5 WAYS TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR MASTERING ENGLISH

Make your goals public for a bigger commitment

We’ve seen before how important setting goals is for learning a language, but there’s no point in setting goals if you don’t reach them. If only you know about your goals, it’s easy to forget them. If other people know about them too, it’s less likely that you will quit without reaching them. Tell your family, friends, or colleagues about your goals. You can even tell the public about them by writing an English blog or sharing them in the comments below.

Give yourself rewards for reaching goals

Are you thinking of buying a new tablet? Maybe you would love to take a trip to a spa? Use your favourite treats as a reward for reaching your goals in English. That way you will be even more motivated to work towards them. Once you reach your goal and buy yourself that tablet, book the visit to the spa or buy yourself your favourite treat, you will reinforce how good it feels to persevere with your studies.

Make it a competition

Some people love competition. Even if you’re not competitive by nature, you can still use this technique. For people who like competing with others, compare your language skills to another person and say to yourself: “In 3 months I will be better at English than that person”. However, remember not to brag to other people when your English is better than theirs. Instead, why not help them improve? You can learn a lot about English by helping other people learn.

If you don’t like competing with others, you can have a competition with yourself. Set yourself a certain task every month and have a target to do it better than you did the previous month. It might be to write a better essay or give a better speech. Whatever you choose, make sure you record it in some way to help track your progress.

Get your priorities right

Watching TV or meeting up with friends at the weekend is great fun but is it more important than learning English? Think about which activities will bring the biggest benefits to your life when you choose how you are going to spend a day. You could even combine learning English with the activities you do to relax to make the most of your free time.

Learn to enjoy learning

This is the most important one of all. Learning a language shouldn’t be a chore. The process of learning a new language is one of the most rewarding things we can do. Discovering a new culture and way of expressing yourself is an amazing experience and one that you should enjoy. Find interesting things to read and write about in English, talk about topics you find useful or exciting and think about how understanding a certain word or grammar point will make your skills better.

Once you enjoy the process of learning, you will be amazed how much time you can find to practise English and how quickly you make progress. If you enjoy learning, studying will never be a chore again!