You understand English. You just freeze.
This is not a grammar class and it is not exam preparation. It’s training for producing English in real time, with a real person, when it actually matters.
Who this is for
- People who read and understand English well but go blank when speaking
- Professionals who say nothing in meetings and feel it costs them credibility
- Anyone avoiding phone calls in English
- People who passed an exam and still can’t function conversationally
- Anyone whose confidence dropped after being asked to repeat themselves
What this test is really measuring
Understanding and speaking are genuinely different systems.
Listening and reading are receptive skills, recognition. You meet the language and identify it. Speaking is productive, your brain builds the sentence in real time, under social pressure, often while translating.
Years of input, films, articles, meetings you follow perfectly, train recognition brilliantly and production almost not at all. That gap is not a sign you’re bad at languages or that your level is low. It’s the predictable result of training one system and not the other.
If you are searching for how to improve business English conversation pacing naturally, how to reduce native language interference in speaking, or professional English speech training for relocation to the UK, USA, Canada or Australia, this is the mechanism underneath all of it. The same applies if you are trying to overcome conversational accent anxiety in professional interviews.
For many people there’s a second layer: fear of making a mistake causes hesitation, hesitation makes the struggle visible, and that feeds the fear. That spiral responds to different handling than a pure skill gap.
Recent changes that affect your preparation
Nothing regulatory here, but what has changed is the number of people trying to solve this with apps and AI tools alone.
Those are genuinely useful for input and for drilling. What they cannot provide is the thing that actually breaks the freeze: a real person, present, patient enough to let you be imperfect in front of them. The fear is social, so the practice has to be social too.
If more input worked, you’d already be fluent. Most people in this position have had years of it.
Which version do you need?
1:1 or group?
| One to one, £25 | Small group, £54 total | |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | Specific goals, higher anxiety, targeted correction | Natural back and forth, lower pressure, better value |
| Pace | Entirely yours | Shared with 1,2 others |
| Booking | Any available slot | Scheduled slots, book your own place, no need to bring anyone |
Group classes run with a minimum of 2 and a maximum of 3. If fewer than two book by 24 hours before, you can take a shortened 1:1 at the same price or move to the next slot free.
Where the marks actually go
What usually goes wrong, what I look for in your work, and how we work with it.
Speaking under pressure
Producing language in real time, while someone waits, without rehearsal.
What usually goes wrong
- Building the whole sentence mentally before starting to speak
- Restarting a sentence three times to get it perfect
- Going silent rather than risking an error
- Losing the thought entirely while searching for one word
How I work with it: Practice at starting before the sentence is fully formed, and finishing it anyway. Uncomfortable at first, and it’s the single thing that most reliably breaks the freeze.
Response speed
The gap between understanding a question and producing an answer.
What usually goes wrong
- Translating from your first language and back
- Long pauses that feel like hours to you and seconds to everyone else
- The conversation moving on before your answer is ready
- Preparing a perfect answer to a question that’s already passed
How I work with it: Buying time phrases that sound natural rather than stalling, and drilling the reflex of responding before the answer is complete.
Intelligibility, not accent
Being understood easily. This is not about sounding British or American.
What usually goes wrong
- Assuming the problem is your whole accent when it’s a few specific sounds
- Word stress landing on the wrong syllable, which affects clarity more than individual sounds
- Speaking quietly because of low confidence, which makes clarity worse
- Avoiding words you’re unsure how to pronounce, which shrinks your vocabulary in practice
How I work with it: Targeted work on the specific sounds and stress patterns that actually affect whether you’re understood. Your accent is not a defect and the goal is never to remove it.
Listening in live conversation
Different from exam listening: no replay, no transcript, and you have to respond.
What usually goes wrong
- Missing the next sentence while processing the last one
- Struggling with speed, overlap or unfamiliar accents
- Not catching the question and being too embarrassed to ask
- Following the words but missing the tone or intent
How I work with it: Repair strategies, asking someone to repeat without losing face, plus practice with natural, unslowed speech.
Confidence
The part most courses skip, and often the actual barrier.
What usually goes wrong
- Perfectionism preventing any speaking at all
- One bad experience shrinking what you’re willing to attempt
- Avoiding calls and meetings, which removes the practice you need
- Believing you need to be better before you can practise
How I work with it: A space where being imperfect is genuinely fine. Correction happens lightly, in flow, without stopping the conversation to explain a rule.
Common score patterns
If your report looks like one of these, the cause is usually known and specific.
Understands films without subtitles, freezes in conversation
Passed IELTS 7.5 and still can’t speak at work
Writes excellent English emails, silent in meetings
Avoids phone calls in English entirely
Told to speak up, then can’t produce the words
If this is you
Understands everything, can’t produce it quickly
Knows the grammar rules, can’t use them live
Senior in their field, invisible in English meetings
Perfectionist, won’t speak until it’s right
What we fix first
Most conversation classes are grammar lessons with a friendlier name. Most apps give you practice without a witness. Neither addresses the actual mechanism.
Here, you choose the topic, work, news, whatever you actually talk about, and we talk. I correct as we go, lightly, without stopping the flow to explain rules in the abstract. The aim is production under real conditions, not knowledge.
What progress looks like, honestly: the first sign isn’t that you stop stumbling. It’s that you recover faster when you do, and stop treating a stumble as a failure. That comes before fluency and it’s what makes fluency possible.
When this is not the right test for you
This isn’t the right service if:
- You need a test score, this doesn’t prepare you for exam Speaking, which is scored on published criteria and needs different work. See IELTS, PTE or OET.
- You’re a complete beginner, you need foundation vocabulary and structure first. Conversation practice works once you understand more than you can produce.
- You want accent elimination, that isn’t what I do. I work on being understood, not on sounding like someone else.
What you get in a Diagnostic Session
- Your score report or writing reviewed properly, not skimmed
- The exact weakness named, criterion, skill or route
- A written report and a one page plan naming what to fix first
- Honest advice on whether to continue, retake, or switch test
Conversation Practice, £25 for 1:1, or £54 total in a small group. No programme required, book a single class. See full pricing.
No score report? You don’t need one. The Diagnostic works just as well from a goal and a deadline.
My daughter became much more confident speaking English. She now participates more in class and is much less afraid of making mistakes.
Li
China
I struggled to speak English during meetings and conversations. The lessons gave me practical speaking practice, and I now express my ideas much more clearly.
Sophie
France
I knew the grammar but struggled to speak fluently in the IELTS test. Regular speaking practice and detailed feedback helped me improve my fluency and confidence.
Ahmed
Saudi Arabia
I understood English when people spoke to me but found it difficult to reply quickly. The lessons helped me respond more naturally and speak with less hesitation when travelling.
Elena
Spain
I often gave very short answers during speaking practice. With structured practice and feedback, I learned how to develop my answers and speak for longer with more confidence.
David
Italy
I needed English for communicating with international clients. We focused on real workplace conversations, and I now feel much more comfortable speaking during meetings and calls.
James
UK
Conversational English coaching for people who know more than they can say.
This is not an exam class and we do not treat it as one. There is no band, no criteria sheet and no scoring system to satisfy. What there is instead is evidence of how you actually perform when you have to speak.
We look at retrieval, how long it takes to find the words you already know. We look at hesitation, where it happens and what triggers it. We look at clarity, whether you are understood first time. We look at what changes under pressure, when somebody is waiting or the conversation moves faster than you expected. And we work on realistic situations rather than abstract topics.
Your words stay yours. My job is not to replace your English with mine. If your vocabulary already communicates what you need, we work with it. Where language genuinely is the blocker, we work on it. Where it is not, we do not pretend it is.
Progress here is measurable: you recover faster, you hesitate less, and you stop avoiding the conversations you have been avoiding.
How your classes happen
Classes take place online using Cal Video. There is nothing to download. Your private meeting link is provided automatically with your confirmed booking. At the scheduled time, simply click the link to join from a phone, tablet, laptop or desktop connected to the internet, wherever you are.
FAQ Questions about Conversational English
Why do I freeze when I understand everything?
Because understanding and producing are different systems. Input trains recognition; only production trains production. Years of listening and reading can leave the speaking system almost untrained, which is extremely common and entirely fixable.
Is this for advanced learners only?
No. It works for anyone who understands more than they can currently say, which covers a wide range. Complete beginners need foundation work first.
Do you do workplace English?
Yes, meetings, calls, presentations, disagreeing politely, thinking on your feet. Tell me that’s your goal and sessions focus there.
What if I'm shy or a perfectionist?
That’s the most common profile here, not an obstacle. The whole point is a space where being imperfect is fine. We start where you’re comfortable and expand from there.
Is this exam preparation or real life English?
Will you fix my accent?
No, and I’d push back on the goal. I work on intelligibility, the specific sounds and stress patterns affecting whether you’re understood. Your accent isn’t a problem to solve.For most universities, yes, but acceptance of the reformed format was uneven during the transition. Confirm with your specific institution and programme before booking.
Do I need a score report or a test result to start?
No. There is no exam attached to conversation practice and no score involved. If you happen to have a test result and want to talk about it, that is fine, but nothing here requires one.
What actually happens in a Diagnostic Session?
Sixty minutes, live. We go through your score report or your writing line by line. If you have no report, we do a short skills check instead, across all four skills if it is your first time, or focused on the weakest one if you have sat before. Then I name the specific thing holding your score, show you the evidence in your own work, and give you a plan. Afterwards you get a written report and a one page plan by email.
Can I pay in instalments?
Instalment options, where available, are shown at checkout. Payments are handled securely through Stripe.
What payment methods do you accept?
Payments are handled securely through Stripe. Available payment methods are shown at checkout. All processed securely by Stripe, so we never see or store your card details.
Still not sure what's holding your score back?
Start with a Diagnostic Session. If it turns out you don’t need lessons at all, I’ll tell you that.