美語發音視頻教程Paul Gruber 主講全程15個系列教程文本
Pronunciation Workshop
—The Americandream does not come to those who fall outquick.
Session One
1. Consonant R
2. Consonant W
Hi, I』m your instructor Paul Gruber and welcome to thePronunciation Workshops---First Training Session.
I am very excited that you have taken this first step toimprove your English pronunciation and I do hope that you wouldenjoy this program and receive great benefits from it. Before webegin I wanna make sure that you have downloaded and printed outthe training manual which accompanies this course. If you have notyet done so, please do it soon because you』ll definitely needit.
Now you may be wondering how is it that I am going to helpyou change the way you speak. Well, basically, when you learnedEnglish as a second language, you kept many of the sounds andspeech rules from your first language and you were continuing touse them when you speak English. This is what gives you an accent.You were using the sounds and speech rules from your nativelanguage instead of the sounds and speech rules of English. And youknow why? Well, because when you learned English, nobody evershowed you what the sounds and speech rules of English were untilnow.
That』s why I』m coming . Because I am going to show you andtrain you on how to use these sounds and speech rules correctly.Knowing in using these rules will help you reduce or possibly eveneliminate your accent. Now throughout the program you』re oftengoing to see me point to my mouth to show you how to producea particular sound. I want you to pay close attention and try tocopy exactly what it is I am doing. I would be showing you how tocorrectly form new sounds by changing the position of your tongueor changing the shape of your lips. These small changes are goingto make very big changes in your speech. We』re going to practisingand I recommend that you use the training manual and try topractise often. When you practise, I recommend that you start outspeaking slowly out loud in a strong voice while exaggerating allthe mouth movements. What would you be doing is retraining themuscles of your mouth in your tongue to move in new ways, whichwill produce a new pronunciation patterns. These new speechpatterns will slowly and eventually involve into your ownspontaneous fast speech, but it is important that you start outgoing very slow. If you can pronunce words and sentences correctlyspeaking slowly, well, then you』ll have no problem in saying themfast.
I believe practising is important, but I do not believe it』sthe only key towards success. Being aware of your errors. That』 sthe key. Being aware and also recognizing mistakes when you hearthem will probably be the most important factors towards yourimprovement.
Another thing I』d like you to keep in mind and I』m sure youmay have noticed this already is that when most Americans speak youwill notice that we seem to open our mouth a lot and there is agreat amount of mouth movements. Watch my mouth when I saysomething like 「Wow, was there really raining on Wednesday!」 Didyou see how my mouth seemed to move? It wasn』t with my lips flat.It wasn』t 「Wow, was there really raining on Wednesday.」 There was alot of movements. My mouth opened wide, but also my wholemouth moved forward. Now I find many foreign speakers, maybebecause of their language characteristics, they don』t move theirmouths much. There is very little facial movement. Because of this,to an American listener, the words often sound mumble, making itvery very difficult for an American listener to understand what itis you said. One way to be better understood immediately isto become more aware of your speech and to really start opening andmoving your mouth.
I』d like to try to observe what I』m talking about. Whenyou speak to native-borned Americans or watch TV or movies,notice how when Americans speak, generally our mouths really openbig and our lips come forward. These movements have a lot to dowith the sound of American English.
I also want to add that I』ll often be asking you to repeatwords and sentences on these videos. Try to think as if we wereboth sitting in the same room and I am directly right in front ofyou. Listen carefully to the words and sounds that I give you.Listen carefully to my pronunciation and watch my mouth, thenrepeat the words back to me in your own voice with the techniquesthat I』m showing you as clearly as you can. Now at first you mayfeel a bit of foolish talking to your computer screen, but reallyyou shouldn』t. Make believe you』re speaking directly to me. You』llfind this will to be extremely helpful and effective.
During the course of this program, I will begin by addressingconsonant sounds and then later on we』ll work with vowel sounds.Now vowel sounds, as you know, are A E I O and U, like ahh, ohh,eee, ehh, ihh and ooo. And consonant sounds are basically all theother letters』 sounds, like b, ch, s, t, f, g, sh, w and of course,there are many many more sounds.
The consonants that we are going to cover in this firstsession are the consonant R and the consonant W. Ok, are you ready?Here we go. Let』s get started. Let』s start with the AmericanR.
R』s are everywhere. They』re probably the most commonlyoccurring consonant sound in English. One reason for this is thatR』s affect vowel sounds, especially when an R falls at the end ofword or after a vowel sound as in the word CAR, or the wordAIR, or the word TURN.
After working with so many non-native English speakers fromaround the world, I believe the R sound is one of the main causesfor being misunderstood in American English. Therefore, this is whyI』ve chosen to start out with this sound. Now when some languages,like our speaking Spanish, the R is produced by bringing the tongueforward in the front of the mouth behind the upper teeth androlling or trilling the tongue~, like that. Now when some otherlanguages, like German and French, the R is produced in the back ofthe throat, but this is not how we produce an R sound in the UnitedStates. In American English, in order to say a clear R sound, twodistinct things hafta(have to) happen. The first thing is that ourmouth and lips come tightly forward as if you would be saying theOO sound. Do this with me, say OO and make sure you bringing yourlips all the way forward. Say OO. That』s it. You see how your lipsare forward? That』s what you wanna do. This is the position yourmouth should be in when you producing an American R, like that, andI』ll bet you know whenever I told you that. Now, the second thingis that your tongue moves back in your mouth. It doesn』t comeforward. It』s pulled back. This is probably the opposite of whatyou』re doing right now. So, for example, in the word Rock,notice how my lips are coming forward and my tongue moves back inmy mouth and I push out the R sound. Watch this: RRRock. Dowith me and exaggerate the R: RRRock. Watch with my headturn: RRRock. You see that? See how the whole bottom of myface came forward. Don』t be afraid to do this. This forward mouthmovement is what is going to give you an American R sound. It』snot~ and it』s not Rock with your lips flat. Your whole mouth reallyhasta( has to ) come forward. Now latter I recommend that youpractise doing this in front of a mirror while watching your mouth.Really push out the R and remember to pull your tongue back. Nowone way of checking if you』re doing this correctly with your tongueis by actually putting your finger around an inch into your mouthwhile saying an R sound. Watch this, RRRock, like that. Youshould be able to take the tip of your finger and feel the tip ofyour tongue. If you do these two simple things---bringing yourmouth forward and pulling your tongue back. I』m telling you yourspeech』s going to be clear and you』re going to sound so muchbetter.
Ok, we』 re going to start out with R』s at the beginning ofwords. Here we go. Repeat after me.
Rock
Rip
Reach
Road
Rain
Rich
Rome
Raise
Robe
Rice
Very good. Now repeat this sentence.
The round rooster rushed into thewrong road.
Very good. Now pronuncing R』s like this may feel a littleweird to you, but if you notice this is how most Americanstalk.
Ok. Now let』s do R』s at the end of words or after a vowel.When a foreign speaker produces R which at the end of word offollows a vowel, it』s usually very weak---gets not really heard andleaves the word opener unfinished, like in the word CAR. Nowyou may say CAR ending with the A vowel. But it』 s not CAR.It』s CAR/r/. Your tongue hasta pull back. CAR. And also your lipsclose a little bit in the front. The R needs to be very strong andyou need to close the word. CAR. Let』s practise these words.Repeat after me.
Car
Far
Star
Door
Bear
Four
Air
Year( now has a high vowel sound EE.Year.)
Turn
Poor
Very good. Ok. Now let』s discuss R』s inthe middle of words.
In the word Very, for example, which is a frequentlyused word in English. The R occurs in the middle of the word. It』snot a D sound. The word is not Vedi, or Vehi, it』s Very.Make sure that the R sound is strong and your lips are comingforward. Your tongue is back and you push out the R: Very,like that. Practise these sentences with me nice and slow. He isVery Very nice, like that. See how my lips arecoming all the way forward? Next one. She is VeryVery tall. Here are some morepractice words with R in the middle. Repeat after me.
Direction
Arrange
Erase
Correct
Marry
Garage
Original
Hurry
Zero
Marine
Berry
Operation
Caring
Arrive
Everyone
Ok. Very good. Now, R』s are often combinedwith other consonants and form what we call R Blends. It isimportant to understand that the R sound is the stronggest sound ofthe blend and your lips often come forward before you even say theword. And example of this is the word Grape. Now notice howmy mouth comes forward before I even say the word. Grape.Did you see that? And notice in the word Grape the R soundis strongger and you even hear it more than the G sound.Grape. Here are some practice words with R Blends. First atthe beginning of words. Here we go.
Training
Trust
Trip
Great
Tropical
Bring
President
Product
Cracker
Crawl
Break
Ok. Now in the middle of words.
Subtract
Waitress
Nutrition
Australia
Introduce
Compress
Oppression
Betray
Very good. Ok now let』s practise R sounds in sentences. Thesesentences are filled with R』s. Keep the R sound strong. Don』tforget to bring your mouth forward and pull your tongue back. Saythese sentences with me. Here we go.
The story he read on the radio wasincorrect.
Her career in the law firm ispermanent.
Richard and Brooke took aride in their brand new RangeRover truck.
Everyone will respect the Royal Familywhen they arrive at the airport.(Be shorterclose to the word Air. It』s not airport. It』sAir, Airport, like that with strong R sound.)
The trip to the Rocky Mountains will berescheduled on Friday.
Very good. Ok now let』s talk about Wsounds. W sounds are very similar to R sounds. The major thing tokeep in mind is that in English when you see a W, it always has a Wsound. Like in the word What. Again notice how my mouthmoves forward. One way to make sure you were doing this correctlyis to first say oooo with your whole mouth forward, oooo, likethat, and then, open and close your lips to make the W sound, likethis, ooooWaWaWa. That』s how you produce a W.Wa, like that. It』s never a V sound, /v/,or you』re likebiting down on your lower lip, never. We』ll be going over V soundsin the fourth session. The reason I mention this is because manyforeign speakers, especially the German speakers say, for example,Vhat with V for the word What. Instead of saying「What will we do?」, which is correct. They maysay 「Vhat vill ve do?」 And that is not right and many people maynot understand you. Bring your mouth forward on those W words.What will we do. Say with me. Whatwill we do. Very good.
Now as I said the W and the R are similar,both of them are made with your mouth in the forward position andyour tongue pulled back. Your mouth should be a little bit tighterwhen you』re saying an R. Listen to the similarities and differencesbetween these R and W words.
Rick – Wick
Right – White
It』s not Vhite with V. It』s White with W.
Very good. Also be aware that the W sound occurs in somewords beginning with the letter O, like in the words: One,Once. You might not be aware of this. Practise the W wordswith me. We』ll start out with W at the beginning of words. Don』tforget to bring your mouth forward at the beginning of eachword.
Why
Which
When
What
Wipe
Wish
Weight
Wing
Very good. Ok now W in the middle ofwords.
Always
Away
Beware
Awake
Someone
Rewind
Halloween
Hollywood
Now practise these W sentences.
The wind from the west was verywet. (Remember Very starts with the V sound followedby a strong R. --Was very wet. Very good.)
We woke up and washed thewhite washcloth.
We waited for the waitress togive us water.
We had a wonderful time inWashington and Wisconsin.
Very good. Now while weare talking the W sounds, I』d like to mention Q sounds. How are Qsounds related? Well, Q sounds are made with the K/k /sound and theW sound/w/ put together. You may have known that. So, for example,the word Quick is pronunced with the K and the strong Wsound. KWICK, like that. Repeat some of these wordsbeginning with the Q sound.
Question
Quiet
Queen
Qualify
Quit
Quebec
Quilt
And also in the CH word Choir
Very good. Ok, here now is a paragraph which contains many Rand W sounds. You may wanna practise reading this paragraph a fewtimes . Notice how my lips come forward and all my Rs and Ws. Tryto do the same thing and don』t forget. Do not roll your R』~. Don』tdo that. Here we go.
Ray was born in Russia. He dreamed of building the perfectroller coaster at the Grand Canyon in Arizona. He had a friendnamed Fred who lived in Norway. Fred』s profession was designingrailroad tracks and his career involved traveling all around theworld. Ray thought it would be perfect if Fred designed his rollercoaster ride. Fred was creative, brilliant and worked well withrailroad tracks. He would be the perfect engineer for the project.The ride took two years to construct and was painted red and white.Everyone really wanted to ride the brand-new rollercoaster.
Very good. Now if you strongly push out those Rs and Ws whenyou practise eventually your Rs and W sounds are going to be clearand your speech will be much easier to understand.
If you have the time watch the session again and practiseyour pronunciation along with me, then take out your trainingmanual and practise on your own. All the word lists and readingpassages that are on these videos are in the munual as well. I hopeyou enjoy our first session together. Fell free to watch thissession again. I』m Paul Gruber with the Pronunciation Workshop andI』ll see you next time.
Session Two
1. Voicing
2. Consonant pairs
3. Consonant S
4. Consonant Z Voicing
Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Second Session. I hope things havebeen going well since we last met. I would like to just mentionagain there are literarlly hundreds of languages around the worldand every language has its own set of characteristics. What I』 vedone in this program is to address the most significantpronunciation errors made by most foreign speakers that you mayfind that not every lesson pertains to you individuallypronunciation problem. If that』s the case, well, that』sgreat cause you』ll get less to work on. But I hate you to miss outanything important. Therefore, I still do recommend that you watchall of the sessions in chronological order from the first sessionto the last session to get the most out of this program and latteron if you feel you meed more practice, review the sesions which youfeel may need more attention.
Ok. Let』s get started with today』s session. In this video,we』re going to talk about Voicing. We』ll also talk about ConsonantPairs and what they are and then we』ll cover S sounds and Z sounds.Ok, here we go.
Voicing. You』re going to hear me say this word a lot and youneed to understand what it is what I』m talking about. All speechsounds , all of them are either voiced or unvoiced. Now, what didthat mean? Well, first, let』s take a look at this video. It maylook a little bit disgusting . Do you have any idea what it is.It』s look like something that is opening and closing. I』ll give youa hint. You』ve got pair of these and you use them when you speak.Any idea? Those were vocal chords. Vocal chords are those tinymuscles that are right here when your throat that vibrates quicklyand creat sound and that sound is your voice that you can easilymake you vocal chords vibrate by just saying AH. That』s it. That』svoicing. Voicing is when your cocal chords are vibrating, producinga sound, and you can feel the vibrations if you put your hand righthere on your throat. Do this with me. Put your hand on your throatand now let』s loud say AH. Do you feel the vibration? Those yourvocal chords vibrating. Now all vowel sounds are voiced A, Oh, OO,AE, EE . You can not produce a vowel sound without voicingit. Nothing would come out. You see? You need voicing. AH. So allvowels are voiced. Now, consonants are completelydifferent story. Some consonants are voiced andsome consonants are not voiced. And many consonants are what wecall paired. So, let』s talk about Paired Consonants. Let』s look atthe sound. The letter P makes /p//p//p/-- that』s the sound of theletter P. Are your vocal chords vibrating when you』re saying thesound?/p//p//p/.You feeling vibrations in your throat? No, yourvocal chords now are not producing a sound so therefore the P soundis what we call unvoiced because there is no voicing. And this isthe sign that I』m going to make when there』s no voicing.
So now let』s look at the same sound the Psound /p//p//p/. But this time we』ll add voicing by vibrating ourvocal chords. Now we won』t change the thing with our mouth. We』 llkeep that the same, we』 ll just add voicing. So what happens to theP sound /p//p/---/b//b/. It becomes a B sound. Watch again. P—novoicing, /p//p//p/. /b/--B, voicing. /p/--/b/. You see thateverything here stays the same. The only differences my vocalchords are either vibrating or they』re not vibrating. So we say theP sound and the B sound are Paired Consonants. They』re producedexactly the same way here in your mouth, but the P sound has novoicing and the B sound /b//b/ does have voicing. Ok. Having saidthat, let』s look at another set of consonants. How about the letterT. What sound does that make? /t//t//t/. Is that voiced orunvoiced? /t//t//t/--It』s unvoiced. Your vocal chords are notvibrating. /t//t/. Now don』t change the thing with your mouth. Justtake the same sound and add voicing. What does that T soundbecome?/t//t/---/d//d//d//d/---becomes a D sound. So we say thatthe T sound /t/ and the D sound /d/ are also PairedConsonants.
Ok. Now let』s look at the F sound /f/.We』re biting down on your lower lip---/f/. Is that a voiced soundor unvoiced sound? /f/---it』s unvoiced. Your vocal chords are notvibrationg. /f/. Now same sound but this time we add voicing./f/---/v/. V. It becomes a V/v/. You see that? F/f/---no voicing.V---voicing./v/. So the F and V are also Paired Consonants.
There are many more consonants that are paired and we』ll getto those at another time. But for now, I』m going to to mention justone more. The S consonant, made with the air going through yourfront teeth. /s/. Any voicing going on with the sound /s/. No, theS sound is unvoiced./s/. What would be if you didn』t change thething. You just add voicing. What would the S sound become./s/---/z/. It will become a Z sound/z/. So S has no voicing /s/, Zhas voicing/z/. So we say the S sound and Z sound are also PairedConsonants. And this brings us to what I would like to covertoday---S sounds/s/, Z sounds /z/and how they work in terms of wordendings. I find that most people who learn English as a secondlanguage do not use the proper voicing on /s/ and /z/ endings. Sowhat happens is it can cause your speech to sound unclear andsometimes may cause you to be misunderstood. I』m going to show youthree easy rules that will help you pronunce many of these wordscorrectly.
This first rule is easy and this one I know you probably doalready. Rule 1: If the last sound in a word is unvoiced, andyou』re adding an S, well, then the S remains unvoiced, too. Let meexplain that. Take the word Cup. Cup. It ends withthe unvoiced P /p//p/Cup /p//p/or then if you add an S tothe word Cup to make a plural. The S you add also remainsunvoiced. So, for example, you have one cup or twocups. There』s no voicing at the end of that word. The Sremains unvoiced. One cup. Two cups. That』s easy. Youalready do this. I』ll show you another word Cat. Catends with the unvoiced T/t//t/. One cat. Two cats.Again the S ending is unvoiced. Cats. This also goes forverbs like in the verb Break. I Break. Breakends with the unvoiced K sound/k//k/. There』s no voicing on that K.So when you put the word in the third person. He Breaks. TheS you add also remains unvoiced. He breaks.
I stop(ends with the unvoiced P /p/). I stop. Hestops./s/---unvoiced S. Stops. Now as I said you already followthis rule and there really isn』t anything you don』 t know.
But on rule No.2, now this one you probably do not do, So pay closeattention to this rule. When adding an S to a word to make aplural. If a word ends with any of these sounds S Z SH CH orDG(J) as in Judge. Don』t worry. You really don』t need tomemorize this. It will become automatic. When you add an S ending,this time, we always add the ending IZZZZZ with the voiced Z. Itdoesn』t matter that it』s spelled with an S. It』s never S, unvoiced,never. It』s always IZZZZZ with voiced Z. Ok. Do this with me. Putyour hand on your throat, cause I want you to feel the vibration inyour neck and say IZZZZZ. Feel that right here IZZZZZ. Ok, so let』slook at the word Page, for example, which ends in a voiced sound.One Page becomes Two Page with that voiced Z. Two Pages. It』s notTwo Pages/s/,unvoiced,no. It』 s Two Pages /z/ with the voiced Z.Even though you spell the word like this, in American English youpronunce the word like this PAGEZZ. You』 re probably saying I neverknew that. See what you』 re learning from me. Ok, let』s look atanother word in the word BUS, for example, BUS ends with an S sound/s/. BUS. So if you make a plural, you』 re going to add the endingIZZZZZ with the voiced Z. So we』 ve got One Bus or Two Buses.Buses. Two Buses. The last sound you hear is that voiced Z,Buses.
Next one. Lunch. Lunch ends with the CH sound[?] . Sowe』ve got One Lunch or Two Lunches. Lunches./IIIZ/. Very good.Let』s do some verbs. Raise. Meaning like to raise my hand. Thisword is a bit unusual because even though it is spelled with an S,it』 s pronunced with the voiced Z. So we say I Raise with thevoiced Z ending. And he Raises. Raise. He Raises his hand. It』svoiced. Next one. Brush. Like to Brush our teeth. I Brush. HeBrushes. Brushes. It』 s a voiced ending. Push. I Push. He Pushes.He pushes. Very good. By voicing these endings, your speech willbecome clearer, sharper and cleaner. Most likely you haven』 tnoticed that American English spoken this way, but now as I pointedout listen forward when you hear people speak. To an a nativelistener, this makes a very big difference.
Ok, here comes the thrid rule. This one』 s easy. If a wordends with a vowel sound, all you do is add a voiced Z. It』s simple.Let』s look at the word Tree. The last sound you hear in thatword is the vowel /EE/ and remember a vowel is always voiced. Sothe word ends in a voiced sound. Tree. So what you wanna doif you』 re going to add an S to word like this to make a plural isyou continue the voicing throughout the whole word and add on avoiced Z. So here we go. You』ve got One Tree or TwoTrees. It』s not Trees /s/ with theunvoiced S. It』s Tress /z/ with that voiced ending. You see that.Another example, the word Day. It ends with the voiced sound/e/, so you have One Day or Two Days. It』s notDays/s/---unvoiced S. Days/z/, with voiced Z ending. Nextone. Shoe. One shoe. Two shoes. Next is theverb Fly, which ends with the voiced sound[а?]. So you』 ve got I Fly. He Flys. Keep that ending voiced.Flys. The last sound you hear in the word Game is the M sound /m/,which is a voiced consonant. So because of that, when you add an S,the S should also be voiced. One game. Two games.Games. Another word. Head ends with the voiced D/d/,so we got One Head or Two Heads. Heads. It』svoiced. Two heads. Very good. Next word. Train endswith the voiced n. See that? So you』 ve got One Train or TwoTrains. Two Trains with the voiced Z ending.Song ends with the voiced NG sound, so if you make a plural,don』t forget to add a voiced Z ending. You』 ve got One Songor Two Songs. Two Songs.
Now what I just showed you take some practice to actuallyincorporate into your English. But I can tell you from pastexperience that most my clients were able tomaster these S and Z voiced endings in just a few weeks.
Ok, now for something else. As you know by now, English is adifficult and crazy language. All these words that I』m going toshow you now are written with an S, however, they』 re all pronuncedwith voiced Z. Why this is I have no idea, but this is how Englishis.
Here we go. The word Is. It』s not/Is/(unvoiced). It』s pronunced as if it were a Z/IZ/. Thisis good. You hear that. Is. His. Same thing.It also has a voiced Z ending. His mom is Mary.As. You pronunce it with voiced Z. As the phone ring.Was, which is a very common word. It wasraining. These, voiced ending. These are mychildren. Those. Those are my books. Easy,again, the S is like a voiced Z. Easy. This is easy.Because, which is another common word. Because wewere late.
Ok, now let』s do some practice with reading passages. Each ofthese has many voiced and unvoiced S and Z sounds. All of theunvoiced Z sounds you』 ll see are underlined. If you printed outthe training manual using a color printer, you』 ll notice that thevoiced Z sounds are all printed in red. This will help you visuallysee which sounds should be voiced. I』 m going o slow and exaggeratethe sounds. You may just wanna listen to me first, then stop thevideo, practise on your own and then later on watch this videoagain and pratice with me. Whatever feels right to you. Now thisfirst one has many voiced Z sounds. Here we go.
Another zippy, zappy, crazy daycomes to a close. As we zoom up toJoe』s snooze zone, Zoe Jones ofZodiac Zoo plays with her zipper.
Very good. Next one.
Last week, Jim』s brothers were picked torepresent their country in the Olympic Games. Two of thebrothers were swimmers, while the other two were longdistance runners. All of the brothers woreglasses. These athletes worked hard at qualifying forthe games and were hoping to come home with prizes.Since the brothers go to the same university, they oftentake the same courses. This makes studying easier andgives them more time to do other things.
O, here』 s the lastone.
On Thursday, I had a very lazy day. I woke upearly and first squeezed oranges into juice. I thengot dressed and watched the sunrise come up over themountains. It was so beautiful that I took manypictures with my camera and I used three rollsof film. After drinking two cups of coffee, I got dressed, left thehouse, and walked three miles home.
Very good. Now another good way to practise these voiced S and Zendings is to do a naming activity. What you do is you just sit inyour rome and out loud name everything you see. First in singularform, and then in plural form. For example, you look around and yousay out loud One door, Two doors with the voiced Z ending. Onetable. Two tables. One computer. Two computers. One light. Twolights. Some of my clients found this to be very helpful. Inaddition, try listening for these voiced sounds when you hearnative-borned Americans speak. It』s very good ear-training andthat』 ll help you improve. Soon , slowly begin to put these soundsinto your own speech. You』 ll find that by adding thesevoiced endings your English will sound cleaner and people will havean easier time understanding you. Believe me it』s going to reallymake an improvement.
Before we finish, I have one more suggestion that comes fromclients who have taken this program. I think it』s really a goodidea. If you can find a very small mirror and attach it maybe withsome tape right onto the side of your computer monitor right nextto the screen. By having a mirror right in front of you during oursessions you can easily read the text on the screen, watch my mouthand then look right into the mirror at your own mouth. You』 ll beable to compare your mouth with what I』m doing. Andyou』 ll know whether you』 re forming your lips and tongue into thecorrect positions. Through imitation and following my instructions,you』 ll be becoming closer to speaking with American accent. Well,that is for today. Relax. Have fun and practise what I』 ve shownyou until next time. I』m Paul Gruber with Pronunciation Workshopand I』 ll see you on the next session.
Session Three
1. The Unvoiced TH Sound
2. The Voiced TH Sound
3. THR Blends
4. Voicing the T Sound
Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Third Training Session. Inthis class, we will cover the American TH sounds, both the unvoicedTH[θ] and the voicedTH[e]. This is one of my favourite areasbecause when you correctly produce TH sounds, you willsignificantly improve the way you speak English. Later on in thisvideo, we』 ll also address voiced T sounds.
Now except for maybe a few languages, English is one of theonly language in the world that has TH sound when your tongue comesout between your teeth[θ] that you may havea difficult time with this sound because this sound probably doesnot exist in your own native language. Therefore, you don』t thinkto use the sound when you speak English. Most likely, you justsbustitute another sound, like a T or an S. So instead of saying aword like Thumb, my Thumb, which this is and noticemy tongue is coming out. My thumb. You』 ve been saying Tumb. MyTumb or my Sumb and your tongue is not coming out. That is notcorrect. If you made mistake like this and connected speech overand over again. There』 s a good chance people are not going tounderstand you. I have found that some people from differentcultures of the world find the idea of sticking out their tonguewhen they speak to be rude and offensive even if it is to produce aTH sound, I want you to understand that this is how American speakEnglish and it is something that you must become comfortable withif you wish to speak well. To produce TH sound correctly you needto first stick your tongue out between your teeth and bite downslightly[θ], thenblow[θ]. This created Air Friction. Thesound comes from the air friction and should be prettyloud[θ] . Keep your tongue flat andmaintain it even steady flow of air. I』 m not just saying stick itout a little bit, I』 m saying stick it way out at least while you』re practising to get used to the feeling. The TH sound comes fromthe air and the friction. You have got to hear it and should besomewhat loud [θ], like that. If you』 relike most people, you may need to work on this a little bit buttrust me I know you can do it. Hundreds of my clients who havenever produced a TH sound in their lives are speaking EnglishEnglish clearly and beautifully, because they』 ve learned how to dothis. It may help if you look at a mirror and watch your mouth andtongue. See if you can maintain the air flow for these sounds[θ],like that. I know this may feel verystrange and uncomfortable to do possibly, but soon you』 ll get usedto it and the small change in your speech is going to reallyimprove how your English sounds. Now the TH sound is a frictionsound and it』s not as aloud as other speech sounds. ThereforeAmerican speakers stretch them out a little bit we don』 t evenrealize we do this, but this make the sound come out clearer. Letme show you what I mean. Let』s look again at the word Thumb. Forpracticing purposes, think of the word in two beats: One. Two.[θ]Thumb. You see that? Notice how long I』 mholding the TH sound. [θ] Thumb. It』s notgood enough just to put your tongue between your teeth and say a THword. Like this~. You see that, my tongue came out. But there wasnever any air friction. That』s not good. You must stretch out theTH sound and hear the air friction. Thumb. Like that. Let』s pratisesome words with TH sounds. First at the beginning of words. Here wego.
Thanks
Thick
Thunder
Thursday
Think
Now in the middle of words.
Anything
Bathmat
Toothpick
Athletic
Mouthwash
Now at ends of words.
Bath
North
Beneath
Fourth
South
Very good. Ok now let』s talk about voiced TH sounds. To makea voiced TH sound, all you have to do is take the TH sound that Ijust showed you and just add voicing [e].There』s the voiced TH. You should be able to feel the strongvibration in your throat and on your tongue[e].
Let』s go over some of these voiced TH sounds. This first setof words are some of those the most commonly used words in Englishand yes they should all be voiced and all made with your tonguecoming through your teeth. First at the beginning of words.
The (The book)
That (That house)
They (They came over)
Them (Give them water)
There (There it is)
This (This is my nose)
Those (Those boys are good)
These (These are my parents)
You know, another goodway to practise these words is by going around your room and namingeverything you see using a TH word. For example, the chair, thatwindow, those books, this door, like that. Then go around and nameyour body parts in some clothing like that shoe, this watch, thesefeet. Ok. That may be helpful. Let』s look at these voiced TH soundsin the middle of words.
Clothing. Notice how my tongue comes out in the middle of theword and the TH sound is pushed out. Clothing.
Leather. Same thing. Stick out your tongue and make a verystrong vibration. Leather.
Mother
Another
Weather
Northern
And now at the ends ofwords.
Smooth. Believe it or not. The TH in Smooth is voiced. Mostforeign speaker say this word incorrectly. They say Smooth, theunvoiced TH. But it』s voiced. Smooth [e].
Bathe. The word Bath is a noun, with an unvoiced TH. Bath.But when you change it into a verb 「to bathe」 the vowel changes toan /e/ sound and the TH is voiced. Bathe, like again.Batheing suit.
Breathe. Same thing. Breath is a noun. Take abreath, unvoiced. But when you change it into a verb, the vowelchanges and becomes Breathe. I am breathing with the voiced TH.Now, let』s do some practice phrases. These all have voiced andunvoiced TH sounds. Repeat after me.
This and that
A tablecloth
Winter clothing
Athens, Greece
That』s the one
Her skin is smooth
Thirty Day』s notice
A famous author
Here and there
False teeth
Thread the needle
A thoughtful gift
Thunder and lightening
Thumbs up
Repeat these sentences.
Thelma arrived in town last Thursday.
I』m having trouble threading this needle.
I need 33 thick thermometers.
The thing they like best about Athens is the weather.
This thrilling novel was written by a famous author.
He will be through with his work at three-thirty.
Now and then, she likes to buy new clothing.
They thought they were going to Northern Spain.
Which tablecloth shall we use for the party?
That was the thirty-third theatre to open.
Now, I』d like to talk about THR Blends which is thecombination of TH sonund and the R sound. Like in the word Thrillor Throw. When producing these blends, I want to be aware that theR is the stronggest sound of the blend and it』s louder than the TH.Just like what we talked about in the first session. So when yousay a word which begins with THR. First make the TH sound and thenstrongly push out the R. Let』s practise a few of these .
Thread (thread the needle)
Throw (throw the ball)
Throat (my throat is sore)
Thrill (a thrilling ride)
Three (three more days)
Threw (yesterday he threw the ball)
Throne (the king sits on a throne)
Ok, now let』s go over this reading paragraph. It has many THsounds and it might be difficult, but it is a very good paragraphto practise on. You may wanna watch me do this a number of times.Keep your eyes on my mouth and notice how often my tongue comesout. Try to do the same thing. Here we go.
Nurse Thatcher was thankful it wasThursday. She knew that on Thursday she had todeliver 33 boxes of thermometers to the NorthAmerican Athletic Club. They thoughtthat thermometers were necessary for testing thehydrotherapy baths. This was thought tobenefit the athletes with arthritis.The athletic trainers required authorization toprovide hydrotherapy to the youthful athleteson the three bulletin boards withthumbtacks throughout the athleticclub. Rather than risk the health ofthe athletes, they thoroughly checkedthe thousands of thermometers to insuretheir worthiness; otherwise they neededto be thrown away.
Very good, I hope that wasn』 t too bad. As I said that is anexcellent paragraph to practise on. You should review it a fewtimes if you can.
Ok, now as I always said English is a crazy language andthere are always to be exceptions. Here are a few TH exceptionsthat I』d like to point out. Although these next words and names arespelled with TH. They』 re pronounced as if they were spelled with anormal T/t/, like that. And these words are:
Thomas
Thompson
Theresa
Thailand
Thames, likethe river
Esther
Thyme,which is a spice
Ok, now let』s take amoment and talk about T sounds. The T sound is the unvoiced soundlike in the name Tom or the word TV. If you add voicing to a T,what do you get? /t/---/d/, a D. Remember? We went over this in thefirst session, but I want to tell you is in American pronunciationwe like to make things easy. So if a letter T falls between twovowel sounds, which are voiced. So if it falls in the middle ofvowels, then the T is pronunced as a D and the whole word isvoiced. This is very easy and you may already be doing thiscorrectly. Here are three examples:
Water is pronunced as Wader, the T into a D and the wholeword is voiced. Water . I want water.
Better becomes Bedder. She』 s feeling better.
And Butter becomes Budder. Please pass the butter.
This should be simple. So now that you know that. Practisingthis poem with me. Remember all the Ts are pronunced as Ds becausethey fall between vowels.
Betty bought a bit ofbetter butter. But, said she, thisbutter』s bitter. If I put it in mybatter, it』ll make my batter bitter.
Again, notice that you do not hear any T sounds /t/. they areonly Ds /d/, which are voiced. Go over this poem a few times. It』salso printed in your manual. Once you get good at it, try to speedit up. I』 ll do it one more time for you a little bitfaster:
Betty bought a bit ofbetter butter. But, said she, thisbutter』s bitter. If I put it in mybatter, it』ll make my batter bitter.
Well, that was marvellful.Ok, start by practising it slow and then later get faster. Try tolet the words just roll out of your mouth. That』s for today』ssession. Try spending some time in front of a mirror and practisingthese TH sounds like Thumb and Throw. The small change will reallyimprove your English and make you a lot more understandable. I』 mPaul Gruber with the Pronunciation Workshop and I』 ll see you atour next session. Good bye!
Session Four
1. Consonant 『F』
2. Consonant 『V』
3. The Unvoiced 『SH』 Sound
4. The Voiced 『ZSH』 Sound
Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Fourth Training Session. I hopethings have been going well. Today, we』 ll cover F and V sounds aswell as SH and voiced SH sounds. Just a reminder all of thematerial covered in those videos are also printed in your trainingmanual for pratising later on. Let』s get started.
In the last session, we talked about Air Friction with THsounds [θ] that the sound is made with airfriction. Well, today we』 re going to talk about Air Frictionagain, but this time it is with F and V sounds.
The F and V are paired consonants and they are both producedexactly the same way except the F sound is unvoiced and the V soundis voiced. They are both produced by contacting your upper teeth toyour lower lip. It』 s sort of feels like your biting down on yourlower lip /v/,like that. Now remember all the voicing means thatyour vocal chords here on your throat are vibrating and making asound. So the F sound is unvoiced and sounds like this /f/ and theV sound is voiced, and sounds like this /v/. Correctly pronuncingthese sounds will make your speech nuch clearer and you moreintelligible, like the TH sounds from the last session. Fs and Vsare friction sounds and not that loud. So we stretchthese sounds out a little bit, so they can be clearly heard. Let』sstart by looking at the F sound in the word Foot. Now many foreignspeakers may use the right positioning by biting down on theirlower lip, but they still keep the F very short and they don』tcreat air friction. Therefore , you do not hear the F clearly andit sounds like~. That』s no good. Let me show you what you need todo. First think of the word is having two beats: one- two. Hold theF sound for the first full beat. F---oot, like that. Do it again.F---oot. Do you see how long I』 m holding that F? Now I know that』sa little bit exaggerated, but you get the idea. You need to hearthe air friction when practising. Try to give the F one beatF---oot. Let』s work with words beginning with the letter F. Here wego.
Find
Finally
Family
Freedom,with the strong R, freedom
Laugh, notice the gh combination in that word,laugh.
Telephone, notice the ph combination in that word, it』s alsopronunced as an F
telephone, It』s the same thing in this next word
Symphony, this is a tricky one because you』 ve got the Msound followed by an F sound, symphony.
And the last word
Rough, notice the gh combinatin in that word,rough.
Let』s work on this paragraph.
Do you feel like a physical wreck?
Are you fed up with your feeling of fatigue?
Have you had enough of feeling rough?
Why don』t you fight fever with
Pharaoh』s Friend.
A medicine that is tough on Flu.
Very good. Ok now let』s talk about the V sound. First of all,like the F sound. Don』 t make the V sound too short. Let』s look atthe word Vote, you』 ve got to stretch out the V. Like this.V---ote,V---ote. Are you hearing that long V sound. That』s what you shouldbe doing. Now, depending on your native language, you may bereplacing your V sounds for W sounds. Be careful not to do this.The word is not Wote, it』s Vote. Every V that you』 ll see inEnglish is made with this lip-biting position./v//v//v/. When yousay a V, it』s never WaWaWa. It』 s never a W sound. It』s alwaysV---, V---ote, like that. Let』s practise some words with the Vsounds, Here we go.
Vine
Oven
Evaluate
Voice
Travel
River,notice the strong R, River
Every
And now the ends of words
Glove
Alive
And Leave. This last word Leave is very different from theword Leaf , like from the tree, which has an unvoiced F
The word is leave,with voiced V.
Keep the voicing going throughout the whole word and voicethe V. Leave, like that. If you stop the voicing at the end of thevowel /i/, then you』 ll be saying Leaf with an unvoiced F and theword we』 re trying to say is Leave with the voiced V. Ok, now let』slook at the paired words with F and V. You』 ll see here just byadding voicing, you can completely change the meaning of the word.Here we go.
Feel – Veal
Safe – Save
Fat – Vat
Fine – Vine
Face – Vase
Fan – Van
Foul – Vowel
Proof – Prove
Very good. Ok now we』 re going to work on listening exercisesand ear-training. I』 m going to displace some words with V sounds,however, some words I』 ll be saying correctly and then some othersare purposely saying incorrectly. I want you to listen carefully tomy pronunciation and to the voicing of the V sounds and see whetheror not you can tell if I』 m saying the words correctly orincorrectly. Here we go. Here』 s the first word.
Stove-- I cooked dinner on a hot stove. Was that correct? No.I should have said Stove/V/. I cooked dinner on a hot stove with avoiced V.
Next word, Five. There, four, five.Correct? Yes , I said Fivewith voiced V.
Leave—I』 m in a hurry, and I need to leave. Is that correct?No , it』s not Leaf with an unvoiced F. I should have said Leavewith the voiced V sound.
Visa—She just received her international Visa. Correct? No ,I said Fisa with an unvoiced F. I should have said Visa with voicedV.
Living—I am living in a house. Is that correct? Yes, the V isvoiced. Living. That』s correct.
Ok, now repeat these phrases.
A famous athlete
A food vendor
The Foreign Service
Summer vacation
Vocabulary test
Over the rainbow
Our first victory
Harvard University
Husband and wife
Very well done
Good. Ok now repeat these sentences with me.
Her promotion in the firm was welldeserved.
There was only one survivor on theisland.
Steve noticed that the olive juice musthave stained his sleeve.
The street vendor was selling souvenirs totourists.
Dave gave me his car so that I coulddrive on New Year』s Eve.
There were several dents in the rearfender.
Tom placed several tomatoes from thevine into a basket.
Very good. Now we』 re talking about English so you know thatthere』s always an exception to everything. I would like to show youwhat I call the OF Exeception. Many foreign speakers make thismistake. Even though the word OF is spelled with an F, we pronuncethe word OF with the voiced V. I know this sounds crazy, but it』 strue. For example, Statue OVVV Liberty. Andnotice how I connected the word OF with the word. Liberty ofLiberty. You see OF is voiced. Here』 s another example. It』s madeovvv Glass or it』s made ovvv Wood. It』s not OF with unvoiced /f/.It』 s all voiced and it』s all connected. It』s made ovvv wood, likethat.
Very good. Ok now let』s go on to something new. Let』s talkabout SH sounds[?] andvoiced SH sounds[?]. First,to make the SH sound, you bring your lips forward, keep them open,and leave your teeth slightly apart. Blow air through your teethand produce the sound[?] . It』s aneasy sound. What you may not know was that there are some words inEnglish that are written with the letter S, but are pronunced withthe SH sound. Words like Sugar and Sure. And to make things evenmore difficult. There are a couple of words that are spelled withCH and are also pronunced the[?] sound.Words like Chef and the city of Chicago. Ok, having said that let』sgo over these words:
She
Sugar
Sure
Shadow
Sheep
Shirt
Shoe
Shape
Chicago
Chef
Very good. Ok now let』s do[?] sounds inthe middle of words. You』ll notice that there are many differentspellings for these sound, but the sound is always the same. Herewe go.
Nation
Motion
Mission
Special
Reputation
Official
Machine
Fishing
Insurance
Sunshine
Ocean
Tissue
Addition
Subtraction
And now at the end of words.
Rush
Dish
Establish
Splash
Irish
Fresh
Finish
Very good.Ok, let』s do some sentences now.
The fishing trip was planned and we left to go to theocean.
Was the chef ashamed to use the precioussugar?
Sharon gave a specialperformance.
He will be stationed in Washington, D.C, thenation』s capital.
She went to a fashion show aftertaking a shower.
She sells seashells by theseashore.
The social club was praised for theircooperation.
Now try this.
Joe』s weather machine shows a sharp dropin air pressure, especially offshore.
Ships in motion on the oceanshould be sure to use caution.
Very good. Ok, now let』s work on the voiced SH sound[?]. Toproduce this sound, first make a[?]sound and then you add voicing[?]--[?]-, likethat.[?]. Now, forsome people this may take a little bit of practice, you should feelthe vibrations right here in your throat[?]. Believeit or not. This is a very important sound in American English. Manynone-native English speakers mispronunce the words with the sound,especially the words Usual and Uusual, which are very very common.If you were someone that pronunce the word Usual as ~(a wrongpronunciation). I』 m telling you you』 re not being understood. Letme show you how to pronunce the word Usual correctly. Break it upinto three syllables. U-ZSHU-AL. That』 s second syllableZSHU, the one with the underline needs to be voiced. Put your handon your throat and feel for the vibration in the second syllableU-ZSHU-AL. Now, put it together U-ZSHU-AL, Usual, like that. Ok nowtry Usual, UN-U-ZSHU-AL, Unusual, like that. Very good. Now let』spractise some more words. It may help if you keep your hand righthere on your throat to feel the vibrations. Here we go.
Vision
Visual
Conclusion
Asia
Version
Division
Casual
Television
Very good. Now there areonly a few words that have the voiced[?]sound atthe end. A few of these words are:
The color Beige.
The word Massage.
And the word Prestige.
Ok. Now that you』 re great at this. Let』sgo over some sentences.
It』s not unusual for people to study divisionin Asia.
I usually use a measuring cup to measureerosion.
The beige walls were the usual color in thetreasury building.
Very good, you』 ll find in your manualthat there is a worksheet that you could list things that you wouldconsider usual and things that you would consider to be unusual.For pratice, fill this list and read your answers out loudin full sentences. Like this:
It』s usually hot in the summer.
And it』s unusual for me to be late for anappointment.
Great. Well now it』 stime to go on practice. You may want to wait a day or two and thenwatch this training session again. You』 ll find that the things inthis video again would probably be very helpful. Ok, have funpractising. I』 m Paul Gruber for the pronunciation workshop and I』ll see you at our next session.
Session Five
1.Consonant L
Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Fifth Training Session. We』 re reallymoving along. In this session, we will cover the L sound, whichhappens to be another important speech sound. Dpending on yournative language, some speakers have a very difficult time with theL sounds. L sounds are actually very easy. Here are a few things toremember.
No.1. When you』 re saying a word which begin with an L, yourmouth should be wide open and your jaw should be down, like this.That』 s an easy one.
No.2.Your tongue should rise up and push just behind your topteeth, like this. Notice my mouth is open.
No.3. And this is an important part. You pronunce the L soundby dropping and relaxing your tongue~, like that. Now, again you』ll notice that my mouth and jaw are open. This is the key. What Idon』 t want you to do is to be moving your jaw along with yourtongue. I don』 t want you to be doing this Ah Ah Ah. Your jawshould not be moving at all. Keep it open. Here』 s a trick that mayhelp you. Take your finger and put it in your mouth and pull downhard on your lower lip and force your mouth open and your jaw down.Like this. Now, while your jaw is down, bring your tongue tip allthe way up behind your teeth and do this LaLaLa. My tongue iscoming up but my jaw is staying down. What you』 re doing is forcingyour mouth and your lower jaw to stay open while you』 re raisingyour tongue up, and that』 s what I want. I want your jaw to staydown, your mouth to stay open and your tongue to rise upindependently of your jaw LaLaLa, like that and that』 s how youproduce a beautiful and clear L. Ok, let』s do some pratice. Repeatthese words beginning with the letter L. Here we go.
Lunch
Local
London
Learn
Large
Life
Lobby
Library
Lucky
Lift
Laugh
Long
Very good. Here are somewords with L in the middle of them. When you say these words, focuson the L sound and really push themout.
Inflation
Believe
Volume
Glue
Elevator
Solve
Pulling
Flood
Delete
Elect
Alive
Color
Ok, let』 s talk aboutwhen L falls at the end of a word. This is a big problem for manyforeign speakers, so pay close attention to this. To produce an Lsound at the end of a word. Keep in mind that the sound of the Lcomes from the movement of the Tongue Rising. It does not come fromthe placement of the tongue, but from the actual movement. Watch meas I say this word. Hill. The L comes from the movement of mytongue. You may want to use that finger trick again. Put yourfinger in your mouth, pull down on your lower tip and slowly saythe word. The only thing that should be moving is your tongueshould be coming up. Hill. Your jaw should not be moving at all tolet your tongue rise up. Hill. If you』 re having difficulty,produce this in front of a mirror and watch your jaw and yourtongue and be sure you don』 t produce the L sound by closing yourmouth which many foreign speakers do. Hill. Hill. See how my mouthis closing. Hill. You don』 t want to do that. That produces a weakL and to an American listener it is not clear and you may not beunderstood. Let』s start in practising these words ending with Ls.Here we go.
Will
Ball
Tall
Call
Small
Control
Bowl
Apple
Miracle
Powerful
Control
Financial
People
Notic in this last word People is notpronunced People with your tongue not moving. It』s people with yourtongue slowly moving up and your jaw remaining down. Stretch outthat L sound. People, like that. Here』 re some sentences that havemany Ls in them. Listen carefully to my example and then repeat.Don』 t forget to push your tongue behind your upper teeth and touse strong L sounds. Here we go.
The lollipop fell into the cool water.
Her driver』s license was pulled out of the blue golfbag.
Blake』s bowling ball fell under his tools.
Carl could not locate the lemons or the limes.
The school was a mile away from the hill.
The golf club was made of steel.
Al』s goal was to play baseball with Carol.
A certified letter was delivered for the enrollmentlist.
It was revealing to look at the smiling lawyer.
Very good. Now let』s tryreciting this poem with FL Blends. Here we』 re combining two soundsthat we have already covered. The F sound and now the L sound. Don』t forget to first bite your lips for that F/f/, like that and thenquickly push your tongue up and against your teeth for the L tocreat the FL blend Fly, like that. Ok, let』s try thisslowly.
A flea and a fly, flew up in a flue.
Said the flea, 「Let us fly!」
Said the fly, 「Let us flee!」
So they flew through a flaw in the flue.
Ok, let』s do that one more time. This time a little bitfaster.
A flea and a fly, flew up in a flue.
Said the flea, 「Let us fly!」
Said the fly, 「Let us flee!」
So they flew through a flaw in the flue.
Very good. Ok, these next sentences allhave the word Will in them. The word Will may be difficult for youbecause it has that final L sound. Remember try to keep your mouthopen, your jaw down as your tongue rises up. By doing this, you』 llproduce good final L sound. Again, if you』 re having difficulty,try looking at a mirror, use your finger and push down on yourbottom teeth as you say the word Will, like that. This will forceyou to keep your bottom jaw down as your tongue moves up. Here wego.
Will you empty the garbage?
Will you ask her to clean the kitchen?
Will you prepare a meal for the children?
When will you begin your studies at college?
When will she purchase the dress for her wedding?
Why will he ask them to stay late at work?
Why will she bring her baby to the meeting?
How will they know if our flight is delayed?
Where will the child be going next year?
Where will they put all of the pillows?
What will she do with the millions of dollars shewon?
Very good. Now someJanpanese and Chinese speakerS in particular have difficultiesdistinguishing between the L sound and the R sound. Now that wehave covered hoth of these sounds I would like to go over somepaired words containing these sounds. Keep in mindwhen you』 re producing an L, your tongue moves forward and upbehind your tip. When you』 re producing an R sound, your lips moveforward but your tongue moves all the way back. Basically, the Land the R are completely opposite sounds. Listen carefully andrepeat these paired words.
Red - Led
Rick - Lick
Reef - Leaf
Rear - Lear
Rest - Less
Grass - Glass
Crime - Climb
Free – Flee
Very good. Well, I call the next words LRcombinations. These words and phrases having an L sound and an Rsound right next to each other. This forces you to make a clear Land then roll it right into a strong R. Here we go. Repeat afterme.
Seal ring
Toll road
Already
Civil rights
Railroad
Rivalry
Coral reef
Jewelry
Schoolroom
Gravel road
Verygood. As you can see. Ls are very important sounds when they cometo speaking understandeable English. You should review thismaterial a few times for practice. Have fun and I』 ll see you nexttime. I』 m Paul Gruber with the Pronunciation Workshop.Goodbye.
Session Six
1.Word Endings
Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Sixth Training Session. In thissession, we will cover Word Endings. Often people who speak Englishas a second language drop the endings or final sounds offtheir words, well, they do not pronunce the final soundscorrectly. If this is done consistantly in conversation, chancesare you』 ll not be understood. I』ve noticed that the majority of myclients clip off the endings of words without even realizing thatthey』 re doing this. What I mean by clip off is whensaying words a common mistake that foreign speakers make isthat they drop off the last sound in a word, especially those wordsthat end in B, P, D or a T. For example, in the word Job, you maybe saying Jo_ without a B sound or the B is so weak you don』 t evenhear it. I have a good Job. You see that. You did not hear the Bsound. For Cap, you may be saying Ca_. I am wearing a Ca_ and youdon』 t hear the P sound. For bed, you may be saying Be_. I sleep ina Be_ and there is no D. For the word Plate, you may be sayingPla__. I eat on a Pla__ and you don』 t hear the T sound. Theproblem with your listeners is not hearing that last consonantsound and the person you』 re speaking with does nothear with the last sound is in your words. They』 ll consistently beguessing at what you』 ve trying to say. Therefore don』 t drop offthe endings. Make sure that the final sounds come through clearlyand fully. Don』 t shorten them. Let』s practise these followingsentences. Be aware not to drop the endings off. We』 re going onstarting with words ending with P.
I hope the group will sleep on theship.
The soda pop spilled out of the cup, over the map and ontoher lap.
Was the Egg Drop Soup cheap?
Very good. Now anothermistake that foreign speakers make is unvoicing a sound when itshould be voiced. For example, Job ends in a B, which is a voicedsound. Job. It』s not Jop with an unvoiced P. Keep the voicing goingthroughout the whole word. Job, with a voiced B ending. Same thingwith Robe, also has a voiced B ending. It』s not Rope with anunvoiced P. It』s Robe. OK? Let』s go over these sentences endingwith Bs.
We cleaned the cobweb from the doorknob near thebathtub.
Rob broke his golf club when he slipped on the icecube.
The crab was under the cement slab at the yacht club.
The ticket stub was found in the taxi cab.
Now T endings. Make sure the Ts comethrough clearly.
Kate left her cat on the mat as she flew a kite.
The sailboat came into the port to join the fleet.
What bait will make the fish bite? A cricket or a piece ofmeat?
Very good. Now also remember to add avoicing towards with D endings. Bed has a voiced Dending. It』s not Bet with an unvoiced T. It』s Bed with a voiced D.Road also has a voiced D ending. Road. It』s not Roat,unvoiced. It』sRoad. The whole word is voiced. Let』s go over these sentencesending with voiced Ds.
Fred will decide which sled should be painted red.
David tried to send a refund back to England.
He could not hide his report card behind the chalkboard.
Very good. Ok now let』s talk about EDEndings. Many verbs that are in the past tense end with ED. Forexample. Clean. Today I clean. Yesterday I cleaned. Now ED Endingshave similar rules as the S and Z endings that we discussed in thesecond session.
Here』s the first rule and probably you already do thiscorrectly. If a word ends in an unvoiced consonant, all we do isadd an unvoiced T. So let』s look at the word Jump, for example, thefinal sound in Jump is P, which is unvoiced. So when you put it inthe past tense, all you do is add a T, so Jump becomes JumpT withthe T sound at the end. Jumped. Of course the word is spelled withED Ending. It』s just pronunced as a T. Jumped, like that. The wordWalk, which has an unvoiced K sound at the end. Walk becomes walkT.Yesterday I walked.
Here』s the second rule. If a word ends in a voiced consonant,you add a voiced D. In other words, to keep the whole word voiced.So for example, the word Rub ends with the voiced B. Rub. Today Irub. Yesterday I rubD. All I did was add a voiced D sound at theend. Rubbed. It』s not Rubbet with the unvoiced T. It』 s Rubbed,like that. Here』s another example. Clean ends with a voiced N. Sotoday I clean. Yesterday I cleaned. I cleaned the kitchen. Pourbecomes PourD. I poured the milk. Scrub becomes scrubD. I scrubbedthe floor. Tag becomes TaggD. I tagged the clothing. Spill endswith the voiced L sound, spill, so becomes SpillD. I spilled thejuice. Trim becomes TrimmD. I trimmed the tree. Move has thatvoiced V sound. Move. So it becomes moved. I moved to California.Buzz becomes BuzzD. The clock buzzed all night. Ok. So that』s thesecond rule.
Here is the third rule. If a word ends in a T or a D sound.We add the ending ID which is a vowel I followed by a D, which isvoiced. ID. So, for example, the word Lift. Lift ends with anunvoiced T. Lift. So today I lift the ball. Yesterday IliftID(lifted) the ball. Lift becomes Lifted. And remember in thethird session we talked about when a T falls between two vowelsturns into a D, like in the word Water. Water becomes Wader.Remember that? Well, the same thing happens here when a T comesbetween two vowels. So look at this next word Heat. The verb toheat becomes Heated. I heated up my dinner. Vote becomes VotID. Hevoted this morning. Hand becomes HandID. He handed me his report.Trade becomes TradID. I traded in my old car. Add becomes AddID.She added some information. Ok, now let』s go over these exerciseswith ED Endings. You』 ll notice that I put a line under all theendings that are voiced to help you remember to add voicing. Herewe go.
Bob raked the leaves and then started to wash his car.He then loaded up the dishwasher and finished washing hisdishes.
Susan spilled her drink on the spottedrug.
She cleaned it up with a napkin, which wasted alot of time.
He thanked me and offered me money, if I picked up theused equipment.
Very good. Ok now let』 s talk about words that end in NG.Some people who speak English as a second language have gone intothe bad habbit of adding a K release sound /k/, like that, after NGEnding. For example, in the word Ring, it becomesRingK(×). The word Walking becomesWorkingK(×). The word Talking becomesTalkingK, /k/ like that. That is not right. The problem is there』 sjust this little/k/ K sound at the end of the ING sound. Don』 t dothis. It is not right and it does not sound good. Let』s talk aboutthe NG sound. There are three nasal sounds in English. Nasal soundsare sounds which come out of your nose. Those three nasal soundsare M/m/,N/n/,NG [?], like that. Let meshow you something. Try to say the M sound /m/ while closing offyour nose. You see you can not do it. Because the M sound comes outof your nose. It』s the nasal sound. Same thing with the NGsound-- [?]-- comes out of your nose. It』sa combination of a N and a G and it』s found at the ends of words,like Ring and Sing. And I want you to realize that there』s not a/k/ K sound. There』s not a K sound. The word is not Walking/k/.It』s Walking [?] with that NG Ending, Ok?Walking. Let』s practise these sentences with NG Endings. Here wego.
I have a feeling that she is working too much.
She has been wearing a hearing aid so that she couldsing.
He is looking forward to speaking at the Thanksgivingcelebration.
Very good. Well, that isfor today』s session. I hope that you』 ve been enjoying this programso far and I』 ll be getting to know some improvements in the wayyou』 re speaking English. I』 ll bet you』 re sounding much betteralready. Have fun practising those ending sounds and I』 ll see youat the next session. I』 m Paul Gruber with Pronunciation Workshop.Good bye!
Session Seven
1. CH sound
2. The American J sound (DG)
3. Consonant H
Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Seventh Training Session. In thissession, we will cover the CH sound[?]and the American J sound[?] and thenlater on the H sound/h/.
Ok, first let』 s start with CH. It』 s a common sound inEnglish. It』s a combination of the T sound/t/ and the SH sound[?]. When youput these two sounds together, you get a[?]. It』s anunvoiced sound. You can hear the sound, for example, at thebeginning and at the end of the word Church. Church. See that. Nowif you take this CH sound and you keep everything in your mouth thesame, you just add voicing. It becomes an American J sound[?]. CH[?],unvoiced. J, voiced. You see that everything here stays the same.You just add voicing for the J. This voiced J sound comes at thebeginning and at the end of the word Judge. Now the mistake thatmany foreign speakers make is that they unvoice the J sound at theend of a word. So, for example, many foreign speakers wouldpronunce the word Judge as Juch, turning that last sound into anunvoiced CH. Juch . And that is not right. The J sound in AmericanEnglish is always voiced[?] Judge,like that. For you Spanish speakers whenever you say the letter Jin English, it always make this[?] sound.It』s never a Y sound. Never. So, for example, the word Job hasthe [?]at the beginning. Job. It』 s never Yob, my Yob. It』 s always myjob, with the strong J sound. Job, my Job, like that. Ok, let』 s dosome practice. Let』 s start with some CH words. First with CH atthe beginning of a word. Here we go.
China
Cherry
Charge
Chocolate
Challenge
Cheese
Chunk
Chairman
Now with CH fallen in the middle.
Key chain
Lunch box
Richard
Picture (That』s a tricky one. It has two syllables. Youpronounce it pic-ture,picture)
Teacher
Fortune
Nature
Beach ball
Now with CH at the ends of words.
Detach
Teach
Porch
March
Patch
Wrench (notice the strong R sound at the beginning of thatword .Wrench)
Coach
Approach(also with the strong R sound,approach)
Very good. Let』stry this exercise.
Chop-chop, children, it』s Charlie』s Kitchenadventure!
Today, Chuck will be teaching future champion cooks how tomake a chocolate cheesecake.
Very good. Ok, now let』s practise wordswith the voiced American J sound. We』 ll start with the J sound atthe beginning of words. Keep in mind that these sounds can bespelled with both the letter J or the letter G. Here we go.
Juice
Jump
Juggle
Jury
Japan
Giant
Genetic
Junior
Generate
German
Now in the middle ofwords.
Algebra
Legend
Magic
Subject
Digest
Rejoice
Objective
Majesty
Educate (That has also an unusual pronunciation. Let me breakit down for you. e-du -cate,deucate)
Next one suggestion. (This one also a bittricky.sug-gestion,suggestion.)
Very good. Now theAmerican J sound at the ends of words. Be sure to keep the voicinggoing through the whole word.
Age( It』s not Ach. It』 s Age, with voiced ending)
College
Postage
Stage
Pledge
Village
Average
Page
Courage
Knowledge
.
Very good. Now this paragraph coming up is filled withAmerican J sounds. Don』 t forget to voice these endings. Here wego.
A German judge and jury have charged and jailed a strangegiant, who sat on the edge of a bridge throwing jelly onto largebarges.
Very good.
You know , later on in this course. You』 ll get a lot morepractice using these sounds in connected speech. But for now, I』 dlike to cover H sounds when they come at the beginning of words.When an H is at the beginning of a word. It is pronunced with thestrong loud air stream. You should first breathing and then loudlyout. /h/, like that. Now is the vowel A, HHHA,HHHA. Did you hear that sound? Now this may notpertain to you, but many foreign speakers tend to drop that airsound when a word begins with the letter H. For example, instead ofsaying the word Hand. They would say _and, like my right _and. Bynot putting in that H sound with the loud airstream, your speechcan be very difficult to understand. Let』 s practise some of thesewords beginning with an H. You may want to put your hand in frontof your mouth for this exercise. You should be able to feel theairstream come out onto the palm of your hand. /h/, likethat.
Note that some words in English that begin with the letter Ware also pronunced just like an H. Here we go.
Hand
Hide
Hope
Hair
House
Harvard
Honey
Happy
Who
Whole
Let』 s go over some of these words pairs. The first word inthe pair does not have an H sound. The second word does have an Hsound. Here we go. Repeat after me.
Old- Hold
Is- His
It- Hit
At- Hat
Arm- Harm
Ill- Hill
Ate- Hate
As- Has
Now try these words with the strong Hsound in the middle.
Ahead
Behave
Anyhow
Inhale
Downhill
Dehydrate
Wholehearted
Overhaul
Now, let』s do these Hpractice sentences using the word He for each of these sentences.You』 ll be using the same opening phrase. Focus on clear and loud Hsound in the word He.
He thought that he should…
Wash the car.
Thank his teacher.
Watch television.
Use the telephone.
Shut the door.
Breathe deeply. (Voiced TH)
Tell the truth.
Good. Ok now let』 s try this.
Henry the hungry hippo, who hogged a huge heap of one hundredhamburgers, has had hiccups for one whole week.
Very good. Ok, before weend today』 s session. Let』 s talk about how you』 re supposed toincorporate all this material that I』 m giving you into your spokenEnglish.
As you』 ve seen there』 s a lot I』 mteaching you and a lot to remember. Don』 t try so hard to puteverything into use. Instead, just focus on what it is you』 resaying. You』 ll find by taking this program the more you speakEnglish, the more you』 ll become aware of when you have pronuncedsomething incorrectly. I』 ve said this before. It is this theawareness of your mistakes that will eventually help you to changeand improve the way you』 re speaking automatically. So I want youto keep on practising, but just sit back and relax and watch yourEnglish pronunciation continues to improve. I hope you had a goodtime. I』 m Paul Gruber for the Pronunciation Workshop and I』 ll seeyou at the next session. We』 re going to begin working onVowels.
Session Eight
1. American English Vowels
2. Vowel EE
3. Vowel I
Hi, and welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and thisis the Pronunciation Workshops---Eighth Training Session. Today, wewill begin to work on Vowel Sounds. I know that vowel sounds areoften difficult for non-native speakers. One reason is that thereare five vowel letters in English: A E I O and U. But there arearound 15 vowel sounds and some vowels have as many as 10 differentspellings. So that』s why it is so difficult. When some one learnsEnglish as a second language what they often do is substitute vowelsounds from their first language into their newly learned English.And when these vowel sounds are spoken incorrectly, it may oftencause you to be misundrestood. That』 s why I need next fewsessions. I』 ll be teaching you the correct way to pronunceAmerican English Vowels.
Now, vowel sounds are made by slightly changing the Size,Shape and the Tension of the musles in your mouth, your tongue andyour lips. A small change can produce an entirely different sound.Instead of giving you diagrams of tongueplacement---how round your lips should be or how far you shouldopen your mouth. I believe the best way to learn American vowels isby Ear Training. Ear Training is learning vowel sounds just bylistening and then reproducing them on your own.
To help teach you the American vowel sounds, I』 ll separatethem to two groups: front vowels and back vowels. When your tonguerises up in the front, it』 s a front vowel. When your tongue risesup in the back, it』 s a back vowel. Let』 s start by going over thebasic front and back vowel sounds. My goal right now is to justhave you hear the sounds. You do not need to memorize this.
First,front vowels. Listen carefully. Don』 t repeat. Justlisten. These sounds move from what I call high to low. Herewe go.
EE
I
AE
EH
A
Notice with each of these vowels. My jaw is opening a littlebit more and more. Let』 s do it again. Listen carefully. EE, i(which is a difficult one for many people) i, AE, EH, A. Now, thistime I』 d like you to repeat. EE, i, AE, EH, A. EE, i, AE, EH, A.Now, I put them in word forms to make it a little bit easier.Repeat after me.
EE as in Heat
i as in Hit
AE as in Hate
EH as in Het (which is a nonsense word)
And A as in Hat
Heat, Hit, Hate, Het, Hat, Heat, Hit,Hate,Het,Hat.
Ok. Now let』 s do back vowels. Again,vowel sounds move from high to low. Here we go.
OO
Uh
Oh
Aw
Ah
Again.and notice how my jaw is opening on each one and also noticehow my lips are coming forward all the way on the OO sound. Yousee? That OO. OO, Uh, Oh, Aw, Ah. Ok now repeat with me. OO, Uh,Oh, Aw, Ah, OO, Uh, Oh, Aw, Ah. Let』 s put these sounds into wordforms.
OO as in Boot
Uh as in Book
Oh as in Boat
Aw as in Bought
Ah as in Bot (which is a nonsense word)
Boot, Book, Boat, Bought, Bot. Again . Boot, Book, Boat,Bought, Bot. Boo_, Boo_, Boa_, Bough_, Bo_.
Very good. Now, let』s go back a little bit to front vowels.I』 d like to address the EE sound in the word Heat and the i soundas in the word Hit. Most of the foreign speakers that I work withmake many errors with these two sounds. And many times they』 reswitched when the word should have an EE. It』s pronunced as an i.When it should have an i. It』s pronunced as an EE. Think of thesound EE as in Heat as being high up and i as in Hit. It』 s being alittle bit lower. One hint that I would give you is when you』 repractising raise your eyebrows with EE words, like this Heat, andthen lower your eyebrows and don』 t smile so much with i words,like Hit, Heat, Hit, like that. I put together some paired wordswith these two sounds. Listen, compare the vowel sounds and thenrepeat them back. Here we go.
Heat – Hit
Keen – Kin
Deal – Dill
Seek – Sick
Seen – Sin
Reap – Rip
Teal – Till
Bean –Been (Bean is high. I ate a bean. Been is low. I havebeen here.)
Let』 s talk about these last two words.Bean and Been. Most of the time in English when a word is spelledwith double E. It』 s pronunced as EE like in the word FEED or SEENor TEEN with the double E. However, in English, here is anexception. The word BEAN spelled B-E-A-N, which you eat ispronunced with the high EE sound, BEAN. However, this word B-E-E-N,spelled with the double E is pronunced with the low i sound. BEEN,like in the word Hit. Ok. Even though it』s spelled with the doubleE, it』s pronunced with the vowel sound i. So for example, thissentence reads I』 ve been buying beans. Ok? We』 ll be going overmore of these this moment. But first, let』s look at some words withthe EE sounds, remember smile and think high.
See
Me
Each
Even
Key
Green
Tree
Very
Happy
Softly
Mary
Busy
Finally
Country
Now, these sentences.
Speeding on the Freeway
Happily eating cheese
He and She
Skiing very Rapidly
Very good. Ok, now let』 s try this paragraph.
She sees a monkey eating honey.
We see a pony stealing money.
Who can he see?
It must be me!
Very good, Ok now let』 s work on the ivowel sound. The same sound as in the word Hit. Hit. Repeat afterme.
Bit
Bill
Lift
Fizz
Kitchen
Build
Bigger
Chimp
Fifth
Listen
Business
Fist
Display
Filming
Live
Fish
Discuss
Fig
Fifty
Been
Ok, now let』 s go over these practicesentences which have both the EE sound and the i sound. Listen andrepeat these sentences after me. I』 ll be putting my hand up highfor every EE sound and lower it for every i sound. EE, i, likethat. And also all the words with EE sounds are underlined. Here wego.
The beans have been cooking since six o』clock.
Sit in that seat by the window.
We ate our meal, by the mill.
The seal will live in the ocean.
Tim』s team grinned after seeing the greenfield.
Pip and Pete shipped the sheep cheaply.
Those bins are for Bill』s beans.
Does Jim still steal Jill』s jeans?
The girls put concrete on Jill』ssneakers.
Pick cherries at their peak or you willeat the pits.
Very good. Now I know these vowels can bevery tricky. It』 s probably a good idea to review this video a fewtimes. Some of you may have noticed that you』 ve been mispronuncingmany words incorrectly using wrong vowel sounds. For example,eariler we spoke about the pronunciation of the words Heat and Hitand how the sounds are often switched. So if you say 「He hit thebaseball and felt the heat.」 I want you to realize that that』 s notright. What correct is He hit the baseball and felt theheat.
Ok, so keep on practicing. Believe me you』ll eventually get very good at this. Thanks for watching. I』 m PaulGruber for the Pronunciation Workshop and I』 ll see you at our nextsession.
Session Nine
1. Vowel O
2. Vowel AE
Hi, and welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and thisis the Pronunciation Workshops---Nineth Training Session. I hopethings have been going well. Today we would be addressing the Ohandthe AE vowel sounds. Also, most foreign speakers do not know how tocorrectly pronunce the 50 American States. In fact, many times whennone-native speakers try to name the states, they』 re noteven close to how they』 re supposed to sound. Thereforein today』 s session, I』 m going to show you how to correctlypronunce all 50 of the United States. Hopefully this willcome in very handy.
Let』 s get started . let』 s begin with the American O sound.Many foreign speakers do not pronunce the American O correctly andvery often the O sounds like an AH. So, for example, the word Opensounds like Apen and there』 s no such word that people may notunderstand you. So let me teach you how to properly pronunce the O.First thing that I』 d like to talk about is what Icall the Hidden W. I have found this to be the best way to teachforeign speakers how to pronunce the O sound correctly. When anAmerican speaker makes an O, we end the vowel with a small 「w」sound. Watch this. O---www.OOO. You notice how my lips are all theway forward and the front of my lips are opening and closing likethe front of a trumpt. Owww. You hear that little w sound inthere like wo wo wo. That』 s what you need to make a good O sound.Owowowo. It』s a little hidden w at the very end.
Now another way you can approach this is to bring your lipsforward, use a strong w and say the word We, like that. Now, put anO in front of it and connect the two. O-Wee. Now , you』 ve donethat. Now just drop the EE vowel. O-W and you got a perfect O soundO-W. So now when you wanna say this word Open you』 re not sayingApen with an AH. You』 re using that hidden w. You』 re bringing yourlips forward and you』 re saying Owpen. Owpen,like that. So let』 s practise some of those words with the O sound.Repeat after me. Let』s start with Open.
Open
Oatmeal
Blown
Bold
Owner
Phone
Cold
Robe(Remenber to bring your lips forward on that R,robe ,verygood)
Coach
Rotate
Loan
Slow
Road
Roam
Now let』 s do some sentences.
How did you know that?
I don』t know where the hole is on the coat.
Does Joe know how to drive on the road?
I need to blow my nose when I have a cold.
Has it ever snowed in Rhode Island?
Ok,now try this.
Cold winds will slowly blow snow over most of Ohio.
This low is no joke. So folks, don』t go out withoutcoats!
Very good. Now, I wannatell you about two words that you』 re probably saying wrong. Andthese words are Woke and Won』 t. Most foreign speakers mispronuncethese two words. Instead of saying Woke, when they say it soundslike Walk. So instead of saying I just woke up. It sounds like Ijust walk up and that is not good. And instead of saying the wordWon』 t. It sounds like they』 re saying Want. So instead of saying Iwon』 t go. It sounds like they』 re saying I want go. So it soundslike you want go when you actually saying you won』 t go. So listencarefully because I』 m about to give you great information on howto say these words correctly and you』 re not going to learn thisanywhere else. Here we go. If you were riding a horse and you wantthe horse to stop or to slow down. If you remember wordtaught to say Whoa, Whoa, right? Now watch my mouth when Isay that Whoaw. There』s a W sound at the beginning ofthat but there』 s also a hidden w sound at the end.Whoaw and my mouth is also very forward and tight.Whoaw.Whoaw.Whoaw.Whoaw . Right? Saywith me, Whoaw. That is exactly the sound you need tomake to say the words Woke and Won』t correctly. So here』 s what youdo is to say the word Woke. First, say Whoaw with the wsound at the beginning and the end and then you just add theK sound /k/. Whoaw+K, like that. Put it together andyou』 ve got Whoaw k Whoawk. I just woke up, like that. Very good. Now Won』 t. First sayWhoaw with the w sound at the beginning and at the endand then you add nt Whoaw nt. Now you put it together.Whoa + nt . I won』 t go, like that, won』 t. Let』 s practise theseexercises comparing the words Want, Woke and Won』 t.
I want the ball.
I won』t give you the ball.
She wants to sleep.
She woke up.
He wants to buy a car.
He won』t buy a car.
They want to speak with you.
He won』t speak with you.
Very good. Ok, now let』 s work on Asounds. If you listen carefully, you will hear that this sound is acombination of two vowel sounds. You start with an A and then youglide up to an E. A—E, A—E. Notice how my mouth also closes alittle bit at the end of the vowel A—E. And notice it』 snot[ ? ]as in Egg. It』s not the[? ] sound.It』s A-E A-E, as in Age. Think high. It』 s a high vowel. Ok, let』 sgo over some of these words. Here we go.
Age
Aid
Eight
Able
Chain
Date
Eighteen
Fake
Lazy
Made
Baby
Gain
Change
Gave
Nation
Day
Paper
Angel
Basic
Face
Ok, now let』s try these sentences.
The ape gave the trainer a cane.
David began shaving when he was eighteen.
The rainbow appeared when daylight changed.
The baby snake lived in a painted cage.
My neighbors basement was changed from blue to beige.
Hey, take away the strain! Weigh the gains of a great breakwith Lazy
Day Vacations. Lines are open eight till late. They aim tomake your day!
Very good. You know by improving you O and A vowel sounds. Itwill really make a huge difference in your speech and people willhave a much easier time understanding you.
Ok, now for something new. How to pronunce the names of the50 American States. Many of my clients have often asked me to helpthem out and provide them with correct pronunciation. So I thoughtthis may be helpful for you as well. The names of many States aredifficult to pronunce, especially the ones with R and L sounds inthem.
When saying then, if you say an R. Don』 t forget to usestrong R sounds and if say an L, don』 t forget to use strong Lsounds with your tongue tip rising up in the front, right behindyour teeth. L, like that. Ok? You』 ll notice that there』 s a lineunder the syllable in each State which receives the most stress tomake it a little bit easier for you to pronunce. Ok, let』 s go.These States are in alphabetical order. Repeat after me.
Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming
Very good. Now as you know, the UnitedStates is a large country and each state is unique and has a lot tooffer. If you haven』 t done much traveling yet in the UnitedStates, I hope someday you』 ll get to see how beautiful thiscountry really is. Well, that』 s it for today. Now, go on practiseand please feel free to review today』 s session again if you like.Thank you for watching. I』 m Paul Gruber for the PronunciationWorkshop and I』 ll see you at our next session. Goodbye!
Session Ten
1. Vowel OO
2. Vowel UH
3. Vowel EH
Hi, and welcome back. Againmy name is Paul Gruber and this is the PronunciationWorkshops---Tenth Training Session. Today, we』 ll work on morevowel sounds. The vowels OO, Uh and EH. Now, a few sessions ago, wediscussed front and back vowels. If you remember the back vowels wediscussed were OO, Uh, Oh, Au and Ah. OO as in Boot. Uh as in Book.Oh as in Boat. Aw as in Bought and Ah as in Bot(which is a nonsenseword)
So, let』 s talk about the first one now.OO, OO. The OO sound is in the word Move. Notice how my lipsare parked tight and forward OO. Wove. If you don』 tbring your lips tight and forward you』 re not going to make thecorrect sound and if you don』 t do this right, the OO will soundlike [ ? ] and Move willsound like [ m?v ]. And that is no good.Practise these words with me, making sure your lips are comingforward and that you』 re getting that clear OO sound. Here wego.
Blue
Booth
News
Juice
Loosen
Ruler
Food
Choose
Mood
Moving
Loop
Knew
Tooth
Smooth
Pool
Moon
Shoes
Zoo
Grew
Room
Ok, now let』s go over these sentences.
The room in the school was very cool.
Tuesday at noon in the studio.
Viewing the moon on June nights.
Do you remember the woman who lived in a shoe?
She hadn』t a clue what to do when her family grew.
Well, through your help, they are moving in June into two bigboots.
Very good. Now at timesyou know English pronunciation can be very confusing. Here is oneof those times. There are many words that are spelled with thedouble O. As we just went over and in most of these words, thevowels are pronunced as OO. However, here』 s the confusing part.There are also many words that are spelled with the double O. Butthere』 re not pronunced with the OO vowel. They』 re pronunced as Uhwhich is a lower vowel. Let me show you . the word Food has adouble OO and it』 s pronunced as OO-Food. Ok? But the word Foot isalso spelled with the double OO. But it is pronunced with a lowervowel sound Uh. Food. Foot. Foot. OO. Uh. Food. Foot. You hearthat. There』 re whole bunches of words spelled with that double OObut are pronunced with that lower vowel Oh. Let』 s practise some ofthose words now. Here we go.
Foot
Took
Cook
Shook
Stood
Good
Look
Book
Wool
Swoosh
Very good. Now, another word thatgives many foreign speakers difficulty is the word Woodregardlessly the spelling as in 「it』s made of wood.」 or 「Would youhelp me?」 Or 「The city of Hollywood California」. The vowel sound inWood is also a lower vowel same sound is in the word Foot. Wood.Foot. What makes it difficult for many people is the 「w」 at thebeginning. I』 ve seen many foreign speakeres just drop that Wsound. The Wood is not _ood without the 「w」. It』s Wood. Your lipsneed to be tight and forward and you need to push out that 「w」sound. Wood, like that. Now, say this sentence with me. Here wego.
Would you please ordre the wood from Hollywood?
Very good. Ok, notice also that the wordGood has the same vowel sound as the word Would and Foot. Verygood. Ok . Let』 s practise these sentences with the OO and the Uhvowel sounds. To help you out all the words that have a high OOsounds appear in red. Here we go.
He took a good look under thehood and found a flute.
Julie enjoys good books after school.
He put his foot in the new boot.
She took her students to the brook to washtheir shoes.
We pulled him out of the swimming pool.
The fool ate until he was full.
Verygood. Now let』 s do a new vowel sound. Let』 s cover the EH sound.EH is in the word Egg. Ok ? It』 s made with the front of the tonguelow. Listen carefully and try to copy that sound EH EH Egg Egg. Ok?Let』s go over some words with that sound in them. Here wego.
Egg
Get
Friend
Next
Entrance
Better
Healthy
Lettuce
Wrench
Spread
Best
Ready
Every
Red
Exit
Check
Fence
Headset
Necklace
Wealth
Now, let』 s go over thesesentences.
Resting on the edge of the bed.
Ten letters from the enemy.
Dennis will enter the festival.
The message was given to the chef.
Very good. Ok, now let』s try this.
Hello again, friends! Let』s do a weather check. Well, whoeversaid temperatures are getting better, better get ready to spend awet weekend in Tennessee.
Great. You know generally nowels take alonger time to master. But if you hear the sounds I』 m giving youand understand the concepts eventually you』 ll be saying all ofthese vowels correctly. Remember . Practising does help. Well,that』 s it for today』 s session. Thanks forwatching and I』 ll see you next time and I』 m Paul Gruber forPronunciation Workshop.
Session Eleven
1. Vowel AU as in Out
2. Vowel AH as in Top
3. Vowel A as in Hat
Hi, and welcome back. Again my nameis Paul Gruber and this is the Pronunciation Workshops---EleventhTraining Session. Today we will work on three vowel sounds. A as inHat. Au as in Out and AH as in Top. Ok, the firstvowel sound that I want to address is A as in Hat. It is the lastfront vowel. You may remember the front vowels that we went over.EE, i, AE, EH and A. Well, that last sound A as in Hat. That』 s thesound we』 re covering today. Listen carefully. It』s not AH. It』s A.Hat. Your mouth has to be wide open. Listen very carefully andpractise these words with me.
Back
Dad
Fax
Value
Sat
Hatch
Jacket
Taxi
Apple
Catch
Rabbit
Tack
Ok, now try these sentences.
The fat cat wore a jacket.
Pack your sack and bring your magnet.
He sang about an actor named Jack.
Very good. Now the next vowel sound thatwe』 re going to cover is a little bit more tricky. It』 s the AUsound, as in the word Out or the word Downtown. Many Asian speakershave difficulty with this sound. In order to say correctly, whenyou begin the sound, you start it with the sound that we just wentover. A as in Hat. That A sound is what begins the AU sound. Youthen move your mouth forward and you close the sound sort of on theW. AAAAWWW , AAAAWWW . Did you hear that? Itstarts with A but then moves forward. AU. Let』s look at this word.Downtown. First of all, it』 s not DonTan, which you may be saying,especially if you』 re from China. To correctly say this sound withproper pronunciation. Here』 s the trick. You have to make believethe vowel begins with the A sound as in Hat. Once you have thatsound, then you close it. AU.Daaa wn. Ta Taaa wn, like that. Yousee if you don』 t begin the vowel with the A sound in Hat. You』 llnever say it correctly. Ok, now the whole word. Downtown. Withpractice, you』 ll be able to say these sounds perfectly. You justhave to remember that even though Down and other words like it arespelled with an O, you still attack the vowel withthat A sound as in Hat. Downtown, like that. Let』 s practise thesewords slowly and as you』 re saying them. Keep that A sound in theback of your mind.
Now
House
Round
Loud
Gown
Sound
Ouch
Out
Found
South
Ounce
Rebound
Mouth
Bounce
Flower
Thousand
Spout
Count
Ok, now try these sentences.
The brown couch is downstairs.
Her house is on the South side of the mountain.
I was proud of the sounds that came out of my mouth.
If these vowel sounds strange to you, justlisten when American speakers talk and you』 ll start to notice thatis exactly how we pronunce our words.
Ok, new topic. How to pronunce the wordsAre and Our. You may not have known that there』 s a pronunciationdifference between these two words. Because many people pronunceAre and Our exactly the same. This is not correct however. Let meshow you how to pronunce these words correctly. The first word Arehas a strong R sound at the end. AR. Are you going? The second wordOur has that AU sound like in the word Out and it sorts ofhas a hidden w in the middle AU-Wer. Think of the word Our ashaving two syllables. One two. AU-Wer, like that. Our car is overthere. Also, while we』 re on the subject. Know the word Hour thatis used for telling time is pronunced exactly the same way as in「Our meeting is in one hour.」
Ok, let』 s practise thesesentences.
Are you going to our house?
Sales are down, but our projections for next year are verygood.
Our plans will be changing in the next hour.
Are you sure that our meeting will be an hour late?
Very good. Ok, here is another example ofwhen English pronunciation can become very confusing. Do you knowthat there are words in English that are spelled with an O but arepronunced as AH. So even though these words that I』 m about to showyou all spelled with an O, we pronunce all of these vowels with anAH. Here we go.
Hot .You see, it』 s not hot. [? ]. It』 s[ ?/а ]Hot.
Top
Stop
Probably
Follow
Not
Blob
Sock
Mop
Product
Solve
Problem
Ok, let』 s practise these sentences. Notethat I put a line under all the words which having AHsound.
Bob opened the box and followed theinstructions.
Tom put some cotton, rocks and adoorknob in his locker.
My mom made a concrete model of ahockey rink.
Very good. You may wanna watch thissession again, especially the part when I talked about the au soundin words like Downtown. Ok? Now go practising and I』 ll see you atour next session. I』 m Paul Gruber for the Pronunciation Workshop.Good bye!
Session Twelve
1.Tongue twisters
Hi, and welcome back. Again, my name is Paul Gruber and we』vemade to the pronunciation workshops---Twelveth Training Session. Ihope that you』 ve begun to notice some really good improvements inyour speech. I also hope that these sessions have been giving you abit more confidence when you speak English. Today, we』 re gonnahave some fun, we will work with English Tongue Twisters. Tonguetwisters can be found in almost all languages. They are sequencesof words and phrases which are difficult to pronunce because theyhave many different consonant sounds with very slight variations.There are a lot of fun in their perfect for practising some of thelearned techniques we have covered in this program. Tongue twisterscan be very tricky. They will force you to concentrate even harderon some of the new sounds that you are learning. I』 ll give them toyou both slowly and then a little faster. Listen carefully to mypronunciation, then pause the video and then repeat themback.
Ok. This first one is called Fuzzy Wuzzy.In this tongue twister, we』 re addressing F sounds /f/, W sounds/w/ as well as voiced Z sounds/z/. All the voiced Z sounds areunderlined to help you out a little bit. Here we go.
Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear,
Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair.
Fuzzy Wuzzy wasn』t fuzzy, was he?
Very good. Ok now pause the video here and practise it back.Now, I』 m going to give you the same thing a little bit faster.Here we go.
Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear,
Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair.
Fuzzy Wuzzy wasn』t fuzzy, was he?
Very good.
Ok, this next one has many voiced V sounds/v/. V sounds. Don』 t forget to bite your lower lip and feel thatvibration when you make this sound/v/, like that. First slow. Herewe go.
Vincent vowed vengeance very viciously.
Now, a little bit faster.
Vincent vowed vengeance very viciously.
Good. This next one is called Peter Piper. It』s one of themore famous tongue twisters. You may heard this one before. Thereare many P sounds. Before I begin, note the L sound in the wordPickled. Don』 t forget to bring your tongue up on that L. Keep yourjaw open /l/, like that. Ok? Here we go.
Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
How many peppers did Peter Piper pick?
Ok. Pause the video here and then repeat it back. Ok, now I』m gonna do Peter Piper this time a little faster.
Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
How many peppers did Peter Piper pick?
Very good. Ok, this nexttongue twister』 s also well-known. It contains SHsounds[?], S sounds /s/ as well as voiced Z sounds /z/. Also notice the EEvowel sounds in the word Seashore and She. It』 s notshe[ ? ].It』 s She[ ? ] with that high EE vowelsound. Ok ? Also remember the word Sure and Surely are bothpronunced with that American SHsound[?].Ok. Here we go.
She sells seashells by the seashore.
The shells she sells are surely seashells.
So if she sells shells on the seashore,
I』m sure she sells seashore shells.
Very good. I』 ll say that again a littlefaster now.
She sells seashells by the seashore.
The shells she sells are surely seashells.
So if she sells shells on the seashore,
I』m sure she sells seashore shells.
Ok, this next one has many W sounds/w/,many CH sounds[?] as wellas many final consonant sounds. Do not forget to bring your lipsforward on the word Wood. Keep it tight. Wood. Here we go.
How much wood, would a woodchuck chuck,
If a woodchuck could chuck wood?
He would chuck, he would, as much as he could,
And chuck as much wood as a woodchuck would
If a woodchuck could chuck wood.
Very good. Ok, let』 s do that a little faster now.
How much wood, would a woodchuck chuck,
If a woodchuck could chuck wood?
He would chuck, he would, as much as he could,
And chuck as much wood as a woodchuck would
If a woodchuck could chuck wood.
Very good. Ok. Here are a few tonguetwisters to give you practice with W sounds. Here we go.
Which witch, wished which wicked wish?
That』 s a tough one. Let』 s do that again a little faster.Notice how my lips are coming tightly forward very quickly for eachof those W words. Here we go.
Which witch, wished which wicked wish?
Here』 s another one with W words.
While we were walking, we were watching window washerswash
Washington』s windows with warm washing water.
Notice how my lips are moving on the phrase「We Were」, 「We Were」. My lips are coming quickly forward on thosewords to creat clear W sounds, 「We Were」, like that. Let』 s do thatwhole thing again a little faster.
While we were walking, we were watching window washerswash
Washington』s windows with warm washing water.
I love that one. Ok. Here is anotherone.
If two witches would watch two watches, which witch wouldwatch which watch?
That』 s another very good one. Here it isa litter bit faster.
If two witches would watch two watches, which witch wouldwatch which watch?
Very good. This next one is great topractise your R sounds, like the W sounds we just covered. Makesure your lips are coming forward for each R word. Here wego.
Roberta ran rings around the Roman ruins.
Let』 s do that a little faster.
Roberta ran rings around the Roman ruins.
Very good. This next one is a little bit tricky. It』 s a goodpractice for BR and BL blends. Also, do not forget the TH in theword Bath, Brush. Here we go.
Bradley』s big black bath brush broke.
Bradley』s big black bath brush broke.
Let』 s do that a little bit faster.
Bradley』s big black bath brush broke.
Bradley』s big black bath brush broke.
Very good. Ok. Here are a few tonguetwisters with the TH sounds. All I can say about this is don』 tforget to stick your tongue out between your teeth and be sure tomake a loud air friction sound[θ], likethat. Ok, here we go.
Tom threw Tim thirteen thumbtacks.
He threw three free throws. A free throw is a basketballterm. A free throw.
There are thirty-three thousand birthdays on the third ofevery month.
In this next one remember that the Smoothis an exception that ends with voiced TH sound. Smooth.[e].
The father gathered smooth feathers for Thanksgiving.
The sixth graders are enthusiastic about Jonathan』sbirthday.
This next one has Gr and Gl blends. Remember to bring yourlips forward on the Grs and bring your tongue up on the Gl/gl/,like that. Ok, you ready. Here we go.
Green glass globes glow greenly.
Very good. This next one has only two words in it but it canbe very tricky. It will ready get your mouth going. It has the OOvowel sound as well as a lot of the Ls. Here we go.
Aluminum
Linoleum
Here』 s it faster.
Aluminum
Linoleum
I wanna in case you wondering ,Linoleum is a washable floor covering. It』 s often used forflooring in kitchens.
Ok, in this next one the last word is Won』t. Did you remember what I told you about saying Won』 t correctlywith the hidden w. Remember first say Whoawwhoaw with the w at the beginning and at the end andthen add the nt. Keep your lips and mouth forward. Won』t, likethat. Won』 t.
I would if I could! But I can』t, so I won』t!
Let』 s try that again.
I would if I could! But I can』t, so I won』t!
Very good. Ok, we』 ve come to the lastexercise. This last one has the word Woke. Remember what I told youabout Woke. It』 s just like the word Won』 t with that hidden w. Youfirst say Whoaw with the w at the beginning and the endand then you add a K. Whoaw +K ,Woke, like that.
I woke, he woke, she woke, they woke.
We all woke up.
Now, a little bit faster.
I woke, he woke, she woke, they woke.
We all woke up.
Very good. Very good.
Ok, well, we』 ve made to the end. I hopeyou thought this was fun and at the same time productive. Thank youfor watching and I』 ll see you next time. I』 m Paul Gruber for thePronunciation Workshop. Good bye!
Session Thirteen
1. Phrase Reductions
2. Intonation Phrase
Hi, and welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and thisis the Pronunciation Workshops---Thirteenth Training Session. Inthis session, we will cover Phrase Reductions and Intonation. Ok,what do I mean by Phrase Reductions, well, in conversationalEnglish, words are often broken down or not fullypronunciated. Two and three words are sometimes squeezedtogether to creat easy-to-say phrases. I』 ll show you what I mean.Look at this phrase. Going to try. When we reduce the phrase. Itbecomes Gonna try. All we do is combine the words. I』 m gonna tryto finish this book. Repeat with me. Gonna try. 「Want to eat」becomes 「Wanna eat」. Do you wanna eat at 7 O』clock. Repeat with me.Wanna eat? 「Have to start」 becomes 「Hafta start」. I really haftastart studing for that text. Repeat. Hafta start. 「Has to try」becomes 「Hasta try」. He hasta try harder. Repeat. Hasta try. 「Gotto leave」 becomes 「Gotta leave」. I reallygotta leave in fifteen minutes. Repeat. Gotta leave. 「Ought tobelieve」 becomes 「oughta believe」. She really oughta believewhat he is saying. Repeat. Oughta believe.「Out of bed」 becomes 「outa bed」.I got outa bedwhen I heard the alarm clock. Repeat. Outa bed.
「Did you go」 becomes 「Didja go」. Didja go to the store?Repeat. Didja go. 「Would he help」 becomes 「Woody help」. Woody helpme move the furniture? Repeat. Woody help. 「Won』t you play」 becomes「Woncha play」. And don』 t forget about that correct O sound in theword Won』 t. Woncha play one more song on the piano?Repeat. Woncha play. 「Didn』t you know」becomes「Didincha know」Didincha know that she was coming home tomorrow?Repeat. Donincha know? 「Is he」 becomes 「Izzy」 Izzy the onethat called? Repeat. Izzy. 「What do you want」 becomes 「whadayawant」. Repeat. Whadaya want. 「Give it to me」 becomes 「Gividame」.Gividame right now. Repeat. Gividame.
Very good. You』 ll find the better you』 regood at speaking English, the more you』 ll be using these phrasereductions. The key is to still be easily understood. You』 ll findthat almost all of the rules that I have told you, especially theones having to do with voicing remain the same.
In the last example Ginidame. The only big change comes fromthe Ts being pronunced as Ds and this happens because the Ts fallbetween two vowel sounds. If you remember an American pronunciationwhen Ts fall between two vowels, they become voiced and arepronunced as Ds. Now even though you may at times to speak quicklyand use these reduced phrases in your conversations, you』 llstill be easily understood as long as you continue to use thepronunciation rules that I』 ve been showing you throughout thisprogram.
Ok, now we』 re going to talk about Intonation. English is avery musical language. As we speak our words and phrases go all theway up and then they come all the way down, much like the musicdoes. Now as you can see. I』 m trying to give you a good example ofintonation. This keeps our speech interesting and it helps to getour message across. Now, listen to this.
Many foreign-borned speakeres of English use a flatintonation pattern or in monotonous tone. This can creatuninteresting and misunderstood speech. Everything is veryflat.
Ok, I hope you can see from that example what I』 m talkingabout. Monotonous speech can be very boring and difficult to listento. Use correct intonation to make people want to listen to you.It』 s generally easy to guess what country a speaker is from justby their accent. Each language has its own characteristic rhythmand melody. Some languages use a wide range of tones and change inpitch with the melody going up and coming down. And other languagessound very flat. These characteristics of languages calledintonation. Even though they distinguish one language from another.They are rarely taught. Now in American English, words that carrythe highest information of value in a sentence are given moreemphasis with increase loudness—a higher pitch and sometimes alonger duration. Listen to my intonation and notice how I slowlystep up and then I work my way down again. Listen to the followingmade-up advertisement for Diane』 s Donuts. Listen to how the wordsin each sentence are stressed.
Have you ever tried one of Diane』s Donuts? They are sodelicious. I have eaten many different kinds of donuts, from allover the country; however, I have never tasted anything, quite likeDonuts made by Diane. I have been told that she uses the finest andfreshest ingredients that money can buy. The best flour, the besteggs and the best milk. I am sure, that once you taste theseincredible donuts, you will run and tell all of your friends.
Now I recommend that you practise that paragraph again alongwith me. Do your best and emphasize the important words byincreasing your loudness as well as raising your pitch. Ok?
Very good. Now let』 s talk about AskingQuestions. Notice how my voice goes up at the end of a question,like this. Are you sleeping? And notice how my voice comes down atthe ned of the sentence. That is not a question. He is notsleeping. Very often if you don』 t use proper intonation whenasking a question. The person you』 re speaking to won』 t understandthat you』 ve even asked them question to begin with. So rising upat the end of a question is very important. Ok, now let』 s talkabout Syllable Stress. In words that contain more than onesyllable. There』 s always one syllable which receives the moststress or giving a higher ptich. Now although there are manyexceptions, it is most common that 2 syllable words have stress onthe 1st syllable. Let』 s go over some examples. Repeatafter me.
Sofa
Oven
After
Finger
Station
Second
Enter
Often
Uncle
Carpet
Father
Children
Walking
Jacket
Lucky
Comment
Good. Now here are a few Two-Syllablewords that are stressed on the second syllable.
Delete
Decline
Survive
Protect
Adopt
Advance
Below
Resolve
Advice
Acquit
Control
Arrive
Involve
Massage
Disease
Relate
Very good. Now again. Although there areexceptions. Most Three -Syllable words are stressed on the secondsyllable.
Reduction
Arrangement
Audition
Companion
Detective
Ambitious
Companion
Appliance
Discover
Unlawful
Conclusion
Assemble
Adjustment
Affected
Acceptance
Ferocious
Very good. Practise using syllable stressin these sentences.
The pictures are fantastic.
He needs permission to find a solution.
The party is in honor of his retirement.
Her son exhibited bad behavior on their vacation.
Very good. You know stress and intonationcan have a big impact on the meaning you』 re trying to get across.Let』 s compare some of these sentences.
Joe drinks cheap wine.
Sue only drinks expensive wine.
Don』t forget his birthday.
We would never forget his birthday.
She』s planning to leave tomorrow.
He made plans to leave a month ago.
The Teacher』s meeting is at 9:00.
The students announced that they will never have ameeting.
My telephone isn』t working.
The telephone needs to work by lunchtime.
He』s painting his house blue and green.
Your house would look terrible if it were green.
Very good. Well, I hope you have fun withthis session. You may wanna watch this one again and go over it afew more times. Now when you』 re speaking to people in English. Tryto bring more intonation into your conversations, you』 ll find thatyou』 ll be better understood. Thank you for watching. I』 m PaulGruber for the Pronunciation Workshop and I』 ll see you at our nextsession. Goodbye！
Session Fourteen
1. Putting it all together – Part I
2. The 10 Key steps towards Improvement
Hi, and welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and we』 vemade to the Pronunciation Workshops---Fourteenth Training Session.What I』 ve done in the last two sessions is put together readingpassages that contain all of the material covered throughout theprogram. In the past, my clients have often requested that I dosome paragraph reading using correct American pronunciation. Sothey could hear and repeat and get a chance to practise everythingthat they have learned in this program. It』 s sort of like review.I have been told many times that this is extremely helpful and aidsin overall improvement of pronunciation abilities. So therefore,this is what I have done. Today』 s session contains four shortparagraphs. Each paragraph is designed to address everything thatwe have covered: Consonants,Vowels, Intonations, Phrase Reductionsand Word Endings. All the conponents needed to speak clearly andwith good pronunciation.
You may want to listen to these paragraphs a few times. Readalong with me and then practise your pronunciation on your ownusing your manual. As I told you earlier in the program, Irecommend that you speak out loud a little slower than usual andtry to incorporate as much the material as you can from all theprevious sessions. Now don』 t worry if first it doesn』 t come outperfectly, you can』 t possibly remember everything. It takes time.But soon you』 ll find that they』 ll all come together and you』 llsound just great. Also at the end of today』 s session, I』 ll coverthe 10 keys towards improvement, which I believe will guarantee yousuccess in speaking with American Accent. Ok. Let』 s begin. Thisfirst paragraph is about Photo Albums.
Photo album
Keeping a family photograph album is a good way to savefamily memories for yourself and future generations of your family.Very old pictures can be taken to a photo shop and reprinted sothat they can be placed in an album. Be sure to write on the backof the picture any information you remember about the people in it.Also, write the date if you remember it. Looking at photo albums isa relaxing way to spend the day and it is a fun activity to sharewith family and friends. Your children, grandchildren and theirchildren will appreciate your efforts too.
Ok, this next paragraph is called ThePublic Library.
The Public Library
Your library card can be your ticket to entertainment,current events and new ideas. Almost every city has a publiclibrary and there is no charge for a library card. Libraries havebooks about many subjects, but there are also other things at thelibrary. These include books on cassette tape, videotapes, largeprint books, CD』s, DVD』s and magazines. Many have free programs inthe afternoon or evening about travel, hobbies or other topics ofinterest. Some cities also have a bookmobile or traveling library,which brings the library right into your neighborhood.
Very good. Ok, this next paragraph is about John DRockefeller who is a famous American.
John D. Rockefeller
John D. Rockefeller did three amazing things. First, heacquired probably the greatest fortune in all history. He startedout in life digging potatoes under the hot sun for four cents anhour. In those days, there were not half a dozen men in all theUnited States who were worth even one million dollars. Eventually,John D. managed to collect a fortune said to be anywhere from oneto two billion dollars. And yet, the first girl he fell in lovewith refused to marry him.
The reason given was because her mother refused to allow herdaughter to throw herself away on a man who had such poorprospects.
Very good. Ok. This next paragraph is called Stars. In thisparagraph. Be aware of my pronunciation of numbers, especially theTH and the voiced Z sound/z/ in the word Thousand. Thousand. Ok?Here we go.
Stars
How many stars can you see on a dark, clear night? You cansee about 3,000 stars with your eyes alone. But keep in mind thatyou are viewing only part of the sky. If the whole sky werevisible, you could count about 5,000 stars. If you look through asmall telescope you might see as many as 600,000 stars. Through themost powerful telescopes, astronomers can spot millions of stars.No one is sure exactly how many stars there are altogether, butastronomers believe there are at least 200 billion, billion starsout in space.
Ok, very good. Now, then we』re putting it altogether. I wannagive you the 10 keys that I believe will guarantee you success inspeaking with American accent. Here we go.
No.1. Practise and listen are the key. You can improve yourpronunciation in only a few weeks. But for many people, it takeslonger. As I told you when we started. Practising is important butso is listening. As you go through your day, you listen to themelody of English. English has its own rhythm and flow. It goes upand it comes down. Master that and people will more easilyunderstand you. Also, listen to native speakers, inmitate the waythey speak. You』 ll see that they also follow the same speech rulesthat I presented throughout this program.
No.2. Do not leave off the endings of your words. Say theending of each word, especially the final Ss and the final EDsounds and the final LY sounds. These sounds have a lot to do withmaking you better understood, especially when saying numbersclearly.
No.3. Make a list of frequently used words or wordsrelated to your profession that you find difficult to pronunce. Aska native speaker to pronunce them for you. Perhaps you may want torecord those words into a mini-voice recorder and play them back atlater time.
No.4. And this is a big one. Open your mouth, open your mouthmore when you speak English than when you speak your nativelanguage. Native speakers of English generally open their mouthwider than speakers of other languages. People who speak English asa second language sometimes speak like this and they fellembarrassed to open their mouth too much. Trust me, if you openyour mouth more, you most likely will speak slower and produceclearer speech in more intelligible English.
No.5. Don』 t be afraid to speak. Get involved inconversations. It is very important that you practise what you』 relearning and use these techniques that I』 m teaching you to makeyourself understood in all different situations.
No.6. Read aloud in English for ten to 15 minutesevery day. This will help you strengthen and retrain the movementpatterns of your mouth muscles that you use to pronunceintelligible English. It will also give you the experience to focusstraightly on pronunciation without having to think about anythingelse.
No.7. Record your own voice and listen for pronunciationerrors. Now this could be just audio or audio in video. It』 sreally a good idea to do because it will increase your awareness ofpronunciation mistakes that you may not even be aware of.
No.8. Watch the mouth movements of native speakers andtry to imitate them. When you watch TV, look at the mouth movementsof actors. Repeat what they』 re saying. Try to inmitate theintonation and rhythm of their speech.
No.9. Here』 s a really good tip that many of my clients do.Buy books on tape and also buy the actual book. Go to your favoritebookstore and buy a book that you』 ll really enjoy reading on tapeand then also buy the same book. Be sure that the person reading onthe tape is a native-borned American. This is very important sothat you can hear their American pronunciation. Listen and read outloud at the same time. Maybe record yourself reading some sessionsof the book and compare the sound of your English without thespeaker from the recording. Many of my clients have found this tobe extremely helpful step in improving their English.
And here is the last one. No.10 is Be patient. You can changethe way you speak, but it won』 t happen overninght. It will taketime. Some people expect instant results and they give up too soon.You』 ll definitely can change the way you sound, but you must bewilling to put some efforts into it and you must give ittime. Now go on practise the paragraphs that we coveredtoday and I』 ll see you at our next session. Thank you forwatching. I』 m Paul Gruber for the Pronunciation Workshop.Goodbye!
Session Fifteen Part A
1.Reading Passages
Hi, and welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and thisis the Pronunciation Workshops---Fifteenth Training Session.Congratulations! You have made it to the final session. In today』 ssession, we will continue to incorporate everything that we havecovered: Consonants, Vowels, Intonation, Phrase Reductions and WordEndings. As I told you eariler in the program, I recommend that youspeak out loud when you』 re practising this material and also tryto listen really hard to my pronunciation. Try to hear it when Ivoice my Z endings/z/. Try to hear it when I pronunce correct theTH sound [θ] or bring my lips forward foran R or W sound/w/. As I told you eariler, if you』 re able torecognize many of these speech sounds when you hear them, well,that alone is crucial in helping you speak with properpronunciation. Now, all you got to do is practise using thesetechniques in your own conversations. Ok, let』 s begin with somereading passages. You』 ll see that they start out easy andprogressively become more difficult. For today, I want to give yousome material that I thought with challenging . You』 ll also findthese passages in your workbook under Session 15. Here wego.
A foreign student
When a student from another country comes to study in theUnited States, he has to find out for himself the answers to manyquestions, and he has many problems to think about. Where should helive? Would it be better living in a dormitory or in a private roomoff campus? Should he spend all of his time studying, or should hetake advantage of the many cultural and social activities that areoffered? At first, he may not feel that he fits in with theAmerican culture. He may not feel confident when he speaks. Littleby little, however, he learns how to handle himself in varioussituations. Finally he begins to feel very secure and 『at home』.Unfortunately, this long-awaited feeling doesn』t develop suddenly.It takes time.
Very good. Ok. The next paragraph is onVolcanoes.
Volcanoes
Volcanoes are holes in the Earth』s crust which allow moltenrock to escape from beneath. The molten rock, or lava, may flow outgently or it may be blasted high in the air with gas and ash in aviolent explosion. There are eight hundred and fifty activevolcanoes around the world. Do you know where these mountains offire are found? Three quarters of them are found within a zonecalled the 「Ring of Fire.」 One edge of the zone stretches along thewest coast of the Americas from Chile to Alaska. The other edgeruns along the east coast of Asia from Siberia to New Zealand.Twenty percent of these volcanoes are located in Indonesia. Otherbig groupings are in Japan, The Aleutian Islands, and CentralAmerica.
Very good. Ok. This next paragraph is aboutthe Chinese language.
The Chinese Language
Chinese is a most unusual language. It differs from Englishand most other major languages in that it has hundreds of differentdialects. A person who lives in one section of the vast country ofChina, often cannot understand a fellow Chinese who lives inanother section. These two major dialects are Cantonese andMandarin. Cantonese is a southern dialect. Mandarin, a dialect thatoriginated in northern China, is spoken by more Chinese than anyother dialect.
Non-Chinese people often say that the Chinese seem to 「sing」their language. Chinese sounds as though it is sung, because manywords are only one-syllable long and because the tone of voicechanges for each word. As in English, many words have more than onemeaning. The speaker』s tone of voice indicates each word』s specificmeaning.
Even more fascinating than the variety of spoken sounds isthe Chinese written language. It has no alphabet. Instead, itemploys signs called 「characters.」 Each spoken word in the languageis represented by a separate character. Originally, the characterswere drawings that depicted the meanings of words, but over theyears, they have simplified, and most no longer look like thethings they represent.
Very good. Ok. This next paragraph is onthe supercontinent.
The Supercontinent
Around 100 to 150 million years ago, there may have been onlyone continent on our planet. At least that is what some earthscientists have decided after years of research. If you look at themap of the world carefully, you can see that the present-daycontinents could be thought of as the pieces to a gigantic jigsawpuzzle. In your imagination carefully put the pieces together toform the supercontinent. You will see that if you took away theSouth Atlantic Ocean and pressed South America and Africa togetherthey would fit very nicely. You could continue removing oceans andseas and put other parts of the world together quite easily untilyou get to those last two pieces of Australia and Antarctica.Scientists believe that the continents of Australia and Antarcticawere once linked together. They may have split slowly off from thesupercontinent and then separated from each other as recently as 40million years ago.
Very good. Ok. The video for this sessioncontinues on session 15 Part B. Please go to that now. Session 15Part B. I』 ll see you there.
Session 15 Part B
1.The 50 most mispronunced words.
Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Fifteenth Training Session PartB.
Ok now for the grand finale. In this section, as addedbonus what all my clients beg me for I』 ve included for you. The 50most mispronunced words in American English. I give you the words.I show you how to pronunce them correctly and then I use them in asentence. You』 ll find this list to be extremely beneficial. Theseare all pretty common words and many of them are often used inprofessional situations, like offices and universities. I hope youfind this list to be helpful. Here are the words in alphabeticalorder.
Accounting, OU, like Down. He works in the accountingapartment.
Argue, it』 s not Argu. It』 s Argue. There』 s a hidden y. Idon』 t argue with my coworkers.
Actually. It』 s not Actually with the CH. It』 s Ac tuallywith an SH sound. Actually. Actually, I left you a message.
Available with the strong V/v/. It also has four syllables.Available. Available. These shoes are not available in yoursize.
Arrangements use a strong R followed by the[?]sound. Arrangements. We made arrangements to meet afterwork.
Basically. There are three syllables. Ba-sica-lly. Basically.It』 s basically a good idea.
Business. Most Americans pronunce this word with twosyllables. Busi-ness. Her business does very well.
Calls. Bring your tongue up for that L. Calls. She calls meevery day.
Complete. This has a strong L in the second syllable.Complete. We will complete our project.
Continue. Three syllables. Last syllable has a hidden y.Continue. His classes will continue next month.
Contribute. Three syllables. Con-tri-bute. We will contributeour time.
Corporation. Four syllables. The third syllable has avery strong R. She works for a hugecorporation.
Differences. These syllables and the second syllable beginswith a strong R. Differences. There are many differences betweenus.
Directly. Three syllables and most Americans drop the T.Directly. She is directly responsible.
Exactly. Three syllables Ex-act-ly. It』 s exactly what wealways wanted.
Educational. Five syllables. E-du-ca-tion-al. Educational.This movie is very educational.
Every has a very strong V sound followed by an R. Every. Wetravel every year.
Exceptional. It has four syllables. Ex-cep-tion-al. She is anexceptional student.
Familiar with a strong L and there』 s also a hidden y afterthe L. Familiar. She has a familiar face.
Financial. Three syllables. Fi-nan-cial. New York is a greatfinancial center.
Frustrating. Strong R』 s in that word. Frustrating. Goodpronunciation can be frustrating.
General. Don』 t forget the L at the end of that word.General. Give me a general idea.
Immediately has five syllables. I-mme-di-a-te-ly.Immediately. Once I took the phonecall, I left immediately.
Inconvenience. Four syllables and there』 s also a hidden y inthe last syllable. Inconvenience. The power outragewas the inconvenience.
Introduce. Three syllables In-tro-duce. Let me introduce toyou.
Irrational. Four syllables with a very strong R. Irrational.His fear of elevators was irrational.
Justice. Don』 t drop the middle T. Jus-tice. They asked thejudge for justice.
Likeable has the high /aI/ vowel, likeable. He』 s verylikeable.
Loosen. This has the OO vowel sound. Bring your lips forwardOO. Loosen. It』 s too tight. We need to loosen it.
Measurements has the voiced[?] sound.Measurements. The measurements were accurate.
Middle. It has two syllables and bring your tongue up quicklyfor that final L. Middle. Middle. We get paid in the middle of themonth.
Multiple. Three syllables. Mul-ti-ple. Multiple. We havemultiple offices in the city.
National with the[?]sound in the middle and the L sound at the end. Na-tion-al. Ourstory made the national news.
Original. Four syllables with the strong R. O-ri-gi-nal. Youridea is certainly original.
Outrageous. Three syllables. First syllable has the[ а? ] soundfollowed by an R. Outrageous. That was an outrageousrequest.
Particular. Four syllables. Par-ti-cu-lar. Particular. Shewants a particular car.
Partnership. Three syllables. We have a solidpartnership.
Problem. This has a strong R and then the sencond syllablehas a strong L. Problem. They no longer have a problem.
Prohibit. Three syllables. Pro-hi-bit. They prohibit the useof alcohol.
Quality. Your tongue should come up slowly from the L.Quality. The shirt is made of good quality.
Question. Please ask me a question.
Referring. Three syllables. Referring. What are you referringto.
Regardless. Regardless with the strong L. I want you redothis project regardless of the cost.
Request. Don』 t forget that st ending. Re-quest. They made aspecial request.
Similar has three syllables. Si-mi-lar. Similar. We havesimilar opinions.
Specific. Three syllables. Spe-ci-fic. Please bespecific.
Value. There』 s a strong L and then a hidden y. Value. Ivalue our friendship.
Visualize. Four syllables. Vi-su-al-ize. Visualize. Can youvisualize what you』 ll be doing in ten years.
Vulnerable. Give that a strong L. Vul-ner-able. Without thepolice, they』 re very vulnerable.
Working. This word has the[?] vowelsound. Working. I have been working on these videos for six years.No kidding.
Well, there you go. The 50 mostmispronunced words in American English. I hope that would behelpful. You may wish to go over this list again.
Well, congratulations! You finally made it to the end of thisprogram. Although I』 m sure there』 s more to improve upon. I dohope that the pronunciation workshop program has given you agreater sense of confidence and self-worth in terms of your Englishcommunication skills. I hope that if before you begin my program.If you were self-conscious about your English pronunciation. Thatyou now feel a little better about your speech and at least knowwhat areas of pronunciation you need to continue to work on. I』 malways trying to improve this program and I do get many ideas frommy clients. If you have time. Please send me an emile through mywebsite. Let me know how you did if you enjoy the program and ifyou had any suggestions to make it even better. I always loved tohear from people who took this program and see how my works changepeople』 s lives for the better. Also, don』 t forget to tell yourfriends, relatives and coworkers about this unique on-line trainingprogram. I』 m sure that they would love to improve the way theyspeak English as well. Also, for your information, atcertain times throughout the year dependently on my workschedule. I do work with people individually over the telephone aswell as in person. Believe it or not. Working with me personallyover the telephone one on one can be very effective especiallyafter completing this on-line training. If you were interested inworking with me and direct to one-to-one basis. Again contact methrough the pronunciation workshop.com website.
Well, congratulations again. You have justcompleted the most comprehensive and effective program on Englishpronunciation avaialbe today. You should be very proud of yourselfthrough all your efforts. I hope my program has brought you agreater sense of confidence and I also hope that in some way I』 vebeen a positive influence on your life. I thank you for allowing methis opportunity. Good luck in all your endeavours and take care.I』 m Paul Gruber for the Pronunciation Workshop. Goodbye!
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