at a school called British Institutes, among many other schools.
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I was a teacher as I was studying here to earn a little bit of money
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and to have a more comfortable life.
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But when I graduated and when I became an engineer with a master's degree
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and I did a three-month internship in a company relevant to my field of study, I realized this is not what I want to do with my life.
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Not at all.
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After that private company, three months, I did another internship in the public sector, municipality of Milan, for two months.
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And I realized even the public sector is not what I want to do.
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This is not what I want to do in my life.
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And that is when POC English was born.
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Now, I will tell the story of POC English in another video.
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If you are interested, let me know in the comments.
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But this was my experience studying abroad for two years, and I'm still here.
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It's been eight years now.
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After this, again, I did another course.
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I did another master's in the UK in London at Imperial College London.
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Now that's the second best university in the world right after MIT.
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And that was a great experience, a lot different from the experience I had in Italy.
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If you were interested in this video, let me know in the comments.
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I will make sure I would talk about the experiences I had in London as a student in another video.
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But let me know in the comments if you are interested.
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Anyways, let's do a quick recap.
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These are the words and phrases that I used as I was talking about my experience in higher education.
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It's a nice idea for you to take a screenshot
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because then you can study them and you can use them when you are speaking about higher education.
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Or more importantly, if you plan to take the IELTS test and get a good score, one way or another, during the test,
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you will be asked about higher education.
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And so it's a great idea to learn them and to use them to boost your IELTS score.
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I hope you've enjoyed this lesson.
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Now, I'm going to go to the comments section.
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You should do the same thing too.
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Go to the comments section and talk to me.
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Did you like this video?
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Do you want to hear about my experiences in London?
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Or is there anything else you would like to hear about
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and probably was this podcast very fast for you should I slow down
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or can you keep up I hope you've enjoyed this lesson see you soon bye
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This B2 speaking lesson is built on the video “How English Changed My Life”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: English, experience, Milan. This video has 267 sentences and 3338 words to shadow. The speech runs for 21:03. The speaker talks at a natural 159 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. 86% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.
Key vocabulary in this video
The 15 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| scholarship noun | /ˈskɑːləɹʃɪp/ | A grant-in-aid to a student. |
| merit noun | /ˈmɛɹɪt/ | A claim to commendation or a reward. |
| tuition noun | /tjuːˈɪʃən/ | The training or instruction provided by a teacher or tutor. |
| summarize verb | /ˈsʌməˌɹaɪz/ | To prepare a summary of (something). |
| internship noun | /ˈɪntɜːnʃɪp/ | A job taken by a student in order to learn a profession or trade. |
| bind verb | /ˈbaɪ̯nd/ | To tie; to confine by any ligature. |
| academically adverb | /ˌæk.əˈdɛm.ɪk.ə.li/ | In an academic style or way; from an academic perspective. |
| broaden verb | [ˈbɹɔː.dn̩] | To make broad or broader. |
| analyze verb | /ˈæn.əˌlaɪz/ | To subject to analysis. |
| rejection noun | /ɹɪˈd͡ʒɛkʃən/ | The act of rejecting. |
| horizon noun | /həˈɹaɪ.zən/ | The visible horizontal line (in all directions) where the sky appears to meet the earth in the distance. |
| coursework noun | An assignment, project or task that a student is required to complete as part of a particular course, which is then assessed and counts towards the grade given. | |
| prohibitively adverb | In a prohibitive manner. | |
| recap verb | /ɹiːˈkæp/ | To seal (something) again with a cap. |
| undergrad noun | An undergraduate. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| take out verb | To remove. | |
| pay back verb | /peɪ bæk/ | To pay (a debt or the lender) so as to provide the entire amount of money owed. |
| come back verb | To return to a place. | |
| come back from verb | To become successful, confident or effective again after an injury, setback, failure, embarrassment, etc. | |
| keep up verb | To maintain; to preserve; to prevent from deteriorating or falling. | |
| keep up with verb | To manage to remain beside or just behind someone or something that is moving away from one. | |
| slow down verb | To decelerate. | |
| stand up verb | To rise from a lying or sitting position. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- You're dealing with a lot of anxiety, stress.
- What if I give the wrong answer?
- What if I speak with wrong grammar?
- I don't like being an urban planner.
- Did you like this video?
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | I've seen · I've talked · have secured |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | are rejected · was offered · was given |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | horizons, which means · scholarship, which is · English, which was |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 24 contractions and reduced forms, such as you're, I'm, you've. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: scholarship /ˈskɑːləɹʃɪp/, tuition /tjuːˈɪʃən/, internship /ˈɪntɜːnʃɪp/, rejection /ɹɪˈd͡ʒɛkʃən/, graduation /ˌɡɹæd͡ʒuˈeɪʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: academically /ˌæk.əˈdɛm.ɪk.ə.li/, graduation /ˌɡɹæd͡ʒuˈeɪʃən/, pronunciation /pɹəˌnʌn.siˈeɪ.ʃən/, dissertation /ˌdɪsəˈteɪʃən/, municipality /mjʊˌnɪsɪˈpælɪti/
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 scholarship, merit, tuition.
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.