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# 10Jump From Conversational (B1) To Mastery (C2)The way I reach spoken fluency quickly is to get a hell of a lot of spoken practice. From day one to day 90 (andbeyond), I speak at least an hour a day in my L2, and my study time is tailored around the spoken sessions to makesure that my conversation is what’s improving—not just my “general language skills” through some vague list ofwords I may never use.So, for instance, I may start a session by asking what my native friend or teacher did over the weekend, and tell themwhat I did. Then I will share something that is on my mind lately and attempt to express my opinion on it, or allowthe native speaker to introduce a new topic. It’s important to take an active role and make sure you are havingvariedconversations. Have a list of topics you would like to discuss and bring them up (your hobbies, hopes for the future,dislikes, what you will do on your vacation etc.) and make sure the conversation is constantly progressing.Lots of practice and study to improve those spoken sessions tends to get me to lower intermediate (B1) level, whichmeans I can understand the other person speaking to me fine as long as they are willing to speak clearly and adjustto my level and mistakes. It’s a LOT of work, mind you! On typical learning days I can be filled with frustration orfeel like my brain is melting when–in fact–I’m truly making a lot of progress.But the work is totally worth it when you have your first successful conversation with a native speaker. You’ll bethrilled beyond belief.To see what this B1 level looks like, check out these videos of me chatting to a native in Arabic (in person with myitalki teacher!), and in Mandarin with my friend Yangyangabout how she got into working as a TV show host:At this level, I still make plenty of mistakes of course, but they don’t hinder communication too much.Benny Speaking Arabic 1Benny Speaking Arabic 2But to get over that plateau of just “good enough,” this is the point where I tend to return to academic material andgrammar books, to tidy up what I have. I find I understand the grammar much better once I’m already speaking thelanguage. This approach really works for me, but there is no one best language-learning approach. For instance, Timhas had great success by grammatically deconstructing a language right from the start. Your approach will dependentirely on your personality.After lots of exercises to tidy up my mistakes at the B1 level, I find that I can break into B2.At the B2 stage you can really have fun in the language! You can socialize and have any typical conversation thatyou’d like.To get into the mastery C1/C2 levels though, the requirements are very different. You’ll have to start reading