Learning English as an Adult┃Learn American English Pronunciation On the Go

Rachel: You're listening to the Rachel's English podcast,  

made especially for non-native speakers, where  we study the way Americans really speak. My goal  

is for you to listen to this podcast every week  and sound more natural when speaking English and  

improve your listening comprehension. If you need  a transcript of this podcast, it's absolutely free  

to download. Visit Rachelsenglish.com/podcast  and look for this episode. In today’s episode,  

we're speaking with an American about  how he learned to speak English. Now,  

most Americans don’t know how they learned,  because they learned when they were kids and it  

happens naturally by immersion. Dave learned that  way, but when he suffered a stroke as an adult,  

he had to relearn how to speak. He has some great  insight into how an adult can train to sound more  

like an American and to participate in  American English conversation. Let's  

take a listen. I'm here with my friend Dave. Dave and I met only online, but several years ago,  

we had a Skype call. I want to say  that was five or six years ago.

Dave: Yeah. I think so.

Rachel: Dave contacted me because he  

had been using my videos to practice his English,  and he was using them in a way that I had not  

thought about before, and that was as a native  speaker who had suffered a stroke and needed to  

relearn speaking. I thought, whoa. I'm making  these videos for non-native English speakers,  

but this is an obvious application as well. So,  welcome Dave. Thank you for coming on my podcast.

Dave: Thank you for having me.

Rachel: I've actually made  

a video that has a little bit of video with Dave  in it as well, so if you want to check out Dave,  

go to Rachels English on YouTube or on my website  and search the word squirrel. Such a tough word.

Dave: You know I still can't pronounce that, squirrel.

Rachel: Yeah. It's hard.

Dave: That's the best I can do.

Rachel: It's hard,  

because it has S, K, and W all at the beginning.  Dave, can you tell me a little bit about yourself?  

How old were you when you had your stroke?  And what were you doing up to that point?

Dave: I had my stroke when I was 58,  

and at the time, I was working for a software  company as a technical writer. My job was  

working with words and language. I even had people  reporting to me who were not native speakers,  

and they would always come to me and say,  what is the best way to say this or that?

Rachel: Okay. You were an expert  

there on English, on the language.  It was your work, writing in it.

Dave: Yeah.  

Rachel: Okay. I was going to ask you,  

what was your relationship to language like  before the stroke? It sounds like not just the  

average relationship that your average American  would have, because it was in fact your work.

Dave: Yeah.  

I love language and words already,  but in 2008, I had a stroke in my  

sleep. I woke up and I couldn't move my  right side and I couldn't speak at all.

Rachel: That sounds terrifying.

Dave: Yeah, it was. After a while, I relearned how  

to move and I relearned how to walk, and my hand  and arm got better. My main thing was speaking.

Rachel: Was speaking harder  

to work on, harder to gain ground with  than the physical with the arm and such?

Dave: Yeah. Yes and no. No, because walking  

came back quickly. My arm came back so-so quickly,  but my language was very gradual. As you can hear,  

my voice sounds, it sounds odd. Many people say,  do you have an accent? I say, well, I do now.

Rachel: Right. Do you know,  

is there research to say why the language  takes more time to come back than walking,  

for example? Does it have to do with  the smaller and more subtle movements?

Dave: Well,  

every stroke is different. Some people  are not affected, some people with speech.  

Some people never get it back. I am lucky  that I can speak at all. I don’t know. My  

stroke affected my left side of my brain,  and that is where the speech centers are.

Rachel: Right. You said when you realized  

you were having a stroke that you couldn't  speak. When were you able to start speaking?

Dave: As I said, it was very gradual.  

About one or two weeks, the speech therapist  would work on my being able to imitate sounds  

and words, but I couldn't come up with them  by myself, because I had aphasia and apraxia.  

Rachel: Okay. So, two  

different speech issues. Aphasia and apraxia. What  would be the definition of those two conditions?

Dave: For me,  

aphasia is word finding. At first,  every word I wanted to say, I couldn't  

come up with a word for it. Every concept I wanted  to say. I knew what I wanted to say conceptually,  

but not the individual words. Every word  was at the tip of my tongue, but I couldn't—

Rachel: You couldn't recall, yeah.

Dave: Yeah.

Rachel: How do you work on  

that? That seems like something that I wouldn't  even know how to practice remembering the words.

Dave: Yeah. In my case,  

the speech therapists have lots of tricks to  get that to help me. In my case, aphasia was  

only about two years. It got better and better,  and now, I mostly can get the words. I know what  

the words I want to say, but apraxia is now my  main problem. Apraxia, as opposed to aphasia,  

apraxia means I have the concept of what I  want to say. I have the words I want to say it,  

but I can't remember how to make those words.  The muscles and the tongue and the palette,  

I have forgotten how to make the words.  That's why your videos were so good for me.

Rachel: So, apraxia is, you can  

hear the word in your head. You know the word,  but getting it out of your mouth is a struggle.

Dave: Yeah.  

I had to relearn how to make all  the sounds in the English language.

Rachel: Wow. Then, also, how to put them all together.

Dave: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Rachel: Would you say that now,  

do you think more in terms of sound units?  Or have words themselves become a unit?  

Maybe even common phrases have become a unit.

Dave: Yeah.  

I am working on that. Many  phrases come out naturally now.  

Rachel: That's great.

Dave: But not all of them.

Rachel: Yeah. That's one  

thing I try to encourage my students to do, is to  identify phrases that they're using all the time  

or hearing all the time, like, I don't know. And  to think of that as one thing rather than three  

separate words. Dave, before we talk a little  bit more about apraxia, which I definitely want  

to do because I think that's really connected to  learning the language, you had mentioned that with  

aphasia, with recalling the word, that your speech  therapists gave you some tips. Do you remember any  

of those tips that they gave you that you used  to actually actively work on your word recall?

Dave: Yeah. One of  

those tips that therapists  would give a cue. C-U-E.

Rachel: C-U-E. Cue.

Dave: Cue, yeah.

Rachel: Cue. Uh-huh.

Dave: They will give a  

cue like a cup of tea. A cup of, and  I say coffee. Saying the word coffee,  

it's hard, but saying it with  filling in the blank, it's easy.

Rachel: Okay. Again,  

that relates to thinking of language  units of being these common phrases.  

That's interesting. I think that's a great  tip just for people to think about. When  

you're learning English, you have the  building bocks of sounds and then words,  

but not to stop there. To look beyond that to  the common phrases, idioms, etc. that we use.

Dave: Mm-hmm.

Rachel: I think I know the  

answer to this. Is your listening comprehension  completely intact? Did you ever have problems  

post-stroke understanding people? Or was that  part of the language center not affected?  

Dave: Not for me. It is for some people, but not for me.

Rachel: Okay. So,  

that was one less thing that you had to work on.

Dave: Yeah.

Rachel: I just read an  

article that you wrote that you sent me, and  there were some really interesting things in  

there. You talked about filler and how much  of what we say isn't just the actual content,  

but filler phrases, filler words.  Can you talk about that a little bit?

Dave: Well, yeah. As I was relearning my speech,  

I found that so many things I wanted to say and so  many things that people say were throwaway words,  

like a person might say instead of yes, they might  say, well, I think that it is necessarily so.

Rachel: Okay. So,  

by throwaway, you mean words that are  extra to just conveying the actual meaning.

Dave: Yeah. Or sometimes, they are um and uh.

Rachel: Right. Thinking.

Dave: I mean and all those little throwaway words, too.

Rachel: 

I record myself a lot in conversation and  go back and use it for videos and such. I've  

noticed that I do use the filler word like  quite a bit. It doesn't have any meaning,  

and there, I just had, and it doesn't, you know.  You know. There, also being a little filler phrase  

without meaning. What is your advice for dealing  with that? Coming from where you were, did you  

just find the most direct way to say something  because it required the least amount of work?

Dave: Yeah. At first,  

I would think of what I wanted to say in my head,  and it was things like, well, I don't know if you  

are right or something, and that was too many  words for me. So, I edited in my mind to maybe.

Rachel: 

I love it. Your mind still worked the way it  always did with coming up with that phrase,  

but you just simplified. Dave: 

Yeah. Now, I am getting back in  the habit to say unnecessary words.

Rachel: And you're  

adding them back in now because they  have a subtle meaning or because they  

change the way something would be perceived?  Or, why are you adding them back in now?

Dave: Well,  

I think it was because I used to speak  like that, and it sounds natural to me.

Rachel: Yeah. That makes sense,  

because that's what Americans  around you are also doing.

Dave: Yeah.

Rachel: 

Back to apraxia and this concept of, you know the  word in your head, but you have to think through  

every mouth position in order to say it. How did  you work on that? What processes did you have?

Dave: At first, me and my speech therapist worked on  

the letters of—

Rachel: The alphabet.

Dave: Yeah.

Rachel: Yes.

Dave: The alphabet,  

yeah, and the letters and  the individual sounds. Then,  

we worked on putting those sounds into words and  then into phrases. It is a very hard process.

Rachel: Yeah, I bet. Very tedious.

Dave: Yeah. It took me years, yeah.  

Rachel: Yeah. When you  

were doing this, I imagine that you started out  going very slowly, and then the more you did it,  

the more your mouth was able to do things  more quickly with less thought. Is that right?

Dave: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Rachel: So,  

it was just slow, intentional  practice. Slow, intentional work.

Dave: Mm-hmm. Yeah,  

because my brain unlocks the muscle memories.

Rachel: Yes. This is something I'm always  

telling my students is, they want a shortcut. They  want to know, okay, I get the concept. How do I  

just make it happen? I tell them, there's  no making it happen other than the slow,  

intentional practice. You start slowly and you do  it as correctly as you can, as slowly as possible,  

and then you build from there. Then, your muscles  will start to do some of the work for you,  

but as a teacher, I'm not giving knowledge.  I'm giving people tools to train themselves.  

If they don’t feel like they have the time  train themselves, then the tools I'm giving  

them mean absolutely nothing. Of course,  for you, you were in a situation where  

I'm sure you were willing despite the  tediousness of it, to put in that time.

Dave: Yeah, because I had to. What choice did I have?

Rachel: Right. You said it took  

you years to get to where you are. How much time  did you work on speech a day? Is it the kind of  

thing where you work for a half-hour and would  just need a break? How did you structure that?

Dave: For two years,  

I went to speech therapy three times a week, but  after that, I kept working on reading aloud and  

working on my speeches. I give sometimes talks to  students and the like. That helped me a lot, too.

Rachel: You mean  

having something to work on  that you were presenting?

Dave: Yeah.

Rachel: That's a good  

point. That's something that I  think my students could think  

about, is come up with a presentation to do or  a video to make, and then work towards that.  

Dave: Mm-hmm.

Rachel: You also mentioned in this article the musicality  

of language and how it was activating a different  part of your brain. Can you talk about that some?

Dave: Yeah. As I said,  

my stroke had affected my left side of my  brain, but music is mostly on the right  

side. It is all over the brain, but mostly  on the right side. Many people are amazed  

that people who can't speak because of a  stroke can sing almost perfectly. In fact,  

I sang Happy Birthday in the hospital when I  had my stroke. That was amazing to me, too.

Rachel: Yeah.

Dave: There is an amazing  

YouTube video by a guy who is giving a talk who  had severe aphasia. He didn't speak at all for two  

years. Now, he speaks fluenty, and he says there  is a therapy called melodic intonation therapy.

Rachel: Melodic intonation therapy.

Dave: 

That saved his life, because now, when he  wants to talk, in his brain he translates  

the words to singing. He said, every  time I talk, I am singing to you.

Rachel: Yeah. You showed me that video, actually.  

You sent me that clip. I watched it years ago.  It's amazing. Is that something you've done?

Dave: Not as quickly, but that guy was an  

inspiration to me, and he, MIT therapy, and you,  too. You guys are reminding me that music is a  

lot like singing. When I get trouble with a word,  I tap my pinky finger and that helps me, because  

finger tapping is also a trick of therapists  to remind the brain to keep the rhythm going.

Rachel: Yeah. When  

you're tapping your finger, it's bringing in  a musical element. That makes a lot of sense.

Dave: Yeah. It reminds the brain, also, to keep going.  

Aphasia and apraxia are not helped by stopping  on a word. They are helped with going on and on.  

Rachel: That's interesting. I didn't know that,  

but that actually rings true to something I'm  doing with my students. I have this online school,  

Rachel's English Academy, and in the opening  weeks there, I have people work on this concept  

of singing their phrases and singing their  English. I wonder how many people want to  

drop out immediately, because it just seems too  strange. Then, I've also found that when I'm  

working with students, I set up the material in  there for them to study on their own, and I break  

it down into these little phrases, and there's a  button they can press to play that over and over.

I tell them to play it, say it, play it, say it.  Right away, 10, 20 times. I say, if you mess up,  

don’t stop and try to go back and fix it, because  you're just going to play it and say it again.  

Just keep thinking forward and I found that  when they do that, that I don’t have to tell  

them what's wrong. They somehow figure out how  to sound more American and they're able to do  

it without me giving them any coaching, just  by playing it and repeating it 10 or 20 times  

in a row. It's really mind-blowing to see them  make these corrections without me doing a thing.

Dave: That's brings up another therapy that I had,  

MLG. MLG is what it stands for. I can't remember  what it stands for. MLG. You take a word or a  

phrase, and you just power through it and say it,  and you wait four seconds. One, two, three, four.  

You say it again and you wait four seconds. One,  two, three, four. You say it again. Four times.  

After the fourth time, it's amazing how much  improved the fourth time is from the first time.

Rachel: Yeah. That's so  

cool. I guess that has something  to do with the muscle memory.

Dave: Yeah. I don't know. It's like magic or something.

Rachel: Yeah. It is magic. I  

often compare working on your accent with being  a musician practicing a tricky passage. You slow  

it down. You do it so many times, and your  body starts to take it in, and that's how you  

work it into what you're doing. You've said  that R versus W can be pretty hard for you,  

like quest-crest. Quest-west. Is there  anything that you do in particular to  

work on that? Or is it just the same  method that you use for everything?

Dave: I have a book of minimal pairs  

that I work on. Working on the minimal pairs helps  a little bit, but working on the phrases for the  

minimal pairs helps a lot, because rest and west  don’t sound a lot different to me. But go west,  

young man sounds very good, I think. That's when  I get stuck, but I try to use it in a phrase.

Rachel: Again, coming back to the idea of phrases and not  

just breaking it down to the teeniest, tiniest,  smallest part. That's a great idea for my students  

with tricky sounds or a minimal pair that they mess up. R versus W. Maybe don’t just think  

of a word that you're going to use to remind  yourself, but think of a small phrase like go  

west or something like that, that can somehow  bring up the sound in a cleaner, clearer way.

Dave: Or link it to the previous word.

Rachel: Oh, I love linking. You're speaking my language.

Dave: Yeah, I know you do.

Rachel: So, you would say  

that linking one of those tricky words to the  word before helps you with that opening sound?

Dave: Yeah, because it's no longer opening.

Rachel: Okay. If you think  

of a phrase that starts with R, then you just  think of a filler word to put in front of it?

Dave: Yeah,  

but it's hard to think of  filler words all the time.

Rachel: Yeah. It's hard to do that on  

the spot in the moment. Speaking of on the spot in  the moment, there's one other thing that I wanted  

to ask you about from this article, where you  talk about being in a group conversation and how  

there are just these little pauses and otherwise,  the conversation just keeps going and it's hard  

to chime in. Can you tell me a little bit about  what you've discovered about what works for that?

Dave: In my case, saying something  

like um or something loud draws attention to me.  Then, I can formulate the words I wanted to say,  

because it takes me a little bit of time, and  more time than a normal person is given to speak.  

Another way to interrupt this conversation  is to put up their finger, saying, me, too.

Rachel: Yeah. A visual clue.

Dave: Yeah.  

Rachel: Yeah. I like that idea. I also  

like your idea of, you don’t have to formulate  your whole sentence in order to break into a  

conversation. Native speakers speak very fast. If  you just have one word that will direct attention  

to you, then you can take that second to formulate  your sentence and your idea. Dave suggested um,  

and I think other quick words that you could  use would be something like well or you know.

Dave: Or but.

Rachel: Or but.

Dave: But.

Rachel: Yes.

Dave: 

Everyone turns to you and  expects the rest of the sentence.

Rachel: Right. To listen to your opinion. This  

is something that my students who are intimidated  by group conversation can think about. One or  

two words that they will get very comfortable  with that they can use as their break-in words.

Dave: Yeah.

Rachel: Dave,  

is there anything else that you wanted to  talk about with your experience with speech?

Dave: Well, keep at it.

Rachel: That's right. If you had  

decided back when you had your stroke that it was  too hard, then you would be in the same position  

today that you were then, but instead, here you  are, interviewed for a podcast, speaking English.

Dave: Yeah.  

Thanks. Rachel: 

I love that advice. Like I said, I think  a lot of people want a quick fix. It does  

take some time and some dedication to make a  change and to retrain these very fine muscles.

Dave: Mm-hmm. It does.

Rachel: Well, Dave,  

thank you so much for taking the time out  of your day to come onto this call with  

me. I know that the people listening  really appreciate it, and I do, too.

Dave: No problem. Thank you.

Rachel: What a hardworking  

learner of English. Thanks for listening. To  see the show notes and links to related topics,  

including Dave’s YouTube channel, which has  all sorts of resources for stroke survivors,  

visit Rachelsenglish.com/podcast, and look for  this episode. New podcasts are released every  

Wednesday. Be sure to go to the iTunes store  and subscribe. Also, please consider leaving  

a review in the iTunes store. I'd love  to hear what you think of the podcast.