How to Learn English with Video Games

What if you had a great time playing one of your favorite games after a busy day at work? Besides being a huge temptation, it’s a great opportunity to learn English. See it to believe it, but playing video games can give your English learning an awesome boost.

What better way of enhancing your vocabulary than pressing some buttons, and scoping out some powerful tips on game magazines? It’s about time to press start.

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One of the first words I’ve ever learned was “thanks“. I felt like as happy as Larry [really happy], since I could understand its meaning, and all I wanted to do was make my close friends aware of my kickass achievement. I didn’t find that word in a textbook, and neither in a dictionary.

Bringing Some Fun to Your English Learning

I’ll admit that taking formal English classes pays off. On the other hand, learning is much more than a mental process, but also an emotional one. When we were toddlers, learning was a matter of paying attention to our parents’ smile and repeating, in a funny way, their movements and words. It all happens just because it’s a natural process, so we don’t have a hard time learning how to run, or even hold a spoon.

In this article, we’ll explore how to make the most of video games to learn some English:

reading some basic information
digging into the plot
visiting game forums and reading game magazines

Reading Basic Information

Want to be a successful gamer? Paying attention to some bits of information can help you achieve your goals. For instance, when it comes to play soccer video games, we gotta scope out our players’ technical attributes, such as dribble and acceleration. By doing so, you’ll choose the most suitable players for your team AND know some basic words in English. If you’re a Portuguese speaker, you’ll see that these words – acceleration and dribble – are way similar to the Portuguese words aceleração and drible. My advice: try searching for words that hold some similarity with those of your mother language.

Digging Into the Plot

Many games provide us with the opportunity to take an in-depth look at their plot. Generally, short dialogues point out some really worth knowing details about the characters. So why not spending a short amount of time delving into the written messages?

Here are four important notes:

Even if you don’t know the meaning of a word/sentence, take risks.
Taking risks will activate your intuition.
The more you sharpen your intuition, the closer to the meaning of a specific word/message you get.
Taking some graphic details into account can boost your written comprehension.

Visiting Game Forums and Reading Game Magazines

Taking part in forums is a cool way of meeting new people and interchanging ideas. Plus, if you participate in online communities, such as game forums, you can benefit from some nice tips concerning your favorite games. Also, you’ll feel encouraged to come up with your own questions. Practice your English by asking and replying to comments. Furthermore, if you’re a true gamer, checking out game magazines is a must. There you’ll find reviews, useful tutorials and news about recent launched games.

Here are some great game forums and magazines:

You’ve Got a Bonus!

Lots of games have a remarkable soundtrack. So while you listen to the following one, make sure you join the most entertaining English learning community in the world and inspire yourself to keep revolutionizing your way of learning English.

[media url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sknDb2n6jE&feature=player_embedded” width=”600″ height=”400″]

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