Can You Pass This English PRONUNCIATION Test?

- When I did this pronunciation test with some students,

only 10% of them got all the phrases right.

How will you do?

Are you ready for the challenge?

Let's find out.

(upbeat music)

Hello, this is Keith and I run the website,

the Keith Speaking Academy, as well as the YouTube channel,

English Speaking Success

and English Speaking Success Shorts.

Now, this test is for fun, right?

But pronunciation is hugely important.

I mean, you can have the best vocabulary in the world,

the most perfect grammar, but if people can't understand

what you're saying, communication breaks down.

And what's more, in IELTS speaking,

pronunciation counts for 25% of your score.

So it's a really important area to work on.

What's more, personally, I think bad pronunciation,

can cause a really bad first impression, right?

It's a bit like having scruffy hair

or even food on your face.

So how do we fix this?

I mean, not the scruffy hair and the food, pronunciation.

Well, this test will help you see where your weaknesses are

and what you need to focus on.

And so then, you just need to start working on them.

Later, I'll tell you about a fantastic tool

to help you with that.

It's a mobile app and it's called ELSA Speak.

It's a pronunciation app that basically lets you practice,

all different aspects of English pronunciation.

It then pinpoints your mistakes

and gives you feedback so you can improve.

Brilliant.

More about that later.

By the way, there is a free PDF you can get

with all of these phrases, if you want to practice.

And also I have made a study set in ELSA

so that you can go to the app later

and practice more and more.

All of the links down below in the video description.

Right now, let's get into the phrases.

Okay, getting into the test, right.

So I'm gonna show you 10 phrases

with some challenging words.

I will show you first the phrase on the screen,

then you can pronounce it,

and then listen to me as I will pronounce it

and check if you were right.

I'll repeat it again and then ask you to repeat it

so you can practice.

A few things to notice, first of all, be aware,

I am using British pronunciation.

American pronunciation may have some variances.

Sometimes, I will show those if they are noticeable

with my best American accent.

Also notice that some of these phrases are natural,

but some of them are not that natural.

I've kind of made them up to help practice specific sounds.

And also we will start with some easy phrases,

but it gets harder as we go along.

Okay, let's begin with the first one.

Okay, so the first phrase now is gonna be helping you,

practice the difference between /I/ and /i:/, right?

/I/ and /i:/.

Here's the phrase, you try first.

And now listen.

You can sit on this seat.

Let's try again.

You can sit on this seat.

Now you try.

Excellent, very, very good.

Number two.

In number two, we're gonna be practicing the difference

between two diphthongs, which are au and oo, right?

The diphthong is where it moves from one vowel sound

to another.

It kind of slides.

Owwww.

Ohhhh.

Two different sounds. Here's the phrase.

Here we go.

Now I know how you knew.

Again.

Now I know how you knew.

You try.

Brilliant.

Number three.

This is a very short phrase that looks at something we call,

consonant clusters or groups of consonants, right?

English often puts two or even three consonants together.

And they're quite difficult to get the sounds right.

So let's try this one. You go first.

Okay, and listen.

I like comfortable clothes.

Again.

I like comfortable clothes.

And now you try.

Okay, very difficult word is clothes.

It's the th and the s, clothes.

Right?

You have to have the th because otherwise it sounds

like close, close the door, right?

Clothes.

Comfortable, we can say comfortable,

but normally the f just becomes comfortable, f, t.

The f, and the t sound come together. Comfortable.

Comfortable clothes.

Right? Excellent.

That's number three, let's see how you do with number four.

Phrase number four looks at two words,

which are often confused

because the spelling is quite similar, right?

Let's see how you do.

And listen,

I need a receipt for this recipe book.

And again, I need a receipt for this recipe book.

And you repeat.

Right, moving on to number five.

Number five looks at words that have a silent letter.

I know English spelling is so strange, right?

We have letters that we just don't pronounce sometimes.

Let's see if you can spot them and pronounce this phrase.

It's quite long, it's getting harder, right?

Try your best.

Okay, and listen.

There is a subtle difference between the schedules

on Wednesday and Tuesday.

Again.

There is a subtle difference between the schedule

on Wednesday and Tuesday.

You try.

Right.

So notice the word subtle, we don't pronounce the B, subtle.

Wednesday, we don't pronounce the d, Wednesday.

Schedule is an interesting word.

And I do know in America they pronounce it schedules.

So if you said schedules, that's fine.

If you prefer British English, we would say schedules.

And also Tuesday, I think if I remember rightly

in some American states, they say Tuesday,

I remember the Soprano's and there was a scene

where the guy, the gangster was going.

You've got to go on Tuesday, man.

Go on Tuesday.

And I think it was a Tuesday.

If anybody's from New York, please do correct me

if I'm not right, but I think you can say that.

Right.

Let's take a little break because the next phrases,

six to 10, really up the ante, push up the challenge.

You're going to need all the energy you've got.

You'll need to be full of beans to do that part well.

Come with me to the water cooler, right?

Let's get a little something to drink.

I've got something really important to tell you.

Come on.

Hi, come in, yeah.

Come and have a seat.

Sit on this seat.

How are you feeling, right?

Would you like a tea or coffee?

Yeah, maybe you need something a little bit stronger

after all of that pronunciation, right?

Who knows?

Listen, I hope this test is helping you see

where you need to focus, right?

But I guess the really important question is

how can I improve my pronunciation?

It's actually quite simple.

All you need is feedback and practice.

It's as simple as that.

And I'd like to show you that mobile app,

I mentioned earlier,

ELSA Speak because it's perfect for this.

It's got really high tech, voice recognition

and artificial intelligence that really helps give accurate

and detailed feedback on all the sounds

and different aspects of pronunciation that you're making.

What you've got in the app, basically there's a wide range

of topics you can look at and practice in.

You've got a whole section on IELTS practice.

So you can practice part one, part two and part three.

And that includes vocabulary, collocations, model answers,

indeed whole conversations like this in part three,

where you're practicing the different parts of your answer

to get your pronunciations spot on, right?

Also you've got study sets

where students are sharing different phrases

that they've been practicing.

I have the study set about the phrases from today's video,

which you can get through the link down below,

more about that later.

But I'd like to show you actually how this mobile app works

and the kind of feedback that you can get.

Let's have a look at an example.

So when we go in, we can have a look right

at a mixed skills, ending sounds, different phonemes,

such as the S and the SH and the Z.

Let's have a look.

When you go in, you can see some videos

that can help you work out those sounds.

Then you get into the practice, right?

Let's take one of the lessons and see how it works.

So the sun, for example.

- [Voice] The sun's finally coming out.

- So you can see, you get to see the phrase.

You get to hear an example, and then you press record

and you repeat it.

Let's see what happens,

if I don't get the right pronunciation.

(buzz sound rings)

The sun finally coming out.

(buzz sound rings)

Now you can see here, it identifies the sound

that's not right, the sun's.

And it tells me pronounce the S here with a Zed sound

as in zero and buzz, let's try again then.

(buzz sound rings)

The sun's finally coming out

(buzz sound rings)

And there we get it, we get the feedback smiley face,

and it compares you to a native speaker,

how close you're getting.

So you can see hugely effective, very valuable feedback.

You can get even more advanced and detailed feedback

if you like, but it's a very powerful tool.

And one that I really think will help you

with your pronunciation.

And ELSA are offering a very special offer

to all of my students, that's you, right?

And you can get 30% discount on a one-year membership

and 80% discount, yes, eight zero,

80% discount on the lifetime membership.

And then you've got the tool, the app for your whole life.

You can be practicing all the time.

Fantastic, great.

Go and check out the links below, you can download the app

and start practicing today.

Right now, let's get back to part two

of the pronunciation test.

Right now that you're all refreshed and ready to go,

let's go with number six.

This one again is looking at constant groups in particular,

the /sks/ sound.

Here's the phrase, have a go.

And listen.

He always asks about specific tasks.

One more time.

He always asks about specific tasks.

And you try it.

very good, right?

This is quite a complicated sound, asks, tasks.

Lots of words like that, so it's useful one

to get really, really right.

Another challenging word is specific, it's got the s,s,k.

Specific.

Great, let's move on to the next one.

And this phrase is gonna look at the s and sh sound, right?

The S and the SH.

S, sh.

Have a go.

Right, and listen.

She says sociable people love society.

And again.

She says sociable people love society.

And you try.

Fantastic, right?

So you've got the she says, notice says becomes says,

and this is the difficult one, sociable, s, sh , sociable.

But society, s, s, society.

Nice one.

Here we are then number eight, have a go.

And listen.

Many women are enthusiastic entrepreneurs.

And again.

Many women are enthusiastic entrepreneurs.

And you.

Lovely, right.

Now I think there's three difficult words here.

First is women because a lot of students confuse woman, one,

with women in the plural, /I/, /I/, women, right?

Enthusiastic has the N, th sound, enthusiastic.

Enthusiastic.

And then this word is probably,

it's such a popular word nowadays, but,

and it comes from French.

We pronounce it in a British way, but it's entrepreneur.

Think of the four sounds en, tra like train, tra,

pre, like prize, and neur like neur

Entrepreneur. Entrepreneur.

Lovely.

Okay, number nine.

Now, number nine is getting complicated.

This one is quite long, try your best.

And listen,

I'm not exaggerating the expected extinction

of the black rhino.

And again.

I'm not exaggerating the expected extinction

of the black rhino.

And you.

So the three tricky words here are exaggerating.

That sound in exaggerating is like eggs, right?

Eggs, as in fried eggs, sunny side up eggs, right?

Eggs, exaggerating.

But the other two words, it's a X,

it's a c, s, X, expected, extinction.

How are you doing? We're almost there.

Let's move on, phrase number 10.

Phrase number 10 looks at once more

at two different vowel sounds, which are often confused

because they don't exist in a lot of languages.

We've got /ɔ:/ and /ɜ:/.

Have a go.

Okay, have a listen.

Walk and work are the weirdest words in the world.

One more time.

Walk and work are the weirdest words in the world.

And you go.

Excellent, right?

You can see from the shape of the mouth, the walk, walk,

and work, how do I mind work, I don't know.

And word, weird, word.

And word and world are almost the same,

but you've got the L right, word, world.

Excellent. Great.

Well, brilliant.

Now some of you who've done very, very, very well,

maybe thinking I want more.

Well, I've got a spicy bonus for you, right?

Because there's one sound I haven't really covered,

which is one of the most challenging out there.

It's the th and the th and the OUGH.

When you're looking at that word,

how do you pronounce OUGH?

Okay, here's a bonus phrase for you.

Let's see how you do.

Right, and listen.

Although he thought he was thorough throughout,

he went through it too quickly.

And again.

Although he thought he was thorough throughout,

he went through it too quickly.

And you go.

Wow.

That was one of the most challenging, right?

Although, with a th, although meaning but,

he thought with a th, thorough throughout,

through, right.

All those three, have got the th sound.

Well, listen, well done.

So how did you do?

Well, listen, a big congratulations for completing the test

and I hope it helped you, right?

Listen, the next step for you, right,

is to download the mobile app, ELSA,

there's a link down below,

and because in there I've got a study set

and you can practice all of these phrases

until you can get them better and better.

Remember it's about practice, not perfection.

And also remember, right,

that if you sign up today, ELSA are giving you, my students,

30% of the one-year membership

and 80% of lifetime membership, ELSA with you for life.

Perfect English for life, sounds good to me.

Please do remember to press the subscribe button,

turn on the notifications to find

about the new upcoming videos that I have every Saturday

and also live lessons on Thursday at 10 o'clock Spain time.

Leave me a comment below and let me know what score you got

when you practice my study set in ELSA.

Thank you very much for joining me.

I look forward to seeing you in a few moments

in the next video.

Take care, my friend.

Bye-bye

(upbeat music)