You need to think in English if you want to become more confident when speaking as you will speak more naturally, fluently and with less hesitation.
Thinking in your native language and then translating it into English is not going to help you with your learning process. I know that you will be thinking that you are not able to think in English because you don’t have enough vocabulary but please, think for a moment. When you were a baby, you used to think in Spanish as you did not know any other languages. Of course you weren’t able to say everything but you learnt how to express yourself in different ways, maybe with sounds, facial expressions, etc. That’s the “painful” process that we have to follow to reach English fluency.
Many people will be thinking that is boring and a long process but it isn’t. It can be as boring as you want it to be. Look at me, I looked for a way to make my English learning process more fun. I looked for a language exchange and I found Norman
I realised that learning English was much more fun speaking to somebody and learning things as you go. Why is that? Because you don’t need to learn long lists of vocabulary, you learn the new words and expressions in the context and you just enjoy what you’re doing.I highly recommend people to find a language exchange partner in order to improve your speaking skills but don’t forget that listening is so important too and you can’t focus just on one person, you have to listen to a wide variety of accents in order to understand everybody.
As soon as you have fun with the learning process, you will feel relax and comfortable. It’s important that you don’t mind making mistakes as it is from that moment on when you start thinking in English.
When you think in your native language and you try to translate everything into English it doesn’t sound natural, because the sentence structure is different in your language and it might take you a while to say what you need to say because you are translating in your head at the same time as you speak.
I am going to give you some strategies to help your brain to think in English
1) Find a language exchange partner. For me that’s the best way. You need to speak as much as you can
2) Listen to a lot of English ( videos on Youtube, podcasts, the radio, TV programmes..)
3) Get rid of the fear of making mistakes when you speak. Everybody makes mistakes and it’s a positive thing to learn faster.
4) Surround yourself with English as much as you can.
5) Set yourself goals when studying in English. Learning English can become addictive. Set small goals that are achievable.
6) Speak out loud, memorise new words as you go.
7) Learn vocabulary always in sentences, not single words. Words without context are very very hard to remember
8) Use the vocabulary you learn as much as you can.
9) Read out loud. At first you will sound a little bit strange but soon it will feel totally natural
REMBEMBER! LISTENING AND SPEAKING ARE THE KEY TO SUCCESS