#003 The Importance Of Repeated Listening in English

Hello, everybody! I am Georgiana your English teacher and founder of SpeakEnglishPodcast.com. My mission is to help you speak English fluently.

In this episode, I will be talking about how many times we have to repeat an audio material in English. After that, you practice your conversation skills with a new mini-story.

Ok, let’s get started!

As you may know, I always recommend you to listen to improve your English speaking. There are many studies, which suggest that there is a correlation between our level of the language and the hours we have been listening. In other words, the more you listen, the better. The more hours you spend listening, the quicker you improve.

 

Here’s an interesting question you might ask: “How many times do I have to listen to every piece of content?” Do I have to listen just one time? Or more than that?

What most students do is listen to certain content once or twice and then change to another material. The typical student thinks that the more variety, the better.

 

Well, variety is useful, but what you want is to consolidate what you listen, and the most effective way to achieve this is through repetition.

So, let’s say you are starting with English. You're a beginner. This is the situation where you need a lot of repetition. The reason is that you need to create the most common patterns in your head. That’s why you need to repeat many times. For example, let’s say you have a 5-minute audio adapted to your level. Then, you can repeat the audio twenty, thirty, or even more times.

Yes! You heard me well! Twenty, thirty, or more times!

I’m not saying that you have to do it in one day. For example, you can repeat the audio three times every day for one week. This is only 15 minutes a day for seven days, which is 21 times. You can read and listen if you need to.
Yes, it seems crazy, but I can assure you that this is very effective. You can learn a lot! And the most important thing is that you’re consolidating the phrases, the vocabulary, the pronunciation, and it becomes easier to use all of this in a conversation.

If you do this as part of your routine, and you dedicate one hour a day doing repetitions of different audios, soon you’ll notice a big difference. You’ll become familiar with many structures, and you will start to understand what you say without translation in your head.

Repetition is the key to consolidation. If you have an intermediate level or higher, you don't need to repeat so many times. What you can do is: Always listen to the same person. Focus on just one material and then stick to it for a while. You might prefer some particular phrases, vocabulary, expressions, etc. So, if you listen to the same person, you’ll repeat more.

Another approach is to listen to the same topic consistently. Although you’re not repeating the same audio, you are repeating the vocabulary and expressions of the same topic.

This rule of repetition is not strict, of course. The important thing is to listen for many hours, and if you can repeat, much better!

(END OF THE EXTRACT)

Read the transcript here: speakenglishpodcast.com