IELTS EXAM: How to Improve Your English in Russia?

Как улучшить свой английский в России?

How to Improve Your English in Russia

Learning English in Russia is an uphill task for many of us.

Therefore, it is only natural that people would look for some easy ways out, which is actually a fatally flawed approach. Nothing can be achieved without perseverance, and English is no exception. If you are genuine about improving your foreign language, you should do your best to achieve your goal.

I truly believe that every little helps, however, I would stress the importance of language immersion.

So what should one do?

• Surround yourself with English. It is not easy to do in Russia where everyone speaks Russian. This is why you need to spend more time watching English programmes to improve your listening and speaking skills. You can also imitate natives to get rid of your thick Russian accent and say goodbye to your Runglish.
• Start speaking English more often. It means you need to use English while conversing with your friends and acquaintances. You might make friends with natives who could improve your English considerably. While those English who live in Russia tend to lose some of their English, it becomes a bit rusty, so you should use Skype to talk to the English living in England.
• Read in English. You should read in English a lot, it should become compulsive. I for one have The Guardian on my mobile, and it is free and works both online and offline. You can think of other free English media. The main thing is to read as much as possible. Choose something right up your street and start reading.
• Write in English. Stop writing in Russian and start using English instead on the daily basis. Don’t be afraid to lose your mother tongue. Even if your Russian deteriorates a little bit as a result of your obsessive English learning, it is not irreversible. You can post in English on Facebook and/or VK, you can even write articles or stories in English.
• Use proofreaders. There are quite a few proofreaders that could not only improve your writing but also make your English better. I for one like free proofreaders like: www.grammarly.com, www.proofreadbot.com, and www.hemingwayapp.com. I will use them together to achieve the best possible results.
• Never give up. It might be difficult to follow all these recommendations, but you should never surrender. There can’t be any days off in your English learning, you should do English every single day. Even if you are tired of English, you can always ask for help. At least you could entertain yourself with some good English film or English stand-up comedy show.

There are a lot of videos on YouTube, so you can always find something interesting and entertaining.