I am a big fan of reading for the purpose of learning a language as well, of course as listening, which is why I make podcasts. If you want to improve both of your listening and reading as well as your vocabulary, then this should be a good resource for you today. In today’s episode, Ariel Goodbody will tell you a story, but pre-teach some of the harder vocabulary first. This is a crosspost episode where Ariel shared one of my episodes on their podcast, and I am sharing a story I enjoyed...

In this episode, I will be talking about the IELTS Speaking exam. I know the IELTS exam isn't going to be relevant for everyone, although I always like to mention that preparing for the exam can also be great practice for English in a general sense. I'm sure those who have taken the exam before will agree that their English improved during the process. So even if you're not taking the exam, I really hope this episode will be useful for you in some way. Since the beginning of this podcast,...

Over the years doing this podcast, the topic of exercise seems to have come up a lot when making comparisons to language learning, so I thought it was about time I made an episode where I talk all about it. In this episode, I talk about exercise and some of the benefits, teach you some useful expressions, and make some links on how exercise and language learning are similar and benefit you in the same ways. Show notes page - https://levelupenglish.school/podcast244 Sign Up for Free...

I get comments occasionally from people who say “I want to be like a native speaker” and “I don’t want to learn from non-native speakers.  In this episode, I'll argue the benefits of learning from non-native speakers as well as natives, and not closing yourself off from learning. The main thesis here is to stay open-minded in language learning and I explore some reasons why. I cover some ways in which non-native speakers might be preferable to native speakers, and even when they're not, the...

In this episode, I have a great and casual chat with Zhifei from​ Xiaogua Chinese about language learning, using flashcards, the best mindset for learners, getting a good English accent, and much more!  We also talk about my own Chinese learning methods and share ideas on the best way to learn two languages at once. There's a lot of useful information in this long episode, and I hope you find it useful listening practice for your English too. Xiaogua Instagram Xiaogua YouTube Show notes...

For many of us, pets and animals are a huge part of our lives. We spend a lot of time and money looking after our furry friends, and I definitely have a huge soft spot for animals - especially cats! In this episode, I talk about choosing the right pet, dog people vs cat people, my own experiences with pets and vets, dealing with the loss of a pet, and share lots of useful phrases and expressions useful for daily English speaking. Join the conversation below. Show notes page -...

I’ve been living in Bangkok, Thailand since the beginning of August, so it’s been over 2 months now. This is the longest I’ve spent in one place outside of my home country before. One of our group class students requested an episode sharing my thoughts and experiences after moving here, and I decided to give it a go. In this episode, I’ll be talking about what’s changed here and some big differences I’ve noticed between the UK and Thailand. I’ll be sharing the good and the bad, things I miss...

Memory is something we've covered a few times on the podcast before, but it's always worth coming back to with more ideas and tips. In this episode, I share advice on how you can stop forgetting English vocabulary, 2 methods of learning new vocabulary that suit all types of learners and personality types, expressions related to memory and forgetting, and at the end I give some advice on general memory and forgetfulness. I think there's a lot of value packed into this episode so listen...

Every now and then, I invite the members of Level Up English to join me for a chat about different topics. This time, we spoke about giving advice. In the end, only 3 people joined, which was quite a nice casual group. All members gave some amazing advice and also used some really good vocabulary.  I hope you enjoy this episode! In this episode, we cover: Advice on being happyAdvice on getting good sleepAdvice on learning languagesAnd problems we're facing in life Show notes page -...

Cara Leopold (Leo Listening) joins me once again on the podcast to discuss the benefits of learning English in groups with her experience teaching group classes based around movies, as well as some good movies and TV series she likes to use to practice and teach English.  If you've caught this episode in 2023, Cara is relaunching her Movie Club course. You can try it out for one week in September to see if you like it. We talk more about this in the episode too Show notes page -...

In this episode, we'll be talking about some patterns you can remember when adding UP to verbs. Here are some examples: cloud up, clear up, finish up, drink up, break up One of the Level Up Members recently asked about the difficult part of phrasal verbs where we add ‘up’ to a verb and why we do this. I decided to make an entire episode about it because it’s not an easy thing to get your head around. Part 1 was Episode 224. I decided to stop the episode halfway because 1 hour of listing...

I had a great audio question sent in today about learning with comprehensible input. So in this episode, I cover some of the ideas behind the comprehensible input method, and then explore the input hypothesis from Stephen Krashen and how these ideas might benefit your language learning methods. As always, keep in mind we are all different and learn in different ways, but I think a lot of these points will be relevant to most of you. Perhaps you can take something away today that you can...

Steve Kaufmann is a polyglot who has a good level of proficiency in around 20 languages. Steve is well known for his content online and on his YouTube channel, Lingo Steve. You've probably seen him before!  Today he joined me for a really fascinating chat about language learning. I cover some of his recent YouTube videos and ask for tips on some of these topics. If you want to know more, I highly recommend going to his channel for more details. In this episode, we cover: Language learning...

On the private podcast last week, I chatted a bit about my experience in China and then ended on the idea of the benefit of being silly in your language learning. I thought it was a really interesting and potentially useful topic for people to hear, so I decided to turn it into a public podcast episode too. In this episode, I’ll be talking about reasons why you shouldn’t take yourself too seriously, and how inserting more silliness into your life can benefit you - both generally and to help...

I recently made a huge change in my life and I'm announcing it to everyone in this episode today. I'm going to talk a little bit about this change, why I made it, and some of my feelings about the future. I then talk about change in a more general sense and give you some tips (inspired by Atomic Habits) to help you in life and language learning, as well as some useful expressions related to change.  Show notes page - https://levelupenglish.school/podcast232 Sign Up for Free Lessons -...

Do you know how to use the word 'dear'? A lot of people get confused with this term, and honestly the answer isn't as simple as you may think, so let's look into that today. I'll cover the ways in which we use this word and why you might not want to say it to strangers. This is a re-share of a video I posted on the English with Michael YouTube channel, so thanks for your patience with me during this busy time! Show notes page - https://levelupenglish.school/podcast231 Sign Up for Free...

A listener requested a topic on the housing market in the UK, so I thought I'd give it a shot and make it as interesting as I can. In this episode, I talk about the housing crisis the UK is currently going through, my own experience with buying a house and share some interesting sayings and idioms too. As always, we look at lots of useful and high-level vocabulary. Do you know the word 'insurmountable'? Let's learn it today!  Show notes page - https://levelupenglish.school/podcast230 Sign...

Kevin Stroud from the History of English Podcast joins me for a fascinating discussion and dive into... well, the history of English! In this episode, we talk about a variety of things, including: Why TH doesn't have its own letterIn what part of England the language was standardised?When did the first dictionaries comeWhy there are so many French words in EnglishWhy we have so many silent lettersWhy we have different words for animals and meat (pig, pork)Where English surnames come...

This episode will be deleted soon! Just a quick update to inform you of what I've been working on. I've added a Premium Membership which includes group classes to Level Up English. If you want to join these classes or try them out, follow the link below. Sign Up here: https://courses.levelupenglish.school/courses/premium If you have any questions: info (at) ewmichael.com This is still an experiment, so we will see how it goes and I'll be checking your feedback, and changing and improving...

This week I’m beginning to come down with a cold. I can feel my throat getting hoarse and it hurts to swallow, and I probably don’t have much time before I’ll be unable to record a podcast episode, so let’s get this done quickly! Getting sick is something we all have to deal with at some point, so although it’s not the cheeriest of topics, it’s an important one to cover since there are so many great expressions we can use to talk about this. I’ll be covering a lot of those today as well as...

I had a listener question about Phrasal Verbs and why some of them use prepositions even though the meaning seems to be the same without them. Can we say "Check it" and "Check it out"? What's the difference? I break down this question in detail and also talk about the difference between literal and idiomatic phrasal verbs. I hope you learn a lot today in this useful and information-packed episode.   Show notes page - https://levelupenglish.school/podcast227 Sign Up for Free Lessons -...

This is the first AMA (Ask Me Anything) episode I have done since #84! It's been a while, but this is where I reach out to Instagram to get some questions for me to answer on the podcast. If you like these episodes or have a question to submit for a future episode, get in touch with me on the website below or on Instagram. Show notes page - https://levelupenglish.school/podcast226 Sign Up for Free Lessons - https://www.levelupenglish.school/#freelessons Join Level Up English -...

Aubrey Carter from All Ears English and IELTS Energy joins me today for a chat about the IELTS English exam, and a few other topics. We discuss tips for the exam as well as some interesting slang and vocabulary that would be useful for all learners! Should you use formal or informal English?Should you improve your English or study the exam structure?Useful vocabularyUsing idioms and slangNew English words that we have learnt recentlyAnd more! Show notes page -...

I got a question about adding "UP" to certain verbs and this learner wanted to know more. As I did more research, I was plunged into a rabbit hole of research and it turned out to be much more complicated than I first realised! I decided to try to tackle this topic in a podcast episode. Because there's a lot to talk about, this is just part 1. If you like this episode, let me know! If this one goes well, I'll do my best to make a part 2. In this episode, I talk about what a phrasal verb is,...

I see a lot of writing mistakes with learners struggling with parallel structures, or parallelism. This is where features in a sentence have to follow the same grammatical patterns to sound natural. It may sound a bit confusing, but honestly, it's fairly simple once you understand the main idea. In this episode, I go through 7 examples of how to sound more natural with this grammar rule as I talk about some of my favourite travel memories. I encourage you to respond and do the same! Show...