When you first come to the U.S., you might feel some pressure caused by the fact that you must speak in a language other than your mother tongue. However, you shouldn’t worry about it, since every international student goes this, and it gets easier over the time.
There are two main parts in getting comfortable with speaking in English. One part is to make sentences without thinking much about it, which means training your brain to be ready for it at any time. The rest is about training your tongue as a muscle to be able to pronounce the words in a correct way. Once you do enough practice to get used to it, the rest will be easy. However, such practices should be done with enough knowledge of common terms, phrases, slang, and correct pronunciation of the words.
There are opportunities on UCI campus for you to accelerate and ease this process. In addition, you can also do some activities on your own to get used to English faster. Here are things that can be helpful in improving your English speaking skills.
ESL courses
There are courses offered each quarter in which you can enroll as part of your course work. The good news is that you can take those courses as Pass/No Pass option, so you don’t have to worry about your GPA. These courses include, pronunciation, speaking, writing, and grammar courses. The first two directly relate with speaking skills. The last two can advance your speaking skills, since they help you in making sentences and using higher level words. In other words, they can give you an opportunity to extend your vocabulary as well as training your mind to make sentences without having to think much about it.
Programs and Workshops at the International Center
You can enroll in “English Conversation Program” as 1.3 pass/ no pass units, which is more of practicing and improving your conversational English with the help of English speaking facilitators. There are also workshops held in the International Center each quarter, called “English Development Workshop Series”, which can assist you with strengthening your skills in academic writing, reading and vocabulary development, pronunciation, conversation, and grammar in the English language.
International Center Coffee Hours
As I said before, after you get enough basic knowledge, it will be all about practice. The more you practice English speaking, the more comfortable you feel when you do so. There are coffee hours held weekly at International Center, which is a fun time to have conversations with other international students. This can be considered as a fun practice, especially if you’re a coffee addict.
Join a Club at UCI
You can become a member of one of the clubs at UCI. This gives you an opportunity to talk to people more, which will lead to speaking English more. It does not have to be specifically related to English speaking. You can pick any club which matches your interests and sounds fun to you, for example, an astronomy club, hiking club, art club, etc.
Watching English Movies
If you’re into movies, you can learn some slang or common phrases which are used in American society by watching the American movies. You can go to a movie theater, or get a Netflix membership. Even Amazon Prime provides access to movies.
What have you done to become more comfortable with speaking English? Which tip do you think you will try out? Let me know!
Duc Phan says
August 2, 2017 at 9:02 pmI would also look for local Meetup groups (www.meetup.com) that you find interesting and join their events. It could be Meetup groups based on hobbies/interests, or it could be Meetup groups for professional development and career networking. It’s a great way to meet new local people who share the same career path or hobbies/interests and boost your confidence in speaking English with native speakers.