If you find yourself battling to have enough time to prepare for the CELPIP exam, or to be working on your English, because you just have too many things going on in your day, and it's hard to squeeze out time in order to devote to that kind of practice, then this episode is for you. Over the next couple of weeks, we're going to be talking all about practicing in the fringes of our lives, the edges, those moments when maybe you can only squeeze out five or ten minutes or maybe even two minutes to do something that will help you move towards your goal of taking the CELPIP exam or to help you keep moving in your development of your English skills. But what good can 5 or 10 minutes of practice do you?

If you're sitting there wondering that to yourself, can 5 minutes, or 10 minutes, or even something as small as 2 minutes, can something as small as that really help me? Well, if you pair it with consistency, If it's something that you're doing on a regular basis, then my friend, yes, those small little blocks of time do add up and they will help you move towards your goal if you do them on a regular basis.

See, the thing that happens is this. We get it into our minds that I have to devote two hours to my practice in order for it to be counted as real practice. I have to be in a long class where I'm listening to a teacher for an hour and a half, or I'm working through a course book for that amount of time in order for it to be effective practice.

But you know something? That's not true. That's not true. Effective practice is the practice that you actually do. And if all you have right now, today, is five minutes, or ten minutes,

then those short little blocks of time are worth it. And they do make a difference. If you compound them over time, and like little Lego blocks building on top of each other, if you keep stacking, if you keep putting in the reps, those repetitions, you will see that your CELPIP exam practice is actually moving you forward.

And you will see that your English skills are growing and developing, even if all you have is ten minutes. Today we're going to be talking all about what you can do in a 5 or 10 minute window of time that will help you practice for the writing section of the CELPIP exam. So sit back, grab a piece of paper and a note, something that you can use to take notes with.

And pay attention to today's episode. You're going to come away with something that you can use that will help you take advantage of those small blocks of time to get ready for the writing section of the CELPIP exam.

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 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. If this is your first day downloading this podcast, Hi, welcome. I'm glad that you decided to check this program out. And if you are a returning listener, if you've been a regular listener here, thank you so much for continuing to come back and support the show.

First timers, long timers, both of you are welcome today. And I hope that you find today's episode to be helpful and encouraging for you, especially if you find yourself battling with your schedule, battling with a busy life and trying to take care of the things that are important to you, like a family or, or your work or your spouse.

And at the same time, trying to deal with the pressures and the stresses of trying to get ready for the CELPIP exam. How do you combine all of those things together? Well, Sometimes, the only way that you can do it, like I said in the intro, is on the fringes of your life, when all you can do is grab something on the edges of your schedule, like a 5 or 10 minute block of time.

And if that's all you have today, just 10 minutes Then, my friend, you have enough time to do something that will be effective and that will help you to develop and grow your writing skills for the CELPIP exam.

I am a writer. I've been working on a story for the last eight years. On and off. Not every single day, unfortunately, because I haven't been able to do it every single day as much as I would like to be. But I am a writer. I love to write. I always have. Writing has been one of my favorite things to do. And I have been, like I said, been working on a story now for eight years.

And one of the things I was challenged to do over The summer last year was to create a novella, which is a shorter version of a novel. That's what a novella is. It's a short version. It's usually about 7, 000 and Um, 15, 000 words that makes up a novella and the idea of it is, is to have something that you can give away to potential readers so that they can get to know you and get to know you as a, as a writer and to get to know the material or the, the story that you are working on.

Like the novella can be like a mini episode of a larger story that you're working on. And the goal of that novella is to maybe hook a potential reader into connecting with you over the long term so that they can read that big story that you've been working on. So last summer, like I said before, I was involved in a writer's group, and one of the things that they were challenging the members to do and myself because I was a member, but the challenge was to create a novella that would introduce potential readers to the characters in your story. That would hook potential readers and get them interested in what you're writing, interested in the main characters, and maybe, just maybe, stick around with you long enough until you are ready to launch your bigger work.

So that's what I started doing. In my writers group, I did not have a lot of time. Like I said in the intro, I'm one of those people who have things going on from the moment I wake up all the way to the moment I go to bed. It's a rare day when I have nothing to do. I don't think there's ever a day where I feel bored.

Like what am I gonna do with my time? No, that never happens to me. And I bet you are the same way There's always things going on. I mean, I have a family. I've got kids. I have my wife I've got things to do here around the house. So, you know, and I've got you I have you I mean, I want to take care of you by producing these podcasts and providing help and information for the CELPIP exam that will help you move forward.

So, I don't have a dull moment in my life, ever. And I'm not saying that to brag, I'm just saying that that's my reality, I am full. I am very full. And so, for me, finding time to write on my story, that I've been working on now, my big story. that I've been working on. I've been doing it for over eight years and it's been taking me that amount of time because I have lacked this habit that I'm sharing with you today that began for me over the summer last, last year when I joined a writer's group.

This is what happened in that writer's group. All of us would get together and share What we've been working on that week. We met together weekly for an hour and during that time, like I said before each of us would share what by reading what we had written that week and the only way for you to have something to share is if you actually sit down and write something and And for me, that was super hard.

I did not have any extra time at night to do this. I didn't have any time in the morning. The only time that I had to do my writing was during my 30 minute lunch break at work. So that's what I did. I would take 30 minutes and just write. As best as I could, while I'm trying to eat my sandwich, or whatever it was that I brought to work with me for lunch that day.

I would write as quickly as I can, as much as I could, to move my story forward. Now, because I was eating, and because I needed to put something in my stomach, I wasn't able to write at the same time. So, really, that writing time was probably, really just about 15 or 20 minutes in length. It wasn't a lot of time.

But you know what? I, I was shocked and surprised by what began to happen as I consistently used my lunch hours or my lunch break because I didn't get an hour, I got 30 minutes. As I used that time Again, and again, and again, putting them together, stacking them up, just like I said in the intro, like little Lego blocks, one on top of the other, something began to take shape.

Over the weeks and months that I did it, I created my novella. It had 25 mini chapters, 62 pages long in total, and there was a total of 16, 300 words. All in about a space of 6 months. Maybe a little bit less. Of me just using 15 or 20 minutes of my lunch break to begin working on this and I didn't even have the opportunity to do this every single day on my lunch break.

It was usually just one day a week and usually the day that I had my writer's group. That was the day that I could steal those 20 minutes to work on my novella, but I did it. I finished my novella. I have it ready and all it took was those 20 minutes. repetition, doing it again and again and again. And a 25 mini chaptered novella is what came out.

I think that the thing that helped me the most to make that kind of progress wasn't my self discipline because I don't think I had very good self discipline when it came to writing that book. It was the power of being in that small little group. There was only about six of us. But knowing that I would need to share what happens next in my story with those five or six other people was what kept me writing.

That group also provided for me wonderful support and feedback. There were times when I would write something and not be sure if it was any good or if it was even making sense. So I would often say, before I would start to read what I had written I would ask the members of the group, Hey, could you give me some feedback on what I'm about to share?

And they always did. They were always willing to give friendly and supportive feedback. And it was so helpful. And most importantly, the group gave me the encouragement to keep going. They actually were enjoying what I was writing. And that gave me fuel to keep going. So yeah, being a part of that group made a huge difference for me.

And you know what? You know, I've got to tell you this. You know, I need to tell you about this. If, if working on the CELPIP exam is something that's hard for you to do alone, you don't have to do it by yourself. You can join the CELPIP Success School. If you go to celpipsuccess.com/listener, you will get a 25 percent discount if you join using that link.

As a thank you for being a podcast listener. So if you want someone to give you that accountability, the same kind of accountability that I had that helped me make that kind of progress on my story, on my writing, then this is the group for you. If you're tired of trying to do this by yourself and you'd love to have support and feedback and encouragement, then this is the group for you.

You need to join the CELPIP success school. Just go to celpipsuccess.com/listener, and you can sign up for that today, but today I want to share a quote with you. Yes, I've got another quote, but this time it's from an author friend of mine who I've actually met, at least online. She was one of the leaders of this writers group that I was a part of.

Her name is Ann Kroeker, and she also knows The struggles of trying to write in the fringes of her life. And this is one of the quotes that she shared. She said, "I realized a way forward in the midst of motherhood with no time to write. I seized tiny moments. I learned that a single sentence or well crafted phrase composed in five minutes could lay the foundation for a future manuscript."

That's by Anne Kroeker. So what she's saying there is that amidst all the pressures of being a mother, she found it hard to write. So instead of trying to sit down and write chapters and chapters, she seized, or she grabbed, tiny moments and focused on maybe even just writing a single sentence or a phrase and As she did that on a regular basis those sentences and phrases are what stacked up to eventually become the foundation of a book.

Little steps regularly taken Will lead you to the place where you're wanting to go. And she also shared in that same post, in the same blog post that I'm going to be linking to in my show notes, she shares a really interesting quote from an author named Julia Cameron. And Julia Cameron. Cameron has a book called The Right to Write.

The Right to Write, and this is what Julia says about making or having time to do what matters to move your writing forward. And when I'm about to, I'm, the quote that I'm going to be sharing with you is all about writing a book. But what I want you to imagine when you hear Writing a book, or writing an entire novel, or writing a paragraph, you know, I want you to imagine it instead being being ready for the CELPIP exam, or having your English grow and develop.

So kind of switch those out, okay? Think of This being a sort of recipe or yeah, a recipe that will help you to move towards the CELPIP exam, even though it's talking about writing a novel. There's a lot of things that you can apply from this quote to your journey of trying to get ready for the CELPIP exam.

So this is what Julia Cameron says. "The. "If I had time" lie is a convenient way to ignore the fact that novels require being written and that writing happens a sentence at a time. Sentences can happen in a moment. Enough stolen moments, enough stolen sentences, and a novel is born without the luxury of time.

Yes, it is daunting to think of finding time to write an entire novel, but it is not so daunting to think of finding time to write a paragraph or even a sentence, and paragraphs made of sentences are what novels are really made of." And again, that's by Julia Cameron, who is an author, and that's coming from her book, The Right to Write.

So the if I had time lie can also apply to you as you are working on getting ready for the CELPIP exam. You can think to yourself, I need to have big blocks of time like we already talked about before. I need to have a big block of time in order to make this work. No, you don't. All you need is to have enough time to write a sentence.

And if you keep practicing writing that sentence, you are eventually going to have enough. Writing practice that you will feel comfortable and confident in the writing section of the CELPIP exam because that's what today is going to be focused on. Things that you can do, practical things that you can do, even if you have just 5 minutes or 10 minutes to devote to practice.

So, Let's dive in to today's writing challenge. It's first of all based on the listening challenge that we talked about last week. And that's in the previous episode, which I will be linking to in my show notes. It's the episode previous to this one. So you'll need to grab what you had written down.

in your listening activity that hopefully only took you two to five minutes of time. If you did it, if you tried that out, you have something on paper that you can work with today. So grab that. You don't have to start from an empty page today. You've got material that you can be working from and repurposing to help you now.

with your writing skills, instead of just your listening skills.

So here's what I want you to do. Look at the listening activity and everything that you have written down. If you remember, you were listening to a news segment on the CBC, and your job was to identify the five W's being talked about. The Who, the what, the when, the where, and the why. And you were trying to write that down as you listened.

Well, today we're going to take that activity and we're going to transform it into a writing practice activity that you can do with probably five to 10 minutes of time. So again, we're only looking at things that you can do on the edges of your life. So the first activity is this. Take your notes and rewrite them.

Rewrite those five W's into full ideas. Probably as you were writing them, you were just taking notes. Well today, what I want to challenge you to do is to build them out into more complete ideas. See if you could retell that segment of news in your own words. through writing. What I want you to focus on is linking together your ideas with proper transition words in order to create a summary of what you just listened to.

And again, I think that you will only need about 5 to 10 minutes to do this.

So that activity again is just to take those 5 W's that you worked on last week and transform them into a writing exercise by writing a summary of the news article. And you can create that summary by joining your ideas together, creating longer points, because I imagine that what you wrote down in that first listening activity was probably just in point form.

So build on those ideas, turn them into complete sentences, join them together, use transition words, and create that short summary of the listening activity. Again, probably about a 10 minute exercise. If you're looking for another thing that you can do, You can then write one or two sentences after that summary and include your opinion about that segment of news that you were writing about.

Talk about it in your writing. Do you agree or disagree with what is being talked about in the news? Are you for or are you against it? How does it make you feel and why include all of those things in a follow up paragraph about the article that you just wrote about that summary that you just wrote in the first activity, you're just putting down the facts.

You're retelling the facts, the five W's in the second paragraph. If you choose to accept this challenge, you're now reflecting on those facts and giving your opinion. You're telling, you're writing, if you agree or disagree. with what is going on or you're saying if you are for or against what's going on and why and then how does it make you feel and why and again this writing activity doesn't have to be long I think that you could probably do it or at least most of it in about a 10 minute block of time.

And if you like this activity, you can do it all over again. Remember that listening activity is new every day. If you keep going back to that link, and I will be posting that link in my show notes again for you. If you keep going back there on a daily basis, and I highly suggest you do for regular listening practice, this can also be a regular writing practice.

Of you just taking those five W's that you wrote down as you were listening, then transforming them into a summary, and then transforming that summary into a thought piece, where you are expressing how you feel about what's going on in our world today. So, right there, you've got two activities that you can be doing on a daily basis that will not take you more than five or ten minutes of your time.

And if you do them consistently, if you are consistently practicing that listening activity where you're listening for the five W's, the who, what, when, where, and why. And if you are consistently, maybe every other day, trying to write summaries about what you've listened to, if you consistently do that, Your skills in listening and your skills in writing are only going to get better.

They're going to stack up on top of each other, like a Lego block building. The more you repeat it, the taller and stronger your building will become. Now, do you remember how at the beginning I told you about the writers group I was in and how they provided me with such great support and feedback and encouragement to keep my writing going as you're working on your CELPIP goals, you could be part of a group just like that.

It's called the CELPIP Success School. You've heard me talk about it on this show before, and I want to invite you to join the CELPIP Success School today. You will get that. Accountability that I was talking about, you will get the opportunity to present your work and get feedback that's encouraging, that's supportive, and that will help you to keep going in the right direction.

If you would like to join, then I want you to go to celpipsuccess.com/listener to find out more. And I've got a special resource for you today. If you haven't subscribed to my weekly newsletter, my friend, you are missing out. Every week I send helpful tips, strategies that will help you to get a strong score on the CELPIP exam.

You don't have to be doing this alone, you know. And if you subscribe today, I'm going to send you my 4 Skill Workout Session Guide that will help you practice for the CELPIP exam consistently for a week. If only you have 10 minutes a day. You can use this guide to help you practice and stay consistent.

If you would like to subscribe to that newsletter and get my free guide that will help you to stay consistently practicing, then just go to celpipsuccess.com/subscribe to get your copy today. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode, and I'll see you again next Tuesday.