Learn & Remember MORE Vocabulary

hey what's up Stefanie the English coach here from EnglishFullTime.com in this video we are going to talk about how to learn and remember more vocabulary so you guys can start speaking more fluently and just feel more comfortable with English now I have many methods to share with you guys but what I want to say is that we all learn a little bit differently so there's not one way that will work for everybody you really have to test and see what works for you what you enjoy because when you enjoy the way that you're learning you learn more and you learn faster okay let me give you a quick example of this my husband loves studying languages he goes crazy he studies everything basically French Italian Russian I can't even keep track of all the languages that he studies and you know how he likes studying them he uses apps like duolingo and mango languages he loves using these apps and you know you can find him at any point of the day just sitting there with the app learning new vocabulary learning new words and then when he meets people that speak these languages he actually can talk with them but for me I don't like that method I cannot just sit and play with an app it's not my learning style it does not work for me and I'm just not interested in that kind of learning so I have other methods that work for me but maybe that method will work for you so it's something to consider if you're trying to learn more vocabulary okay before I tell you what will work and what has worked for me and what is amazing I want to tell you what doesn't work okay or at least what doesn't work for me cramming never works you guys should know this right we're all adults here or most of us are all adults we've all been through traditional education systems and we all know what happens when you cram maybe you're able to pass the test but then you don't remember anything the next day this happened to me all the time when I was in high school because in my history classes every Friday we would have a vocabulary exam we had to learn 10 new words each week and then take a test on those words and I never studied I was super lazy when it came to learning new vocabulary because I hated this learning method I was I was just so against it I hated it so basically what I would end up doing is right before the test when our teacher would give us ten extra minutes to prepare I would just read through all the words really quickly I would memorize the definition and I think you know because my brain was in survival mode like you have to pass this test then I was able to memorize all the definitions word-for-word it was incredible and then you know we would do the test I would get ten out of ten right every single time I had the words down the definitions everything memorized 100% but guess what the following week I never remembered what those words were okay so cramming like that does not work it's not a good method you want consistent exposure to English over a long period of time that is literally the best method okay so now I want to tell you guys about a youtube video that I saw years ago that was phenomenal and it's about the way that our brain works if I can find it I'll link it in the description for you guys to watch because it's truly really incredible so first in this video the narrator shows you a list of words ten words and says okay try to see how many of these words you can memorize and then after you see the list you have to write down as many as you can remember and I was able to write down like four maybe five I could not remember all the words and then the narrator told a story using those words and showed you images of the words as he was telling the story and then at the end of it he was like okay now how many do you remember and I was able to remember every single word and the reason is because that word was placed in a story there was context there was an image there was something for me to relate to and identify with so that is a big key for you and for me when we're learning languages and when you guys are trying to improve your English that the best way to really learn new vocabulary is one in context okay in a story because we remember stories and then using imagery as much as possible so for me this is why when I learn a new word in Spanish or something and I'm like oh man I keep forgetting what this word is I need to see it I need a visual I literally just go to Google Images I typed the word and then I see all these pictures and this is a fantastic way to learn new vocabulary you don't have to write it down and sit there memorizing it day after day trying to get that definition in your mind because words and definitions are all abstract okay they're taking something concrete they're making it abstract and then they're you're trying to memorize that in your mind and it's just not as efficient so trust me on this try it out next time you hear a word when you're like oh my gosh what does that mean or I don't understand it go look it up on Google Images okay even if it's a feeling or a word that is abstract like disappointed for example let's pretend you learn this word for the first time there's not really an image like ball you can see a ball right you can't see disappointed but you can because Google Images is going to show you pictures of people who are disappointed and you're gonna recognize the expression on their face because that's an expression we make in any language okay so that's just a quick example of how you can use imagery and use the fact that your brain remembers things better when it sees images to learn new vocabulary and remember it in English okay the next thing I want to talk to you guys about is social media because as you guys know it's already been proven that social media is highly addictive Facebook Instagram etc so what we can do is we can actually use this to our advantage all of your Facebook all of your Instagram account everything it should be in English but not just the account itself you know where it says settings and friend requests and all this stuff not just that okay but all of the content that you're seeing inside of Facebook all of the content that you're seeing inside of Instagram all of that should be in English so if you focus on a deeper motivation that you have not just English but something that you're really passionate about this could be related to your career related to your hobbies whatever it is but some that you love just follow pages and content related to that in English and because Facebook and Instagram is already so addictive in and of itself you're gonna be scrolling through your newsfeed for at least five minutes every day you're gonna be getting new words in English and it's just a really easy way to build your vocabulary so I'm gonna give you two examples of pages that I love following on Instagram all in English and if you guys follow pages like this you're gonna be learning new sentences and new words every single day so one type of page that I love following on Instagram is quotes like uplifting inspirational motivational quotes you can find pages where they post quotes every single day multiple times a day and if you're following 20 pages like this first of all you're gonna be feeling a lot more positive I think on a daily basis and you're gonna feel a lot more encouraged with whatever goals you're trying to achieve but you're also gonna learn new sentences new words new ways of structuring phrases etc okay and to find these pages just use the hashtag search function and go to hashtags and then type in motivational quotes or inspirational quotes and you'll start finding a bunch of pages that publish this kind of content the other kind of page that I love following on Instagram is pages about memes okay memes and jokes and funny things they make me laugh every single time and this is a really great way also to stay up to date on slang or to learn slang if you're following pages on Instagram that are nothing but memes your vocabulary is gonna increase without a doubt and your slang you're gonna start learning a lot more slang too and you're gonna laugh more because they're so funny okay so the next thing I want to say about this is that it takes time for the brain to process new information okay so you're not going to be able to learn hundreds of words every single day and you shouldn't even try because even if you learn the definition of a word you have to hear that word in context many many many many times before you really truly understand that word and can use it on autopilot so a lot of times I see students that hear a word for the first time and they start trying to use it but they're misusing it they're using it out of context because they don't really understand how to use it so sometimes I think it's better to just listen a lot more first and analyze how words are used and then once you feel like okay yeah I totally understand how this word should be used then you can incorporate it into your vocabulary and start using it now with all of that said there are times where you're gonna have to memorize a lot of words in a short amount of time and this happened to me when I had first come to Argentina it was my first year in the country and I decided that I wanted to start working as an independent beauty consultant and I was going to start selling and marketing different beauty products well it wasn't until that point when I realized oh my gosh I don't know how to say these basic words in Spanish that are related to makeup and you know doing your makeup like how do you say lipstick how do you say eyeliner how do you say blush how do you say eyeshadow these are all words that are related to makeup and doing your makeup and I didn't know any of them so what did I do I had to go look up all of this information and start memorizing like crazy and I remember that I printed a bunch of material I watched youtube videos in Spanish I was taking notes about how the girls were describing their makeup and describing how they were applying it I was taking notes and then I would practice I would do presentations in front of the mirror I would make people listen to me and I was basically like hey this is my job now I have to know these words I can't not know these words so that was really frustrating because even though I was studying every day I kept forgetting words and it felt like I was making no progress but you know what it took me about one week maybe or two weeks or a few days I don't remember but it was not actually that long it's just like when you're studying those new words that's when it feels like it's taking forever but then you look back and you're like hey you know it didn't that long so that method of writing words down studying their definitions looking them up etc and trying to cram as much into your brain in as little time as possible again it can work but it's not a good long-term strategy that's like if you're desperate and you're like okay I need a certain set of vocabulary terms ASAP that I don't know then of course that will work okay and my last tip here on how to learn and remember more vocabulary is to just start being more observant right we have active vocabulary and passive vocabulary what happens with a lot of you guys is you understand everything that I say so my vocabulary is in your passive vocabulary because you understand it but then when you want to speak a lot of times you don't have the actual words you don't have the fluency that's because you don't have my vocabulary built into your active vocabulary okay you have just a base vocabulary of whatever you're working with right now and maybe you've been incorporating a few extra words a week but if you really want to start improving faster you have to really listen to what I say and ask yourself what words is she saying that I don't use ask yourself that question and you'll start realizing oh she always says this phrase or she always says these words and I don't use them how does she use them and then once you start making those observations you'll be able to incorporate it into your speech and of course start having a bigger vocabulary and with that said the idea here is not to have a huge vocabulary it's just to be able to express yourself well you guys might notice that I don't use a ton of big words because I don't care about using big words I want people to understand me and I want to communicate what I'm thinking and what I'm feeling and in order to do that you don't need a huge amount of words okay you just need basic words okay though you can do this even without having an extensive vocabulary just remember that you should be focusing on chunks okay not necessary individual vocabulary words but chunks and phrases focus on one type of English because if you're trying to learn British English Irish English and American English or different types of American English and British English or whatever all at the same time you're going to drive yourself crazy it's better to just focus on one area so you can master that vocabulary and then move on so for example British English a lot of their vocabulary that's in my passive vocabulary I understand it but I don't use it okay so for you you can understand American English but speak British English or you can understand British English but speak American English or whatever you feel more comfortable with okay guys so hopefully those tips were helpful please let us know in the comments what tips you'd like to add based on your personal experience what works for you what learning styles you enjoy to improve your vocabulary we look forward to reading what you have to say and of course don't forget to check the description because I leave lots of links and lots of other information in the description for those of you who always ask no I don't offer private classes I'm so sorry but I do run several online programs that you might be interested in so again check the links in the description and you'll learn more about them there that's it you guys and I'll see you in another video bye

Channel: The English Coach

Views: 743,190

Keywords: Remember vocabulary, Learn vocabulary, the secret to remembering vocabulary, improve vocabulary in english, how to remember vocabulary in English, why I forget vocabulary, how to learn and remember vocabulary in english, English vocabulary, remember vocabulary, forgetting words when speaking, why I can't improve my english, english not improving, better vocabulary, best way to learn vocabulary, increase vocabulary, learn and remember english vocabulary, build vocabulary, vocab

Id: RE8Q1rIvQ7o

Length: 14min 21sec (861 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 17 2018