Surround Yourself With English ALL the Time!

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Hi guys, hello my dear fellow English speakers and welcome back to Robby's English Harmony video blog! In today's video we are going to look at the following topic: full English immersion and its importance in your spoken English fluency development. And sometimes you may think “what's the big deal? Why would I have to necessarily surround myself with English 24/7? Surely, if I want to improve my English I can just do certain things and that will improve my spoken English, right?” Well, you're right to a certain degree. Yes, you will definitely improve it because doing something is better than doing nothing, right? But here's the deal: if you immerse yourself in English 24/7, it's going to provide even additional benefits for your overall spoken English fluency development. (more…)

English Idiomatic Expression: “The Big Picture…”

English Harmony Q & A: Foreign Accent & Learning English for Free

English Fluency Q & A – 17 September 2016 – Ask Robby!

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Hi Guys! In today's video I'm going to respond to a number of e-mails sent by my blog readers, and here's exactly what I'm addressing in this video: How heeding to my advice about using SIMPLE VOCABULARY helped one of my blog readers to succeed at a job interview which resulted in securing a job 1:00 - 3:15 Is trying to build huge vocabulary and phraseology going to help overcome an English fluency issue whereby the person in question keeps constantly second-guessing themselves when speaking in English? 3:20 - 9:50 Studying English grammar for 20 years - and still can't speak in English! 9:50 - 11:05 Struggling with English Tenses and modifying English sentences 11:15 - 13:05 Robby P.S. Are you serious about your spoken English improvement? Check out my English Harmony System HERE!

Correct Yourself When Speaking in English Without Others Noticing!

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Video Transcript Below: Hi guys! Hello boys and girls and hello my dear fellow foreign English speakers! It's Robby here from EnglishHarmony.com obviously. And welcome – I was going to say velcome. This is one of those typical mistakes that some of us make. Instead of welcome we would say velcome. Basically instead of the “wa” sound we'd be saying “w” for some reason or another, you know. And it does happen to me on the rare occasion and now you actually witnessed that occasion but I'm not going to delete it out from the video. I'm just going to leave there on record just to prove you guys that making mistakes is nothing to be ashamed of. It's a – I would even say an integral part of your development as a foreign English speaker, you know. Because getting rid of mistakes altogether is not possible, right? Anyhow, now I'm having my Saturday afternoon green tea. Cheers. And to a healthy lifestyle, right? Instead of coffee these days I'm rolling with green tea pretty much all the time, and especially when I'm at work, the workload is really, really big I would say. Sometimes even overwhelming so green tea keeps me energized and focused and I would really suggest you start doing the same thing, right? If you're drinking coffee, switch over to green tea and you're going to feel the effects of it immediately! (more…)

English Fluency Questions Answered: Q & A Session With Robby

Watch This If You Have Total English Grammar Confusion!

Recently I got contacted by one of my blog readers and she told me that the more she thinks about the various English grammar tenses, the more confusing the whole thing gets… On a lot of occasions it seems that you can use a number of different Tenses, for instance – “I’m going to the movies tonight”, “I’ll go to the movies”, “I’ll be going to the movies” – so how do you know which one is right? And the more you analyze all this kind of stuff, the more confusing it gets and eventually you start feeling that you know nothing about English grammar! Now, watch this video above where I’m giving precious advice on how to approach such a state of mind, and if you’ve got any questions – don’t hesitate to publish them in the comments section below! Robby P.S.S. Are you serious about your spoken English improvement? Check out my English Harmony System HERE!

English Idiomatic Expression: “Along the Lines of…”

Update From Robby: New Job, Fluency Star Finished, Spoken English Self-practice Still Going Strong!

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Hi Guys! Today I'm bringing you a quick update on what I've been up to this summer, and you wouldn't believe how busy I've been doing all the following: Finishing my IT certification; Organizing my work experience; Preparing for a job interview; Starting in a new job; ...and all the while keeping teaching my Fluency Star students at night! (more…)

English Idiomatic Expression: “To The Best of My Knowledge”

What Happens When You Don’t Learn English Contextually?

Past Events in English: “There Was This Time When… Next Thing I Know…”

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Hi guys, hello boys and girls and hello my dear fellow foreign English speakers! It's me, Robby from EnglishHarmony.com and welcome back to my video blog! Now, in today's video I'm going to give you two new English idiomatic expressions which is somewhat unusual because normally I'd be giving just one. The reason being, if you learn a number of expressions all at once, especially if they describe a very similar concept, oftentimes you would get confused when we learn them all at once and then we try to speak all those expressions would mix together kind of. So that's why I normally suggest only focusing on one particular expression at a given time. But in this particular case the topic that I want to touch upon today is discussing past events, all right? The reason being, a lot of my blog visitors have contacted me in the past asking me “Robby, can you tell me ways of simplifying my speech when I talk about past events because I oftentimes get confused about using the different tenses or whatever?” And on top of that, a lot of my Fluency Star coaching clients have also expressed the same wish that we incorporate some storytelling basically into our programs. And by saying storytelling don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about some old style storytelling whereby the storyteller gets in front of the crowd and entertains everyone by telling entertaining stories. It's not about that. It's just about talk about past events, right? So basically provided all this I have a pretty clear picture basically. A lot of you guys are struggling with talking about past events and that's exactly the reason why I'm going to be touching upon that subject today. And the two phrases will come in very handy because the first one “there was this time when…” is a great way of initiating the story, right? And then the phrase “next thing I know...” is a very handy way of making the transition from the past tenses into the simple present. The reason being, you can use simple present when talking about past events. Surprise, surprise, a lot of you guys probably didn't know that, right? And chances are that you didn't because nobody really tells you that. You wouldn't find that information in an English grammar book. Nobody would write in it that simple present can be used to talk about past events, right? But in reality it happens a lot. Native English speakers use this strategy a lot but nobody – I suppose nobody really thinks a great deal of it. You know what I mean, people just speak that way, okay? But if you want to learn exactly how to use these two phrases “there was this time when…” and “next thing I know...” and how to make the transition from past tenses back to simple present to simplify your speech and get your story going, please bear with me and you'll find it all out, my friends in a couple of moments! (more…)

Where I Source All These English Idiomatic Expressions?

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Hi guys, hello boys and girls and welcome back to Robby’s English Harmony video blog! I’m obviously Robby, your English fluency facilitator. Yes, that’s the term that I came up with myself, facilitator means obviously someone who facilitates your fluency. I’m not a teacher, because I really hate the term teacher. It kind of implies a traditional setting whereby the teacher is looking down on their students, right? But I’m not looking down on you guys, I’m just merely facilitating your fluency and improvement! I’m accompanying you on your journey to English fluency, that’s all I’m doing, I’m giving you the right advice, the right tools and then it’s up to you guys to decide whether you take my advice on board and take some action or you don’t in which case obviously your fluency won’t improve. It’s as simple as that! As a matter of fact, I’m getting plenty of questions almost on a daily basis asking me to help people with their fluency. And the question is posed in a way that makes me kind of wonder whether that person actually realizes that it’s actually down to them to make all the effort, do the hard work and actually work on their fluency because they almost expect me to kind of magically transfer all my skills unto them but it just doesn’t happen like that in real life. And it’s another one of those things that I blame the traditional English teaching industry for - basically they’ve created this notion out there that if you just attend an English class, you will improve just because you have attended the class. The teacher has all the qualifications and it’s enough to have that kind of setting and you will automatically improve. So it kind of takes away all the hard work and effort that you have to do. And it makes it look as if it’s very easy but in real life it’s quite hard, right? It’s hard work. But a lot of people don’t realize that and they think that Robby will somehow make them fluent which is not the case. I’m merely facilitating your own journey to fluency. I’m giving you the right advice, the right tips and tricks, so that’s how it happens, right? But anyway, today’s video is all about how I find all these English idiomatic expressions and collocations and phrases, you name it. How I come up with them. Because I’ve been cranking out all of these idiomatic expression videos – well, lately I haven’t published too many of them because of my high workload, I’m currently engaged with a couple of students that I took on. My Fluency Star students and I still had a few left from the previous round. (more…)

Ignoring Grammar Doesn’t Mean You Have to Speak Incorrectly!

Emigration to an English Speaking Country: My Honest Opinion

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Video Transcript Below: Hi guys, hello boys and girls and welcome back to Robby's English Harmony video blog! Today is Saturday and I'm having my Saturday afternoon decaffeinated coffee here. You know, this is actually the second cup of real coffee. Well, in this case it's actually not a cup, it's a proper mug, right? A huge mug for that matter. Guinness, right? But I'm not drinking beer, I'm having my second cup of coffee. I just said cup again, right? Second mug of coffee, right? But the fact of the matter is that you wouldn't be normally saying second mug of coffee, second cup of coffee, that's an expression. So I would say that I'm not really wrong in saying that this is my second cup of coffee. That's what people would normally say. That's how people would understand you best, right? Anyway, cheers! And let's start focusing on the actual matter I want to discuss in today's video. But just before we get down to business let me just tell you that today I met up with a friend of mine and he's an Irish fella, right? I'm a Latvian living in Ireland, been living here for 14 years and I have an Irish friend named Will. And as a matter of fact he is my good luck charm in terms of spoken English fluency. What it actually means is that whenever I meet with him I can give my fluency free reign and I speak just like a native English speaker, right? He is the one person that brings out the best in my fluency, right? As I go about my daily business, dealing with people in the college and my students and so on, obviously I speak a lot in English with others but this particular person, my former co-worker Will for some reason or another is the one that I can speak with best, right? I'm so familiar with him that I just lose any awareness of the language boundary so to speak. So you may want to click on this link. And the article in question is called who is your English good luck charm and it's all about what a good luck charm person is in terms of spoken English fluency and that if you find, if you manage to find one then you may want to hold on to them, right? (more…)

English Sentence Starter: “I Heard Somewhere That…”

Should We Make Sure Everything We Say Is Grammatically Super-correct? My Opinion on Correct English!

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Video Transcript Below: Hi guys, it's Robby here from EnglishHarmony.com and welcome back to my video blog! In today's video we're going to discuss the correctness of the English language. And the fact of the matter is that there's so many things that we say in our English conversations that would be considered as incorrect if we went by the textbook English grammar rules. And if you paid particular attention to the last sentence - I said something incorrectly! I said “there's so many things” whereas in reality I should have said “there are so many things” because the noun “things” obviously is in plural in this case so the verb “to be” should have been conjugated to reflect that, I should have said “there are so many things”. And this is just one of those examples where something that's incorrect, it has been accepted in the general public and everyone speaks like that and there's nothing wrong with it. So it begs the question and as a matter of fact this particular phrase “it begs the question – to beg a question” has also been criticized as being incorrect English, right? In reality we should say “it raises a question”. But this phrase “it begs a question” is also used by everyone. And I would say that it actually makes it correct. (more…)

English Sentence Starter: “Speaking Of…”

Why Are We Always Trying to Speak Too Fast in English?

You Think I Speak Fluent English Because I Live In Ireland? Nope!

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! If you were to find out I live in Ireland, which is an English speaking country, would you automatically assume all the credit for my fluency goes to me living among native English speakers? Well, guess what? Nothing could be further from the truth! I’d say that 90% or my success as an English speaker can be directly attributed to constant spoken English self-practice and if you doubt that – just check out this link HERE where my blog visitors and customers are providing hard proof that spoken English self-practice works indeed! You see, the way I see it, the major problem that we, foreigners, have is that most of us live in foreign countries where English isn’t spoken on the street. As a result you may be under the wrong impression that it’s next to impossible to become a fluent English speaker when living abroad. I say – it’s just an excuse! (more…)

FAQ: I’m Afraid My English Fluency Isn’t Coming Back!

English Idiomatic Expression: “The Fact of The Matter Is That…”

English Idiomatic Expression: “As A Matter Of Fact”

Hi guys. Hello boys and girls and hello my dear fellow foreign English speaker and also any native English speaker that might happen to be watching this video on my blog at EnglishHarmony.com or on my YouTube channel! Now, in today's video we're going to look at the following English idiomatic expression “as a matter of fact,” right? And the fact of the matter is that I thought that I had made a video about this particular idiomatic expression. And if you were listening attentively, you definitely realized that I used a very similar expression there a few seconds ago. I said the fact of the matter is, right? And it's funny because these two phrases “as a matter of fact” and “the fact of the matter is” they almost sound the same, but not quite. They're not the same because “as a matter of fact” is used in different situations. But let's not get confused guys because if you're trying to learn these two expressions at the same time, you will end up having created a very wrong vocabulary association in your brain. Because those two phrases will kind of go together so whenever you want to use one or the other, the other phrase will just come barging in and then your speech will get very hesitant and interrupted and you will say the wrong thing at the wrong time. So that's how typically you would be experiencing these fluency issues when you're trying to say something and then some other thing just pops up in your brain and comes out of your mouth without actually you wanting to say that particular thing. So this would be a typical example. If I were to give you both of those phrases “as a matter of fact” and “the fact of the matter is”, then we would end up with even bigger fluency issues. So we will look at the other phrase, “the fact of the matter is” some other time but today we will be a 100% focused on the first one, “as a matter of fact”. Yeah. And just like I said I thought that I had made a video about it and it turns out that it's not the case, right? And I was a bit surprised, I was taken aback because I thought that definitely I would have made a video about this one because it's a very simple idiomatic expression. It's one of the basic ones, as a matter of fact, right? It's something that you would probably learn on the second page of an English phrase book or something. But anyway, if you are interested in how exactly this phrase is to be used, when to use it, how to use it, please bear with me for a few more minutes and I will explain everything to you in every detail my friends! (more…)

Back in College: English Fluency Hitting an All-Time High!

English Idiomatic Expressions: “I’ve Been Meaning to… Never Get Around to…”

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Video Transcript Below: Hi guys. Here's the funny thing. I've been meaning to record this particular video for a while now but finally, when I got around to it yesterday, all sorts of weird thing started happening. I tried to record it two times in a row but every time when I connected the camcorder to the laptop, there was nothing there. There were no files to be found and it was very weird to say the least! And as you noticed guys, I actually used today's phrases in this sentence. So this was the first sample sentence actually. “I've been meaning to do something” and the second one is “to get around to doing something”. And depending on whether you refer to a past event or things in general, you will say either “got ‘round to doing something” or “get ‘round to doing something”. And you will also notice that I don't say “get around,” I said conversationally. I shortened the word “around” to just 'round basically. I omit the “A” letter, just stick an apostrophe there and it becomes 'round. That's what native English speakers say conversationally and that's what I'm sticking with. So do you want to find out more about these two idiomatic expressions “I've been meaning to do something” and “to get 'round to doing something”? Well, bear with me for a few more moments and everything is going to become crystal clear to you my friends! (more…)

How to Learn English Synonyms and Antonyms Effectively

How to Decide Which Tense and Which Verb Form to Use?

We Create English Fluency Issues for Ourselves!

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! This one may come as a shock to you, my friends, but the fact of the matter is that sometimes those terrible problems we experience with our English fluency are our own making. Yes, you heard me right – we create a lot of our fluency issues for ourselves, and there’s no-one else to blame for it but us! Sure enough, we’re not even aware of the fact that we’re contributing to our inability to speak fluent English, but the good news is that it is relative easy to get our fluency back on track if you know the right techniques and methods, and that’s exactly what today’s video is all about. So don’t despair, watch the video and you may just learn the right approach to fix your fluency issues on 5 occasions out of 10! Chat soon, Robby ;-)

My Own Struggling With English Fluency is What Drives Me!

Here’s how to improve your English listening skills when listening to my video: put the headphones on, playback the video and write it all down while listening to it! Video Transcript Below: Hi guys, hello my dear fellow foreign English speakers! It's Robby here from EnglishHarmony.com and welcome back to my video blog. Here's the thing my friends - I've been struggling with my English fluency for the last couple of days and what I wanted to tell you is despite the fact that is happens I don't regret it. I don't really wish to have been a completely fluent English speaker at all times. And guess why? It's quite simple. If I didn't have these fluency issues I wouldn't have created the blog EnglishHarmony.com in the first place, right? So I wouldn't be able to help you guys! I wouldn't be in a position to create all these blog articles and videos and whatnot and helping thousands and millions probably of other foreign English speakers worldwide. So basically if not for my fluency issues, none of this would have happened! (more…)

Want Solid Proof that Spoken English Self-practice Works? Check This Out!

Your Body Constantly Changes – And So Does Your English Fluency!

Video Transcript Below: Hi guys, hello boys and girls and welcome back to my Fluency Gym which is the only gym in the world where you work out your fluency, your mouth basically, instead of your muscles! But in case you're new to this whole Fluency Gym thing and you've never heard me talk about it before, I want you to read this article first where I'm talking about the fact that your mouth is just another muscle of yours. Therefore your ability to speak is a very, very practical skill. It's all about your ability to move your mouth in a certain way and produce sounds in a certain sequence for the English word combinations, sentences which results in a very fluent speech. (more…)

English Idiomatic Expression: “Out of the Question”

Why It’s So HARD to Accept Spoken English Can Be Practiced?

Video Transcript Below: Hi guys, hello boys and girls, hello my dear fellow foreign English speakers! It's Robby here from EnglishHarmony.com and welcome back to my video blog. Let's talk about the subject of spoken English self-practice again for the millionth time. But in case you're thinking “Robby, come on, you've been talking about it in every single video for the last couple of months.” Hold on a second, just bear with me for a moment and you'll realize that today I'm going to reveal a certain aspect of the whole spoken English self-practice thing that hasn't been talked about before. And to be honest with you guys, I didn't even realize that it existed up until today, when I happened to receive an email from one of my blog readers. And I actually sent him an email a couple of days before that, telling him that spoken English practice, basically speaking is the only way that's going to develop his fluency, his ability to speak for that matter. And I didn't explicitly mention in the email that speaking with himself is one of the options. I only spoke about speaking in general terms and then I went on to give him a few tips and tricks on how to approach the whole speaking thing but I never explicitly mentioned that if you don't have anyone else to talk to, you can do self-practice in the comfort of your own home. Okay? Next thing I know that person responds by saying “Listen Robby, it's not going to work. I can't, I can't heed to your advice because I can't speak. There's no one for me to speak with!” (more…)

How to Practice English for FREE? Make Phone Calls!

How to Prepare for a Job Interview In English (Tried & Tested!)

English Sentence Starter: “I Can See Where You’re Coming From”

Video Transcript Below: Hi my friends. Hello my dear fellow foreign English speakers and welcome back to Robby's English Harmony video blog. In today's video we're going to look at the following sentence starter / disagreement… a phrase, basically a phrase that you can use to disagree, right? And the phrase in question is: “I can see where you’re coming from on this but…” or there could be a few variations of the same phrase. “I can definitely see where are you’re coming from. However, I think that and so on and so forth.” But basically the main structure, the basic structure of the phrase is comprised of the words, “I can see where you're coming from.” And if you translate this sentence quite literally, you would think that I'm saying that I can see where you're coming from, right? But in reality it's got nothing to do with the person coming from somewhere. It's basically got to do with what that person thinks. And then you're telling them that you're actually relating to their opinion, however, you are of quite the opposite opinion for example, right? (more…)