Pronunciation Workshop

—The Americandream does not come to those who fall outquick.

Session One

1. Consonant R

2. Consonant W

Hi, I’m your instructor Paul Gruber and welcome to thePronunciation Workshops---First Training Session.

I am very excited that you have taken this first step toimprove your English pronunciation and I do hope that you wouldenjoy this program and receive great benefits from it. Before webegin I wanna make sure that you have downloaded and printed outthe training manual which accompanies this course. If you have notyet done so, please do it soon because you’ll definitely needit.

Now you may be wondering how is it that I am going to helpyou change the way you speak. Well, basically, when you learnedEnglish as a second language, you kept many of the sounds andspeech rules from your first language and you were continuing touse them when you speak English. This is what gives you an accent.You were using the sounds and speech rules from your nativelanguage instead of the sounds and speech rules of English. And youknow why? Well, because when you learned English, nobody evershowed you what the sounds and speech rules of English were untilnow.

That’s why I’m coming . Because I am going to show you andtrain you on how to use these sounds and speech rules correctly.Knowing in using these rules will help you reduce or possibly eveneliminate your accent. Now throughout the program you’re oftengoing to see me point to my mouth to show you how to producea particular sound. I want you to pay close attention and try tocopy exactly what it is I am doing. I would be showing you how tocorrectly form new sounds by changing the position of your tongueor changing the shape of your lips. These small changes are goingto make very big changes in your speech. We’re going to practisingand I recommend that you use the training manual and try topractise often. When you practise, I recommend that you start outspeaking slowly out loud in a strong voice while exaggerating allthe mouth movements. What would you be doing is retraining themuscles of your mouth in your tongue to move in new ways, whichwill produce a new pronunciation patterns. These new speechpatterns will slowly and eventually involve into your ownspontaneous fast speech, but it is important that you start outgoing very slow. If you can pronunce words and sentences correctlyspeaking slowly, well, then you’ll have no problem in saying themfast.

I believe practising is important, but I do not believe it’sthe only key towards success. Being aware of your errors. That’ sthe key. Being aware and also recognizing mistakes when you hearthem will probably be the most important factors towards yourimprovement.

Another thing I’d like you to keep in mind and I’m sure youmay have noticed this already is that when most Americans speak youwill notice that we seem to open our mouth a lot and there is agreat amount of mouth movements. Watch my mouth when I saysomething like “Wow, was there really raining on Wednesday!” Didyou see how my mouth seemed to move? It wasn’t with my lips flat.It wasn’t “Wow, was there really raining on Wednesday.” There was alot of movements. My mouth opened wide, but also my wholemouth moved forward. Now I find many foreign speakers, maybebecause of their language characteristics, they don’t move theirmouths much. There is very little facial movement. Because of this,to an American listener, the words often sound mumble, making itvery very difficult for an American listener to understand what itis you said. One way to be better understood immediately isto become more aware of your speech and to really start opening andmoving your mouth.

I’d like to try to observe what I’m talking about. Whenyou speak to native-borned Americans or watch TV or movies,notice how when Americans speak, generally our mouths really openbig and our lips come forward. These movements have a lot to dowith the sound of American English.

I also want to add that I’ll often be asking you to repeatwords and sentences on these videos. Try to think as if we wereboth sitting in the same room and I am directly right in front ofyou. Listen carefully to the words and sounds that I give you.Listen carefully to my pronunciation and watch my mouth, thenrepeat the words back to me in your own voice with the techniquesthat I’m showing you as clearly as you can. Now at first you mayfeel a bit of foolish talking to your computer screen, but reallyyou shouldn’t. Make believe you’re speaking directly to me. You’llfind this will to be extremely helpful and effective.

During the course of this program, I will begin by addressingconsonant sounds and then later on we’ll work with vowel sounds.Now vowel sounds, as you know, are A E I O and U, like ahh, ohh,eee, ehh, ihh and ooo. And consonant sounds are basically all theother letters’ sounds, like b, ch, s, t, f, g, sh, w and of course,there are many many more sounds.

The consonants that we are going to cover in this firstsession are the consonant R and the consonant W. Ok, are you ready?Here we go. Let’s get started. Let’s start with the AmericanR.

R’s are everywhere. They’re probably the most commonlyoccurring consonant sound in English. One reason for this is thatR’s affect vowel sounds, especially when an R falls at the end ofword or after a vowel sound as in the word CAR, or the wordAIR, or the word TURN.

After working with so many non-native English speakers fromaround the world, I believe the R sound is one of the main causesfor being misunderstood in American English. Therefore, this is whyI’ve chosen to start out with this sound. Now when some languages,like our speaking Spanish, the R is produced by bringing the tongueforward in the front of the mouth behind the upper teeth androlling or trilling the tongue~, like that. Now when some otherlanguages, like German and French, the R is produced in the back ofthe throat, but this is not how we produce an R sound in the UnitedStates. In American English, in order to say a clear R sound, twodistinct things hafta(have to) happen. The first thing is that ourmouth and lips come tightly forward as if you would be saying theOO sound. Do this with me, say OO and make sure you bringing yourlips all the way forward. Say OO. That’s it. You see how your lipsare forward? That’s what you wanna do. This is the position yourmouth should be in when you producing an American R, like that, andI’ll bet you know whenever I told you that. Now, the second thingis that your tongue moves back in your mouth. It doesn’t comeforward. It’s pulled back. This is probably the opposite of whatyou’re doing right now. So, for example, in the word Rock,notice how my lips are coming forward and my tongue moves back inmy mouth and I push out the R sound. Watch this: RRRock. Dowith me and exaggerate the R: RRRock. Watch with my headturn: RRRock. You see that? See how the whole bottom of myface came forward. Don’t be afraid to do this. This forward mouthmovement is what is going to give you an American R sound. It’snot~ and it’s not Rock with your lips flat. Your whole mouth reallyhasta( has to ) come forward. Now latter I recommend that youpractise doing this in front of a mirror while watching your mouth.Really push out the R and remember to pull your tongue back. Nowone way of checking if you’re doing this correctly with your tongueis by actually putting your finger around an inch into your mouthwhile saying an R sound. Watch this, RRRock, like that. Youshould be able to take the tip of your finger and feel the tip ofyour tongue. If you do these two simple things---bringing yourmouth forward and pulling your tongue back. I’m telling you yourspeech’s going to be clear and you’re going to sound so muchbetter.

Ok, we’ re going to start out with R’s at the beginning ofwords. Here we go. Repeat after me.

Rock

Rip

Reach

Road

Rain

Rich

Rome

Raise

Robe

Rice

Very good. Now repeat this sentence.

The round rooster rushed into thewrong road.

Very good. Now pronuncing R’s like this may feel a littleweird to you, but if you notice this is how most Americanstalk.

Ok. Now let’s do R’s at the end of words or after a vowel.When a foreign speaker produces R which at the end of word offollows a vowel, it’s usually very weak---gets not really heard andleaves the word opener unfinished, like in the word CAR. Nowyou may say CAR ending with the A vowel. But it’ s not CAR.It’s CAR/r/. Your tongue hasta pull back. CAR. And also your lipsclose a little bit in the front. The R needs to be very strong andyou need to close the word. CAR. Let’s practise these words.Repeat after me.

Car

Far

Star

Door

Bear

Four

Air

Year( now has a high vowel sound EE.Year.)

Turn

Poor

Very good. Ok. Now let’s discuss R’s inthe middle of words.

In the word Very, for example, which is a frequentlyused word in English. The R occurs in the middle of the word. It’snot a D sound. The word is not Vedi, or Vehi, it’s Very.Make sure that the R sound is strong and your lips are comingforward. Your tongue is back and you push out the R: Very,like that. Practise these sentences with me nice and slow. He isVery Very nice, like that. See how my lips arecoming all the way forward? Next one. She is VeryVery tall. Here are some morepractice words with R in the middle. Repeat after me.

Direction

Arrange

Erase

Correct

Marry

Garage

Original

Hurry

Zero

Marine

Berry

Operation

Caring

Arrive

Everyone

Ok. Very good. Now, R’s are often combinedwith other consonants and form what we call R Blends. It isimportant to understand that the R sound is the stronggest sound ofthe blend and your lips often come forward before you even say theword. And example of this is the word Grape. Now notice howmy mouth comes forward before I even say the word. Grape.Did you see that? And notice in the word Grape the R soundis strongger and you even hear it more than the G sound.Grape. Here are some practice words with R Blends. First atthe beginning of words. Here we go.

Training

Trust

Trip

Great

Tropical

Bring

Print

President

Product

Cracker

Crawl

Break

Ok. Now in the middle of words.

Subtract

Waitress

Nutrition

Australia

Introduce

Compress

Oppression

Betray

Very good. Ok now let’s practise R sounds in sentences. Thesesentences are filled with R’s. Keep the R sound strong. Don’tforget to bring your mouth forward and pull your tongue back. Saythese sentences with me. Here we go.

The story he read on the radio wasincorrect.

Her career in the law firm ispermanent.

Richard and Brooke took aride in their brand new RangeRover truck.

Everyone will respect the Royal Familywhen they arrive at the airport.(Be shorterclose to the word Air. It’s not airport. It’sAir, Airport, like that with strong R sound.)

The trip to the Rocky Mountains will berescheduled on Friday.

Very good. Ok now let’s talk about Wsounds. W sounds are very similar to R sounds. The major thing tokeep in mind is that in English when you see a W, it always has a Wsound. Like in the word What. Again notice how my mouthmoves forward. One way to make sure you were doing this correctlyis to first say oooo with your whole mouth forward, oooo, likethat, and then, open and close your lips to make the W sound, likethis, ooooWaWaWa. That’s how you produce a W.Wa, like that. It’s never a V sound, /v/,or you’re likebiting down on your lower lip, never. We’ll be going over V soundsin the fourth session. The reason I mention this is because manyforeign speakers, especially the German speakers say, for example,Vhat with V for the word What. Instead of saying“What will we do?”, which is correct. They maysay “Vhat vill ve do?” And that is not right and many people maynot understand you. Bring your mouth forward on those W words.What will we do. Say with me. Whatwill we do. Very good.

Now as I said the W and the R are similar,both of them are made with your mouth in the forward position andyour tongue pulled back. Your mouth should be a little bit tighterwhen you’re saying an R. Listen to the similarities and differencesbetween these R and W words.

Rick – Wick

Right – White

It’s not Vhite with V. It’s White with W.

Very good. Also be aware that the W sound occurs in somewords beginning with the letter O, like in the words: One,Once. You might not be aware of this. Practise the W wordswith me. We’ll start out with W at the beginning of words. Don’tforget to bring your mouth forward at the beginning of eachword.

Why

Which

When

What

Wipe

Wish

Weight

Wing

Very good. Ok now W in the middle ofwords.

Always

Away

Beware

Awake

Someone

Rewind

Halloween

Hollywood

Now practise these W sentences.

The wind from the west was verywet. (Remember Very starts with the V sound followedby a strong R. --Was very wet. Very good.)

We woke up and washed thewhite washcloth.

We waited for the waitress togive us water.

We had a wonderful time inWashington and Wisconsin.

Very good. Now while weare talking the W sounds, I’d like to mention Q sounds. How are Qsounds related? Well, Q sounds are made with the K/k /sound and theW sound/w/ put together. You may have known that. So, for example,the word Quick is pronunced with the K and the strong Wsound. KWICK, like that. Repeat some of these wordsbeginning with the Q sound.

Question

Quiet

Queen

Qualify

Quit

Quebec

Quilt

And also in the CH word Choir

Very good. Ok, here now is a paragraph which contains many Rand W sounds. You may wanna practise reading this paragraph a fewtimes . Notice how my lips come forward and all my Rs and Ws. Tryto do the same thing and don’t forget. Do not roll your R’~. Don’tdo that. Here we go.

Ray was born in Russia. He dreamed of building the perfectroller coaster at the Grand Canyon in Arizona. He had a friendnamed Fred who lived in Norway. Fred’s profession was designingrailroad tracks and his career involved traveling all around theworld. Ray thought it would be perfect if Fred designed his rollercoaster ride. Fred was creative, brilliant and worked well withrailroad tracks. He would be the perfect engineer for the project.The ride took two years to construct and was painted red and white.Everyone really wanted to ride the brand-new rollercoaster.

Very good. Now if you strongly push out those Rs and Ws whenyou practise eventually your Rs and W sounds are going to be clearand your speech will be much easier to understand.

If you have the time watch the session again and practiseyour pronunciation along with me, then take out your trainingmanual and practise on your own. All the word lists and readingpassages that are on these videos are in the munual as well. I hopeyou enjoy our first session together. Fell free to watch thissession again. I’m Paul Gruber with the Pronunciation Workshop andI’ll see you next time.

Session Two

1. Voicing

2. Consonant pairs

3. Consonant S

4. Consonant Z Voicing

Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Second Session. I hope things havebeen going well since we last met. I would like to just mentionagain there are literarlly hundreds of languages around the worldand every language has its own set of characteristics. What I’ vedone in this program is to address the most significantpronunciation errors made by most foreign speakers that you mayfind that not every lesson pertains to you individuallypronunciation problem. If that’s the case, well, that’sgreat cause you’ll get less to work on. But I hate you to miss outanything important. Therefore, I still do recommend that you watchall of the sessions in chronological order from the first sessionto the last session to get the most out of this program and latteron if you feel you meed more practice, review the sesions which youfeel may need more attention.

Ok. Let’s get started with today’s session. In this video,we’re going to talk about Voicing. We’ll also talk about ConsonantPairs and what they are and then we’ll cover S sounds and Z sounds.Ok, here we go.

Voicing. You’re going to hear me say this word a lot and youneed to understand what it is what I’m talking about. All speechsounds , all of them are either voiced or unvoiced. Now, what didthat mean? Well, first, let’s take a look at this video. It maylook a little bit disgusting . Do you have any idea what it is.It’s look like something that is opening and closing. I’ll give youa hint. You’ve got pair of these and you use them when you speak.Any idea? Those were vocal chords. Vocal chords are those tinymuscles that are right here when your throat that vibrates quicklyand creat sound and that sound is your voice that you can easilymake you vocal chords vibrate by just saying AH. That’s it. That’svoicing. Voicing is when your cocal chords are vibrating, producinga sound, and you can feel the vibrations if you put your hand righthere on your throat. Do this with me. Put your hand on your throatand now let’s loud say AH. Do you feel the vibration? Those yourvocal chords vibrating. Now all vowel sounds are voiced A, Oh, OO,AE, EE . You can not produce a vowel sound without voicingit. Nothing would come out. You see? You need voicing. AH. So allvowels are voiced. Now, consonants are completelydifferent story. Some consonants are voiced andsome consonants are not voiced. And many consonants are what wecall paired. So, let’s talk about Paired Consonants. Let’s look atthe sound. The letter P makes /p//p//p/-- that’s the sound of theletter P. Are your vocal chords vibrating when you’re saying thesound?/p//p//p/.You feeling vibrations in your throat? No, yourvocal chords now are not producing a sound so therefore the P soundis what we call unvoiced because there is no voicing. And this isthe sign that I’m going to make when there’s no voicing.

So now let’s look at the same sound the Psound /p//p//p/. But this time we’ll add voicing by vibrating ourvocal chords. Now we won’t change the thing with our mouth. We’ llkeep that the same, we’ ll just add voicing. So what happens to theP sound /p//p/---/b//b/. It becomes a B sound. Watch again. P—novoicing, /p//p//p/. /b/--B, voicing. /p/--/b/. You see thateverything here stays the same. The only differences my vocalchords are either vibrating or they’re not vibrating. So we say theP sound and the B sound are Paired Consonants. They’re producedexactly the same way here in your mouth, but the P sound has novoicing and the B sound /b//b/ does have voicing. Ok. Having saidthat, let’s look at another set of consonants. How about the letterT. What sound does that make? /t//t//t/. Is that voiced orunvoiced? /t//t//t/--It’s unvoiced. Your vocal chords are notvibrating. /t//t/. Now don’t change the thing with your mouth. Justtake the same sound and add voicing. What does that T soundbecome?/t//t/---/d//d//d//d/---becomes a D sound. So we say thatthe T sound /t/ and the D sound /d/ are also PairedConsonants.

Ok. Now let’s look at the F sound /f/.We’re biting down on your lower lip---/f/. Is that a voiced soundor unvoiced sound? /f/---it’s unvoiced. Your vocal chords are notvibrationg. /f/. Now same sound but this time we add voicing./f/---/v/. V. It becomes a V/v/. You see that? F/f/---no voicing.V---voicing./v/. So the F and V are also Paired Consonants.

There are many more consonants that are paired and we’ll getto those at another time. But for now, I’m going to to mention justone more. The S consonant, made with the air going through yourfront teeth. /s/. Any voicing going on with the sound /s/. No, theS sound is unvoiced./s/. What would be if you didn’t change thething. You just add voicing. What would the S sound become./s/---/z/. It will become a Z sound/z/. So S has no voicing /s/, Zhas voicing/z/. So we say the S sound and Z sound are also PairedConsonants. And this brings us to what I would like to covertoday---S sounds/s/, Z sounds /z/and how they work in terms of wordendings. I find that most people who learn English as a secondlanguage do not use the proper voicing on /s/ and /z/ endings. Sowhat happens is it can cause your speech to sound unclear andsometimes may cause you to be misunderstood. I’m going to show youthree easy rules that will help you pronunce many of these wordscorrectly.

This first rule is easy and this one I know you probably doalready. Rule 1: If the last sound in a word is unvoiced, andyou’re adding an S, well, then the S remains unvoiced, too. Let meexplain that. Take the word Cup. Cup. It ends withthe unvoiced P /p//p/Cup /p//p/or then if you add an S tothe word Cup to make a plural. The S you add also remainsunvoiced. So, for example, you have one cup or twocups. There’s no voicing at the end of that word. The Sremains unvoiced. One cup. Two cups. That’s easy. Youalready do this. I’ll show you another word Cat. Catends with the unvoiced T/t//t/. One cat. Two cats.Again the S ending is unvoiced. Cats. This also goes forverbs like in the verb Break. I Break. Breakends with the unvoiced K sound/k//k/. There’s no voicing on that K.So when you put the word in the third person. He Breaks. TheS you add also remains unvoiced. He breaks.

I stop(ends with the unvoiced P /p/). I stop. Hestops./s/---unvoiced S. Stops. Now as I said you already followthis rule and there really isn’t anything you don’ t know.

But on rule No.2, now this one you probably do not do, So pay closeattention to this rule. When adding an S to a word to make aplural. If a word ends with any of these sounds S Z SH CH orDG(J) as in Judge. Don’t worry. You really don’t need tomemorize this. It will become automatic. When you add an S ending,this time, we always add the ending IZZZZZ with the voiced Z. Itdoesn’t matter that it’s spelled with an S. It’s never S, unvoiced,never. It’s always IZZZZZ with voiced Z. Ok. Do this with me. Putyour hand on your throat, cause I want you to feel the vibration inyour neck and say IZZZZZ. Feel that right here IZZZZZ. Ok, so let’slook at the word Page, for example, which ends in a voiced sound.One Page becomes Two Page with that voiced Z. Two Pages. It’s notTwo Pages/s/,unvoiced,no. It’ s Two Pages /z/ with the voiced Z.Even though you spell the word like this, in American English youpronunce the word like this PAGEZZ. You’ re probably saying I neverknew that. See what you’ re learning from me. Ok, let’s look atanother word in the word BUS, for example, BUS ends with an S sound/s/. BUS. So if you make a plural, you’ re going to add the endingIZZZZZ with the voiced Z. So we’ ve got One Bus or Two Buses.Buses. Two Buses. The last sound you hear is that voiced Z,Buses.

Next one. Lunch. Lunch ends with the CH sound[ʧ] . Sowe’ve got One Lunch or Two Lunches. Lunches./IIIZ/. Very good.Let’s do some verbs. Raise. Meaning like to raise my hand. Thisword is a bit unusual because even though it is spelled with an S,it’ s pronunced with the voiced Z. So we say I Raise with thevoiced Z ending. And he Raises. Raise. He Raises his hand. It’svoiced. Next one. Brush. Like to Brush our teeth. I Brush. HeBrushes. Brushes. It’ s a voiced ending. Push. I Push. He Pushes.He pushes. Very good. By voicing these endings, your speech willbecome clearer, sharper and cleaner. Most likely you haven’ tnoticed that American English spoken this way, but now as I pointedout listen forward when you hear people speak. To an a nativelistener, this makes a very big difference.

Ok, here comes the thrid rule. This one’ s easy. If a wordends with a vowel sound, all you do is add a voiced Z. It’s simple.Let’s look at the word Tree. The last sound you hear in thatword is the vowel /EE/ and remember a vowel is always voiced. Sothe word ends in a voiced sound. Tree. So what you wanna doif you’ re going to add an S to word like this to make a plural isyou continue the voicing throughout the whole word and add on avoiced Z. So here we go. You’ve got One Tree or TwoTrees. It’s not Trees /s/ with theunvoiced S. It’s Tress /z/ with that voiced ending. You see that.Another example, the word Day. It ends with the voiced sound/e/, so you have One Day or Two Days. It’s notDays/s/---unvoiced S. Days/z/, with voiced Z ending. Nextone. Shoe. One shoe. Two shoes. Next is theverb Fly, which ends with the voiced sound[аɪ]. So you’ ve got I Fly. He Flys. Keep that ending voiced.Flys. The last sound you hear in the word Game is the M sound /m/,which is a voiced consonant. So because of that, when you add an S,the S should also be voiced. One game. Two games.Games. Another word. Head ends with the voiced D/d/,so we got One Head or Two Heads. Heads. It’svoiced. Two heads. Very good. Next word. Train endswith the voiced n. See that? So you’ ve got One Train or TwoTrains. Two Trains with the voiced Z ending.Song ends with the voiced NG sound, so if you make a plural,don’t forget to add a voiced Z ending. You’ ve got One Songor Two Songs. Two Songs.

Now what I just showed you take some practice to actuallyincorporate into your English. But I can tell you from pastexperience that most my clients were able tomaster these S and Z voiced endings in just a few weeks.

Ok, now for something else. As you know by now, English is adifficult and crazy language. All these words that I’m going toshow you now are written with an S, however, they’ re all pronuncedwith voiced Z. Why this is I have no idea, but this is how Englishis.

Here we go. The word Is. It’s not/Is/(unvoiced). It’s pronunced as if it were a Z/IZ/. Thisis good. You hear that. Is. His. Same thing.It also has a voiced Z ending. His mom is Mary.As. You pronunce it with voiced Z. As the phone ring.Was, which is a very common word. It wasraining. These, voiced ending. These are mychildren. Those. Those are my books. Easy,again, the S is like a voiced Z. Easy. This is easy.Because, which is another common word. Because wewere late.

Ok, now let’s do some practice with reading passages. Each ofthese has many voiced and unvoiced S and Z sounds. All of theunvoiced Z sounds you’ ll see are underlined. If you printed outthe training manual using a color printer, you’ ll notice that thevoiced Z sounds are all printed in red. This will help you visuallysee which sounds should be voiced. I’ m going o slow and exaggeratethe sounds. You may just wanna listen to me first, then stop thevideo, practise on your own and then later on watch this videoagain and pratice with me. Whatever feels right to you. Now thisfirst one has many voiced Z sounds. Here we go.

Another zippy, zappy, crazy daycomes to a close. As we zoom up toJoe’s snooze zone, Zoe Jones ofZodiac Zoo plays with her zipper.

Very good. Next one.

Last week, Jim’s brothers were picked torepresent their country in the Olympic Games. Two of thebrothers were swimmers, while the other two were longdistance runners. All of the brothers woreglasses. These athletes worked hard at qualifying forthe games and were hoping to come home with prizes.Since the brothers go to the same university, they oftentake the same courses. This makes studying easier andgives them more time to do other things.

O, here’ s the lastone.

On Thursday, I had a very lazy day. I woke upearly and first squeezed oranges into juice. I thengot dressed and watched the sunrise come up over themountains. It was so beautiful that I took manypictures with my camera and I used three rollsof film. After drinking two cups of coffee, I got dressed, left thehouse, and walked three miles home.

Very good. Now another good way to practise these voiced S and Zendings is to do a naming activity. What you do is you just sit inyour rome and out loud name everything you see. First in singularform, and then in plural form. For example, you look around and yousay out loud One door, Two doors with the voiced Z ending. Onetable. Two tables. One computer. Two computers. One light. Twolights. Some of my clients found this to be very helpful. Inaddition, try listening for these voiced sounds when you hearnative-borned Americans speak. It’s very good ear-training andthat’ ll help you improve. Soon , slowly begin to put these soundsinto your own speech. You’ ll find that by adding thesevoiced endings your English will sound cleaner and people will havean easier time understanding you. Believe me it’s going to reallymake an improvement.

Before we finish, I have one more suggestion that comes fromclients who have taken this program. I think it’s really a goodidea. If you can find a very small mirror and attach it maybe withsome tape right onto the side of your computer monitor right nextto the screen. By having a mirror right in front of you during oursessions you can easily read the text on the screen, watch my mouthand then look right into the mirror at your own mouth. You’ ll beable to compare your mouth with what I’m doing. Andyou’ ll know whether you’ re forming your lips and tongue into thecorrect positions. Through imitation and following my instructions,you’ ll be becoming closer to speaking with American accent. Well,that is for today. Relax. Have fun and practise what I’ ve shownyou until next time. I’m Paul Gruber with Pronunciation Workshopand I’ ll see you on the next session.

Session Three

1. The Unvoiced TH Sound

2. The Voiced TH Sound

3. THR Blends

4. Voicing the T Sound

Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Third Training Session. Inthis class, we will cover the American TH sounds, both the unvoicedTH[θ] and the voicedTH[ð]. This is one of my favourite areasbecause when you correctly produce TH sounds, you willsignificantly improve the way you speak English. Later on in thisvideo, we’ ll also address voiced T sounds.

Now except for maybe a few languages, English is one of theonly language in the world that has TH sound when your tongue comesout between your teeth[θ] that you may havea difficult time with this sound because this sound probably doesnot exist in your own native language. Therefore, you don’t thinkto use the sound when you speak English. Most likely, you justsbustitute another sound, like a T or an S. So instead of saying aword like Thumb, my Thumb, which this is and noticemy tongue is coming out. My thumb. You’ ve been saying Tumb. MyTumb or my Sumb and your tongue is not coming out. That is notcorrect. If you made mistake like this and connected speech overand over again. There’ s a good chance people are not going tounderstand you. I have found that some people from differentcultures of the world find the idea of sticking out their tonguewhen they speak to be rude and offensive even if it is to produce aTH sound, I want you to understand that this is how American speakEnglish and it is something that you must become comfortable withif you wish to speak well. To produce TH sound correctly you needto first stick your tongue out between your teeth and bite downslightly[θ], thenblow[θ]. This created Air Friction. Thesound comes from the air friction and should be prettyloud[θ] . Keep your tongue flat andmaintain it even steady flow of air. I’ m not just saying stick itout a little bit, I’ m saying stick it way out at least while you’re practising to get used to the feeling. The TH sound comes fromthe air and the friction. You have got to hear it and should besomewhat loud [θ], like that. If you’ relike most people, you may need to work on this a little bit buttrust me I know you can do it. Hundreds of my clients who havenever produced a TH sound in their lives are speaking EnglishEnglish clearly and beautifully, because they’ ve learned how to dothis. It may help if you look at a mirror and watch your mouth andtongue. See if you can maintain the air flow for these sounds[θ],like that. I know this may feel verystrange and uncomfortable to do possibly, but soon you’ ll get usedto it and the small change in your speech is going to reallyimprove how your English sounds. Now the TH sound is a frictionsound and it’s not as aloud as other speech sounds. ThereforeAmerican speakers stretch them out a little bit we don’ t evenrealize we do this, but this make the sound come out clearer. Letme show you what I mean. Let’s look again at the word Thumb. Forpracticing purposes, think of the word in two beats: One. Two.[θ]Thumb. You see that? Notice how long I’ mholding the TH sound. [θ] Thumb. It’s notgood enough just to put your tongue between your teeth and say a THword. Like this~. You see that, my tongue came out. But there wasnever any air friction. That’s not good. You must stretch out theTH sound and hear the air friction. Thumb. Like that. Let’s pratisesome words with TH sounds. First at the beginning of words. Here wego.

Thanks

Thick

Thunder

Thursday

Think

Now in the middle of words.

Anything

Bathmat

Toothpick

Athletic

Mouthwash

Now at ends of words.

Bath

North

Beneath

Fourth

South

Very good. Ok now let’s talk about voiced TH sounds. To makea voiced TH sound, all you have to do is take the TH sound that Ijust showed you and just add voicing [ð].There’s the voiced TH. You should be able to feel the strongvibration in your throat and on your tongue[ð].

Let’s go over some of these voiced TH sounds. This first setof words are some of those the most commonly used words in Englishand yes they should all be voiced and all made with your tonguecoming through your teeth. First at the beginning of words.

The (The book)

That (That house)

They (They came over)

Them (Give them water)

There (There it is)

This (This is my nose)

Those (Those boys are good)

These (These are my parents)

You know, another goodway to practise these words is by going around your room and namingeverything you see using a TH word. For example, the chair, thatwindow, those books, this door, like that. Then go around and nameyour body parts in some clothing like that shoe, this watch, thesefeet. Ok. That may be helpful. Let’s look at these voiced TH soundsin the middle of words.

Clothing. Notice how my tongue comes out in the middle of theword and the TH sound is pushed out. Clothing.

Leather. Same thing. Stick out your tongue and make a verystrong vibration. Leather.

Mother

Another

Weather

Northern

And now at the ends ofwords.

Smooth. Believe it or not. The TH in Smooth is voiced. Mostforeign speaker say this word incorrectly. They say Smooth, theunvoiced TH. But it’s voiced. Smooth [ð].

Bathe. The word Bath is a noun, with an unvoiced TH. Bath.But when you change it into a verb “to bathe” the vowel changes toan /e/ sound and the TH is voiced. Bathe, like again.Batheing suit.

Breathe. Same thing. Breath is a noun. Take abreath, unvoiced. But when you change it into a verb, the vowelchanges and becomes Breathe. I am breathing with the voiced TH.Now, let’s do some practice phrases. These all have voiced andunvoiced TH sounds. Repeat after me.

This and that

A tablecloth

Winter clothing

Athens, Greece

That’s the one

Her skin is smooth

Thirty Day’s notice

A famous author

Here and there

False teeth

Thread the needle

A thoughtful gift

Thunder and lightening

Thumbs up

Repeat these sentences.

Thelma arrived in town last Thursday.

I’m having trouble threading this needle.

I need 33 thick thermometers.

The thing they like best about Athens is the weather.

This thrilling novel was written by a famous author.

He will be through with his work at three-thirty.

Now and then, she likes to buy new clothing.

They thought they were going to Northern Spain.

Which tablecloth shall we use for the party?

That was the thirty-third theatre to open.

Now, I’d like to talk about THR Blends which is thecombination of TH sonund and the R sound. Like in the word Thrillor Throw. When producing these blends, I want to be aware that theR is the stronggest sound of the blend and it’s louder than the TH.Just like what we talked about in the first session. So when yousay a word which begins with THR. First make the TH sound and thenstrongly push out the R. Let’s practise a few of these .

Thread (thread the needle)

Throw (throw the ball)

Throat (my throat is sore)

Thrill (a thrilling ride)

Three (three more days)

Threw (yesterday he threw the ball)

Throne (the king sits on a throne)

Ok, now let’s go over this reading paragraph. It has many THsounds and it might be difficult, but it is a very good paragraphto practise on. You may wanna watch me do this a number of times.Keep your eyes on my mouth and notice how often my tongue comesout. Try to do the same thing. Here we go.

Nurse Thatcher was thankful it wasThursday. She knew that on Thursday she had todeliver 33 boxes of thermometers to the NorthAmerican Athletic Club. They thoughtthat thermometers were necessary for testing thehydrotherapy baths. This was thought tobenefit the athletes with arthritis.The athletic trainers required authorization toprovide hydrotherapy to the youthful athleteson the three bulletin boards withthumbtacks throughout the athleticclub. Rather than risk the health ofthe athletes, they thoroughly checkedthe thousands of thermometers to insuretheir worthiness; otherwise they neededto be thrown away.

Very good, I hope that wasn’ t too bad. As I said that is anexcellent paragraph to practise on. You should review it a fewtimes if you can.

Ok, now as I always said English is a crazy language andthere are always to be exceptions. Here are a few TH exceptionsthat I’d like to point out. Although these next words and names arespelled with TH. They’ re pronounced as if they were spelled with anormal T/t/, like that. And these words are:

Thomas

Thompson

Theresa

Thailand

Thames, likethe river

Esther

Thyme,which is a spice

Ok, now let’s take amoment and talk about T sounds. The T sound is the unvoiced soundlike in the name Tom or the word TV. If you add voicing to a T,what do you get? /t/---/d/, a D. Remember? We went over this in thefirst session, but I want to tell you is in American pronunciationwe like to make things easy. So if a letter T falls between twovowel sounds, which are voiced. So if it falls in the middle ofvowels, then the T is pronunced as a D and the whole word isvoiced. This is very easy and you may already be doing thiscorrectly. Here are three examples:

Water is pronunced as Wader, the T into a D and the wholeword is voiced. Water . I want water.

Better becomes Bedder. She’ s feeling better.

And Butter becomes Budder. Please pass the butter.

This should be simple. So now that you know that. Practisingthis poem with me. Remember all the Ts are pronunced as Ds becausethey fall between vowels.

Betty bought a bit ofbetter butter. But, said she, thisbutter’s bitter. If I put it in mybatter, it’ll make my batter bitter.

Again, notice that you do not hear any T sounds /t/. they areonly Ds /d/, which are voiced. Go over this poem a few times. It’salso printed in your manual. Once you get good at it, try to speedit up. I’ ll do it one more time for you a little bitfaster:

Betty bought a bit ofbetter butter. But, said she, thisbutter’s bitter. If I put it in mybatter, it’ll make my batter bitter.

Well, that was marvellful.Ok, start by practising it slow and then later get faster. Try tolet the words just roll out of your mouth. That’s for today’ssession. Try spending some time in front of a mirror and practisingthese TH sounds like Thumb and Throw. The small change will reallyimprove your English and make you a lot more understandable. I’ mPaul Gruber with the Pronunciation Workshop and I’ ll see you atour next session. Good bye!

Session Four

1. Consonant ‘F’

2. Consonant ‘V’

3. The Unvoiced ‘SH’ Sound

4. The Voiced ‘ZSH’ Sound

Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Fourth Training Session. I hopethings have been going well. Today, we’ ll cover F and V sounds aswell as SH and voiced SH sounds. Just a reminder all of thematerial covered in those videos are also printed in your trainingmanual for pratising later on. Let’s get started.

In the last session, we talked about Air Friction with THsounds [θ] that the sound is made with airfriction. Well, today we’ re going to talk about Air Frictionagain, but this time it is with F and V sounds.

The F and V are paired consonants and they are both producedexactly the same way except the F sound is unvoiced and the V soundis voiced. They are both produced by contacting your upper teeth toyour lower lip. It’ s sort of feels like your biting down on yourlower lip /v/,like that. Now remember all the voicing means thatyour vocal chords here on your throat are vibrating and making asound. So the F sound is unvoiced and sounds like this /f/ and theV sound is voiced, and sounds like this /v/. Correctly pronuncingthese sounds will make your speech nuch clearer and you moreintelligible, like the TH sounds from the last session. Fs and Vsare friction sounds and not that loud. So we stretchthese sounds out a little bit, so they can be clearly heard. Let’sstart by looking at the F sound in the word Foot. Now many foreignspeakers may use the right positioning by biting down on theirlower lip, but they still keep the F very short and they don’tcreat air friction. Therefore , you do not hear the F clearly andit sounds like~. That’s no good. Let me show you what you need todo. First think of the word is having two beats: one- two. Hold theF sound for the first full beat. F---oot, like that. Do it again.F---oot. Do you see how long I’ m holding that F? Now I know that’sa little bit exaggerated, but you get the idea. You need to hearthe air friction when practising. Try to give the F one beatF---oot. Let’s work with words beginning with the letter F. Here wego.

Find

Finally

Family

Freedom,with the strong R, freedom

Laugh, notice the gh combination in that word,laugh.

Telephone, notice the ph combination in that word, it’s alsopronunced as an F

telephone, It’s the same thing in this next word

Symphony, this is a tricky one because you’ ve got the Msound followed by an F sound, symphony.

And the last word

Rough, notice the gh combinatin in that word,rough.

Let’s work on this paragraph.

Do you feel like a physical wreck?

Are you fed up with your feeling of fatigue?

Have you had enough of feeling rough?

Why don’t you fight fever with

Pharaoh’s Friend.

A medicine that is tough on Flu.

Very good. Ok now let’s talk about the V sound. First of all,like the F sound. Don’ t make the V sound too short. Let’s look atthe word Vote, you’ ve got to stretch out the V. Like this.V---ote,V---ote. Are you hearing that long V sound. That’s what you shouldbe doing. Now, depending on your native language, you may bereplacing your V sounds for W sounds. Be careful not to do this.The word is not Wote, it’s Vote. Every V that you’ ll see inEnglish is made with this lip-biting position./v//v//v/. When yousay a V, it’s never WaWaWa. It’ s never a W sound. It’s alwaysV---, V---ote, like that. Let’s practise some words with the Vsounds, Here we go.

Vine

Oven

Evaluate

Voice

Travel

River,notice the strong R, River

Every

And now the ends of words

Glove

Alive

And Leave. This last word Leave is very different from theword Leaf , like from the tree, which has an unvoiced F

The word is leave,with voiced V.

Keep the voicing going throughout the whole word and voicethe V. Leave, like that. If you stop the voicing at the end of thevowel /i/, then you’ ll be saying Leaf with an unvoiced F and theword we’ re trying to say is Leave with the voiced V. Ok, now let’slook at the paired words with F and V. You’ ll see here just byadding voicing, you can completely change the meaning of the word.Here we go.

Feel – Veal

Safe – Save

Fat – Vat

Fine – Vine

Face – Vase

Fan – Van

Foul – Vowel

Proof – Prove

Very good. Ok now we’ re going to work on listening exercisesand ear-training. I’ m going to displace some words with V sounds,however, some words I’ ll be saying correctly and then some othersare purposely saying incorrectly. I want you to listen carefully tomy pronunciation and to the voicing of the V sounds and see whetheror not you can tell if I’ m saying the words correctly orincorrectly. Here we go. Here’ s the first word.

Stove-- I cooked dinner on a hot stove. Was that correct? No.I should have said Stove/V/. I cooked dinner on a hot stove with avoiced V.

Next word, Five. There, four, five.Correct? Yes , I said Fivewith voiced V.

Leave—I’ m in a hurry, and I need to leave. Is that correct?No , it’s not Leaf with an unvoiced F. I should have said Leavewith the voiced V sound.

Visa—She just received her international Visa. Correct? No ,I said Fisa with an unvoiced F. I should have said Visa with voicedV.

Living—I am living in a house. Is that correct? Yes, the V isvoiced. Living. That’s correct.

Ok, now repeat these phrases.

A famous athlete

A food vendor

The Foreign Service

Summer vacation

Vocabulary test

Over the rainbow

Our first victory

Harvard University

Husband and wife

Very well done

Good. Ok now repeat these sentences with me.

Her promotion in the firm was welldeserved.

There was only one survivor on theisland.

Steve noticed that the olive juice musthave stained his sleeve.

The street vendor was selling souvenirs totourists.

Dave gave me his car so that I coulddrive on New Year’s Eve.

There were several dents in the rearfender.

Tom placed several tomatoes from thevine into a basket.

Very good. Now we’ re talking about English so you know thatthere’s always an exception to everything. I would like to show youwhat I call the OF Exeception. Many foreign speakers make thismistake. Even though the word OF is spelled with an F, we pronuncethe word OF with the voiced V. I know this sounds crazy, but it’ strue. For example, Statue OVVV Liberty. Andnotice how I connected the word OF with the word. Liberty ofLiberty. You see OF is voiced. Here’ s another example. It’s madeovvv Glass or it’s made ovvv Wood. It’s not OF with unvoiced /f/.It’ s all voiced and it’s all connected. It’s made ovvv wood, likethat.

Very good. Ok now let’s go on to something new. Let’s talkabout SH sounds[ʃ] andvoiced SH sounds[ʒ]. First,to make the SH sound, you bring your lips forward, keep them open,and leave your teeth slightly apart. Blow air through your teethand produce the sound[ʃ] . It’s aneasy sound. What you may not know was that there are some words inEnglish that are written with the letter S, but are pronunced withthe SH sound. Words like Sugar and Sure. And to make things evenmore difficult. There are a couple of words that are spelled withCH and are also pronunced the[ʃ] sound.Words like Chef and the city of Chicago. Ok, having said that let’sgo over these words:

She

Sugar

Sure

Shadow

Sheep

Shirt

Shoe

Shape

Chicago

Chef

Very good. Ok now let’s do[ʃ] sounds inthe middle of words. You’ll notice that there are many differentspellings for these sound, but the sound is always the same. Herewe go.

Nation

Motion

Mission

Special

Reputation

Official

Machine

Fishing

Insurance

Sunshine

Ocean

Tissue

Addition

Subtraction

And now at the end of words.

Rush

Dish

Establish

Splash

Irish

Fresh

Finish

Very good.Ok, let’s do some sentences now.

The fishing trip was planned and we left to go to theocean.

Was the chef ashamed to use the precioussugar?

Sharon gave a specialperformance.

He will be stationed in Washington, D.C, thenation’s capital.

She went to a fashion show aftertaking a shower.

She sells seashells by theseashore.

The social club was praised for theircooperation.

Now try this.

Joe’s weather machine shows a sharp dropin air pressure, especially offshore.

Ships in motion on the oceanshould be sure to use caution.

Very good. Ok, now let’s work on the voiced SH sound[ʒ]. Toproduce this sound, first make a[ʃ]sound and then you add voicing[ʃ]--[ʒ]-, likethat.[ʒ]. Now, forsome people this may take a little bit of practice, you should feelthe vibrations right here in your throat[ʒ]. Believeit or not. This is a very important sound in American English. Manynone-native English speakers mispronunce the words with the sound,especially the words Usual and Uusual, which are very very common.If you were someone that pronunce the word Usual as ~(a wrongpronunciation). I’ m telling you you’ re not being understood. Letme show you how to pronunce the word Usual correctly. Break it upinto three syllables. U-ZSHU-AL. That’ s second syllableZSHU, the one with the underline needs to be voiced. Put your handon your throat and feel for the vibration in the second syllableU-ZSHU-AL. Now, put it together U-ZSHU-AL, Usual, like that. Ok nowtry Usual, UN-U-ZSHU-AL, Unusual, like that. Very good. Now let’spractise some more words. It may help if you keep your hand righthere on your throat to feel the vibrations. Here we go.

Vision

Visual

Conclusion

Asia

Version

Division

Casual

Television

Very good. Now there areonly a few words that have the voiced[ʒ]sound atthe end. A few of these words are:

The color Beige.

The word Massage.

And the word Prestige.

Ok. Now that you’ re great at this. Let’sgo over some sentences.

It’s not unusual for people to study divisionin Asia.

I usually use a measuring cup to measureerosion.

The beige walls were the usual color in thetreasury building.

Very good, you’ ll find in your manualthat there is a worksheet that you could list things that you wouldconsider usual and things that you would consider to be unusual.For pratice, fill this list and read your answers out loudin full sentences. Like this:

It’s usually hot in the summer.

And it’s unusual for me to be late for anappointment.

Great. Well now it’ stime to go on practice. You may want to wait a day or two and thenwatch this training session again. You’ ll find that the things inthis video again would probably be very helpful. Ok, have funpractising. I’ m Paul Gruber for the pronunciation workshop and I’ll see you at our next session.

Session Five

1.Consonant L

Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Fifth Training Session. We’ re reallymoving along. In this session, we will cover the L sound, whichhappens to be another important speech sound. Dpending on yournative language, some speakers have a very difficult time with theL sounds. L sounds are actually very easy. Here are a few things toremember.

No.1. When you’ re saying a word which begin with an L, yourmouth should be wide open and your jaw should be down, like this.That’ s an easy one.

No.2.Your tongue should rise up and push just behind your topteeth, like this. Notice my mouth is open.

No.3. And this is an important part. You pronunce the L soundby dropping and relaxing your tongue~, like that. Now, again you’ll notice that my mouth and jaw are open. This is the key. What Idon’ t want you to do is to be moving your jaw along with yourtongue. I don’ t want you to be doing this Ah Ah Ah. Your jawshould not be moving at all. Keep it open. Here’ s a trick that mayhelp you. Take your finger and put it in your mouth and pull downhard on your lower lip and force your mouth open and your jaw down.Like this. Now, while your jaw is down, bring your tongue tip allthe way up behind your teeth and do this LaLaLa. My tongue iscoming up but my jaw is staying down. What you’ re doing is forcingyour mouth and your lower jaw to stay open while you’ re raisingyour tongue up, and that’ s what I want. I want your jaw to staydown, your mouth to stay open and your tongue to rise upindependently of your jaw LaLaLa, like that and that’ s how youproduce a beautiful and clear L. Ok, let’s do some pratice. Repeatthese words beginning with the letter L. Here we go.

Lunch

Local

London

Learn

Large

Life

Lobby

Library

Lucky

Lift

Laugh

Long

Very good. Here are somewords with L in the middle of them. When you say these words, focuson the L sound and really push themout.

Inflation

Believe

Volume

Glue

Elevator

Solve

Pulling

Flood

Delete

Elect

Alive

Color

Ok, let’ s talk aboutwhen L falls at the end of a word. This is a big problem for manyforeign speakers, so pay close attention to this. To produce an Lsound at the end of a word. Keep in mind that the sound of the Lcomes from the movement of the Tongue Rising. It does not come fromthe placement of the tongue, but from the actual movement. Watch meas I say this word. Hill. The L comes from the movement of mytongue. You may want to use that finger trick again. Put yourfinger in your mouth, pull down on your lower tip and slowly saythe word. The only thing that should be moving is your tongueshould be coming up. Hill. Your jaw should not be moving at all tolet your tongue rise up. Hill. If you’ re having difficulty,produce this in front of a mirror and watch your jaw and yourtongue and be sure you don’ t produce the L sound by closing yourmouth which many foreign speakers do. Hill. Hill. See how my mouthis closing. Hill. You don’ t want to do that. That produces a weakL and to an American listener it is not clear and you may not beunderstood. Let’s start in practising these words ending with Ls.Here we go.

Will

Ball

Tall

Call

Small

Control

Bowl

Apple

Miracle

Powerful

Control

Financial

People

Notic in this last word People is notpronunced People with your tongue not moving. It’s people with yourtongue slowly moving up and your jaw remaining down. Stretch outthat L sound. People, like that. Here’ re some sentences that havemany Ls in them. Listen carefully to my example and then repeat.Don’ t forget to push your tongue behind your upper teeth and touse strong L sounds. Here we go.

The lollipop fell into the cool water.

Her driver’s license was pulled out of the blue golfbag.

Blake’s bowling ball fell under his tools.

Carl could not locate the lemons or the limes.

The school was a mile away from the hill.

The golf club was made of steel.

Al’s goal was to play baseball with Carol.

A certified letter was delivered for the enrollmentlist.

It was revealing to look at the smiling lawyer.

Very good. Now let’s tryreciting this poem with FL Blends. Here we’ re combining two soundsthat we have already covered. The F sound and now the L sound. Don’t forget to first bite your lips for that F/f/, like that and thenquickly push your tongue up and against your teeth for the L tocreat the FL blend Fly, like that. Ok, let’s try thisslowly.

A flea and a fly, flew up in a flue.

Said the flea, “Let us fly!”

Said the fly, “Let us flee!”

So they flew through a flaw in the flue.

Ok, let’s do that one more time. This time a little bitfaster.

A flea and a fly, flew up in a flue.

Said the flea, “Let us fly!”

Said the fly, “Let us flee!”

So they flew through a flaw in the flue.

Very good. Ok, these next sentences allhave the word Will in them. The word Will may be difficult for youbecause it has that final L sound. Remember try to keep your mouthopen, your jaw down as your tongue rises up. By doing this, you’ llproduce good final L sound. Again, if you’ re having difficulty,try looking at a mirror, use your finger and push down on yourbottom teeth as you say the word Will, like that. This will forceyou to keep your bottom jaw down as your tongue moves up. Here wego.

Will you empty the garbage?

Will you ask her to clean the kitchen?

Will you prepare a meal for the children?

When will you begin your studies at college?

When will she purchase the dress for her wedding?

Why will he ask them to stay late at work?

Why will she bring her baby to the meeting?

How will they know if our flight is delayed?

Where will the child be going next year?

Where will they put all of the pillows?

What will she do with the millions of dollars shewon?

Very good. Now someJanpanese and Chinese speakerS in particular have difficultiesdistinguishing between the L sound and the R sound. Now that wehave covered hoth of these sounds I would like to go over somepaired words containing these sounds. Keep in mindwhen you’ re producing an L, your tongue moves forward and upbehind your tip. When you’ re producing an R sound, your lips moveforward but your tongue moves all the way back. Basically, the Land the R are completely opposite sounds. Listen carefully andrepeat these paired words.

Red - Led

Rick - Lick

Reef - Leaf

Rear - Lear

Rest - Less

Grass - Glass

Crime - Climb

Free – Flee

Very good. Well, I call the next words LRcombinations. These words and phrases having an L sound and an Rsound right next to each other. This forces you to make a clear Land then roll it right into a strong R. Here we go. Repeat afterme.

Seal ring

Toll road

Already

Civil rights

Railroad

Rivalry

Coral reef

Jewelry

Schoolroom

Gravel road

Verygood. As you can see. Ls are very important sounds when they cometo speaking understandeable English. You should review thismaterial a few times for practice. Have fun and I’ ll see you nexttime. I’ m Paul Gruber with the Pronunciation Workshop.Goodbye.

Session Six

1.Word Endings

Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Sixth Training Session. In thissession, we will cover Word Endings. Often people who speak Englishas a second language drop the endings or final sounds offtheir words, well, they do not pronunce the final soundscorrectly. If this is done consistantly in conversation, chancesare you’ ll not be understood. I’ve noticed that the majority of myclients clip off the endings of words without even realizing thatthey’ re doing this. What I mean by clip off is whensaying words a common mistake that foreign speakers make isthat they drop off the last sound in a word, especially those wordsthat end in B, P, D or a T. For example, in the word Job, you maybe saying Jo_ without a B sound or the B is so weak you don’ t evenhear it. I have a good Job. You see that. You did not hear the Bsound. For Cap, you may be saying Ca_. I am wearing a Ca_ and youdon’ t hear the P sound. For bed, you may be saying Be_. I sleep ina Be_ and there is no D. For the word Plate, you may be sayingPla__. I eat on a Pla__ and you don’ t hear the T sound. Theproblem with your listeners is not hearing that last consonantsound and the person you’ re speaking with does nothear with the last sound is in your words. They’ ll consistently beguessing at what you’ ve trying to say. Therefore don’ t drop offthe endings. Make sure that the final sounds come through clearlyand fully. Don’ t shorten them. Let’s practise these followingsentences. Be aware not to drop the endings off. We’ re going onstarting with words ending with P.

I hope the group will sleep on theship.

The soda pop spilled out of the cup, over the map and ontoher lap.

Was the Egg Drop Soup cheap?

Very good. Now anothermistake that foreign speakers make is unvoicing a sound when itshould be voiced. For example, Job ends in a B, which is a voicedsound. Job. It’s not Jop with an unvoiced P. Keep the voicing goingthroughout the whole word. Job, with a voiced B ending. Same thingwith Robe, also has a voiced B ending. It’s not Rope with anunvoiced P. It’s Robe. OK? Let’s go over these sentences endingwith Bs.

We cleaned the cobweb from the doorknob near thebathtub.

Rob broke his golf club when he slipped on the icecube.

The crab was under the cement slab at the yacht club.

The ticket stub was found in the taxi cab.

Now T endings. Make sure the Ts comethrough clearly.

Kate left her cat on the mat as she flew a kite.

The sailboat came into the port to join the fleet.

What bait will make the fish bite? A cricket or a piece ofmeat?

Very good. Now also remember to add avoicing towards with D endings. Bed has a voiced Dending. It’s not Bet with an unvoiced T. It’s Bed with a voiced D.Road also has a voiced D ending. Road. It’s not Roat,unvoiced. It’sRoad. The whole word is voiced. Let’s go over these sentencesending with voiced Ds.

Fred will decide which sled should be painted red.

David tried to send a refund back to England.

He could not hide his report card behind the chalkboard.

Very good. Ok now let’s talk about EDEndings. Many verbs that are in the past tense end with ED. Forexample. Clean. Today I clean. Yesterday I cleaned. Now ED Endingshave similar rules as the S and Z endings that we discussed in thesecond session.

Here’s the first rule and probably you already do thiscorrectly. If a word ends in an unvoiced consonant, all we do isadd an unvoiced T. So let’s look at the word Jump, for example, thefinal sound in Jump is P, which is unvoiced. So when you put it inthe past tense, all you do is add a T, so Jump becomes JumpT withthe T sound at the end. Jumped. Of course the word is spelled withED Ending. It’s just pronunced as a T. Jumped, like that. The wordWalk, which has an unvoiced K sound at the end. Walk becomes walkT.Yesterday I walked.

Here’s the second rule. If a word ends in a voiced consonant,you add a voiced D. In other words, to keep the whole word voiced.So for example, the word Rub ends with the voiced B. Rub. Today Irub. Yesterday I rubD. All I did was add a voiced D sound at theend. Rubbed. It’s not Rubbet with the unvoiced T. It’ s Rubbed,like that. Here’s another example. Clean ends with a voiced N. Sotoday I clean. Yesterday I cleaned. I cleaned the kitchen. Pourbecomes PourD. I poured the milk. Scrub becomes scrubD. I scrubbedthe floor. Tag becomes TaggD. I tagged the clothing. Spill endswith the voiced L sound, spill, so becomes SpillD. I spilled thejuice. Trim becomes TrimmD. I trimmed the tree. Move has thatvoiced V sound. Move. So it becomes moved. I moved to California.Buzz becomes BuzzD. The clock buzzed all night. Ok. So that’s thesecond rule.

Here is the third rule. If a word ends in a T or a D sound.We add the ending ID which is a vowel I followed by a D, which isvoiced. ID. So, for example, the word Lift. Lift ends with anunvoiced T. Lift. So today I lift the ball. Yesterday IliftID(lifted) the ball. Lift becomes Lifted. And remember in thethird session we talked about when a T falls between two vowelsturns into a D, like in the word Water. Water becomes Wader.Remember that? Well, the same thing happens here when a T comesbetween two vowels. So look at this next word Heat. The verb toheat becomes Heated. I heated up my dinner. Vote becomes VotID. Hevoted this morning. Hand becomes HandID. He handed me his report.Trade becomes TradID. I traded in my old car. Add becomes AddID.She added some information. Ok, now let’s go over these exerciseswith ED Endings. You’ ll notice that I put a line under all theendings that are voiced to help you remember to add voicing. Herewe go.

Bob raked the leaves and then started to wash his car.He then loaded up the dishwasher and finished washing hisdishes.

Susan spilled her drink on the spottedrug.

She cleaned it up with a napkin, which wasted alot of time.

He thanked me and offered me money, if I picked up theused equipment.

Very good. Ok now let’ s talk about words that end in NG.Some people who speak English as a second language have gone intothe bad habbit of adding a K release sound /k/, like that, after NGEnding. For example, in the word Ring, it becomesRingK(×). The word Walking becomesWorkingK(×). The word Talking becomesTalkingK, /k/ like that. That is not right. The problem is there’ sjust this little/k/ K sound at the end of the ING sound. Don’ t dothis. It is not right and it does not sound good. Let’s talk aboutthe NG sound. There are three nasal sounds in English. Nasal soundsare sounds which come out of your nose. Those three nasal soundsare M/m/,N/n/,NG [ŋ], like that. Let meshow you something. Try to say the M sound /m/ while closing offyour nose. You see you can not do it. Because the M sound comes outof your nose. It’s the nasal sound. Same thing with the NGsound-- [ŋ]-- comes out of your nose. It’sa combination of a N and a G and it’s found at the ends of words,like Ring and Sing. And I want you to realize that there’s not a/k/ K sound. There’s not a K sound. The word is not Walking/k/.It’s Walking [ŋ] with that NG Ending, Ok?Walking. Let’s practise these sentences with NG Endings. Here wego.

I have a feeling that she is working too much.

She has been wearing a hearing aid so that she couldsing.

He is looking forward to speaking at the Thanksgivingcelebration.

Very good. Well, that isfor today’s session. I hope that you’ ve been enjoying this programso far and I’ ll be getting to know some improvements in the wayyou’ re speaking English. I’ ll bet you’ re sounding much betteralready. Have fun practising those ending sounds and I’ ll see youat the next session. I’ m Paul Gruber with Pronunciation Workshop.Good bye!

Session Seven

1. CH sound

2. The American J sound (DG)

3. Consonant H

Hi, welcome back. Again my name is Paul Gruber and this isthe Pronunciation Workshops---Seventh Training Session. In thissession, we will cover the CH sound[ʧ]and the American J sound[ʤ] and thenlater on the H sound/h/.

Ok, first let’ s start with CH. It’ s a common sound inEnglish. It’s a combination of the T sound/t/ and the SH sound[ʃ]. When youput these two sounds together, you get a[ʧ]. It’s anunvoiced sound. You can hear the sound, for example, at thebeginning and at the end of the word Church. Church. See that. Nowif you take this CH sound and you keep everything in your mouth thesame, you just add voicing. It becomes an American J sound[ʤ]. CH[ʧ],unvoiced. J, voiced. You see that everything here stays the same.You just add voicing for the J. This voiced J sound comes at thebeginning and at the end of the word Judge. Now the mistake thatmany foreign speakers make is that they unvoice the J sound at theend of a word. So, for example, many foreign speakers wouldpronunce the word Judge as Juch, turning that last sound into anunvoiced CH. Juch . And that is not right. The J sound in AmericanEnglish is always voiced[ʤ] Judge,like that. For you Spanish speakers whenever you say the letter Jin English, it always make this[ʤ] sound.It’s never a Y sound. Never. So, for example, the word Job hasthe [ʤ]at the beginning. Job. It’ s never Yob, my Yob. It’ s always myjob, with the strong J sound. Job, my Job, like that. Ok, let’ s dosome practice. Let’ s start with some CH words. First with CH atthe beginning of a word. Here we go.

China

Cherry

Charge

Chocolate

Challenge

Cheese

Chunk

Chairman

Now with CH fallen in the middle.

Key chain

Lunch box

Richard

Picture (That’s a tricky one. It has two syllables. Youpronounce it pic-ture,picture)

Teacher

Fortune

Nature

Beach ball

Now with CH at the ends of words.

Detach

Teach

Porch

March

Patch

Wrench (notice the strong R sound at the beginning of thatword .Wrench)

Coach

Approach(also with the strong R sound,approach)

Very good. Let’stry this exercise.

Chop-chop, children, it’s Charlie’s Kitchenadventure!

Today, Chuck will be teaching future champion cooks how tomake a chocolate cheesecake.

Very good. Ok, now let’s practise wordswith the voiced American J sound. We’ ll start with the J sound atthe beginning of words. Keep in mind that these sounds can bespelled with both the letter J or the letter G. Here we go.

Juice

Jump

Juggle

Jury

Japan

Giant

Genetic

Junior

Generate

German

Now in the middle ofwords.

Algebra

Legend

Magic

Subject

Digest

Rejoice

Objective

Majesty

Educate (That has also an unusual pronunciation. Let me breakit down for you. e-du -cate,deucate)

Next one suggestion. (This one also a bittricky.sug-gestion,suggestion.)

Very good. Now theAmerican J sound at the ends of words. Be sure to keep the voicinggoing through the whole word.

Age( It’s not Ach. It’ s Age, with voiced ending)

College

Postage

Stage

Pledge

Village

Average

Page

Courage

Knowledge

.

Very good. Now this paragraph coming up is filled withAmerican J sounds. Don’ t forget to voice these endings. Here wego.

A German judge and jury have charged and jailed a strangegiant, who sat on the edge of a bridge throwing jelly onto largebarges.

Very good.

You know , later on in this course. You’ ll get a lot morepractice using these sounds in connected speech. But for now, I’ dlike to cover H sounds when they come at the beginning of words.When an H is at the beginning of a word. It is p

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