Stop "Studying" English in 2026! Do This Instead | Easy English Podcast

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1. 0:01Hello, and welcome back to the Easy English Podcast.
2. 0:05I'm your host Oliver, and today we are looking at how you can
3. 0:11plan to learn English better and more effectively in 2026.
4. 0:18That's this year. As always, we're going to be looking at this topic in slow and clear English.
5. 0:26If you're new, make sure that you follow and subscribe to learn more English vocabulary and practice your listening
6. 0:34skills every week. So it's 2026, you have a pocket translator, so on your phone, your tablet or even your
7. 0:44computer and it's 99% accurate. A lot of the time you have AI that can now write messages and I see them sometimes in English
8. 0:54written by ChatGPT or other softwares.
9. 0:58And it can do this in seconds, easy and free.
10. 1:04So why are you still learning English?
11. 1:06What's the point? Why do you still learn the language? Why do you still want to be fluent? Well, the answer is very simple.
12. 1:18Connection in a language cannot be replaced, at least not yet.
13. 1:27You don't want to simply know English, you want to be yourself in English. You want to experience things through another language. Maybe you want to express
14. 1:36yourself freely in that language without depending on a translator and whether that's digital or not.
15. 1:45When we think in a language and communicate in it, it is totally different and I understand that. And the problem is that most
16. 1:53study plans, a lot of advice from teachers and Youtubers and all sorts of influencers out there are about how to learn
17. 2:03English like a subject to learn. So you're looking at it almost like a subject and we're not looking at it rather than almost
18. 2:12a lifestyle or life habits that we lead today we're going to throw away the to do lists. We've had plenty of episodes on
19. 2:22advice or on study plans and certain types of learning, and today we want to throw that away and we're going to talk about
20. 2:32the high signal plan. And I'll explain in one moment what that is, a high signal plan on how to stop simply consuming
21. 2:41English and how to start processing it better.
22. 2:47This will make more sense in a little bit.
23. 2:50But as always, first, what I would like to do, and I think it's very important, is teach you some key vocabulary and phrases for this episode. And I want you to listen out for
24. 3:01these phrases, these vocab and phrases as we go through today's topic and to try and remember them.
25. 3:08We also have for each of these words, flip cards and some additional ones available on Patreon.
26. 3:15So if you join become a Patreon supporter, you can not only get bonus episodes every single week, extra series as well where
27. 3:25I read news articles in English and explain them to you.
28. 3:30You get PDF transcripts and access to the Quizlet vocabulary flip card class. So if you want it and most actually importantly, you support the show too.
29. 3:41So if you want to get access to that, you can click the link in the description below and become a Patreon supporter.
30. 3:50Let's look at our key vocabulary today.
31. 3:53The first phrase that I want to teach you, it is it is an adjective and it is high signal in this case.
32. 4:00So high signal. We talked about high signal plan, but what does high signal mean?
33. 4:08And high signal as an adjective here means information that is valuable, relevant, and high quality.
34. 4:18So high signal content is very high quality.
35. 4:21It's very relevant. And I hope that this episode is high signal content for you learning English.
36. 4:30Our next phrase is passive consumption.
37. 4:34Passive consumption. And passive consumption means watching or listening to something without actively
38. 4:43thinking or responding or maybe processing it.
39. 4:48So when something is passive, it's the opposite of active.
40. 4:52You're not actively doing it. Our next phrase is output driven, output driven. And when something is output
41. 5:01driven, it's focused on producing, so speaking and writing in the case of language, rather than just receiving.
42. 5:10So listening and watching our fourth, our 4th vocab word today
43. 5:17is a nine, and it is curation. Curation is a great, great 9, and it means the act of carefully choosing what you
44. 5:27allow into your environment. And there's a verb version of this, which is to curate, to curate.
45. 5:35And the process is curation. And our final word for today is, and it's one that I've had in two other episodes recently, but
46. 5:44I want to do it one more time because I think it's a great word. And that is nuance.
47. 5:51Nuance. And nuance means a small, subtle difference in meaning or expression.
48. 5:58So I hope you remembered it from last time.
49. 6:00So try to keep it in your mind, OK?
50. 6:03So look out for these words in today's episode and let's go through to talk about our main topic now.
51. 6:10First, when most learners are thinking about English, to be honest, they probably have a plan that spends about 90% of
52. 6:20the time in the day today in what I call ghost mode.
53. 6:24Ghost mode. So you're watching Netflix, you're maybe listening to podcasts like this one, which is fine. It's good.
54. 6:34It's good. You're you're going to learn from this podcast and maybe you're scrolling through the news and consuming some stuff in English.
55. 6:44You feel like you're learning, but your brain is actually asleep. It's not actively learning.
56. 6:50This is passive consumption, but in our 2026 plan.
57. 6:56So my tips for the rest of this year, the high signal rule that I want you to apply is simple. Try not to consume without a
58. 7:06reaction. What does that mean?
59. 7:09Try not to consume without a reaction.
60. 7:12Or maybe to reframe that, try to react when you consume.
61. 7:19And this subtle change makes a very big difference.
62. 7:23We could say it's a nuance of learning because consuming is great, but when you react, it completely changes how you
63. 7:33learn. So for example, let's take a one minute reaction. So after you've watched a video in English or you've read an article, a news article, try to
64. 7:42summarize it or to answer some questions about it.
65. 7:47You know, maybe try to rewrite what you just read or even in your head to try and summarize that.
66. 7:53So you don't even need to say it out loud.
67. 7:56Whenever I ask questions on the podcast, for example, try to answer, leave a comment and answer the questions.
68. 8:04And if you don't want to leave a comment, try to answer in your mind. Even getting that active thought process and thinking about what is being said allows you to
69. 8:15react, and it allows you to become actively engaged with the passive content that you're consuming.
70. 8:25And it really doesn't need to be much.
71. 8:27It just has to be something to keep you keyed in and get your brain working on that active learning.
72. 8:36And it helps move parts move, I guess things that you're learning from the part of your brain that is, you know, recognizing it into the part that is producing and even
73. 8:48storing it more long term. But I don't know a lot about the science of that. We've talked about it in some episodes, but all I do know is that if you use it and you
74. 8:57engage with it, you most certainly remember it a lot more than if you just listen and consume it.
75. 9:07And you'll know this is true from other areas of your life, whether from school, from university, from the job and the career that you've learnt. When you put something into
76. 9:17practice after learning it, or you engage with it and react, you learn it faster, better, and you remember it longer as well,
77. 9:28which is excellent. OK, let's take a look at tiered energy management. Now, what does that mean?
78. 9:35That's complicated phrase, right?
79. 9:38So stop trying to do deep study all of the time whenever your brain is dead and tired. I recommend in 2026 that you
80. 9:48take the approach of using some kind of a free tiered system,
81. 9:54something that depends on your mental bandwidth, the energy that you have in your mind at the moment, kind of how tired you are, but how tired your brain is, right?
82. 10:06So for example, whenever your mental bandwidth, so your mental energy is very high, so you have plenty of energy, like in the morning, if you feel fresh, maybe you're a night person, you
83. 10:18prefer this in the evening, you want to do some more active learning. So write something, record something, try some speaking, something where you're producing
84. 10:30and then that will help push the boundaries of what you're learning. Do you want to engage more?
85. 10:38If you're listening to the podcast, maybe in the car, try to think in your mind or maybe use your notepad if you can and engage with the content. But of course, if you're
86. 10:49driving, don't use your notepad. Then when you have medium energy level, you want to maybe adjust as well.
87. 10:55So perhaps during your lunchtime or when you're travelling home after work, you might want to use more active input.
88. 11:03So listening to this podcast, you know, perhaps shadowing some speech or listening to something in English that you want to more passively listen to, but still engage with a little bit.
89. 11:17And then when you're tired, so times of the day where you feel really tired and low energy, you could use some English entertainment with subtitles as an example.
90. 11:27So in this way, you're taking more of a lifestyle plan rather than forcing yourself to learn and do something at a time when
91. 11:36your brain really isn't in the right shape or form to be able to learn. And creating this more of a
92. 11:45lifestyle approach, it allows us to learn English for longer because we're building it in and around our days, our lifestyles
93. 11:54and our routines. And the rule I have for this is if you have only 5 minutes in the day, do a low energy task.
94. 12:04Don't force yourself to try and do something really difficult.
95. 12:08If you're having a bad day or a low energy day, do something but make it as low a bar to entry as possible.
96. 12:17So just a low energy easy task for you to do with your learning. It's better to do something even just a little bit than to do nothing.
97. 12:27And if you do that just a little bit, you might find that more than more often than not, you will end up doing a little bit more. And you'll, you'll, you'll find
98. 12:37that because it was easy to start, you end up learning and doing more. Whereas if it was a hard task that you wanted to do to learn and you feel low energy, you're
99. 12:48probably not going to do it at all.
100. 12:51OK, so now is the time where we're going to take a little bit of a break and go to our listener Spotlight.
101. 12:58So in last week's listener Spotlight, I asked if you can ask me a question. So usually I ask you questions,
102. 13:07but I decided to make the questions for you to ask and I will answer. And we had plenty of great
103. 13:17comments and great questions. But I've picked a couple today for you. The first was from Hanneko from Japan. So Hanneko said, hi Oliver, it's
104. 13:28so nice to meet you. I'm from Japan and I'm listening to your podcast from Indonesia. I have used English during working. However, my speaking and
105. 13:40listening skills are not perfect.
106. 13:43Don't worry, Hannah Go, almost no one's skills are perfect, not even mine. Therefore, I cause some trouble.
107. 13:50I would appreciate it if you could advise me how to improve my English skills as soon as possible.
108. 13:57I'm sorry if there are any mistakes in my writing.
109. 14:01Thank you. Thank you very much for your comment, Hanniko. That was a lovely comment, very well written. And do not worry because there
110. 14:10was no major, there were no major mistakes there at all.
111. 14:13It was an excellent comment. So I would advise, you know, if you want to make immediate improvements in your English,
112. 14:20it's taking a look, a good look at your plan at how you learn English and thinking at the start, how can I improve this
113. 14:30plan? Maybe why am I not getting the progress that I want? Is it because you're not consistently learning? Maybe you're not producing
114. 14:40English, like practicing speaking as much as you need to.
115. 14:43You need to look at what you want to improve and why it's not improving. So don't focus too much on
116. 14:51increasing how much you're learning more about where you're learning to get the result that you need and want.
117. 15:02So I would advise, if you're really looking to improve your speaking and listening skills, the only way to do that is going to be to actually do it. You're going to have to join
118. 15:14some conversation classes or find a language exchange partner or something along those lines. Without practicing speaking,
119. 15:25your speaking is not going to get better.
120. 15:30And for listening, you can listen to shows like this podcast and other content, but try to actively listen and engage with that content and it will really, really help you.
121. 15:45So thank you very much for your comment.
122. 15:46We'll take a look at our next question today.
123. 15:49So we had another question and it was from Lena from Columbia.
124. 15:54And Lena said, Hi, Oliver, I love your podcast because I learn a lot of new things. I have a question about an issue that I don't understand about English, and it's the
125. 16:04pronunciation of the determiners.
126. 16:07Ah, and and the OR the omission of those.
127. 16:12Thanks for all of your helpful episodes.
128. 16:14Finally, as a follower, for sure I'd like to know more about you and how do you get so much knowledge about issues that are not necessarily related with the English language?
129. 16:25Regards, Lena from Colombia. OK, thank you very much for your comment. I'm not sure I fully understand
130. 16:33around the pronunciation of A and and the, although I can think about, you know, explaining when or why you use
131. 16:42them. So the general rule when you're using ah or an and the and I hope this is this is the question you're asking is ah we pronounce and use it before a
132. 16:54consonant sounds. So more for general items like a book, a city, a table, and those consonants, those are, you know,
133. 17:04harder letters like B, CT and not vials like a E, I/O and U.
134. 17:12And if the following word has an A, E, I/O and U, and it's more of a general word, again, like an apple, an orange, then we use
135. 17:23the an as the article before that.
136. 17:28But the one bit that a lot of people miss out is that it's also not just vials, but it's vile sounds.
137. 17:36So any kind of soft sounds that sounds like a EIOAU, for
138. 17:43example, an R, you know, the time or an honest man.
139. 17:50So even though it starts with an H, we still use an before that.
140. 17:55And when we use the instead of ah and an, we use the when we're pointing to a specific thing. So like the dog in the story or
141. 18:08on the R or the apple. And that is for both consonant
142. 18:14signs and vile sounds. And those are the general rules.
143. 18:21There are of course exceptions, like with everything in English,
144. 18:28but that's the general sort of gist of it and general rule of thumb there. So hopefully that helps.
145. 18:34And to answer your other question about myself, so how I know so much about maybe other topics, it's really just researching for each episode. So when I have an episode idea,
146. 18:45I like to, you know, read about it, make the episode a little bit of the script and the plan and then record.
147. 18:54But as well, I also have a big interest in reading.
148. 18:57So I I love to learn a lot about international politics, about history. I love as well and geography too. And I love to travel.
149. 19:09So I suppose just all of those things I pick up little bits to talk about on this podcast about cultural things and learning about differences between countries.
150. 19:20So thank you very much for your lovely, lovely comment and I look forward to hearing from you again in the future.
151. 19:27OK, so for next week's episode, again, remember to leave your questions, any question at all about myself or about, yeah,
152. 19:37about English or language questions and I'll be happy to answer in our listener spotlight as well.
153. 19:46And you can leave me part of your comment about the episode's content too. And the one thing I'll ask you before we go back to our main episode is to remember to have
154. 19:55rated the podcast 5 stars on Apple or Spotify, wherever you listen. It really, really helps more people to find the podcast and it to get discovered even more
155. 20:06on Spotify or other platforms. So you go on to the podcast page and you click the star button and give us five stars.
156. 20:15That really helps. OK, so let's take a look at the social anchor. Really, fluency can die in a
157. 20:25vacuum. So when you are not using or being surrounded by English at all, if the only person you're
158. 20:35speaking English to this year is yourself or an AI, that's probably not a great plan. I'm a very big advocate, a very
159. 20:46big promoter of using English. So the social aspect of language is very important because languages fundamentally are
160. 20:57social. So find a community, find a group, find a class, build it into your routine and your
161. 21:05lifestyle and it will really, really help you this year.
162. 21:12If you meet people, you make friends and you learn English, you're not just, you know, you're not just learning and practicing, you're building it into your routine and your
163. 21:23lifestyle. You're communicating while you do things and you practice. It's a wonderful thing.
164. 21:34So in 2026, the person who is going to speak the best English or learn the best English isn't the one with the biggest vocabulary. It's the person who has created
165. 21:45their life, their routines, and their English learning plan so that English is a natural part of that.
166. 21:53It's built into a natural routine of learning, and what that means will be different for each and everyone of you.
167. 22:00But the most important thing is that you find a way to blend English into your life in a natural, lovely routine that
168. 22:09suits you, that isn't too stressful and that allows you to improve regularly without stressing and ultimately not
169. 22:18enjoying studying language. So I hope this was an interesting episode. I hope it may be reframed the way you think about a plan for learning the language.
170. 22:30And probably coming into this topic you thought I'm going to tell you exactly what to do and when.
171. 22:36But more I want you to take away from this episode is how you can sit down and think about how you can build English into your routine and your everyday life. So thank you very much for
172. 22:48listening and I hope to see you in our next episode.
173. 22:52Remember, if you want bonus content, you want to ask me more questions and get bonus series flip cards, PDFs to sign up to
174. 23:01the easy English Patreon. The link is in the description below. Thank you very much and I will see you next week. Goodbye.