Name: How to Learn English with SONGS
Uploaded: 2020-06-27T21:01:30.000Z
Duration: 5 min 46 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Gerund

Hey guys, welcome to our channel; thank you for tuning in.

And this video's topic is a very interesting one.

Modal verbs - A2

Can we learn English by listening to songs?

And can we practice our pronunciation by singing along?

People have different opinions on this and ask me a lot about this.

This is a very pleasant way to learn indeed.

And yes, you can learn some English from songs, and no, you can't at the same time.

If you're sitting and listening to some songs in English every single day, even for many hours, but you don't read the lyrics⏤

because, let's be real, we don't understand everything that they sing in songs for many reasons, and we'll get to them later.

If you don't read the lyrics, you don't understand half of what is sung, therefore you don't learn.

And if you don't check the lyrics, you can't call this working on your listening skills, either.

And even native speakers don't always understand everything.

Now that we've gotten this out of the way, let's talk about how we actually can learn by listening to songs.

So, as you already probably guessed, the first thing you have to do is read the lyrics.

If you like some song and you listen to it a lot, daily maybe, read it's lyrics, and read it while you're listening to the song as well.

It'll help you memorize them more easily.

Step number two, if you don't know the meaning of some words, look them up.

And, bam! You've learned some new vocabulary.

And very often, singers use different expressions and phrases in their songs, and if you look them up as well, you'll learn some new expressions.

Let's take "Shallow" by Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper.

There's a very deep meaning behind this song.

Moreover, fully understanding the lyrics can be quite difficult sometimes because it's poetry.

And, sometimes, authors, in order to express their thoughts and feelings, use figurative language.

But let's take just this phrase, "I'm off the deep end", which means "change your behavior, to start doing something risky or uncertain or lose control of yourself".

So, there you go, you've learned a new expression.

But again, always check if you're not sure about something.

'Cause every now and then, in order for the words to rhyme, authors can use improper grammar. Intentionally.

Let's take "Let It Snow" by Frank Sinatra.

It's an old song, but nonetheless, still very popular these days, especially during the holiday season.

"He don't care about the cold and the winds that blow," when we know that it supposed to be "he doesn't care".

But if you don't know that, it can be misleading.

There's even a song called "He Don't Love Me" by Winona Oak.

And this different-from-standard English is even a perfectly normal English for some regions and classes in the US.

And you will even hear it in some movies.

But its usage in speaking, moreover, in formal writing, is considered uneducated, and we don't want to come out as such.

Now, for example, in this song, which happens to be one of my favorites, "See You Again" by Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth.

And I honestly choke up every time I listen to it.

There are these lines, "It's been a long day without you, my friend, and I'll tell you all about it when I see you again."

Just in these two lines, we have an example of the present perfect tense, "it's been a long day", and, at the same time, people use this statement as a phrase to express fatigue because they were extra busy that day or to express frustration.

And, then this line, "And I'll tell you all about it when I see you again."

It's an example of the first conditional; there it just used "when" instead of "if".

And it shows us that we don't use the future tense with "when", which is a common mistake.

And on top of that, you'll get to repeat these words a lot by singing along since we're listening to our favorite songs over and over again.

And what is better than repetition to help us remember something better?

As long as you analyze and do research, you'll learn a lot.

Now, it's time to talk about pronunciation.

Yes, you can practice your pronunciation by singing along to songs, like, for example, let's take that same "See You Again".

There's a line, "How could we not talk about family when family's all that we got?"

A very good line for practicing your pronunciation⏤just as that whole couplet is good.

The speed and contractions, everything sounds very natural.

But, again, oftentimes, singers, to sing some high or low note, change the vowel in a word or change the stress in words so they sound more melodic.

And that's why we can't always understand what is being sung.

Well, guys, I hope that I managed to set things straight regarding this topic, and if you found this information useful, smash that like button so that I know this.