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• Hello, everyone, and welcome back to English with Lucy.

Today, we are going to talk about self introduction,

the answer to that dreaded question,

“Tell me about yourself.”

Now, to some of you this topic may seem very basic,

but learning to introduce yourself properly

is incredibly important.

You might need to introduce yourself

without any forewarning, so you need to be prepared.

You may need to introduce yourself in your English class

or in a job interview.

You might need to introduce yourself at a new job

or at a new hobby or leisure activity.

You may even need to introduce yourself at a big event

or convention in front of thousands of people.

I feel very nervous and anxious

when I have to introduce myself to large groups of people,

and English is my first language.

For learners of English, for my students,

this is incredibly intimidating.

In order to successfully introduced yourself,

you must have your self introduction pre-written and learnt.

You have to be prepared.

In this video, I am going to guide you through this process.

At the end of this lesson, you will have

a complete self introduction that is ready to use

and ready for you to learn off by heart.

Right, let’s get on with the lesson.

So, let’s start with the basics of a self introduction.

The very first thing that you’ll need to say

when introducing yourself is a greeting.

Now, you can have formal greetings

or you can have informal greetings.

It depends where you are, the situation you are in.

Let’s start with formal greetings.

Obviously, hello.

Hello can be both formal and informal,

but it’s fine to use it in a formal situation.

You also have good morning, good afternoon and good evening.

Make sure you pay particular attention

to what time of day it is.

I have said good morning in the evening

and good evening in the morning before.

One thing to note is the use of good day.

In British English, good day is considered

very old-fashioned, very very, very formal.

It’s not commonly used.

However, it is very common in Australian English.

They kind of shorten it down to g’day.

G’day. (chuckling)

And I would say that, g’day.

I wonder what Emma from mmmEnglish will think

(chuckling) of me saying g’day.

Will she approve? I’ll ask her.

But, g’day is more informal.

But this again is if you’re in Australia.

It’s just something I’ve noticed

people using in my comments section, “Good day.”

I can see why you would use it.

It appears to be a greeting

that is suitable for all hours of the day,

when in reality, in British English,

it’s just a very, very old-fashioned saying.

Also note that goodnight is normally a send off,

an equivalent for goodbye.

You say it when you are leaving

instead of when you are greeting someone.

If you’re introducing yourself in the night time,

you would say good evening.

Now let’s talk about informal greetings.

It’s really important for you to find one

that you feel comfortable with.

There are lots of informal greetings,

like hey, what’s up, hi, hiya,

yo. (laughing)

There’s even, what’s good?

Which is quite an American one.

Honestly, if I said yo when I was introducing myself

in an English class or in a less formal situation,

I would feel really stupid, because it doesn’t suit me.

My particular region doesn’t use yo,

so it feels a bit forced.

I really admire people who can just stand up and say,

“Yo, what’s good?”

But it’s not gonna happen for me.

So make sure you pick one

that you feel really comfortable saying.

Next of course we have your name.

Now, there are many ways of introducing your name.

The very basic ones like I’m or I am.

I’m Lucy. I am Lucy.

Or, if you’re introducing yourself in a situation

where the majority of the audience cannot see you,

for example on the telephone.

No one can really see you

when you’re speaking on the telephone.

You can say, my name is or my name’s,

with the apostrophe-s, the contracted form.

Or, if you’re in a very large

auditorium or convention centre,

then you might want to use this is, “This is Lucy.”

On the telephone I would normally say,

hi, this is Lucy speaking, or this is Lucy.

Next let’s talk about location,

where you’re from and where you’re living.

There are many variations of this.

I’m going to start with the most basic

and move on to slightly more complicated ways

of describing your geographical location.

Firstly we have I’m from, and then the place name.

I’m from Bedfordshire.

We also have I’m and then the nationality adjective.

“I’m British, I’m English.”

If you are from somewhere that is quite far

from the place where you’re introducing yourself,

you can say I come from, and then you can name that place.

Come from implies a little bit more of a journey.

If you want to say where you grew up, you can say,

I was born and raised in place name.

I was born and raised in England.

If you were born in one place

but grew up in a different place, you can say,

I was born in France but raised in Sweden.

If you want to say that you are from one place,

but are now living in another place,

there are various options.

You can say, I grew up in…

“I grew up in LA but now live in New York.”

“I’m originally from Edinburgh but I’m now based in London.”

If you want to say how long you have lived

in a certain place, you can say,

“I’ve been living in London for three years.”

Or, “I’ve spent the past few years in Paris.”

Now, those are the basics.

Let’s talk about some other options

that you can add on to your self introduction.

A very important option is your position and your company.

For example, “I work at Google in the marketing department.”

You can say, I work at or I work for.

You would not say I work in, and then a company name.

It’s at or for a company name.

You can also say, “I’m a manager at Starbucks.”

I’m a position at company.

Again, the at can also be replaced with a for.

If you just want to give general idea

of the field in which you work, you can say,

I work in, general area.

“I work in sales.”

If you want to give the specific position, you can say,

“I work as a deputy manager.”

“I work as an accountant. I work as an accountant.”

You might also want to mention your qualifications,

especially if you are introducing yourself

in a job interview.

If you want to say that you are close to graduation,

you can say, “I’m about to graduate.”

You could also say, I am a subject graduate or postgraduate.

“I’m a marketing graduate.”

“I have a bachelor of arts degree in marketing.”

Or, “I have a BA degree in marketing.”

Or just, “A BA in marketing.”

“I’m a biology post-grad.”

Shortening it down to grad is more informal,

so it might be something that you do at a convention

or in your English class.

If you want to talk about courses or other achievements,

you can say, I’m currently taking a course

in subject. Maths.

Now, note the preposition, in versus on.

You can take a course in something theoretical like maths.

You can take a course on something practical

like jewellery making or pottery.

You can also remove the preposition.

“I’m taking a pottery course.”

If you want to say that you finished a course,

it’s now on your CV, you can say

I have completed a 72-hour course in or on subject.

For the time scale of the course,

you can say the number, dash, and then the unit of time,

and that together forms an adjective.

A 72-hour subject course.

A three-day subject course.

Now, if you want to talk about experience,

about your previous jobs, you can say,

I have number years of experience in the field.

“I have three years of experience

“in the neuroscience field” at whichever company.

You don’t necessarily have to say field.

You can say I have 10 years of sales experience.

Or, I have 10 years of experience in sales.

You can also say I’ve worked in field

for however long you’ve worked there.

“I’ve worked in the accounting field for three years.”

Or, “I’ve worked in accounting for three years.”

Now, if you are in a more informal situation,

one in which you’re introducing yourself to make friends

and to meet people and to get to know each other better,

you may want to talk about your family.

Now, obviously, there are the normal things like,

I have a brother, I have a sister, I have a mum and a dad.

But what if you want to give a little bit more information

and also show off your language skills?

One common mistake I hear my students make

is when they’re trying to talk about

how large or how small their family is.

They want to tell me how many family members

there are in their family.

I often hear them say, “We are five in our family.”

This isn’t correct in English.

In English we say, I’m from a family of number.

“I’m from a family of four.”

Or, “We are a family of four.”

That’s a really important one for you to remember.

It’s a mistake I hear very frequently.

If you want to talk about

how many brothers or sisters you have, you can say,

“I am one of four siblings.”

Siblings doesn’t specify the gender,

so you don’t have to say two brothers, one sister.

You can just say siblings, three.

“I’m one of four siblings.”

Or even, if you’re already talking about families,

you can just say, “I’m one of four,”

and they’ll understand you.

If you have no brothers or sisters,

you can say I am an only child.

“I’m an only child.”

You might want to talk about hobbies.

You have all the usual phrases like,

I really like running, I really enjoy tennis.

A really good phrase I think is, I’m a big fan of.

“I’m a big fan of go-karting.”

You can also say, I am a keen and then a noun.

For example, “I’m a keen runner.”

Or, “I’m a keen tennis player.”

Now, I’ve left this one till last because really,

it really isn’t as necessary anymore,

but it’s important that you know how to say it. It’s age.

We have the basic one.

“I am 25 years old.”

We can shorten it down. “I’m 25.”

If you don’t want to specify your age, you can say,

I’m in my early, mid or late, and then your decade.

20s, 30s, 40s, 50s,

teens as well, if you’re really young.

“I’m in my mid-20s.”

“She’s in her early teens.”

“He’s in his late 40s.”

You might also hear people say,

“She’s a 20-something marketing graduate.”

Or, “He’s a 30-something accountant.”

That’s if you don’t know their age

or you think it would be rude to try and guess their age.

The last point in this vocabulary section of the lesson,

I want to talk to you about the dreaded fun fact.

I’ve been to a lot of events,

I’ve been to a lot of conventions

and I’ve had to introduce myself

in a lot of English classes,

and something that teachers and speakers

love to ask you to do is give a fun fact about yourself.

I must admit, I have asked my students

to provide a fun fact about themselves.

It’s annoying, ‘cause you have to stand up

and say, my name is and my job is,

and my fun fact is (mumbles).

And that could be really, really daunting, intimidating.

To suddenly think of an interesting fact about yourself

is really, really hard.

So, I highly recommend that you have

a fun fact up your sleeve, a fun fact prepared.

Think about an interesting fear, a weird like or dislike.

A good one is always your pet,

or a strange achievement or extraordinary experience.

I always say that I have hypermobility,

and then I’ll just show them my thumbs

or dislocate my shoulder blade.

That is twice in a month I’ve done that on YouTube.

I need to calm down.

Have a think, if you want to do bonus homework,

share your fun fact about yourself.

But this is optional.

I know how horrible the fun fact can be.

Now, I’ve given you loads of different options.

I’ve given you the basics

and then you can add on the options.

But you’ll be left with a lot of short sentences.

Let’s see how mine would look.

Good morning, everyone.

My name is Lucy. I am 24 years old.

I am from Bedfordshire.

I work as an English teacher.

I am a marketing graduate.

I’m a big fan of running and fitness classes.

Now, whilst all of that is grammatically correct

and very clear, if I do say so myself,

I think it would be a lot better

if I condensed these seven sentences down

into two flowing sentences.

What do you think of this?

Good morning, everyone.

My name’s Lucy and I’m a 25-year-old

marketing graduate from Bedfordshire.

I now work as an English teacher,

and I’m a big fan of running and fitness classes.

So much better, so much shorter, so much more natural.

See if you can condense your introduction

down to two flowing sentences, minus the greeting.

That could be a little sentence on its own.

I haven’t removed any of the information.

Right, I really look forward