Pronunciation
"you don't have to sound like a native speaker but..."
Pronunciation is not
only a matter of you being understood when producing words. It is also a
question of you understanding when spoken to. It’s a two way issue. If you are aware of sounds and how English
works phonetically speaking, it makes it easier for you to understand. It’s not
only a matter of pronouncing though, it’s important to know vocabulary and to
understand how grammar works that you’ll lead you to a greater comprehension.
You explain something so the
other understands and acts accordingly. But you have to understand as well. If
you catch certain sounds you’ll be more accurate and if you are accurate your
message will be clearer to understand or at least you’ll reduce the chances of
misunderstandings because of pronunciation, at least. If you catch the sounds
you’ll find it easier to produce them too, and consequently, if you produce
them, and you are more easily understood, your confidence will grow. For example, the pronunciation of the regular
past, in many cases is just a matter of a t sound. Only the t sound (if there’s
no time reference) indicates the past tense! So it’s important to train the ear
to identify it and produce it.
Another important thing is to
speak slowly. Speaking fast does not hide mistakes or proves that your command
of the language is good. Speaking fast you may end up getting the person
confused, which is not the aim of communication!
Then again, it’s also
important to note that if you are going to interact with mainly non-native speakers there are items below which may become a little less
important to tackle in-depth. Yet, should you speak to native speakers, it’s worth mentioning that those native speakers
who are not used to speaking to non-natives speakers will hardly ever express
their lack of understanding and they simply nod. So, you are never sure if they
got your message in full or not. Whereas native speakers who are used to
working/speaking with people with your accent will certainly find it a touch
easier.
- Sound awareness 42 sounds: Look at the pdf doc with a comparison of the letters (of the alphabet) and actual sounds that English, French, Italian, Spanish and Catalan have. Objective: become aware that English pronunciation and therefore understanding and producing it can be hard for languages of Latin origin. Spanish has 26 letters and 27 sounds, Catalan ...27 letteres and 32(?) sounds amongst them the schwa, the most common sound in English, French also has more sounds than letters,... Which makes or should it easier to discriminate and produce more accurate English in terms of phonetics only. The fact that Spanish has fewer sounds explains why Spanish-only speakers find English hard to understand and produce intelligible output- among other reasons.
- Watch the Introduction videos from bbc learning English, pronunciation tips. Listen to them at least twice.
Introduction:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/pron/sounds/vowel_long_5.shtml
All the
videos can be found on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=bbc+learning+english+pronunciation&sm=1
You don’t
have to learn the symbols but it’s useful and not hard. As the lady says, many
of the symbols are the same as the letters.
Learn to associate a sound to a symbol to become aware of little
differences between very similar sounds. In Spanish for example: cajón, cojón. Note
that if you change the sound, you change the meaning!
- Symbols look scary but try the Quizzes tab for fun and you’ll discover that they are intuitive and you can draw patterns of use. Do the quizzes twice or more. It’s fun and easy to use.
Vowels v consonants ?
- Sounds: learn, cup cap, etc. Carefully read and listen to the sounds and videos from the ppt doc provided.
- –es, -ure word document. Use www.howjsay.com and www.wordreference.com
- Schwa and weak forms
- Past ed
- Ea spelling and sounds
- Minimal pairs
- Connected speech
- Learn to identify –er at the end of word as most times –er means :
-
Verb
+ er = Noun. The person (or thing) that
+ meaning of verb
Ex.
Teach – teacher, recruit-recruiter, cook-cooker
-
Adjective
+ er =Adjective. More , comparative adjective
Ex.
Simple- simpler, big- bigger, easy- easier, common- commoner (+than)
-
Other
with no suffix: sister, brother, etc.
It’s just a
little schwa sound. 1 little sounds together with other grammatical information
to help you figure out the words category.
Become aware of the grammar to help the brain make you understand the
word.
-
- Ea in spelling can be tricky:
- Oo
- ou
