Eurospeak Language School

Fun Ways to Practice Fluency in English By Yourself

Did you know that it’s absolutely possible to practice fluency in English when you’re by yourself? It may seem counterintuitive, but it’s not impossible by any means. In this blog post, we will discuss some of the most effective methods to gain fluency in English, even when you don’t have the luxury of practicing with a teacher or another English speaker.

  1. Learn through TV and film

TV and film from English-speaking countries can be incredibly valuable resources for practicing fluency. The first step is to identify something that not only interests you, but is also comprehensible (for the most part). Try not to choose something with language that is overly complex for your level of English.

Next, depending on your language level, you might want to try watching your chosen film or TV episode with subtitles in your native language first. This is to ensure that you understand the storyline and context of the language used. If you are comfortable jumping straight into English, watch it in English with the subtitles.

After you’ve gained an understanding of the language and situational context, you can now start practising your fluency. This one point we can’t stress enough: repeat, repeat, repeat! Choose a scene (or even just a sentence or two) from your TV/film and repeat it as close as possible to how the actors do. Pay attention to their pronunciation, intonation (rise and fall of the voice), speed, and tone. Try to imitate some phrases exactly as the actors say them. Repeating fixed expressions is a sure-fire way to improve one’s fluency.

2. Read aloud to yourself

Although it will most likely feel awkward at first, another way to improve your fluency (and pronunciation at the same time) is to read aloud to yourself. Reading silently to yourself is, of course, invaluable in its own way, but does nothing to improve your fluency when speaking. Instead, try reading an article, book, or anything else that interests you aloud, focusing more on pronunciation and fluency than meaning.

We recommend first reading a text silently to yourself in order to comprehend it, identifying and looking up any unknown words beforehand, then reading it aloud straight away without focusing so much its meaning. Now, as mentioned above, one step in this process will be essential: repetition. Read your chosen text aloud as many times as it takes for you to read it through without having to pause – this can take many attempts to do, but doing this exercise can almost guarantee higher fluency.

3. Listen to music in English

Music can be a rich source of language learning material, and luckily for English language learners, English is one of the world’s most popular languages to make music in. If you want to practise your fluency using music as a tool, start by identifying a song that you like and (mostly) understand. Play your chosen song while reading the lyrics simultaneously. Once again, repetition is going to be key; the tendency for songs to get ‘stuck in your head’ is actually a great thing when it comes to language learning. Sing along to your chosen song with the lyrics in front of you repeatedly until you don’t need them anymore.

As you can see, repetition tends to be a key factor in making gains in fluency. To put it simply, the muscles in our mouths start to develop muscle memory as strings of words are repeated over and over, eventually making it easier to produce these words. It’s like riding a bike!

If you are someone who enjoys consuming any type of media in English, then you automatically have endless opportunities to improve your fluency, even on your own. Eurospeak is the coordinator of a project on this very topic, titled “Improving Communicative Competence in Foreign Languages from a Distance,” or iCom for short. Check out the iCom website (www.icom-erasmus.site) for more information on improving your communication skills without being enrolled in a class or having access to a native speaker.