The first pitfall is to try to memorize entire sentences, full of grammar and things. While this might be impressive on paper, it’s pretty difficult to say a long sentence without getting half-way through and forgetting the rest. It’s much easier to say 2 or 3 words, but say them properly, and then just do it a few times a day. Practice with a few words, like “I need…” “I want to…” “I normally…” “Can you say that again?” etc. It’s much better to practice little chunks and go up from there.
Focus on single patterns, and try to change just one thing about it. If I say “I like coffee,” try “I like tea” and “I like this song” and “I like quiet places.” Now try changing the time element, “I liked it” “I like it” “I will like it.” In this way you learn how to play around with the grammar without having to worry about getting it perfect. The most important thing is to be able to play around with it in the first place. If you get stuck, don’t go and look up an amazing sentence. Go back to your base pattern, and simplify it. Getting back on your feet is probably the most important thing you can do as a beginner.
Memorize chunks, but avoid full sentences, especially at the beginning. Another thing you want to avoid is translating word for word from your native language. The grammar is rarely the same, so your English ends up sounding unnatural. Try to think in chunks. Instead of “I yesterday to shop went because needed milk,” try “I went to the shop yesterday because I needed milk.” Say it slow, then try again at full speed. Record yourself once, listen once, and try to focus on just one thing to improve (maybe word order, maybe lack of an -ed ending).
Even 15 minutes a day is better than nothing. If that’s all you have, try this. Spend 5 minutes saying three sentence patterns out loud until your mouth relaxes a bit. Then spend 5 more minutes modifying the patterns in a few ways (changing places, times, objects). Finally spend 5 more minutes talking about your day using only the sentence patterns you practiced. Try to narrow down the topic. You could talk about your breakfast, your room, the weather, your plans for tomorrow. If you find yourself missing a word, pause and write it down, then look it up after you finish speaking and say the sentence again. This way you’re still practicing speaking, and not just reading.
Pronunciation is important, and you should do it early on, but you don’t have to make it a class to itself. Find a sentence and listen very closely to how it sounds. English pronunciation isn’t just about getting the sounds right, but also the stress and intonation. Listen to “I want TO go” and “I WANT to go.” The intonation changes the meaning slightly, and also the way it sounds. Beginners tend to say each word with equal emphasis, which makes the English sound flat and a bit harder to understand. Try listening to a short line from an audio track and try to mimic it exactly, trying to get the timing just right. Don’t worry if you fail, just try to get the timing roughly right and then do it a few times until it gets smoother.
It’s also more helpful to have very specific feedback. Saying “your English is great” or “your English is terrible” isn’t going to help you much. Saying something like “you dropped the -ed ending” or “you need to change the word order in that sentence” is much more helpful. You can even do some of this yourself. Record yourself for 30 seconds, listen once for grammar, once for pronunciation, once for pausing. Pick one thing you did wrong. The next day, talk about the same topic and see if you did that thing any less. Little things, lots of times, are the way to improve your English. Not big things once every week or two.
The best way to improve your speaking is still repetition and variation. Try to keep it as close to your real life as possible so you have sentences you can actually use. Ask yourself questions and answer them, talk about what happened to you during the day, describe your surroundings. The point isn’t to sound incredibly advanced. The point is to make the basics very solid, smooth, and easy to access when you need them for a conversation.