Shadowing Practice: What Makes a GOOD English Teacher? - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
1
Hey there, it's Hadar and this is the Accent's Way and this is the place for you if you are a non-native speaker of English who is looking to feel confident, clear and proud when speaking English.
2
Now have you ever taken private lessons with a tutor or an English teacher or even group classes and you weren't sure if this is the right teacher for you?
3
Have you ever wondered whether or not you're just wasting your time or actually seeing progress...
4
So this episode is about how to know if you are learning with the right teacher for you and if you are getting the best out of your training.
5
So let's get started.
6
The first thing you need to ask yourself is what is the emotion that you're experiencing once the class has ended.
7
Do you feel this bubbly excitement of success and improvement?
8
Do you feel defeated and challenged but you have clarity, you know what you need to work on?
9
Do you feel tired but happy?
10
Do you feel good about yourself?
11
Or do you feel like a failure? Do you beat yourself up?
12
Do you feel like you'll never be able to get it?
13
Do you feel self-conscious? Are you ashamed?
14
A good teacher will never let you feel bad about yourself.
15
Because a good teacher will always empower you, make you feel great about yourself, show your strengths but also your weaknesses with a clear strategy on how to improve that.
16
They will not keep you confused or stuck or feeling self-conscious and feeling like a failure.
17
You know I was once talking to a teacher that used to teach at this really big language school and he said that the management had asked them to understand what the biggest struggles of their students are and then to accentuate them, make them a big deal instead of helping them resolve it.
18
Why? Because it was their marketing strategy. It kept them in the school, it kept them taking more and more and more classes.
19
But it's a horrible strategy if you ask me.
20
But unfortunately, people do that. So you as an English learner, you need to understand what it is that you're experiencing and if the these are negative feelings then something is wrong. Because this is not how it's supposed to be.
21
Another thing you need to ask yourself is who does most of the talking?
22
If you find yourself just sitting there and listening to the teacher talk about English and about things and about rules and explaining all of these things to you and you find yourself not speaking as much it's a problem. Because you need to do most of the speaking with feedback, with guidance, with direction but you need to do most of the speaking. So if you find yourself mostly listening and reading or writing then you might be missing out on a better opportunity to practice because if you're learning just passively constantly it's just like watching a YouTube video you want to put it to practice right away and as much as possible. So this is something by the way that you can tell your teacher that you want to do you can say: "Hey, I feel like I'm not speaking enough. Let's try a session where we just talk about things that bother me, a few subjects, maybe read an article and then talk about it but I want to do most of the talking and you just give me feedback." Now of course when you go into a lesson it's easier to just sit down and listen and be less active but you got to catch yourself because if that's a situation you're wasting your time and money, right. So although it's easier and more convenient you got to step out of your comfort zone, you got to feel uncomfortable, you got to push yourself and you got to stand your ground and say what you need and communicate it clearly to your teacher.
23
The third thing you need to ask yourself is are you both aligned with what is the best way for you to learn? What is the best content to discuss? What is the best way for you to get feedback? Some people prefer to get feedback right away every time they mistake on every single thing, others prefer to get feedback only on the important things and some may prefer to get feedback only at the end so they don't lose their train of thought as they're trying to speak. You need to understand what works best for you and you need to communicate that to your teacher.
24
Because some teachers are sometimes teaching because that's what they think is best and if someone tells you: "No-no, I know what's best for you. You listen to me." That person is not empathetic or is sensitive to your needs.
25
Same thing with content if your teacher teaches you things that are not interesting to you or you feel you'll never use then you need to say: "hey, this doesn't work for me. Let's say something else. I want to talk about this and I need to talk about that and this is my world of content, this is where I come from.
26
I want to discuss technology and negotiations and practice small talk and I don't want so much to talk about hypothetical situations of Martha and Arthur at the zoo.
27
Understand that even if you are with the same teacher there isn't just one method of teaching English and you need to see if something's working for you, is it getting your results, do you understand it, do you pick it up quickly. If not there is a problem with a method, not with you, okay. It's not you that is the problem, maybe it's the method, maybe it's the energy maybe it's how you feel because when you feel self-conscious the brain shuts down and you don't learn anything new. But when you feel empowered and open and challenged in a good way then you are open to change. In order for you to learn something deeply in order for it to stick you need to associate good emotion as you're learning and if the feeling is of frustration and fear then it's not gonna stick, okay.
28
So you need to be aware of that and change whatever need to change in order for you to create the best circumstances for yourself.
29
The fourth thing is do you know your 20 percent?
30
According to the Pareto principle, 80% of the results come from 20% of the causes.
31
So if we look at the business world for example then we can say that 20% of the products lead to 80% of the revenue or 20% of the clients are responsible for 80% of the income.
32
So in English it's very much the same thing.
33
If you work on the areas where you struggle with okay whether it's specific grammar rules or specific sounds or an element of fluency, if you work on that and just on that it will get you 80% of the result of where you want to be.
34
So you need to know what are the things that will get you the best results and your teacher needs to recognize those things and tell you, communicate to you what they are.
35
So whether or not you need to work on your present tense because everything else is great but you always get stuck when you try to speak in the present tense and what do you need to do in order to improve that.
36
Or let's say that in terms of clarity you have all these things in your speech but you don't need to work on all the sounds. It's enough that you work on the R and on your rhythm and it will give you a huge boost to your clarity.
37
So your job is to know what your 20% is, what are the things that you still struggle with but if you resolve them it will kind of like open up the gates to fluency and you will feel a lot more fluent, you'll get stuck less and you'll be a lot clearer and focus just on that and you two need to do that together. So if that hasn't been communicated to you just yet then you need to ask your teacher to tell you what those things are and ask your teacher to focus on those things as you're learning. But if they don't know and they start giving you all of these things and every time they give you feedback they give you a lot of notes about everything and you feel overwhelmed and confused then there's a problem even when you get feedback the feedback should be the 20% the things that will get you the best results because you don't need to start correcting every single thing it will be super inhibiting and almost impossible to grow from there.
38
The last thing is do you feel intellectually challenged?
39
Do you feel that your teacher sees you as a peer, as a person who can conduct a conversation, an intelligent conversation with this language barrier, yes with less vocabulary but still the content is engaging and interesting.
40
If you feel that they're speaking to you like a little kid it will make you feel like a little kid.
41
So you need to feel that your intelligence is not compromised.
42
You need to be able to talk about deep things even if it's not perfect, even if you make mistakes and even if you're lacking the vocabulary.
43
Your teacher is there to help you, right.
44
But you don't need to feel like you are only talking about stupid things just because it's an English class.
45
No, that's the wrong direction.
46
And of course, you can tell your teacher that and change that.
47
Take charge of your training, okay?
48
So to conclude, you have to be responsible for the time that you're investing.
49
Don't leave all responsibility to the teacher.
50
Sometimes they don't know what they're doing, sometimes they think that they're doing the best thing for you when in fact it's not and you it's like in a relationship right if you're not gonna speak up nothing will change and then at the end, you will quit and everyone loses, okay.
51
You lose time and money and they lose an opportunity to really help someone, okay.
52
So communicate your needs, understand your needs, understand what is not working for you and then change it.
53
So to conclude, I want you to take action and answer these two questions in the comments below: The first thing is tell us about one really good experience with a teacher and one not so good experience with a teacher and why that happened and what did you do about it?
54
The second thing is what to your opinion makes a good teacher? Right.
55
What are you looking for in a good teacher.
56
So I named my five things. I'm really curious to hear what are the things that you are looking for in a good teacher.
57
So just so you know you don't really have to take private lessons or group classes in order to improve your English.
58
You can do that on your own and if you want to do it watching YouTube videos and using online resources I'd be happy to help you.
59
So don't forget to subscribe and hit the bell to get notifications and you can also visit my website to get a lot of free stuff, free courses and really feel the improvement.
60
Improve significantly.
61
Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you next week in the next video.
62
Bye
📺 Same Channel
B1How to Pronounce the -ED ending in English (past tense pronunciation)
Business EnglishDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B2American English Vowels | IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) vowel chart FREE DOWNLOAD
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
![American Accent🇺🇸: Master the FLAP T and R transition [water, daughter, better, computer]](https://img.youtube.com/vi/RdAiGn7RB4I/mqdefault.jpg)
B1American Accent🇺🇸: Master the FLAP T and R transition [water, daughter, better, computer]
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B21
American rhythm practice with a metronome exercise
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B23
3-minute fluency practice
Daily Conversation
B21
You Speak English. But Are You Actually Showing Up? | JOIN THE CHALLENGE
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
![10 MIN Daily Pronunciation Practice for English Learners [Challenge mode🔥]](https://img.youtube.com/vi/A1R6fw2_FaE/mqdefault.jpg)
B136
10 MIN Daily Pronunciation Practice for English Learners [Challenge mode🔥]
Daily ConversationHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B12
15 Minute Morning Pronunciation Practice for English Learners
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B12
Boost your PRONUNCIATION, GRAMMAR and VOCABULARY with this 10-min daily exercise | Hadar’s #SPRINT
Business EnglishDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B22
Small Talk Success: A Simple Trick to Go From Awkward 😬 To Brilliant 😎
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
A24
Practice your intonation
TeensDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B14
25 daily phrases to practice your connected speech
TeensDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B26
Read out loud with me! Atomic Habits PART 1 - Practice vocabulary, pronunciation and intonation
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
C1Bored of Practicing English? Try These 5 Awesome Methods
Daily Conversation
B16
Practice the best tongue twisters for clear pronunciation
Daily ConversationHigh School StudentsUniversity Students
B24
You’re learning vocabulary WRONG (Here’s what to do instead)
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B1A new way to practice irregular verbs (pronunciation practice)
Business EnglishDaily ConversationHigh School Students
B25
Read out loud with me! Atomic Habits PART 2 – Vocabulary, pronunciation and intonation
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B22
Practice with The Devil Wears Prada 2 | Listening & shadowing FAST ENGLISH
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B12
Learn English with The Last of Us | Shadowing Exercise for Pronunciation and Intonation
Business EnglishDaily ConversationHigh School Students
✨ Recommend Video
B2153 sentences
Who Can Make You Speak English Fluently?
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B21
100 sentences
Train Your Ear to Hear English Rhythm and Melody
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B21
129 sentences
How to Be a Confident Teacher: 16 Tips to Unlock Your Potential
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B21
205 sentences
Chapter 1: A Better Way To Learn English
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B21
106 sentences
Why Some People Become Fluent — and Others Stay Stuck
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B1657
16 sentences
How good does your English NEED to be? | Why perfection isn’t the goal.
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B1104 sentences
How to stay Motivated to speak English / Tips to keep Learning when you’re stuck
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B21
176 sentences
How to Stop Translating and Start Thinking in English | Simple English Podcasts
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B2216 sentences
English Podcast | Why You Should Stop Trying to Sound Like a Native Speaker
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B22
97 sentences
How I Learned English (didn’t speak it until I was 18)
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B2198 sentences
Why You Need To Train Your Ears First, Not Your Eyes | English Tips
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
Why Practice Speaking with This Video? Boost Confidence & Clarity Fast!
Want to level up your English speaking? This video is a goldmine for IELTS speaking practice and everyday fluency. It’s not just about rules—it’s about real, relatable tips to find the right teacher and take charge of your learning. By shadowspeak (repeating the speaker’s words aloud) along with the dialogue, you’ll master natural intonation, pacing, and confident communication. Plus, you’ll pick up phrases like “step out of your comfort zone” and “associate good emotion” that work in both casual chats and formal settings. It’s like having a free coaching session—perfect for learn English with YouTube fans!
Grammar & Expressions in Context: Speak Like a Pro
The video is packed with practical structures. Let’s break down 3 key ones:
- “Do you feel…?” (Question structure for self-reflection): Use this to discuss emotions, e.g., “Do you feel empowered after class?” Great for shadow speak practice—repeat the rhythm to sound natural.
- “If you find yourself…, it’s a problem” (Conditional for identifying issues): Perfect for giving feedback or self-assessment. Try: “If you find yourself not speaking enough, ask your teacher to adjust.”
- “In order for…, you need to…” (Purpose + action): Use this to explain goals, e.g., “In order for skills to stick, you need to practice daily.” It’s a must for clear, structured speech.
Common Pronunciation Traps: Avoid These Mistakes
Even native speakers stumble here—let’s fix them! The word “empower” has a silent “w” and stress on the first syllable: EM-pow-er, not “em-POW-er.” “Intellectually” is tricky—break it into “in-tel-LEK-choo-uh-lee” to avoid muddling the middle. And “Pareto” (from the Pareto principle) is pronounced puh-RAY-toh, not “PAIR-toe.” Practice these with shadowspeaks—repeat the speaker’s tone and stress to nail them.
Remember: You’re in control of your learning. Use these tips, speak up, and watch your confidence soar. Happy practicing!
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 resolve them it will kind |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | has ended · hasn't been communicated |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | been communicated · is not compromised |
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.