Learning English in the New Age

Learning the English language has become a huge opportunity for the bright and enterprising.  Take Lucy Earl, a Brit who recently graduated and started to think of ways to make English learning fun and frivolous.  She ended up obtaining a following of 350,000 people who wanted to know why Brits drink pimms and take tea at 4:00 pm, why they pronounce fruit as “froot” and not “fru it”, “choobe” and not “toobe”, and “choona” not “toona”.  She compiled a list of the 100 must-to words that you need to know in English, she did a Christmas swear words special, and her website launched her into the English language stratosphere.

Her YouTube teaching course, English with Lucy, provides short videos filmed at her home, on the streets, and while taking a bus to the town center.  It is a slice of England as well as some fun lessons in English.  She has 12 million views on some of her most popular videos plus an international following.  She reportedly earns about $40,000 a year in advertising revenues alone but bottom line is that it’s fun.  She is fun and everyone gets to see a slice of real life through Lucy’s eyes.

Language schools take note.  Online language is growing fast.  Teaching English as a foreign language and heading abroad, while still popular, are being outpaced by this phenomenon.  Lucy got it right and right again.  Note that there are 1.7 billion people learning English. It’s going to be 2 billion by 2020. 375 million people speak English as a second language and 750 million as one of their foreign languages.  300 million people in China have learned English. Incidentally, if you want to teach English in the UAE, they pay you $4,000 a month and in Japan about $3,500 a month.  Lucy is doing alright and with simply a 500 URL camera and little to no overhead.  She is light as a feather on the business front.  Zero overhead.  Exports for English language teaching e-books have doubled in recent years while hardcopy books have dramatically declined.  The lessons are good for all, make the classes fun, and give people a slice of the culture.  Check English with Lucy out on YouTube.  It’s free!

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