Speak Your Way To Fluency

In order to speak well, you have to speak a lot.

Hi there, Steve Kaufmann here, and today I want to talk about

talking your way to fluency.

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I do appreciate it.

So we often, you know, hear people say that they can talk their way to fluency.

People have the impression that speaking the language is the key to becoming

fluent in the language, the key to learning the language, we have to use it.

In Japan, they have these, you know, groups, English conversation groups

where people gather around and speak in English and, and so I think the idea that

you're gonna speak your way to progress in the language is, is quite popular.

And I'm not saying that that's, you know, counterproductive.

But I would like to suggest some ways to make it more effective.

So I think there are two possible scenarios, or two polls here.

One is that you're in a place where the language is spoken.

You're surrounded by the language.

You have lots of opportunity to use the language, and I think in that situation,

speaking your way to fluency can work.

Remember, in order to speak well, you have to speak a lot.

So the only question is when are you able to, or when should you

speak more and more and more in order to get better at speaking?

So, uh, when I was in Japan, wherever I had an opportunity, I

was in the country, I used whatever little bit of Japanese that I had.

Although I maintained my input activities.

So if you're surrounded by friends, you're in the country, you've met people, maybe

you have a common interest, you're playing tennis or you're into some other activity.

So you're with people that you know, uh, it's a comfortable environment.

It becomes increasingly a familiar environment.

Uh, you have common interests, so actually your input, excuse me, your

output, your speaking is triggering input for you because you are able

to participate initially just a little bit, eventually more and more.

And when you talk about something, something more or

less familiar to you comes back.

I always found, even when I'm quite good in a language, an

unfamiliar, you know, situation, it's much more difficult for me.

Whereas if it's a familiar situation, I can react, I can almost

predict what's going to be said.

And I think if you're in a country where the language is spoken and

you're with people a lot, and familiar people and subjects that, uh, you are

comfortable talking about, uh, and you get more and more input back at you,

then you are learning and improving in a situation, and you're learning

primarily because of the input you're getting back, and also to some extent,

because you're outputting some of the same words and phrases and concepts.

So that's a, an ideal scenario.

Takes a while to get traction, but slowly, slowly, slowly by being with

people, friends of yours, you do improve.

But let's look at the other situation.

Let's say that as is the case with me right now and many language

learners, you're in a place where the language is not spoken.

So you have to now create opportunities to speak typically with an online

language partner or with a tutor, or perhaps you can find people in

your, you know, wherever you live, that speak the target language.

But that's more difficult to organize.

So inevitably in the second scenario, you are speaking less often, so

you are getting less, you know, input material coming back at you.

What can you do?

Well, here again, I think you have to organize as much

input material as possible.

And as is the case when you are in a, you know, situation where you can speak

a lot, you wanna try to, you know, input or find input or surround yourself with

input material that is familiar, that is comfortable for you, and therefore

depending on your level in the language.

You can go to the mini stories, particularly if, uh, you have learned

another language, say at LingQ, and so the mini stories are already familiar to you.

Then you can learn a second language with these mini stories, but even if

it's your first language that you're learning, because the mini stories,

the same content basically repeats.

So familiar is good.

The more familiar the content is, the better you're learning.

And then as you progress in the language, you'll be, I think you

want to bring in content to listen to that is of interest to you.

maybe you're familiar with it.

It might be sports, it might be some other, even, for example, a series

on Netflix where the same people, the same family meets, you know,

every episode familiar is good.

Also, it now gives you something to talk to your tutor about.

I have begun with, uh, say Persiabn doing the mini stories and then having

that tutor ask me those very same questions that show up in the mini story.

Uh, I've even read with her reading the mini story because Persian reading,

Persian for me was very difficult.

So you can use the mini stories as again, familiar content.

Later on, you can work with your tutor.

So that your online conversations can deal with something that is of interest

to you, which could be sports, which could be cooking, which could be whatever.

And the tutor might even help you find content that's in this area of interest.

So again, you're dealing with material that's familiar to you, that's gonna

make it easier to talk about those to speak, and it's gonna make it

easier to use that input material to power up your ability to speak.

So to summarize, I think whether we can speak our way to fluency

or not depends on where we are.

But in either case, whether we are in a place where the language is

spoken or whether we are not in a place where the language is spoken,

we are gonna need a lot of input.

And the more familiar that input is, the more we're dealing with things that you

like, the better off you're gonna do in the better you're gonna do in both cases.

And in both cases, you'll be more comfortable talking about

things that you're familiar.

So just a thought on, uh, this issue of, of, uh, speaking your way to fluency.

So I hope that was helpful and I have spoken on this subject before,

and I'll leave you with a couple of videos that talk about the

relationship between input and output.

Thank you for listening.

Bye for now.