Most people say that “I can understand English, but I cannot speak”, because of that most people are thinking about how to improve English speaking. Moreover, the internet and technology give chance to speak fluently. There are a lot of ways how to improve English speaking by using online material.
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How to Improve English Speaking in 7 Ways
If you do not want to spend a lot of money, there are a lot of alternatives on the internet. This list consists of 7 ways how to improve English speaking. Thanks to online materials you can improve both your grammar and vocabulary knowledge and speaking skills. This article may be the answer to how to improve English speaking skills (by yourself) questions.
1. Take a MOOC
MOOC sounds like a hiccup of cow or a weird insult, but MOOC means massive open online course. MOOC resembles an unlimited online multiplayer game. Massive online games like Guild Wars or Starcraft ensure playing an online game with a lot of people in a game. There is same logic between MOOC and online game platforms, but MOOC is generally free, unlike online games.
Real teachers who answer students’ questions online taught English in MOOC. Moreover, there are online MOOC message boards, a limited count of live web broadcasts, and pre-recorded video lectures on the system. In this way, you can figure out how to improve English speaking skills and make English speaking practice.
There are a lot of online English courses which are found in MOOC specialty websites. FutureLearn, Coursera and EdX may be examples of these websites.
2. Enjoy with Music, Online TV, and Movies
Most of the TV series and movies we watch or the songs we listen to fondly are in English. You can solve how to improve English speaking fluency. Because listening to the spoken dialogs or words, you can easily remember the sentence patterns and makes it easy to talk.
Moreover, it is a very enjoyable and free way to learn and speak English. If you watch movies without subtitles, you can solve how to improve listening skills in English. You should check out the FluentU English YouTube channel for both education and entertainment. If YouTube is not accessible in your country, Vimeo and Dailymotion are good alternatives.
For movie and free TV, websites may be MoviesFoundOnline, Hulu, and Crackle. For listening to music, you can use some web services such as Spotify and Pandora, or you can use Tuneln or iHeartRadio for radio channels.
3. Practice English with Mobile Applications
If you want to improve your English by yourself, you should use the English speaking practice app. You can use these applications on smartphones or tablets. Moreover, there are a lot of free options, so you can select any of them. For example, Duolingo is a good and well-known example of these applications.
Duolingo presents self-study and well-organized lessons. These lessons focus on listening, writing, and reading skills. FluentU is another application to improve English. FluentU turns real-life videos such as movie trailers, music videos, inspiring talks, and news into personalized language learning courses. Moreover, this application uses a natural approach to help users get used to English culture and language.
4. How to Improve English Speaking : Follow English Educational Websites
Websites like applications will be of great help to you in learning English. There are different kind of web sites to use. Below you can see some of these websites.
- Informative websites: If you want to learn English while following the world news, informative websites are good for you. You can follow BBC News, CNN or Al Jazeera English for science, technology, and breaking news. There are more websites such as Popular Mechanics and Scientific American, Popular Science mostly focus on English science news. Moreover, there are some web sites for younger English speaker. For example, Wonderopolis is one of these websites. There are some interesting articles about world works.
- Infotainment Websites: Infotainment is combination of “information” and “entertainment”. These web sites are both educational and entertaining. There are fun and interesting true facts, weird news stories and funny commentary in these web sites. Some of them are Boing Boing, Snopes and Cracked.
- Podcast Websites: Boing Boing and Cracked are also known as their enjoyable English podcasts. There are informative conversations and talks by English native speakers.
5. Make Contact with English Learners
Meeting new English learners is a good and very effective way how to improve English speaking. You can use online English Learners forums which are known as called message boards. Learners can practice by talking to each other in these areas.
There are busy message boards on most ESL websites. ESL Café forums and The English Club Forums are two of the most popular examples. If you search some websites to prepare for English exams, there are also some forums such as the IELTS Network message board, the Urch TOEFL forums, and so on.
You can use some popular social media like Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, and so on to meet English learners or enter some groups. If Facebook is not accessible in your country, you can use VK as an alternative. There are some online English conversation groups, English book clubs, and platforms for English teachers in VK.
6. Studying with Online English Materials
Self-studying is not impossible to learn English. You may wonder how to improve your English writing skills by yourself. Even if it is better to work with someone else while improving your speaking and writing skills, it is okay to be alone while learning English. There are some free websites for reading and listening practice.
- Websites for Listening Practices: These websites are divided into three titles. These are conversational English listening, practical “daily life” English listening, and academic/educational talks in English. You can select the types of listening websites according to your interesting area.
- Websites for Reading Practice: There are three main types of English reading exercise websites. These are self-study courses, graded readings, and English learner newspapers. Each website has different topics. You can select according to your purpose or interesting area.
7. Speaking Activities with Native English Partners : How to Improve English Speaking
The most common and true answer of how to improve English speaking skills is that make speaking exercises with a native speaker. There are some free websites for this purpose such as Creativa, italki, Verbling, Skype Tutors, and so on. italki is one of the most popular platforms for speaking practice. You can speak native speakers in private tutoring sessions.
There is another option on italki. If you spend money, you can make scheduled speaking practice. Even if you know English, you still wonder how to improve English speaking in business. Because there are differences between daily life and business English. Creativa may be a good option for this purpose. You can play Game for English Learning