So you want to practice English every day.
Great idea!
But how can you do this in your everyday life? We all have work to do, or studying, chores in the house…
The day never ends. How can you find time for reading?
Let me introduce FIVE effective strategies to help you incorporate English reading into your everyday life.
Let’s dive right in…
Start With Short Stories Or Articles
You need to start with something bite-size. Something that is not too wordy — ie, not too many words.
Something that you can read on the subway on the way to school or the office.
Short stories or articles are perfect for this.
And the good thing about this is that there are literally thousands of short stories and articles for you to choose from online.
Ideally, you should choose stories that you like to read.
If you love ghost stories, then read those.
If you find crime stories fascinating, of course, you should read those.
Equally, if you have no interest in romance or love stories, avoid those.
The same with articles.
Choose articles on subjects that you are interested in.
If you have a deep passion for gardening, then dive into articles about this topic.
If you really love tea and how it is grown, how it is produced, then you should read articles about this.
But if you find cars boring, there is no need for you to read articles about this.
You can find many short stories and articles with a word count under 1000 words.
This makes it more manageable to read for you.
And ideal to read while commuting to work or going to and from school or college every day.
Check out my two great series below:
These are full and complete lesson plans based on an article or short story.
All free to use!
Set A Daily Reading Goal
This is where you might make a mistake.
I know I have when I have set goals for things I want to do in life.
I have woken up and decided that I need to do meditation every day.
‘I know,’ I say to myself. ‘I’ll get up at the crack of dawn and meditate for one hour every day.’
You think that happened?
Of course not.
It’s too much, too soon.
As with everything in life, you need to start small and start slow.
Create a daily habit that you can do EVERY SINGLE DAY.
That is the key thing.
Build a habit.
So don’t do as I did.
Set a reading goal that is within your reach. Something you can achieve every day without too much effort.
Your reading goals can be defined by the page, by word count, or by time.
Whatever suits you best.
So you might say to yourself: I will read one page of a short story or article every day.
Or: I will read 100 words every day.
Or: I will read for ten minutes every day.
Choose whichever method works best for you.
Try all of them until you find something that feels right.
But whatever you choose, start small.
Start easy.
The one thing you must do is to be consistent.
You must read every day.
Then you will achieve your goals.
Say, you start by reading just for ten minutes every day.
After two months, you could be reading for twenty minutes a day.
Six months later, the number could rise to thirty minutes every day.
If you are reading thirty minutes every day, then you could be reading around 5000 words each time.
That’s about twenty pages of a book!
Pretty good!
Remember: Start small. But do it every day.
Read Anything And Everything
I’m not saying that you have to become a reading machine and read all day, every day.
But you can find other things to read when you are going about your daily life.
Even if you live in a country like China, Nigeria or Brazil.
There are signs in English.
You can see advertising using English.
Product labels, and slogans are in English.
Also, you can see English on public transportation, road signs, tourist information and restaurant or coffee shop menus.
There is English everywhere.
Get in the habit of reading it and analysing it.
Does it make sense to you?
Can you understand the meaning of it?
By doing this, you are immersing yourself into a world of English that you can use every single day.
Of course, you don’t need to spend every second being outside reading English signs and advertising.
But look at it sometimes.
Read it and try to understand it.
It’s good for you.
Join Online Reading Groups
The beauty of the internet age is that everything is done online.
You might be able to find a real live reading group in your hometown.
But if you live in a remote place, don’t worry!
You can find an online reading group easily.
Here are four I found that might be useful to you:
Or start your own!
You can use something like Discord to start your own online English reading group.
It’s a great way to meet other like-minded people who want to improve their English reading skills.
Plus, it is fun.
Just another thing you can do to take steps to improve your English reading…
Technology Is Your Friend
My wife bought me a Kindle around 2011 and I didn’t read a real book made of paper after that.
I took to using the Kindle immediately.
It was light and compact and no need to stare at an electric lightbulb screen.
I thought it was just like reading a real page of an old-fashioned book.
Plus, I could store many books on it.
In the old days, I might have walked around with one book in my bag, because carrying any more than that was just too cumbersome.
Now I could keep all the books I was reading on one simple device.
I have always liked to read two or three books at the same time. Often, one fiction, one novel, and a third one of some other kind of reading material.
By using the Kindle I could do this easily.
So if you have access to a Kindle, then use it.
I think most young people use their phones to read. No problem there.
Just make sure you adjust the brightness to suit your eyes!
Many ebook reader apps allow you to highlight certain words or phrases. This is great for making a list of words or phrases you need to learn.
And some of these apps even include a dictionary to help you understand the words or phrases as you read.
These are great learning tools that you can use on your reading journey.
Take advantage of them and use them at your will.
Conclusion
I hope this highlights a few things you can do to improve your English reading skills in your everyday life.
Of course, this system requires a great deal of commitment from you, the student.
As I said before, an important thing to do is to set goals that you can achieve every day.
Don’t create unbelievable goals for yourself.
Just try to do some reading every day and you will find your reading skills will improve.
What did you think of this article?
Do you agree with some of the points I outlined above?
Do you have any pieces of advice of your own to add?
If so, feel free to leave a comment below.
And thanks for reading!
