Conversational sparring - (conversational English learning insights)

Learning English like a boxer

One of my favourite analogies for conversational language learning lessons is that language learning conversations are like sparring.

In this artilce, I will describe some conversational English learning insights by comparing conversational English learning to sparring for boxers.

Sparring is what boxers do to learn the art of boxing and fighting, it is essentially a practice fight in controlled conditions. Once you are in a fight, your opponent won’t tell you how and where to stand, where to move and how, how to react and slip a punch, how to punch back and when and where, and how to absorb the pain of a punch and not show that pain, or surrender — your opponent is not going to teach you how to fight with them. So boxers learn all this through sparring.

In the same way, when an English learner gets into a real world conversation in English, their interlocutor is not going to tell them how to speak and when, how to ask questions, which words to use and their meanings, the correct grammatical constructions and why we use them and when, the correct pronunciation and accent, so that they may be optimally understood, or how not to get flustered and stressed under the pressure of difficult questions, or the soft skills of interpersonal communication — no interlocutor will do those things for the English learner.

That is why good conversational lessons, in my view, should be regarded as quality sparring.

Boxers always talk about quality sparring and often how difficult it is for good boxers to find quality sparring and sparring partners. And while this may sound rather unrelatable for many people who have not fought or sparred. I can promise you that under the right guidance sparring can be very enjoyable and rewarding (see my guiding through boxing). You learn how to trust your skills and instincts. You gain deep body-level confidence.

It must also be said, I’m not endorsing the need to fight. Rather, the philosophy, learn to fight so you don’t have to, in the same vein as, preparing for war is preparing for peace. What is more, unnecessary sparring can be harmful to our brain and body. Sparring has to be done economically, in controlled conditions, and with the correct supervision and guidance.

Seeing English conversational learning as quality sparring

There are different different types of sparring, technical, conditioned, half sparring, and full sparring, sometimes just referred to as technical, conditioned, and full sparring. In the same way, we can have different types of conversational English learning.

Conversational sessions can be either “technical” with a greater focus on the technicals i.e. vocabulary and grammar, or they can be “conditioned” i.e. simulating conversation scenarios, meetings, presentations, interviews, or they can be “full” i.e. full-blown conversations, actual presentations, or interviews. All this is built onto my fundament in conversational English learning, which is the three-level structured conversation (see my article English conversartional lessons are not like chats down the pub).

In these ways, a conversational English lesson is very much like sparring, as an English learner gets to practice all the things that are necessary and may be needed in a “full” real life conversation. Just as the boxer may be in “full” sparring, or even a fight. And just as the fighter needs to know how to fight without any help or advice, so the English learner needs to be prepared for being in real life conversations.

Why a conversation is more like a fight than we might think

For many people this analogy with boxing and sparring can often seem brutal.

However, a fact of life whether we like it or not, is that life can, but not always, be brutal, unfair, and short. Just like some conversational encounters. I’m sure at some point in their life everyone has had the experience, whether in their personal, academic, or professional life of being in a conversation where they couldn’t express themselves well and lost the attention or respect of their interlocutor, or perhaps missed an opportunity to get to know someone better, or seize an opportunity, or failed in an interview, or failed to assert themselves in a meeting or business negotiation.These are brutal and unfair life situations.

No well trained fighter ever goes looking for fights. Anymore than anyone goes looking for conversations that make them stressed, or which they come out of worse than when they went in. But life being life, these situations are often unavoidable when they happen, and happen they will. And on the other hand, people don’t get into conversations that they would benefit from, or would serve them well, from an unconscious fear of not performing well in the conversation. Just as many avoid fights, that in fact they shoudn't. Again, I'm not promoting fighting and aggression, but take examples of bullying, abuse, or road rage attacks. These are all cases where it might be wise to fight than be dominated. So just like doing hard sparring gives boxers confidence when they get into actual fights, learners “doing hard conversations” also begin to gain confidence when they get into real-world conversations.

Thus, we can prepare for such conversations through conversational sparring, just as a boxer would prepare with sparing for potential fights.

Knowledge in the body, is worth more than knowledge in the mind

Well, this is partly a joke, tongue in cheek, as we say in the UK.

Thanks to the paradigm of embodied cognition, we now understand that the mind is non-trivially embodied, meaning our mind, thought, language are shaped through the unique types of bodies that we have as humans and how we engage our bodies in the world, with people, and in socio-cultural learning at all levels.

Essentially, when we learn something, we learn far better when our whole body is engaged in the process of learning, when literally things are hands-on. Conversational learning is hands-on in this way, as our vocal muscles, facial muscles, gestures, body behaviour and kinetics, psycho-emotive states, are all engaged in the process of communicating and conversing.

One thing is for sure, as a boxer, I know that doing many rounds of various types of sparring has made me much more confident as a fighter. As my whole body is engaged in the process. Learning technique and fixed positions, as many martial arts are taught, are not always the best ways of getting good in a fighting art. It’s a bit like just learning grammar and vocabulary in a classroom but never conversing in the real world.

I know from my many students and clients, that the many rounds of conversational sparring they have done with me has really made them much more confident, but also able and competent, in real life conversational situations. It has reduced, or even completely eliminated, their conversational anxiety, or it has given them a deep belief and trust in their own ability to learn and improve, and this acts as a template for future accomplishments.

We know that many boxers go on to have success after the ring, in business, arts, or other walks of life, that’s because they apply the same principles of discipline from boxing to those other walks of life.

So learn English like a boxer through conversational sparring.

You’ll not only enjoy it, but you’ll also lose the fear of being in conversations!