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After living in Portugal for 15 years and teaching English in various capacities there, including at the University of Aveiro, I moved back to the United States in 2019. Returning for our church was the best decision we have ever made and God has been so good to us. Reading the Bible everyday and trying to keep the commandments of Jesus are my priorities, along with loving my family and all the people God has put into my life. Helping people is something I enjoy doing, and meeting the individual needs of students who want to learn English is important to me.

Monday, October 1, 2018

Things that Hold us Back from Speaking English

1. Being self conscious
Worrying about how you sound or whether or not you're speaking perfectly can keep you from even trying.  If someone can't understand you, or even makes a comment about how you aren't speaking well you have to learn to brush it off and keep going.  Learn to laugh at yourself, even, and keep in mind it's quite possible the person judging you may not even speak another language.
2. Lack of opportunity to speak or listen
If you aren't living in an English speaking country, you'll have to take it upon yourself to engage in self immersion.  How?  Find a television program in English and dedicate a time to watch it everyday.  Try to find something with the same characters in it, as this will help you to begin "predicting" what someone might say and find more meaning in the context of what you're watching.  This speeds up the learning process.  Listening to native speakers will also help you with your pronunciation.  Now all you need to do is find someone to talk to so you can practice.
3. People around you all speak your language
Living in Portugal hasn't necessarily made it easy for me to learn Portuguese.  Everyone here seems to speak English.  So I have to force myself to speak Portuguese even when those around me are speaking in English.  It is much easier and less tiresome for me to fall back into my native language, and believe me I've done it many times. But when I'm conscious of the fact I need to improve my Portuguese I make a deliberate effort to not revert back to my English-speaking
comfort zone.

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