how I learned English by myself in a lazy way without studying (advice from a polyglot)

Summary

In this video, the speaker shares how they learned English in a fun and relaxed way without attending an international school or living in an English-speaking country. They provide practical steps, such as watching videos without subtitles, mimicking speakers with emotion, and incorporating reading and self-talk. The speaker emphasizes the importance of enjoying the learning process and involving emotions for faster improvement. They also discuss how putting oneself in an English-speaking environment can significantly boost fluency. The video concludes with a personal story of their motivation to learn English, inspired by a desire to sound 'cool' speaking the language.

Takeaways

• 😀 The speaker learned English independently, without attending an international school or living in an English-speaking country.
• 📚 They completed both their bachelor's and master's degrees in English-taught programs.
• 🎥 The first step is watching YouTube videos or other media for 30 minutes a day without subtitles to develop a sense of the language.
• 🔤 Watching videos without subtitles helps reduce stress and encourages focusing on how the language is spoken.
• 📺 In the second step, after a week, the speaker recommends watching videos with English subtitles, focusing on familiar topics like travel vlogs.
• 🗣️ The third step involves mimicking short video clips with emotion, including facial expressions and gestures, to improve speaking skills.
• 💭 The speaker suggests talking to oneself about anything, especially during emotional moments, as this helps enhance fluency.
• 📖 The fifth step is to start reading English novels after six months, focusing on fiction for better engagement and understanding.
• 🏫 Immersing oneself in English-speaking environments, like taking courses or interacting with English-speaking clients, can accelerate improvement.
• 💡 The speaker’s motivation to learn English started when they admired people speaking it fluently on the streets, which drove them to become fluent.

Q & A

What was the speaker's primary method of learning English?

The speaker primarily learned English by watching YouTube videos and other media without subtitles, focusing on how the language is spoken, and mimicking tones, rhythms, and expressions.

Why does the speaker recommend watching videos without subtitles in the first week?

The speaker believes watching videos without subtitles helps reduce the overwhelm from too many new words and allows learners to focus on how English is spoken naturally, including tone, rhythm, and body language.

How does the speaker suggest learners involve emotion in their English practice?

The speaker suggests mimicking the speaker's emotion, tone, facial expressions, and gestures when repeating sentences from videos. This makes the learning process more engaging and improves speaking skills.

What type of videos does the speaker recommend for beginners, and why?

The speaker recommends watching travel vlogs that are under 10 minutes long because they are entertaining, easy to follow, and offer changing scenes, which help beginners guess the meaning of sentences.

Does the speaker recommend looking up every new word encountered while learning English?

No, the speaker advises only looking up words when curious and not stressing over memorizing vocabulary or following strict rules for learning new words.

What does the speaker mean by developing 'language sense'?

Developing 'language sense' refers to understanding how the language works by observing how people speak, including their tone, rhythm, and body language, rather than focusing solely on vocabulary and grammar.

How does the speaker recommend practicing speaking English alone?

The speaker recommends talking to yourself about anything, especially when experiencing strong emotions, as this can help improve fluency. They found that emotional expression helps with speaking English more naturally.

When does the speaker suggest learners start incorporating reading English novels?

The speaker suggests starting to read English novels after consistently practicing English for at least six months, choosing books where the learner can understand around 60% to stay engaged and motivated.

What was the speaker’s initial motivation for learning English?

The speaker was motivated to learn English at the age of 12 after seeing two strangers speaking fluent English. They thought it was 'cool' and decided to become just as fluent to feel confident and impressive.

How does the speaker suggest immersing oneself in an English-speaking environment?

The speaker suggests joining English-speaking programs, online courses, language exchanges, or even making videos in English. Immersing yourself in situations where you must use English can accelerate language improvement.

Outlines

00:00

🎓 How I Learned English in a Fun and Lazy Way

The speaker introduces their journey of learning English without attending an international school or living in an English-speaking country. Despite this, they managed to achieve fluency through a fun, lazy method. They discuss how they completed their bachelor's and master's degrees in English and have made videos on language learning tips. The speaker emphasizes enjoying the learning process and suggests watching videos without subtitles in the first week to develop a natural language sense. They also recommend observing body language, tone, and facial expressions.

05:02

📺 Watch Videos with Subtitles to Enhance Learning

In the second week, the speaker suggests watching videos with English subtitles to deepen understanding. They recommend shorter videos, preferably under 10 minutes, and travel vlogs to aid in guessing word meanings through context. The speaker highlights the importance of familiar topics, like Japan travel vlogs, for beginners to make the learning process smoother and more engaging.

10:08

🗣️ Mimic and Speak with Emotion to Improve Fluency

The speaker advises learners to repeat after speakers in videos, mimicking their tones, rhythms, and emotions. This emotional involvement enhances fluency, especially in speaking. The speaker shares a personal anecdote from their teenage years when they memorized Nigahiga's scripts and acted them out for fun, emphasizing how involving emotions makes learning more enjoyable and effective.

💬 Talking to Yourself Helps You Practice Speaking

The speaker explains the importance of talking to oneself as a way to practice speaking. They recommend talking about daily experiences or videos watched, especially when feeling strong emotions like anger or excitement. The speaker humorously notes how they become more fluent in English when complaining about frustrating situations, underscoring how emotional engagement aids learning.

📚 Incorporate English Novels to Strengthen Reading and Grammar

After six months of daily practice, the speaker encourages incorporating English novels into the learning routine. They recommend choosing fiction over non-fiction for its engaging content and suggest selecting books that are at least 60% comprehensible. This helps with grammar, writing skills, and staying focused, particularly for those in academic environments.

🌐 Put Yourself in an English-Speaking Environment

The final step is to immerse oneself in an English-speaking environment. The speaker reflects on their own experience of joining an English-instructed bachelor's program, but suggests alternatives like joining online courses, finding language exchange partners, or interacting with English-speaking clients at work. They emphasize that immersion is crucial for rapid improvement.

😊 Have Fun and Stay Motivated in Your Language Learning Journey

The speaker wraps up by sharing their motivation for learning English, which stemmed from a desire to be as 'cool' as fluent English speakers they once observed. This simple goal drove their progress, and they encourage viewers to find similar motivation while enjoying the process. The video ends on a light-hearted note, with the speaker wishing viewers good luck and reminding them to have fun while learning.

Keywords

💡Self-learning

Self-learning refers to the process of independently acquiring knowledge without formal instruction. In the video, the speaker shares their experience of learning English on their own, in a 'fun and lazy way,' illustrating that it is possible to achieve proficiency in a language without attending formal classes or living in an English-speaking country.

💡English subtitles

English subtitles are text translations or transcriptions that accompany visual media. In the video, the speaker advises viewers to first watch videos without subtitles, to focus on how the language is spoken, and then later to use English subtitles to reinforce learning by connecting spoken words to their written form.

💡Language sense

Language sense refers to the intuitive understanding of how a language works, including its rhythm, tones, and natural flow. The speaker emphasizes the importance of developing this sense early on by observing body language, expressions, and the nuances of speech while watching videos without subtitles.

💡Emotion in language learning

Emotion in language learning involves engaging feelings and expressions while speaking or mimicking a new language. The speaker highlights that involving emotion, such as mimicking tones and gestures, makes the learning process more effective and enjoyable, as it accelerates speaking fluency.

💡Repeating after videos

Repeating after videos is a technique where learners mimic what speakers say in videos, sentence by sentence, to practice pronunciation and intonation. The speaker explains that this method helped them improve their speaking skills, particularly when they repeated sentences with emotion and tried to imitate the speaker's style.

💡Familiar topics

Familiar topics refer to subjects that the learner already knows about, which makes understanding the context and guessing vocabulary easier. The speaker recommends watching videos on familiar topics, like travel vlogs about places they know, as it aids comprehension and retention when learning a language.

💡Talking to yourself

Talking to yourself is a self-practice method where learners speak out loud to improve fluency and confidence in using the language. The speaker encourages learners to talk about anything, especially during emotional moments, as it helps them become more expressive and fluent when speaking in English.

💡English novels

English novels are works of fiction written in English, which the speaker suggests incorporating into the learning process after gaining some basic language skills. The speaker prefers fiction over non-fiction, as it tends to be more engaging and helps readers stay focused while learning new vocabulary and sentence structures.

💡English-speaking environment

An English-speaking environment is any situation where learners are required to use English, either for communication or academic purposes. The speaker emphasizes the importance of placing oneself in such environments to accelerate language learning, whether through online courses, language exchanges, or even social settings like meetups.

💡Fun in language learning

Fun in language learning refers to the enjoyment and playfulness of the learning process, which the speaker believes is crucial for success. Throughout the video, they stress the importance of having fun and avoiding strict rules, as they found that learning English in an enjoyable and stress-free manner helped them progress significantly.

Highlights

The speaker learned English without attending an international school or living in an English-speaking country.

They achieved proficiency in English in a 'lazy' and fun way, completing both a bachelor's and a master's degree in English.

The speaker recommends watching YouTube videos or other media without English subtitles for the first week to develop a language sense.

They suggest paying attention to how English speakers use tone, rhythm, facial expressions, and body language.

After a week of no subtitles, the speaker advises using English subtitles on videos to help with understanding vocabulary and context.

Travel vlogs are suggested as good beginner content due to their changing scenes and familiar topics.

The speaker encourages repeating sentences out loud with emotion, mimicking the speaker’s tones, rhythms, and even gestures.

They recall memorizing entire scripts from Nigahiga's videos during their teenage years, which helped improve their speaking skills.

They emphasize that looking up unfamiliar words should only be done when curious, rather than following strict rules.

Talking to oneself, especially when experiencing emotions, can significantly help in improving speaking skills.

The speaker shares that they are often better at speaking English when they are angry or emotional.

After six months of consistent practice, they recommend incorporating reading English novels into the learning routine, choosing books that are at least 60% comprehensible.

Reading fiction is preferred over non-fiction to stay engaged, especially for language learners.

They highlight the importance of placing oneself in environments that require English usage, such as academic programs, online courses, or language exchanges.

The speaker’s initial motivation for learning English at age 12 was seeing strangers speak fluently, inspiring them to want to be 'cool' by speaking English as well.

Transcripts

good afternoon guys so the thing is I have  never attended an international school  

nor have I ever lived in an English-speaking  country but by learning English on my own in  

a lazy way I managed to achieve a pretty good  level in English I would say and I actually  

also completed my bachelor and master's degree  which were instructed in English I already did  

two videos regarding language learning advices  in general this one and this one so if you are  

interested the links are in the description box  below but today I wanna share with you guys more  

specifically about how I learned English by  myself in a fun and lazy way without so let's  

get right in! First Step watch YouTube videos or  any other medias that you preferred and watch  

it without English subtitles first for at least  I would say 30 minutes a day for about a week  

you might be wondering why Why without English  subtitles because personally I find it much less  

stressful to watch videos in the beginning without  subtitles because it can be overwhelming sometimes  

with so many subtitles so many new vocabulary  and so on and remember we are here to have fun  

right we are here to enjoy language learning  process and to enjoy our life so that's not  

overwhelm ourselves in the first week of learning  this language and another important reason I  

believe to watch videos without subtitle is to  try to develop your language sense from day one  

so when you are watching the videos try to focus  on how this language is spoken by people you know  

the tones the Rhythm and also how people speak  English their facial expression their mouth their  

body languages and so on and so on have you ever  heard of a statement saying that our personalities  

shift when speaking a different language I  find this statement so interesting and so true  

so anyway in first week of learning English just  try to get a sense of how this language function  

and you will be good step number two so after  watching videos without subtitles for about  

a week now it's time to turn on your subtitles  and watch it with English subtitles so I usually  

prefer to watch videos that are less than 10  minutes long otherwise I find it quite easy  

to get overwhelmed as a beginner and also as  a beginner my go-to videos to watch are always  

always travel vlogs because I find it not only  very entertaining to watch it also contains many  

changing scenes so it's gonna help me a lot  to navigate what he or she is talking about  

and to guess the meaning of sentences and words  additionally I would also prioritize watching  

videos that contains a familiar topics places  or products, etc. For example I'm pretty familiar  

with Japan as I used to live there before so my  go-to video to watch as a beginner would be Japan  

travel vlogs because even without knowing the  language a familiar topic like this would help  

me immensely in understanding the context and also  in guessing the meaning of the sentences and words  

third step pick a shorter video that you love  watching and repeat after each sentence of what  

the speaker said with EMOTION as if you were  the speaker yourself this is very important  

and you might wonder why with emotion because  based on my personal experience I find myself  

improved much faster especially in speaking when  I involve my emotion in Reading English out loud  

like mimicking their tones their rhythms their  facial expressions and even their hand gestures I  

remember when I was a teenager I love watching  Nigahiga's contents to an extent that I even  

memorized the whole scripts of some of my favorite  videos and acted out myself yeah just involve your  

emotion in reading the English sentences and it is also much more interesting and fun to do that  

at least that's what I felt you might be also  wondering do I look up the words that I don't  

know when watching videos well yes sometimes I  do but only when I feel like doing it and only  

when I'm like curious about a certain word I've  never followed any rules like you have to write  

down all the new words that you don't know and  look it up later or you have to write down at  

least 10 words each day in order to memorize it  etc etc I just do what I feel like doing and just  

have fun now moving on to the fourth step talk to  yourself it's time to talk to yourself so to be  

honest you can talk about anything you want like  anything whether it's about your day or about the  

videos or articles that you watch that you read  that day but personally I find it super useful  

to talk to yourself when you experience some  sort of emotion like when you are excited you  

are happy or you are angry sad confused etc etc  I find it very funny because whenever I run into  

some shitty things shitty situations that just  made me really angry and want to complain a lot  

I usually like all of a sudden become really good  at English speaking when complaining about things.

Surprised!!! lol

but I guess it's a good thing so I think in  general just involve your emotions when you  

speak and learn English is very helpful and  effective in improving your English skill in  

general ah nice step number five congratulations  and have reached this stage after you have been  

doing step one to four for at least one hour a  day for approximately six months well it depends  

on how much time you spend on English each day  so it could be longer than six months or shorter  

than six months but anyway if you have reached  this stage you can start incorporating reading  

English novels in your English learning routine  so just pick one novel that you like and that you  

could understand at least 60 percent otherwise  it wouldn't be fun to read and I would recommend  

reading fiction over non-fiction like novels  because books in general have very few pictures  

right so as a language learner it can be quite  difficult to digest sometimes and and it can  

even be a bit boring but usually novels will keep  you engaged with the story at least that's what I  

find to be quite effective in helping me to stay  focused if you are already in or about to join  

an academic environment that would require you  to use English I would highly suggest to read  

more English books as I find it very helpful in  improving my grammar and writing skills I think  

the foundations I built through Reading English  books helped me significantly in writing English  

essays and also my graduation thesis back then  for both my bachelor and master program yeah  

last but probably the most challenging step

are you ready yes I'm ready so to put yourself  in an environment or situation that will require  

you to use English for example I decided to  join a bachelor program that used English as  

an instructional language of course you don't need  to do a program like this in order to improve your  

English you can for example join an online course  with a subject that you are interested in that is  

instructed in English or you can find a language  exchange partner whom you can talk casual things  

with using English or you could join a Meetup  where everyone's are required to speak only in  

English or if you are working in your work you  can try to seek any opportunities you could to  

interact with English speaking clients whether  is via email or video chat or you can do like me  

filming videos in English and post it online I find  myself improve the fastest when I intentionally  

put myself in this kind of environment it's  like a game! in order to complete your task you  

have no choice but to figure out how to apply  how to use English while keep on improving it  

that's all for today thank you so much for  watching if you came all~~~~ this far yayyy I hope this  

video is helpful and remember just remember just  to have fun you know enjoy the learning process  

and enjoy your life you know for me there's really  no such things as you have to do this do that in  

order to learn a language just do whatever you  feel like doing and just play around with it and  

just have fun I would say if there's any magic  when it comes to language learning it would be  

to learn to have fun while learning the language so  I wish you best of luck in learning English and  

later I'm gonna share a bit about my motivation  of learning English if you're interested feel  

free to stay with me for a few more minutes and  if you're not I'm gonna say goodbye to you here  

goodbye and see you in the next video bye  it's always really funny whenever I recall  

the reason back then, when I was still a teenager,  that motivated me to start learning English so  

I remember I was around 12 years old back then  and one day on the streets I saw two strangers  

near my neighborhood speaking fluent English  and I still remember vividly that at that  

moment I literally couldn't take my eyes off them because that was for me so so so freaking cool  

to be able to speak English like that and yes guys  that's THE day that I made up my mind that in the  

future I'm just gonna be just as cool as them  you know like walking on the streets and speak  

fluent English so that motivated me to start  learning English back then and this simple  

"I just want to be cooler by speaking fluent English"  goal has brought my English so so so far till today  

so yes that's my motivation back then anyway  thank you so much for watching this video  

again and I'll see you oh I just hit my  lamp again I'll see you in the next video

bye bye bye I'll give you two hearts bye