Complete Guide to Learning English | Original

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Table of Contents

  1. Affordable English Practice with Native Speakers
    • Discovering Cheap Online English Courses
    • IELTS Preparation and Speaking Practice
    • Comparison with Traditional Platforms
    • Platform Shopping and Service Selection
  2. Mastering English
    • My English Learning Journey and Career Success
    • Intensive Learning Methods (16 hours daily)
    • Tools and Techniques for Continuous Learning
    • Becoming the Sharpest Person in the World
    • Dedication to My Daughter
  3. The Recipe to Learn English
    • Total Learning Effort Summary (7 years)
    • Work Environment and Rapid Progress
    • Brain Changes Through English Immersion
    • Learning Methods That Don’t Feel Like Work
    • Finding Ways to Work Hard Without Pain
  4. Improving English with Extensive Input
    • From Chinese to English Preference Shift
    • Learning Through Enjoyable Content Methods
    • Statistics and Time Investment Details
    • Making Learning Like a Game
    • Advice for Students and Self-Learners

Affordable English Practice with Native Speakers

2025.02.15

Recently, I tried an English language conversation practice session with a native speaker from Pinduoduo.com.

The assistant will add your WeChat via your mobile phone number and help you arrange the course.

It’s cheap, at only 18 CNY per course for about 25 minutes. The teachers are from the Phillipines. By the way, I just learned the word “Phillipinos” from this chat.

I discovered this course through a post on X and was drawn to its affordability. Despite achieving an IELTS score of 6 two years prior, my goal is to reach 7.5 this year, necessitating increased English practice, particularly in speaking and writing.

We talked about some IELTS speaking exercises. The English teacher asked me exam questions about topics like travel, photo-taking habits, and traffic jams.

Another famous platform, VIPKID, charged 150 CNY per course for 25 minutes years ago.

So, the price is really cheap here now.

I searched for Japanese conversation practice on Pinduoduo.com. Unfortunately, there are no merchants offering such a service at the moment.

I would like to take more English courses.

Source: Pinduoduo.com

I bought 10 courses for 180 CNY and tried another merchant on Pinduoduo.com. I prefer to buy and compare products or services on Pinduoduo.

Mastering English

2022.11.08

One year ago, regarding my English ability, my reading was good, my listening was not so good, and my writing and speaking were poor. After working in a Singaporean company, four aspects of my English level are proficiency.

I passed a lot of interview rounds recently, and got several offers from big outsourcing companies whose clients are big banks. Though I will work still as a contractor for a big bank, I am still proud of what I achieved regarding that I was a dropout student.

Regarding the poor economic environment in China, I am confident that I will not lose my job in the next 10 years. Many graduated guys lose their jobs. It is hard for many middle-aged people to find a job. Society is ruthless. I am also trying very hard to ensure that I can find a job and pay my mortgage.

I learned English a hard way. Besides my 965 work, all of my leisure hours are spent learning English. 16 hours on the weekend, 8 hours on the work days. After half a year, I find my brain changed miraculously. I become passionate about speaking and writing English, become passionate about listening and reading English. I must ensure that I have some English materials to listen to whenever my mind is awake. Of course, it is annoying when you listen to lectures and write some code at the same time.

I love expressing myself in English now. As long as my Chinese friends can read simple English, I will send English text messages to them. I made bilingual short videos, so I made bilingual captions and dubbing. I just changed myself to an English native speaker though I live in China surrounding the Chinese.

Why? One reason is that as now I am proficient in English, it is easy for me to speak and write. Another reason is that I want to make my English level perfect. And I want to inspire more of my friends to reach the English level I got. The last reason is that using a lot of what you learned is funny. Especially not many people can do that, it is cool. And just one year ago, I couldn’t do that. So, see, how miraculous it is.

So how can I learn English for 16 hours a day? If I can play mobile phone, I will happily play TikTok and Youtube Shorts. The short videos are funny. If I can’t play mobile phone, I will listen to podcasts on Google Podcasts and listen to Youtube videos which you can play in the background if you are a Youtube premium member.

And what am I doing when I am listening to English lectures at the same time? Listen when driving, listen when laying in bed, listen when falling asleep, listen when eating meals, listen when walking, listen when riding a bicycle, listen when talking to others, listen when going to the toilet. So just let the English lectures play all the time, and focus a little bit some time to listen carefully and try to understand. I find in this way, I learn quite fast.

So now, my daily English and working English are proficient. I am about to make my academic English proficient. How can I do that? Same way, try to listen to a lot of academic materials. I am confident that my academic English can be quite sharp after one year.

In the above paragraph, I mention I listen to English lectures when talking to others. How can I do that? So it is on-ear headphones.

So you can hear what others say clearly at the same time you can hear the voice from the headphone. And what other tools do I use?

I find that if I wear Bluetooth earphones too much, I will feel pain. It may be that I listen for too much time. So I bought a mobile phone rope to wear on my neck. So I can use my mobile phone to listen to lectures when there are not many people surrounding me. I will preferably use this way more than the on-ear headphone way.

I try hard to solve the problem of how can I live well as a dropout undergraduate student. Now I can easily find a job. The global big company cares more about the English level of candidates instead of their college diplomas. And there is a lot of outsourcing company whose clients are global big companies.

And actually, I am just one step to a permanent position at a big bank. I failed in the last round of the interview. They weren’t unsatisfied with my English level. They mentioned that my technical knowledge foundation is quite good, however, I still lack a bit of knowledge deepness.

So my answer is that if you can do the things the people who have a college diploma can’t do, then you can beat them. Especially in the highly competitive and hardcore technical area, there are many chances for dropout, for the people who want to prove themselves, and for the people who want to earn a high salary.

So I am trying hard to solve my dropout problem. I spent half a year learning 16 hours a day to solve them. However, the great lesson is that if I can learn English so fast and well, why can’t I learn other things as well?

So I am trying to polish my academic English comprehension ability. I am listening to academic lectures the whole day. I listen to lectures about how to make a rocket, how the economy works by Ray Dalio, and how to make a computer from scratch. I listen to one lecture for a whole week. At the first shot, I don’t know what they are talking about. After a week, to my surprise, I can almost listen most of the words they speak and understand some main points they share. It is quite amazing. Because I originally don’t think I can learn such stuff, especially since they are taught in English.

So how to become the sharpest person in the world? I think I find the answer. Just learn the whole day, the whole week, the whole year. You will be quite sharp. I will be quite sharp.

The most difficult obstacle for me to becoming the sharpest is that I am an easily distracted guy. My concentration ability is poor. However, the good news is that when I play lectures for 2 hours, to let the voice surround my ear, then I can focus a little bit to listen carefully for 1 hour. Especially when you are driving, your eyes are looking ahead, and you are bored, so your mind has just enough attention to listen and learn something. When I drive for 2 hours, I can listen carefully for 1.5 hours.

Is it amazing? Yes, it is quite amazing. And nowadays, new energy vehicles are becoming popular. I also bought one, NETA V Chao Lite 400. I think it is the best new energy car whose price is below 100k CNY. Young people like me in China can afford one. The car is amazing. So you drive to do a road trip without spending much money to get fuel for the car.

And in this way, I can only get familiar with technical stuff or academic papers. Regarding most of the precious knowledge, I must do to learn. How can I learn precious knowledge?

I find a way today. When I did something, I got anxious when I feel I am not progressing. For example, when I build some circuits or play with Arduino, I find my progress is slow. Then I give up. Then, I find my solution. I listened to English lectures while building circuits, in this way, I get to brush up on my English even if the circuit doesn’t work. At least I get one percent more familiar with some words and some sentences in English. So I think if I play lectures at my home using a Bluetooth speaker, then I can build circuits the whole day. If I want to have the patience to do some labor work, then I just need to play lectures to make myself relaxed to do it.

Does it sound exciting? Yes. It is really exciting to learn if you can learn very fast and without much effort. It is appealing if you have ways to learn anything. It is wonderful if you can calm down to do any labor experiment or work.

This is my way how to becoming the sharpest person in the world. Because I learn 16 hours a day, I experiment 16 hours a day, I explore 16 hours a day.

I have a daughter who is one and a half years old now. Her father learned for 27 years and used 2 hours to write the most precious lesson down. So it is dedicated to her. I am 27 years old now. It is hard for me to become the sharpest though it is still not late and I have chances. But I am very confident that my daughter will become one of the sharpest people when she grows up.

One generation beats one generation. Humans are wonderful.

The Recipe to Learn English

2022.09.30

Recently, I shared my job change with my friends. To their surprise, the big change in me maybe my English skill improved a lot in a year.

I already share the article about how to learn English. Let me summarize my total effort to learn English after graduating from high school.

7 years to use Google search to read English websites. Half a year to play in TikTok or Youtube Shorts for at least 6 hours. Watch Netflix for around 100 TV shows and movies. Read about 30 English books. Use English to work in an international big company. Listen to Google Podcast for at least 4 hours in half a year.

See, these are my total effort. Does it seem that it is really hard work? It may seem like a lot of work. However, I don’t feel any pain in this process. Do you learn your mother language painfully? No, you don’t. So I just make learning English like learning my mother language.

I think everyone in Chinese can reach the level I got. It helps me to pass the English technical interview at a big company. I heard that only in 1 of 50 developers, there is just one guy who can speak English fluently.

I joined a big Singaporean bank as a contractor. Before I joined the company, my reading is good, my listening is not so good, and my writing and speaking is poor.

I know that when at the first day of my work, I only type English words for 5 words in a minute. However, after several months, I found that I can type 20 words in a minute. I still have some grammar errors in my writing. However, at least, I can express what I want to say and my colleagues can understand well.

My colleagues say that the English environment is really important. Yes, it is. However, these days, we can use the Internet to mock the English environment. Youtube, Netflix, and Google Podcast is really good.

So I took a TOFEL Exam. However, in the process of taking the exam, my computer adapter isn’t plugged in and the screen is turned off. After I plug in the adapter for 15 seconds, the teacher can’t see me. So I canceled the test. I will retest the exam in the golden week. In a mock exam, I can get 80 to 90 scores of 120. However, I am afraid that in the real exam I can get that points. Listening and reading are hard. Also, I don’t like to prepare for the exam. The idea that we sit before the computer and practice for the exam as a student will kill me. It is so painful. I don’t have that kind of self-discipline.

I can use my way to learn English and I feel that my English skill improve a lot. So why do I try to prepare for the exam to do better in the exam? I know there are a lot of reasons. But I don’t like that way.

So when I feel that my English ability improve a lot. However, the test beat me. So I begin to listen to podcasts during my daily commute. So I try to walk for 2 or 3 hours daily to wear Bluetooth earphones to listen to podcasts. The Lex Friedman Podcast is really good. I listen to the speeches of Steve Jobs and Tony Fadell a lot.

So I just listen to podcasts for around 5 hours a day. After several months, I notice my brain had changed. I can use English to express myself faster. When I want to say something, my brain quickly knows how to say it. Just like using Chinese.

So then I think if I can use this way to learn English, why not Japanese or Hardware? or whatever you like.

My insight is that your brain is easy to distract. So if you let your brain in an environment, then it can focus sometimes. So if I let my brain emerge in 5 hours of English talk, then my brain can focus to listen to it for about 2 hours. Then I can feel that I learned fast!

So this is my recipe to work hard. And I start to learn hardware and chips. I listen to the capacitor and transistor the whole day. So I can think about it again and again. The electricity is just like a flow, the electrical component is just like the software library. The electrical parameter is just like the API of the software. You can gain more insights after thinking and listening to them for long hours during the day.

I am a very lazy person. If I can do it, anyone can do it. In the modern highly competitive day, you need to work hard to be great. I am glad that I find a way to work hard. And it is very funny. I don’t feel pain.

See, I just use one hour to write this article. And just half a year ago, I feel very painful to write one sentence myself.

Let’s end with my recent favorite quote.

The difference between a good student and a great one is that a good student is concerned more about the outcome while a great one is fascinated by the process of learning.

And, friends, long time no see, hope you guys all doing well.

Improving English with Extensive Input

2021.01.25. This post was originally written in Chinese. It has been translated to English to facilitate further translations into other languages.

In 2014, when I encountered programming problems, I would search for English web pages on Google. However, I found it difficult to continue because I read slowly and frequently needed to refer to a dictionary. I felt lost in the clouds and decided to turn to Chinese web pages instead. At that time, I preferred reading in Chinese whenever possible. However, over the past six years, my approach has reversed, and I now only read content in Chinese when it is not available in English. I spend my leisure time in the English-speaking world, watching American TV shows without subtitles and browsing TikTok videos. Despite my efforts, my English proficiency is still not as good as my Chinese, maybe only half as good.

Regarding the question of “How to learn English to the level of a native speaker” I believe I have found the answer. Over the last two years, my English proficiency has steadily improved, especially during the second half of 2019. Looking back, I realize that if I had put in the same effort in 2015-2016, my English proficiency might be as good as it is today. With time and work, I can now use English resources to solve many of the problems I had given up on before. This progress allows me to read more professional books and broadens my horizons. In the internet age, I have come to realize that we can simulate living in English-speaking countries without leaving our homes. People in English-speaking countries are similar to us; they spend most of their time on phones and computers, surfing the internet. Once we learn how to access the internet freely, we can enter their world too.

I am sharing these insights and experiences as if I am speaking to my younger self, to high school and college students today, and to anyone interested in learning English on their own. In my previous article on “The Journey of Learning English,” I discussed my experiences in learning English over the years. Here, I want to add some recent reflections.

Just like with any other subject, the most important thing is finding a method that you enjoy and sticking with it. If you love English songs, start by learning their lyrics, word by word, understanding their meanings. Then, listen to the songs and write down the lyrics with a pen or on your computer. If that seems challenging, that’s okay; move on to learning another song. Learn many songs, maybe a hundred of your favorites. Believe me, when you have learned a hundred songs, your brain will be different. You’ll find that you can understand similar lyrics and songs much easier. To continue improving your English to a native-like level, learn another hundred songs, but this time, switch to different topics and genres, from love songs to country music.

If you enjoy quotes, find a hundred inspiring quotes, especially from people you admire. Learn them one by one, look up words in the dictionary, and understand their meanings. If you admire certain foreign personalities, follow them on Twitter, read their tweets one by one, and look up unfamiliar words. If you like playing games and also want to learn English, try playing English-language games. Find a hundred games to play. If you love watching American TV shows, try watching them without subtitles. Initially, it might be challenging to understand, but as you continue watching, you’ll gradually notice that you can understand more. If watching without subtitles is too difficult, try using English subtitles. Platforms like Netflix and YouTube offer subtitle options easily. After watching a hundred episodes of TV shows or documentaries, you’ll realize that your English listening skills have improved significantly. If you continue this for a couple of months, you’ll find that you can’t go back to your previous level. Language learning is fascinating; once you understand something, you won’t forget it.

Currently, in my day-to-day life as a freelancer, I spend a significant amount of time improving my English. I read a couple of chapters on Kindle, browse TikTok for short videos, watch TV shows and documentaries on Netflix, and explore various content on YouTube. I do whatever interests me at the moment. My only requirement for myself is that since I’m choosing content I enjoy, I should focus and understand every sentence carefully.

Here are some statistics: I’ve watched tens of thousands of TikTok videos, liked around ten thousand of them. I’ve watched a hundred documentaries and movies on Netflix. I’ve read over a hundred English blog articles. I’ve read 15 English books. Achieving this progress took time and concentration, mainly during the second half of 2019. On average, I spent around eight hours per day, five days a week. My main focus was on improving my listening and reading skills.

I believe it’s essential not to force yourself to learn. Persistence can be painful. Find the content and methods that you enjoy the most, and stick with them. Watching international TikTok videos is effortless and doesn’t require persistence. If you find certain materials difficult, look for easier ones to learn from. Once you’ve mastered the easy ones, move on to slightly more challenging content. Language is omnipresent, and there’s an abundance of topics and expressions to explore.

To make progress, reflect on how you learned Chinese. It wasn’t by studying grammar and doing exercises; you watched many martial arts movies and TV shows before coming to school. You engaged in simple conversations with your parents before starting school. Similarly, learning English should be approached in the same way.

Back in high school, even after learning English, our listening and reading skills were still poor. In exam-oriented learning, we might not have been efficient in our studies. Apart from exams, did we take the initiative to learn on our own? Probably not. In the past, learning resources were limited, with only textbooks and exercises like “New Concept English” and language learning tapes. In elementary school, we only occasionally listened to audio tapes in class. In middle school, we had around 15 minutes of listening practice before evening self-study.

Despite the hassle of accessing the internet, we now have abundant resources available for self-learning. The internet provides us with ample material for learning English.

Learning anything might be similar to learning English. Believe in the power of time and allow yourself to indulge in the simplest knowledge. If you want to learn physics, start with a series of basic physics experiments. If you want to learn programming, start with graphical programming. If you want to improve your drawing skills, start by drawing simple things. Turn learning into a game; even studying English with TikTok is genuinely fun and addictive.

When it becomes a game, our focus is intensified, and thinking becomes enjoyable. If you find yourself struggling to understand, search for easier materials to read. Read English children’s books and watch animated films for children; they are excellent resources.

We should consider how we encourage high school and college students and those interested in learning English. After sharing these insights, I want to end with a memorable and slightly exaggerated statement: Learning English like a native is genuinely simple and enjoyable.

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