15/11/2024
Everyone thinks about immersing in the English culture and language during a process of learning this foreign language. I guess there is little or no exception. This is specially important for people who would like to achive high level of fluency in English language. Proficiency in Speaking is one aspect that requires live interactions with native speakers. You can improve Listening, Reading and Writing of English in any spot on the Earth without direct face-to-face contacts with the help of modern technologies. For example, you can work on your Listening skills with the help of YouTube. Different Internet forums and online communitites give you a lot of opportunity to practice in writing on every day basis. As for me I like to share my opinion in English about interesting places worldwide on www.tripadvisor.com. Maybe even Speaking abilities can be now significantly improved with the help of the modern Internet technologies?
Living in English speaking country
From my point of view a person needs about at least six months of immersing in a real English culture for getting a meaningful result. By the way the more time you have the better effect you get. I think from time to time about such a deep dive in English language. But there are some difficulties that should be taken into consideration.
- Ability to leave your own home country for a long period of time. Sometimes it is not easy to do for many of us due to different responsibilities. You can work with a long-term contract or study in a university in your home town. Besides you can have personal obligations, that would prevent you from living abroad.
- Availability of enough amount of money to cover such adventure. The cost of living in the English Speaking countries is very high. The United States, Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zeland require a lot of money to live there. This makes sense specially for citizens of countries with a low income like Uzbekistan. Even such countries like Malta, Belize, South Africa or Singapore demand thousands of US dollars every month for living there.
- Visa problems. For any person like me who lives in Uzbekistan or similar country it’s quite difficult to receive long stay visa to the US, UK, Ireland… You must have a solid reason and it would be obvious to Visa officer in an embassy of a target country.
Anyway after all you can pass through all of these difficulties and get the next opportunities:
- Immersing in the day to day life of a desired English speaking country. As we know each particular language has traces of influence of specific countries and places. So we can find out a lot about the language just being there on the ground.
- Practicing Speaking English on every day basis. Buy you should remember that many countries have small communities that use their native language most of the time. The best solution for a language learner is to stay away from such communitites and communicate in English language only in any circumstances.
- Listening different accents, vernaculars and spoken English language in everyday situations. It can help a lot in achieving fluency.
Practice english conversation on italki.com
There are different language learning resources like italki.com in the Internet. I personally use www.italki.com for practice English speaking. I have also tried lingoda.com that offers similar experience. There are tens of other alternatives that can be used for online language practice. For example, preply.com, amazingtalker, verbling.com and so on. I think that italki.com is the most popular and famous at the moment and it was the first web site in this direction that offered such services. I choose italki.com due to flexibility in booking lessons, affordable prices and great teachers from different English speaking countries.
From my point of view there are some advantages of using online services such italki.com for improving English speaking skills:
- You don’t need to break the bank to practice speaking English with real native speakers. The price for each lesson can start from 5-6 USD. In general it is not required to buy monthly or yearly subscription on italki.com, but some other similar services ask for monthly payment.
- You can choose your tutor from any English speaking country as you wish. Different english speaking countries have different accents and different ways of expressing yourself. As for me I take lessons on italki.com from teachers, who live in the USA, UK, Canada and Ireland. It gives me an opportunity to learn different aspects of the culture in different nations of English-speaking World.
- It’s possible to have everyday english speaking practice with the help of italki.com. Moreover you can take your english class lessons from any point on the Earth with an online Internet connection. I usualy have 3 hour-long sessions per week. At the moment it’s enough for me.
Wrap up
Achieving fluency in any foreign language is a great result for a language learner. You must spend a lot of time on different aspects of the language during this way. Speaking skills are very important for most of us. From my point of view modern IT technologies give us a great and more affordable opportunity to achieve high level proficiency in a foreighn language. italki.com or similar web services can help you a lot in improving your english speaking skills without living in the US, UK, Ireland etc.
