Shadowing Practice: Tom Hiddleston- Letters Live, All this I did Without You - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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July 31st. 1978.
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My darling McGeorge, You said that things seemed clearer.
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when they were written down.
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Well, here with a very boring letter in which I will try to put everything down
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so that you may read and reread at horror at your folly in getting involved with me.
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Deep breath.
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To begin with, I love you.
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with the depth and passion that I have felt for no one else in this life.
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And if it astonishes you, It astonishes me as well.
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Not, I hasten to say, because you are not worthy of loving.
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Far from it.
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It's just that First of all, I swore I would not get involved with another woman.
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- Thank you.
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Secondly, I have never had such a feeling before and it's almost frightening.
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Thirdly, I would never have thought it possible that another human being could occupy my waking
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and sleeping thoughts to the exclusion of almost everything else Fourthly, I never thought that even if one was in love.
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One could get so completely besotted with another person so that a minute away from them, felt like a thousand years.
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Fifthly, I never hoped.
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aspired, dreamed, that one could find everything one wanted in one person.
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I was not such an idiot as to believe this was possible.
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Yet in you, I found everything I want.
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You are beautiful.
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Gay, giving, gentle.
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idiotically and deliciously feminine, sexy, wonderfully intelligent and wonderfully silly as well.
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I want nothing else in this life than to be with you.
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to listen and watch you Your beautiful voice, your beauty.
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to argue with you, to laugh with you, to show you things and share things with you.
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to explore your magnificent mind to explore your wonderful body.
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to help you, protect you, serve you, and bash you on the head when I think you're wrong.
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Not to put too fine a point on it, I...
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Consider I'm the only man outside mythology.
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to have found the crock of gold at the rainbow's end.
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But having said all that, Let us consider things in detail.
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don't let this become public but Well...
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I have One or two faults.
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Minor ones, I hasten to say.
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For example, I am inclined to be overbearing.
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I do it for the best possible motives.
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All tyrants say that.
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But I do tend, without thinking, to tread people underfoot.
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You must tell me when I'm doing it to you, my sweet, because it can be a very bad thing in a marriage.
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Thank you.
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Right.
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Second blemish.
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- Thank you.
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This actually is not so much a blemish of character as a blemish of circumstance.
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Darling, I want you to be you in your own right.
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and I will do everything I can to help you in this.
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But you must take into consideration that I'm also me in my own right.
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and that I have a head start on you.
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What I'm trying to say is that you mustn't feel offended if you are sometimes treated simply as my wife.
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Always remember that what you lose on the swings, you gain on the roundabouts. But I am...
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an established creature in the world and so on occasions You will have to live in my shadow,
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and nothing gives me less pleasure than this, but it is a fact of life that has to be faced.
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Third, very important and nasty.
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Pleimish.
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Jealousy.
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I don't think you know what jealousy is, thank God, in the real sense of the word, I know that you felt jealousy over Lincoln's wife and child,
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but this is what I call normal jealousy and this to my regret is not what I've got.
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What I have got is
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A black monster that can pervert my good sense my good humor and any goodness that I have in my makeup.
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It is really a Jekyll and Hyde situation.
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My hide is stronger than my good sense and defeats me.
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"How do I try?" As I told you, I've always known that this lurks within me,
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but I could control it and my monster slumbered and nothing happened to awake it.
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And then I met you.
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And I felt my monster stir and become half awake when you told me of Lincoln and others you've known.
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"With your letter, my monster came out of its lair, Black, irrational, bigoted, stupid, evil and malevolent.
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You will never know how terribly corrosive jealousy is.
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It is a physical pain.
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as though you'd swallowed acid or red -hot coals.
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It is the most terrible of feelings.
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But you can't help it. At least.
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I can't.
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God knows I've tried.
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I don't want any ex -boyfriend sitting in church when I marry you.
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On our wedding day, I want nothing but happiness.
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both for you and me.
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And I know I won't be happy if there is a church full of your ex -conquests.
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When I marry you, I'll have no past.
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Only a future.
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I don't want to drag my past into our future and I don't want you to do it either.
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But remember, I am jealous of you.
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Because I love you.
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You're never jealous of something you don't care about.
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Thank you.
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Okay, enough about jealousy.
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Now let me tell you something.
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I have seen a thousand sunsets and sunrises.
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on land where it floods forest and mountains with honey -colored light.
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At sea, where it rises and sets like a blood orange, in a multi -colored nest of cloud.
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slipping in and out.
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of the vast ocean.
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"I've seen a thousand moons.
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Harvest moons like gold coins.
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Winter moons as white as ice chips.
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New moons like baby swan's feathers.
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I've seen seas as smooth as if painted.
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Colored like shot silk or blue as a kingfisher.
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or transparent as glass or black and crumpled with foam.
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moving ponderously. and murderously.
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I felt winds straight from the South Pole.
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bleak and wailing like a lost child.
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Winds as tender and warm as a lover's breath.
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Winds that carried the astringent smell of salt and the death of seaweeds winds that carried the moist, rich smell of a forest floor.
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The smell of a million flowers.
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Fierce winds that churned and moved like the sea, like yeast.
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or winds that made the waters lap at the shore like a kitten.
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I've known silence.
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The cold, earthy silence at the bottom of a newly dug well.
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The implacable stony silence of a deep cave the hot, drugged, midday silence.
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when everything is hypnotized and stilled into silence by the eye of the sun.
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The silence when great music ends.
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I've heard summer cicadas cry so that the sound seems stitched into your bones.
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I've heard tree frogs in an orchestration as complicated as Bach.
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singing in a forest lit by a million emerald fireflies.
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I've heard the keyers calling over the gray glasses
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that groan to themselves like old people as they inch their way to the sea.
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I've heard the hoarse street vendor cries of the mating fur seals, as they sang to their sleek golden wives.
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The crisp, staccato admonishment of the rattlesnake.
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the cobweb squeak of the bat.
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and the belling roar of the red deer "Knee Deep in Purple Heather." I've heard wolves baying at a winter's moon.
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Red howlers making the forest vibrate with their roaring cries.
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I've heard the squeak, purr, and grunt.
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of a hundred multicolored reef fishes.
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I have seen hummingbirds flashing like opals around a tree of scarlet blooms.
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humming like a top.
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I've seen flying fish.
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skittering like quicksilver across the blue waves.
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drawing silver lines on the surface with their tails.
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I've seen spoonbills flying home to roost like a scarlet banner across the sky.
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I've seen whales.
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black as time.
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cushioned on a cornflower blue sea.
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creating a Versailles of fountain with their breath.
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I've watched butterflies emerge and sit.
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trembling while the sun irons their wings smooth.
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I've watched tigers.
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like flames.
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mating in the long grass.
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I've been dive -bombed by an angry raven, black and glossy as the devil's hoof.
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I've lain in water warm as milk.
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soft as silk.
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while around me played a host of dolphins.
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I have met a thousand animals, and seen a thousand wonderful things.
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All this.
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I did without you.
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This was my loss.
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All this I want to do with you.
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This will be my gain.
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All this I would gladly have forgone for the sake of one minute of your company.
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for your love, Your voice.
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your eyes, hair, lips, body, and above all for your sweet, ever surprising mind.
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which is an enchanting quarry.
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in which it is my privilege to delve.
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About This Lesson
In this lesson, you will practice your English speaking skills by engaging with an emotionally charged letter performed by Tom Hiddleston in the "Letters Live" event. The heartfelt nature of the transcript not only provides rich vocabulary but also offers insights into personal emotions and relationships, which can be a great topic for conversation. By shadowing Hiddleston's performance, you will enhance your English speaking practice and boost your confidence when expressing complex feelings in English. This exercise will also assist in preparing you for the IELTS speaking practice by developing your ability to articulate thoughts clearly and expressively.
Key Vocabulary & Phrases
- Darling - a term of endearment used to express affection.
- To be besotted - to be very much in love or infatuated with someone.
- Waking and sleeping thoughts - refers to the constant thoughts one has during both awake and sleeping hours.
- Crock of gold - a metaphor for finding something extremely valuable or fulfilling.
- Idiotically and deliciously feminine - a colorful way of describing someone’s allure and charm.
- To tread underfoot - to dominate or overwhelm someone, often without realizing it.
- In your own right - refers to someone being valued for their unique qualities and contributions.
- To help and protect - phrases that indicate care and support in a relationship.
Practice Tips
Using this transcript for practice can significantly enhance your improve English pronunciation skills. Here are some tailored tips for effectively shadowing Tom Hiddleston's performance:
- Listen Carefully: Before attempting to shadow, listen to the video multiple times. Pay attention to intonation, rhythm, and emotion in his delivery.
- Start Slow: Begin by mimicking short phrases or sentences. This can help you get accustomed to the speed and emotional weight of the speech.
- Focus on Emotion: Notice how Hiddleston expresses various emotions through his voice. Try to replicate that emotional quality in your shadow speak, adding depth to your pronunciation.
- Record Yourself: Record your voice while shadowing. Listening back can help you identify areas for improvement in both pronunciation and emotional expression.
- Use Pauses: Don’t rush. Take pauses where Hiddleston does, allowing time for expression and understanding of the context.
By consistently practicing with this video, you will not only develop your language skills but also gain confidence in communicating complex ideas and feelings in English. Engaging with such rich content is an excellent way to learn English with YouTube while preparing for speaking assessments like the IELTS.
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 | have felt · have thought · I've always known |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | were written · are sometimes treated · be faced |
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.