Hey everyone, welcome to the English Fluency Journey podcast.
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Today we're going to be talking about the best TV shows to learn English from.
Well, according to me. because this is such a cool and pleasurable way to learn English and work on your listening skills.
But first I want to say a couple of important things to keep in mind when you're choosing a TV show to watch.
The most important thing for me is that a show must be interesting to me.
It has to be about something that I really enjoy and am curious about.
But we all have different tastes and my suggestions might not work for you, so keep this in mind as well.
Now another thing is that there are no super easy to understand TV shows where they speak slowly and use easy vocabulary like specifically for non-native speakers who are learning English.
Well, not that I know of. And if there are, I know that...
Those are not the ones I could enjoy watching.
So for beginners, in my opinion, I think it'd be better if they watched a TV series in English that they have already seen in their first language.
This way, it'll be easier to understand and follow along even if you don't get every word. and it may help you build associations and guess those words.
Adding to that, Depending on your current level, you can watch TV shows with subtitles or without them.
You can turn them on when you didn't understand or didn't hear something clearly.
But use English subtitles, not subtitles in your native language.
I personally do not recommend using subtitles in your native language.
I think it messes up with your comprehension and It doesn't let you immerse yourself in the language because you're not really concentrating on English.
It's that same translation. And what we want is to get used to hearing the language, get the feel for it.
And try to learn not to translate in our heads, but think in English.
Don't understand what is being said, read it.
Don't know the meaning of a word, look it up.
Yes, pause the show and look it up. Listen, you don't have to do this if you know a better way. to learn and understand new words from TV shows. use them and tell us about them in the comments.
But I don't. If you wanna watch them just for pleasure, go for it, it's still gonna be useful.
However, if your goal is to learn and improve, look those words up.
At the beginning, there's lots of them and it might be annoying and tiring and might take away all the fun, but only at the beginning because it gets so much easier. over time you know these things depend on your motivation goals attitude etc But for beginner or intermediate levels, I wouldn't recommend choosing a show with a specific focus when you're just starting out, like about medicine, crime, space, physics, science, like Big Bang Theory.
This is one of my favorites, but you probably should watch it a bit later when you develop your listening skills better. because it can be quite overwhelming at first since they mostly use lots of terms and very specific vocabulary. in those shows and what you want is this generic vocabulary.
Well, unless you want to watch something like that and you're ready to work.
And I also like watching TV series for improving my listening skills better than watching movies.
A lot of people say that it's very hard to understand and watch a movie in English, but it's a little easier with TV shows.
And I'll tell you why. Depending on the movie, they may use a lot of special effects and background music. actors speak differently, their articulation differs, not to mention different dialects and accents.
All this affects our ability to make out what they're saying.
I noticed that by watching watching a TV show, you're getting used to the way people speak and start to understand them better because there are a lot of episodes. but you don't have that much time to get used to people's manners of speech by watching a movie.
And now let's get into my list. and the first TV show that I want to recommend is Modern Family.
Modern Family is a hilarious mockumentary sitcom that depicts the lives of three modern-day families. who are actually parts of one big family.
The characters often find themselves in ridiculous and ludicrous situations, And it's very amusing to watch how they get out of those situations and deal with their kids, spouses, and jobs.
Overall, it's just an interesting, light, family-friendly and funny show. perfect to watch after a hard day.
The Good Place. It's an NBC TV series that premiered in 2016.
It's about the afterlife. It shows where you go when you die, either the good place or the bad place, depending on the type of person you were during your lifetime.
While the show is very funny and filled with Eleanor's, the main character, sarcastic jokes and amoral behavior, It's also philosophical and brings up lots of questions about the way we act towards others and its consequences. and the way we live our lives.
There are so many teachable moments. It's an entertaining show with a very interesting plot and it's undoubtedly one of the best shows I've ever watched.
Stranger Things. If you're a sci-fi, horror, and mystery lover, this series is definitely a perfect match for you.
The events take place in the 80s in the fictional town of Hawkins. where in a laboratory headed by Dr. Martin Brenner, federal government conducts scientific experiments.
The victim of experiments is a little girl, Jane, whom the doctor abducts and names Eleven.
During those tests, Eleven comes into contact with a monster. and that is where the door into the other dimension opens.
Eleven possesses psychokinetic and telepathic abilities. which she got because when her mother was pregnant with her, she underwent chemical experimentation.
When a boy named Will Byers is abducted by the monster, his friends go in search for him and find Eleven.
That's how they meet her. Then they investigate the lab, strange things and disappearances while trying to get rid of the monster.
It's definitely thrilling and keeps you on your toes.
And, and this is very exciting, there's gonna be a season 4 and hopefully we'll see it on our screens in 2021.
Killing Eve. According to Wikipedia, it's a British black comedy drama spy thriller television series, and this description fits it very well.
The storyline is very interesting and unlike any other TV series that I've watched.
The series revolves around two women, a psychopathic assassin Villanelle and Eve Blustery, an agent working for British intelligence. and their weird connection.
Working as a spy isn't what Eve expected.
She's bored, but her life takes a sharp and unexpected turn when she's assigned to capture Villanelle.
What else I liked very much about this show is that it takes you all around the world and the characters speak with different accents.
It allows you to really work on your listening skills and shows you diversity.
Veronica Mars. This is a story about once being a popular teenage girl that became an outcast and started helping her father, a private investigator, after her friend was murdered.
She's clever, sassy, sly, witty, with a snarky sense of humor, and she's a badass.
Veronica helps her father investigate and solve cases, as well as her friends and schoolmates' mysteries.
I really love and vibe with the main character as well as the actress that plays it.
This is perfect for those who enjoy detective shows.
But I gotta be honest with you, the fourth season was really anticlimactic for me.
How I Met Your Mother. This sitcom starts with Ted Mosby, the main character, sitting with his children and telling them the story of how he met their mother.
It revolves around five characters and each of them is quirky in their own way.
Every episode is a flashback of events and hilarious situations from Ted's life, each of which leads to him meeting their mother.
It's a very cool show and it's impossible not to enjoy it.
And it's also impossible not to catch Barney Stinson's catchwords and phrases.
Smallville. It's an interpretation of the Superman story.
If you like it in similar genres, you'll love this TV series.
It's so good. They don't just show some supernatural stuff, but also real life, like Clark, the main character and his friends, school years and some real life things in combination with supernatural occurrences.
Clark, aka Superman, lives on a farm and was raised by a very honest and decent family. and he grew up to be a very honorable, fair, faithful young man with a strong sense of right and wrong. and of course with a big secret.
So he and a couple of his friends who know his secret live a double life of being normal teenagers and fighting with all sorts of strange, uncanny and mysterious things.
Of course, it's a teenage love story. The story, Clark Kent and Lana Lang and then it's also a love story of Clark Kent and Lois Lane that I'm sure you've heard of.
And rumor has it that we might see Clark Kent and Lois Lane on screens again.
Personally, I'm anticipating this. The Office.
When you learn a language, it's important to learn about its culture as well.
A lot of Americans say that in a way it depicts their culture.
It's not a documentary but a mockumentary.
It portrays the lives of office workers and it's filled with American humor.
The characters are unique, funny, quirky, and relatable.
I watched it with a great pleasure. The Tenth Kingdom.
It's an American fairy tale fantasy miniseries.
It's only one season that consists of five episodes.
If you like fairy tales and like to watch shows about magic, this one's for you.
I've probably watched it like five times and I love it.
It takes you from a modern-day New York City straight into a parallel world of theory that consists of nine kingdoms. that our heroes got into.
They now have to go through lots of adventures to get back home and come to terms with the fact that the fairy tales they thought were just a product of someone's imagination are real and that magic exists.
It's such a fascinating and adorable mini-series and I highly recommend it for the ones who enjoy this genre.
Friends. Yes, friends. This iconic show doesn't need an overview, I think, everybody knows it.
I just could not not include it in this video because I just love it so much.
But if you're one of those people who are like, blah friends, I hate it, this is so cliche, couldn't you come up with something more unique?
No, I couldn't. So this is a show that I watched in my native language and like a thousand times in English.
And every time I enjoy it, it never gets old.
And when you watch and listen to something that much, those words and phrases and even sentences from it... stick with you, and eventually you start using them in your everyday life.
Sometimes, when you watch something more than once, you realize that you catch some words and phrases that you couldn't understand before.
Or you didn't pay attention to them because you couldn't make them out.
Well, this shows that your listening skills have improved.
And in general, this is a very positive show about regular people's lives.
They use vocabulary that we can use just in our everyday lives.
So guys, that was the list. Try them out and let me know what you think about them.
I also really, really love Criminal Minds Grey's Anatomy.
Dexter and a lot more, but as I said, they use very niche vocabulary.
Nonetheless, if your listening skills are on a good level and you're ready to improve your vocabulary, go ahead and watch something like this.
As your vocabulary grows, as you learn new phrases, as your listening skills improve, it'll become easier and easier and a little more enjoyable to watch TV shows in English.
The secret is just consistency. If you're worrying about the fact that you still need to search for the meanings of some words or idioms or you still need to translate them in your head from time to time, worry no more.
It's absolutely normal. It's a process that takes time, so give it time and be consistent.
This is the only way, unless your brain is a computer and you can just download a language on it.
But I promise you that if you don't give up and keep working, you will be very that one day you can just sit and watch whatever you want in English, understand it, and enjoy it.
You may occasionally still be using a dictionary or Google because it's just impossible to know everything.
Okay guys, that's it for now. Thank you for choosing our podcast.
Until the next one.
