Learning ENGLISH with BOB!

BOB THE CANADIAN

LEARNING ENGLISH

IS A LOT LIKE EXERCISING!

BOB THE CANADIAN
YouTube Channel
August 2, 2022

The world of fitness has some cool strategies that you can use to get healthier and more fit. The world of learning English is actually quite similar. Just like exercising, learning English requires you to make a plan, challenge yourself, and sometimes take a rest!
In this English lesson, Bob will talk about how we can use some of the strategies normally used for exercise to help us learn English!
Hope you enjoy this English lesson!

• CLICK HERE to listen to/download the audio.
• CLICK HERE to watch/download the video.

AUDIO/VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

So, we have this funny saying in English when we’re talking about exercising and working out and it’s the saying, don’t skip leg day. What this means is don’t go to the gym and just lift weights with your arms and shoulders and chest muscles and back muscles, you need to work out your legs as well, otherwise your upper body is really, really fit and your legs are really, really skinny. So don’t skip leg day. And when I thought of this saying, I thought this applies to English as well. When you’re learning English it’s important to not just read, it’s important to listen and to speak and to do a little bit of writing as well. It’s important to not skip leg day, so to speak, when you’re studying English. So in this English lesson, I’ll go over a few more ways that learning English is a lot like exercising. It’s a lot like working out.
We have another saying in English that people use when talking about working out and getting fit, and it’s the saying, you can’t out exercise a bad diet. What this means is that exercise alone isn’t what makes you super healthy, you need to eat healthy food, you need to get a good night’s sleep. When I think about learning English. When I think about all of you learning English, I hope you’re taking that into account as well. I hope you’re thinking about your diet. I hope you’re exercising a bit. I hope you’re getting good rest every evening. All of these things will help you learn English just a little bit better. Hi, Walter. (Moving the camera to show his dog.) Here’s Walter by the way. He just wants to lick people right now.
When you’re exercising, it’s good to have a plan. It’s good to decide what you’re going to do that week. When are you going to run? When are you going to lift weights? It just really helps you to make progress and learning English is the same way in my opinion. I think it’s a really good idea to have a plan. You should decide what you’re going to do each day of the week and then you should stick to it. You should stick to your plan. So just another way that exercising and learning English are very, very similar, it’s really good to have a plan.
If you go to the gym and you lift a 25 pound weight every other day for an entire year, it will help you to get a little stronger at first but eventually it won’t help anymore because you need to challenge yourself. You should move from a 25 pound weight eventually to a 30 pound weight and then maybe to 35. And I think the same is true when you’re learning English. When you’re watching English videos in particular, maybe you have the English subtitles on and that helps you understand what’s being said, but you should challenge yourself. You should turn the subtitles off every once in a while. Maybe you’re reading English books that are very, very straightforward and easy to understand. At some point you should find a book that’s more challenging and more difficult. If you don’t increase the difficulty regularly when you’re learning English, it’ll be hard to make, make really good progress. So similar to exercising, you need to challenge yourself when you’re learning English.
We have another saying in English, variety is the spice of life. When you’re exercising and trying to get healthy, it’s good to do a variety of activities. You should do some walking and some kayaking and maybe some rock climbing and lift some weights and maybe run on a treadmill. When you do a variety of things, your body responds by becoming healthier. When you’re studying English, I think the same thing is true. Variety is the spice of life. Don’t just watch the same television show, watch a few movies. Don’t just read the same books, read the news, maybe read some comic books as well. Don’t just listen to rock and roll music because that's what you like the best when you’re studying English, listen to some country Western music as well. So, if you can incorporate variety into your workout to get healthier, you should also incorporate variety into your English learning.
Similar to making a plan, it can be good to set goals when you’re trying to get healthy. Maybe your goal is to run in a five kilometer race in a few months. When you set a goal, it makes you work hard as you get closer to that goal. When you’re learning English, you can do the same thing. Set a goal in the future. Think to yourself, in four months I want to be able to have a perfect English conversation with a native English speaker. Or think to yourself, in five months, I’m going to take an English test, and I’m going to get a really, really good score. So, if you set goals, it really helps motivate you. From the time you set the goal until you get there, you work really hard to attain that goal. This is one more thing you can do to just supercharge your English learning.
Other people can help motivate you when you’re exercising and working out. This is why sometimes people will take a class. Maybe they’ll take a class where everyone rides stationary bikes. Maybe they’ll take a class where they do some kind of workout together. When you’re with other people, it can be energizing and it can really help motivate you. This is the same when you’re learning English. If you take a class, it can really, really help. When you go to a class, you will be with other people who are doing the same thing as you. This can really help you feel better about your progress. You’ll be able to have conversations with them. You’ll be able to share the things that you find challenging. They might give you little tips that will help you progress faster in your English learning and you might be able to help them out as well. So, another way that exercising and learning English are very similar, taking a class, being with other people can be super helpful.
This past Sunday I went for a walk. I went for a 10 kilometer walk. It took me an hour and a half and it even rained a little bit while I was walking. And it was really, really good. The next day I was a little bit sore. So, what I did is I had a rest day. When you’re exercising and working out, when you take a rest day, it means you don’t work out. You don’t exercise on that day. It’s just good for your muscles to have a day to heal. I think this is also true when you’re learning English. There are seven days in the week, and when people ask me, “what’s a good plan for the week?”, I usually recommend that you study English for five or six days, and then take a day off, have a day where you rest. I think your brain needs a little bit of time to recover. If you study for an hour or an hour and a half Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, it’s probably a good idea to just not study English on Sunday. Your brain will still be doing something. I’m sure it will still be processing and storing some of the information that you learned earlier in the week, but taking a day to rest is just a really, really good idea when you’re learning English.
Well, thank you so much for watching this English lesson where I compared exercising and working out with learning English. I’m still kind of surprised at how many things they have in common. Remember, if this is your first time here, don’t forget to click that red subscribe button over there. Give a thumbs up if this video helped you learn some English, and if you have the time, why don’t you stick around and watch another English lesson.

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