Learn Languages With Songs - A Three Step Activity To Study on Your Own

If you like listening to music, then you must use songs to learn languages! Every time we connect a learning experience with something we enjoy doing, we can be sure we are going to have great results.

So, today I'm going to propose a 3 Step Activity for you to learn any language on your own with songs.

Before we start the activity you have to choose a song you like, your favorite one at the moment. 
Have you chosen it yet? Don't keep reading if you haven't chosen it yet! I chose the song Thinking Out Loud by Ed Sheeran.

Choose your song!

1- Listen to it on Youtube or wherever you can listen to it. Write down everything you can hear by listening to the song only once. No pauses allowed! It doesn't matter if you can only write 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 words, this is just a warm-up and the more you do it, the better you get at it.

The picture below shows the result of my first step.

2- Listen to the song again, but this time read the lyrics as you listen. There are many websites where you can find lyrics. Lyrics.com is one of them. 

Pay attention to the way the words are pronounced. Are there any words you can't hear? Are there any letters you think are not pronounced?

Check if the words you wrote are actually part of the song. If they are, congratulate yourself, you did a good job! If not, try again and don't ever give up. Maybe the song was too difficult for your level and it would be better to choose a slower song.

3- Use the lyrics and the song now, it's time to listen and sing! Try to imitate the pronunciation of the singer and don't worry if your voice doesn't sound great, all that matters is the pronunciation and rhythm.

You can repeat all the steps as many times as you like with the same song or with another song. I recommend you do it once a week.

This activity is focused on listening and pronunciation, but if you want to learn new vocabulary you can look up all the new words in a dictionary and make a list of the new words from this song.

I hope you liked my activity and that you can learn a lot by using this technique! 

Another Song Activity

I just love music, I can't get enough of it! So, the other day I was planning a class for a student. We were finishing up one topic, Simple Present and Present Continuous, and about to start a new one, Future. While planning I was listening to music, I always do that, and I heard one song that caught my attention: Not There Yet by a Luisa Sobral, a singer from Portugal. It was exactly what I needed. The song has a mix of Simple Present and Future-WILL. It shows one of the uses of WILL which is the uncertainness of future actions. We often use the words MAYBE, PROBABLY, POSSIBLY and I THINK with the Future WILL because we are not sure if the action will happen or not.

Listen to the song, complete the gaps and then tell what you understood. Why does she use WILL?

The video was removed, so I'll leave here a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vs1PUNzWy3M

Not there yet

By Luisa Sobral

I ______ a tree
I see a ___________
I see children ___________
Going inside and out

I _________ sunflowers
everywhere
And a big scarecrow
with a hat on his head

But I'm not there ______
But someday I'll ______
And I'm not there ______
We'll _________

Will you _________ me
To go inside
Will you hold me and _________
Will you lay down by my side
Be there _________ 'till we die

And you're not there _______
But someday you'll __________
And you're not there __________
We'll _______

Will we have a sunday picnic
Will the __________ wear blue and the girls wear pink
Will we _________ around the world
Will we make everybody watch our family slideshows

But we're not there _________
But someday we'll ________
And we're not there _________
We'll ________
And we're not there ________
Maybe we'll _________ ever be
And we're not there _________
We'll _______