english with Lucy. Today I'm going to talk to you about confidence.

Confidence is something that a lot of language learners lack.

i know because i myself

speak some other languages and when i

was learning them i really felt quite shy at times.

And I could have used a video by someone to give me a boost.

So this is what I want to do for you.

Today I've got five tips that I can give

you that will help you learn to speak more confidently more fluently.

And I really hope that my tips will motivate

you a bit more so that you can really

learn English with lots of enthusiasm.

Now I've got an Instagram account and i

like to chat with my students on there.

And this morning I posted a video asking

my current students what made them feel

more confident when speaking english and

i got lots of replies and at the end of the video.

I'm going to show some of

those replies to you and see if you can

relate with them see if you disagree or agree.

I think it's really important to get opinions and information from people who are learning English right now.

They're just like you in the same situation.

So a little bit about me first.

So obviously i am English with Lucy, I am

an English teacher and I have been

teaching for over three years now.

Its my love it's my passion it's what I want to

do for the rest of my life.

Now part of the reason that I enjoy teaching so much

is because i have also been through the language learning experience.

I've been through it with Spanish I now speak fluent spanish.

y si me quereis ver hablando en pues podeis ver este video aqui que grabe hablando de los errores que he cometido en español.

Right so let's get started with the tips.

The first and most important tip i can give you is

laugh at yourself,

have a sense of humor,

don't take it too seriously.

On this channel I like to laugh I like to have

fun and sometimes I will sort of make fun of the errors that my students normally make

and this is because I want them to get used to laughing at their own errors.

Enjoy your errors your errors are not bad

and if you can laugh at them,

it will make the learning experience so much more pleasant.

Now my teaching methods aren't for

everyone, for every 99 positive comments

I will receive a negative one saying you

shouldn't laugh at your students.

You're a terrible teacher. Now I can laugh at your

errors but i can also laugh at mine and

I do so frequently. So that's why I include

the outtakes at the end of some of my videos

and that's why i filmed my perra choriza video which is actually in Spanish

but it's of me talking about

these stupid ridiculous hilarious errors that i made in Spanish.

I once asked for a penis Caesar salad. I once also made an

awful mistake in an ice cream shop.

The word for a cone of ice cream is un cono

de helado and the word for vagina in spanish is coño.

And I think you can probably

imagine what i asked for un coño de helado.

yeah I was kind of embarrassed in the moment.

But now i can laugh about it and

it's a great story to tell.

I always find that if you're finding it

hard to have a good conversation with someone that's also learning another

language while a really good way of starting a conversation is

by talking about the errors that you've made with learning languages.

It's always a really good conversation starter for me.

Now number two is all about your mistakes again.

So we're not just laughing about them.

We are intentionally making them.

I want you to make mistakes. I know many

students that would go long periods of

time avoiding making certain mistakes.

They are trying to achieve 100-percent perfection.

I want you to laugh at your mistakes,

learn from them and move on.

Mistakes are essential even in English.

I make mistakes and you guys love pointing them out.

So you need to accept your

mistakes learn from them love them and move on.

Okay number three is pretend that you are confident.

When i started teaching english,

i was only nineteen and I remember walking into

classrooms of 20 to 30 adults nervous

low-level adults in Spain.

And just thinking wow I am the youngest person in this room.

I have to get this group of

scary scary adults to trust me and

believe what I'm saying and and listen

to me and also to respect me. And I never

really felt truly nervous before in my

life but walking into big classrooms

especially on the first day was nerve-racking.

It was ... it made me really

nervous and really anxious. And I found

that the best way of gaining confidence

was to pretend I was confident.

I hadn't been teaching for long.

I didn't have much experience but I

tried my best. I prepared hard and I

walked in held my head high and I spoke

to everyone confidently and I really

pretended that I knew what I was doing

more than I actually did.

And this actually created real confidence not

only in me but in my students.

I looked as if I knew what I was doing and they

trusted me and respected me.

And once I'd spent enough time pretending I was confident,

I actually started feeling genuinely confident.

Though I had real confidence but it came from that initial

fake confidence. So how can we apply this

to your language learning.

Well when you're speaking English hide those

nerves body language is key. Pretend that

you know what you're talking about,

don't be arrogant but show that you are

not afraid and people will trust you,

listen to you. Pretend that you're confident

Ok number four and this is something that I really really believe in.

And this is talk to yourself. I always talk to

myself in the language that I'm learning.

And it really serves as a preparation

for when you're in situations in which you will need to use the language.

The main things that I like to practice on my anecdotes,

the stories that you typically tell to each new person, you meet

things that you generally say on a weekly or daily basis.

It's also good to practice funny stories that you think will make people laugh.

Because you want them to come out in the right way.

So if you're a lower-level make sure you

practice your daily conversations.

How are you, how's the weather, what your hobbies are,

what you do for a living.

And if you're a more advanced learner

make sure you talk to yourself about funny

anecdotes, your life story, things that

happened to you that were interesting,

observations about other people's cultures.

When you give a presentation for university or for work.

You don't just wing it you don't just walk up and speak.

You practice it so it should be

the same for these stories as well.

Number five immerse yourself .

And you can take whatever you want from this immersion.

In my case would be going to the country

of the language you're learning and living there,

integrating yourself into the society,

into the culture just absorbing the language

and the feeling and the in the atmosphere

that for me is the best form of immersion.

Now that isn't possible for everyone.

Immersion for you might be a narrow week

in a language academy, it might be a

language exchange with a native speaker,

it might be an online language exchange with another English Learner,

it might be watching an episode of your favorite TV

show in English with english subtitles every night.

But in order to build your

confidence you need to get used to

listening in English. So you need to find

the right immersion technique for you

There is always a solution.

We have a brilliant saying in English called:

where there's a will there's a way.

So when you intend to do something

there's a way of doing it.

And if you want to find a way of

immersing yourself into english or the

language that you're learning, there is a way.

Now I want to read a few of these

suggestions from my students on Instagram.

And one I really like and not

all of you are going to like this.

This is from Ilich from Venezuela and he says

hello, I believe that drinking is the way to get more confidence.

I went to Brighton for a year and the best classroom was the pub.

Brilliant! Look, Ilich has really made the most of his situation.

He was in brighton he immersed himself and he found native speakers

Micarla from Brazil that she likes watching movies without subtitles.

Again it's that immersion technique i was talking to you about.

Alejandra for a mexico has a really good piece of advice.

People should not be afraid to ask natives when they don't know how to say something.

It's the way that I've increased my

vocabulary and improve my pronunciation.

And of course your videos help.

Haha! That's sweet and yeah I had that is absolutely right.

Muhammad has also got some really good advice.

He says speak English with your close friends.

Yeah you can speak English with people you trust.

He also says to imagine yourself in different daily situations in which you have to speak English.

Again it's that talking to yourself technique that i mentioned before.

Paco says the more he speaks with natives the more confident he feels.

And yes it's the immersion again.

Roy says get a girlfriend who is a native speaker.

Yes if you can manage that that's fantastic but make

sure you're with her for the right reason.

Hectore says speak slowly at first and then build up.

Absolutely i completely agree with Hectore.

Ok guys that is it for today's

class I really hope that it's helped you

and I really hope that you feel slightly more motivated.

Now don't forget to

connect with me on all of my social

media and I will see you again soon for another lesson.

Alright big kiss and I will see you soon.