questions about why is it's so difficult to understand the news in English it is

frustrating when you don't understand the news because it is essential to

understand what's going on in the world especially now so in this lesson I'm

gonna explain about some common misunderstandings about understanding

the news in English and how you can quickly and easily improve your

listening comprehension and understand everything that you are hearing in the

news these days in English on a global scale so listen up pay attention because

this is important not only for your English skills but for your knowledge

and information remember knowledge is power so there are some common

misconceptions about why it's difficult to understand the news in English many

English learners think that newscasters or reporters or the people on the news

speak too quickly to understand but that's actually not true most

newscasters actually speak more slowly and more clearly than most native

English speakers do newscasters use less slang and less regional dialects they

tend to use a standard American dialect and of course I'm talking about

North American newscasters here in English and so listening to the news in

English is not difficult because the newscasters are speaking too quickly

it's more a matter of understanding the vocabulary this is the hardest part the

most difficult part of understanding the news and so I'm going to share with you

how we can solve this problem now I want to give a shout out to the sponsor for

this English lesson I talked II and I'm gonna share how you can get a special

you as $10 I talk credit when you sign up for online

English lessons and make your first purchase there this is another way that

can really help you to improve your English fluency your confidence in

listening and speaking again the real reason why you're not understanding news

as well as you would like to is vocabulary could also be a matter of

listening skills but the news is actually easier to understand than most

native English speakers because as I mentioned newscasters speak more slowly

more clearly and used less regional slang or dialect first when you're

watching the news understand the difference between global marginal and

local news the more local the news the more references to local business or

local economy or local landmarks you're going to have and if you're not from

that City or that town it's going to be more difficult to understand but that

doesn't mean that your English is bad that just means that you're not familiar

with that locality if you're watching the national news well you need to be

familiar with what's going on in that country maybe it's the United States of

America or maybe Canada but if you're watching the national news there's still

going to be references to the national politics the national economy and

national problems or crime or maybe some positive stories - the first thing that

you should do to improve your understanding of the news in English is

to watch the topics in the news global news preferably in your native language

first and then watch them or listen to them in English so I did this when I was

learning Spanish I wanted to improve my vocabulary and understand the news in

Spanish so I would watch a story in English about something

specific that was going on in the world right now and then I would watch the

same topic in Spanish and it was so helpful because there's many cognates

which are words that are similar for example in Spanish you have the word

fetus and in English you have the word virus which are spelled the same and

just pronounced slightly differently but I can definitely guess that they're

probably the same meaning and so this can be really helpful if you make

yourself familiar with a story or a topic in your native language first and

then watch it or listen to it in English because you'll be able to guess or pick

up the main idea even if you don't understand every single new word now the

news is full of new words that you may not have ever learned in your English

class so words that are specific to the weather or to politics or economy are

prevalent in the news but they may not have ever been on your English class

vocabulary test but this is why it's so important to familiarize yourself with

the news in your native language and then listen to it in English and see

what you can guess if there are no cognates if your native language doesn't

really have a lot of cognates with English or similar sounding or similarly

spelled words then you might want to start looking words up in the dictionary

or online but before you start looking words up or searching for the meaning

really challenge yourself to guess the main idea guess what's going on based on

your understanding of world news in your native language you can already

understand what's going on in your native language and applying that to

your listening skills in English when you're watching the news is so powerful

you begin to trust your listening and your ability to catch new words without

ever having looked them up in the dictionary or online I highly recommend

reading news stories before you watch them on TV or listen to them on the

radio when you read you give yourself more time to understand the words you

give yourself more time to think about what the meaning might be to guess from

your prior knowledge and by the way this is what makes learning English as an

adult actually easier than learning English as a child because you

understand concepts or news stories in your native language you know what's

going on in the world through your first language or your mother tongue and then

you can apply that to English so give yourself the chance to read about what's

going on first and then listen to it or watch it on TV this way you can take

your time and if you do want to research new vocabulary words that you've never

seen or heard before you don't feel pressured by the fast pace that the news

reporter is speaking at I've done this a lot with Spanish by finding

spanish-language newspapers online and reading the stories and giving myself

the opportunity to find the meaning of those new words in the news

using the news to learn English is fantastic for improving your vocabulary

because the news is generally written grammatically speaking at a 5th grade

level that means that most 10 year olds can understand the grammar in

english-speaking news it's nothing complicated yes of course occasionally

you'll have more advanced complex structures but in general the news

reports on what is happening now in the present tense and it doesn't report on

historical facts or stories in the past as much as it talks about what is

happening right now in the present moment however much of the vocabulary in

the news can be advanced or very specific to a certain topic for example

if you're reading about health or technology or

the economy or politics you're going to find very specific vocabulary related to

each of those topics if it's still difficult after following these tips

reading or watching the news in your native language first and then watching

the news in English reading the news first in English before you listen to it

or watch it then try just reading the headlines in english-speaking news if

you just start with short phrases it's much less overwhelming than trying to

read a long article start with short chunks of English maybe short news

stories that are just a paragraph long and I'm going to share some

recommendations of news sites online also TV channels that I recommend for

practicing your English with the news it's really important that you practice

talking about the topics and news with an english-speaking conversation partner

this will not only help you to understand the vocabulary it'll help you

to remember the new vocabulary because you'll use it find someone who is

patient and can help you navigate and understand the new vocabulary that you

find in news stories this is an excellent opportunity to talk about

online English lessons with I talkie because you can sign up for a one on one

lesson where you can practice your conversation and even talk about the

news or the topics that you want to practice talking about you can practice

the vocabulary words that you're not sure about improving your pronunciation

with the native English speaker teachers and feeling comfortable with practicing

with their experienced teachers learning with I talking online is a very

efficient way to learn you can customize your lessons to do what you want to do

to practice what you want to practice and to learn what you want to learn you

can also schedule lessons anytime anywhere you have an intern

connection I talked he doesn't only have English lessons but they provide lessons

in dozens of languages as I mentioned I have taken Spanish lessons with them

I've also taken Portuguese Japanese and French lessons so there's a wide variety

of lessons available on the high talkie website I'm gonna share a link with you

down below so that you can get that special credit of 10 u.s. dollars

applied to your account after you make your first purchase I talking is also a

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stone or school programs where you have to pay thousands of dollars per semester

the really great part about I talking is you can schedule just one lesson or you

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much of a commitment as you want and need on the itoki website you can select

a teacher based on their ratings based on the style or subject that they teach

for example business English or conversational English and you can also

search for teachers based on what country they're from so if you want to

learn more about Canadian culture for instance you could search for a teacher

from Canada and I find this super helpful if I'm planning a trip or if I

want to learn something specific about a certain country's culture I can

experience that with a teacher at itok II so check it out by clicking on the

link in the description and through that link you can earn ten u.s. dollars in I

talk you credit after you purchase your first lesson this is a really exciting

way to learn English online anytime from anywhere and it can be super helpful for

you to practice talking about the news asking questions if you don't understand

something that's happening in the news and also to ask for different

perspectives what is half

in that teachers country and how do they view things what is their opinion how do

people from their culture react to news stories it can be quite eye-opening and

different than simply reading about a topic in the news so I highly suggest

that you try that out if you have any questions about that let me know in the

comments last but not least be careful where you get your news information not

all news sources are created equal I wanted to share some of my suggested

resources for reading the news online or tuning in to news programs on TV I would

suggest CNN NPR the BBC and for English learners specifically VOA news or Voice

of America news has news stories for English learners that are shorter and

easier to read also breaking news English is a good resource with English

news stories at the beginner intermediate and advanced level it's a

super way to advance your reading skills little by little tell me in the comments

do you usually watch news in your native language or in English have you ever

thought about using the news to improve your English listening skills before let

me know and I'll look forward to hearing from you if you enjoy English learning

tips be sure to subscribe here to go natural English and I'll see you next

time in next week's video bye for now