Speaking Strategies

You probably want to be able to speak the foreign language you are learning. You want to communicate with others and be understood. Read and apply our tips below and enhance your speaking skills.

Suggestions for improving your speaking skills

Speak, speak, speak! Practice is essential. Get in touch with native speakers or other foreign language learners and use the language in communication. It's okay to make mistakes.
In your every day life, make up a dialogue in your head for the situation you are in: think about how you could order something to eat in English when you are at a restaurant; how you could ask someone for help when you are lost; how you can buy a ticket for the train when you plan to go somewhere, …
Buy a small dictionary and carry it around with you. When you make up dialogues, use it to look up unknown words.
When you are alone somewhere, for example in your room or under the shower, come up with sentences in the foreign language and speak them out loud.
Learn poems that you like and speak them out loud.
Expose yourself to the foreign language: listen to audio books, read books, watch films and videos, …
Look for a tandem partner, i.e. a person who speaks the foreign language and wants to learn your native language. Meet him or her regularly and speak the foreign language.
Use the computer and the internet to improve your speaking skills. For example you can listen to public podcasts in the foreign language, watch videos or chat with native speakers.
Work on your pronunciation. For suggestions how to do so, click here.