Juliet Coaching Proposal

Olá, Juliet! 👋

Thank you for the conversation, and for getting straight to the point about where you are and what you actually want. It was a real pleasure. We have been thinking about your situation since, and the short version is this: you are a great fit for coaching, and you already have almost everything you need to reach your goal. You speak two languages fluently, you taught English for years, you understand how language works, and you are not the least bit self-conscious about speaking. That combination is rare. What is missing is not ability. It is the right kind of practice, aimed at the exact thing standing between you and fast, natural Brazilian by September.

Below you'll find two coaching plans we built specifically for you, plus a third self-directed option. Take your time, and let us know if you have any questions.

Aquele abraço,

Alexia

(+ Foster & Buddy 🐶)

What we noticed

You are not at the beginning of this, not even close. After six intense weeks and two in Rio, you can hold your own on the in-depth, business side of things. The conference, the education systems, the contracts. That is the hard part for most learners, and you have it. So the label "intermediate" undersells what you can already do.

Here is the real gap, and you named it yourself. Most learners understand more than they can speak. For you it is the opposite. You can build a sentence and get where you need to go, but when a waiter or a yoga teacher speaks at full speed, it goes straight over your head. The everyday, colloquial Portuguese is harder for you than the formal stuff, because colloquialisms are the one thing you cannot guess at from French and German.

You also put your finger on the mechanism better than we could: you are building sentences block by block instead of chunking. With enough time you get there, but as you said, people do not give you that time in real life. It has to come more naturally. That is exactly the wall, and it is a normal one. It is the intermediate plateau, and it is very crossable.

The good news is that you have already crossed it twice, in German and French. You know it is not an impossible task. You just need to push a little more, in the right places, with the right people in your corner.

What we would focus on with you

Training your ear for real-speed Brazilian. This is the gap, so it gets the most attention. Alexia will speak to you at natural Brazilian pace and slowly stop slowing down, building your comprehension up to the speed of a real conversation. This is the single thing that closes the distance between understanding the topic you expected and understanding what someone actually said.

Getting you through the intermediate plateau. Foster was exactly where you are now, in this same language. He knows what it takes to go from constructing sentences block by block to chunking them automatically, that moment you described wanting, where the brain can rest and you just speak. That is his side of the work: strategy, the mental side, and the specific roadblocks that show up right at your level.

The everyday and colloquial Portuguese, not just the boardroom. You can already talk about education policy. We will build the other register: the casual, fast, idiomatic Portuguese of the yoga class, the street, and the off-script moments with your students. The bits you can't translate your way into.

The grammar that actually trips you up. No endless drills. The specific things, like the simple past you mentioned, worked on deliberately until they stop slowing you down. Plus a light, ongoing touch on pronunciation where it matters, like the nasal vowels.

Connecting with the people you do this for. This is what ties it together. The ministry representatives, where a real conversation in Portuguese builds the trust that English never quite will. And the students, the 16-year-olds far from home for the first time, where being able to speak their language is, in your words, the right thing to do. You said there is no point half-doing it. We agree. This program is built so you can really do it, by the time the next students arrive in September.

CC Coaching: what is included

Every coaching plan includes the following:

Your two coaching options

Our recommendation for you is Option B.

Here is the honest reasoning. The thing you most want to fix, understanding fast speech, is the one thing that does not respond to a single intensive burst. It responds to repeated exposure over weeks, until your ear simply stops needing to translate. Sixteen sessions, two per week starting the first week of July, runs through July and August and lands you right where you want to be when the September students arrive. Eight sessions builds real momentum, but it ends just as the ear training is hitting its stride. For your specific goal and your specific deadline, the longer runway is what gets you there.

That said, Option A is a real program, not a lesser one. It is a focused month that breaks the plateau, sharpens your ear, and gives you a clear map of exactly what to practice. If you would rather start there and extend later, that works too. We are flexible on the duration.

Payment for either option can be split into two installments.

Get started with Coaching! →

(You can change the price on the payment page depending on the plan you want.)

A note about CC Club

CC Club is our full self-study membership, and it is the right fit for learners who are genuinely self-motivated and happy to build their own structure. At $360 per year, you get everything we have made over ten years of teaching Brazilian Portuguese: the full episode library, transcripts, worksheets, the Fundamentals course, and weekly live group classes with Alexia.

The honest difference is this. CC Club gives you the resources. Coaching gives you Alexia's ear pushing your comprehension up to speed, Foster's experience getting you over the exact plateau you are on, and two people building the program around your September deadline. You are self-motivated enough to do well in the Club. But the Club's group format will not train your ear for fast speech as fast as one-on-one work will, and that is the whole reason you are here.

One more thing worth knowing: most of our coaching students continue as CC Club members after their program ends. Coaching builds the foundation. The Club is where they keep it going. CC Club access is included for the duration of your coaching program only. After that, continuing as a member is $360/year, and most students are glad they do.

Join CC Club →

What we would ask of you

• Dedicate roughly an hour a day to focused study, on top of your two weekly sessions
• Do the reading we assign and come ready to talk about it
• Respond to Alexia's audios in the WhatsApp group, and send your own
• Push the nasal vowels even when it feels like you are exaggerating
• Show up to every class (with exceptions, of course)

Consistency is what makes this work, and you already have it. You did ten hours a week through a university course. Our job is to design the right program and stay with you the whole way. Your job is to show up, push hard, and have some fun speaking Brazilian Portuguese before those students land in September. 🇧🇷

Questions?

If anything here is unclear, or you would like to talk it through before deciding, just reply to this email and we will get back to you personally.

Once you get started, this page becomes your personal study hub. Your curriculum, class recordings, vocabulary notes, homework, and audio materials will all live here in one place as the program runs.