I want to improve my grammar
Honestly, we believe that most learners focus way too much on grammar.
It is important to have some knowledge of grammar, to help add structure to your learning, but when you place all of your focus on memorizing all the rules, it doesn't make for real-life fluency.
A good explanation of it gave Tiffani who was a guest on Beyond Border talk show said:
That's why I focus on the creative side and not the grammar side, even though grammar is very important, to get to the next level of your English, you have to stop focusing on it and trust what you learned and build on it.
Our advice would be to try learning like you've learned your first language: listen A LOT, speak at every opportunity, read, and sometimes write, and once you feel really comfortable communicating, then you can learn grammar to help add structure to it all. I think you'll find this method not only more effective, but also more fun!
Look what Jennifer another Ethan's guest:
My three tips for learning English - exposure, exposure, exposure, whatever way you can that feels comfortable to you. You might not have a native speaker to speak with or someone in your country who speaks English that you can speak with. Reading is good if you like reading, because you can pick up on grammar. Some people are worried that they're not always grammatically correct. Well, don't worry, native speakers aren't either. You might think we are but we're not all the time. So books help a lot of people I work with. It doesn't have to be a book, but it should be something that's been edited, [...] really reputed newspapers, or other types of reading material. Just keep exposing yourself till you pick up a lot of vocabulary. So you can try to use that if possible. If not with a person, maybe you can try to use it in writing.
Watch these video lessons to learn more about these ideas:
If you would like to listen to a great podcast episode on grammar and the verb tenses, check out this one.
It is important to have some knowledge of grammar, to help add structure to your learning, but when you place all of your focus on memorizing all the rules, it doesn't make for real-life fluency.
A good explanation of it gave Tiffani who was a guest on Beyond Border talk show said:
That's why I focus on the creative side and not the grammar side, even though grammar is very important, to get to the next level of your English, you have to stop focusing on it and trust what you learned and build on it.
Our advice would be to try learning like you've learned your first language: listen A LOT, speak at every opportunity, read, and sometimes write, and once you feel really comfortable communicating, then you can learn grammar to help add structure to it all. I think you'll find this method not only more effective, but also more fun!
Look what Jennifer another Ethan's guest:
My three tips for learning English - exposure, exposure, exposure, whatever way you can that feels comfortable to you. You might not have a native speaker to speak with or someone in your country who speaks English that you can speak with. Reading is good if you like reading, because you can pick up on grammar. Some people are worried that they're not always grammatically correct. Well, don't worry, native speakers aren't either. You might think we are but we're not all the time. So books help a lot of people I work with. It doesn't have to be a book, but it should be something that's been edited, [...] really reputed newspapers, or other types of reading material. Just keep exposing yourself till you pick up a lot of vocabulary. So you can try to use that if possible. If not with a person, maybe you can try to use it in writing.
Watch these video lessons to learn more about these ideas:
If you would like to listen to a great podcast episode on grammar and the verb tenses, check out this one.
Join our Native Immersion course here
Updated on: 09/11/2022
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