Day 5 : This is the best study method I know

Hello again! Aaron from PhraseMix here.

In the last two emails, I told you not to study vocabulary or grammar.

So you may be wondering, what should you study?

In my opinion, the best way to become more fluent in English is to...

Memorize sentences.

Take a natural English sentence that you understand pretty well. Let's try this sentence, which you say when you hear a song that's easy to remember:

"It's pretty catchy."

Repeat it again and again until you remember it. Wait a little while, then try to remember it again. Do the same thing for the next two days.

After you do all of that, you will have memorized that sentence. Now the fun part begins!

As you use English in different situations, you'll start to hear parts of that sentence. You'll hear the word "catchy". You'll hear "pretty (something)".

And if you ever find yourself listening to a simple, easy-to-remember song, you'll know exactly what to say!

Sentences teach you both vocabulary and grammar at the same time. You learn what the words mean, as well as how to use them. But to get the biggest benefit, you have to not just understand the sentences; you have to remember them!

If you want to try memorizing sentences, PhraseMix Premium makes it easy. I built an audio player which keeps track of which sentences you've listened to. It reminds you to review sentences that you've listened to recently, so you'll remember for a lot longer.

OK, I've explained why you should memorize sentences. But how? Tomorrow I'll give you some pointers.

Until tomorrow,

Aaron

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Our postal address: 118 W. 72nd St., New York, NY 10023

Day 4: Something else you shouldn't do when learning English

Yesterday I told you not to study vocabulary.

Today I'm going to share another controversial opinion about learning English.

You see, in my opinion...

You shouldn't study grammar, either!

Here are a few reasons why:

• The part of your brain that learns information and the part that controls your speech are completely different. Just because you learn some rules doesn't mean that your speaking will improve.
• There are too many grammar rules, and they're too complicated. Every rule has exceptions. A book describing English grammar fully would need to be thousands of pages long.
• Even if you learn all of the grammar rules, it takes too long to remember them. You sometimes have to figure out what to say in less than a second. That's too short a time to recall all of the rules from your grammar textbook.
• Most grammar rules only describe formal English. Formal English is important, but you need to learn casual spoken English too.

For all of these reasons, I recommend that you not spend a lot of time on studying grammar.

But if you shouldn't study vocabulary or grammar, what should you study? I'll answer that question in tomorrow's email. This is the big one. You don't want to miss it!

Aaron

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Our postal address: 118 W. 72nd St., New York, NY 10023

Day 3: Avoid this common mistake that English learners make

It's me, Aaron. I have some more thoughts about learning English for you.

Most learners make one big mistake when they study English. They make this mistake because of how language is taught in most schools.

I'm going to give you one piece of advice so that you can avoid making this common mistake:

Don't study vocabulary lists.

Huh? What's wrong with learning vocabulary?

Vocabulary isn't wrong. You need it. The problem is the traditional way of thinking about vocabulary.

Most people are taught to study lists of words by themselves: apple, surrender, enormous. But when you learn words by themselves, a few things happen:

• You learn what the words mean, but you don't learn how they're used. You don't learn what other words they fit together with.
• The words get saved in your brain one by one. So when it's time to make a sentence, you have to pull them out again one by one. That makes it slow.
• You don't get a real connection to the words. They're just boring words in a list, so it's easy to forget them.

Instead of teaching words, PhraseMix teaches phrases: eat an apple, surrender to (someone), an enormous mistake. This gives you better understanding of how words are used, not just what they mean.

So here's a new rule: Never learn a word by itself. Always learn two or more words together in a phrase.

Tomorrow, I'll share an even better way to learn that will make you more fluent than ever.

Thanks for reading!
Aaron Knight

P.S. If you'd like to get started with mastering English through phrases, you don't have to wait for the rest of this course to do it; check out PhraseMix Premium: phrasemix.com/getpremium.

You received this email because you signed up for the PhraseMix Learn English email list. To make sure you keep getting these emails, please add aaron@phrasemix.com to your address book or whitelist us. Want out of the loop? Unsubscribe.

Our postal address: 118 W. 72nd St., New York, NY 10023

Day 2: How to keep what you've learned

Hi! This is Aaron from PhraseMix again.

Yesterday I shared my #1 English learning secret with you. Do you remember what it was?

If not, you should go back to yesterday's email and review it.

And that's my next tip:

You must review!

Our brains are lazy. They quickly forget anything that they don't need.

If you learn something once and don't review, you'll probably forget it in a day or two. By the end of the week, it's totally gone.

You're probably busy, so you have to use your time smartly. You can't practice something completely different every day. You have to spend some of your time reviewing what you learned before.

Do this, starting today:

1. Get a small notebook. Keep it with you all the time.
2. Every time you do something in English, write down a few notes about it.
3. Look at your notes once or twice a day, every day.

Is that too much work for you? Then maybe you should try PhraseMix Premium, my tool for learning real English. I built it to keep track of what you've learned, and automatically schedule lessons for you to review. All you have to do is hit the "play" button.

However you do it, make sure to review what you've learned before. And do it every day, without skipping any days.

Tomorrow, I'll tell you about a big mistake that most English learners make.

But if you're interested in improving your English skill, you don't have to wait for the rest of this course to get started; check out PhraseMix Premium: phrasemix.com/getpremium.

Until tomorrow,

Aaron

You received this email because you signed up for the PhraseMix Learn English email list. To make sure you keep getting these emails, please add aaron@phrasemix.com to your address book or whitelist us. Want out of the loop? Unsubscribe.

Our postal address: 118 W. 72nd St., New York, NY 10023