One of the biggest reasons people get frustrated and give up trying to speak a second language is because they don’t have a well-thought-out plan to learn grammar step by step. So how should we get started on the path to learning English and what should the overall process look like?
We’ve put together this article to share our suggestions.
How Do I Get Started Learning English?
Before starting to learn a language, it’s important for us to know about its characteristics.
Is English Pronounced the Way It’s Written?
Bear in mind that English is not a phonetic language. What does that mean? When a language is phonetic, it means that the letters of the alphabet are always pronounced the same way in any word. English is far from being a phonetic language.
Let’s take a look at some English words and their pronunciations:
city /sɪti/
clown /klaʊn/
chair /tʃeər/
In these examples, we can see that in each of the words, the letter ‘c’ is pronounced in different ways. Certain letters produce certain sounds when placed in specific positions within words. But it’s important to remember that overall, English is a language that doesn’t have many rules when it comes to pronunciation. That means that when we come across a new word that we don’t know how to pronounce, we need to listen to a native English speaker to learn its pronunciation.
Trying to pronounce a word based on rules or our own instincts is not likely to produce good results. The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) can be useful in this regard. The IPA Chart shows the phonetic transcription of words in brackets, just like we saw in the examples above. So when we don’t know how to pronounce a certain word, we can look it up in the chart and see its pronunciation. That’s why learning how to use the IPA is crucial to furthering our English skills.
English Pronunciation Varies From Country to Country
English is the official language of various countries like the United States, England, Australia, and Canada. It’s important to bear in mind therefore that it is spoken in many different accents and dialects. In some instances, the same word can be pronounced differently in an English accent than in an American accent.
For example: leisure
English – leisure /leʒə/
American – leisure /liːʒər/
In other instances, a word can have a similar pronunciation but be spelled differently in two distinct countries.
For example: aluminium / aluminum
English – aluminium /æljəmɪniəm/
American – aluminum /əluːmɪnəm/
Sometimes, countries use different words for the same meaning.
For example: pavement
English – pavement /peɪvmənt/
American – sidewalk /saɪdwɔːk/
Starting With Verbs is the Smart Way to Go
We definitely recommend you start your English learning process by first looking at personal pronouns and common verbs. This way, if you need to communicate something in English as a beginner, you can express yourself with simple sentences using your gestures and body language. When using the simple present tense, all we have to do is combine a personal pronoun with the bare infinitive of a verb.
For example:
I go
You take
He/She/It sleeps (exception! In the third-person singular, the verb always ends with an ‘s’)
We try
You fall
They come
If you’ve noticed, the third person singular takes on three different forms. He, She, and It. ‘He’ is used to describe males. ‘She’ is used to describe females. ‘It’ is used to describe animals and objects. The third person plural doesn’t have this distinction. We simply use ‘they’ to refer to a group of two or more, and also to refer to non-binary individuals who prefer to use ‘they’ as their pronoun.
Prioritize Your Goals
At this beginning stage, you shouldn’t worry too much about getting your sentences grammatically correct. What matters most is that we know how to use as many verbs in conjunction with personal pronouns as possible. In time, we learn how to use correct sentence structure with the right tenses and prepositions.
We also want to point out: there are two ways of learning a language. You can either study its grammar step by step, or you can learn it the way children do, by listening and speaking. Although both will get you to your goal, the latter method is much more effective and will ensure that you have a natural-sounding way of speaking. This does not mean however that studying grammar and reading books aren’t important practices. We’re only trying to say that people usually prioritize them way too much to get to their goal of learning the language.
Familiarize Yourself With the Language
If we want to learn English in a productive way, it’s important to prioritize spending time around native English speakers so we can analyze the language and familiarize ourselves with it. When doing so, we must not forget the significance of monitoring the language. By this we mean listening to the way people speak and seeing if the vocabulary, grammar, structures, and pronunciation they use affirm what we’ve learned or indicate a gap in our knowledge. And of course, filling that gap with the new information we’ve been presented with. It’s important that we surround ourselves with people who are native English speakers to learn the language, because if it’s their second language, they might make mistakes that we incorporate into our own way of speaking.
No Pain, No Gain
We can’t emphasise this next point enough: the only way to really learn a language is to practice speaking it. If we don’t get into the habit of using what we’ve learned to express ourselves, all the studying we do will be in vain. Putting our fears and anxieties to one side and practicing speaking the language will improve our skills and make us more confident English speakers.
If you want to practice your English with tutors from all around the world who are native English speakers, you’ve come to the right place by choosing Cambly!
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