Shadowing Practice: The problem with traditional language-learning - The Fluency Habit Podcast - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Hey, and welcome to another podcast episode.
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My name is Meredith with phoneticfluency .com.
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In today's episode, I'm going to be talking about the problem with traditional language learning techniques.
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This is going to apply to you regardless of what your native language is
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and regardless of what language you're trying to learn or have already learned.
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What I want to talk about is how traditional language learning takes these abilities
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that naturally should be the final step to complete your language learning journey, and it puts them at the very beginning.
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And when we do this, we learn language in a way that actually hinders your fluency later on.
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Hinder is a word that means like to limit or to make harder or something.
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So when you learn in this way, it hinders your ability to really become a good communicator in your target language later down the line.
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So to introduce this, I want to remind you of your first language learning experience.
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So I want you to think back again, regardless of what language it is, I want you to think back to the first time you ever had a language class
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if you're a typical member of my audience you might be a native spanish speaker who learned english in school
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so think back to that first day you ever had an english class
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and what was the first thing that happened in that class
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and maybe even more importantly how was information presented to you that day
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so whatever you thought of i'm willing to bet it was probably one of the following things
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you either remember your teacher asking you to take out your textbook
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and open the textbook to a certain page
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or the teacher handing out a worksheet that you're going to start filling out
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probably a conjugation table most likely or a list of vocabulary words
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or the teacher writing something on the board for you to copy down leave me a comment
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and let me know if that was the case but
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that was more likely than not probably what you thought of
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when you think of your first day ever taking a language class
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and what do all of these have in common the common denominator is
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that in all of these situations language is presented to you as something visual
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that is something on a piece of paper in a book
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or on a board that you see with your eyes
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and interpret you did not learn your native language in this way by the time you were introduced to letters
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and reading and writing you could already have complete conversations you could You could argue, you could express your wants and desires,
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and complain about things, and talk about the weather, and basically you were a fluent speaker of your native language by the time you were taught how to spell your name.
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So we need to ask ourselves, why is this suddenly reversed when it comes to learning a second or third or fourth language?
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When it comes to learning a foreign language, why do we start with writing before we can even speak?
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so that is essentially the main problem with traditional language learning
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and the reason that this is a problem the reason this holds you back later on is
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that language in essence is oral
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in this case i'm not talking about signed languages such as
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asl i'm talking about the language i'm speaking right now
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or spanish or any languages that you speak with your mouth language is oral.
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And so what that means is I make sounds, I speak and your ears hear me and you interpret the things that I,
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the sounds that I make and you understand me and you move your mouth, make sounds.
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I hear the sounds of my ears and I interpret them and I understand you.
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So language in essence is oral.
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Writing is simply a visual representation of the oral language.
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And in the long history of language development and evolution, writing is really, really new.
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If we think about language developing over thousands and thousands of years,
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being able to write something and use our eyes to interpret language is a relatively new phenomenon.
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The mistake that traditional language learning methods make is treating the written language as the real language
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and the oral language as this thing that we do and it may or may not match to the written language, which is like the real thing.
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You'll also see this in outside of the foreign language learning community, like outside of the foreign language learning world, you'll see that people who are kind of elitist about language,
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they tend to really rely on the written language.
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They'll be like, ah, in the dictionary, it's not like that.
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That's not the real conjugation.
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It's not supposed to be that way
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when they're talking about the way people are actually speaking
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because in every language i don't think there's a lot of exceptions here you can let me know
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if you can think of one
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but i don't think there's a lot of exceptions here
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that most languages the way they're spoken
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and the way they're written are different yeah like what's considered appropriate for writing a formal email
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or an essay is not going to be the same as what's considered appropriate to say out loud
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and people who are kind of elitist about
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that they tend to correct people's actual spoken language to be like ah you said this
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or you did that and that's not what the book says and the book is the real language
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This is a mistake that way of thinking about thing is called a prescriptive.
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So you're prescribing how the language is supposed to be taking the written as the real thing
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and then saying the way you speak should match this thing, the written thing.
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But the goal of writing down and codifying languages should be descriptive.
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So the real language, because remember languages oral, the real language is what we speak, the things that native speakers say naturally, that's the real language
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and what we write down is just a description of that and should match that.
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I'm going off a little bit on a tangent, but that's the thing.
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Traditional language learning makes the mistake, which many people make, of thinking that the written language is the real language
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and the spoken thing is some variation of that.
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Therefore, when you learn with a writing -first methodology, you form a certain understanding of these words,
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and when native speakers say something different than what you expect, to you, it sounds like they're speaking too fast or,
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or maybe even like they're saying it wrong or like native speakers are not speaking clearly, but this is fundamentally wrong because the spoken language is the real language.
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The other thing that makes it problematic to learn in a literacy first approach
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that is reading and writing first approach is you build your understanding of the language on a false foundation.
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Let's keep this example very simple by saying we're talking about languages
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that use the roman script so
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that is english french spanish italian like all these languages
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that use a b c d e f g right
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so we all have the same alphabet
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but we do not at all all have the same sounds we have very very different sounds
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so if you are literate in your native language you already have a map in your mind between the letters
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and the sounds
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so letter a makes this sound letter b makes this sound letter c makes this sound
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and so on when you start learning another language and first day of class you are writing things down, reading a textbook, filling out a worksheet,
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you're starting to create an understanding of the new language
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that is fundamentally incorrect because you're using the same letters but those letters are not representing the same sounds.
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So fundamentally how you learn that word, your mind is gonna map that word to the sounds of your native language
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and so your expectation of how
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that word should sound is fundamentally incorrect this is basically inevitable
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so what that means with this false foundation is that
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when you hear a native speaker use this word it's going
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to be different than the map you've created in your mind
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and so you're not going to understand the word and then
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when you try to use the word you're going to use your pronunciation you've created in your mind
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and native speakers aren't going to understand the word
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so you don't understand and you can't be understood
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so this is extremely frustrating for most people and it feels like something's wrong with your language ability abilities.
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So if it's English, for example, you're like, Oh my God, my English is so bad.
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No, you're using the right word, but fundamentally the right word is in your head,
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but it's registered in an incorrect way because you registered it with the sounds of your native language.
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And this is kind of an inevitable problem of learning with a reading and writing first approach.
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And I would say as a pronunciation coach, The majority of the incorrect pronunciation that I hear is completely due to this fact.
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When people pronounce words wrong, it's because they're pronouncing the spelling of the word as it should sound if they read it in their native language.
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It's going to totally affect everything about how you understand and how you speak, which is essentially your goal, right?
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Your goal isn't to read and write perfect emails.
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Your goal is probably to communicate with other people to communicate with native speakers And if you've learned with writing first,
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this is fundamentally gonna mess all of that up Let's look at an example and the word is radio
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It's spelled the same in English Spanish
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and Portuguese R -A -D -I -O this word is pronounced differently in all three languages
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because the letters are mapped to different sounds in each language So if your native language is English, the letter R to you makes a sound like er,
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the letter A in this situation makes it sound like A, the letter D sounds like D, the I and the O are going to make a sound like E, O.
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So we get a word, radio.
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If your native language is Spanish, the R sound, the letter R, makes a sound like r or r.
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This would not make sense to an English speaker.
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They look at a letter R and they think er, but if you're a Spanish speaker, you look at a letter R, you think r.
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right?
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Same thing with A makes the sound A, D makes the sound D, E, O makes the sound E,
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or sorry, I, O makes the sound E, O.
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So then we get the word radio.
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Sounds totally different from the English one.
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Then in Portuguese, I'm a beginner in Portuguese, so sorry if I don't get this 100 % right, but the letter R, when it's at the beginning of a word, makes it sound like H.
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The letter A makes it sound like A.
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The letter D, when together with an I, is going to make a sound like G and the letter O
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when it's at the end of a word makes it sound like ooh so we end up with had you
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Let's hear that.
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Radio.
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Radio. Had you.
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Completely same spelling, completely different pronunciations.
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So this is just an example to show you that how in your native language you map letters to sounds.
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This is going to hinder you if you try to learn a new language,
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looking at it visually, looking at letters rather than learning through what language essentially is, which is oral and auditory communication.
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So what happens when you learn this way, when you learn based on this false foundation, the language exists in your head.
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And if you study for a long time, it probably exists pretty good.
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You might have a pretty high level of this language.
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So the language exists in your mind.
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You understand reading, you write well, you can pass tests, but then when it comes to speaking, you say things in this language,
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you try to speak, you try to join a conversation and you can see in people's eyes that they don't understand you.
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and when they speak to you you don't understand them
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so again you've done all the work technically of learning this language
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but you can't really understand it and speak it and
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so this is super super frustrating this is the problem
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that most of my students are dealing with
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because they've learned in this traditional way
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so in real life your language abilities are not judged based on theoretical abilities like grammar
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and vocabulary in real life your language abilities are judged based on how it feels to talk to you
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and how it feels to talk to you is all about the auditory experience
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so that means do people understand the words
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that you say based on your pronunciation
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if you have bad pronunciation they won't understand the words you say do the things
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that you say fit into the flow of the conversation that's being had this is based on your rhythm
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and if you never learn about rhythm and melody
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and language you're not going to flow with other people who speak this language.
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But I want to highlight that if you're dealing with these problems, which so, so, so many people are, it's not your fault.
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It's because of this traditional language learning methodology, this methodology that puts literacy reading and writing at the forefront of language learning and saves everything else for the end.
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If you get to it at all, the reason this is so common is because of this, this methodology, right?
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So like you meet so many people, I have talked to so many people who are also from the united states
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and say like oh yeah i took spanish for like five years
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and i can't say a word that's crazy five years of your life dedicated to actively studying
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and learning something and you can't actually use it
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because the purpose of language is to use it to communicate in this language and
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if you spend five years learning like this reading writing memorizing
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trying to solve language like an equation with conjugation tables like
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okay this verb put in this position becomes this that's treating it like math
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and language isn't like math so that's why this situation is
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so so so common so
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if you are in this situation it is not your fault it's the system
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that failed you that's the issue in essence now let's talk about the solution
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and the solution to this is going to depend on where you are in your language learning journey
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so if you've already learned the language using this literacy reading writing first approach
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and And now you need to go back and correct kind of what's been done wrong.
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Or if you're starting a brand new language from day zero.
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So most of my students are in the first camp, so they have already learned English using the traditional language learning methods,
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and they've spent years cementing bad pronunciation habits and bad language habits
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that now they're going to need to undo and try to relearn.
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So we're going to talk about that solution first.
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and then after that i'll talk about what to do
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if you are starting from absolute zero in a new language
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so correcting the first thing that we have to understand is that language is again oral
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and so that means it's something i'm doing with my mouth it's not cerebral it is physical
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me understanding grammar me knowing a lot of vocabulary
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and being able to pull from
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that vocabulary to use it in a conversation yes that's something that's happening in my brain
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but the actual act of me making language out loud
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that another person will understand that is physical it's 100 physical it's not like math or history
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which a lot of times that's how we treat it in
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traditional language learning it's more like learning to play an instrument
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or learning how to dance or learning how to ride a bike it's something
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that at the beginning you start
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and it feels like this is uncomfortable in my body
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because your body doesn't know how to do it yet
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And you have to overcome that discomfort and train it
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and teach your body something new
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and each time you do it It gets a little bit easier
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and easier and easier until the point we can do it without thinking about it when I speak my native language
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there's really not any thought going into how I'm moving my mouth.
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I just moved my mouth and I make the sounds I need to make.
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And I'm just thinking about the ideas, the things I want to say.
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But the reason I can do that without thought is because I've been speaking my native language my entire life.
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And so I have years and years and years of experience doing this automatically.
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When I was a baby, I couldn't do it automatically.
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And so I had to go through
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that awkward phase of trying to move my mouth in ways
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that would make the correct sounds and then getting to the point where I was making sounds people now understood.
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So it's a physical ability.
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So going back to the thing about dancing, I'm not a naturally good dancer.
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Let me rephrase that.
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I am naturally a good dancer in like a freestyle way.
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Like if I just go on a dance floor and kind of like start moving around, like I feel like I'm a good dancer mainly
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because also in the U S like a lot of people don't like to dance like that.
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Sorry, side note.
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A lot of people don't like to dance like that.
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People are kind of like awkward about it.
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And so if they see me like actually dancing, they're like, wow, you dance really good and it's just
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because i actually dance uh anyway
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but for like coordinated dancing choreographed dancing i don't feel like i have a natural ability for
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that it's not very easy for me
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but since i moved to mexico i've been really interested in latin dance specifically salsa this started with cumbia like
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and when i say cumbia that's going to mean different things to different people
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because there's also like cumbia colombiana which means one thing
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but here in mexico especially like mexico city if you say cumbia this means like cumbia sony data
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certain kind of like latin rhythms
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that are danced in a certain way here in mexico city
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and that's what i saw in parties so i wanted to dance like
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that this seems not related
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but i promise it is related i'm going to get back to how it relates to language
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so that's the first thing i wanted to learn is i
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want to be able to dance with people in parties
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so i learned how to do like you know mexican cumbia dancing
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and mexican cumbia dancing involves like the main basic step is a diagonal step
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so i'm here and then one foot goes backwards diagonally
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and then comes back and then backwards diagonally the other foot
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and then comes back and
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so on that's the basic step in Mexican cumbia well eventually I started wanting to dance salsa cubana
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which is also very popular here and
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when I started this the basic step of salsa was
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so hard for me because unlike the basic step of cumbia it's backwards
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and forwards so cumbia is diagonal and salsa is forward, backwards, forward, backwards.
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And so every time I would come out of a turn in salsa, I would like want to immediately start going into this diagonal step.
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The reason why is because I had trained this diagonal step through repetition
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so many times that now it felt natural to me.
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It felt automatic, like something I could do without thinking about it, which is the same thing that happens with speech.
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We train habits until they become automatic.
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When When I speak my first language, I'm speaking automatically without thinking about moving my mouth consciously.
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It just happens.
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And so when I started dancing salsa, it was really impossible for me to do the basic step of salsa
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because my body was conditioned to automatically do the basic step of cumbia.
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And this was so annoying and so frustrating and like teachers would be like, well, if you speak Spanish and you are from Mexico, maybe you'll know like, no lo vayas a cumbiar,
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they would say like, don't do it in like a cumbia way.
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For me to learn the basic step of salsa was actually
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a lot harder than someone who had never danced a Latin dance before, because I had to overcome a habit that I already had deeply ingrained,
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which was the cumbia step and undo it and override it to get the salsa stuff.
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But I was able to, even though it was harder for me with enough practice.
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Now the salsa step feels normal and I can switch back to the cumbia step when I want to.
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So when I'm dancing salsa, I can put my mind in like, okay, I'm dancing salsa.
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So my step is going to be backwards and forwards.
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And if I'm at like a wedding or whatever, and I want to dance like Mexican Cumbia, I can start doing the diagonal step with no problem.
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So I can easily go between the two.
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How did I do this through repetition practice?
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The only way to make a physical thing become so ingrained in your body that it's automatic is through repetition.
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The only way you can learn to ride a bike is riding a bike a lot of times.
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The only way you can learn to dance well is repeating a certain step that you're trying to learn many, many, many, many times.
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So that's exactly what I did with the salsa step.
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I learned through repetition practice and perfected it.
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The exact same thing can happen with your pronunciation.
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Your challenge is you already have reading literacy.
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You understand the language in a very like cerebral way at a pretty high level probably, but your brain has cemented a lifetime of incorrect sound to
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letter mappings you have to do the hard physical work of breaking the habit
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and while you're doing this you're also retraining your ears
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and retraining your mouth so that means
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that you start to hear the sounds correctly you start to make the sounds correctly yourself
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so this is going to improve your listening comprehension of understanding native speakers
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when they speak to you and this is also going to make your pronunciation better
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so they understand you better so it's going to improve both your comprehension and you being understood by others.
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I say it's hard physical work, but I would say, let me rephrase that.
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It's actually not hard.
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It's very, very simple what you have to do.
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It just requires dedication of deciding that you're actually going to do it and the dedication to do it every day.
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So that's the gist of retraining.
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If you've already learned language on this false foundation, incorrect letter to sound mapping, because you learned with a literacy first approach,
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you need to go back to the basics of phonetics
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and retrain your ears and your mouth to understand the sounds of your target language appropriately
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and remap the letters to their actual sounds in the new
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language rather than the sounds of your native language okay now
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i'm going to talk about i'm going to talk about the other solution
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which is when you're starting from day one starting from absolute zero on a brand new language now
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if you're in that position where you're starting a brand new language you've never learned before, and you don't have these bad habits submitted, this is ideal.
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You're in the perfect position to actually learn the language very, very well with a proper foundation of properly understanding the differences in phonetics between your language,
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any other languages as you speak, and this new language.
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So again, I want to remind you of how you learned your first language.
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When you think about how you learned as a child, you had people around you all the time, family members, you know, your parents,
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who were patiently repeating things to you over and over.
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Even the little kids' TV shows and things like that that you watch, they say the same stuff over and over so that you can hear it many, many times.
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So you're getting all this auditory exposure to the sounds that you're supposed to be making, and you repeat back.
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And here I want to mention something.
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A lot of my students, I get the feeling that they consider themselves visual learners, so they like need to see something to learn it,
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but no one is a visual learner when it comes to language because no one learns their first language visually.
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We all learn our first language the same way, auditorily.
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We have our input coming into our ears of the sounds that other people are making, and we start like making sounds, and we're like trying to make sounds.
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We don't know what we're doing.
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We don't know how we're doing it, and we're just making sounds until eventually through our ears, we're able to see that the sound that they made and the sound that I made.
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Now they're close.
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And we also get feedback from the people around us because they're like, yeah, good.
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You know, when you make a sound, that's like the correct sound for whatever it is you're trying to say.
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So that's how we learn our first language.
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Now I am not saying that this is how we need to also learn our second, third and fourth languages.
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There are some people in the language learning community online, the people who are not part of the traditional language learning, but people like myself who have their own brands or whatever academies.
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And there are some people who are like, oh, we have to treat it like we're children again.
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No looking at letters at all.
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Don't ever even involve your native language in the learning process.
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You need to start from like a blank slate and only be absorbed in comprehensible.
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And I don't agree with this methodology.
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I mean, if you like that, you could do it.
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But the thing is as adults, we do have certain advantages over children.
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You might not get it right away, but as an adult, if I tell you, you need to make your lips more round, you're going to know basically how to do that.
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A baby won't know how to do that
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so you have an advantage over a baby in
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that way another thing is you already speak fluently your native language
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and so we can use this as a benefit
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so all of these words you already know in your native language
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if there's a connection to the language you're trying to learn for example between english
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and spanish so many cognates
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that end in shun in english will be sion in spanish
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like celebration celebration essentially the exact same word just pronounced in an english way and pronounced in a Spanish way.
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So that's a benefit you have as an adult.
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And finally, the last thing is etymology.
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We can look at a word like, for example, in Spanish, the word for lighthouse is faro.
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And this comes from the same origin as the word pharaoh in English.
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So if you can just kind of say in your brain, okay, somehow lighthouse and pharaoh are connected, this is going to help you remember that lighthouse in Spanish is faro.
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So we have advantages over babies as adults.
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So there's no reason to totally discard all of our adult learning capabilities.
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We can still use them.
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But what's going to be the same as how we learn
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as children is learning with a focus on communication first and literacy last the same way you learn your native language.
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You were already speaking, having conversations, not perfectly, but having conversations by the time you learned how to read and write.
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If you're starting from zero with a brand new language, I want you to try to do it the exact same way.
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All your focus is going to be on hearing and speaking.
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And then later we add in the reading and writing element.
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When you do it this way, this prevents the writing from being a limiting factor, because as we saw in the beginning,
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learning prematurely how to read and write will actually negatively impact your ability to speak and understand.
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So when you learn in this way, you will avoid that.
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So if I were starting from zero on a brand new language, the first thing that I would do is start with the phonetics clearly.
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So, uh, there's a couple of different ways to do this.
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Uh, what I would do is go to the Wikipedia page for the phonology of whatever language it is.
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So imagine I'm learning French.
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So I would go on Google and type in French phonology.
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The first result will be the Wikipedia page for French phonology.
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And there you'll see lots of symbols.
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You don't have to know how to read the IPA to do this, but learning to read the IPA is just helpful in general, if you're interested in languages.
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So probably should.
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But anyway, you can click on these sounds, click on these symbols, which represent sounds, and then you'll find an audio file and you can click play
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and you just click play over and over and try to make it.
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So let's imagine we're learning the French sound.
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I don't, I haven't spoken French since high school, so I don't know if I'm doing that 100 % right, but I think I'm close to it.
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So let's just say I'm on Wikipedia and I'm clicking play over
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and over and over on the sound and I'm hearing and
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so I'm like messing with my mouth to see how I can also make
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and I'm using my ear as the tester to verify that the sound I'm making sounds like the sound I'm hearing.
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Let's make the example about English.
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So let's say you're trying to learn that pesky sound of American English.
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If you're a Spanish speaker, you're going to be wanting to make something like ah ah like in casa ah
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but the sound is different so it's ah
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so you're on the wikipedia page you click on the sound
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you click on the recording you're like hearing it ah ah ah
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and you're like ah ah ah
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and your ear is telling you something isn't matching there you're hearing ah you're making ah
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and you're like noticing that that's not right
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so you start moving your mouth
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and like adjusting these tiny little things until the sound
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that comes out of your mouth sounds exactly like the sound that you hear.
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This is called mimicry.
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This is what we all use as babies to mimic the people around us
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and make sounds that sound like the sounds that they make.
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That will be the first thing I do is like just explore all of the sounds of my target language
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and hone my ability for mimicry to mimic and imitate the exact sound
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that I hear and make the sound that I make sound like what I'm hearing.
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This is also going to help you tune your ears to sounds
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so as you do this you're accomplishing two things you're unblocking
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your ears you're opening your ears to properly hearing these sounds
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and you're opening your mouth unblocking your mouth abilities to be
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able to make all of these sounds in your target language
386
from there i would listen to some audio content you don't have to understand it even
387
if you understand absolutely nothing that's okay
388
but this is gonna help you continue to recognize the sound
389
so then you start listening to the language in like a podcast or audiobook or youtube video and you're like, Oh, okay.
390
And you're starting to hear those sounds in context.
391
And you're like, Oh, that was that sound.
392
Oh, that was that sound.
393
At this point, you could also start imitating it.
394
So again, even with zero understanding, you start imitating and making the same sounds that you're hearing in the audio content that you're listening to.
395
That should only take a couple of days, right?
396
After that, I would do an audio only course.
397
The ones that I know and recommend are language transfer,
398
which is at language transfer .org and Pimsleur which is spelled P -I -M -S -L -E -U -R.
399
Language transfer is free and I really admire the project
400
that language transfer is and Pimsleur is paid but
401
if you have a library card you can also borrow it on the Libby app from your library.
402
Anyway the point is you need to find an audio course.
403
It doesn't have to be one of these two.
404
It can be any audio course but it needs to be a 100 % listening only course.
405
Now obviously in this process it's going to be impossible to
406
100 % avoid seeing the written language it's going to happen but i would recommend waiting until you're
407
most of the way or maybe even all the way through an audio course and then start introducing
408
written language and this part you should do with a teacher
409
so find a teacher of the language that you're learning
410
so you will tell your teacher i want to understand what letters make what sounds and
411
so the teacher is going to help you understand okay this
412
letter in our language makes this sound you're gonna make okay in my language it makes this sound
413
but in this language it makes this sound let me give you an example
414
or rather remind you of the example we already had in
415
radio the letter r in english sounds like r in spanish it sounds like
416
or if it's like it could be like
417
so anyway it's a tapping thing in portuguese in certain situations
418
such as at the beginning of a word it sounds like huh
419
that is one letter three different pronunciations
420
so you will make a note okay in my native language this letter sounds like this
421
and now in this language it sounds like this and
422
so now you have a much better foundation to start reading
423
and writing because you know
424
that the letters make different sounds you've spent a lot of
425
time studying the audio part of the language the phonetic part of the language hearing the language
426
and treating the language as a
427
auditory and oral thing now we can start introducing the visual aspect
428
and you're gonna avoid this mistake of incorrectly mapping different sounds
429
and letters according to your native language so you'll do
430
that with a teacher
431
and then at this point of your language learning journey i
432
would do as much comprehensible input as possible comprehensible input means input that is auditory things like podcasts,
433
YouTube videos, TV shows, movies, audio books, whatever you can consume auditorily that you understand.
434
It doesn't have to be 100%.
435
They recommend something like 80%.
436
So as long as you're understanding like 70 to 80 % of what you're listening to, perfect.
437
In fact, if it's 100%, it's probably you need to find something a little bit more difficult.
438
So as much comprehensible input as you possibly can, create a virtual immersion where you're You're hearing this language all the time.
439
And then just below that, as much speaking practice as possible, you're going to be, you know, having conversation practice with a teacher or whatever during this process,
440
as you come across new words, you know, I love studying my vocabulary words with the app Anki.
441
I'm going to make a video soon about how Anki works and how to set it up and all that stuff.
442
But for now, find another video, um, or check my channel.
443
Maybe I've already put it out by the time you're watching this, uh, yeah add my new words to enki and add audio so
444
that means like okay i'm an english speaker
445
so the first side of the card will just say the word i don't need to add audio
446
because i know how to say it in my native language
447
so let's say the word is radio okay
448
so the first side of the card says radio
449
and then on the reverse it says radio but if i'm learning portuguese the audio will say had you
450
so that i don't start saying radio if i'm speaking portuguese okay
451
so add new words to enki with audio and again as much comprehensible input as humanly possible followed by a
452
pretty good amount of output practice speaking conversation practice at this stage you still want to avoid reading
453
and writing as much as you possibly can obviously as I said it's impossible to avoid at 100 %
454
but just use it only as needed you know like
455
if you're writing a note if you want to remember a word later
456
and you have to write it down in your target language with writing do it
457
and then you know later you can look up the pronunciation
458
with an audio source you know as you're having class your
459
teacher's probably going to use written materials like it's okay at this point now
460
that you're very comfortable with the phonetics of the language it's okay to start using the written language
461
but the point is your number one focus should still be audio
462
and oral that's always going to be the the most important
463
thing that's the source of truth of the language is what you hear
464
and can say and then writing comes below
465
that that's how you learn language with a phonetic focus first the same way
466
that you learn your first language so
467
that the sounds are correctly mapped in your mind you're able to correctly interpret them
468
when you hear them and you're able to correctly produce them
469
when you speak so that means you understand native speakers
470
when they talk and native speakers understand you when you talk
471
which is ultimately the goal of learning a language actual human communication and being a good communicator at At this point, now you can start reading and writing.
472
I mean, if you want to, depending on what language that you're learning, learning the reading and writing part at the end could be relatively easy.
473
Like for example, with Spanish, the sounds and the letters are pretty one to one.
474
Some letters make maybe more than one sound, but it's pretty easy to learn.
475
But again, because you can't really avoid written language the whole time, you're probably going to start learning some stuff anyways.
476
So this part won't take very long.
477
That's it for today's podcast episode.
478
Just in conclusion, let's remember a couple of things.
479
The real language is the spoken language.
480
Writing is just a tool.
481
And that's why when you learn as traditional language learning has you do with writing and reading as the first part,
482
you set yourself up on a false foundation
483
because you understand language as a visual thing
484
and the auditory part is going to be mismatched with your visual understanding of the language
485
so to really become fluent
486
and be a good communicator in another language you have to put the spoken part first okay
487
so if you like this video please leave a comment let me know your thoughts about the things
488
that i had to say let me know
489
if you want to see more content like this let me know i don't know whatever comes to your mind
490
and uh if you want more content from me make sure you subscribe
491
and you can also click the link to get my free
492
pronunciation guide for spanish speakers it covers the five most common pronunciations uh issues
493
that spanish speakers have in english and it has some audio files
494
so that you can retrain yourself to do these correctly
495
and doing so will also subscribe you to my newsletter where you'll get all kinds of like videos
496
and tips and tricks from me.
497
So that's it.
498
I will see you next time.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “The problem with traditional language-learning - The Fluency Habit Podcast”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: language, sound, learning, word, letter. This video has 498 sentences and 6854 words to shadow. The speech runs for 34:42. The speaker talks fast, about 198 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 87% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is easy to follow.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| audio adjective | /ˈɔ.di.oʊ/ | Focused on audible sound, as opposed to sight. |
| salsa noun | /ˈsɑl.sə/ | A spicy tomato sauce of Mexican origin, often including onions and hot peppers. |
| pronunciation noun | /pɹəˌnʌn.siˈeɪ.ʃən/ | The formal or informal way in which a word is made to sound when spoken. |
| oral adjective | /ˈɔː.ɹəl/ | Relating to the mouth. |
| ear noun | /ˈɪə̯/ | The organ of hearing, consisting of the pinna or auricle, auditory canal, eardrum, malleus, incus, stapes and cochlea. |
| input noun | /ˈɪnpʊt/ | The act or process of putting in; infusion. |
| habit noun | /ˈhæb.ɪt/ | An action performed on a regular basis. |
| correctly adverb | /kəˈɹɛk(t).li/ | In a correct manner. |
| incorrect adjective | /ˌɪn.kəˈɹɛkt/ | Not correct; erroneous or wrong. |
| literacy noun | /ˈlɪtəɹəsi/ | The ability to read and write. |
| fundamentally adverb | In a fundamental or basic sense; reaching the very core of the matter. | |
| backward adjective | /ˈbækwɚd/ | Situated toward or at the rear of something. |
| methodology noun | /ˌmɛθ.əˈdɑ.lə.d͡ʒi/ | The study of methods used in a field. |
| vocabulary noun | /vəˈkæb.jə.lə.ɹi/ | A usually alphabetized and explained collection of words e.g. of a particular field, or prepared for a specific purpose, often for learning. |
| interpret verb | /ɪnˈtɜː.pɹɪt/ | To decode the meaning of a topic and then act, whether to continue researching the topic, follow through, act in opposition, or further the understanding… |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| come back verb | To return to a place. | |
| fill out verb | /fɪl ˈaʊt/ | To complete a form or questionnaire with requested information. |
| go back to verb | To stem from; to originate in. | |
| write down verb | To produce or set (something) down in writing; to record something. | |
| come across verb | To change sides; to cross over to work for the opposition. | |
| get back to verb | Return to (an activity) | |
| go back verb | To return to a place or state after having been there at a previous time. | |
| go off verb | To explode. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- Your goal isn't to read and write perfect emails.
- How did I do this through repetition practice?
- It's very, very simple what you have to do.
- We don't know what we're doing.
- Just in conclusion, let's remember a couple of things.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result | if you have bad pronunciation they won't understand · if i'm learning portuguese the audio will say |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | have already learned · you've created · you've learned |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is presented · were introduced · were taught |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | language, which is · people who are · speak, which is |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 184 contractions and reduced forms, such as you're, I'm, don't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: methodology /ˌmɛθ.əˈdɑ.lə.d͡ʒi/, mathematics /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/, rhythm /ˈɹɪð.əm/, theoretical /ˌθi.əˈɹɛt.ɪ.kəl/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: pronunciation /pɹəˌnʌn.siˈeɪ.ʃən/, essentially /ɪˈsɛnʃəli/, exception /əkˈsɛpʃən/, celebration /ˌsɛl.ɪˈbɹeɪ.ʃən/, dedication /ˌdɛdɪˈkeɪʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: pronunciation /pɹəˌnʌn.siˈeɪ.ʃən/, literacy /ˈlɪtəɹəsi/, methodology /ˌmɛθ.əˈdɑ.lə.d͡ʒi/, vocabulary /vəˈkæb.jə.lə.ɹi/, naturally /ˈnæt͡ʃ.(ə.)ɹə.li/
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 audio, salsa, pronunciation.
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.