20: The Rhythm Rule and Sentence Stress

Spoken English rhythm follows patterns of stressed and unstressed words and syllables.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is podcast number 20. Today's podcast is exciting for a number of reasons.

First, I am looking for input from all of you. I am planning to start adding supplemental podcasts in addition to these regular ones that are language specific. I know I am going to do one for Japanese speakers first and Spanish speakers second, because many of our listeners come from Japan as well as Spanish speaking countries. After that I will go down the list of what I can guess other listeners speak, based on the country you are listening from. If you're listening from the United States, I have no idea what your first language is. I can't get that information through my podcast tracking software. I need you to tell me.

In addition, I am wondering what your language's specific problems are. Send me a quick email and tell me what language you speak as well as what sounds or aspects of pronunciation you find the most troublesome. The more I hear from a language group, the more likely it is that I will do a special podcast for your language, and the more specific I can get with resources to help you.

The second reason that this is an exciting podcast is because it is first in a set of podcasts about sentence stress and the rhythm of spoken English. It is a bit too detailed to be able to cover all in one podcast, so I'm going to spend 2 or 3 weeks on it.

I've talked about the rhythm of English before during the podcasts on contractions and reduced pronouns. Those were episodes numbers 12, 13, and 16. But this podcast finally gets into some specifics about how to deal with sentence stress.

Think about sentence stress as simply saying the most important words of a sentence at a different pitch, or a little bit louder, or for a little bit longer than the other words of the sentence.

It isn't surprising that the most important words (we'll call them content words) are usually nouns, verbs, adjectives, and some adverbs. Those are the words that help us form a picture in our head; they give us the contents of our story. We want our listener to be able to quickly grasp the main content of our story, so we make the content words easier to hear by bringing attention to them.

The other words (we'll call them function words) are the words we use to make our sentences grammatically correct. Function words are words like pronouns, determiners, and prepositions. If our function words were missing or used incorrectly, we would be considered poor speakers of English, but our listener would probably still get the main idea of what we're saying. Since function words don't give us the main information, we don't usually want or need to do anything to give them added attention. In fact, sometimes we do things to deliberately push them into the background.

I'll have a chart with the transcripts to this show that gives examples of content and function words.

Content Words

View fullsize

Function Words

View fullsize

I want to make sure to mention that not very many aspects of English are concrete, and the idea of stressing content words, but not function words, is a generalization and not a rule. Not every content word receives stress, and not every function word is left without it. A speaker chooses exactly which words to stress based on the message he or she is trying to send.

Here is an example of a sentence with typically stressed content words and unstressed function words.

I bought a car.

That is a very simple and straightforward sentence, and it follows an important concept in spoken English: the Rhythm Rule.

When English is spoken, the speaker alternates between stressed and unstressed syllables in regular intervals, with the stresses falling within content words. This is called the Rhythm Rule.

I'll repeat that again. When English is spoken, the speaker alternates between stressed and unstressed syllables in regular intervals, with the stresses falling within content words.

The Rhythm Rule is more of a guideline than a rule because it is often not followed exactly. The main idea is that stresses in spoken English happen in regular intervals, or beats. My sentence I bought a car had a pattern of an unstressed syllable, then a stressed syllable, then an unstressed syllable, then another stressed syllable. The stressed syllables create the beats that I could tap my fingers to.

I bought a car.

I can easily add to the sentence and keep the rhythm.

I bought a car on Tuesday.

How can you tell if a word is stressed? A speaker can stress a word in any combination of the following three ways:

1. by changing the pitch of the stressed syllable of the stressed word compared to the syllables around it

2. by saying the stressed syllable of that word for a longer period of time than normal

3. by saying the stressed syllable of that word louder than the surrounding syllables

Notice that I didn't say that entire word is stressed, just the stressed syllable of that word. This stress is in addition to the normal stress placed on the stressed syllable, emphasizing it even further. Also note that while we are discussing syllables as the parts of speech which receive the beats, it is the words they are part of that are being emphasized.

The sentence I bought a car on Tuesday is seven syllables long and the content words alternate with function words. We can easily tap our fingers on the table during each stressed syllable and hear that the taps are equally spaced on the verb (bought) and nouns (car and Tuesday) of the sentence. Only the first syllable of Tuesday is stressed because it is the normally prominent syllable of that word.

What if I were to give you more information and tell you the color of the car?

I bought a blue car on Tuesday.

Now I've added another content word, the adjective blue, and things become trickier because I've created choices for which words to stress and how to stress them. The Rhythm Rule says that we will stress content words and that the stressed syllables will occur at regular intervals. With the simple addition of the word blue, there is no longer an unstressed syllable present between stressed syllables of the content words. I've opened up three options for placing word stress. With all of the choices, I'd naturally try to keep the stressed beats at regular intervals. We'll talk about why I'd choose one option over another a little later; for now, we are just trying to understand how I would do it.

I can:

1. Stress bought and car and Tuesday

2. Stress bought and blue and Tuesday

3. Stress all the content words (bought, blue, car and Tuesday)

Let's listen to all three examples.

I bought a blue car on Tuesday.
I bought a blue car on Tuesday.
I bought a blue car on Tuesday.

Now listen again. I want you to notice what happens when a content word is not stressed, as well as what happens when two single-syllable content words next to each other are stressed.

I bought a blue car on Tuesday.
I bought a blue car on Tuesday.
I bought a blue car on Tuesday.

In the first sentence, when I stressed car, but not blue, the word blue was said very quickly. Even though we added a word between the words bought and car, the syllable taps remained constant.

I bought a blue car on Tuesday.

In the second sentence blue is stressed but car isn't, so car is said quickly and the beat moves to the word blue. Still, the beats happen regularly.

I bought a blue car on Tuesday.

The third sentence is where I need to make the biggest alteration in speech to allow the Rhythm Rule to work. Because blue and car are both only one syllable long, and because they are next to one another in our sentence, the syllable of the word blue needs to take more time or the beat will be off. Remember that lengthening the stressed syllable of a content word is one of the techniques we can use to stress it. In this situation, we need to lengthen the word blue for extra time just to allow us to follow the Rhythm Rule.

I bought a blue car on Tuesday.

Well, that's all I am going to cover for today. Although this podcast was not thick with examples, there was a lot of information here. Next week I will get into more details and hopefully we'll get to listen to another clip from The Incredibles to hear these concepts in action.

As always, I would love to hear from you! Specifically, I'd like to know the languages of the listeners of this show, and specific problems that you know you have. Please email me at podcast@p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.com.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening everyone!

Bye-bye.

19: -ed ending pronunciation

/d/, /t/, and /ɪd/: become fluent with the three pronunciations for regular past tense verbs in English.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is podcast number 19.

Last week we studied the f sound and v sound, and the difficulties many students have between the v sound and w sound, or the v sound and b sound. As a review, here are a few minimal pairs between the f sound and v sound.

leaf, leave
few, view
refuse, reviews
proof, prove

The week before that, we studied the sh sound and zh sound. Here is the practice sentence for those sounds:

Vision is usually measured with special machines.

Today I am going to talk about the -ed ending we add to words when creating the past participle of regular verbs. This tricky ending has three different pronunciations. It can sound like a t sound (t sound), like a d sound (d sound), or like the combination of a short i and a d sound (-id sound).

I talked about how exactly to create the t sound and d sound way back in episode 2, so if you want a full review of that, go back and listen to that episode again. The important thing for these sounds is to tap the tip of your tongue to the front of the tooth ridge, that bony area right behind your upper front teeth.

Today I'm going to talk about when to say these sounds for the -ed ending. If you remember the rules for the -s ending from episode 3, you will find a lot of similarities between the -s ending rules and the -ed ending rules, and it all comes back to understanding voiced and unvoiced sounds. Hopefully, if you've been listening for a while, you're getting very good at identifying if a sound is voiced or not. Remember, a voiced sound uses our vocal folds, and all vowels and the r sound and l sound are voiced. Stops and fricative often have a voiced and unvoiced pair, like the f sound and v sound we studied last week. If you cannot identify a sound as voiced or not, it will be very, very hard to know if an -ed ending sounds like a d sound or a t sound.

The -ed ending rules go like this:

Rule number 1

If the final sound of a word before the -ed ending is unvoiced, the -ed will sound like a t sound. An example is the word wish. Wish ends in the sh sound, which is unvoiced. If I add an -ed, the word becomes wished, and the sh sound gets followed by a t sound. Listen again, wished. Another example is the word miss, which ends in an s sound. When I add the -ed ending, it becomes missed.

Rule number 2

If the final sound of a word before the -ed ending is voiced, the -ed will sound like a d sound. Remember, all vowels are voiced. So, if I have the word stay, which ends in a long a sound, and I add an -ed, I will now have stayed, ending in a d sound. Another example is the word live, which ends in a v sound, which is voiced. When I make the word into a past participle, I get the word lived, ending in a d sound.

So far, it's pretty simple, assuming you have a good grasp of voiced and unvoiced sounds. Rule number 3 is pretty simple, as well.

Rule number 3

Rule number 3 is the exception rule for the first 2 rules. If a word ends in a t sound or a d sound, and I mean that it ends in one of those sounds before the -ed is added, the -ed ending will sound like id, which is a combination of a short i sound and a d sound. This happens whenever we need to add a syllable to a word when the -ed ending is added.

A few examples of this rule are the words lasted, acted, included, and added. Notice that all of those words ended in either a t sound or a d sound before the -ed was added, and that after the addition of the -ed ending, the words all ended in id, and none of the words ended in it. Notice also that it is impossible to add the -ed to these words and not add a syllable to the word. Last became lasted, act became acted, include became included.

Most commonly, I hear students say the -ed ending with a t sound, no matter what the last sound of the word before the -ed ending was. You won't be misunderstood because of this error. A native speaker will always understand exactly what you said, but you will sound less fluent than a speaker who can control of their -ed endings.

The book these podcasts are based on, Pronunciation Pages, has exercises to help you practice these rules of English pronunciation and online listening activities to help you hear the difference between the -ed ending sounds. You can find more information about Pronunciation Pages, along with transcripts to this episode at www.pronuncian.com.

As always, I would love to hear from you! If you'd like to send me comments or suggestions, please email me at podcast@pronuncian.com.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening everyone!

Bye-bye.

18: The /f/ and /v/ in English

Compare pronunciation of /f/ and /v/ and learn why they're difficult to say fluently.

Transcript

Hi everyone. Welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is podcast number 18.

Last week we practiced the sh sound and zh sound. Let's review our practice sentence for those sounds.

Vision is usually measured with special machines.

Do you remember the linguistic classification of those sounds? They are consonant fricatives. That means that the sounds happen when we create friction somewhere in the vocal tract.

Today we are going to study two more fricative sounds, the voiced/unvoiced pair of f sound and v sound. You probably already know that we don't need to use the tongue to create these sounds. These sounds happen when we place our bottom lip lightly against our upper teeth, and push air through the small space between the teeth and the lip. The f sound is unvoiced, and the v sound is voiced. Listen to these sounds and repeat after me if you can: (f sound, v sound)

When thinking about the v sound and f sound, always think about the lower lip and the upper teeth. If you are creating friction with air between the lower lip and upper teeth, a native English speaker will hear a v sound or f sound, depending on if you are voicing the sound or not.

Let's practice a few f sound, v sound minimal pairs and notice the difference between these sounds.

leaf, leave
few, view
refuse, reviews
proof, prove

The biggest problem I hear with these sounds is usually with the v sound. Some students do not voice the v sound, and so it sounds more like an f sound to a native English speaker, some students have trouble between the v sound and w sound, and some Spanish speakers have trouble between the v sound and the b sound.

If you remember from podcast number 7, making our lips into a small circle and pushing air out while using our vocal cords creates the w sound. We cannot touch our lips to our teeth at all during the w sound, or it will sound like a v sound to a native English speaker.

Let's practice some minimal pairs between the v sound and w sound to hear and feel the clear difference between them. The w sound is created entirely with the vibration between the lips, and the v sound is created with the vibration between the lower lip and upper teeth.

vent, went
vine, wine
vest, west
veil, whale
verse, worse

Now I'm going to talk a little bit about the v sound compared to the b sound. I'll talk about this again when I teach about the b sound in an upcoming podcast. For now, I just want to point out that a b sound is made by pressing our lips together, then letting them go with a puff of air, (b sound) and that the b sound is not made by pressing the lips to the teeth at all.

Listen to these v sound, b sound minimal pairs.

vote, boat
very, berry
vest, best
vase, base
vent, bent

I will have a link to the word list practice for the f sound, v sound, and w sound, and b sound along with the transcripts for this episode. You can find free word lists and transcripts at www.pronuncian.com.

A very cool new feature for people who have purchased the book Pronunciation Pages is downloadable MP3 lists of words for each sound. Instead of going to the website and clicking to hear each word, you can download the entire list as one file and keep it forever on your computer or MP3 player. Even after the subscription ends, you still have all the lists!

As always, I would love to hear from you! If you'd like to send me comments or suggestions, please email me at podcast@p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.com.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy, where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening everyone!

Bye-bye.

podcast@p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.com

17: The 'sh' /ʃ/ and 'zh' /ʒ/ in English

Practice comparing the 'sh' (as in she) and lesser known 'zh' (as in vision).

Transcript

Hello again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. This is podcast #17. My name is Mandy.

I am going to get back into some sound practice for a few weeks, because there are still quite a few sounds to study. Since it's been a few weeks, I'll review a little bit of vocabulary from the earlier sound podcasts.

Today we are going to study the voiced/unvoiced fricative consonant pair, the sh sound and the zh sound. Most students are well aware of the sh sound, the first sound is the words she and show. The zh sound is a less common sound. It sounds like (zh sound) and is in the words usual and casual.

We'll have a practice sentence for these sounds, today. It is:

Vision is usually measured with special machines.

I'll come back to that sentence later.

The sh sound and zh sound are fricatives. If you have been listening since the beginning of these podcasts, you may remember from the first podcast, which was about the voiced and unvoiced th sounds, that a fricative is a continuous sound that is created by allowing only a small amount of air to leave the mouth, which causes friction, and sound. Something special about fricatives is that we can continue to make the sound for as long as we have breath in our lungs.

I'm going to say both the sh sound and the zh sound so you can hear the friction, and so you can notice that I can continue saying the sound for a long time: (sh sound, zh sound).

Another special thing about the sh sound and zh sound is that they are a voiced/unvoiced pair. We've studied three sets of voiced and unvoiced pairs so far: the voiced/unvoiced th sounds, the t sound and d sound in episode 2, and the s sound and z sound in episode 3. We use our vocal folds for the voiced sounds, and we can feel the vibration in our throat. The unvoiced counterpart is said almost identically, except we do not use our vocal folds.

Listen to the sh sound and zh sound again. Which one is voiced and which one isn't? (sh sound, zh sound) I hope you said that the sh sound is unvoiced, and the zh sound is voiced.

So, how am I creating these sounds exactly? Do you remember where the tooth ridge is? If not, I want you to use the tip of your tongue to touch your front upper teeth. Now slide your tongue back a little bit behind your teeth. Do you feel that bump behind your upper teeth? That is your tooth ridge. You use your tooth ridge when creating the voiced and unvoiced th sounds, the s sound and z sound, and the t sound and d sound.

Let's create those sounds now. I am going to say the sound and I want you to repeat it, noticing where your tongue is.

unvoiced th (unvoiced th)
voiced th (voiced th)
s sound (s sound)
z sound (z sound)
t sound (t sound)
d sound (d sound)

Did you feel where your tongue touched, or nearly touched, the tooth ridge during those sounds? If you want reminders for those sounds, go back and listen to episodes one, two, and three again.

Now let's get back to the sh sound and zh sound. To create the sh sound and zh sound we make our lips rounded and place the tip of our tongue near the back of the tooth ridge and push air out. The zh sound is the same, except we also use our vocal folds and cause a vibration at the same time.

Korean speakers in particular have a lot of trouble with these two sounds. I often hear Korean students place the tip of the tongue too far back in the mouth, too close to the roof of the mouth. It is a subtle difference in sound, but try to keep the tip of the tongue right at the back of the tooth ridge, but not behind the tooth ridge. Repeat the sounds after me: (sh sound, zh sound).

Another problem with these sounds is that the spelling does not give many clues for when the sh sound is said and when the zh sound is said. It is another set of sounds that needs to be memorized or looked up in the dictionary if you aren't certain which sound to use.

Let's practice some words for both of these sounds.

sh sound (sh sound): she, shoe, fish, crash, special, emotion
zh sound (zh sound): massage, pleasure, usual, leisure, version

I'd also like to note that the zh sound almost never occurs at the beginning of the word.

Here is a practice sentence again to help remember these sounds. Please, repeat after me:

Vision is usually measured with special machines.

Let's repeat that again.

I will have a link to the word list practice for these sounds and an audio of just the practice sentence along with the transcripts for this episode. You can find free word lists and transcripts at www.pronuncian.com. If you purchased a copy of Pronunciation Pages or are a student of Seattle Learning Academy, you can find additional practice identifying words containing these sounds.

I would love to hear from you! If you'd like to send me comments or suggestions, please email me at podcast@pronuncian.com.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy, where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening everyone!

Bye-bye.

16: Reduced Pronouns: 'he, him, her,' and 'them'

Learn how and why to NOT say the first sound of the words 'he, him, her,' and 'them.'

Transcript

Hi everyone. Welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American Pronunciation podcast. This is podcast number 16. If you are just joining us, my name is Mandy.

I decided to stay on a topic related to rhythm today, since that is what we've been studying since episode number 12. In fact, today's podcast about reduced pronouns has a lot of similarity to podcast 12, which was about common contractions.

If you don't remember the grammatical term, a pronoun is a word that takes the place of a noun. It is a word like he or she or they. We use them all the time. While there are no surprises with the pronunciation of most pronouns, there are four in particular that have unusual pronunciation issues: he, him, her, and them.

These four pronouns, when they are not the first word of a sentence or clause, become very similar to a contraction. With the words he, him, and her, we will omit the h sound at the beginning of a word and link the remainder of the word to the word before it using the linking rules we learned in the last two podcasts. Here's an example.

If I reduce the pronoun and link the words watch + him, I get watch 'im. I take off the h sound of the word him, Then I link the ch sound at the end of the word watch to the first sound of the word him because it now begins with a vowel sound. Listen carefully again. Watch 'im. Watch 'im.

Listen to an example with the word he, and I'll add an informal contraction also, just for fun.

Does 'e wanna come along?

Did you hear it? Does 'e. I removed the h sound of the word he, then linked the final z sound of the word does to the long e sound of the reduced pronoun, he. I get does 'e.

Here is an example with the word her: I like 'er a lot. So, I took off the h sound of the word her and linked the remainder of the word to the word like. I ended up with like 'er.

Finally, we have the word them. Most students hate the word them because it begins with a voiced th sound and it is hard to say. Episode 1 was all about voiced and unvoiced th sounds. If you've forgotten about them, go back and listen again for a little review. I have good news for all of you, though. You can remove the voiced th sound from the word them when it does not begin a sentence. You must link the remainder of the word with whatever was before it. Then you don't have to say that voiced th at all!

Here's an example:

Give 'em a sample.

Listen again:

Give 'em a sample.

Now, the reduced pronoun of him 'im and the reduced pronoun of them 'em sound quite similar. But your listener should know which one you mean by the context.

All of the example so far were easy to link, because I chose words that ended in a consonant sound. If the word before the reduced pronoun ends in a vowel sound, though, you need to follow the rules for linking vowels. We studied this last week in Episode 15.

Let's listen to some examples of using a reduced pronoun after a word that ends in a vowel sound.

show + them becomes show 'em, with an distinct w sound between the words.
carry + her becomes carry 'er, with a y sound added between the words.

The only way reducing pronouns works is by linking the reduced pronoun to the word before it. There are two times that we do not reduce pronouns. The first time is when it is the first word of a sentence. The second time is if we are emphasizing the word for some reason.

As an example, if I weren't emphasizing the word he in this sentence, it would sound like this:

I thought 'e was picking me up.

But if I was emphasizing the fact that I thought it was him that was going to pick me up, I would say:

I thought he was picking me up.

It may seem very hard to notice, but a native speaker and listener would immediately perceive the difference. Most Americans don't expect a person who doesn't have English as a first language to do this, but you will sound more fluent if you can.

That's all for today. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy is where the world comes to learn. The transcripts for this week's show are online at www.pronuncian.com. You can email comments or suggestions to me at podcast@p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.com.

Thanks for listening everyone.

15: Linking vowel sounds

Become fluent by linking a word that ends with a vowel sound to a word that begins with a vowel sound.

Transcript

Hello everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation Podcast. My name is Mandy. Today we are going to continue our lesson about linking, so if you haven't listened to episode 14 yet, I'd suggest you do so before listening to this one today.

As a review, linking is a technique used to help with the rhythm of English. Linking means to join two or more words together without pausing between them. Last week we studied linking a consonant sound to a vowel sound. I hope you remember that we must share the final consonant sound of the first word with the word that comes after it in order to link them. As an example, linking the words wake + up sounds like wake_up. The final word, up, sounds nearly identical to the word cup in that word sequence.

wake_up

Linking vowels is a bit more difficult however, because instead of sharing a sound between two words, we need to add a sound, specifically, a w sound or a y sound, between the words.

Let's listen to an example. In the phrase I_asked, the first word ends in a long i and the following word begins with a short a. To fluidly link the words together, we add a y sound between them. Listen again.

I_asked

Now listen to an example that uses a w sound to link the words.

go_away

Did you hear the w sound between the words? Listen again.

go_away

So how do you know if the vowels should link words with a y sound or w sound? Well, I could list all the sound combinations, but really, it becomes very obvious if you try using the wrong one. Listen to the examples I used so far when I intentionally say them incorrectly.

Here is I_asked said with a w sound

I (w sound) asked, I (w sound) asked

And here is go_away, said incorrectly with a y sound

go (y sound) away, go (y sound) away

Those are very obviously wrong, I hope.

One of the hardest aspects of linking vowels that my students usually have is realizing when a word ends in a vowel sound. Any word that ends with the letters w or y will always end in a vowel sound. When the next word begins with another vowel, then add a w sound or y sound in between the words.

Listen to and repeat the next examples. See if you can tell which sound was added.

hurry_up

Did I add a w sound or a y sound?

hurry_up

I added a y sound, and the word up sounded like yup.

hurry_up

very_unusual

Was it a y sound or w sound?

very_unusual

It was a y sound again.

Try these next three.

yellow_onions
my_answer
you_always

Yellow_onions was linked with a w sound.
My_answer was linked with a y sound.
You_always was linked was a w sound.

If the w sound or y sound is not added between the words, the two words can get muddied and less clear.

Students often ask, "When can I stop linking the words?" Well, you will need to take a breath eventually. Usually you will pause for the breath at the end of a sentence or a phrase. Pause where you would have punctuation like a period or comma if it were written English.

If you are a current student at Seattle Learning Academy or if you have purchased the Pronunciation Pages book and have full access to the site, you will find more lessons on this material in the linking section of the website. After logging in, click on a lesson and at the bottom of the lesson you will find links to additional exercises.

If you are interested in purchasing the book, there is a link with the transcripts to this week's show. The transcript is available online at www.pronuncian.com. If you are finding these podcasts helpful or if you have suggestions for pronunciation issues you would like me to talk about, email me at podcast@pronunican.com.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy is where the world comes to learn. Thanks for listening everyone.

14: Linking consonant sounds

Learn how linking from word to word increases spoken English fluency

Transcript

Hi again everyone. This is Mandy, and this is Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation Podcast. This is podcast number 14, and the beginning of a couple of podcasts about linking.

Last week I talked about informal contractions, words like wanna and gonna and lemme. The purpose of informal contractions is to help with the rhythm of English. By combining some words that occur frequently together into a single word, we can easily reduce those words and stress the words surrounding them.

Linking two words together also helps us control pauses between words and use rhythm to its fullest. Some other teachers use the word "blending" in the same way that I use the word linking. Not all links words blend together, though, so I find linking to be a more accurate term.

Linking, in its simplest terms, is joining one word into the next with no pause between them. We aren't creating a contraction, because we aren't removing sounds or parts of words, we are just linking the final sound of one word to the beginning sound of the next word. We use different strategies to link different sounds together. Native speakers do this intuitively, but it must be taught to many non-native speakers. We usually link words all in a row until we come to a reason to pause. That might be because it is where we would have punctuation in written English, or we are pausing for emphasis of a word.

Today I am only going to talk about linking a consonant sound to a vowel sound. If you are a new listener and aren't clear which sounds are consonants and which are vowels, it would be a good idea to go back and listen to some of the previous podcasts.

For today I am just going to practice linking two or three words together. When practicing linking, always think about sounds that are next to each other, but not in the same word. To link a consonant to a vowel, share the consonant sound with both words, so it sounds like the end of one word and the beginning of the next word, with no pause between the sounds. I'm going to say that again, because it is very important. You want to share the consonant sound with both words, so it sounds like the end of one word and the beginning of the next word, with no pause between the sounds. Here is an example:

good_idea

The final d sound of the word good also sounds like it is the first sound in the word idea. Listen again:

good_idea

Here is another:

wake_up

Wake_up could easily sound like the words wake and cup, if those two words made sense together. Listen again:

wake_up

Listen to a few more examples:

can_I, can_I
some_old_animals, some_old_animals
upset_about_it, upset_about_it
click_on_it, click_on_it
because_it_is, because_it_is

That is your simple introduction to linking. If you are a current student at Seattle Learning Academy or if you have purchased a book and have full access to the site, you will find more lessons on this material in the linking section of the website. Click on a lesson and at the bottom of the lesson you will find links to additional exercises.

This transcript is available online at www.pronuncian.com. If you are finding these podcasts helpful or if you have suggestions for pronunciation issues you would like me to talk about, email me at podcast@pronunican.com.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Thanks for listening everyone.

13: Informal contractions in American English

wanna, gonna, hafta, whadja, howdja: Learn how to understand and why to use informal contractions

"The Incredibles" audio clip

HELEN (ELASTIGIRL) Cutting it kinda close, don't you think?
BOB (MR. INCREDIBLE) You need to be more... flexible.
HELEN (ELASTIGIRL) I love you, but if we're gonna make this work, you've gotta be more than Mr. lncredible. You know that. Don't you?
PRIEST ...so long as you both shall live?
BOB (MR. INCREDIBLE) I do.

The Incredibles Internet Movie Database webpage

Transcript

Hi everyone, it's me Mandy, and this is the American English Pronunciation podcast number 13. Today we have a fun podcast about informal contractions. Last week I taught about common contractions, words like don't and can't. Remember, contractions are important to use to help the rhythm of spoken English. Informal contractions are optional contractions, which are said very frequently, but rarely used in writing. Examples are words like wanna, gimme, and lemme. You're likely already familiar with these common informal contractions if you live in the United States.

As a listener of English, you really need to be able to understand people who use informal contractions, and nearly every native speaker does. It is your choice to decide to use them in your own speech or not.

Let's start with the most well known.

1. Lemme: if you see this spelled, which you usually won't, it is spelled l-e-m-m-e, and is actually the words let + me. Lemme, as in, "Lemme help you with that."

2. Wanna: w-a-n-n-a. Wanna is the combination of the words want and to. "I wanna go to the movies. Do you wanna come along?"

3. Dunno: d-u-n-n-o. Dunno is the combination of the words don't and know. "I dunno how to speak Japanese."

4. Lotta and lotsa. Lotta and lotsa are combinations of the words lot of or lots of. "There are lotsa grammar rules for English."

5. Kinda k-i-n-d-a is a combination of kind and of. Kind of means sort of, or a little.

6. Gonna g-o-n-n-a is a combination of going and to. "I'm gonna go to the movies tonight."

7. Gotta g-o-t-t-a is a combination of the words got and to, and the double t is said as a d sound, listen again, gotta.

Then there are the less known combinations, often of more than two words.

One of them is wheredja. Wheredja is the combination of the words where + did + you. Wheredja. "I love your shoes. Wheredja get them?"

Whadja: Whadja is the combination of the words what + did + you. "Whadja have for dinner last night."

Howdja: Howdja is the combination of how + did + you. "Howdja like the movie? I thought it was great.

Like I said before, it is truly your choice to use or not use these words. They do have benefits of sounding more casual as well as helping with the overall rhythm of English, which I talked about a little bit last week. You will hear these words everywhere from informal conversations in a coffee shop or anywhere else to on TV and in movies, and even now being used by the broadcasters for American news.

I'm going to play a few lines from a movie I like to use for teaching called "The Incredibles." It's a funny Disney-Pixar computer generated cartoon. I've found examples of nearly everything I teach demonstrated in this movie. I'm going to tell you what the characters say, then play the example a few times. You'll probably find that the example goes by very, very quickly in actual speech. That speed is what makes it very hard to discover these aspects of spoken language on your own. In fact, these contractions were born from people talking quickly in the rhythm of English.

Let me tell you the scene of the movie. Helen and Bob are superheroes and are getting married. Bob was nearly late for the wedding because he was out performing a super-act. Helen says, "Cutting it kinda close, don't you think?" There is the phrase "to cut it close" in that sentence, which means that you didn't leave room for error. She uses the informal contraction kinda, to mean that she wants to tell her husband that he was too late for her to be comfortable. He then tells her to be more flexible, which is alluding to an earlier scene, but is also a common phrase. Then she says the sentence, " I love you, but if we're gonna make this work, you've gotta be more than Mr. lncredible. You know that. Don't you?" She used the contraction gonna, for going + to, and gotta, for the words got + to. "If we're gonna make this work, you've gotta be more than Mr. Incredible" Then they go on to get married.

Here's the clip.

HELEN (ELASTIGIRL) Cutting it kinda close, don't you think?
BOB (MR. INCREDIBLE) You need to be more... flexible.
HELEN (ELASTIGIRL) I love you, but if we're gonna make this work, you've gotta be more than Mr. lncredible. You know that. Don't you?
PRIEST ...so long as you both shall live?
BOB (MR. INCREDIBLE) I do.
PRIEST I pronounce this couple husband and wife.

Here is the whole clip one more time.

HELEN (ELASTIGIRL) Cutting it kinda close, don't you think?
BOB (MR. INCREDIBLE) You need to be more... flexible.
HELEN (ELASTIGIRL) I love you, but if we're gonna make this work, you've gotta be more than Mr. lncredible. You know that. Don't you?
PRIEST ...so long as you both shall live?
BOB (MR. INCREDIBLE) I do.
PRIEST I pronounce this couple husband and wife.

I'll also add that audio separately online with the notes for this show so you can hear just this part again and again.

If you bought the Pronunciation Pages book or are an SLA student and have full access to the website, there is a webpage in the stress lessons which also covers these informal contractions.

As a review for today, we learned the following informal contractions:

lemme
wanna
dunno
lotta
lotsa
kinda
gonna
gotta
wheredja
whadja
howdja

Start listening for them and notice their frequency. Play around with using them in your own speech and see how you like them. If you don't live in the United States or most of your interaction is in English with other non-native speakers, using informal contractions may not have the effect you are hoping for, as it may make you harder to understand by other non-native English speakers. You be the judge.

Remember, you can visit www.pronuncian.com to view the transcripts for this show and hear the clip for The Incredibles. That's all for today everyone. Next week I'm going to begin teaching about some other aspects of speaking that will help your rhythm in spoken English, mainly about a concept called linking.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening, and have a great week!

12: Common contractions in American English

don't, can't, won't, hasn't, didn't, weren't: Learn how to say and why to use common contractions

Transcript

Hello everyone, and welcome to Seattle Learning Academy's twelfth American English Pronunciation podcast. I have to make an apology. I was going to teach about informal contractions during this podcast, but I have changed my mind. I've decided that I would do common, or regular contractions today, and save informal contractions for next week. So I am going to save gonna and wanna for next week, and stay with the basic contractions like don't and she's today.

I'm doing this for two reasons. One, I can lay the foundation for contractions now, using words people are more familiar with, and two, it is much more important to be able to use the regular contractions before the lesser acknowledged ones.

First, our review. Since we just finished a series of four podcasts about vowels, I'd like to do a quick review of all 15 vowel sounds and their key words. If you are listening from a private place, please repeat the sound and the key word after me. Speak as accurately as possible.

long a (long a) cake
long e (long e) keep
long i (long i) bike
long o (long o) home
long u (lung u) cute
short a (short a) cat
short e (short e) bed
short i (short i) sit
short o (short o) top
short u (short u) sun
oo sound (oo sound) soon
u as in put (u sound) put
aw sound (aw sound) dog
oi sound (oi sound) join
ow sound (ow sound) down

Good. If you want specific reviews of certain sounds, go back to the previous four episodes.

All right, contractions.

A contraction is a word like don't and can't, which is a combination of two, or sometimes more words. Wikipedia has a pretty good article on the use of contractions in English as well as other languages. I'll put a link up along with the transcripts this week on pronuncian.com.

Although I think most ESL classes teach contractions, few teachers emphasize the importance of using them in everyday speech. Contractions help us keep the rhythm of spoken English. English is a stress-timed language, meaning we keep about the same amount of time between stressed syllables of spoken English. This leads to things like reducing vowels, and in turn, creating things like contractions, along with other spoken English features.

Languages that are not stress-timed are usually a type of syllable-timed. It is generally considered that each syllable takes about the same amount of time in syllable-timed languages.

For some quick examples, which I am taking from Wikipedia's article on stress-timed and syllable-timed languages, the following languages are considered stress-timed: English, German, Dutch, Portuguese, Russian, and Czech. In contrast, Finnish, Slovene, French, and Spanish are commonly cited as syllable-timed languages. I'll also put the link to that article with this week's show notes for those of you that would like to learn more.

In English, the intuitive desire of a native speaker to have stressed syllables occur on beats makes it likely for us to reduce or omit some sounds, especially vowel sounds of function words. Function words are the words that serve a grammatical purpose. A content word, or a word that gives the most information about our topic, is usually stressed. I could talk about this for a long time, and I will in a future podcast. Right now I hope you will just trust me that learning to say contractions is a good thing to do. In fact, when a native speaker does not use a contraction where one is possible, it is usually going to slightly change the meaning of the sentence. For instance, in the sentence I didn't wash the car, using the contraction didn't, the important fact in the sentence is that the car wasn't washed. If I said I did not wash the car, splitting the word didn't into the words did and not, I am actually now emphasizing the word not. I would do this for a number of different reasons, like perhaps to offer a correction to the fact that you thought I did wash the car.

Let's listen to the common contractions with the word not, focusing on their pronunciation.

don't, can't, won't, hasn't, didn't, weren't

The word don't is the combination of the words do and not, and is pronounced with a long o sound. The whole word is only one syllable long. Listen to me again, and repeat after me if you can.

don't

The word can't is the combination of the words can and not. It is said with a short a sound, and is also only one syllable long.

can't

The word won't is strange because it sounds so little like the words it combines. Won't is the combination of will and not. It is also one syllable long, and said with a long o sound.

won't

The word weren't is the combination of the words were and not. Weren't is only one syllable long. I often hear this accidentally pronounced as were-n't by my students. Try to say it as one syllable.

weren't

The word hasn't is the combination of the words has and not. It is a two-syllable word and pronounced with a short a sound.

hasn't

The word didn't is the combination of the words did and not, and is two syllables long. It is pronounced with a short i sound.

didn't

The other set of words that are often made into contractions are auxiliary verbs including forms of the verb to be. These are words like: he's, she's, it's, I'd, you'd he'd, we'd, you're, they're, I've, you've, they've and others.

Let's look first at the combinations with the word is: he's, she's, and it's. These are all one-syllable words. Saying them as 2-syllable words is like not making the contraction at all. Listen again, and repeat after me if you can.

he's, she's, it's

Let's listen to the contractions with the word are: you're and they're.

The words your, spelled your, and you're, spelled you're, sound exactly the same. They are both one syllable, and sound like your. The word they're, t-h-e-y-'-r-e sounds exactly the same as the words t-h-e-i-r and t-h-e-r-e. Yes, they all sound exactly the same. Listen to the word again: they're.

The word have is commonly made into a contraction, like in the words you've, they've, and I've. These are all one-syllable words. Listen again. You've, they've, I've.

The last set of contractions I'm going to talk about at the combinations with the word would. When making a contraction with the word would, the only part of the word that remains in the d sound. Most pronouns can be combined with the word would. Listen to just a few:

I'd, you'd, they'd, we'd, she'd, he'd

All of those words are only one syllable long. Listen to them again, and repeat them if you can.

I'd, you'd, they'd, we'd, she'd, he'd

We can combine these auxiliary verbs with other words besides pronouns, and I would also encourage you to do so. We can combine them with any noun. For instance, the dog is, becomes the dog's. This sounds identical to the possessive form. So the word dog's is spelled and pronounced the same whether the phrase or sentence is:

The dog's barking, as in the dog is barking
or
The dog's bone, as in the bone that belongs to the dog.

You will notice these contractions much more in spoken English than in written English. The more formal the writing is, the less contractions will be used. In informal emails, lots of contractions are used. In a business document, few contractions are used. I try to use contractions in a more conversational manner during these podcasts so you can get used to hearing and understanding them. You have the option of reading the transcripts, which makes it easier to understand if my use of contractions ever confuses you.

The transcripts to this podcast are available online at www.pronuncian.com. I will also add the Wikipedia links that give some more information about the concepts I've talked about today.

As a little activity, I would encourage you to watch some video on TV or online and try to notice when contractions are used and when they aren't. Most subtitles on DVDs will have common contractions written the way they are said. Subtitles often do not write all of what the actor said, though, so you still have to listen closely.

Next week I will teach about informal contractions. Informal contractions are so informal that you will seldom see them written, except in some very informal emails. But they are spoken more than most Americans ever even realize, and you need to be able to comprehend them in conversations with native speakers.

Until then, have a great week everyone. If you have any comments for the show or if you have anything you would like to make sure I talk about, please email me at podcast@pronuncian.com.

Thanks for listening to the Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye everyone.

Stress-timed and syllable timed languages from: Timing (linguistics). (2008, June 1). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 19:07, June 1, 2008

11: The American English 'aw' /ɔ/, 'oi' /ɔɪ/, and 'ow' /aʊ/

Practice comparing the 'aw' with other similar vowels, and practice the diphthongs 'oi' and 'ow.'

PRACTICE: The lost dog stopped running and dug under a rock until his paws got muddy.

Transcript

Welcome to the eleventh episode of Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. If you are just joining us in this podcast, my name is Mandy, and we are just finishing up a series of four podcasts about vowels. I would strongly encourage you to listen to the previous three podcasts along with this one. These shows about vowels lay the foundation for many upcoming podcasts, and I hope you come back to them when you need a reminder about certain vowel sounds.

Last week we had a practice sentence in addition to our new key words. It was "Good fruit looks like good food should," and it emphasized the u as in put sound and the oo sound. Our key words for those sounds were put and soon.

Let's quickly review all of our key words, from the beginning.

long a (long a) cake
long e (long e) keep
long i (long i) bike
long o (long o) home
long u (lung u) cute
short a (short a) cat
short e (short e) bed
short i (short i) sit
short o (short o) top
short u (short u) sun
oo sound (oo sound) soon
u as in put (u as in put) put

Today we are going to learn about the final three vowel sounds, the aw sound (aw sound), the oi sound (oi sound), and the ow sound (ow sound).

Our new key words are the words dog, join, and down.

We will start with the word dog. (d sound, aw sound, g sound). Listen carefully to the middle sound of the word again (aw sound). To create the aw sound you need to have you jaw more open and make your lips round, like the short o sound, but then stick your lips out. That sounds strange, but I want you to push them forward so the sound comes out a longer round opening. Don't stick your lips way out, so you look odd, but enough to create a distinctively different sound from the short o sound. Compare the key words for the aw sound and the short o sound, dog, top. (aw sound, short o).

There are not a lot of minimal pairs between these sounds, but there are a few. Let's practice them now. I'm going to say the word and spell it, because some of these may be new vocabulary for you.

odd o-d-d, awed a-w-e-d
tock t-o-c-k, talk t-a-l-k
rot r-o-t, wrought w-r-o-u-g-h-t
stock s-t-o-c-k, stalk s-t-a-l-k
pond p-o-n-d, pawned p-a-w-n-e-d

Now you know that when you see a word spelled with the letter o, you need to be aware of the many sounds associated with that letter. Is it the long o, like in the word most, or the short o, like in the word stop, or the aw sound, like in the word cost?

Along with the aw spelling and the o spelling, the aw sound is usually the sound in words spelled ough and augh, like cough c-o-u-g-h, and taught t-a-u-g-h-t. When you practice the word lists on pronuncian.com, you will notice these different spellings, and now you know the sound associated with them.

Here is a practice sentence to help you compare the short o and aw sound, as well as the short u sound:

The lost dog stopped running and dug under a rock until his paws got muddy.

See if you can identify the vowel sounds in that sentence.

Now for our last two vowel sounds, the oi sound and the ow sound. Lucky for you, these are usually pretty easy sounds for ESL students. They are both 2-sound vowels, meaning they are a combination of a vowel sound and a w sound or y sound. Can you hear the y sound at the end of the oi sound (oi sound)? How about the w sound at the end of the ow sound (ow sound)?

Our key words for these sounds are join and down. (oi sound) join, (ow sound) down.

The oi sound is usually spelled oi, like in join, obviously, and it is also spelled oy, like in the words boy and toy.

The ow sound spelling is a little trickier, though. The o-w spelling can have two different sounds, (ow sound) like in down, but it can also sound like the long o, like in the word snow. s-n-o-w. If you purchase the book Pronunciation Pages online at pronuncian.com or seattlelearning.com, you will get extra practice at identifying confusing spelling patterns like these.

For more information about Pronunciation Pages, go to the promotional podcast from a few weeks back. I don't want to spend too much time talking about the book during these podcasts. But I do want to make sure you know it exists.

Okay, let's practice some quick word lists for our three sounds from today.

aw sound (aw sound): off, boss, gone, soft, flaw
oi sound (oi sound): boy, moist, choice, toy, coin
ow sound (ow sound): brown, mouse, count, house, town

And that's it! We have now studied all 15 vowel sounds! It took us four weeks, but for these very important sounds I wanted to make sure you got a good introduction to them. I'll keep returning to them in the future, now that you've got the basics.

Be sure to listen to next week's podcast, because it will be on one of my student's favorite topics, informal contractions. If you've never been to the United States, you may not know how important these are for understanding spoken English. They are not formal English and are often not taught at all, but they are common, and they do need an introduction. Informal contractions are words like gimme, lemme, wanna, and dunno. You don't actually need to know how to say them or use them in your speech, but if you can't understand them, you will have a very hard time comprehending an American's speech.

This podcast's transcripts are online at www.pronuncian.com, along with practice word lists for all of today's sounds, and all of the sounds of American English. As always, if you have a topic you'd like me to talk about, or if you just want to give me comments on the show, please email me at podcast@pronuncian.com.

Thanks for listening to this Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye now.

9: The American English short vowel sounds /æ, ɛ, ɪ, ɑ, ʌ/

 Learn which sounds are short vowels and how to correctly pronounce them. 

PRACTICE: Short vowel key words: "cat, bed, sit, top, sun"

Transcript

Hi everyone! Welcome to episode 9 of Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation Podcast. If you are a regular listener, you know we are in the middle of learning about vowel sounds. If this is your first time listening to this podcast, I'd like to say hello. My name is Mandy. As always, the transcript for this show is available at www.pronuncian.com. You will also find a link on Pronuncian for buying the book, "Pronunciation Pages: Sounds of American English" published by Seattle Learning Academy. The book is available as an ebook download, or as a physical copy to be shipped to you. Along with your book purchase, you get 6 months full access to the pronuncian website.

Let's get back to vowels. Last week we started talking about vowels and learned the five key words for our long vowels. Do you remember them? If not, they were: cake, keep, bike, home, cute. Long vowels are easy to remember because they sound like their name, a, e, i, o, and u. Today we will talk about short vowels, which are way more difficult to say and to hear. Like long vowels, I have key words for short vowels.

Since short vowels will take longer to get through, I'm going to jump right into them today. The short a sounds like (short a), (short a). The key word for short a is cat. To create the short a sound we need to lift the middle of the tongue and push it forward and into our bottom teeth a little bit. short a is a pretty forceful sound; we use a lot of muscle in our mouth to create it. Try saying the sound alone. (short a). Now say our key word, cat: (short a, cat).

The short e sounds like (short e). There is very little muscle involved to create this sound, just raise the middle of your tongue a tiny bit toward the roof of the mouth. The sides of your tongue may lightly touch your upper teeth. The key word for short e is bed. Do you hear the (short e) sound in bed? (b sound, short e, d sound). So, so far we've had short a and short e. (short a, short e). You want to be able to hear the difference between the sounds.

The short i sounds like (short i), (short i). It is the middle sound of the key word sit. The middle of your tongue is a little higher for the short i sound than it is for the short e sound. Listen to both sounds side by side. (short e, short i), (short e, short i), (bed, sit) Try saying those sounds: (short e, short i). Now say the key words: bed, sit.

To create the short o sound (short o), we need to open our mouth a lot. Our jaw actually needs to open to get this sound out nice and clear. At the same time as we open our mouth, our tongue bunches up some in the back of our mouth. (short o) The key word for short o is top. Top. (t sound, short o, p sound).

Do you remember the four key words so far? They were cat, bed, sit, and top.

Our last short vowel sound is the short u, and it sounds like (short u). The short u sound is created by pressing the back of our tongue down, and our mouth does not need to be open in the same way that it does for the short o. The short u key word is sun. Listen to the difference in the middle sound in the words top and sun: Top, sun. (short o, short u).

So we have the key words: cat, bed, sit, top, sun. Your job is to memorize those words. We'll come back to them again after practicing some short word lists, like we did last week for the long vowels.

short a (short a): add, after, bath, plan, crash
short e (short e): end, enter, bend, yes, dress
short i (short i): it, ill, gift, since, drip
short o (short o): odd, on, box, lot, rock
short u (short u): up, us, jump, luck, fun

Now let's practice with some listening for a bit. I'm going to say a word, and I want you to decide which short vowel sound is in the word. I am intentionally going to pick words that may confuse you because of their spelling. Keep listening for the comparison to the key words to help you. Start to learn to use those key words. Trust me, memorizing them will help you!

1. myth, m-y-t-h, Does it sound like cat, bed, sit, top, or sun? Myth. It is the short i (short i) like in sit.

2. said, s-a-i-d, said. Compare it to cat, bed, sit, top, sun. Said. I hope you said it is the short e. Please, do not say the word said with a long a, like sayed, or people will think you are saying s-a-y-e-d, which isn't a word, but an expected way to incorrectly conjugate the word say.

3. done, d-o-n-e, done. Compare it to cat, bed, sit, top, sun. Did you say it is the short u? If you did, very good; you didn't let the spelling mess you up.

4. lot, l-o-t, lot. Does it sound like cat, bed, sit, top, or sun? That one should have been easy. Lot is the short o, like the word top.

5. fast, f-a-s-t, fast. This one is also easy, it is the short a, like cat.

6. blood, b-l-o-o-d, blood. Can you get that one? The spelling is unusual for the sound, but it is the short u, as in sun. Listen and compare. Blood, sun. It is the same sound.

7. This is the last one today, bread, b-r-e-a-d, bread. Compare the sound in the word bread to the key words. Did you sat it is the short e sound? I hope so, because you would be correct.

Maybe you are starting to notice the sounds that are a bit harder for you. I cannot stress the importance of listening practice enough, and I really recommend that you go to the pronuncian website and practice some sets of minimal pairs. You can find minimal pairs practice for most of these sounds just below the word lists for each individual sound. You can click the sounds tab and find sounds that way, and the show notes from each show link directly to sound lists for the sounds we practice during each episode.

Thanks for listening everyone. This podcast covered the most number of difficult sounds in one show of all the shows so far. I know I go through it quickly, but that's why I give you so much free content on Pronuncian. That way you can practice what is more important to you. If you find this podcast valuable in your everyday life, please write an iTunes review. Don't worry about imperfect English. Even native speakers don't have great grammar, and I make mistakes all the time.

Have a wonderful day everyone. Bye-bye.

8: The American English long vowel sounds: /eɪ, i, ɑɪ, oʊ, yu/

Learn which sounds are long vowels and how to correctly pronounce them.

PRACTICE: long vowel key words: "cake, keep, bike, home, cute"

Transcript

Hi again everyone, it's me, Mandy. Welcome to Seattle Learning Academy's eighth American English Pronunciation Podcast. I hope you're enjoying the shows. Today we are going to begin a difficult set of shows about vowel sounds. Actually, today's show isn't that hard, but the next couple of weeks will have harder topics. We talked a little about vowels last week when I introduced the semi-vowels, the w sound and y sound. Speaking of the w sound and y sound, do you remember our practice sentence from that show? "Will you watch TV quietly while I'm working?"

How about the r-controlled vowel practice from the week before? "Learning early in the morning can be fairly hard work."

And before that we had my favorite practice sentence, "I would really like a little red wagon like Laura's." That sentence is also great for practicing the w sound. Just because those episodes are in the past, don't forget about them; it will be very helpful for you to go back to them and practice them once in a while. And, you'll be surprised when they have suddenly become easier.

So, vowels. Our alphabet has five vowels, a, e, i, o, and u. But we have 15 vowel sounds. There are many reasons that vowels are so hard, both to teach about and to learn about. One reason is terminology, vocabulary. I don't teach pronunciation using the International Phonetic Alphabet or symbols of any kind. I do this because dictionaries do not have one standard symbol library that they all use, and because you can't see the symbol I would be talking about. Although, even when teaching in person I use names instead of symbols. Once you know the name of the sound, you know exactly what I am talking about when I say that name. However, just as dictionaries don't use standard symbols, linguists don't use standard names. Can you see the problems arising already?

So the names I have chosen to use for our 15 different vowel sounds come from two places; one is the elementary schools of the United States, and the other is from their spelling. Today I'm only going to talk about one set of vowel sounds: the long vowels. Next week, you guessed it; I'll talk about short vowels.

This vocabulary "long vowel" or "short vowel" comes from elementary school and teaching kids how to read. Those teachers also need to name their sounds, and so the very, very, VERY old terminology of long and short vowels lives on. When I say old, I mean centuries old. The terminology is so old that they no longer correctly describe the sounds. Yet, in all the wisdom of our public schools this terminology is still used very frequently. Basically, 2 to 5 hundred years ago, long vowels sounded differently than they do now. Then a phenomenon called "The Great Vowel Shift" happened, and the pronunciation of each vowel changed. But the vocabulary didn't. So don't let the name of the sound confuse you! Long vowel does NOT mean that it is said for more time! Although, some long vowels are pronounced for longer than their short vowel counterparts.

So, what sounds am I talking about when I say "long vowel"? Well, when we teach kids how to read, we tell them that a long vowel sound says its name, a, e, i, o, or u. So, the long a sound sounds like (long a), as in the word cake c-a-k-e. For our vowel sounds, in addition to having some practice sentences, we will have key words. A key word is the word I will always refer back to when I want to compare sounds. The key word for the long a sound is the word cake. The word cake has three sounds, (k sound, long a, k sound), even though it has four letters. Don't confuse letters with sounds. Do you hear the long a? (long a) cake. If I wanted to get technical with this sound, I would mention that the end of the long a has a very brief y sound attached. Can you hear it? (long a) Cake. Letter sounds that end in a y sound or w sound are diphthongs, or two-sound vowels. American English uses different diphthongs than British English. I'm just going to teach you the American ones.

Long e sounds like (long e), just like the name of the letter. Our key word for long e is keep. (k sound, long e, p sound). Do you hear the long e sound? Keep.

Now, in staying with the pattern, the long i sounds like (long i) and is the middle sound of the word bike. (b sound, long i, k sound). The long i is also a 2-sound vowel that end in a brief y sound. Listen again. (long i, bike).

Long o (long o) is the middle sound of the word home. (h sound, long o, m sound). The long o sound ends in a brief w sound. Listen again. (long o) home. Many of my students don't say this sound with the w sound at the end, and it can cause miscommunication.

The long u is the middle sound of the word cute. (k sound, long u, t sound). Notice that the long u sound (long u) begins with a very distinct y sound. Without that y sound, we only have (oo sound), which is a different sound that we will study later. Can you hear the different middle sounds in the words cute and rule. Cute is said with (long u) rule is said with the (oo sound) sound.

If you and look at the transcripts for this episode at pronuncian.com you will see these words written out by their sounds. Seeing that will help you understand the more about sounds in words, and I encourage you to do that.

Let's practice our long vowel key words: cake, keep, bike, home, cute. See if you can remember the whole sequence: cake, keep, bike, home, cute.

Now I'm going to say a word, and you decide if the word has a long vowel or not. The first word is cat. Do you hear a, e, i, o, or u in the word cat? (pause) No, the middle sound is (short a) which is not a long vowel sound. How about the word few? Few. Yes, few has a long vowel, the long u. (f sound, long u) Let's try another. Run. Run. Nope, that is the (short u) sound in run, not a long vowel. Let's do two more. Eight. Eight. (pause) Yes, that word begins with the long a sound. (long a) eight. And the last word today, dream. Dream. I hope you could hear the long e sound in the word dream. (long e) dream.

I'm going to say five words for each long vowel sound, and I want you to repeat after me. I know, if you're on the bus or in a public place, that is harder to do, but if you can, repeat after me.

long a: faith, aim, play, grade, safe, may
long e: each, eat, team, deep, free
long i: ice, bright, smile, shy, fly
long o: own, both, drove, glow, throw
long u: youth, huge, pure, few, view

Good, I hope you talked along with me.

For this week, I'd really like you to memorize the long vowel key words for your practice. For most people, these are the easiest vowel sounds to say and hear, and I want you to have a really good vowel base before we start the short vowels next week. Can you remember the word set from earlier? Probably not. We didn't actually practice it very much. So here it is again: cake, keep, bike, home, cute. Let's say it one more time to put it to memory: cake, keep, bike, home, cute.

Along with the transcripts to this episode, word lists for all of these sounds and all the sounds we study are available at www.pronuncian.com.

Another reason I like using the old terminology of long and short vowels, even though it does not describe the sound, it only names it, is because it is still so widely used that you can do a search on the internet with the words long vowel or short vowel and you'll find results. It is much easier than searching for a symbol that represents a sound.

That's all for today. I would love to know if you are enjoying this podcast or if you have any suggestions to make it better. Email me at podcast@p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.com. Or, tell everyone what you think with a review on iTunes.

Thanks for listening, everyone.

7: Pronouncing /w/ and /y/

Learn how to create semi-vowels (glides), the /w/ and /y/ and how they exist in words.

PRACTICE: "Will you watch TV quietly while I'm working?"

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation Podcast. This is podcast number 7, and my name is Mandy. We have just finished up three shows dedicated to the r sounds and l sound, and we had some pretty difficult practice sentences associated with those shows. Do you remember, "On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks," and "I would really like a little red wagon like Laura's" and finally, last week's really hard sentence, "Learning early in the morning can be fairly hard work."

Let's talk a bit about last week's practice. Remember, I told you that the practice sentence has all four r-controlled vowels. The schwa+r is in the words, learning, early, and work. The or sound is in the word morning. The ar sound is in the word hard, and the air sound is in the word fairly. Did you get that? I hope so.

Today's sentence is going to be, "Will you watch TV quietly while I'm working?" because we are going to learn about the y sound and w sound.

The y sound and w sound are in the linguistic category of semi-vowels. They are also known as glides. Semi-vowel means that they are not quite vowels, and not quite consonants. They are similar to vowels in the way the sound travels through our mouth, but dissimilar in how they affect syllables.

Vowel sounds have two important attributes. First, there is little constriction in our mouth for these sounds. Vowel sounds don't create friction like the th sounds, or r sound in some languages. Vowels don't stop air like the t sound or d sound, or touch the tongue directly to another part of the mouth like an l sound. Vowels are subtle sounds with our vocal tract left quite open. Another thing vowels do, is cause syllables. Sometimes the consonant of the word can take over the vowel sound, like was saw last week with r-controlled vowels and the schwa+r sound. Many times, the schwa sound (or unstressed vowel sound) can be barely heard. That was all pretty technical, and I'll link on the pronuncian website to wikipedia articles that also explain these concepts.

The w sound and y sound are like vowels in the way we create the sound. (w sound) (y sound). This is very important to keep in mind if you are from India or Germany or any other country that says a sound more similar to an English v sound than w sound. Our v sound is said with friction caused when we touch our bottom lip to our upper teeth (v sound). In English, the w sound is created by making a small circle with our lips, then sticking them out enough so they don't touch our teeth and cause friction. Then we voice the sound. (w sound). Try saying the word wow, w-o-w. Wow. Notice the way your lips start in a small circle, then open, then end with the small circle again. Wow. For those of you with w sound / v sound issues, here are a few minimal pairs to repeat. Vest, west; vine, wine; verse, worse.

The y sound is created by lifting the middle of our tongue so that it almost touches the roof of our mouth, then voicing the sound. (y sound) The y sound is very similar to another sound we will study when we study long vowels next week, the long e sound. The long e sound is the middle sound in the word keep and the first sound in the word ear. Let's compare two very similar words, y-e-a-r and e-a-r. See if you can tell which one I'm saying. Year. That was year, with a y sound. Listen again. Year. Now, try this, ear. That was e-a-r. Ear. Say both of those words: year, ear.

Something most English teachers never teach is how we need to include these sounds in the middle of words even when we don't see them written there. This is a big part of having fluid speech, and it happens between words as well as within words.

Let's look at an example of where we need to add a y sound into a word that has no y written, the word quiet.

Many of my students aren't understood when they say the word quiet. Let me tell you why. Quiet is a 2-syllable word with two vowel sounds next to each other in the word. The first syllable is qui, and the second syllable is -et. It is difficult to join the final sound of the first syllable, (long i) to the first sound of the second syllable (short e). The way to join them is to add a little y sound between the syllables. Now we have quiet. Do you hear that y sound? Quiet. The same thing is true of the word idea. IdeYa.

But it isn't always a y sound that gets added. It can also be a w sound, like in the word fluent. Do you hear the w sound? Fluent. It is also in the word evaluate. Repeat that word. Evaluate.

How do you know which sound to add, the w sound or the y sound? Well, it's pretty easy because it will sound horrible if you use the wrong one. Here is the word quiet with an accidental w sound added instead of the correct y sound quiWet. Hear the difference? Quiet, quiWet.

As we get into the specifics of vowels in the next few weeks, this will begin to make more sense. For now, start to notice these sounds happening around you.

I'm sure you are all anxious to get to today's practice sentence. "Will you watch TV quietly while I'm working?" I'll say it in two parts: "Will you watch TV / quietly while I'm working?" Again. "Will you watch TV quietly while I'm working?"

That's all we're going to cover of the w sound and y sound for now, but both of these semi-vowels will keep coming back in the next few weeks of vowel practice. If you want to practice more of these sounds, go to www.pronuncian.com.

Good luck everyone. And remember, you can email suggestions to me at podcast@pronuncian.com. I'd love to hear from you!

6: American English r-controlled vowels /ɚ, ɑr, ɔr, ɛr/

Practice saying and hearing the difference between r-controlled vowels: /ɚ, ɑr, ɔr, ɛr/

PRACTICE: "Learning early in the morning can be fairly hard work."

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation Podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is podcast number 6. If this is your first time listening to this podcast, you should know that this is the third of three podcasts dealing with the l sound and r sound, and you may want to go back and start with podcast #4.

I hope you've all had a chance to visit www.pronuncian.com and see the other free practice activities we offer on that site as well as read the transcripts if they help you understand this information.

Did you are memorize last week's practice sentence "I would really like a little red wagon like Laura's"? How about the sentence before that "On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks"? Before that, we had the s sound, z sound practice in the sentence "Cats love boxes; dogs love beds." Today we will learn about r-controlled vowels and we will practice the sentence "Learning early in the morning can be fairly hard work."

So what are these r-controlled vowels I've been talking about for 2 weeks now? All of the sounds I've talked about so far have been consonant sounds. In the Latin alphabet, the alphabet English uses, we have 26 letters. 21 of those letters are consonants. For example, the letters t, d, s, z, l, and r, are consonants. The letters that aren't consonants, are vowels. We have five vowels: a, e, i, o, and u. These five vowels are used to represent 15 different sounds. How do we have so many sounds for so few letters? Well, think about the words "top" and "home". Already we can see the letter o representing two different sounds, the (short o) sound and the (long o) sound. If we add the word "dog", we find another sound represented by the o, the (aw sound) sound. Listen to those three words again: top, home, dog. When we begin talking about vowels, it is very important that we distinguish whether we are talking about a letter or a sound.

When I talk about r-controlled vowels, I am talking about four vowel sounds that are said differently because they are followed by the letter r. Or, to say it another way, the r sound changes the way we say the vowel sound before it.

Which sounds change when before an r sound? One of the easiest to hear is the (ar sound) sound. This is usually spelled as "a" plus "r" as in the word "car". C-a-r. Say the ar sound alone (ar sound). Now, if you learned a British pronunciation of English, you were probably taught not to say the r sound at the end of the word "car" unless the next word begins with a vowel sound. In the United States, we always say the r sound. Other words with the ar sound are farm, start, and smart. Say those words after me. Farm. Start. Smart.

The next r-controlled vowel is the "or" spelling, which sounds like (or sound). Word with the or sound (or sound) include the words four, tore, store, and explore. Repeat those words now. Four. Tore. Store. Explore.

Another r-controlled vowel is the a-i-r sound (air sound), like in the words air, stair, hair, and care. Say those words after me: air, stair, hair, care. Later, I will expand on how these vowels sound different from when they are not before an r, for now, I really just want you to know that they exist.

The r-controlled vowel that really seems to cause the most confusion is the schwa + r sound. First, what is the schwa sound? The schwa sound is an unstressed vowel sound in English. When schwa comes before an r, there becomes almost no vowel sound at all, and we say and hear only an r sound that takes a little longer than it would if it weren't after a vowel.

In the r-controlled vowels we looked at so far, we can hear two distinct sounds. In the a-r sound (ar sound) we hear (a, r). With the o-r sound (or sound) we hear o-r. And a-i-r sound (air sound) we hear (ai-r). But with the schwa+r, we just hear (r sound), and no distinct extra vowel sound. Listen to the word girl. Girl. Girl. We hear g-r-l, only three sounds, all of them consonants. Listen to the word learn. Learn. Learn. We hear l-r-n, only three sounds. The r sound is nearly taking over the vowels in those words. It isn't completely taking over the vowel, however, because it is still responsible for creating syllables in words.

I'll demonstrate this by comparing two very similar words, the words terrain t-e-r-r-a-i-n, and train t-r-a-i-n. These two words are pronounced the same except that the first word has an r-controlled vowel and the second word does not. Listen carefully. Terrain, train. Notice also that the first word is two syllables long, and the second word is only one syllable long. Terrain, train.

The schwa+r sound is the most common r-controlled vowel and is commonly spelled er, ir, or ur. For instance, and er spelling exists in the word her h-e-r. An ir spelling exists in the word girl g-i-r-l. And a ur spelling exists in the word burn, b-u-r-n. Those are the most common spellings, but any vowel before an r can become a schwa+r. For example, the words work and word are both spelled or, but sound like schwa+r. Work, w-r-k, and word, w-r-d.

Remember, a schwa+r really just sounds like an r sound that takes more time to say. We really don't hear any vowel sound before it. Let's look back to our first r sound practice sentence from two weeks ago, "On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks." Can you pick out the r-controlled vowel in that sentence? Maybe you noticed the first time we practiced that sentence that the first sounds in the word "Thursday" are different form the first sounds in the words "threw" and "three". "Thursday" has an unvoiced th sound followed by a schwa+r sound. "Threw" and "three" are both the unvoiced th sound followed by a plain r sound. I'm going to say all three words again. Thursday, threw, three. Thursday, because it has a schwa+r sound, has an r sound that lasts longer than three and threw.

Let's review the four r-controlled vowels. The ar sound (ar sound), the or sound (or sound), the air sound (air sound) and the schwa+r sound (er sound). Which r-controlled vowel do you hear in the word corn? (pause) It is the or sound. How about the word first? (pause) It is the schwa+r sound. And the word dark? (pause) That is the ar sound. Do you remember the word work? Work, though it is spelled with an or, is pronounced as schwa+r. Work.

So, are you ready for our practice sentence for r-controlled vowels? Here it is. "Learning early in the morning / can be fairly hard work." See if you can find all the r-controlled vowels in that sentence. All four of them are there, and one is there three times. Repeat after me. "Learning early in the morning / can be fairly hard work." For some of you, saying these r sounds is very, very hard work! Let's say the sentence again. "Learning early in the morning can be fairly hard work."

There, after three weeks of working on the r sounds and the l sound, are they getting any easier for you? Let me know! You can email me at podcast @pronuncian.com, and tell me what you think. If you have a pronunciation issue you'd like me to talk about, I'll get to it as soon as possible. Also, if you've downloaded this podcast through iTunes, please, write a review. Tell the world what you think. I create these podcasts for free, and writing a review is a great way to let me know you appreciate my efforts.

Next week I am going to work my way into vowel sounds by starting with the semi-vowels, the y sound and w sound. These two sounds are important on their own, but become even more important when we start talking about joined speech and I give you some tips for whole sentences and not just single sounds and individual words.

Have a great week everyone, and remember, you can go to the transcripts from this episode to find word lists specific to the skills we worked on today, as well as all of the past shows. It takes a lot of practice to break speech habits.

Good luck!

5: The American English /r/ and /l/

The /r/ can cause even more problems when it is near the /l/.

PRACTICE: "I would really like a little red wagon like Laura's."

Transcript

Hello again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is podcast #5. Today we are going to continue our study of the two liquid sounds, the r sound and l sound. Today's practice sentence is, "I would really like a little red wagon like Laura's." We'll come back to that later.

Did you practice last week's practice sentence? "On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks." I'm going to start only going back and reviewing the past three show's practice sentences or word sets. Our s sound / z sound practice with the s endings from two weeks ago was "Cats love boxes, dogs love beds." Remember that the final sound of the word before the -s ending dictates if the final s will be like an s sound or z sound. And our word set from Episode Two was: "dime, time; dense, tense; code, coat; tide, tight; spend, spent."

Last week we talked about the fact that the General American Accent is a rhotic accent, meaning we say our r sounds, no matter where they occur in the word. Today we are going to compare the r sound to the l sound. I find that students from Asia tend to have a lot of trouble with both of these sounds, and if your native language is Japanese, you probably already know the struggle with the r sound and l sound. Many of my Japanese students come to me and not only can't say the sounds, but also cannot hear the difference when a native speaker of English says them. There have been many studies that link the ability to hear sounds with the ability to say them. If you are one of those people who can't hear the difference between an l sound and r sound, go to pronuncian.com, find the sound you want to practice, and click "additional practice". Many troublesome sounds have minimal pairs for very specific practice. Minimal pairs are words like we practiced for the d sound/t sound show; they are two words that are identical except for one sound, like dime/time. English has a lot of minimal pairs between the l sound and r sound. Can you hear the difference between the following words:

play, pray
climb, crime
arrive, alive

If you can't, be sure to do some listening practice.

Also, speakers from a wide variety of backgrounds have trouble with the l sound when it occurs near the r sound. So, even if you aren't from Asia, you aren't free of l sound trouble. The reason these sounds conflict with each other is because of how they are produced inside our mouth. Remember, the r sound can have lots of formations at the tip of our tongue, the important thing is that it is the very back of the tongue, all the way in our throat, that is responsible for articulation in the General American Accent. (r sound). The l sound, however, happens way at the front of our mouth, with our tongue touching the tooth ridge in the same place we touch it for a t sound. (l sound). That requires a pretty large movement of our tongue to go quickly from an l sound to the r sound. I also want to say that the back of our tongue is low for the l sound, not high, like it is for the r sound.

People from India tend to have another problem with their l sounds. Just like people from many languages of the Indian subcontinent retroflex their t sound and d sound, they do the same for the l sound. Retroflexing is placing the tip of the tongue too far back, behind the tooth ridge instead of at the front of it.

Let's say some easier words with the l sound at the beginning before we combine it with the r sound. Repeat after me.

laugh
like
let
list

Were those easy for you or hard for you? If they were hard, please practice the l sound word list on pronuncian.com.

Now let's practice some words that have both the l sound and r sound in them. Ready?

girl
world
learn
early
really

Let's say all of those again.

girl
world
learn
early
really

I want to make sure you that you can clearly pronounce the words word w-o-r-d and world w-o-r-l-d. I have a lot of students who cannot say these words clearly enough for a native speaker of English to hear the difference between. You need to make sure to add the l sound to the word "world". Let's say them both: word, world.

So, let me give you the practice sentence for today.

"I would really like a little red wagon like Laura's."

Again:

"I would really like a little red wagon like Laura's."

I have to say, this is my favorite practice sentence of all because it hits a number of sound issues, many of which we haven't even talked about yet. We'll come back to this sentence in the future, so you might as well memorize it.

"I would really like a little red wagon like Laura's."

There you go. Hopefully you now better understand the r sound and l sound. But we aren't finished yet. As I said last week, another aspect of the r sound is r-controlled vowels. For people who learned Received Pronunciation, the British standard of English pronunciation, you will have some major habits to overcome if you are trying to learn an American accent, and many of those habits are elements of r-controlled vowels.

I hope you are enjoying this podcast. Please, let me know what you think by emailing me at podcast@p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.com! You can also to go pronuncian.com for show notes and transcripts. If you liked the show, you can let me know your appreciation by writing a review in iTunes.

That's it for today, everyone. Have a wonderful week, and have fun practicing your American English Accent! Thanks for listening.

4: The American English /r/

Learn how the American /r/ is different from the British /r/.

PRACTICE: "On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks."

Transcript

Hello everyone. It's me, Mandy. Welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. This is podcast number 4. Today we are going to begin a series of podcasts dedicated to one of the most hated sounds of English, the r sound and l sound. These are very complicated sounds, and it will take us a few shows to get through them in their entirety. In fact, today, we aren't even going to talk about the l sound. Our sentence for practicing the r sound today is, "On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks." It is no accident that we are putting so much emphasis on the r sound after the unvoiced th sound in that sentence.

Before we begin talking about the r sound and l sound, let's review our sentences and word sets from podcasts one through three. First, the th sounds. Repeat after me. "Think about this thing, that thing, and those things." (pause). Then our d sound/t sound minimal pairs, "dime, time; dense, tense; code, coat; tide, tight; spend, spent." And finally our s sound / z sound practice with the s endings in the sentence, "Cats love boxes, dogs love beds." All of these practice sentences are in the show notes, along with audio for them, as well as the transcripts for each show, at www.pronuncian.com.

Now, back to the r sound and l sound. First, let's give these sounds a category. We'll use the common linguistic term "liquid" for these two sounds. Liquid is the most consistent term I've found for these sounds.

When speaking with the General American Accent, Americans use a rhotic r, which means we say it in all parts of the word, including when it occurs after a vowel sound. This is one of the major differences among accents of English. I tell my students, where you see an r written, pronounce the r sound. Wikipedia has a map showing Britain and America and the areas of those countries that speak with a rhotic and non-rhotic accent. All I want you to remember is that the General American Accent pronounces the r sound wherever it is written.

So how do we create this tricky sound? Well, there is no single correct way. The tip of the tongue may be raised or lowered, some people bunch the tongue up in the center of the mouth, and some bunch the tongue up at the back of the mouth. The important feature of creating an r sound is that the very back of our tongue, actually down in our throat, is constricted. In the General American Accent, the r sound is also a smooth sound that we can make continually without stopping: (r sound).

The continuous quality of the sound is very important. It means that we do not tap the r sound like this, (red-tap) trill, or roll our r sound like this. (red-trill) If the tip of your tongue is raised so high that it touches the tooth ridge, you cannot be creating the sound correctly. Also, if the back of your tongue is causing friction and a substantial vibration, as a fricative would, you cannot be creating the r sound as an American English speaker would, like this. (red-fricative) The sound is smooth and continuous, and the tongue never touches the tooth ridge: red.

It is usually at the beginning of a word that a non-native speaker can first say the sound correctly, as in the words "race" "rough" or "red". The pronuncian.com webpage has all the General American Accent sounds with words sorted by beginning, middle, or end of the word. See for yourself if you have an easier or harder time with the sound based on where the sound is in the word.

Since we've already studied the unvoiced th sound, let me bring attention to a particularly difficult sound combination for a lot of people, the unvoiced th sound then r sound. If you have a tendency to tap your tongue, you will probably find that this is quite difficulty to stop doing in this combination. Ready? Repeat after me.

"On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks."

Let's try it again.

"On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks."

And, one more time a little faster.

"On Thursday, Thelma threw three red rocks."

Let me say here that there is not a language group that I have taught yet that has had no trouble with the r sound. So if this is a really, really tough sound for you, you're not alone. Spend some time analyzing your own speech patterns and see what you learn about the way you speak.

In our next podcast I'll add the l sound to the picture, and then after that I will come back to r-controlled vowels. For now, practice the r sound at the beginning of a word and after the unvoiced th sound. If it takes a long time to make this change, remember that you are dealing with both relearning to use the muscles in your mouth as well has needing to break very old habits.

If you have a pronunciation issue that you would like me to talk about, please email me at podcast@p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.com, and I'll get to it as soon as possible. Also, if you've downloaded this podcast through iTunes, please, write a review and tell the world what you think.

Good luck with the r sound everyone, and have a great week!