How to Learn English Grammar (Step by Step)

Want to write or speak English with better grammar?

Want to get good scores in English grammar exams?

If so, this article is for you.

There are three ways to improve your English grammar:

1. Studying grammar
2. Listening & reading
3. Imitating native speakers

This article explains each approach in detail.

This article is very long, so if you just want a summary of what to do, click here to jump to the step-by-step action plan to improve English grammar.

Let’s get started.

Approach #1: Studying Grammar

Here is how most people learn English grammar:

1. They read grammar books.
2. They memorize grammar rules.
3. They listen to a teacher explain English grammar.

Essentially, they learn English grammar by studying, which is similar to how we learn academic subjects like science or math.

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The Pros of Studying

Let’s look at the advantages of studying grammar.

Pro #1: Suitable for multiple-choice grammar tests

In a multiple-choice test, you have to select the correct answers from lists of possible choices.

If you are preparing for a test like this, and you know what will be on the test, studying can help you get a better score.

For example, if you know that the test will be about prepositions, adjectives, and the past tense, then you can prepare by studying those topics in advance.

Pro #2: Studying can improve your English writing

Unlike spoken English, written English tends to be more strict in terms of grammar and rules.

In some situations, such as when writing a resume, making grammatical mistakes can leave a bad impression on the reader.

By studying, you can learn things that will improve your writing such as:

• How to use colons, semi-colons, and commas.
• Countable and uncountable nouns.
• How to capitalize nouns. (South Africa vs. south africa.)

The Problem with Studying Grammar

Unfortunately, studying has one BIG disadvantage.

It will not make you speak English well!

Studying grammar is NOT a proper way to improve your English speaking skills.

The reason is because when you’re talking with someone, you don’t have time to think about grammar rules. If someone says something to you, you must respond immediately.

This is why students who have studied grammar for years, without using other learning methods, speak English poorly.

Because of this disadvantage, I suggest you use approaches #2 and #3 to improve your English grammar instead. These learning methods will allow you to speak proper English without thinking about grammar.

Let’s discuss approach #2.

Approach #2: Listening & Reading in English

This approach is simple: you learn English grammar through listening and reading.

The content you consume can be anything: YouTube videos, movies, TV shows, books, articles, podcasts, etc.

As long as it’s in English, it’s fine.

This is how you learned your first language as a child—by constantly exposing yourself to the language.

Now you might be thinking…

• This is not learning grammar. You won’t learn anything simply by consuming random content in English.
• Listening and reading is only useful for building vocabulary. It won’t improve my grammar.

If you’re having these thoughts, the next section will change your mind.

Your Brain Can Learn Things “Unconsciously”

The human brain is truly amazing.

It has the ability to automatically learn complicated things, without conscious effort.

Let me explain this with a scientific study.

In this study, people were asked to press keys on a keyboard based on what appeared on a screen.

There were four boxes on the screen. At any given moment, the X sign would appear in one of the four boxes.

If the X sign appeared in the first box, they had to press the X key. If the sign appeared in the second, third, or fourth box, they had to press C, B, or N respectively. (They had to do this as fast as possible.)

But there’s a secret to this experiment.

The X sign didn’t appear randomly; there was a “pattern” in the way the sign appeared.

For example, the X sign may appear in this order: 4, 2, 1, 3, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 2, 1, 2, 4, 4, 1, 3. (The numbers 1 to 4 represent the four boxes.)

So the sign appeared in a specific sequence, but it was too complicated to be detected consciously. (None of the participants knew the pattern existed. They thought everything was random.)

Nevertheless, over time people responded faster. As time went by, it took them less and less time to hit the correct keys!

This is because their brains were able to detect the pattern unconsciously. As a result, they responded faster.

This is a great example of the brain’s ability to learn complex stuff, automatically, without conscious effort from the individual.

Since this process happens at an unconscious level, we call this process unconscious learning (or implicit learning).

How Your Brain Learns English Grammar “Automatically”

The same process happens when you’re exposed to the English language.

When you listen or read something in English, your brain is automatically learning grammar (without you realizing it).

Let me give you an example.

Let’s say that right now you don’t know what “to meet with someone” means. (It’s not the same as “to meet someone.”)

If might think you need someone to explain the meaning to you, but you don’t.

If you hear native speakers use the phrase enough times, your brain will notice that “to meet with someone” tends to be used in certain scenarios only.

With enough exposure to that phrase, you’ll eventually understand what the phrase means. (It means to have a meeting with someone.)

The same is true for difficult concepts like English tenses such as the present perfect tense. (I have done something.)

If you listen to a lot of English conversations, and you hear native speakers use the present perfect tense many times, in various situations, you’ll eventually understand how the present perfect tense is used.

Patterns are in all aspects of the English language: vocabulary, tenses, prepositions, adjectives, adverbs, etc. They are waiting to be detected and learned by your brain.

All you have to do is expose yourself to English as much as possible, and let your brain do the rest.

But Isn’t It Faster to Study Grammar?

Now you might be thinking, “Why do I have to spend time listening and reading in English? If I want to understand English grammar, I can simply find some grammar lessons online and study them.”

This is a great question, so let me explain why studying won’t work.

When you learn something, it results in a memory (knowledge) being stored in your brain.

But there are two types of knowledge:

1. Implicit knowledge.
2. Explicit knowledge.

These two types of knowledge are completely different. And if you want to master English grammar, you must understand the difference between them.

What is Implicit Knowledge

Implicit knowledge is knowledge that you can use automatically, without conscious attention. (Sounds pretty cool, right?)

Examples of implicit knowledge:

• How to ride a bicycle.
• How to play a sport such as tennis.
• How to speak your native language.

Implicit knowledge is fast and automatic. That’s why you can ride a bicycle without thinking about how to move your legs. It’s why you can speak your native language without thinking about grammar.

Remember the study I mentioned earlier? (Pressing keys on a keyboard.) The reason the participants were able to performed the task faster was because of this type of knowledge.

What is Explicit Knowledge

Explicit knowledge is the exact opposite of implicit knowledge.

This type of knowledge requires conscious thought. You must think about the knowledge in order to use it.

Examples of explicit knowledge:

• Academic subjects like physics and chemistry.
• Names of people and places.
• Grammar rules.

When you study grammar, you gain explicit knowledge. To use this knowledge, you have to “think” about it.

Explicit knowledge is slow and requires effort, so it’s only useful when you’re doing a task that doesn’t require fast response (such as writing English).

Unfortunately, this type of knowledge is useless in spoken English, which is an activity in which you need to respond quickly. (You don’t have time to think about grammar.)

If you try to use explicit knowledge when speaking English, the scenario below may happen:

Implicit Knowledge Is the Key to English Fluency

When you learn English through listening, reading, and practice, you gain implicit knowledge. To use this type of knowledge, you don’t have to think about it.

Since implicit knowledge fast and automatic, it is useful in all kinds of tasks: speaking, writing, and even when taking an grammar test.

When grammar students takes a grammar test, they tend to use explicit knowledge; they constantly think about grammar rules during the test.

On the other hand, if a native English speaker were to take a grammar test, he will use implicit knowledge, so he won’t have to think about any rules. Instead, he’ll rely on feelings and instinct to determine the right answers.

As you can see, implicit knowledge is superior than explicit knowledge.

When you learn English (or any other foreign language), you must focus on learning approaches that build implicit knowledge, not explicit knowledge.

How to Build Implicit Knowledge

Listening and reading is an excellent way to build implicit knowledge of English grammar.

When you listen or read in English, be sure to focus on the meaning of what you’re listening or reading. Don’t think about grammar rules. Don’t try to analyze the sentence structure. Don’t try to understand why a particular tense is used instead of some other tense.

Focus on the meaning, not grammar. Let your amazing brain learn English grammar “behind the scene” without your conscious attention.

For more scientific information about how this process works, feel free to visit the wiki page on grammar learning. That page links to various studies on this topic. (But be warned; it’s very boring.)

But Listening and Reading is Not Enough

Although listening and reading is important, it’s not enough to give you excellent improvements.

Listening to English alone, without speaking practice, will not make you a fluent English speaker.

Reading in English alone, without writing practice, will not make you great at English writing.

To master English, you need to practice.

So, let’s talk about that.

Approach #3: Imitating Native Speakers

Throughout history, people have improved all kinds of performance through practice.

Practice is the most effective way to learn any skill, including spoken and written English.

But in order to improve, you need to practice the right way ― the way that 1) makes you learn new things and 2) results in implicit knowledge.

Reminder: implicit knowledge is the type of knowledge a person can use automatically and without conscious attention.

How to Practice English

Some people practice speaking by talking to themselves about random things.

While this is better than no practice, the problem is that you’re not taking in any new knowledge; you are simply using knowledge you already know.

The same goes for writing about random stuff; you’re not learning anything new this way.

Also, when you do freestyle practice, you don’t know what mistakes you’re making, so there’s no way to correct them.

Fortunately, there’s a better way to practice. It’s called Imitation practice.

The idea is that you learn to speak or write in English by imitating native speakers.

When you copy a native speaker, you are learning to speak/write in English with proper grammar (and learning vocabulary at the same time).

Let me show you how to do it.

How to Imitate Spoken English

There are two ways to do this.

The first way is to use Q&A English lessons. (Q&A means Question and Answer.)

Watch this video to see how it works:

Basically, this is how you use a Q&A lesson:

1. The native speaker asks you a question.
2. You try to answer the question on your own.
3. Then, the native speaker provides the right answer.
4. If your answer was incorrect, you pause the lesson and imitate the correct answer.

In each lesson, the process above is repeated many times, so you get to practice forming all kinds of sentences in English.

If you want to practice with Q&A lessons, you can purchase them from this link.

If you don’t want to spend money, that’s fine. There’s another way to imitate spoken English, and this one doesn’t cost money.

All you need to do is find a conversation in English, listen to it, and repeat what you hear. The conversation can be from anything: a random video on YouTube, a podcast episode, a movie, etc. (Personally, I like to practice Imitation with YouTube videos.)

If you want to learn how to do it step-by-step, I describe the technique in detail in this article.

How to Imitate Written English

If you want to write English with perfect grammar, you’ll love this technique.

Here’s how to do it:

Whether it be for speaking or writing, Imitation practice accomplishes three things:

1. It ensures that you are exposed to new input (words and phrases you’ve never used before).
2. It ensures that you learn correct English. (You only imitate native speakers.)
3. It encourages fast improvement. (Practice is much more challenging than passive activities like reading or listening, so you improve faster.)

Because of these benefits, Imitation is an excellent way to improve English grammar.

Summary: Action Plan to Improve Your English Grammar

I know that this page contains a lot of information.

Since it’s a lot of take in, you’re probably confused about how to apply what you’ve learned to your life.

So, let me summarize how to improve your English grammar, step by step.

Step 1: read/listen in English during mindless activities

Throughout the day, there are many opportunities to learn English:

• While commuting somewhere (either by car or public transportation).
• While waiting at the dentist’s office.
• While exercising on a treadmill or stationary bicycle.

At times like this, most people escape boredom by using social media, listening to music, or playing games.

But not you! Instead of wasting time like that, listen or read something in English.

At least that’s what I do. I always carry an English book with me when I go outside.

Whenever I have a chance, I pick up my book and read. For example, whenever I get on a train, I grab the book and start reading.

I also have a podcast app and the YouTube app on my phone, which are subscribed to various English-language channels. This way I can listen to something in English during mindless activities.

By constantly consuming a lot of English content, I’m building implicit knowledge of English grammar, which is beneficial to my speaking and writing skills.

Step 2: dedicate 15 – 45 minutes a day to Imitation practice

Because practice cannot be done on the train or while waiting in line (otherwise people will think you’re crazy), you should spend 15 – 45 minutes each day on speaking or writing practice. (You can practice more if you have lots of free time.)

Personally, I practice first thing in the morning because that’s when I feel motivated the most.

I think investing 15 – 45 minutes a day to improve yourself is something everyone can and should do.

Step 3: it’s okay to study grammar, but only when necessary

After reading my thoughts on studying grammar, you might think that I hate studying grammar and that I don’t do it.

But that’s not true. On rare occasions, I do study grammar, too.

But when I study, it’s usually because I want to learn something specific that can improve my writing.

For example, the other day I wondered whether you can use otherwise in the beginning of a sentence, so I looked it up.

If you have questions related to grammar for written English, it’s okay to study. But when you do, be specific about what you want to learn.

That’s all I have to say about how to learn English grammar. Thank you so much for reading this long article. I hope you found it useful!