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012 - Are short English podcasts or long ones better for learning?

Welcome to another QA Saturday episode of the FeelGoodEnglish podcast.

This is your host and teacher, Kevin, coming to you from lovely Denver Colorado in the rocky mountains. It’s beautiful here.

QA Saturdays, I answer your questions coming from all of the world about English or life, giving you my opinion on how to best learn English, how to become a confident English speaker.

Go to FeelGoodEnglish.com, and you can sent me an email, you can also record your voice and send me a message. That would be cool.

And if you like I’ll play on QA Saturdays and answer your question so those people around the world that might have the same question as you can also get the answer to them. Cool?

Today’s question comes from Will, Will is a Brazilian and he asks:

” Kevin what kind of podcasts do you think it’s better for listening? Short ones with one minute, up to two minutes like NewsandLevels.com, or podcast with ten or more minutes?

Great question, Will.

So, NewsandLevels was the example he gave. That is a great website with short news articles for English learners they sent all type of news they have the audio and transcripts. They’re short and even have different levels so one, two, and three.

Depending on the vocab and the speed of the speaker speaking, the speed of the speaker speaking, the speed of speaker speaking.

And Will’s question was what do I think it’s better, short podcasts or longer ones that are ten minutes or more, like mine.

Well, my answer is neither and both. Okay stupid answer, Kevin. That’s what you’re thinking. But let me explain. They’re benefits to both. I really believe the power of repetition.

When I was learning Portuguese I used to repeat the podcasts that I listened to, maybe two, three, four times. Because I really think that helps the brain learn new vocabulary, memorize the vocabulary and get used to the sound to the language. So repetition is huge. If you’re listening to the shorter podcast like one or two minutes. It gonna be easier to repeat right. Because it’s quick. As opposed to ten minutes or twenty minutes episode, it takes longer to repeat.

So with repetition, it might be easier for shorter episodes. Also, if you don’t have a lot of patience for listening to things in general, you have ADD, you’re a just very anxious person, shorter episodes might be easier for you to listen to. Because you get bored quickly. So that can also be a benefit of short podcast episodes like NewsandLevels.com.

However, even more important than the length of the podcast, in my opinion, is the content. What’s are you listening to? do you like it? Is it interesting? Is it motivating? Is it inspiring?

Does it teach you something new other than just some new English vocabulary? Can it improve your life? Can it make you smarter?

These things are more important than the length of the podcast.

When I was learning Portuguese I always listened to the podcast called “Cafe Brazil.” (This is an awesome), this is an awesome podcast on politics and culture, great Brazilian music.

He goes deep into very original and underground and cool Brazilian music which I loved. And it was twenty minutes. This is around twenty to twenty-five minutes. Now the level was pretty advanced. However, I really really enjoyed the content, it was exciting. So what would I do? I would go running in the evenings for exercise. And I would listen to it twice that it would be forty minutes. Two times twenty minutes, forty minutes. So I would listen to it for twenty minutes and then go back. Then II’dl go home and read the transcript.

So I could repeat it even though it was longer but more importantly, it was interesting. I liked the content and over time I definitely saw results in my Portuguese. It got better. That level was a little advanced for me but through listening to it on repeat and through listening to the same episode all week long because it was posted weekly, I could listen to each episode five, six, seven, eight times. You need to listen to the content deeply. If it’s twenty minutes, listen to it five, six times over the week. If it’s one minute, listen to it five, six times over the day.

Kind of all comes down to this. The more exciting and interesting the content isfor you. If you like the podcast the more you’re going to listen to it. So stop thinking about how long the episode is, think about what the person is talking about in the podcast. Is it important to you? Is it inspiring? You don’t have to learn English just by listening to English lesson.

You can learn English by listening to one of the other millions of options online in English and learn from that.

Got it?

Great, so thanks Will for your question, again if you have questions sent them to kevin@feelgoodenglish.com or just go to FeelGoodEnglish.com and you can easily find a contact form there.

Hope you listen to this episode more than once put it on repeat. Hope this is inspiring and exciting and educational for you. And enjoy the rest of the weekend. I will see you soon.

Bye bye