You know the words — why can’t you use them? (Activating passive English vocabulary)

(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Hi, we are the 3 English Experts. I'm Rebecca. I'm Dave. I'm Birgit. And welcome to this episode. 3 English Experts is your English podcast to help you speak better English and create a positive and happy mindset for your English learning journey. Hi everyone and welcome to another episode. Today we're talking about vocabulary and vocabulary that is maybe passive at the moment. We'll talk about passive in a second. And getting that passive vocabulary into active vocabulary. First of all, what does passive vocabulary mean, Rebecca? And then how do we get it into active vocabulary? So Rebecca, what is passive vocabulary? Yes. Hi, Dave. Thank you for that. Hi, Birgit. We're back again. So I think the problem is with my learners, for example, they always say, oh, I don't have enough vocabulary. What's the classic? What do you need? I need more vocabulary. And I think people get very focused when they're learning a language on input, input. And they forget that they actually have a lot of words in their head somewhere that they just don't use. And it's this typical scenario. So people say, I listen to your podcast or I watch films or I listen in a meeting and I understand pretty much every word. But then when I speak, I can't find the words. So what's the problem? And they get quite frustrated with that. I understand everything. So why can't I speak? And this is the difference between your passive vocabulary and your active vocabulary. So someone described it to me as passive vocabulary is the books that are on your bookshelf. And the active vocabulary are the books that are open on your desk. They're the actual ones that you have right in front of you. You can reach right now. You can retrieve. Whereas there's all these other ones on the shelf that you've read. But do you actually use them on a daily basis? And that's the difference is this. Words you can actually retrieve, recall. And there's a big difference between just repeating words, reading a word and saying, yeah, I know that word. Yeah. And actually retrieving that word from your brain and from your memory and recalling that word. And that's hard. It's hard even in your native language. So even in your native language, you could learn. I think is it average person has around 20,000 words in their language, but they probably only use around two to three thousand on a daily basis. You can read it all. You understand it all, but you don't speak those words on a daily basis. So it is a normal thing to have a bigger passive than active. That's quite normal. But I think there is when you're learning another language, it's good to let's see if we can activate some of that passive vocabulary. Would you agree with that, Birgit? Would you say this is typical, this input? Yeah, very typical. I think a fantastic comparison you brought here, your own language, I think, because I was thinking of the number of words sometimes people say, OK, how many words do I need? I read I need so and so many words before I can talk. Yeah. And that we also use a very limited number in comparison to what we actually have passively in our own language. Absolutely agree. And with the collecting people, that's even gotten worse over the last 10 or 20 years because there's so much more there at hand. And this is why we need to navigate people. This is why we are here and help you. That's exactly what I was going to say. This is the Duolingo problem. It's the app problem. Duolingo is very input heavy. So you learn a lot of words. And yes, you do have to type. Sometimes you do have to put sentences in. But the active output is very limited. It's input, but actually retrieving, recalling, using it is more limited. And so people tend to go for this input heavy learning style where actually when you want to speak and you want to find the right words, you've got to push yourself to go the other way and do this active retrieving, recalling, producing those words. And I think that's one of the issues. And it's just easier is it just to sit down and go, Oh, I've learned 500 new words. But if you don't use them, does it really help you? And then you're in these scenarios where you can't find the right word. I think the other thing is this perfectionism. I have a lot of clients who rather than say a normal word, they will spend ages looking for a fancy word and they'll go, Oh, I know. And they'll spend ages looking for a word. And I think, use what you know. But of course, if you activate your passive vocabulary, you will just have more options. So those gaps where you sit there thinking, Oh, what's the word? You will just have more options. So three words that mean the same, pretty much the same thing, display, demonstrate, show. Three words that mean exactly the same thing, really. You've just got more options. So those gaps and those moments of where's my word? Well, should get a bit less. Do you agree, Dave? Yeah, absolutely. I think it's just to try to focus maybe for a period of time. If you know you've got a certain number of vocab open on your list or however it might be stored, and then just focus some time that you try to really activate that list before you start collecting more even. And then just getting that up to a level. And I think it's also this idea of variety of words. You just mentioned the fact that often you're using the same words all the time, which is fine. But then maybe try to vary your language. And that's if you've got a certain number of words that mean the same, like we show and demonstrate, display. Then instead of always using the word show, just try to, depending on the context, of course, use the word demonstrate or display and try to get it into your head that you will use these words instead of always using the word show. I think just trying to keep it small but consistent. So to try to, on a regular basis, get this passive into active and try to remind yourself just to maybe use that word more in a situation rather than going to your go-to word or whatever. It might be a safe word that's in your comfort zone. Just keep practising trying to use other things, varying your language. So, Birgit, you had some tips on how do you do this with your Dutch or English or whatever. Yes, and I think I like your word you created here. So input-heavy learning style. So we are now trying to get you to a rather output-heavy learning style. It's a nice creation. And exactly this, always focus on the big thing, what you don't know, but focus on that what you do know. And one way to do that, obviously I had some experience with learning languages, is repeating yes, but another one is make it more emotional and learn in a context. So when I find interesting words, for example, for Dutch, I try to put them in a context and write my own sentences or create my own sentences. So when I learn languages, for example, if I find or come across an interesting word with my Dutch learning, I'll try to put it in a context connected to some emotion. And that happens when you create your own sentences, for example. If it's interesting to me, the word probably needed or I want to use it in a context because I think, OK, I can talk about something around that. So that's a tip. One tip we have for you is create your own sentences with, for example, let's say you pick five or ten vocabulary you really want to remember in the long run. Write them out or read them somewhere and then try to context sentences connected to your life, whatever, could circle around your family, your work, and then it will help you remember them much more easily. Yeah, Rebecca, do you do that with your clients? I do. It's always difficult to push people to do that because it's effort. And this is the point. Activating passive vocabulary, it is effort. It's not just looking at an app. You have to either speak the sentence, you have to write a sentence, you have to create a sentence. It's a bit like going to the gym. You can do your easy workout, but if you choose once a week when you do like interval running or something and you push yourself the week later, you feel the benefit. You feel stronger. You feel better. And it's exactly the same with this. It's this pushing yourself. And it doesn't have to be every day that you do that. Maybe it's just once a week you focus on that or like Dave said, you do it for a specific amount of time, maybe do it for six weeks. Yeah, exactly. Like a sprint. Yeah, I think that's a very important point, because as you said, it's like exercising sports. There's some things where you just stand on a plate and it's supposed to help you lose weight by doing nothing. I think people forget we have a lot of health. We do have computers. We do have robots now. We have GPT. But still, there's something we still need to do here. And it's all helping. But as you said, the effort is not and we should say that we should be honest and say, OK, learning and speaking and levelling up a language will require some kind of effort. It does require effort. There's no free ride. In order to get some output. Yes, of course. To put something in. I play taboo with my clients, which is, I think, quite a great way to do it, because if let's say from one session to the next, you write down in the chat what the vocab was in the actual session. And then I store that and then they have the chance to look at it and then to try just to reactivate it every now and again. You can come back, play taboo or choose out the vocab that was new for the clients and then just focus on the actual vocabulary that was new and then just try to play taboo with this. Again, it's this recall. It's not just, oh, here's the word. This is the word we did last week. Read it and let's talk about it now. You have to recall it. You have to retrieve. And this is much more effective for learning this recall, retrieve method. I did it. I remember doing it for Japanese and it was so hard that sometimes it would take me like an hour to write five sentences because I'd have to get my stupid calligraphy pen out. And it was just a nightmare. But I was so proud of my five sentences that I'd turn up with my sensei and she'd read through them and give me tips or correct or I'd get a big flower when it was right. And yeah, it does make such a difference. It's hard. It's effort. It's not hard, but it is effort. But you will feel the difference. And I think that's the point. Yeah, exactly. And that's putting you aside from others who don't make the effort. And I think that's the point. So we still need and we talked about the why. So what are our goals and things like that? If that goes onto your priority list, you will do that because it's not, to be honest, write five sentences. As you said, it's a lot. You have to sit down, but you find your time. You have to find the time. Yeah. So Dave has some tips on how to find some people like, how do I find my passive vocabulary? How do I find these other words that I want to activate? So you had some prompts, right? Yeah, absolutely. If you've got ChatGPT or any AI, then you might as well take advantage of it and use it. If you want to, first of all, collect vocabulary. And let's say more or less the level you are. For example, you could go anywhere to find a text, whether it's the BBC, whether it's some other, maybe an American newspaper or online place, and then copy and paste that text into ChatGPT. And at the same time, you will put in the prompt that we've got. So when you put in the prompt, it will then say, now, please put in the text. So you put in the text. And then what happens is, ChatGPT will put the level from the A1 to C2. So that's this European standardised level. And it will go from A1 to C2 for the different words in that text. Of course, not every single word, because that would be too much. But it chooses the ones above a certain level. So if, say, you want it to be from B2 to C2, something like that, then that's what it will show you. And then you can take out the words that you want. If you decide you want, let's say, five out of this, then you can go onto the next one and go again to ChatGPT with the next prompt, and then ask ChatGPT with this prompt to send you a number of these words from the list that you've made at a daily time that you set through a certain chat in ChatGPT again. So it's a recurring thing. It can be daily. It can be twice or three times a week, however you want to do it. And then also you can set a time. This is absolutely wonderful that you then get an email on the one hand, but also it pops up, of course, in your ChatGPT feed as a recurring thing. And there you will have things like the vocabulary. You could have a translation. You can have an example of the vocabulary as well. And also with this prompt that I have, you can also have little exercises to do with the vocab. And the exercises, of course, is the main thing, because then you've got the opportunity to train with it, train the vocab and use it in different ways. So I think the first prompt is very good just to find stuff. And then the second prompt just to practise it. And of course, if you want more than just the one word, if you say, I'll do five, I'll have a go at five a day. Okay, then try it with five. So I think things like AI can be used as well just to... MS. Sounds brilliant. Yes. And you say we have the prompt or we are going to share the prompt? MS. Absolutely. Yeah. MS. This will be in the show notes or do they have to subscribe or how do they find the prompts? MS. We'll put it onto our Padlet. What about that? Isn't that a good idea? MS. And how do I get to the Padlet? MS. That will be in the show notes. So the link will be in the show notes to the Padlet and it will be on the Padlet. MS. Yeah. Okay. Very useful. Excellent. MS. My only other... We've talked about making sentences. We've talked about finding these words. I love that with choosing levels of words. I think that's a great idea. A brilliant way to use AI. The other point is how to speak. People say that one of the ways to learn a word is really to say the word. And of course, people have limited opportunities to speak sometimes. I think when you're learning new vocabulary or you're activating this passive vocabulary, sorry, is this you need a safe space to do that sometimes. You don't always necessarily want to bring it up in a meeting if you're not 100% sure about using it. Talk to ChatGPT. You can also have a conversation with ChatGPT and say, I'm learning the word, I don't know, sustainable. And how do I use this word in a sentence? And it will help you and you can practise speaking. Obviously, another safe place is with a trainer. So, you know, have lessons with a nice English trainer. That will always help. You can join our conversation club, which we are kicking off in January. I'm just going to plug that there. EnglishExperts.com, go and buy a ticket. We are setting up this breakfast club, which is very easygoing atmosphere. It's that place where you could learn, use this opportunity to speak, activate this passive vocabulary. And you've got one of us there who's supporting you. Yes. And what just came to my mind is when I learn new words, it's a situation when I'm in, I want to say something and then I lack. So I'm in this situation I don't want to be in, where I can't think of the word. For example, with Dutch, makkelijk and moeilijk is very similar. And one of them is difficult. The other one is easy. So I've been in so many situations when I wanted to say that. And sometimes it's not a bad thing if you're a learner. OK, it's not the end of the world. OK, some people don't like that at all. But that's exactly at one point. I exactly know, OK, I'm not going to make that mistake again. Yeah. Or maybe I made the mistake three or four times, but definitely there will be some time. And then I know it's there. Just a personal experience. Yeah, exactly. You're under pressure or, you know, yourself, you say you don't want to be looking for that word again. So you make an effort to remember the difference. Yeah, exactly. After the conversation, I look it up and I say, OK, repeat that. And yeah. Yeah. OK. OK. Which brings us nicely to talking practise, brings us nicely to our golden nugget. The golden nugget. Yes, our golden nugget of the day today is actually also on our PDF, the golden nugget, 50 golden nuggets, which we created for our 50th episode. And you can get whenever you subscribe to our newsletter on our website. So we're sending that out. That's number 49 out of 50. And this is record yourself. And I have done that before. I did that a week ago, I think. So because my Dutch teacher, he sent me a text created by Chet Chiptie and with a story around my Dutch learning journey. And that's enjoyable. It's fun. It's emotional. I really appreciate that. And I read through the story myself aloud. So that was this was my task. Read it aloud and have it recorded. I use an app which is free, Diktiergerät. Very easy to do. Just press play, read the text aloud, stop it and then listen to it afterwards. And I quite enjoyed that exercise. So that was probably all in total 10 to 15 minutes reading it and then listening to it, which I did when I walked the dog. But still, I want to do it again. It motivated me. And I thought that was was a nice exercise. So maybe some people say they don't like listening to their voices, but it's worth trying. Try it out. It might be for you. And the learning is here because you read something. So you take it in, then you say it aloud, which is different. You do use different skills rather than just saying it inside your head. And then you can listen to it again. You can pick different words out. So, yes, there's some learning in there for you. And Birgit, this is great. This is really good. But I think also there's a difference between when you read and when, of course, you speak normally, right? Of course, there is. Yes. I think there's a good thing to add to it. Reading practise, yeah. Just to record yourself speaking. Yes, of course. Generally, without reading. It's the same idea, but just if you're having a conversation, even with yourself. Yeah, I haven't done that. I will do that next. Yes. But I think some people, they need that to start off. I think I like the idea of reading something aloud because otherwise people are like, what am I going to talk about and what should I say? Do you know what I mean? You don't have to think out too much. It's just let's read out this story. Then listen to it. And so you're reconfirming stuff that you've learned, I think. Yeah. But basically, most people, they have thoughts on their mind. So I would say just to just speak out the thoughts you have. There might be a little bit loose when you want to speak. Some people find that hard, though, I think, to start talking into a microphone. But if you've got something to read, it just gives you a little bit of guidance, I think. As a starter, then once you're a bit more, when you've done it a few times, like Birgit said, maybe you can try the spontaneous sort of thoughts. I did actually. I have two learners at the moment. They're both non-natives, but they are sending each other voice messages every day on WhatsApp as part of a language learning challenge. And they're loving it. And it's so cute. I love this. It was such a good idea. Because at first I thought, well, there's no feedback. I like that. Yeah. And they're sending messages each day to each other. And they said, sometimes it's one minute, sometimes it's 10 minutes. And they just talk about their day and what's going on. And they're just speaking English. And there's no correction there. But they said just this consistent activity of speaking a little bit every single day is really working. I love this. I'm amazed by how well it's working. So we should find a body and do that. We can suggest that to the participants of the conversation. Absolutely. Yeah, they meet the people also. Yeah. Yeah. It's a good idea. It's working. So again, active output rather than only input, input. That's the message of today. Absolutely. That was a long one, wasn't it? It was a long golden nugget. Big one. Big fat golden nugget. That was. Big fat golden nugget. Number 49. Okay. So next time we're going back to grammar and we are going to focus on conditional two. So that's an if clause using would. Yeah. Great. I'm big. It's all excited now because we're doing grammar. And she's very happy to find out that our conditionals episode, I don't know what number it is. It's basically one of our most successful episodes ever. People, I love you out there. If you're interested in grammar, wonderful. I appreciate it. So we're going back to grammar and we're going to talk about different ways you can use the would clause because it is quite useful in lots of scenarios. So thanks for listening and see you next time. Thank you. Bye. Thanks for listening today, guys. Just to remind you that we are offering a workshop, a three English experts workshop on January the 23rd. It's going to be online so you can take part no matter where you are. It's about four hours working with me, working with Birgit, working with Dave. There'll also be a group session. We did one of these recently. It was great. It was so much fun and really productive and really useful. So if you're interested, head over to our new website, threeenglishexperts.com. So the address is the same, we have a new look, we have a new logo. We've been working hard on that. So have a look at that. You can also sign up for the Golden Nuggets, as Dave said. And if you're interested in joining us in January, let us know. Book your place now. Thanks. Bye bye.