How easy is English to learn? The English learning formula from 300+ teachers

Questions such as why English is easy often focus on the language itself. The formula also considers the opportunities a child has to encounter English in familiar situations, with support from the people around them.

In the Novakid teacher survey, respondents recommended integrating English into routine activities. When asked about the most common mistake parents make at home, one teacher wrote: “The single most common mistake is turning English practice into a test instead of making it part of everyday life.”

Another respondent offered concrete examples: “At home, I believe parents can focus more on creating simple, natural opportunities to use English, like talking about toys, food, or their daily routine.” These are situations in which the topic is already familiar to the child.

Support can also come from parents who do not speak English themselves. One teacher explained: “I encourage them to create an English-friendly environment by watching cartoons together, listening to English songs in the car, or simply asking their child to “teach” them the words they learned in our lesson.”

These recommendations illustrate meaningful exposure: English connected to familiar activities, shared experiences and opportunities to participate. 

Recognizing a word and recalling it independently involve different tasks. A child may identify a fox on a labeled flashcard, then need more support to remember “fox” when describing a story without the card.

For parents asking how easy English is to learn, this distinction helps clarify what a child is practicing: recognizing an answer, recalling it or using it to communicate.

In a 2008 experiment, Jeffrey Karpicke and Henry Roediger studied university students learning foreign-language vocabulary. After a word had been recalled correctly, further retrieval practice improved delayed recall. Further studying alone did not produce the same benefit.

This research involved university students learning vocabulary pairs. It did not test conversation lessons for children. It nevertheless provides evidence for distinguishing between repeated exposure to an answer and practicing recalling it.

In the Novakid survey, 43.8% of teachers gave flashcards a score of five for new vocabulary learning (149 of 340 respondents), while 40.0% gave real conversation practice that score (138 of 345). 

Some English teachers in the survey reported that parents ask why lessons repeat topics or vocabulary. These responses raise a useful question: what does repetition contribute to learning?

Nel de Jong and Charles Perfetti studied 24 ESL students practicing speeches. Both groups improved fluency during training, but only the students who repeated their speeches maintained their improvements on subsequent tests.

The study was small and did not establish a practice routine for young children. Its findings suggest that revisiting a speaking task can contribute to lasting improvement under the conditions tested.

The interval between learning sessions also matters. Another study of 52 Cantonese-speaking primary pupils learning 20 English adjectives found that on a multiple-choice test four weeks later, pupils performed better on words revisited after one day than on words revisited after eight days. 

Both schedules involved spaced practice. The findings show a difference between the two intervals in that setting; they do not establish a single ideal schedule for every learner.

For our formula, consistency means returning to familiar language regularly and adjusting the practice to the child’s needs. A word introduced in a lesson could be recalled in a short activity and used again in a later conversation.

In the survey, 71.3% of teachers answering the home-practice question selected between 15 and 60 additional minutes per week (246 of 345): 38.6% chose 15–30 minutes, and 32.8% chose 30–60 minutes. These were teachers’ estimates of practice beyond class, rather than experimentally established requirements.

Ownership means giving the child a supported opportunity to think, recall and respond.

Consider this illustrative exchange:

“What did you do yesterday?”
Child: “I…”
Parent: “Went swimming! Tell her you went swimming!”

The parent has supplied the answer before the child could complete it independently. Teachers in the Novakid survey described this situation directly. One respondent wrote: “Parents help their children answer the questions by giving them the answers directly instead of allowing them to think and respond independently.”

Another teacher acknowledged the intention behind this intervention: “Sometimes they want to help, but the child needs time to think and respond independently.” 

These observations inform the ownership component of the proposed formula: giving children room to attempt an answer while keeping support available. This might mean a clue, a simpler question or a choice between two options, followed by another opportunity to answer.

Allowing that first attempt also gives the teacher useful information. As one respondent explained: “This allows the teacher to identify areas that need practice and guide the student accordingly.”

Parents can also discuss with the teacher what the child managed independently and where support was needed. This provides context for a completed worksheet or an app score.

In the survey, the majority of teachers selected a positive effect of AI practice tools on speaking confidence: 54.5% chose “Helps a little”, and 18.7% chose “Helps a lot” (243 of 346 combined). Meanwhile, 12.3% selected “No noticeable effect”, and 8.1% selected a negative effect. The remaining responses included uncertainty and written qualifications.

The question is English easy to learn for foreigners cannot be answered by this survey or these studies alone. They did not compare English with other languages across different learner backgrounds. Our formula offers a framework for examining the conditions around that learning.

English learning = Exposure × Use × Consistency

The multiplier: ownership.

And it brings together four questions: does the child understand the language they encounter, have opportunities to use it, return to it regularly and take an active part in responding?

Parents can use these questions in conversations with their child’s teacher to identify what to practice next and what support to provide. The formula is a guide for that discussion, rather than a prediction of how quickly any particular child will learn.

At home, giving your child time to think and answer is a practical place to start. The next step is to offer regular opportunities to use English with a teacher who can guide the conversation and provide support when needed.

In Novakid’s online English classes for kids, children practice speaking one-to-one with teachers through conversations, games and interactive activities designed for young learners. These lessons give them opportunities to draw on familiar vocabulary, express their own ideas and try again with the teacher’s help.

Book a free trial lesson with Novakid and give your child a space to put their English into practice, one answer and one conversation at a time.

Resources

The critical importance of retrieval for learning – Jeffrey Karpicke and Henry Roediger 3rd (2008)

Fluency Training in the ESL Classroom: An Experimental Study of Fluency Development and Proceduralization – Nel de Jong and Charles Perfetti (2011)

Input spacing and the learning of L2 vocabulary in a classroom context – John Rogers and Anisa Cheung (2020)