My way to enhance english skills

In a previous post, I wrote about my general approach to job hunting. I decided to write more about my ways to improve my English level.

Knowledge of English turned out to be one of the most common reasons for rejecting my candidacy. And I did what I could in this regard, for example, I participated in an English course at Avra for a year and a half. Unfortunately, I am aware that I am not getting any younger, and unfortunately I do not use this language on a daily basis. It must have ended like this that my English level slowly decreased.

I decided to do something about it. For starters, I realized that returning to my former English proficiency would be neither easy nor quick. I also have a particular problem with learning all languages in which you have to speak a lot and smoothly: I have a congenital speech impediment. Yes, I have been stuttering since childhood. When speaking Polish, I usually manage to hide it, I speak it fluently. However, when it comes to foreign languages - everything comes back, especially during such a stressful situation as a recruitment interview. I don’t tell recruiters about it, hoping they’ll guess I’m struggling. Unfortunately, recruiters interpret this as a lack of English proficiency. And of course, all the claims about a company being an “equal opportunity employer” can only be put aside… among fairy tales.

But back to the topic. So I was convinced that for a 45-year-old with a congenital speech impediment who had no contact with this language on a daily basis, I was doing really well. This was the key attitude that allowed me to continue practicing persistently and calmly.

How to learn English? There is no great philosophy here: practice, practice and practice again. At every possible opportunity. Only this brings measurable results.

Personally, I started by organizing my notes from all previous courses I attended. Additionally, I listened to recordings from IT conferences. Not only did I refresh my technical knowledge, but I also caught and wrote down the most interesting phrases in English. I have a “premium” account on LinkedIn, so I also have access to courses on LinkedIn Learning. There is a lot of training on job interviews in English. I can admit that it was a game changer for me.

An additional, equally powerful source of English language training is YouTube. Here I could list a few tips on what you can look for to raise your English to a higher level:

• Channel “English with Lucy”
• Any “Stop saying…” recordings, for example: “Stop saying ‘I think…’”
• recordings like “12 phrasal verbs for job interviews”

After watching a few recordings, everyone can come to their own conclusions about what they like more and will be able to create their own list. Here, however, you must remember that the most important thing is your own belief that you’re not watching it “because they told you to”, but for yourself. In my case, I often press pause and note down more interesting phrases. For me it really works. The second important thing is that the videos on this topic should be:

• relatively short
• focused on only one thing, e.g. alternative ways of expressing “I think”.

And in this whole topic, the most important thing is perseverance, consistency and patience.

Good luck!