3 simple tips to improve your English vocabulary, whether you are a native speaker or not.

Have you ever had that awkward feeling in the middle of a conversation, where you try to say something but only the words in your native language come to mind?

Or even if English is your vernacular and you are trying to write and essay, a text message, or an article, and that magic word refuses to appear. Are you the kind of person that instantly resorts to online thesauruses and dictionaries for help?

Well, if you are in the club of the multilinguals, I am sure you have been in that situation before. Do not feel bad just yet, you haven't done anything wrong. In fact, based on my not-so-reliable Google researches, only 43% of humans can speak two different languages with proficiency.

The number goes down to 13%, if you speak three languages fluently, and even lower for four or more. So, well done if you are within those groups (or striving to get there). It is not so easy to remember thousands of words and, on top of that, be skilled enough to arrange them in a logical way that allows other people to understand what you are saying.

I know you are more of a word person, but take a look at these very simple numbers. They represent the amount of entries in the biggest dictionaries of each of these languages.

* Korean ~1,100,000 words

* English ~520,000 words

* Chinese ~370,000 words

* Russian ~200,000 words

* Spanish ~93,000 words

Yes, we could start a never-ending debate about obsolete terms, conjugations, the forms of each word, or even including the age of each dialect. That's not the point now though, I only wanted to show you that learning a new language is not an easy task and give you these 3 easy-peasy things you can do, in order to get closer to be a word wizard.

Do not feel left out if you are someone whose mother tongue is English and you are not planning to learn any other language in the future, these tips also apply to you! Actually, here's a challenge for the know-it-alls: if you follow my advice now, and before you go to bed tonight you have a new word in your conversational repertoire, then you owe me a dollar. If not, well...we can discuss it. Here we go.

1. Watch everything with subtitles on.

You know what you are doing tonight, don't say you won't. There is no excuse in times of quarantine not to watch your favourite series or movies. So, before you start a new episode, go to the settings, and turn those captions on. It might seem a bit unnecessary at the beginning but trust me on this one, you will end up knowing a new word for sure. Be it the name of illegal substances perhaps, if you like Breaking Bad, or each and every of the noble ranks (shout-out to all GoT fans there). I've got to say that this one worked even for my partner, who is an English native speaker!

2. Read the lyrics of each song you play.

This has to be one of the most effective ways to learn new words, there is nothing that can erase a great tune from your head. We can even recall lyrics from songs that were sang to us as children. Therefore, remembering the words together with the music it is a combination that will engrave definitions in your memory. Plus, you will get rich context around each term, and grasp the different ways of using it. I still have A4 prints of many songs that I'd stick on my wall while blasting Arctic Monkeys on my speaker (at least until mum yelled at me), but you can choose any genre. I bet that a death metal band will have a significantly different word choice than, say, Taylor Swift.

3. Make a list of all the slang you learn.

This one is my personal favourite. You might be asking yourself, "why slang and not any other regular words?". Well, you can write anything if it works for you. As a matter of fact, the majority of people benefit from jotting things down to remember them. Still, in my opinion, making a list of slang words is a much better option. The reason is that these words are usually associated to people who have used them, which is a great aid at the time of remembering the actual meaning. And, in many other occasions, they are related to fun situations, since learning the urban jargon is a process you go through when you visit a different city or country, for example.

That would be all from me. I hope these tips were useful to you, as they were to me on my journey learning the English language. If you had an idiomatic epiphany, or if you found out you were misspelling a word all this time, let me know so we can tell the world. There is no shame in acquiring new knowledge and probably someone else will benefit from your finding.