Let me tell you a secret. You can learn English without a textbook or a teacher! You can learn from the English that is around you every day. All you need to do is look for it.


Think about all of the “teachers” you have:

People you can talk to: friends, family, colleagues, neighbors, waiters and waitresses, cashiers, taxi and bus drivers, flight attendants, sales people, landlords, hair stylists, the person sitting next to you at a party

Things you see every day: supermarket signs, traffic signs, maps, social media posts, brochures, newspapers, advertisements, billboards, email, junk mail, books, magazines, websites, blogs, food packaging, menus, instruction manuals

Sounds you hear every day: radio, TV, announcements, music, podcasts, the noisy people sitting next to you at a cafe

These are your teachers, and they’re (mostly) free to interact with!
If you interact with the people and things around you, your English will improve naturally. "Interaction" means thinking about what you hear and read, replying to people who speak to you, and writing down notes about things you notice.

• Read the paper, and look up words you don’t know.

• Listen to how cashiers and flight attendants talk to you.

• Listen for different styles of language.

• Read the back of your cereal box.

• Watch TV sitcoms to learn slang.

• Pay attention to signs more often.

Write your observations in a notebook, and if you are taking an English class, ask your teacher questions about what you saw or heard.

Let the English that is around you be your teacher. (If you’re not living in an English-speaking community, you’ll have to try a little harder and be more creative, but it’s possible to find many of these things if you have access to the Internet.)

Go on, look. English is all around you!