hey what's up Stefanie the English coach here from Englishfulltime.com in this video I am gonna be answering the very popular question will studying English abroad in an english-speaking country make me fluent well the simple answer is no it won't make you fluent but it can definitely help or maybe it won't right so we're gonna talk about what this depends on how you can have the best experience possible and make the most of your trip if you decide to go and maybe by watching this video you'll also learn that hey you don't need to study English
abroad to reach your fluency goals so first of all lots of people think that by studying English abroad that is going to make them fluent now why do we think this we think this because it's almost like common sense right you you think if I'm just immersed in the language long enough my brain will be able to absorb it and process it and boom I will be fluent right and in theory that is correct by being immersed in a language you will absorb it your brain will absorb it and you will achieve fluency the problem
is that when you go study abroad it's often not the experience a lot of people are expecting you end up being in a class with a bunch of other English learners many of whom probably have worse English than yours maybe some of them have better English but basically when you study English abroad in a traditional setting which almost all language Institutes have this traditional type of teaching you're basically going to have a teacher classroom worksheets homework it's almost going to be the same exact experience that you could have in the country where you live so
what you're really trying to do is immerse yourself in the language not necessarily go for the classes because you can do classes where you're at you can do classes online you can do courses online but you're going to immerse yourself in the language so it's going to be super important that if you study English abroad you need to find ways to connect with the native English speakers that are there the locals okay now this can be a lot you know harder than you might think but it doesn't have to be right I've heard stories of
people going into stores just to talk with the associates there and ask questions to practice their English or you could try to find an internship position while you're studying depending on how long your trip is if it's like two weeks and that's not enough time but if you're going there for six months or more my advice is really just get yourself away from the other students and find ways to interact with the locals because that interaction is what will improve your fluency it's not the classes it's not the worksheets it's not even what you learn
about the grammar because you need as much interaction as possible you need as many opportunities as possible to speak and the schools what they do is they advertise to get you to their program right because it's a business hello they're trying to make money okay they get you to go into their programs but they're not always thinking about your extracurricular activities or how to help you connect with the community around you so that's gonna be on you and there are so many people that spend thousands of dollars to go study abroad and then the experience
just is not what they expected because they're like wait I'm just in school again I'm just doing worksheets again I'm just doing a homework I could have done this back home and I'm with a bunch of other English language learners and we're all struggling with the same thing how is this supposed to help me okay so these are things you need to consider when you are studying abroad you can't depend solely on the program and on the teachers and all of that you are going to have to branch out and do things on your own
make friends yourself because that's what it's going to take so from my personal experience in 2013 I went to study Spanish in Argentina I did a semester long program so it was about four months and it was interesting because I did some classes with Argentine people and then I did some classes with other Spanish learners now my grammar class was very helpful I did learn a lot of things there that was awesome but obviously when you have to go into a store and talk with people it doesn't matter how much grammar you know if you're
too afraid to speak right so the cool thing about going abroad is it gives you more opportunities to speak but in my case I was too afraid to even take those opportunities okay I had a lot of issues with my mindset so you are gonna have to work on your mindset and a lot of people don't even realize this they think oh when I go study abroad I'm gonna speak as much as possible and I'm gonna improve and I'm gonna get fluent that is exactly what I thought when I applied to the study abroad program
in college I had every intention of going to Argentina for six months and coming back fluent but did that happen no my Spanish did improve my pronunciation improved my vocabulary improved but at the end of those six months I didn't feel fluent because I still struggled with my confidence and if you can't speak confidently that will make it so you don't feel fluent so basically even though I was living in Argentina for several months and I had opportunities to speak I was often too shy to speak I wouldn't take advantage of those opportunities and you
don't know how you will be in a place until you get there you can think oh yeah I'm gonna take advantage of every opportunity but then once you're there you clam up and you don't speak and you don't want to talk to anybody or you realize oh my gosh my English isn't as good as I thought it was or I definitely don't understand people as much as I thought I did and all of that can be very intimidating also something people never talk about is how your brain gets overwhelmed when you go from living in
your country and speaking your native language everyday to living in a foreign country it's like you go into culture shock you get so much overwhelm and you know people's brains handle it differently I shut down basically okay I didn't want to speak Spanish practice it learn it anything and it was weird because my lifelong dream was to go to Argentina and learn that language and become fluent because my family was from Argentina and I didn't learn the language growing up so even though that was my dream and I felt like I had all this motivation
the second I got into the country practically I was just like oh my gosh my brain got so overwhelmed it shut down I didn't like I said I didn't want study Spanish I didn't want to speak Spanish I didn't want to practice so that is a reality you do not know how you're gonna respond in a new environment until you get there and again you can have all the best intentions in the world to practice but when you get there you might be so exhausted from the trip from the homework from the schedule from the
traveling from everything that you shut down and it's very difficult to control that when it happens so personally for me I don't feel like I achieved fluency after studying abroad for six months I lived in Argentina for five years and I'm fluent now but I'm still improving I'm still learning new things you know but what really made the difference for me was my confidence when from one day to the next I had this shift in my way of thinking in my mindset and I was so tired of not being confident in Spanish I just decided
enough was enough and I said okay from now on I don't care about my mistakes I don't care about any of that I'm just gonna open my mouth and speak and whatever falls out falls out that is good enough for me okay ever since I changed my way of thinking about my own language skills that's really what made the difference for me when it came to fluency because I finally was able to speak freely you might not realize this but if you lack confidence that robs you of your freedom to speak because you're constantly second-guessing
yourself you're constantly doubting yourself you're constantly thinking you're making mistakes when you're not making mistakes okay I know all about that because I lived it okay so the last thing I want to say is just be careful with your decision whether you decide to study abroad or not if you go really prepare and really try hard to make the most of your experience and you know just don't feel like that's the only answer that's really what I want to say don't feel like your entire future depends on you studying abroad I can tell you right
now that I know a bunch of people who have never set foot in an english-speaking country and their English is phenomenal okay there are so many ways of achieving fluency of improving your English and just getting better and speaking with people you don't even have to study abroad if you don't want to or if you have the money to a lot of people watch videos on YouTube to improve their English because they just don't have money to study abroad okay and so the good news is you don't have to study abroad if you can't afford
it or if you don't want to or if you don't feel like that's the answer it's not necessarily the answer it really depends on each individual and their experience it depends on the program you go into the country you go to the teacher you can choose your program you can choose the country that you go to but you won't be able to choose your teacher you won't be able to choose who else is gonna be in the program with you and you know what maybe you get a teacher you don't really like or maybe you're
surrounded with students that you just you don't really like it could happen it has happened to people and so just be very careful with this decision choose wisely and know that studying abroad is not the answer it is not that one thing that will make you fluent you know as humans we always think that we just need that one thing that one extra course or that one extra secret that one extra hack that one extra experience you know it's like people that buy gym memberships so they can lose weight but then they never go they
think oh if I just get that gym membership or if I just do that class or if I just work with that personal trainer that's the answer but usually everything starts with yourself you can improve so much just on your own but really it comes down to your mindset and what you do with your time so where I'm at now in my life I'm studying Portuguese I'm studying Italian I love languages but personally I don't think I would ever go into a language learning program I just know so many other methods now that I think
are so much more effective I would only study abroad maybe if I'm studying a language that I would be completely new to like Japanese or Chinese or German maybe then I would do an introductory course just to get the basics down and then I would do the rest on my own because at this point in time I know that for me and the way I learn I don't like learning in a classroom I don't necessarily like having a teacher I'm very independent in the way that I learn and I can consume video after video and
then apply what I learned I want to talk with other people I want to immerse myself in the culture and in the day to day life I would rather go to a foreign country and do an internship or work as a volunteer and be connected to the people there than be stuck in a school learning in you know traditional education systems that frankly I don't think work very well anyhow there's lots of information in this video for you to consider and think about what I would love now is if you have studied abroad can you
please share your experience in the comments I want to know where you went how long you went for what the experience was like did you enjoy it or actually what did you enjoy and what did you not enjoy what did what happened that was unexpected and would you do it again was it worth it okay because I know for a fact that so many people have had amazing study abroad experiences and it probably sounds like in this video I'm basically saying don't go it's not worth it but the truth is so many people have had
amazing study abroad experiences and then other people have had really bad study abroad experiences I've had my own experiences and I've heard about all these other experiences from people but by you sharing your experience in the comments what you're gonna do is you're gonna allow everybody else to read about your experience and then make a better decision okay so if you have studied abroad please share with us please tell us what it was like that would be amazing and if you haven't studied abroad tell us in the comments what are you considering what are you
worried about what are your questions and I'm sure people can come in and help answer these questions for you and give you advice based on their experience so let's turn this into a forum right where we can all share our information and experiences and get the answers that we need alright so that is it if you want a guide on practicing your English with native speakers meeting native English speakers online interacting with us so you can practice your English improve your English learn new vocabulary build your confidence etc I have a guide on my website
I'm going to link it here in the description I always share this guide because it is literally the most popular one on my entire website Englishfulltime.com that's it you guys have a great day and I will see you in the next video bye
