BE ABLE TO COMUNICATE WITH ALL THE WORLD

Among all the positive side to learn english there is the fact that you will be able to comunicate with all the world, infact according the statistics there are 335 millions of native speakers, plus a little bunch of 1040 millions of people who speak it how a second language, so we have in total 1375 english speakers, even it's not required that your english will be perfect in order to comunicate.

My native language is italian, my language is spoken by only 120 millions of people, that's mean when I reached a good level of english I increased the numbers of people whereby I can talk of 1255 millions, I multiplied of twelve time the number of people whereby I can converse, this was been a huge improvement for me, well, in part also because my native language is not so spread outside my country, anyway doesn't matter where you from, if you learn english you will hugely raise the number as well, that's awesome.

THE TRUE ABOUT LEARN ANY LANGUAGES

Wow , that's crazy , I never see a summer like this in Italy , the weather has been terrible this season , it's not good , first and foremost because I couldn't go in the beach very often how usually I was used to do , and second because bad weather mean less tourists , that mean less probability for me to engage in a english conversation with foreigners , what a pity , hope that the next year will be better.
Nevertheless , I was been able to talk with somebody on the beach , a duch girl and two germans , tuscany coast it's full of germans people in the summer and English it's them second language , a huge opportunity for me,  also this years I realized how if you are able to talk in English by videocall,  it's more easy in real live , because there aren't any sound problem , mic problem , connection problem and so on , so , you are able to speak with a native speaker by skype without any problem ? That awesome , because you have to think that if you had talked with him in the street  you would have done even better. In these days , I took advantage about the bad weather for stay at home and thinking about learn languages , because in some forum I saw that a lot of people have a different opinions , who think that in order to learn languages you need to have a talent , a gift of good genetic , who think that some languages are impossible to learn for people of various country  and so on.

SLANG TOP TEN 2014

Today I wanna do a list about the more interesting slang that I have met this year  so far , it's impressive how many words, slang and idioms english contains , I never stop to learning , anyway let's take a look at my list , I tried to gather those that in my opinion are more useful in real life conversation :

10  TAKE A STAB        

This slang mean try to do something , for example , you are talking about surf with your best friend but you never surfing before , so you can say at him , " I never surfing before but I wanna take a stab about it "

DESCRIBING SITUATION AND ROLEPLAY

Hello guys , what's up , today I wanna talk about two way to learn that I'm using since a
couple of months , Describing Situation and Role Play.

Do you like acting ? If the answer is yes probably you could have a lot of fan by improve your english conversation skills with Role Play , I talked about it before already , you pair up with some other person that could be a friend , a parent or whoever you want and you pretend to be someone else , for example you could pretend to be a boy who have to call his girlfriend because you discovered that her have a relationship with a man, try to talk for almost twenty minutes , it's only one example , you can create as many kind of different scenarios you want , be creative and enjoy it. Describing situation it's one other good trick , yesterday was happened a car accident very close my neighbors , I see everything and when I comeback at house I try to write what happened , every detail , there are many situation that you could try to describe , ( bad, good , strange , funny ) You can also go on youtube and watching some short videos and try to describe what you see , the same thing you can do with the GIF ( Graphics Interchange Format ) , that it's a bitmap image format, and you could realize that could be more practical then videos. Add these two tricks in your daily practice it's a good idea.

SHARPEN OR LOOKING FOR SOMETHING ELSE ?

Always I have believed so far that perfection it's a total waste of time , that mean if you are able to do a thing in very good way , it's better that you shift your focus on try to learn something of new instead of struggle to improve it.
Let make a example , if you start to learn english, in the first years you learn about 60% of the words , in the further two or three years you will learn about 80% , hereafter it's a matter of sharpen , and could take three or four  years in order to add a 5% , so , after  twelve years you will reach 100% , that mean a perfect english , it's worth spend so much time only for sharpen a thing ?
Well , if somebody had asked me this one years ago , my answer would been " no " , definitely , if you ask me that now , I will answer  " depend ",  if you like  more of one foreign language , I think it's the great thing that you can do  because it's much better speak enough well in different language then speak perfect in one , because this , some months ago I left for a bit my english for starting something  of new , I tryed Spanish , Russian , French , German and  Japanise , all interesting language , was awesome at beginning because in this stage you learn fast , but then I discovered that for the moment I was not interesting about learn these language , maybe in the future the things could change , but at that time I felt that was not necessary  learn them , then I returned on my english and I started to refine it.
The point is this , it's true that it's better be able to speak  enough well in various languages then speak perfect in only one , but  unquestionably is also true that it's better sharpen what you like, rather start something of new but that you are not so interesting about it, at least at the moment.
In short , you should do what you like to do.

THE IMPORTANCE OF LEARN ENGLISH

Why you are learning english ?
What are the reasons because you started to interesting about this language ?
Are questions that often I ask to myself , but the answers are very easy , I think every language you learn , it's a new world that it's opening at you ,  it's a different kind of culture and way to live that you are discovering , I like learn languages and probably in the future I will be able to manage as many languages I can , but for now let's focus on english and what are the reasons for learn it :

1   BEST  RESOURCES

     How you know already, I started because I was interesting about improve my keep in shape            knowledge  and I discovered that the best resource were in english , whatever thing you are            looking for , ( business , real estate , hardware , medicine , diet , exercise and so on )  easily
you    will discover that the best resources are in english.

DO YOU KNOW VERBLING ?

Among all the website that I followed in order to improve my english , Verbling was been the best. It's a website where you can watch as many english lessons as you want in free way , of course you can join in the lesson if you make a subscription, the english class are very various and interesting, moreover the teachers are very good and skillful. You can choose the lessons according to your level or also your favourite teachers. How I said the lessons are very various, you can choose between classic lessons, quizz game, or other original lessons, the latter are very funny and get along with my way to learn , that is learn english in fun way , one of these it's called " Role Play " where you and one other student are called for interpreting a role , that is amazing for me , always I liked acting , when I was a teenager my dream was become a famous actor , unfortunately never happened, but right now I can improve my english conversation by acting , it's between the fun way to learn that I have discover so far , but there are much more on Verbling , for example you can join in group voice call or also get a tutor for private lessons. So , I strongly reccomend this website, and I leave you with a videorecording of a lesson where I joined two days ago (Role Play genre ), was my second english lessons in all my life , at the beginning I was a bit excited and anxious, but after I was been able to play my role, I did good.

ENGLISH TEST

Every one or two months , I like do this test in order to know how much wide is my vocabulary, it's  very fast , simple and funny, you should take a look at it :  Test Your Vocab
The test is split in two pages , one of common words , and the second with more difficult words, complete it and watch your score.
Usually most of adult english native speaker know about 20.000 - 35000 words , it's a huge amount of words that we don't need to reach, instead how also the website report, most of the foreign english learners fall in the range  2500 - 9000 words.
When two years ago I did the test for the first time , my score was about 3500 , and I was able to read most of the english articles avaible on the web already.

TOTALLY AVOID ENGLISH LESSONS ?

If you follow my blog since awhile you should know already that I don't like very much english lessons, I agree with who said  " languages should be lived, not learnt " , talking about this topic , some days ago I was chatting by skype with a man from Belgium , his said me that was in the same page with my way to think and moreover told me a story , when lived in Lanaken met a man called Dirk, his job was deliver drink and beer to pubs , he did french at school for years and couldn't speak a word, instead his english was very good , he learned it in pubs speaking with english people who were working there, of course is not a isolated case , there are many examples about people who learned english by themselves.

So , you should totally avoid english lessons ?
Yes , if you completely hate it , otherwise you could follow occasionally some of it , like I do.
Sometime I like take a look at some grammar for write better for example and I like follow some free english lessons videos on youtube , just look for a teacher who is not too much old school or boring , looking for enjoyable teachers , how the amazing Ronnie for example , I love this one...
                                                             
                                                           
                                                       
                                             

LEARN ENGLISH WITH YOUR FAVOURITE SPORT

Likely , most people practice some kind of sport and follow it in tv, this is one other fun opportunity to learn english guys , all that you have to do is make sure that the comment is in english , very simple, it's important that you like the sport that you want follow , don't do the mistake to follow in english a sport that you never would have followed  in your native language , don't force anything , never .
My father was a fan of NBA ,  I joined with him for watching some match , fortunately the commentator was talking in english, anyway NBA never enchanted me very much , neither  soccer ,  you know what you are thinking now , " what ? you are a italian man and you don't like soccer ? " , lol , sad but true, always I  prefered combact sports , before I was a boxing fan , but the lack of champions pushed me to give up about watching it , right now the only sport that I'm following is mixed martial arts , it's regarded the most growing sport in the world, maybe will be famous also in italy  one day.
I like the commentators Joe Rogan and Bill Goldberg , really I like these two guys when commenting  a fight they are able to make it more exciting, thank you to  these  two men I learned a lot of common slang currently using in US just following my favourite sport, also I listened many podcast about Mr Rogan, I like the way which him talk in english also if sometime is hard for me understand because often talk fast and use so many slang.
By the way, doesn't matter what kind of sport you are following , whatever sport you like , you can use it for learn english , albeit  It's a pity that you can't use subtitles like you do when watching movies, don't care , still it's a good exercise.



                                                                  
       
     

MY TYPICAL DAY OF FULL IMMERSION

This is a example of how I use my hobbies for get a full immersion in english, that it's what I did yesterday :
In the morning I surfed a bit in internet among some of my favourites websites, then I had read again for awhile one book that I liked too much one year ago.
Before lunch I did a quick videocall with a girl from Miami and in the afternoon, because I have had some spare time in my work place,  I spent some time chatting with a friend from San Francisco on Facebook and with one other person from London by  Skype, I did all this from my phone, ops , I forget , also I sent some voice message by Facebook and because I had my headset with me  I watched also a bit of interviews about my favourite actors.
When I comeback at home,  just before dinner I played with Videogame for awhile and after dinner I started to watch the only sport that I'm following right now,  UFC mixed martial arts,  you can bet a hand that the comment was in english.

FUNNY TRICKS FOR LEARN ENGLISH

In order to have a full immersion in english , I was used to adopt many tricks , one trick alone seem useless , but many tricks together do a great job in the long term, If you can't go in America , you have to bring the America at you, your goal is add every day more and more english in your life :

1  Simply start  to set every device you have in english ,  your phone , your deckstop pc , your laptop ,
   your alarm oclock ,  your console ( if you like play videogame ) .
   Buy a english calendar and take it in your room , you could take also one agenda and when you have      to  write  something do it in english  ( shopping list , monthly budgets , appointments , whatever you      want ) .
2  If you daily read website , stop to do it in your native language and replace with english ,  you should    start also to write in some forum  for drill your writing skill , doesn't matter if at the beginning  you   are unable to write long post , nobody will care about it.
   It's important that you like the website that you are following  , should talk about some of the your  favourite hobbies or something like that.

LET'S START

Let me say again that albeit  take english class with a teacher that follow you and also going in english country for a full immersion in the language , are each other usefull tool , are not necessary for reach  a good level, if you like english class , go for it , if  you can visit city like London , New York  and even  afford to live over there for some months , go for it , it's great.
At the moment I can't go anywhere because my job , moreover I getting boring taking english classes , if you are like me , maybe this blog could be fine for you, you can reach a post intermediate english level by yourself , it's a level of english that will allow you to read and write about everything , furthermore you will able to have a conversation with a native english speaker.

Of course is not a perfect level of english , when I write I do some grammar mistake , when I read sometime I meet some new word never see before, also my spoken is not perfect and I have to recognize that when I talk with a english person sometimes I have some trouble to understand him in some part if talk too much fast and use too many difficult slang , but in the most case I can manage a conversation without any problem.

HOW LEARN ENGLISH WITHOUT ANY TEACHER

Hello guys , I’m a italian man borned in a small town close Florence ,  when I was a teenager I studied a bit of english in the school , but unfortunately  I stopped to go in the school  when I was 16 years because the professors weren’t able to involve me in any lessons , at that time probably the only english words that I knowed was  ” yes and stop “. Five  years ago , I started to learn english almost by chance , there were some books that I wanted to read but was avaible only in english , so this is the real reason because I started, after that ,I discovered to love this language and I chose to keep going, so  this allowed  me of learn a lesson , that is you learn well a thing only when you need of it or you have passion for it.
Anyway there are varius level of english :    beginner , elementary , intermediate , post intermediate , advance , perfect, right now I think to be at post intermediate level , and my  goal is reach an advance level in some years , maybe two or three.
That funny thing is that I started to learn english by myself  and I passed from beginner level to post intermediate level without any teacher and never go in any english country , I did all this with a computer and little else , from a town of Italy , the whole process lasted five years , but without many mistake that I did ,I would have been able to reach this result in three years.