7 Smart Ways to Think in English

if you can think in english and stop translating then you can answer questions more fluently and participate in conversations more easily let's find out how to do it [Music] hi this is keith um i run the website the keith speaking academy and the youtube channel here english speaking success by the way if you want to build up your fluency check out my fluency course on udemy it'll help you naturally use your grammar improve your pronunciation and help really build your fluency so you can move from being a struggling english student to a successful english speaker

now then talking about thinking in english it's a challenge for some students right um and i think this is because in many schools across the world students are taught with what we call the grammar translation method right we're taught to translate when i learn chinese right the teacher would say okay keith to say hello in chinese you say nihao great to say uh how are you you can say needs to say and so on and so on and so it seems natural right a logical at a beginner level you're translating to learn the language however

the problem is this becomes a habit that is very very hard to break as you move up the levels but it's essential that you break this habit because otherwise you're not going to build up the fluency you need right when you can start thinking in english then you can really answer questions more easily and in ielts speaking that's really important right so in this video i'm going to show you seven smart ways that you can start thinking in english let's begin so i would say the first step to thinking in english is to surround yourself

with english now that does not mean you have to go and live or visit an english-speaking country although it's great if you can you don't have to no you can do this in your own home by giving yourself even just 10 minutes a day of english and you can build up to 20 minutes 30 minutes a day build up slowly and it's important to see this english time as fun and enjoyable not study time right so i'm talking about things like listening to podcasts listening to the internet radio listening to songs reading some books novels

magazines blogs things that you like maybe watching tv series or films in english right but having this this moment when you are surrounded in english and during this moment there are three things you can do right first of all you can listen passively that's fine secondly you can repeat words that you hear or see third you can repeat phrases that you hear or see right now listening passively is great because when you listen passively you're reducing the stress and the pressure and we know from research this can help us learn more deeply repeating words and

phrases is also fantastic because then you're starting to activate the vocabulary which means you can start to use it more fluently so by i wouldn't say i wouldn't say creating an english environment because that sounds very big right and very difficult it's it's very hard to have an english environment in your home i prefer to call it english moments by creating these english moments maybe 10 minutes or 20 minutes then what you're doing is you're enabling yourself um to start thinking in english because you're surrounded in english for that moment great let's move on to

number two okay the next one is to only use words that you already know so when speaking in english sometimes students want to express an idea but they lack the vocabulary so they go to a dictionary and they look up the word or they ask somebody the translation right in english ah gracias right and so you're getting a translation um now that's great for building your vocabulary yes but it is not good for your fluency right a great way to improve your fluency and to start thinking in english is to only use the words you

already know when you're speaking now i know what you're thinking you're thinking hang on keith come on that's that's too simple i'm just going to be speaking simple english yes and that is the beauty of it it's simple and you can focus 100 on fluency because you're not translating and so you're starting to think in english now if you come across an idea you want to express but you lack the vocabulary when speaking there are two things you can do not two two things you can do number one you can either try and find a

way around it to say it in another way paraphrase it essential for ielts speaking right or number two um thing is that you can let the idea go say something else stay with the words that you know trust me i've done this in with spanish um i've even dreamt not only thought in chinese but i've dreamt in hao chinese this is a game changer right try this one out it seems strange but try it i think you'll like it let's move on right the next one is to start small and build up so it's probably

very hard to try and think in english the whole day long right not easy at all so don't think big start small just start even thinking single words in english right and remember to always use words that you already know right so a common technique is to look at a picture and as you look at the picture you think of the things that you see try this have a look at this picture and just don't speak just think one word of the different things you can see try this great now you probably all thought different

things right i was thinking yoga plants t-shirt lights matte right those are the things that i i thought of this is a great and simple activity right you can do this anywhere you can just do it for a few minutes when you're waiting in line if you're queuing in the bank or commuting on a train you can use a picture but probably more natural is just to look around you and describe the things that you see in your head right so you know you're queuing in the bank and you look around and you go bank

queue security guard gun lights camera noisy and so on just going on in your head right very very simple remember with words that you already know the secret is to do this as a daily habit right even just for a minute but to do it every day and it's starting small right atomic habits have you read that james clear come on if you haven't read it go and check it out atomic habits so you build up this small habit every day right that's the first thing and the second thing is to start small and build

up so in my previous example we started with individual words right but then you can move up to collocations right two words or three words chunks or phrases so when we look at the the yoga situation right whether it's a picture or your yoga class you might say yoga mat blue t-shirt bright lights indoor plants right thinking right not saying but you're thinking these and then you can build up and you can start making phrases oh there's a yoga mat she's wearing a blue t-shirt those indoor those indoor plants are nice right have a go

here's the picture again either try collocations or short phrases have a go right nice so you can see you're starting small and building up with this daily habit thinking in english lovely next right next up is talk to yourself so in the last activity right start small and build up we were focusing on just thinking right those words and phrases in your head now we're going to extend that to actually talking to yourself saying the words out loud again the goal is not to build vocabulary right the goal is to work on fluency the reason

for this is i turn to the russian psychologist and educator lev vygotsky right and he said that the inner voice your thinking comes from the internalization of your outer voice the speaking right if you think about it right that inner voice in your head it's the same voice as when you speak the only difference is your muscles you're not using these muscles so this cycle of thinking speaking thinking speaking through practice we can reinforce it and help us to think more in english now we're not here engaging with other people right it's just talking to

yourself right so maybe as you're walking down the street you go oh silly hat that's a silly hat what a lovely day i love the sun oh i'm getting hungry right you're saying little snippets little phrases to yourself and reinforcing that thought in english okay some simple activities you can do here are maybe and you may want to do these at home if you're not comfortable speaking out loud in the street i mean to be honest nowadays right lots of people talk to themselves in the street right potatoes carrots peas yeah yeah yeah i think

i've got everything julie yeah yeah i'll be back home shortly all right darling cheers bye-bye or so we think i mean sometimes they're speaking on the phone but if you're not comfortable talking to yourself outdoors just do these at home so for example in the morning you could talk about your routine for the day or your plan for the day oh today i'm gonna go shopping i've got to pick up some vegetables right um you can describe an activity you're doing right for example i'm cooking so i need two eggs i need a bit more

flour more salt i think [Music] or you can just review what you've done today right so today was a good day in the morning i did this and that and oh that was a good idea and so you can do simple things where you're actually just talking to yourself and reinforcing this thinking as well right let's move on next is to write in english so when it comes to thinking in english i think the active skill of writing complements the active skill of speaking in helping you create this english environment or what i called english

moments throughout your day that will help you think in english now of course the way that we speak and write are very different right and i do not do not encourage you to speak the way you write they are two separate forms of communication however there is some research that suggests that writing and speaking are connected and actually influence each other so i think by writing things in english we can also help start thinking in english remember only use the words that you know and start small and build up as before some simple activities could

be right writing your shopping list in english leaving a message to the family pick up john at six o'clock right or putting a post knit a post knit no a post-it on your computer remember to email udemy and you can build up right maybe then you write a diary in english or a blog post or a complete blog in english right but all of these are creating moments of english that are going to help you start thinking in english let's move on now listen we have an expression in english which is the proof is in

the pudding [Music] which means you can say the pudding or the dessert is delicious but only when you taste it do you know if it's delicious the proof is in the pudding right so only when you do something can you know if it works so so far we've been looking at thinking um in english to yourself talking to yourself writing notes to yourself it's all about you right next is to practice with others because you need to be able to think in english when you're communicating with other people as well so i think it's really

important to practice speaking with others and as you're doing that to practice this thinking in english as you're doing it right in fact the more you engage in conversations in english with your teacher friends students colleagues the more you're going to have the chance to practice thinking in english as well and when you're practicing have some conversations where you just focus on thinking in english right keep it simple use the words that you know simple conversations you may want to tell the other person you're actually practicing thinking in english so that they've got patience with

you and have specific conversations just focusing on that try it out and see let's move on my next and final tip is to be monolingual monolingual let me explain so one of the biggest game changers for me when i was learning french in particular was to move from using a bilingual dictionary so french english to using a monolingual dictionary french french so when i went to look up a word in french it didn't translate to english it gave me a definition in french mind blowing game changer absolutely brilliant this was a critical step because it

forced me to start thinking in french yes it was more difficult yes it took more time it was an effort but really the change over several months was huge now another expression we have in english is there's no such thing as a free lunch right meaning that really you have to pay to get some benefit right so like using the monolingual dictionary um it's hard it takes effort but by paying using that time and effort you get the benefit and you get big big rewards so you won't make the change or transformation from thinking in

your native tongue to thinking in english overnight right it just won't happen overnight it takes time it takes effort and but the rewards are huge and i think the monolingual dictionary is a great one to do all of the steps above i think can be really really useful try them out and let me know in the comments down below which ones work for you or any other tips that you may have do remember check out my fluency course if you want to improve your fluency and help you thinking more and more in english in the

meantime turn on the subscriber button don't turn it on press the subscriber button turn on the notification button and i look forward to seeing you very very soon next time take care my friend bye [Music]