Are You Making These Between-Lesson Mistakes?

Lessons are good.

A private English teacher is great!

But what are you going to do during between your lessons?

You’ll be awake for about 111 hours…

In my experience teaching English since 2004, it’s what you do BETWEEN your lessons that makes you truly fluent.

Stop these common between-lesson mistakes and as we say in English, now you’re cooking with gas!

BETWEEN-LESSON MISTAKE #1: You Do ZERO English All Week

You decided to quit the language school and get a private teacher.

Great! 

But now you have one lesson a week and the rest of the week you do zero English.

Not so great. 

This is like eating a carrot once a week.

It’s like taking a shower once a week. 

It’s like going to work once a week.

It’s simply not enough.

Here’s the progress my students make who only do English once a week:

And here’s the progress my students make who do English daily:

English once a week is a big, big between-lesson mistake.

Want to make steady, consistent, upward progress? 

Then you’ve got to Do English every day.

Read “3 Simple Things You Can Do To Get Better English Every Day (WITHOUT Boring Homework)“

BETWEEN-LESSON MISTAKE #2: Your Schedule Is A Mess

The week starts and you’re on top of it – plenty of time for everything.

Then you start to slide, work gets pushed to later, and soon you’re facing a deadline and an English lesson on the same day.

What do you do? Do you cancel your pub night with your pals? Cancel your family dinner? Your meeting with your boss?

Of course not. The first thing to be removed from a busy schedule is always the English lesson.

And when that begins, it becomes easier and easier to cancel more and more often.

Soon, four hours a week (which isn’t much to begin with) becomes zero hours a week. A year goes by and one day you’re in a meeting pretending to understand the client from the UK and you wonder, Why does my English still suck…?

BETWEEN-LESSON MISTAKE #3: You Torture Yourself With Grammar Homework

Did you take English in school?

Did you study it? Memorize lists? Learn rules? Take tests?

How did that turn out?

Well, since you’re searching for an English teachers on Teacher Creature, my guess is, the result probably was not ideal. 

So why repeat the mistakes of the past?

That’s right, the traditional methods are rubbish!

Text books… drills… exercises… word lists… grammar rules… and the endless exceptions to the rules…

Rubbish! Rubbish! Rubbish!

For an adult past the beginner stage, continuing with these methods is a mistake. 

The traditional classroom methods (also known as “drill and kill”) can only get you to a certain level.

To become the adult who confidently does what he/she needs to do and achieves his dreams using the English language, you’ll need to leave these methods behind.

According to linguists, language researchers, polyglots, and my fluent friends and fluent students, the best way to improve your English when you can’t speak is to read, listen and watch TV.

So ask your teacher what he’s watching on Netflix.

Ask your teacher what podcasts she’s listening to.

Or ask your teacher what news websites he recommends.

And that’s the kind of homework you’ll actually do, enjoy and get fluent from.