English Tongue Twisters

Let’s study some tongue English tongue twisters

Why is it that most speech can be read out loud quickly with no problem?

Why is it that most speech can be read out loud quickly with no problem?

Why is that most speech can be read out loud quickly with no problem?

Easy.

Other word combinations: no way.

Forget it.

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

wristwatch-- wristwatch--

Tongue twisters.

This is a real thing, and it happens in every language.

When you put similar sounds together and try to say something quickly or over and over,

your brain can’t always keep up.

Practicing tongue twisters with tricky sounds may help your brain get better at telling

your mouth how to make that sound.

Let’s start with what the Guiness Book of World Records says

is the hardest English tongue twister.

If this looks intimidating, it’s supposed to.

TH is one of the hardest sounds for non-native speakers to make and the word sixth is really hard.

We have the K-S-TH consonant cluster, ksth, ksth.

Break that down with me: Kk, ss, th, kk, ss, th.

We don’t have to change the mouth position too much: ksth-- ksth--

The jaw just drops a little bit more as the tongue makes a small movement through the teeth.

Kkssth-- Kkssth--

There’s a chance you’re going to want to practice that cluster on its own.

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

I have to break it up, it's too hard to do all at once.

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

Okay, that's tricky. Let me try a little faster.

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

I'm not sure I'm even saying that right.

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

Okay when you mess up, slow down.

Do this out loud.

If your mouth gets in a jumble, just slow it down. That will help.

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

This is not a sentence with meaning,

not a sentence that’s grammatically correct, it’s just a string of words

that is incredibly hard to say.

Practice it to work on your TH sound.

Sixth--

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

Sixth sick-- Sixth sick-- Sixth sick--

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep sick.

Okay, there we go.

She sells sea shells--

Yeah. Exactly.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

Okay.

This tongue twister is a sentence that does make sense, that is grammatically correct.

All the S’s and SH’s can really get mixed up as you say this quickly.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

Remember, if you’re using tongue twisters to practice the brain-speech connection,

slow it down.

There’s actually a little shortcut here, when you have an ending Z sound and a beginning

S sound, like here, you can connect the words with just one S sound: sells sea, sells sea,

sells sea, sells sea shells.

sells sea shells, sells sea shells.

She sells sea shells by the sea shore.

Ok, now R is such a hard sound for non-native speakers.

Some people make a W instead, so this tongue twister is a real challenge.

Do it slowly.

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

And of course, we have SH, S, CH to get mixed up as well.

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

I can't even do it slowly!

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

Man, when you get to 'wristwatch', it really gets hard.

I wish to wash my Irish-- I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

I wish to wash my Irish wrist-- Irish--

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

I can't go any faster than that.

Practice it out loud with me: I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch.

There, the more I do it, the easier it gets.

If you completely mess these up, don’t feel too bad.

Here’s my family trying to do them.

So, tongue twisters may work well as an exercise to help you with some tough English sounds.

You can find lots of tongue twisters online.

And if you want me to do another video on tongue twisters, let me know in the comments,

especially if there are specific tongue twisters you want me to use.

What are you doing this summer?

Do you want to study even more English in an even more structured way?

Join the thousands of others that have signed up for my online school.

You’ll have everything you need not just to be able to understand how Americans speak,

but to be able to do it yourself.

I’ve seen it – it’s amazing what happens to people’s speech when they work with these

materials in the right way.

So much improvement.

RachelsEnglishAcademy.com, join me there.

RachelsEnglishAcademy.com

Ok guys, that’s it, and thanks so much for using Rachel’s English.