In this lesson you will learn how to properly describe a person in English.

TRANSCRIPT

As an English learner, you sometimes experience a problem when you’re reading something or even when you’re having a conversation with people and even sometimes when you’re listening to a podcast or other audio file. This problem is vocabulary. But there is a formula.

This formula will help you to learn 1,000 English vocabulary words and that’s what I will teach you today. Welcome to Speak English With Tiffani. I’m teacher Tiffani, let’s jump right in. Okay, so here’s the problem. The problem is you want to improve your English vocabulary but it just seems too hard. Now let’s look at this a little closer.

So the first thing is you memorize lots of words but what happens is you can’t remember or use them. Many of my students have told me that they memorize vocabulary words but then when they get in conversations, they’re not able to use them and that’s what happens. Or you start off strong but what happens is you get tired and often give up.

And often give up completely. Now to be honest with you I also experienced the same thing when I was studying Korean. I would study hundreds of vocabulary words but then after two or three weeks I would get tired and just stop. So again, you start off strong but you get tired and often give up completely. This is the problem. Now there is a solution.

The solution is three words lead to 1,000 words. Now don’t worry I’m going to explain this very clearly and it will really help you to learn 1,000 words. Alright now the first aspect of this solution, before I explain it in detail, is the memorization and repetition. Memorization and repetition is so important because it is a set pattern that will help your brain.

That will help your brain. Now remember in one of my previous video lessons I explained how your brain works, okay? There are certain triggers that help your brain remember certain things so a set pattern will also help your brain when you are trying to remember or memorize English vocabulary words and the next thing is learn and use. Many times you will learn vocabulary words but you’re not able to use them.

This solution, this formula I’m gonna teach you, will help you do both. So again this will help you use them in daily life. When you meet someone that is a native English speaker or even another English learner, you can use the words that you’re learning, okay? Alright, so the breakdown. Let’s look at the breakdown of this solution or this formula. Okay so again 1,000 words by doing three words each day.

There’s five parts, the select, memorize, visualize, apply, and review. Okay so let’s look at the breakdown in a little bit more detail. The first section is select, so you select the three words that you will use for that day. Now remember in the beginning I said this is a formula and it’s actually a part of a 16 day cycle.

Now the first part of the cycle is the select column, the first column, so on the first day, day one, you will learn only three words. And each day after that you’re only learning three new words. Now let me explain exactly how this selection happens, okay? So once again, you select the words that you will use for that day, this is how it’s going to happen, so let’s start right here on top. There are many different ways that you can select words.

Let’s say for example that you are watching something on TV so you can select words from TV shows or movies that you watch. You may have a favorite American television show that you watch and you may hear a vocabulary word that you don’t know so you can choose it from the television show or you may even have a special book or magazine or newspaper that you enjoy reading, an English newspaper or magazine.

So you can pick a vocabulary word from books, magazines, or the newspaper, or the newspapers you read, newspapers that you read. The other method you can use actually is something that you may already have inside. So this is your brain. So there are some words that you already know. You can actually look for or find synonyms, okay? Find synonyms for words you already know.

For example, let’s say I already know the word big, that’s a word that you already know but a synonym for the word big is enormous. So I already know this word but enormous is a synonym for that word, okay? So these are three different ways you can actually select vocabulary words. Okay let’s keep going. The next part of the breakdown is to memorize.

You’re going to memorize the definitions of the words from the previous day so again let’s look at our 16 day cycle. Now we’ve moved to the second column, the memorize column. Now on the far left you see the day column, then next the select, and then next the memorize. So on day one you only memorized or selected three words.

Now on day two you still need to select three new words but now is when you’re going to memorize the three words you looked up the first day. It’s very important, you’re memorizing on the second day. Let’s go in more detail, okay? So again, memorize the definitions of the words from the previous day. Okay so let’s look at it a little closer. So here’s what’s gonna happen, so right here, let’s give him some glasses, okay?

Let’s give this student some glasses. So we have this student, this English learner right here. So what’s gonna happen? The first thing is to read over the words and meanings. You’re going to think about them. Remember I chose enormous so I’m gonna look over the word enormous and realize, ah, this means big, this means big. The next thing you’re going to do is you’re going to make something, okay?

I’ll explain exactly what these are, I can write really tiny, alright so what you’re going to do, let’s put RD, let’s put it like this. You’re going to make flash cards for each word. Remember it’s not gonna take you a long time because it’s only for three words, okay? Make flashcards and then what you’re going to do, let’s put a little clock right here for us, got a little clock right here, put a little bell on top.

Okay what you’re going to do is time yourself as you memorize, make this O a little better, as you memorize each word. You want to get to the point to where you can memorize and know three words in 30 seconds. This is your goal. This is your goal. Alright so let’s keep going to the next phase. Alright so the next phase is to visualize.

Now for the visualizing step you’re gonna select various images that go along with each of the vocabulary words. Use them to memorize the words more. Okay so let’s go back and look at the 16 day cycle again. So now we’re on the next column, the visualize column.

Alright so again on day one we selected three words, day two we also selected three words but then we also added the memorizing of the first three words and we’re also going to be visualizing on that day the first three words. Now again I’m gonna explain it very clearly so let’s jump in to explain it very clearly, again, selecting various images that go along with each of the vocabulary words, use them to memorize the words more.

So here we go, alright so the first thing you need to do, let’s do a little head right here. Student with their eyes closed. His brain right here, he’s thinking, his mind. Alright so what’s gonna happen is you first need to think about each word and see what picture pops into your head. This is important because everyone is different.

If I say good food, the first thing that pops in my mind may be different from what pops in your mind so it’s important to see what pops into your mind. Now the next thing you’re going to do is you’re going to get on the computer, you’re gonna get on the computer and what you’re going to do is you’re going to go online and find an image that matches, okay? Find an image that matches what you saw in your mind.

Now again remember it’s only for three words so it’s not gonna take you a long time but go online and find an image that matches each word so you’re looking for three images, three images. Now after you find the images, what you’re going to do is you’re going to make another flashcard but this time instead of the word being on the top, the word will be on the bottom and on top you will place the image so again you’re going to finally make image flash cards and practice with them.

Remember these steps are so important because you need to practice and learn vocabulary in different ways, not just sitting and looking at a book and memorizing. Your brain needs to see things that are visual and connected to different situations in order for you to learn and use the vocabulary words so let’s keep going. Alright so the next step is to apply.

Now that you know the meanings, use each of the vocabulary words in a sentence that you create. Okay so again the 16 day cycle, now we’re on the next column, the apply column, so again day one we just selected three new words. Day two we selected three new words and we also memorized and visualized the first three words and now as we move down to day number three we’re still selecting three words, we’re memorizing what we learned or what we selected the previous day and we’re visualizing and now we’re applying the first three words.

Now this applying I will explain, let’s go and I will explain it in more detail. So again now that you know the meanings, use each of the vocabulary words in a sentence that you create. So here’s what’s gonna happen. Let’s have a student right here. So we have this student right here, right? Now this student is looking at something right now so let’s do this like this, let’s have this right here, give her some fingers so she’s holding the book. Okay so this student is looking at something right now.

What you’re going to do is you’re going to review the meaning and, this is the key right here, think about your life. This is key. Review the meaning and think about your life. So here we go, let me show you an example, so let’s look at an example so that you can understand exactly what this step means. So let’s say for example I have this right here. This is my dictionary. And the word I selected was enormous, enormous, which means very big so again it means very big, that’s the definition I found in the dictionary, correct?

Now what’s going to happen is I’m going to look at the dictionary sentence example, I’m gonna look for the dictionary sentence example and let’s say the dictionary says the building is enormous, the building is enormous, that’s the pattern that the dictionary uses. The building is enormous. Now what I’m going to do is think about my life and I’m gonna write my own sentence so you’re going to write your sentence so your sentence which is my sentence right now is gonna be ah, maybe my school.

So I can say my university is enormous. So what happened? I changed this part right here. So instead of the building, I put my university but everything else is the same. This is what you’re going to do for the apply step in this formula. Let’s keep going. Now the last thing for the breakdown is the review step. The final step in the breakdown method is to review all of the previous steps and see which step you need to practice more so remember it’s a 16 day cycle.

Now this 16 day cycle has many different columns but on the 16th day you’re going to review all of the 42 words you learned on the previous 15 days. Now don’t worry I’m gonna explain exactly how to do this. So let’s look at it in more detail. once again the final step in the breakdown method is to review all of the previous steps and see which step you need to practice more.

So let’s jump in, here we go. For the first thing we need to do let’s put our timer right here so we have our little clock right here, this is our timer, our bell. So you’re gonna find a timer and what you’re gonna do is you’re going to set a five minute timer. This is very important, only five minutes, set a five minute timer for the review time.

Very important, remember you’ve been practicing these words for 15 days so you should be able to bring them to mind very quickly so what you’re gonna do next is remember there was a 15 day period for the review day so let’s just do it real quick like this, let’s just kinda do a small sketch so the 15 day period and during that period we had different flash cards.

So we had a word flash card, remember we had the word flash card that we made and we also had image flash cards that we made, okay so what’s gonna happen is you need to review both within the five minute time period. Now it seems like a short period of time to review 42 words but remember your brain is amazing.

You’ve been using and reviewing these words for a 15 day period so that means you actually will know more than you realize. What’s gonna happen is during this five minute period you need to go very quickly and there may be some words that you get wrong. If there are words that you get wrong that just means you need to review them again so what’s gonna happen is you’re gonna have a separate pile.

This is the review again pile. So what you’re gonna do is if you get any wrong put them in the review again pile and what’s important is what you’re gonna do is when you start the next cycle you’re going to go over them every other day until you feel comfortable and you feel like you know them well. This is the review step, okay?

Okay great job now I’ve created the actual formula and spreadsheet that you will need to do this and put this into action. The 1,000 vocabulary words plan is a free download that I created just for you so if you wanna download it go to speakenglishwithtiffani.com/1000vocabularywords Again it’s totally free and you can use it to learn and use 1,000 English vocabulary words. Also remember to watch my next English video lesson that you can see on the left side of your screen. Until then, keep studying English and I’ll talk to you again soon.

~Teacher Tiffani’