I spend far too long in my prep time for the speaking section of the CELPIP exam. Instead of spending the 30 seconds that I'm supposed to be spending, I end up spending 20 minutes or 30 minutes or even more in trying to get my answers ready. And when I do that, I get great answers. I'm able to organize my thoughts with great freedom.

I'm able to explain everything that I want to say. And my answers come out beautifully. But when I'm under pressure, like when I know I need to face that 30 seconds or 60 seconds space that the exam is going to give me to brainstorm and to come up with what I'm going to say, I know for a fact that I'm going to freeze and I do freeze.

, Whenever I try to put myself into that situation where I need to practice brainstorming in that small window of time, I never can come up with what I need to say. And when I need to start speaking, I feel like I start and I stop and I get stuck and I get confused and I get so lost.

Does that sound like you? If it does, please stay tuned to this episode because we're going to give you a mini episode designed to help you overcome the problem of taking too long to prep.

  📍 Well, hello there and welcome to the Speak English Fearlessly podcast. This is the podcast for motivated English learners who want to speak English fearlessly and learn practical tips and strategies to conquer the CELPIP exam. I also love to feature encouraging interviews with regular people, people just like you, who are working towards becoming fluent in English so we can learn from their experiences together.

Who am I? My name is Aaron Nelson and I've been an English teacher for over 16 years and I now help students prepare for the CELPIP exam through online classes.  

.  Feeling like you have a hard time trying to fit your practice and your prep time into those small spaces that you know the exam is going to give you. Is a very common situation for test takers to find themselves in.

It's not easy. It feels like a very unnatural place to be in. So when we are thinking about it or when we are trying to practice because it feels so unnatural, we tend to avoid it. We tend to go for things that we feel more comfortable with. If we feel more comfortable with having lots of time to prepare and develop our answers, because that's the only way that we seem to be able to get the answer out completely, the way we want it to, then of course that's going to be the thing that you and I rely on, right?

Because it feels comfortable and we're able to get good results, at least the practice part, and yet at the same time, we know in the back of our mind, we know, oh no, even though I'm getting really good results when I have lots of time to practice, I know that the exam is not going to be that way.

I know that I'm not going to be able to get my answer out or my planning in, inside of that short 30 second or 60 second window of time. But I don't know what to do. I feel so uncomfortable when I try to do that kind of practice. So it feels more comfortable to stick with what I feel good at. And it feels like I should avoid doing the things that make me feel uncomfortable and make me feel like I'm not doing very well, which is what happens every time I try to force myself into those 30 second or 60 second preparation windows.

I just. Can't seem to make it work for me. But you know what? Allowing that line of thinking to direct what we do does not lead to the progress that you need to be making on as you practice for the exam. It's just not, and you know it, right? I know deep inside, you know it, that as long as you are avoiding stepping into those high pressure practices, you're not setting yourself up for success.

I mean, on some, in some ways it's good. It's good practice to give yourself lots of time to get ready, but it can't be the only thing that you do. Because if it is, if that's the only thing that you rely on to help you to get ready for the exam, when the actual exam comes, you won't be ready for it. And you're going to be faced with that high pressure situation that you haven't been getting yourself ready for.

And it's going to overwhelm you. And when you feel overwhelmed, you will probably struggle to get your ideas out. And that will result in probably you not getting the score that you so desperately need to get. Back when I lived in Mexico, many of you know if you're a regular listener, that my wife and I ran our own English teaching company.

And I remember working with some students who were managers, a couple of them were at the director level of their company. And we started working as a group through a series of really fascinating stories that was profiling how some of the best coaches coached some of the most important athletes at that time.

So at the time, these high performing athletes, the ones that we were reading about and studying was an American swimmer named Michael Phelps. Maybe you've heard of him and a very well known, at least at the time golfer whose name was Tiger Woods.

And the article that we were working on was just profiling how their coaches. Like, how do coaches coach high performing athletes so that they continue to be high performing athletes? And we were really fascinated by that story. I remember I was absolutely fascinated by this just because of how could it be applied to helping language learners.

Because all of the language learners that I know want to develop their skills. They want to grow beyond what they're already able to do. And that's why I just found these articles to be so interesting. How, how did Michael Phelps coach and Tiger Woods coach? How did they work with them? I mean, they were already in some, one of them was an Olympic athlete and the other one was like one of the best golfers in the whole world.

How does a coach? improve their skills. , for Michael Phelps. One of the things that his coach always did was forced him to practice in the most dreaded situations that Phelps could be in. One of the worst things that can happen to an Olympic swimmer. And a high stakes competition has to do with your goggles, the goggles that they wear. If you're swimming, going as fast as you can, trying to win a race, the last thing that you want to deal with is having your goggles break or having water begin to seep in because of two things.

One, it can make you get incredibly distracted because you're focusing on what's going on with my goggles. Why all of a sudden is water starting to get in? It can distract you. It can also temporarily blind you. It can make you or make it hard for you to see. So having something happen to your goggles, having them malfunction in the middle of a race is one of the most detrimental.

Or, one of the most race threatening situations that a swimmer can find themselves in. So can you guess what Michael Phelps coach would do? He would either hide the goggles on Michael Phelps, or he would somehow alter them, so that partway through, the goggles would begin to leak. So the coach would purposefully put his client, Michael Phelps, into those situations that were the hardest to deal with.

And the same thing was true with Tiger Woods coach. One of the most dreaded things for any golfer is to have your ball fly into a sand trap. You know, those deep pits that are filled with sand and you have to try to get out as quickly as you could. Well, Tiger Woods coach would very frequently spend most of their practice time hanging out inside of the sand trap with the goal of getting out of the sand trap with one swing.

That was how he practiced with Tiger Woods, putting him in the most difficult situation, the situation that he did not want to be in as a golfer, the worst place, the last place that you want to be in is inside of a sand trap. So that's what his coach would bring him to do. And you know what?

You need to be taking lessons from these world class coaches. How often are you putting yourself into those high pressure situations that the CELPIP exam will be asking you to be in? Or will be putting you in? If you find comfort, for example, in long, extensive prep times, then you need to force yourself into having those harsh 30 second or 60 second prep times to get ready for a section of the, of the test.

You need to put yourself into it. not avoid it. Being able to practice prepping with unlimited time constraints is good. It can be a good way to practice. But , if that's the only thing that you're doing, you're doing yourself a, a diss service. You're not helping yourself. If that's the only thing that you do., if you expose yourself to the kinds of practice where you only have 30 seconds to get ready or where you only have one minute to get ready in order to start speaking. If you are putting yourself in that kind of pressure, then you will be ready for when it actually happens on the eXam.

Here's how you can begin doing that today. Go ahead and grab your cell phone, open that timer app, set it for 30 seconds.

You know what I'm going to say, don't you get a piece of paper and a pen or a pencil, something to write with, and then practice brainstorming in that 30 second space of time. Like what we were talking about in the previous episode, listen to something. maybe listen to your favorite song or listen to an interview on the radio or listen to a podcast interview and as soon as that interview is finished, hit stop.

And then hit start on your phone's 30 second timer and start writing what are the most important details that you would like to share with your listener about what that article meant to you.

Do you agree with what was going on? Or do you disagree? Maybe List out as many things as you possibly can that you would talk about if this was the exam question that you were faced with. Now here's the rule. As soon as those 30 seconds are done, you need to stop. Don't allow yourself to keep going. Stop.

Look at what you wrote. Do you have enough information to work witH? Did what you did, did, did what you just brainstorm give you enough information to work with?

Probably the first few times that you do this, No, probably it'll be just enough to get you started. Maybe you'll only have enough time to write down one or two ideas, but here's the thing you need to go back and do it again and again and again and again on a daily basis, do it deliberately. Deliberately put yourself in those hard situations so that the more you do it, the easier it will become for you.

Thank you for listening to today's mini episode. I hope that you found it useful and helpful as you work towards your CELPIP exam. Have a great week and we'll see you again next Tuesday.