کلیدی برای یادگیری هر مهارت

029 - The Key to Learning any Skill

Kevin: So hey guys, here I am with Adir Ferreira from adirferrieraidiomas.com. Welcome to the Feel Good English podcast Adir.

Adir: Thanks for having me.

Kevin: So, just to get started, for people that might not know who you are and why I am interviewing you, can you give us a little bit of background on who you are and what you do?

Adir: All right. I have been an English teacher for twenty four years, can you believe that, twenty four years. I started out when I was seventeen in 1992, so you guys do the math. I worked in language schools, public schools, private schools, I did volunteer work, I covered the major aspects of language teaching. And I stopped teaching five years ago when I started doing some work online.

Kevin: And so, tell me about that. What brought you online?

Why did you decide to change how you teach?

Adir: Well, actually it was an ego trip. I wanted to have a blog, I had no idea how the technology worked, but I did want to have a blog. So I bought a domain and I put WordPress in it and I started blogging and writing with no technological knowledge whatsoever.

My earlier posts are so ugly, they’re so angry. But then as time went by I started honing my skills, my skills in blogging and writing and copywriting too, you know and also video audio recording. And in 2011, I was hired by an American company to work online for them full-time. So they took me out of the classroom and put me into my office and that was the start of the this online business for me.

Kevin: Let me stop you real quick to, and I heard you say something about your original blog posts were “angry”. What do you mean by that? What are you angry at? Angry at English?

Why, where did this anger come from, do you think?

Adir: Okay, I learned English the old way. In the 90s we didn’t have this many resources as we do right now so it was very hard for me, it is very hard because I didn’t have access to real English, to real conversational English, to meeting native speakers.

So it was a rare commodity when I spoke to an American or to a British person. And nowadays, people have everything, so they just won’t learn if they don’t want to. But then, I gave tips on how to make the best of your English posts, of your videos and stuff and at the back of my head I thought “How on earth are you not fluent yet with this many resources that we have nowadays?”

So that’s I think is the reason because I was so angry at the time.

But then I calmed down and now I am more relaxed and chill and everything.

Kevin: It sounds like you were kind of frustrated with that, you had to learn in a time where you probably had a little book and that was it. And nowadays, people have access to absolutely every source they could possibly need to become an excellent English speaker. Does that sound about right?

Adir: Exactly, yeah. You know, what I think people lack is organization, with organization. And I don’t agree that we need motivation, so if we really need to do something, we need to dredge up this motivation from somewhere. So we just need to plan and do, plan and do. That’s simple to say, but then if you don’t start, you would never be able to know where you’re going to get to if you don’t start doing things.

Kevin: Yeah, and I think that’s a great point. Sometimes people get so frustrated because there are so many options online.

What do I read? What do I listen to? Which course is the best?

Adir: Oh yeah, exactly. So I think that there is not a right method for everybody. There is a right method for you, for me, for many, all right? So we need to try and do things that work for us, we need to do it every single day and slowly.

We can’t just study on Saturday afternoon and then we don’t do that in the week because it’s not going to work. Learning is an active process, we need to be in contact with the language with the skills that we need to master in order to be fluent in a language, or in any other skills that we are trying to learn. Like singing, like painting, it takes hard work and that’s what people can’t seem to wrap their heads around the nowadays.

Kevin: This is a great time to segue into a book that you’re going to talk about today. Can you tell us the book that you’re going to talk about today that has really impacted your life?

Adir: Yeah, it’s called The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle and it was like a breakthrough book for me and I’m going to explain why. Because you always hear people say “Okay, you’re so talented.” You’re so talented, I would speak several languages and I’m also a pro singer. You didn’t know that, did you?

Kevin: Professional singer huh.

Adir: Ahh, I surprised you. I sing professionally [crosstalk] Kevin: Ahhh.

Adir: Yet.

Kevin: Are you going to give us a sample of that?

Adir: Maybe some other day, not today, I need to warm up first, I need to warm up first. Okay. So The Talent Code says that if you are talented like, let’s take Beyoncé for example, she puts in hours and hours of work in vocal training, in physical training, in dancing lessons, in singing lessons, in public appearances, in keeping her shape and everything else. And that’s what people don’t see.

Okay, so you were born with a gift, you have a good voice, but then if you don’t study and if you don’t nurture this gift, this socalled “talent”, it’s going to go to waste. Okay, it’s about English, for example I find it easy to learn languages, it’s my thing, you know.

But if I stop reading and learning and listening and doing the things that I have to do to keep the skills up-to-date, I’m going to lose them. So if you take your learning for granted, for example, “I am very good at this, I am not going to study for this.” You are wasting a precious opportunity, because you need to sit down and to study every single day, whatever it is you are studying, you need to keep it up. You can’t just say , “Okay, I’m going to do this in August, in a couple of months. Maybe next year, I’m already good at it.”

So in this book the author says that deliberate practice is the one that you practice and you are paying attention to it. For example, you were doing a listening exercise, you were not listening to the radio as a second piece of information, you were listening attentively, closely to it, so you’re trying to learn something from it.

It’s like learning with series, you know with series or movies or music or anything like that, you need to focus. If you were just watching it for fun, okay that’s no problem with that either. But if you tell me that you are learning with movies, but you were just watching the movie, you were not learning.

For example, if you watch movies, if you’re learning with movies, you can’t assume that you’re going to be sitting down for only one hour and a half two hours studying, it takes a long time, you will need to stop, you will need to do your research you will need to write down words that you don’t understand yet. There’s also the cultural aspects of learning because there may be references that I don’t understand and I need to look it up.

So we just can take for granted, for example, I do, I studied French or German or Spanish or English with three to five minute videos and that gives me like thirty minutes of studying.

Kevin: Sure. So you are studying really deeply, you’re going deeply into the words and you’re basically getting as much value from the content as possible.

Adir: Exactly. I don’t coast my way through it, I like to go deep and learn things for real. “Oh, I understand!” No, I still don’t understand this, let me rewind that; that’s how I do it. It’s like singing. You know for example if you are learning a new song, you need to break it down, break it down into very small pieces and study every aspect of it. For example the intonation, the rhythm, the message the song wants to put forth, so that you really learn how to sing it.

So for example if when were studying with the dialogue, your English textbook dialogue, “Oh, okay I understand this.” No, you don’t, study it again, revisit it. Revisiting things is a very interesting way to retain information. And deliberate practice, you need to know why you are studying, the purpose of this studying session.

So that’s the main idea of the book and I love the book, I have read it twice already and it always brings new light into my own learning. I consider myself a good learner, a good language learner in general, but I still have to be very aware of how I’m learning so that I don’t make the mistakes I did in the past. So if I made a mistake, I go and I correct it once. If I make a mistake again, there is something wrong, there’s something wrong, I need to see what’s happening here.

Kevin: It’s interesting and it seems, I really like your point. Just because you really enjoy learning languages doesn’t mean it’s easy for you. It almost makes it even more difficult because you are perfectionist with language so you really need to know the correct methods to study.

And people that maybe don’t like it so much, don’t like studying as much or think they aren’t good with language learning, can just take these tips and focus on the method and the strategies of how you can learn and by going deeply and following somebody like you who studies the actual process of learning and show methods that work and to also minimize learning time and to make it more effective.

For those people out here who might be interested in what this book The Talent Code talks about, what would you say, what is the biggest benefit of reading this book and how could somebody benefit from reading The Talent Code?

Adir: Well, it actually brings the neurological part of learning, there is a substance that our brain produces that helps us learn.

And with everything new that we learn, we make new connections in our brains and that is a very good thing to happen because we start getting out of our comfort zone.

So also getting out of your comfort zone is very important because if you do the same things that you do every day, you will have the same results every single day, it’s not different. The main word, the main phrase here I mean is hard work, specifically focused on the results that you want to gain.

Okay, for example, if I want to speak good English, I am going to study with a good teacher with a good approach and most importantly, consistently. So we need to do things consistently.

But it’s the perfect book, I think I’ll start reading it again tonight.

Kevin: You know Adir, I am going to read it very soon too because this is something that I struggle with, hard work and focus. If I’m focused on something I am able to work hard at it.

The problem with me is often I get sidetracked, I get distracted or I try to move on to something else too soon. Maybe out of boredom, maybe out of fear that I am not doing the right thing, for whatever reason, lack of patience, I lose focus on what I am working hard at and I think it’s a common problem.

Talking about struggling with things, I ask the people I interview on this show just to give us a little insight about your life and maybe talk about something that you are struggling with at this point. We all have things that we find difficult and we often don’t share this with people, we like to share things that are going well.

But sharing something that’s not been too easy for you lately through business or life or whatever, is there something that comes to mind that you are struggling with at the moment?

Adir: Oh, you didn’t say that you were going to ask me that.

Kevin: Yeah, this is the curve ball question.

Adir: Oh my god let me think about it. Well, I struggle every single day with keeping my tasks up to date. Okay, for example, I need to do a YouTube video and a blog post and a lesson for my course. And then a friend calls me want to have coffee with me and then I leave the house, my office is a home office, and then I come back and I’m hungry then I go to eat and then the day is gone. Okay, so that is something that I struggle with, I have gotten so better at this, you have no idea, I was a mess.

But then I think it’s my biggest struggle, and then I think with the tech, with the tech stuff I still do not master. Like I am getting better at editing videos now, or I crush it at editing audio, I am very good at that, but then I have had to learn about it. I learned about it through sweat and blood because I was a classroom teacher, I was a classroom teacher, so I had to rewire my brain into thinking that I could and I was able to do things that are technologically challenging so to speak.

And then, sometimes I say, “How do those people do that? Oh my god that seems so difficult.” And it’s not, it’s just a click away.

So I struggled with that, yeah, with keeping my tasks done, getting them done and then be more bold with the tech stuff.

Kevin: And, going back to the book, and I think this is why this book seems so valuable, like you said. It’s almost like we need to find, we need to be aware, self-awareness, knowing yourself, being able to see where you’re struggling, then making a plan to improve in that area, focusing on that and then like you said, putting in the hard work. It takes time and eventually our brains will work with us and it will help us and it will actually change the brain chemistry to make these things easier.

So The Talent Code, go read that book out there if you guys haven’t read it, it seems awesome. Adir, thanks for sharing that book. So before I leave you, why don’t you tell people listening to this, where can they find you, where can they find more information about you, where can they find your English lessons and things that you do online?

Adir: Okay, I am at adirferriera.com.br, there is a “br” at the end because it’s from Brazil. And I’m also on YouTube, Adir Ferriera, you can find me there, I am on Snap Chat, its Adirsnap and then I do my little broadcast there. I have been having so much fun doing those. I’m also on Periscope Adir Ferriera. on Twitter Adir Ferriera and there is a lot of Adir Ferrieras around, so you can find me anywhere.

Kevin: Everywhere, just type in “Adir Ferriera”, just yell out “Adir Ferriera” into the air and something will probably fall into your lap, right?

Adir: Exactly

Kevin: Thanks again Adir for being here and such a valuable lesson, I thank you for sharing that with myself and my audience and I will talk to you soon.

Adir: Thank you, that was my pleasure.