Learn English pronunciation with the minimal pair sounds l Minimal pairs in English

hello everyone and welcome back to the English  nanny Channel I'm teacher John and I'm here to  

help you become great at learning English in  today's lesson we will be talking about minimal  

pairs this is a lesson that is aimed to help you  improve your speaking and also maybe help you  

improve your listening first let's talk about what  exactly is a minimal pair a minimal pair is a pair  

of words or two words that only have one different  sound this different sound can be a consonant such  

as B or P like the book or put sound or it can  be a vowel such as the a and E sound or and some  

simple examples are sat and set leaf and leave or  think and sink why are minimal pairs helpful for  

you as an English student well again they can  help you improve your speaking very much for  

sounds that often are difficult for ESL students  but also they can help you improve your listening  

when you listen to the native speaker or someone  speaking English it can become easier and easier  

to hear a word that is similar to another word  but only has one different sound there are many  

of them so let's take a look at some of the sounds  that are difficult for ESL students and also some  

exercises that will help you improve your speaking  and your listening let's take a look at the short  

I long e and short e sounds many students often  struggle with hearing the difference between  

these sounds they are a little bit similar but  really they are quite different and they often  

are used in words that are very different from  each so it's important to be able to say these  

sounds correctly and also be able to hear the  difference so let's do an activity that you can do  

by yourself at home but also with your friends or  other students so you can practice and help speak  

and listen to these different sounds now I will  say a word and I want you to choose the correct  

answer this word is sit what did you choose did  you choose sit seat or set the answer is sit s  

i t it is this short I sound and it is a little  bit difficult to hear the difference between the  

long e sound which is e and the short e sound  which is a it's actually a very good idea just  

to practice saying these sounds and also listening  to the differences so again let's listen to these  

three words and so you can hear the difference in  each sound sit seat set the three different vowel  

sounds and these words are it E & a now let's  try the same activity with the same words but  

this time I will cover my mouth with a book this  is important because you really need to be able to  

hear the difference between each of these sounds  okay I'm going to say the words and you should  

choose the correct answer the word is seat did you  choose sit seat or set the correct answer is seat

you can repeat this activity with other students  or your friends to improve your speaking and your  

listening now let's talk about two other sounds  that students also have a difficult time with  

these two sounds are s and th the voiced th sound  they sound like and now I will read a sentence to  

you and after the sentence please pause the video  and try to write down the sentence correctly  

here's the sentence the doctor sought to help all  sick people and thought he really could okay good  

job now let's take a look at the correct answer  right here you can see the two words that sound  

very similar but have very different meanings  if you switch the words the sentence does not  

make sense so it's very important to be able to  say the two different sounds s and th but also  

hear it now let's talk about two more sounds  that students often have a difficult time with  

these two sounds are L and R the sounds are  land rough they're very different but also a  

little bit similar because some languages don't  have a different sound for these two sounds just  

one sound now I will read a sentence to you and I  want you again to pause the video after I say it  

and I want you to try and say the sentence it's  okay at first if you have to say the sentence  

very slowly that's normal but over time if you  practice you should be able to say the sentence  

faster and faster even in just five minutes  of practicing here's the sentence remember to  

pause the video and practice afterwards the  alive squirrel arrived with read leaves one  

more time I will say the sentence very slowly  so you can hear the live squirrel arrived with  

wreathed leaves this is called a tongue twister  it is a very difficult sentence to say but if you  

can practice this over time your pronunciation  will improve ok students that's all for today I  

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