This is an All Ears English podcast, episode 69.
Own your English, own your life.
Welcome to the All Ears English podcast where you'll finally get real native English conversation and fluency for business and life.
We believe in connection, not perfection, when it comes to learning English.
Now here are your hosts Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer, and Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl, coming to you from Boston and New York City, USA.
Hey.
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Hey there, Aubrey.
How are things in your world?
Great.
We're looking forward to fall break here.
We get a couple of weeks off of school, which is, you know, good and bad.
Sometimes it's hard to have kids home and trying to figure out how to keep them entertained.
Yeah.
That's a nice break for them.
Oh, cool.
Cool.
That is awesome.
Do you have anything exciting planned?
Are you guys going to do anything?
I mean, anything?
Yes, we're going to Mexico, Rocky Point, Puerto Penasco.
I'm really excited.
I've been brushing up on my Spanish, trying to really dig in so that I'm ready, because I'm going to take every opportunity I can to speak with you know native Spanish speakers while I'm down there.
That's so cool.
I know that you guys go to Mexico a lot.
That's awesome.
It's a quick drive from here.
It's the closest beach.
It's closer to us than California.
So we do go pretty often.
That's so cool.
Wow.
I can't imagine just like driving to Mexico.
It's so out of my world.
I fly there.
Far from you.
Far from me, even in Colorado here.
So anyways, have fun on that adventure.
I love it.
Our listeners will love to hear about it when you get back.
So cool.
Yes, for sure.
Yeah.
So I mean, speaking of adventures and choosing your own adventure.
Right.
Today we're talking about how you guys can choose to learn English the way that works for you.
Right.
Yes, exactly.
This is a good example, I feel like, because when I, if I know I'm going to visit a country, I'm so much more motivated.
I need that motivation that I know I'm going to be able to visit a place.
Not all the time.
I certainly can still work on Spanish.
But once I know I'm going to be in that place, the motivation is huge.
Yeah, that's huge.
So you know that that's the thing that motivates you.
And it might be different for our listeners, right?
Everyone has something different that motivates you.
But let's start today's episode off with a quote by the famous Steve Jobs.
Right.
And what was his quote?
Aubrey said, Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life.
This is so true when it comes to language learning.
Because maybe a teacher in a language course sort of told you how you need to learn and what is right.
They don't know anything about you.
That might not be what motivates you.
It might not be how you need to learn.
It's so true.
And it makes me think of the phrase for our listeners you know, listen to your gut.
Listen to your gut because we do have a good intuition as human beings.
We know when we're in a system or a situation that's just not quite right for us.
Exactly.
Yeah.
If you feel like you're not making a lot of progress, you're not excited about your language learning.
Something's wrong.
You need to switch it up.
And maybe, right, maybe your focus is what works for someone else, but not for you.
Exactly.
I mean, maybe you are attending a language school and your friends are going to and you're seeing that they're loving it, but it's not quite right for you.
The classroom environment is just not just not working.
It's not jiving.
Right.
That's a good bonus phrase today.
Jive to jive.
What does that mean?
Exactly.
So to to work to fit. to fit in with what you're doing, something would jive.
So for your learning style, like the textbooks and the classroom, if you feel yourself zoning out and you're leaving not feeling uplifted, not feeling like you learned much, that's probably not the right environment for you.
And luckily today in this day and age, there are so many other options.
Oh my gosh, there's so many options.
If you have discovered our podcast, you probably love podcast listening, right?
Because it is such a cool way to learn, but there's other ways too.
Of course, there's YouTube, there's blogs you can read, there's Facebook groups we can visit.
What else comes to mind, Aubrey, that could appeal to different ways of learning?
If you're more of a visual learner just TV movies where you can see the person speaking, and then creating more opportunities to speak in person, meetup groups, finding those chances or Skyping a friend or over Zoom.
If you need...
To have face-to-face with the person.
And honestly, we're starting to create more options like that as well.
We have our YouTube channel now where a lot of our podcasts you can see video.
That's so helpful for a visual learner.
Yeah.
And I also think that if you guys do this, if you take control, if you make English your learning plan your own, it means you're going to learn faster because you have that ownership right.
I mean they've proven that in education like project-based learning, where kids actually create their own project.
They take ownership.
They learn a lot faster.
What do you think about that?
And then, you know, we'd create like an interesting map of a French speaking country and they would talk about the food there and interesting places to see, and they would have to talk about all of this in French.
And then it would really stick because they learned something so interesting.
Oh, my gosh.
I wish I was in that class.
Yeah.
So much more fun than just a teacher lecturing at the front of the room.
I know.
I mean, that's what I had.
I went to a very average public school in Keene, New Hampshire.
And, you know, that's really what it was, right?
It was textbooks.
It was lecturing.
It was memorize this for the test, right?
The history test.
Memorize these facts and then dump them out of your brain as soon as you pass the test.
That was my education growing up and I miss so much.
Yeah, same.
Right.
And we realized both of us, a lot of people of our generation that it didn't work that well.
Think about all the stuff that you learned, that you couldn't even recall it for a trivia night right now.
Right.
That just doesn't stick when you're not really engaged.
Therefore, no trivia skills.
I have no trivia skills.
It's true.
So what we have to do now as adults is re-educate ourselves.
But if we had taken ownership of that stuff through a project, through our own way of learning, we would have learned it much better, right?
So guys, take ownership, own your life, own your English.
That's the message for today for our listeners.
Yes.
And whatever that looks like for you, you need to figure out how you learn best, how you're most engaged at the end of you know studying, whatever you did, if it's a podcast, TV chatting with someone.
How do you feel?
Do you feel like you had a good experience?
You were motivated?
What do you recall, right?
Is it sticking?
And then you're going to realize what is the best method for you when it comes to learning English.
Yes, I love it.
That is so good.
Let's end on that.
That's an important word of wisdom from Aubrey here today.
Guys, thanks for listening.
And Aubrey, let's make sure our listeners.
What should they do before we finish up to make sure they don't miss All Ears English.
Make sure you subscribe to the podcast wherever you find your podcasts and share it with a friend.
You guys all know someone learning English.
You can send a link to the All Ears English podcast.
Let them know about it and all the great stuff you're listening to here.
Awesome.
We'll see you in the next episode.
Take care.
See you there.
Bye.
Thanks for listening to All Ears English and if you believe in connection, not perfection, follow our show wherever you listen to podcasts to make sure you don't miss anything.
See you next time.
