mp4 Hello everyone and welcome back to English with Lucy. Today I want to talk to you about how you can improve your English listening skills. So I've got some 1 that I'm going to give you. If you do follow all of my English listening tips, then you should be able to start to understand native speakers more easily and more 2 . We've got a lot of 3 in this lesson, so let's get it started. There is a word I'm going to use it a lot in this lesson and it is 4 . I want you to use a wide range of resources and listen to a wide range of 5 as well. Why? Well, I know a lot of you come to me and say, “Lucy, I want to learn British English and to do that, I'm only going to listen to British speakers.” But in my opinion, that's not the right thing to do. You are going to meet people from all over the world with all different accents and you're going to need to understand them. You don't want to just be able to understand British people. So if you're not doing it already, I want you to listen to 6 . And when you're doing that, I want you to think about the different sounds that each accent makes. I made a video with lovely Anna from English-like a native about the differences between our accents. A lot of students found that really really helpful because there's not one 7 way of speaking English. There're a lot of variations: 8 variations, variations by country (I mean English spoken in New Zealand is very different to English spoken in America, for example). So you need to be able to 9 more or less everything and 10 your English. Focusing on that word Variety again, I want to talk to you about 11 . For my next point, I want you to ask yourself a question. I want you to answer yourself honestly. How much time do you actually 1 2 to practising and improving your listening skills? Answer it honestly! Most of the students that I asked say ”Around one or two hours”. And even then, they might be 13 a little bit. Now you've recognized that you're probably not practising enough, I want you to start practising. Honestly, practice makes perfect. You're not going to suddenly wake up and be 14 at listening. It takes time, it takes dedication and it is called a skill for a reason. It's something that you have to develope, 15 on your own and also with the help of others. But “What is listening practice?”, you might be asking me. Well, I've got lots of 16 for you, which brings me to my next point: Resources, and more importantly, Variety of resources. Now, the most obvious one is watching TV programs or movies in English. This is great, but I think you can 17 . Maybe you're watching programs with English subtitles. That's good, but you don't want to rely on the subtitles. I want you to learn 18 . So what I recommend you do, to take your listening to the next level, is watch each program or movie TWICE. Probably more achievable with programs, short ones. I'll recommend that you aim for something that's 19 . So you can try a comedy, like Friends, which is American English, or maybe BBC News, and you can just watch the headlines which will be British English pronunciation. So I want to to watch it first, with no subtitles, see how much you can understand. And then I want you to watch it again, with subtitles, and see what you did pick up and what you didn't pick up. And then 20 for next time. Don't be afraid to 21 things again and again and again. Learn the patterns of voice that we use. If you've got a listening exam or you're going to have a telephone conversation or some sort of interview over the phone, you're not going to be able to read the person's lips which can be really useful. So you really ought to practise 22 . So one really really good tip that often gets overlooked is use 23 . Reading is great for building your vocabulary, but it doesn't do much for your listening skills because what a book does not offer you is a pronunciation guide, normally. I'm sure some exist, they do. So I would like you to start to listen to audio books. Pick a book that is interesting and relevant to you. 24 . If you are quite a low level, choose a children's book. If you're more 25 , maybe go something for teenagers. And if you're advanced, obviously go for something that's aimed at adults or maybe has a lot of technical language. Remember that if you want to check your understanding, you can always buy the book as well. Listen to a section and then read it. Listen to another and then read it. This is a wonderful way of improving your listening comprehension. The best website for audio books is Audiable, and if you click in the link, in the description books, you can get a free audio book and a 30-day 26 . There's absolutely no catch, so try it out and see if it works for you. One resource that often gets overlooked is Youtubes. I'm not talking about us, lovely bunch of online English teachers that are all over Youtube at the moment or I think we could help you a little bit with your listening. You have an amazing resource, full of free videos and listening tools. Find something that you're interested in. Maybe you're interested in gossips, 27 , science, current affairs, search for English and start to listening to it. MY next point is 28 . Unlike reading or watching TV, listening is something that you can do whilst you do something else. So once you find your ideal resource, start to build a sort of pack of resources on your smart phone, on your computer that you can take with you. So if you have a long car journey, on the way to work, on the 29 , whilst you're doing something else like cooking, something you don't have to concentrate on, listen to something in English. And that links back to my question: how much time do you actually dedicate to practising your English? So see you spend half an hour traveling to work each day and half an hour traveling back home each day, and you listen to something in English for the 30 of those journeys, each week you'll be doing five hours of listening practice. That's amazing! If you do that, you'll definitely improve 31 . The really great thing is that you're doing something productive. And maybe learn about another topic through English that you wouldn't normally do. So it's really a 32 . My next tip is DO NOT TRANSLATE. Do not translate. When you are speaking to someone else in person, I want you to listen for context. Something I always say to my students is 33 . Now I speak Spanish fluently, but I do not speak it 100% accurately. I have no problem with listening, I have no problem with understanding and I have no problem with communicating. But if you were to fail me speaking Spanish and analyze all of the errors that I make, you'd find quite a view. It's really important to understand that you don't need it to be perfect. You don't need to understand every single word. You need to understand 34 . If you spend too much time analyzing each word, the conversation or monologue would move on by the time you finally understood the word that you were focusing on. So you actually then have to catch up and you lose understanding. So instead of listening word by word, listening to phrases 35 . My next tip is LEARN 36 . Ok? I want you to research into how natives speak. The way in which we write something is certainly not the way in which we say it. English is not a phonetic language and we don't always follow our own pronunciation rules, so what research can you do? Well, you can look at homophones, for example. These are words which have the exact same pronunciation but different spellings and different meanings. I've actually got a video coming out on homophones very soon which I'll put in the description books. An example of a homophone would be 37 , the same but different spelling and meaning. You can also look at minimum pairs. Minimum pairs are words that have the exact same pronunciation apart from a single vowel sound. An example of a minimum pair would be Ship & Sheep. /i/ & /i:/. Ship. Sheep. So the /ʃ/ and /p/ are the same, but the vowel sound is different. It's also important that you understand 38 . So we have strong forms of words and we have weak forms. For example, the word "at”. On its own, I say at /æt/, but sometimes if I'm using it in a sentence, or in a conversation and I'm speaking very quickly, I would say /ət/ with the schwa sound. I wouldn't say “at/æt/ 3 o'clock", I would say "at/ət/ 3 o'clock.” So it's important that you recognize that the schwa sound can represent many vowels. You also need to look at REDUCTIONS. I've got a video all about the reductions: wanna & gonna, which is also in the description books that will really help you out, especially if you really want to use those, I know a lot of you do, it's really a quick way of making yourself sound more native. And also 39 . I am vs. I'm, I will vs. I'll, she would vs. She'd. It's important you learn those. I'm also making a video on contractions, so when that's 40 , I'll also put that in the description books. So that's it for my lesson on how to improve your listening skills. Your homework is to 41 below, and tell me and everyone else how you are going to improve your listening skills. Now you've watched this video, I want to see you be 42 , and I want to see you make a change. I believe in you and you need to believe in yourselves too. Don't forget that I now upload on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays, and I also have a free live pronunciation and vocabulary lesson every Sunday at 4:30GMT, which is London time, on my English with Lucy facebook page. Don't forget to 43 me on all of my social media. My facebook and my instagram as well are most active, and you can also 44 to my mailing list, if you want to receive e-mails from me and hear about 45 before anyone else. All right then, I'll see you soon for another lesson!