Small Actions, Big Learning: How to help Students Learn English Outside the Classroom

Have you ever wondered how much English your students really use outside your class?

In my case, not so much.

For most of my students, English lives only in our classes. They speak it with me, listen to the audio tracks I bring, write assignments, and read texts. But once students leave the classroom, English disappears.

And that’s a problem because learning a new language is not enough to be active student in class, it is also about being exposed to it consistently. And the good news is that it doesn’t mean adding homework. It means guiding our students to use the opportunities that are already around them.

There is an important fact that we have to consider, languages are everywhere, we do not have to travel abroad to listen someone talking in English.

So, what if we helped students turn small daily moments into learning opportunities?

Let’s check the next tools and accessible actions students can use everyday

Watch movies in English with Spanish subtitles, this way you can enjoy a movie while listening to authentic English. If you have streaming platforms like netflix, disney or max it will be much easier to make this small change.

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  Change your phone language to English for learning new vocabulary by using your cellphone as usual.

Add English songs to your daily playlist to practice listening and learn new vocabulary.

Play and learn with Duolingo. This is an easy game to learn about languages.

In the next infography you will find more reasons to use apps as Duolingo.

Remember the goal is to build Habits. Learning does not just happen in academic spaces. The most successful learners are the one with more exposure to the language and our role is to guide them to achieve this goal.