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Learn English Like a Native

Hi I’m Vanessa from SpeakEnglishWithVanessa.com. Would you like to learn English like a native speaker? Of course. Let’s talk about it. Would you like to see how my son, a native English speaker is learning his native language? Today we’re going to talk about three things that happen naturally during conversations with him that are helping him to learn to speak English.

And I’m curious, as you watch this video think about mothers, and fathers in your country. Do they do these things as well? I have a son who just turned one year old. You’re going to meet him in this lesson, and he already knows how to say a couple things like mama, dada, kitty, fish. Even though it sounds like ish, and ants even though it sounds like nts. But he’s learning a lot.

He can even understand more words than he can say. Maybe that’s similar to you. Can you understand more than you can say? He can understand words like milk, food, lets go, give it to me, hurray. You know all of those important words. Over the next year he’s going to learn a lot more words. He’s going to learn how to say them, he’s going to learn how to understand them, but how is he actually going to learn them?

Well at the moment we read a lot of books with him, I tell him stories as we walk through the neighborhood, and he hears my husband and I talking together a lot. But these are things that a lot of you do. Maybe you read stories, you listen to stories. So what are some things that are unique to babies?

Lets talk about three of those things today. We’re going to watch a short clip where I’m going for a walk around our lawn, and I’m just talking to my son about things that are happening. We do this every morning, and in the video it was 7:00 AM, he had just woken up, but we were still having an interaction, a conversation together. Let’s watch this clip, and then we’re going to break it down into those three elements. Do you see the ants Theo? Yeah, they’re on that tree.

They’re climbing up. Where do you think they’re going? Yeah, maybe their little home? What happens when you pull on that tree Theo? Oh, the leaf fell on the ground. The whole branch moves huh? Whoa. That looks like fun. Yeah, are you going to tell me about it? Mm-hmm (affirmative). Okay.

Oh, I can’t let you eat that leaf. I know it looks tasty. It probably won’t feel too god inside of you. Yeah, that one too. Oh, it’s on the ground. Maybe we can go eat some breakfast? That’s something you can eat. Would you like some breakfast? Yeah? Let’s go look over here. There’s so many things to explore outside. Do you want to touch this one? Whoa. You got some leaves off of that branch. And then the gate. What do you see? Oh, do you hear that air conditioning over there?

I know, I hear it too. The first thing that people do when they’re interacting with babies, and speaking with them is they ask a lot of questions. I’ve found myself doing this, and I’ve also noticed other people I know when they interact with my baby, if they’re a parent, if they’re not a parent they ask questions. And I wonder why we do this? I think it’s maybe because he is curious, and he is engaging with the world around him, and we want to be part of that. We want to engage, and be curious with him, “What do you see?

Do you see that? What’s that? What are you doing?” We’re engaging with him, and we’re using his natural curiosity in order to learn more language. So I think that you can use this as well as an English learner. Spark your curiosity about the things around you. Look at the room around you, look outside if you’re outside at the moment, and try to ask questions about things, “What’s that noise?

Oh, is that the air conditioning?” And maybe you don’t know the word for air conditioning in English, or you can’t pronounce it well. This is a good time to use that word, to practice, and to engage yourself in the world around you by asking questions about things that are just natural in your world. The second thing that adults often do when they talk with babies is use baby talk. And this means that your vowels are elongated, and your pitch usually goes up.

Sometimes your emotions are just really obvious. They’re even exaggerated, and we use this for babies almost universally. I think a lot of countries use baby talk when talking with babies. Let’s take a look at a quick clip so that you can hear this in action, and then we’ll talk about it. Do you see the ants Theo? Yeah, they’re on that tree. They’re climbing up. I said, “Yeah, they’re on that tree.

They’re climbing up.” But I didn’t say it like that. I said it in a little bit [inaudible 00:05:47] higher pitch, and I elongated some vowels naturally. I wasn’t thinking, “I should elongate these vowels so that my son can understand me clearly.” No, this is just something that naturally happens, “they’re on that tree.” Those vowels are elongated to help him understand more clearly.

And there was actually a study that showed people who talk to babies in baby talk, those babies understood their native language faster, because they were spoken to clearly, and they could hear those vowels, which are often the most tricky parts of language. So for you, how can this help you as an English learner? Should you listen to mothers speaking in baby talk? No, not necessarily.

But what this translates to for you is that it’s best to start off with something that you can understand. So for example, this English lesson I hope that you can understand the majority of what I’m saying. My speech just naturally is pretty clear, and straightforward. This means it’s easier to understand. So start with this kind of speech. Don’t jump right into an English TV show, and then feel overwhelmed, and bored. Instead start with something that you can understand.

Babies start with baby talk, and then they work up to more mature, adult-like speech. So don’t feel bad starting with something a little bit lower level, and then working your way to eventually watching English movies. The third thing that adults often do when they’re speaking with babies is they interact with them by talking back to them when they’re babbling. Babbling means when they’re just saying nonsense.

It’s just sounds. Yaya, nana, mama, lala. It means nothing, but adults are interacting with them and saying, “Oh yeah, what are you saying?” Or they’re giving a toy, or they’re showing that they’re listening. And this is something that’s really valuable to babies because it’s encouraging them to speak even though it’s nothingness, it doesn’t mean anything.

They’re learning step-by-step to speak. Now let me just say it was really hard to capture any of my sons sounds on camera, because the moment he sees something new like my phone he wants to grab it, and then he stops babbling. So what we have in this clip is about as good as it gets, but let’s take a look at it really quick just to see that kind of sounds, more like mmmm sounds that he’s making, and how I’m interacting with him.

That looks like fun. Yeah, are you going to tell me about it? Mm-hmm (affirmative). Okay. Having someone to talk to is so much more fun than just speaking by yourself. So I’d like to help you use this technique as well. Even if you’re just saying sounds like my baby, it doesn’t mean anything.