The first step to speaking better English

"How can I speak English better?" It’s probably no surprise that this is the most common question I get from English learners. If you have the same question, keep reading to find out what I think the first step is. You can also get a free e-book to help you with your speaking.

​The first thing you need to do is to go a bit deeper. When you say you want to speak English better, what exactly do you mean? Think about what you really need in order to speak better. When you’re trying to speak and you get stuck, what precisely is the problem? Here are some questions to ask yourself.

1. Why are you learning English?
Think about your reasons for learning English. Do you need English for your work or studies? Are you trying to pass an exam? Do you want to meet people and make English-speaking friends? Or do you want to travel? Your reason for learning English will affect what you need to study or practise in order to get better.

2. What are your strengths and weaknesses?
What do you find easy and what do you find difficult about speaking English? Do you need more vocabulary? You can’t speak if you don’t know the words, right?! Is grammar your problem? Maybe you know the words but not how to put them together. Do you need to improve your pronunciation? It’s no good being fluent if people can’t understand you! So if grammar, vocabulary or pronunciation are a problem for you, you now know where to start.

3. Or is it just fluency that needs work?
Maybe you know the words and the grammar but it takes you too long to put the information together to get a sentence out of your mouth! Maybe you are in the habit of thinking in your language and translating everything into English before you speak and that’s slowing you down. Is that something you need to work on?

4. Is fear or confidence your issue?
Maybe you are just afraid of speaking to other people or you hate making mistakes. Often learners just need to practise in order to grow in confidence when speaking English. Perhaps you need to change your mindset and get comfortable with not being perfect.

I hope these questions help you to think a bit more about what better speaking really means for you!

In order to answer the question “How can I speak better English?” I've put together 30 suggestions for you in an e-book, one to try each day.

In 30 days, you will:

• get a new task to try each day
• find ideas for who to talk to and what to talk about
• grow in confidence when speaking
• improve your fluency.

To download your free book, click the button below.

English Speaking Challenge E-book