Aww yeah! I'm Ethan, your RealLife English
Fluency Coach and I get this question all the time from learners like you, about how long
do I need to actually spend to learn English? In fact, just the other day Andrea was doing a
live over on Instagram and got this question, so we thought that it would be a fantastic
idea to make a lesson all about it for you. So to start out, are you of the belief
that the more time that you spend studying the better? Well I have a spoiler alert
for you, this is not always the case. So in this video we'll be covering topics like
the amount of time that you spend studying vs. the actual quality of that study time, a
little bit about how the learning brain works and finally how you can make
the most out of your study time. So we have broken this lesson down into five
topics. First of all, are you a pop learner? Then we'll talk about proficiency vs.
actual study time. Next, Break, a habit. Study like there's no tomorrow; and finally,
is the amount of time really that important? But quickly before we get into any of that
I want to let you know that if you are new here every single week we help you to understand
fast-speaking natives, to be understood by anybody and to connect to the world. Just like our fan
Keenan, who says that now he has the confidence to understand anybody. So we'll help you with
your comprehension and so much more. Just hit that Subscribe button and the Bell below and
you won't miss a single one of our new lessons. All right so this is not like a pop star
like Justin Bieber or Taylor Swift. POP, in this case stands for Proactive, Observant
and Patient, which are really characteristics that any exceptional learner has in common.
So first off being proactive. So someone who is proactive takes their learning beyond the
classroom, they see that they have to find the resources on their own and then their time in
class is really for an expert to kind of guide them and answer any doubts that have come up
while they are using that self-discovery time. So their teacher is there to help them figure
out what they could not on their own. So next I want to share with you a quote from someone
I really admire Barbara Oakley. So she says: So, by the way she has a fantastic Ted Talk
that I highly recommend that you check out because it's all about learning how to learn.
Now this might sound a little bit redundant, but is something so fundamental that hardly
anyone that I know was taught in school. I actually read her book A Mind For Numbers a few
years ago and it had a really big impact on me. And in fact so much so that I included it in
this list of 6 Life-Changing Books for English Learners. So if you want to learn more about that
I highly recommend that you watch that video next. So how can you make this proactivity a part
of your daily routine? You can use a technique called Layering, which is really fantastic because
basically you are just connecting the new thing that you want to learn to an already existing
habit. So that basically means that it won't cost you any extra time, so just to give you some
examples of this: you could listen to a podcast while you're going for a walk. You could listen
to a song in English while you're cooking and if you want extra points then you could actually use
a recipe in English, so you'd actually be layering three things there. Maybe you enjoy running
and you have a treadmill in your house. Why not watch a video in English while you're
doing your daily exercise? So this Layering is something that you can start doing all the time.
And the really fantastic thing is that all of a sudden you'll be adding all this extra time during
your day where you're having exposure to English. You might even find for example that if you start
listening to podcasts in English during your runs, that already you start to put on your shoes in
the morning and your brain switches to thinking in English, because you're so used to having these
two things paired together. And when you do one of these activities for some reason without
the other, so for example you go for your run and you forgot to download the podcast and
so you don't have anything to listen to, then you're probably gonna feel like something is
kind of off. It's just like you're missing that little bit of English exposure during that run.
So if you want to learn more about habits like this that you can develop, then I highly recommend
that next you check out this lesson, where I talk about the best habits to build in English.
So something else really powerful that you can do is make a commitment to yourself. And if you want
to take it to the next level you can even write it down this makes it a little bit more set in stone,
and you want to take it even further then share it with someone: tell your wife or husband, or a
friend or your child, that you're going to do this so you'll have that accountability tied to it.
So you can also be really specific when you do this and that's going to make it much more likely
that you will actually follow through with it. So what I mean by this is instead of saying that
tomorrow I'm going to listen to a podcast in English, you could say at 7am tomorrow while
I'm having my coffee I'm going to listen to episode 210 of the RealLife English Podcast.
So moving on from the P to the O we have being Observant. So someone who is observant
sees everything as a learning opportunity. So for example something that you could do is kind of
figure out what are the different things in your life that already are super automatic for you.
So to give you an example you probably look at your phone all the time you do different things
on there without really having to think about it, about where to click, about what button you
have to do to make a certain action happen. So why not put your phone, or another device, into
English? And another example could be putting your Facebook or your Instagram into English. Because
you already know how those interfaces work. Now, this is something really great because you're
taking something passive and you can actually turn it into something that is more active. And
we'll touch more on that later in this video. So something else an observant learner will
do is they will do a learning activity with a deliberate focus in mind, so what I mean by this
is for example they're not just going to put the podcast on in the background, they're going to
actually maybe set themselves some little mini goals while they're listening to it, or they're
going to listen to it in a very active way. So for example they're going to try to understand 80%
of what's said, they're going to try to identify five new words, they're going to try to
see if there's some aspect of pronunciation that they studied lately or maybe they'll find
some point of grammar that they studied recently. So moving on we have Patience. So this is all
about seeing learning as a process. So when trying to develop new habits it's essential that
you start small. Even just doing something for five minutes a day. Now the reason why this is
so important is because when we try to build a new habit our brain is so set in its ways that
it really does not want to change, which means that it's going to take a while for you really to
get that habit to the point where it is automatic. So what I mean by this is you don't need to finish
a course book in one sitting. You don't need to watch all the videos in a playlist from that new
English teacher that you found on YouTube. No one wakes up one day and just decides that they're
going to run a marathon. And in the same way you're not going to become native like in English
after studying for just three months. Along these same lines consistency is so much more important
than quantity. So for example learning really comes out of use, so even if you are able to study
that entire course book in one day, if you haven't actually put it into practice before you've
moved on to the new points that you're studying, then it's probably going to be a waste of time
because you haven't internalized what you've learned. So the bottom line for pop learners is
that speaking a language entitles living it. They are learning all the time. And they probably don't
even think so much about having to study English because it's just something that they do.
It's a natural part of their everyday life. Alright, so I want you to take a minute and
ask yourself, "Why am I learning English?" All right, do you have your answer? Well, whatever
your answer was this will directly influence how much time you are willing to invest in your
English learning. If you're not new here then it's no news to you how much we believe in the
purpose. So knowing why you are learning English as far as being a huge motivator propelling you
forward on your journey to English fluency. In fact it's a cornerstone of our RealLife way for
learning English, which I made a recent video on. Now maybe you've heard of the popular 10,000 Hours
for Mastery Theory. Well, this has been debunked. Maybe you kind of have that number in your head
if you have heard about this and you're thinking, "Oh my God, how am I going to find all the
time with my busy schedule to be able to study that much English and to achieve native
like fluency," right? Well I would personally recommend that you focus on progress rather than
expertise. If you're so focused on perfection, then that's only going to be a barrier in the way
of you getting better in the language, but maybe you are very left-brained and you really want to
have some number that you can have in mind. Well maybe the CEFR can help shed some light and help
us get a lighter and more achievable perspective. So according to this framework it takes
approximately 1200 hours to reach a level of native-like proficiency. But to be honest most
natives don't even have this level of mastery. So let's break it down. Now imagine that you are
starting an English course from zero. I know if you can understand anything that I'm saying
that that's not the case, but stick with me. But let's take a look at another example
that maybe is a bit more pertinent to you. So let's say that you're an intermediate, which
on this framework would be called the B1 level. So in this case this means that you already
had about 350 hours of guided instruction, which would be exposure, studies, classes, etc.
Or maybe that would even be self-study time. For some of you in order for you to become an
advanced learner, which would be C1 level, you would need another 400 hours of studies. So we can see how powerful it is to live your
English if you make it convenient, like we were talking about before, then you will save so
much time on your English learning journey. So here we're not talking about stopping a bad
habit. Rather we're talking about making a habit out of taking breaks. So these brain breaks have
actually been scientifically proven to increase the amount of productivity that you get out of any
sort of task. So one way that you could do this is with the Pomodoro Technique. Maybe you've heard of
this. But in a nutshell basically what you would do with the Pomodoro Technique is you do like a
25 minute of work, or 25 minutes study session, then you would take a short break (maybe
just three to five minutes). You do this several times and then you take a longer break.
Now the reason why this is so effective is because the brain does not cope well with monotony. So
if you are on the same topic or task for too long it can lead to fatigue, distraction, or lack
of focus. Just to give you an example of this most people work an eight eight-hour day, but
they're probably only productive for around two hours of that time. Now, suggestion for you is to
use this Pomodoro Technique to actually break up a task and mix in different types of tasks that will
make it more effective. So to give you an example, basically imagine that you have a grammar book
that you're wanting to study, so instead of spending one hour studying your course book on
the aspects of the future tense, for example, you could break this up into four 15-minute
chunks with five-minute breaks in between. You could make the breaks more effective, for
example by listening to a song in a completely different language, getting a drink of
water, maybe texting a friend because you've been alone too long you need a bit of
socialization, or getting a healthy snack. So maybe you're one of those people who
believes that sleeping is for the weak or who says that you'll sleep when you're
dead. Well I have some good news for you: sleep is actually for people
who want to be more effective. Now there are all sorts of benefits
to getting a good night's sleep and one that is really relevant to what we're
learning today is that it helps your brain to make connections. Consolidation happens while you're
sleeping and it's actually been scientifically proven that a good night's sleep increases
your declarative memory and procedural memory. So the expression "like there's no tomorrow"
is one that we natives use all the time, and it means basically that you're going
to do something without thinking about the consequences that you might suffer the next day,
or in the future. So just to give you an example, maybe after all this Covid nonsense what you
want to do is party like there's no tomorrow. But actually the way that we're going to use it today
is quite the opposite. So we're going to want to use it to focus more on what you're doing today
and not being so worried about the future, about how many hours you still have to study English for
example. And of course we were just talking about sleep and getting a good night's sleep is going to
be so much better when you can go to bed without having any major concerns in your mind. So what
does that tell us about homework and reviewing? Well the best practice is to actually review your
notes or do the activities the same day that you learned about a certain aspect of grammar, or
that you learned a certain list of words. But sometimes you might find that you're studying,
maybe it's late and you're feeling fatigued, and you're realizing that the thing that you
just studied is already out of your brain, you can't remember it. So Barbara Oakley tells
us that in this case it's much better that we take a break, or even that we go to bed. So it
can be good if you can to get out of the house, to go for a walk or go for a run, maybe play
soccer with your friends. What's going to happen when you do this is that in the background your
brain is going to be making connections between everything that you were studying before.
And exercise can actually help to increase this type of activity in your brain. Now a
study from the University of Alberta says: Maybe you have even experienced this yourself:
that the day after you had like a really intense study session, that all of a sudden something that
was really confused to you finally makes sense, you're finally able to put those puzzles
together. Now this is because while you're sleeping your brain is connecting the dots.
So finally to give you a study tip: retrieving information is so much more effective than trying
to just re-read your notes or re-read the page, or even highlighting in the book. And this is
because it improves your long-term learning and the declarative memory that we learned
about before. So something you can actually do while you're reading something, or while you're
studying something, is imagine as if you had to teach that subject to someone else. So maybe read
a section or read even just a paragraph or a page and then think without looking at your notes, "How
would I explain that to someone?" Maybe even think about how you would explain that to a child or to
your grandmother because this is going to help you to really simplify it in your mind. So I have
a challenge for you here, can you remember just a little bit ago what I mentioned were the
types of memory that a good night's sleep? So this really is the one million dollar
question, isn't it? But I think it could be so much more effective if we actually change
this question to "How can you make the most out of the time that you have right now?" James
Clear, who's an expert on habit formation, says: So you want to make that study time into a habit,
so that your brain looks forward to actually doing it. It's not something that you're dreading.
Don't force yourself to do things you hate, make the learning into an enjoyable experience,
because then when you have to do it your brain will automatically react with a positive response.
And I would encourage you to have a mix of lifestyle English, I think this is really the most
effective thing you can do. What I mean by this is that you have some passive learning so, for
example in the evening you can sit down and relax with your favorite TV series that you're watching
in English, with or without subtitles. But then you also have some deliberate practice. This
would be where you're sitting down maybe the next morning and actually studying the vocabulary that
you learned while watching that TV series. And of course it's really effective to have a plan, so
knowing when and what exactly you're going to study. And keeping in mind your big vision, what
do you really want to achieve, so really with all this it becomes more about the daily improvements,
about getting a little bit better each and every day, instead of focusing so much on having to
study grammar for one hour Monday through Friday. And my final piece of advice for you would
be: think more about how your English is going to bring you closer to the person
that you really want to be. And this is going to guide you to the answer of knowing how
much time you need to invest in studying it. So, as you've seen in today's video, there really
is no straight answer to this question about how long you should spend learning English. It really
is up to you. It depends on your goals and who you want to be or become. And it's going to be
different for each and every person, so if anyone tells you that you have to study English 10 hours
a week then don't believe them because that might be related to their goals. Or to the way that
they see it, it's not related to your needs, your life and your big vision for what you want
to become. So I want you to finish this video by considering the following aspects
that we've been talking about today. So first off, it's super crucial that you
make learning English a part of your life. Be proactive, and learn from and with your
environment. Be patient, you don't have to learn everything at once find your own process. And work
making breaks into an actual habit that you do while you're studying or while you're doing
those difficult things. Keep it interesting by varying your resources, your stimuli and even your
environment. And remember to get a good night's sleep, because otherwise you're not going to be
as effective as you could be. Study the content on the day that you've learned it, and always
test yourself after you've learned something new, even if it's just one line or one paragraph.
Instead of putting all of your focus on the time consider the quality of your studies and
how it's going to help you to become the person that you want to be. And again if you've
enjoyed this video then I want to invite you to join our community of English learners
who are going beyond the classroom. So you can do that really simply by hitting
that Subscribe button and the Bell down below. And now it's time to go beyond the
classroom and live your English. Aww yeah!!
