Now, what conversation would I have with him?

I mean, I don't have a - I'd love to practice - Hi, James from www.engvid.com . I mean,

if I ever met Brad, I'd love to have a conversation because we're like - see how we look alike?

No, we don't.

This lesson is on what - like, how can you practice conversation when you don't have

a partner?

It seems, you know, it seems, you might say oxymoron, you know, practicing conversation

without a partner when you need to have a partner to have a conversation, okay.

But, you know, that's not the word I would use, but it seems, you know, it seems impossible,

aright?

I'm going to give you four ways today that you'll be able to practice, which will give

you the practice of conversation without having a partner.

Don't leave just yet, I haven't lost my mind, we're going to go do it, okay?

Now, why?

Why is this important?

Well, number one, if you don't get the practice in, you don't have the fluency, the pronunciation

or even the vocabulary to maintain a real conversation if you don't get the practice.

But if you don't have partner, you don't get to practice, you're in what we call a Catch-22.

You don't have this, and you need this in order to get that.

So, in order to have a good conversation, you need practice in a conversation, but if

you don't have a partner to have a conversation, you won't get good at conversation.

Yeah, it's a problem.

So, I want to give you something in a structure, or methods you can take apart that you can

practice and notice next time you have a conversation, you're much better and improved so that you

can - ah, wait for it - create a relationship so they will have further conversations with

you and you'll have a conversation partner.

And that's why we're doing this.

So, when Brad and I meet, we'll have the perfect conversation.

Anyway, moving on.

So, before I go on, this video is for Alex, Mom - I'm very sorry I forgot your name - you

were such a lovely lady, and baby Matthew.

I was at a restaurant with a friend up at Shinobu in Toronto and this Russian family,

beautiful little family, came over and said "Hi, are you James from EngVid?" and I was

kind of like "Yeah", and they said "We watch in Russia." and I will say Hi, you're probably

back in Russia, and baby Matthew probably isn't a baby anymore, he's bigger, but it

was brilliant meeting you and this lesson is for you, okay?

Anyway, so this is four ways to improve conversation skills when you're alone.

I've explained the "why", so let's talk about the "how".

What I'm going to use is - well, the "how" is actually right here on the board but I'll

go into it.

We're going to start trying to use the four methods of learning that we have when you

learn a language, which is listening, speaking, or which are-listening, speaking, reading,

and writing, but I'm going to be listing them a little bit differently in order to emphasize

what parts we want to work on to improve our conversation skills alone, so let's go to

the board this way, this way.

Okay, so you notice I have input and output, and this include the skills I talked about,

like you're repeating yourself, yes, but I'm breaking them down into different segments

because each part, there's - in my opinion and from what I've read, there is way of using

these things and input is, obviously, inputting, putting stuff inside your head, you could

say, put in.

And when you input stuff, that's things like reading and listening, okay?

You're not producing anything yourself, you're sitting there and just stuff's coming in.

Input.

Output is like, out, putting out.

That's me right now, I'm speaking.

I'm speaking to you, that's output.

Also, writing is output.

It means I'm putting out information or I'm communicating with the world.

Input is taking information in to understand the world, output is to put information out,

alright?

So, let's go.

So, that's input and output.

The next one I want to do is talk about pacing.

Pacing is what I am doing now.

I'm walking.

But, how fast you walk, how long the strides, what is the pace, the speed?

When we talk about pacing in language, at the beginning of this video, you probably

noticed that I was speaking very, very fast or very quickly.

My pacing was fast.

I've slowed it down now.

Every language has its own flow and its own pace.

For example, "Ni hao mah" in Mandarin is not the same as "Coc de mas verna" in Russian.

The pace is different, alright?

So, we're going to look at pace and we're going to look at the speed, let's just get

rid of this bracket here.

The breaks in the language.

In English, we have certain breaks just as they do in Japanese.

Some breaks are harder, some flow like "Como estas muy?", alright?

If you're doing it in Spanish, it follows, right?

Less break.

We're also going to look at mimicking.

Mimicking is not the same as imitation.

I made a - immitate, it's delicious, yes, it's nice but it's not delicious, so no "mmm",

so im, it means, so I made a mistake, it happens to everyone, alright?

So, imitate, sorry.

So, imitating or copying is - imitate means to do something similar to.

Mimicking is to like, exaggerate and sometimes you do it to make fun of something, alright,

or to ridicule, but we're going to use this particular skill of imitating and copying

to help enhance your English.

Then, we're going to look at some creative practice.

A couple of things that you can do, or one thing in particular, to open up your mind

so when you get locked into a pattern or a habit, we call it a rut.

It's harder for you to learn new things or have new things come in, but if we can break

that up a little bit, it gives your brain the opportunity to start fresh or be new,

so it can absorb more information.

In fact, what I said here was opening the mind, so it can be more responsive and learn

more, faster.

Let me repeat that again, if we open your mind, we can make it more responsive, it means

it can move faster, and it can learn faster.

This is important, because what a lot of people forget is when things stop being fun or interesting,

you quit.

You stop.

And it's important to remember, if you've been even watching this video, you've already

given me 10 minutes of your life.

If you've been studying for a year, you've been studying and giving a year of your life

to something.

You don't want to quit because it's no longer fun or interesting.

To me, that has been a waste of something you worked on that you clearly want, but if

we can make it interesting and fun and you can learn faster, you can get more of what

you want here and now, we'll make you better at what you want and get the things you want

faster.

In this case, it can be getting a job, getting a relationship, or just being able to travel.

You put the time in, so let's make it worthwhile for you, okay?

Anyway.

So, these are the four things we're going to practice - or these four methods - in order

to help increase or improve our conversation skills when we don't have partner.

A lot of people said it couldn't be done, but they weren't me.

You ready?

See you in a second.

We're going to go the board for those lessons.

Okay, so we're back.

So, what I want to do is take on two of the methods right away, which is input and output.

They're like brother and sister.

You need one to go with the other and they usually go together.

When we're studying in English, if you're doing writing, we always say it's best to

read a lot first.

And if you're writing a lot, we say read a lot, so they go together.

Anyway.

I'm going to come here and say a simple statement.

Conversation is like a two-way street, okay?

A two-way street, you have traffic going this way and traffic going this way.

It's not just about you, okay?

You need to understand other people as much as you need to be understood.

You need to see their perspective if you want to have good communication.

And in this case, I'm going to be using input to substitute as your partner, your reading

partner.

I'm sorry, your reading partner.

I'm going to use reading to be your partner.

Now, you might say "How does reading substitute as a partner?"

Well, it's not just reading, we have to specifically talk about something called fiction, reading

fiction, and you might say "What is fiction?"

Fiction is a story that is not true.

When you think about romance novels, science fiction novels, comic books, they're not real,

but they're stories, they're made up stories.

Fiction.

What they have found, or during studies they have found, is that people who read a lot

of fiction tend to understand other people more.

They tend to have more empathy.

Empathy is they feel and understand others, right?

Or they feel the pain or the happiness that other people feel.

So, why is this important in our conversation skill when I'm by myself?

Well, if I don't have a person to speak to, it doesn't make sense.

It just doesn't work.

You need to interact with someone, and if I can't react or, you know, work with a real

person, the next best thing is a fiction novel, because as the writer writes, they are asking

us to get into someone else's head and understand them and understand how they communicate.

And even though it's not a one on one real person, it's similar enough that they have

found that it improves people's ability to communicate after reading a lot when they

meet real people.

In fact, they say that in some ways, that people who read a lot of fiction have better

communication skills and interact better with people than people who just talk.

Because it's the whole thing of seeing things from their perspective, taking your time to

understand it, because you can't - they don't allow you to speak, you just take information

in - input - and as you're taking it in, you're like "Okay, I got it, I got it", and if you

don't get it, you don't understand the story though, it doesn't make sense.

But when you do get it, the story comes alive and you're like "Wow, that is so cool!".

And what's really cool is that you get to actually say something after, but being understood

is great.

Letting people know you understand them is sometimes better, because then they give you

the opportunity to be understood.

And, by the way, when we go up here to the board, I do have a little statement on that,

which is I want you to read and read fiction in order to get that perspective from others

and that empathy and that, you know, ability to work in social circles.

But, I also want you to know that it's not just me saying this.

Here is something right here where it says, okay, here's something.

I'm saying, "Reading helps people modestly improve understanding and their mental reaction

to others in social situations."

I took this out of Psychology Today, it was written in 2018 from a research study, okay?

That's because they found that, and I found that in my classrooms, the ones that read

the most were the ones much more capable of communicating with others, right?

And that's all this is saying is that you read, when you're in a social situation which

is in a school environment, on a date, or in a business environment, you're the one

who can actually speak to other people, because you're listening to them, and that's the important

part.

So, the reading becomes the partner that you need when you don't have one.

Cool?

Good.

So, now that you've got (muffled) because you want to talk, you're like, I did all this

listening, I'm taking all this stuff in, when is it my turn?

Let's talk about writing.

Now, you might say writing has nothing to do with speaking, but there is a thread that

they both have, or something that joins them together, which is thought.

One thing about writing is, or speaking, is when I'm speaking to you, I can make a mistake.

That mistake is instant.

I wouldn't say it's permanent but in a way it's instant and you can be judged on that

right way.

When I write that same statement on a piece of paper, you don't know what I've written

until you get to see it, so I get the opportunity when I write it down to change it and modify

it and improve it, look for mistakes in it.

In fact, when I do lessons, I do that very same thing.

I write all the stuff on the board, then I get a friend to look it over and say, "Look