WEBVTT 00:00.000 --> 00:09.900 Hello, welcome to the podcast. This episode is going to be all about pronunciation. We're 00:09.900 --> 00:19.920 going to look at some of the components of pronunciation, goals, how to be understood 00:19.920 --> 00:37.640 problems regarding being understood, and factors that influence pronunciation. There's quite a lot of information here in this podcast, so to get the maximum benefit from this, you 00:37.640 --> 00:43.000 should take notes, improve your note-taking ability, you're also going to improve your 00:43.000 --> 00:51.360 vocabulary, and also, if you implement any of the instructions I've put, you're probably 00:51.360 --> 00:59.320 going to improve your pronunciation, or at least, find out where the problems are, becoming 00:59.320 --> 01:06.920 more aware of what factors influence pronunciation. So, let's get that, let's have a look at some 01:06.920 --> 01:15.720 of the factors that start off with age. Now, unfortunately, at the moment, we cannot really 01:15.720 --> 01:25.000 influence age factor. So, what I mean by age is maybe the amount of time you've been 01:25.000 --> 01:30.280 learning the language, or maybe the amount of time you've been living in the country 01:30.280 --> 01:37.039 and this does have an effect, logically, the longer you are there, the more likely you 01:37.039 --> 01:47.840 are to speak with that accent. However, this is quite, well, as Ron Penelope makes it clear 01:47.840 --> 01:54.600 here, obviously you need to integrate into that country, so what a lot of people can 01:54.600 --> 01:59.800 do is maybe go to a foreign country, and only hang out with people from that one country 01:59.800 --> 02:06.440 which is kind of ridiculous, really. But this brings me on to the next point, which is exposure 02:06.840 --> 02:13.840 exposure to the language is also going to affect how you, well, affect your pronunciation 02:13.840 --> 02:20.840 And this is a factor that we can totally under our control. So, we might as well use it to 02:20.840 --> 02:28.840 our own advantage. For example, somebody who's living in Poland and listening to podcasts 02:28.840 --> 02:36.040 24-7 is going to have more exposure to the English language than somebody in a Polish 02:36.040 --> 02:40.440 person living in London and hanging out with Polish friends, or worse than with Polish 02:40.440 --> 02:46.840 friends. So, this is what I was going to say about the exposure level. So, because it's 02:46.840 --> 02:52.440 under your control, I strongly recommend you take advantage of this and just put your life 02:52.440 --> 02:57.040 in English, and I said that a million times before. Now, the other factor that's going 02:58.040 --> 03:10.040 to affect your pronunciation is your own language. So, if your language is rather similar to 03:10.040 --> 03:18.040 English, and these languages might include Dutch, German, some of the Scandinavian languages 03:18.040 --> 03:27.040 I often think that definitely Norwegian and Swedish, these languages are similar to English 03:27.040 --> 03:32.040 Like, English is a Germanic language, and it's got a lot of Norwegian words, Swedish 03:32.040 --> 03:39.040 words, German words, and Dutch words, and especially searching German grammar. So, that's 03:39.040 --> 03:47.040 why it's probably easier for people from those countries to learn English, and probably why 03:47.040 --> 03:53.040 they've got better English writing skills and better score. However, you don't want 03:53.040 --> 03:59.040 to beat yourself up about this, okay? You don't want to be comparing yourself to these 03:59.040 --> 04:07.040 people, because they've just got natural advantages. So, for example, if you're Chinese and you 04:07.040 --> 04:14.040 want to learn Japanese, you've got an advantage there. A Scandinavian wouldn't find it much 04:14.040 --> 04:22.039 more difficult. So, there's no point comparing yourself with the other people. I've made 04:22.039 --> 04:28.039 a note here that the race is long, and you'll beat yourself up at the end of the day. And 04:28.039 --> 04:32.039 by the way, if you do start comparing yourself with other people, it's a complete, complete 04:32.039 --> 04:38.039 waste of chaos, because the only comparison is with yourself, and improving your own self 04:38.039 --> 04:44.040 So, let's carry on. Now, the other factor is your phonetic ability. Okay? This basically 04:44.040 --> 04:54.040 means your ability to distinguish between sounds. So, try to hear for the language 04:54.040 --> 05:02.040 If you can hear the differences between boh and boh, if you can hear the differences between 05:02.040 --> 05:09.040 words and stresses. And this is an ability that everybody's got, otherwise they wouldn't 05:09.040 --> 05:15.040 be able to speak their own language or understand their own language. So, you've definitely 05:15.040 --> 05:23.040 got this ability. Now, the key is, can you improve this ability? Can you adapt it? Can 05:24.040 --> 05:31.040 you make it? Can you become accustomed to other languages and other accents? So, this 05:31.040 --> 05:38.040 is also under our control, and one of the best ways is through exposure, increased exposure 05:38.040 --> 05:44.040 start listening to our practices, start listening to the stuff that we enjoy, the material that 05:44.040 --> 05:51.040 we enjoy. Now, this brings me on to the next point. And on to the next point, what's your 05:51.040 --> 05:57.040 goal regarding English pronunciation? Do you want to speak like a native speaker? And 05:57.040 --> 06:03.040 that's quite ambiguous, because native speakers come from Liverpool, from Scotland, from London 06:03.040 --> 06:12.040 from Yorkshire, from all over the place. And maybe your goal wouldn't exactly be to speak 06:12.040 --> 06:19.040 like a Liverpudlian. Okay? One friend said that his kids, when they speak like a Liverpudlian 06:19.040 --> 06:25.040 in Liverpool, sound like a criminal. But that isn't fair. Hopefully, well thankfully 06:25.040 --> 06:30.040 well I doubt it, that a Briton living in Liverpool is a Liverpudlian. Anyway, so let's carry 06:30.040 --> 06:36.040 on. So, what's a more realistic or what's a more exciting goal? That's probably to be 06:36.040 --> 06:45.040 understood. Okay? And this goes back to similar concepts in the essay writing. Okay? And with 06:45.040 --> 06:54.040 the essay writing, you want to be understood. You want to make sure that the examiner has understood that you've got the task response under control. And likewise, when you're in 06:54.040 --> 06:59.040 the speaking test, you want to be understood. Because even though you might be using the 06:59.040 --> 07:07.040 best vocabulary, or the best grammar structure, if you're not being understood, then the examiner 07:07.040 --> 07:14.040 can't give you any points regarding if you've actually answered the correct questions. So 07:14.040 --> 07:22.040 just bear this in mind and do some quick exam tips. When we're actually in the exam, we 07:22.040 --> 07:28.040 sit up straight, I've just done that now, I've reminded myself. And we sit up straight 07:28.040 --> 07:35.040 and we have the echo, we speak slower, we talk a little bit louder, and we offer increased 07:35.040 --> 07:40.040 comprehension for the listener, we speak a little bit slower, we offer increased comprehension 07:41.040 --> 07:47.040 and we also try and vocalise. That means we don't swallow any of the end parts of the 07:47.040 --> 07:56.040 word. I just talked to a student from Venezuela, she's living in Toronto, and everybody there 07:56.040 --> 08:01.040 in Toronto, in Canada, Toronto, if you're Toronto, and that's just their accent, but 08:01.040 --> 08:05.040 they swallow their TV, they don't bother saying it. So if you're not familiar about that 08:05.040 --> 08:09.040 it might be a bit difficult to understand, but if it's the first time you hear it, you're 08:09.040 --> 08:14.040 like, what's Toronto, what's wrong? Obviously, the context is going to help you as well 08:14.040 --> 08:19.040 but what I'm saying is that if you're vocalising, then you're not going to swallow a single 08:19.040 --> 08:25.040 sound, you're going to pronounce every part of the sentence, and that just makes it crystal 08:25.040 --> 08:32.039 clear for the listener. This is what I do a lot actually, just from my teaching at school 08:33.039 --> 08:40.039 the class goes a lot faster than just vocalising, and everybody can follow along with that 08:40.039 --> 08:48.040 However, I've been teaching for a long time now, and this vocalising skill, vocalising 08:48.040 --> 08:55.040 effect that I'm doing, is now cross-reinforced with my everyday speech. So some people say 08:55.040 --> 09:00.040 that I don't sound English anymore, because I'm vocalising all the time, whereas native 09:01.040 --> 09:08.040 English speakers will speak faster, closed, and probably use more colloquial language 09:08.040 --> 09:13.040 Yes, I remember actually a few months ago, somebody in the train station said, I'm sorry 09:13.040 --> 09:20.040 I don't speak English now, I'm like, jeez, time for brunch! Anyway, let's carry on. So 09:20.040 --> 09:29.040 some quick stuff about improving our intelligibility. Now then, let's go on to some of the aspects 09:29.040 --> 09:40.040 of pronunciation. So the rhythm. English has a certain rhythm, and it's got a tendency 09:40.040 --> 09:49.040 for some of the stresses or the strong beats in the sentence to actually fall on nouns 09:49.040 --> 09:57.040 adverbs, adjectives and verbs, which are basically the words that are important to the sentence 09:57.040 --> 10:04.040 So if you just go back, you've probably heard me when I said rhythm, and I say one of the 10:04.040 --> 10:09.040 aspects is rhythm. That's the rhythm, and I did it unconsciously, that this is just 10:09.040 --> 10:16.040 part of the language, that it's got a tendency to put importance on these words, the nouns 10:16.040 --> 10:25.040 the verbs, the adjectives and the adverbs. So if you introduce that into your pronunciation 10:25.040 --> 10:32.040 you're going to improve your intelligibility. Now, the stress. Stress is important. I've 10:32.040 --> 10:39.040 got a friend, he's from Paraguay, and he always laughs at my pronunciation from Manchester 10:39.040 --> 10:45.040 and he says, Manchester, and he really exaggerates the chest, and that's where the stress is 10:45.040 --> 10:52.040 in that word, in that noun. And likewise, to pronounce the capital city of England correctly 10:52.040 --> 10:59.040 London, London is the biggest stress at the end there, sorry, the beginning, London, there's 10:59.040 --> 11:07.040 two stresses in the word. So this basically will come about, the practice of having a 11:07.040 --> 11:13.040 good ear, improving your listening ability. And like I said a million times before, a 11:13.040 --> 11:19.040 really good way to improve your listening ability is to transcribe. And you can even 11:19.040 --> 11:26.040 mark the letters and the words where the stress is falling. There's plenty of online 11:26.040 --> 11:34.040 exercises to do this. Perhaps transcribing a song isn't the best idea, because the words 11:34.040 --> 11:42.040 are going to be bent and stretched and swashed to fit the music, fit the lyrics, fit the 11:43.040 --> 11:49.040 melody. However, podcasts are really good, and I'm pretty certain you can find some online 11:49.040 --> 12:01.040 exercises for this. Sentence stress. And this corresponds with the vision, what I said before about the vision 12:01.040 --> 12:09.040 that the important part of the sentence will be the term that gets the most stress. So 12:09.040 --> 12:16.040 if I say, there's a lot of people in town, the stress there is probably in people and 12:16.040 --> 12:29.040 in town. There's a lot of people in town. Now, if I said another sentence, for example 12:29.040 --> 12:42.040 there isn't anyone here today. The stress is on today. Because I want to emphasize that 12:42.040 --> 12:49.040 actually today there isn't that many people here, there's nobody. So depending on what's 12:49.040 --> 12:59.040 the important component of the sentence will determine, or helps to determine, where the 12:59.040 --> 13:06.040 stress actually goes. So perhaps this might be a difficult thing to practice, and it might 13:06.040 --> 13:13.040 be a difficult thing to master as well, but just being aware of it, and being conscious 13:13.040 --> 13:20.040 of it, will help you to incorporate it into your own speaking abilities 13:20.040 --> 13:30.040 Now then, how could we use this in the adults exam? Well, if the examiner asks us, for example 13:30.040 --> 13:36.040 part 3, and they're saying, what qualities do you find important in a sentence? Well 13:36.040 --> 13:43.040 if you were going to answer this, you'd say, well, some of the aspects or some of the characteristics 13:43.040 --> 13:49.040 of a friend are blah blah blah. But if you put a stress on friend there, if you selected 13:49.040 --> 13:55.040 the sentence and you put a bit of a stress on friend, you'd probably do this naturally 13:55.040 --> 14:01.040 if you were an English speaker, a native English speaker. So there's no reason why you can't 14:01.040 --> 14:09.040 put a bit of a stress there, just a slight stress, and this will make the examiner understand 14:09.040 --> 14:19.040 that you're answering the right question. Now, if we do this to test 1, the examiner makes part 1, sorry, the examiner makes it 14:19.040 --> 14:29.040 full. Where are you from? You say, well, I'm from Venezuela, a lovely part, the capital 14:29.040 --> 14:35.040 of the city is my hometown. I've lived there for about 10 years, but I recently moved to 14:35.040 --> 14:41.040 Mexico, whatever, so I'll be right now again. So it's just a case of recognising the important 14:41.040 --> 14:46.040 part of the sentence, and this will also help you understand other people as well. If you're 14:46.040 --> 14:51.040 having difficulty understanding native speakers, especially English speakers who tend to speak 14:51.040 --> 14:57.040 a little bit faster, then you just listen for the key nouns, the key verbs, and you 14:57.040 --> 15:10.040 can get the gist of the sentence. So, those are some of the aspects. Now then, let's move on to the next component, which 15:10.040 --> 15:19.040 is being understood. So, some of the issues, some of the problems that we might have when 15:19.040 --> 15:28.040 we're being understood could relate to about 3 or 4 issues. The first one might be to stress 15:28.040 --> 15:38.040 we're putting stress, ok? If we're putting stress on the connectors, the less important 15:38.040 --> 15:44.040 fragments of the sentence, then we're going to make it difficult for the actual listener 15:44.040 --> 15:50.040 because it just doesn't sound right. So, some of the other problems might be related 15:50.040 --> 15:57.040 to your own language, and where you put the stress, or maybe you carry over some of the 15:57.040 --> 16:02.040 components or aspects of your own language into English, and this can make it for you 16:02.040 --> 16:09.040 a little bit more challenging for the listener to understand what you're saying. I'll give 16:09.040 --> 16:16.040 you an example. I have an Italian friend, and she always calls me Ben, and I have to 16:16.040 --> 16:22.040 tell her, I'm obviously joking, I have to tell her, I say, look, Ben, and one syllable 16:22.040 --> 16:28.040 Ben, it's not Ben, man, yeah? And Italians do this quite frequently, they'll put an A 16:28.040 --> 16:36.040 a vowel sound, in the middle of the sentence, between words, where it's not necessary 16:36.040 --> 16:42.040 I think another funny example of this is the Italian man in Malta, or the Italian man in 16:42.040 --> 16:48.040 London, it's quite a funny YouTube video, where he just takes it to the extreme, laughing 16:48.040 --> 16:52.040 at him, thinking about it, that, yeah, if you've got a few minutes, you might want to 16:52.040 --> 16:59.040 check that out, as he just bought a pair of... Anyway, yeah, it's always good to laugh at 16:59.040 --> 17:07.040 other people's problems. So anyway, move it on. I remember when I was in Taiwan, there 17:07.040 --> 17:13.040 was another incident, I had a friend, I can't remember what his name was now, but we always 17:13.040 --> 17:21.040 used to put la after it, and I think this is from Chinese, where we just put la in between 17:21.040 --> 17:26.040 words, at the end of words, so it'd be like, Ben La, are you sent to the services today 17:26.040 --> 17:33.040 I'd be like, what? Ben La? Is this a new thing? But then, having talked with other people 17:33.040 --> 17:42.040 and we'd be doing it all the time, I would also send to a la, yeah, and what I'm saying 17:42.040 --> 17:47.040 is that you just need to be aware that if you are bringing any of your own, any character 17:47.040 --> 17:54.040 which is your own language into your target language, in this case, is English. Now, another 17:54.040 --> 18:02.040 interesting issue, or challenge that you might have in the Chinese game itself, is 18:02.040 --> 18:10.040 you might actually delete some of the sounds that are necessary, and this is very frequent 18:10.040 --> 18:20.040 with the simple colour, so a lot of students do miss the E D sound. Okay, so I watched 18:20.040 --> 18:29.040 a game last night, and that E D sound is incredibly important because it dictates the tense 18:29.040 --> 18:39.040 So, yeah, it's just being aware of it, hopefully we'll be able to avoid deleting the sound 18:39.040 --> 18:48.040 and missing it completely. Now, the next issue is called substitution, and this happens when 18:48.040 --> 18:57.040 we might not have the sound in our own language, in which case we'll use a sound from, sorry 18:57.040 --> 19:04.040 yeah, I'm just getting mixed up now, so what I'm saying is that substitution, and this 19:04.040 --> 19:09.040 will happen when we don't have the sound that they use in English, or we use in English 19:09.040 --> 19:15.040 in our own language, so we'll substitute it with a sound that we do have in our own language 19:16.040 --> 19:25.040 Now, I'll give you a clue, I'll give you an example from Spanish. A lot of Spanish 19:25.040 --> 19:36.040 speakers of English will say DA instead of Z, or D, yeah? And the birthday is tomorrow 19:36.040 --> 19:41.040 and that's because they don't really have the key hostess, the Z, but they have the 19:41.040 --> 19:52.040 B, or the D, so they'll say DA, the birthday is tomorrow, OK? And although it's legible 19:52.040 --> 19:58.040 and you do get used to it eventually, however it's not, it could be difficult for somebody 19:58.040 --> 20:06.040 who's not used to it, or for a German speaker of English to understand the Spanish speaker 20:06.040 --> 20:14.040 whereas everybody learns the correct amount of response to using it, OK? So, you might 20:14.040 --> 20:21.040 want to record yourself, and just try and record yourself reading a text, and then compare 20:21.040 --> 20:26.040 it to a native English speaker reading the text. And this way you're going to be able 20:26.040 --> 20:33.040 to just see if there are any differences, and let's go back to what I was saying before 20:33.040 --> 20:43.040 about improving your finesse ability, your ability to understand other sounds and components 20:43.040 --> 20:51.040 of the language. Right, so that's everything, and if you want to take this a bit further 20:51.040 --> 20:56.040 if you're not serious about improving the language, and you've got these goals to be 20:56.040 --> 21:02.040 understood, or you want to speak like a native English speaker, there's a few links for more 21:02.040 --> 21:07.040 resources at Seren's blog, which is just behind this blog post, it's called IELTS Podcast 21:07.040 --> 21:13.040 Pronunciation, and there's also a course there, and of course, if you get the Speaking Confidence 21:13.040 --> 21:20.040 course at serensky.com, there's quite a lot of videos there showing you not only how to 21:20.040 --> 21:27.040 attack the exam, and how to get the confidence you need, and improve your fluency, but also 21:27.040 --> 21:35.040 working on technical aspects such as pronunciation and being understood by the internet 21:35.040 --> 21:40.040 OK, so I hope you've enjoyed this podcast, if you've got any suggestions, send me an email 21:40.040 --> 21:47.040 I'm always looking to improve them, improve the site, and yeah, if you did enjoy it as 21:47.040 --> 21:54.040 well, you could leave us a review at iTunes, that would be fantastic, or on Google Play 21:54.040 --> 21:58.040 or wherever, that would be awesome, and yeah, I'm truly thrilled