On the Shoulders of Giants

I wanted to take the time to write this article because I believe it's important to see the roots of the ETB method—to see where it came from. By looking at its predecessors (the methodologies that came before it) you can gain a better understanding of how the English Tea Break method works.

I'm titling this article "On the Shoulders of Giants" which is a metaphor meaning the ETB method wouldn't be as great as it is without the help from other great language teachers. Thanks to them and all of the work that they've done, I learned French, and English Tea Break was born.

Before we start talking about the other methodologies though, I want to talk about you for a moment. I want to talk about the very first language-learning method to have been created.

Learning Languages as a Child

I should start by applauding you! 👏

You might not realize it, but you're already a language-learning expert! Whatever your native language is, you learned it and you became a master. You did this without any language-learning apps, games, courses, classes, or paid tutors.

How did you do that?

By listening! You had none of those tools available to you, yet you were able to become fluent in a language. All you did was listen. You listened for years and years.

Then, one day, you spoke. You said just one word at first. But one word became short phrases. Those short phrases became full sentences. The people in your life gave you feedback, they corrected your grammar mistakes, and you improved.

Babies TRY so hard and so consistently. The need to understand. It's that effort—that need—that allows them to learn.

This is the very first language-learning method ever invented: Biology.

You're not a baby anymore though. Can you still learn this way?

Learning Languages as an Adult

There's nothing magical about the baby style of learning. Surround yourself with an unfamiliar language, absorb it for years, and then start speaking.

That can be done as an adult too but we'll need to keep some things in mind because things are a little different for adults.

Your brain isn't developing at the same rate that a baby's brain develops. When we're babies, our brains are designed to learn as fast as possible. But it's exhausting, so we learn a lot and then we sleep a lot. As adults, we need to get more things done, so we don't sleep as much, which means we can't learn as fast. High amounts of learning require high amounts of sleep.

You don't have a baby brain that is learning at maximum speed anymore, but that's okay because as adults, we have a lot more control over our environment and we have tools that we can use to improve the learning process.

So don't be discouraged! As adults, our brains don't develop as fast as baby brains. But as adults, we can learn even faster than babies because we're in control!

I learned French in one year. I was having full conversations with native speakers. Babies can't do that.

Don't listen to the people who say "You need to be born in America to speak like an American". Adults can learn languages even faster than babies can. YOUR English level could be even better than mine someday, which brings me to the next giant that helped create the English Tea Break method.

Matt vs. Japan

Recently, Matt has become a controversial guy. He made some business mistakes that caused people to lose respect for him, but his old language-learning methods are great.

He's a YouTuber. I found him while looking for a better way to learn French.

Matt is an American who taught himself Japanese while living in America, and he claims that his Japanese vocabulary is larger than that of an average Japanese person.

I believe him. I don't think he's a very trustworthy businessperson, but I believe his claim here because I've used his methods. I can understand how someone could develop a giant vocabulary with these methods.

Matt focused primarily on "Immersion" which is something we'll talk more about in the next article, but it's basically just watching and listening. Like a baby! His immersion strategy was combined with the strategy of using an SRS like Anki (we'll talk about this later too) to form an excellent way of developing vocabulary.

The Matt vs. Japan strategy came from articles written by another American who learned Japanese, named Khatzumoto. He created a website called "All Japanese All The Time" (known online as AJATT) where he explained immersion and using an SRS, but his articles were very disorganized and the website hasn't been maintained, so Matt modernized that method.

Refold

Matt's videos are just videos though. They're pretty random. Matt organized Khatzumoto's information, but language learners still don't really know where to begin with Matt's videos. Also, most of his videos are specifically for learning Japanese.

That's where Refold came in.

Refold is a website that worked with Matt to create a language-learning method for people who are learning any language, and it's great! It's much more organized than Matt's videos. I highly recommend it.

Other Influences

There are many other language-learning experts that I could talk about including Stephen Krashen, Kató Lomb, Ikenna Obi, and Steve Kaufmann. All of these people have contributed in some way to the ETB method. Each of their methods has pros and cons.

The English Tea Break Method

So if all of these great methods already exist, then what is the point of the English Tea Break method?

There are a few major reasons:

First, the English Tea Break method combines the best pieces from these other methods. It packages them together in a way that helps students learn as fast as possible.

Second, it eliminates "the fluff". The other methods are great, but I believe that many of them over-complicate the process of language learning. Language learning is hard, but it's also confusing when students are told to download 30 tools and try 40 different studying strategies.

Third, ETB is built around learning English specifically. Every language is unique and while general language-learning methods can be useful, the ones focused on a specific language are even better.

Fourth, English Tea Break combines language-learning methods with the newest research in cognitive science. By understanding how the brain works, how we learn, how we forget, and how we memorize, we can learn as fast as possible.

We'll talk about the specifics of the English Tea Break method soon, but first, let's talk more about what "immersion" is and how to use it to become fluent in English.