Shadowing Practice: How to Make English a Habit - Learn English Speaking with Video

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To get fluent in English, you need lots of input Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours of input.
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And to do this, English has to be a habit.
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It has to be something that you do every day.
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and it has to be automatic It has to be something that you don't really think about because
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to do it for long enough that you can reach a high level.
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It has to be easy and it has to be Effortless.
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Now, there has been so much written about how to create habits and how to build habits.
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And I'm not going to repeat all of that because,
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like I said, you can go and research these sorts of things from people who know a lot more about
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the science and about the way the brain works.
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than I do.
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So today I'm just going to tell you how I made learning Spanish A habit? and hopefully,
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You can take something from this And maybe it will help you to make English more of a habit in your life.
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First of all, I listen to two hours of Spanish every day and that might sound like a lot of time,
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because it is, but I want to reach a high level of Spanish.
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quick.
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So I want to do it for as long as I can each day.
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So that's why I do two hours.
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But I didn't start.
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at two hours.
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I started small.
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and built up.
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So When you start making English a habit, I would...
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Start small, start with Five minutes.
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Just say today, I'm going to listen to five minutes of English.
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and do it.
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and something that worked really well for me was that I would do it at the same time every day.
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So after I finished work, I would sit down with my laptop, and listen to Spanish.
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and that is all I would do.
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I would do five minutes and this creates a reward in the brain because our brains love moving towards a goal.
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So if you can do something that is small,
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it still gives your brain that positive reinforcement that it needs to go and do it again.
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And the good thing about starting small is because
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it takes less activation energy you don't need to really motivate yourself to start because it's only five minutes.
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So you go and do it.
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Once you do this, once, twice, three times, you will naturally want to do more.
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So, Start small And then let the natural
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process of wanting to do more take over let that happen and you will soon find that you want to do.
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More than five minutes.
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and it will build from there.
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Now it's easy to say just do or watch your comprehensible input,
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watch your English at the same time every day and do it in one go.
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But that's not really realistic because we do so many
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different things in our day it's not always possible to have the same time every day
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available especially when you want to listen to a lot right because if I'm listening to two hours of Spanish
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I'm not going to do it all in one go.
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something that has worked really well for me is...
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I can't remember the name, the technical name, but it's basically doing Spanish while I do something that is already a habit.
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It's pairing Spanish with an activity that I already do.
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So I walk a lot so when I walk I listen to Spanish as well because Why not?
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What else am I doing?
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So if you can take a habit that you already have and then listen to English while you do it.
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That is such a good way.
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of, getting the repetition of listening to English doing it over and over.
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and helping you to form those habits.
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And again, the repetition here makes it automatic and that is what is so powerful about habits is because
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The first time that you do something, it requires effort.
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but the repetition makes it automatic and it removes that effort So you just do it.
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automatically without really having to think about it and with Spanish it's like
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that now for me I don't wake up every day and think "Oh wow,
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how am I going to get two hours of Spanish done?" It's just something that happens because I've built the habits.
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that mean as I go throughout my day, over the day.
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I gradually reach that two hour mark.
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I think something that's also quite useful in helping you to build habits is If you take a big goal,
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and you say, okay, I want to be conversational in English by this time Okay, how many hours of English do I need to listen to?
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To reach that, And then you say, Okay, so when do I want to reach that goal?
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then you can break it down and you can see exactly how much time every day, you will need to listen to English.
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And If that is something that you think you can do, That's great then go for it.
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But if it's something that you don't think you can do, That's fine you just might need to extend your timeline
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and realise that it might take a little bit longer then you think And the reason I talk about that
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in relation to habits is because if you have a big goal in mind if you have this outcome
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that you can see yourself doing I think that helps you be motivated to build those habits in the first place.
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If you have an end goal in mind and you have a timeline,
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I think it's really important to have a timeline in mind because it helps you to have realistic Expectations.
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and it can keep you motivated to keep going every day,
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especially before You've built those habits because at the start before you've built those habits, you do need a little bit more motivation.
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But then once you've got the habits, they really do a lot of the work for you and you can move towards your goal
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without really having to think too much about it.
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I would also recommend setting your target every day of how much you want to listen to,
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to slightly less then what you think you can do.
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It took me a long time to reach a point where I can listen to two hours a day and
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At the start, I told myself, "Oh, I'm going to do two hours a day
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and it's going to be great and I'm going to be able to improve really quickly.
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But I found out that it was too much.
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It was too much.
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And at the start, I think it's important if you have a lower goal, than what you think you can do because...
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Sorry if you can hear the plane passing overhead.
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but If you have a goal that is less than what you think you can do.
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Once you hit it, You can keep going, there's no problem there. But...
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If you have a goal that you're constantly not hitting, you're consistently falling short of that goal.
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It can be quite demotivating and
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I think it's really important to have the that positive reinforcement of successfully hitting your small goal every day
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Even if that goal is smaller maybe than what you think you can do, Again, I don't know loads about the brain,
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but I feel like it almost tricks you into um it basically just releases these Good feelings.
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inside you And I think it's really worth tapping into those feelings and tapping into that extra motivation.
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So don't set a goal that is too high.
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But by all means, If you are hitting your goal, go ahead and increase it because you'll end up speaking English even faster.
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I hope you found this video useful and remember start small,
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Have a timeline in mind have a goal in mind and
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Listen to English while you do something else that you normally do.
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And I think these things will help you to build a habit
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of listening to English that will help you to become a player.
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So, Thank you for watching.
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and I will see you in the next video.

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Why Practice Speaking with This Video?

This video is a goldmine for learners aiming to make English a daily habit, a key step toward fluency. It offers practical, relatable advice that you can immediately apply, making it ideal for shadow speech practice. By mimicking the speaker’s tone and rhythm, you’ll not only improve pronunciation but also internalize natural phrasing. The focus on habit-building ensures you’ll stay consistent, a critical factor in language mastery. Plus, learning through real-life strategies—like the speaker’s Spanish learning journey—makes the content engaging and easy to connect with, perfect for learn english with youtube sessions.

Grammar & Expressions in Context

The video uses several high-frequency structures worth analyzing. First, the phrase “it has to be” is repeated to emphasize necessity, e.g., “English has to be a habit.” This structure is essential for stating requirements clearly. Second, the speaker uses “start small and build up,” a phrasal verb combination that’s common in advice-giving. Mastering such phrases helps you sound more natural. Third, “pairing Spanish with an activity” demonstrates the gerund form for describing simultaneous actions—useful for explaining daily routines. Finally, “you don’t need to really motivate yourself” uses negation with “need to” to downplay effort, a subtlety that makes your speech sound more conversational. These structures are perfect for shadowspeaks practice, as repeating them helps solidify their use.

Common Pronunciation Traps

Pay attention to tricky words in the video. “Automatic” is often mispronounced with a stress on the wrong syllable; the speaker correctly stresses the third syllable: “au-TO-mat-ic.” “Reinforcement” can trip learners up—focus on the “in” sound followed by “force,” not “forse.” Additionally, the phrase “activation energy” has a soft “t” in “activation,” which can sound like a “d” in fast speech. The shadowing technique is ideal here: repeat these words slowly, matching the speaker’s stress and rhythm. Also, note the speaker’s casual tone—shortened phrases like “it’s not really realistic” use a relaxed “it’s” instead of “it is,” which is key to sounding natural in everyday English.

Grammar in this video

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

StructureIn the video
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters nowhas been · has worked · I've built
Possibility with “might / may” might/may + verb — something that is possible but not certainmight sound · might need · might take
Verb + -ing enjoy, keep, stop… + -ing — verbs that are followed by the -ing formstart making · love moving
Obligation: must / have to / need to saying that something is necessaryhas to be · needs to go · need to really motivate

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 →