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  • Let yourself imagine this: Youre in a group at work or at school,

  • and everyone else is a native English speaker.

  • These are the kinds of moments youve been studying and preparing for!

  • You want to be in the middle of it!

  • But how do you participate in that conversation?

  • Everyone is speaking so quickly and the conversation is taking twists and turns.

  • People are talking over one another and it feels impossible to keep up,

  • let alone figure out how to say something!

  • Today were going to go over my top 5 tips and strategies for participating in group

  • English conversation.

  • I’ve had lots of students explain this scenario and ask for advice.

  • When youre speaking with all native speakers, the pace of conversation can be fast.

  • And when youve said something and it doesn’t really get acknowledged, it’s hard to know what to do.

  • Sometimes the pace of the conversation is fast, the ideas continue,

  • and the conversation moves on without you having expressed yourself clearly.

  • Here, a student of mine is explaining a scenario that you probably know well if you live in North America.

  • He’s talking about when he’s in a group of native speakers.

  • But recently I haveprogram, the group project.

  • I get to discuss at a timethey are heating upand

  • if I speak English not fluently  they ignore me 'cause they're serious to talk so I think it's problem,

  • and I want to improve that.

  • That's a problem.

  • But may be because I translate from Japanese to English and then it is weird for English people.

  • That's why. I am fine to break into the conversations when that happen in Japan.

  • So you feel that once you've said something, you know it's kind of complex, may be you haven't articulated it

  • very clearly, perfectly and then do they just sort of move on?

  • They kind of ignore it without getting clarification?

  • I felt like they don't understand what I mean--

  • >> And they don't ask you? >> They ignore.

  • Hey what do you mean?

  • Sometimes they ask mebut they are working on some thing they don't want...

  • This brings up a good point.

  • So let's talk a little bit about some strategies for that.

  • And then we can also talk about a couple things like I am hearing you say woking,

  • and so that means you're not saying working.

  • I am putting an R sound in thereand when you're saying it, I'm not hearing the R sound.

  • So that's something we can talk about in a second.

  • I think this is something that's really useful for everybody.

  • Because I've had a lot of people tell me that you know when I'm in a group,

  • it's really hard for me to speak my mind

  • because the conversation's moving more quickly than when it's one on one.

  • Okay so..

  • You've figured out how to just say what you want to say but

  • you know that sometimes it is not totally clear.

  • And the people who are hearing you, the conversation is moving on.

  • They're not taking the time to stop and understand.

  • So, an important...

  • It's important for you to take that role then.

  • If they're not going to do thatthen when you've articulated somethingand when you know

  • that it might not have been that clearyou can say,

  • I am not  sure I said that rightdo you understand what I mean.

  • I think it's probably important for you to take the initiative before they move on.

  • or you know You can usually see it on somebody's face if they don't

  • quite understand

  • Yeah, exactly.

  • And so that, as soon as you start seeing that look,

  • flip it to them and don't let them move on.

  • but because you're gonna ask them a specific question about, you're gonna continue to engage them.

  • Are you understanding what I'm saying?

  • So Tip #1 there is to take the initiative and make sure youre being understood.

  • Youve said something, and youre not sure people understood you.

  • Immediately say one of these sentences:

  • Does that make sense?

  • Do you understand me?

  • Or you can even say, I don't think I said that rightDo you know what I mean?

  • You can even acknowledge that you may not have been clear,

  • that opens the door for someone to ask for clarification.

  • “I don’t think I said that right, do you know what I mean?”

  • Or, “Do you understand?”

  • By doing this, you will definitely get your point acknowledged, and likely it will be further discussed.

  • But I would say phrase a question to them.

  • Okay

  • To stop, you know, that will, unless they're extremely rude people, which they are probably not,

  • that will stop them from moving on, to actually you know seek clarification.

  • Some people will not ask for clarifications because they feel bad that they didn't understand,

  • so this is just a way of acknowledging, hey, I am not a native speaker here.

  • We're talking about complex things.

  • I might not say something the way I should. So, you know

  • You're going to go ahead and stop the momentum a little bit to make sure that they understand

  • and then that's the kind of thing that can lead to

  • them asking you a question and making sure everybody's on the same page,

  • making sure you're still able to contribute.

  • In this kind of situation, if you canif you have a smart phone, if you can record it,

  • then you can go back and you can, 'cause they might be helping you out.

  • When you say, do you understand what I mean, and they say no, and then you explain a little more,

  • when they understand what you meanthey're going to say it the right way.

  • That was tip #2.

  • If at all possible, record group conversations like this with your smart phone if you have one.

  • If youre going into a group conversation, maybe with a group of students about a project,

  • or a group of colleagues, pull out your phone and start a voice memo before you begin.

  • You can even say, “I’m going to record this to work on my English.”

  • That will remind everyone that youre not a native speaker,

  • and these kinds of conversations aren’t as easy for you as they might be for others.

  • They're going to say, oh, blah blah blah blah blah  and then you're like, yes.

  • And so they're giving you the right phrase.

  • Unless you write it down in the moment you're going to forget it maybe

  • and you don't want to stop the momentum more by writing it down.

  • So if you have

  • recorded it, then you can go through and you can listen to that and write down those phrases and

  • this is also a way that you're going to start building not just specific vocabulary but sentence construction,

  • whole phrases to talk about the kinds of things you need to talk about in your field.

  • Tip #3:  Screen capture is your friend.

  • If you're recording a voice memo or a conversation, that could be a really really long voice memo.

  • Well, if you can keep your phone out, then you can screencap certain parts to remember to go back later.

  • Let me show you what I mean.

  • Okay this is my phone, it's a note 9, and I am recording a voice memo.

  • Hello, hello, hello!

  • So as you're in the group conversation, if there's something that you think,

  • yes, I want to be able to remember that, to come back to it. Know how to do a screen cap on your phone.

  • For me, I have to press two buttons at the same time

  • for about two seconds and then it takes a screen capture of what is on the screen.

  • Now, the voice recorder is still recording.

  • So later, I can go back and I can look in my gallery at my photos, I can see about what

  • time that happened within the voice memo, and I can skip to that part in the voice memo.

  • That can save you a lot of time if you've recorded a very long conversation.

  • You can just go to the points where you really need to review quite easily.

  • Tip #4:  Collect these words and phrases.

  • Write them down.

  • The student that I was speaking with in this class was studying Economics.

  • So discussing topics in Economics is something he is going to want to do for the rest of his working life.

  • In a conversation with a native speaker, he is going to learn the phrases to use to express ideas

  • relating to economics.

  • Keep a notebook of English phrases and vocab words you're using, you're learning.

  • Look over them for several days after you learn them.

  • If on your audio file, a native speaker has said them, imitate them on your own, out loud.

  • Practice it, try to say it just like the native speaker did.

  • Try to get comfortable with that pronunciation.

  • And Tip #5:  take it a step further.

  • Go to Youglish.com and type in the word or phrase youre learning.

  • Hear lots of other examples of native speakers using that word or phrase, and pay attention.

  • What are they talking about?

  • What context are they in?

  • Does that lead you to other useful phrases that are related?

  • This kind of work will really pay off.

  • Youglish is a search engine for YouTube videos with English subtitles

  • and you can filter it to American English.

  • You can skip from clip to clip

  • and you can also move forward or backward within a clip to get the full context, a great resource.

  • Group conversation is tough, but by using the phrases in Tip 1 and the method in Tips 2, 3, 4, and 5,

  • you can get a lot more comfortable and confident speaking English in these kinds of environments.

  • In the Comments, I’d love to hear from you.

  • What is the most important area where YOU can improve your group conversation skills?

  • And which of these tips are you going to try out?

  • If youve put some of these tips into action I would love to get your feedback.

  • To study some real life English conversation, check out my Real Life English playlist.

  • Youll learn new vocabulary words, idioms, phrases, and of course youll learn a lot about pronunciation too.

  • I’ll link that playlist in the video description.

  • That’s it, and thanks so much for using Rachel’s English.

Let yourself imagine this: Youre in a group at work or at school,

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