LEARN ENGLISH PODCAST: HERE'S HOW TO DRAMATICALLY IMPROVE YOUR PRONUNCIATION

- [Jack] I believe that most English learners

aren't doing enough, nowhere near enough,

to improve their pronunciation,

and that if they did,

then they would speak with more accuracy,

fluency, and confidence.

And that is why in this lesson,

I'm going to outline what you can do

in a very practical way on your own

to improve your English pronunciation

and the way that you speak English.

So be sure to listen to this lesson

or watch this lesson on YouTube until the end,

because I'm going to highlight

and give you the exact step-by-step plan

so that you can become a more confident speaker

by working on this area of English.

But before we get into all of that,

my name is Jack from To Fluency.

Be sure to check out the description

because I'll have some great resources for you

include in my book,

the 5-Step Plan for English Fluency.

All right, let's get started.

Like I said at the beginning of this lesson,

most learners don't focus enough attention

and study time to working on the way they speak English,

working on their pronunciation.

And this is true as well for most language courses,

most language schools.

And I think this is the case

because most people need to do this on their own

and really focus on it.

And it's hard for a teacher with 30 students

or even six students to work individually with each student

to make sure that they're saying the right vowel sounds,

the right consonant sounds,

using word stress and intonation,

but there are so many benefits

when you work on your English pronunciation,

because what you're going to do, if you improve this area,

firstly, you'll speak more accurately

because you'll be using the right vowel sounds,

the right consonant sounds,

and people will be able to understand you better,

but you're also going to speak more fluently

because you won't need to focus on how to speak.

Instead, you can just speak naturally

and use the right sounds in a natural way

without thinking about what you need to do with your mouth,

what you need to do in order to make those sounds.

So it's going to allow you to speak more accurately,

but also more fluently.

And this will lead to confidence,

and it will also lead to you speaking where you just flow.

Everything just flows,

which means it just happens naturally.

It's effortless.

You don't need to put lots of efforts into this.

So today, we're gonna look at how you can do this,

the step-by-step process in which

that you can dramatically improve the way you speak.

And then I'll also give you some very practical tips

at the end so that you can take action

and get started with all of this.

But first, I want to talk about golf.

Golf, the sport of golf,

the one where you have your clubs and a ball,

and you swing the golf clubs

so that the ball goes in the hole.

And the reason I'm talking about this

is because it's going to help you think about the way

to improve your pronunciation by using this analogy.

Okay, so let's say that you start playing golf.

The first thing you need to do after buying your golf clubs

is to learn how to swing a club,

learn how to swing a club.

So learn how to hit the ball properly with your golf club.

And you need to think about

and learn all about your hand position.

Where do your hands go on the club?

How do you stand?

What's the correct stance?

Do you lean forward?

Are your legs narrow or are they wide?

Then you need to think about what you need to do

with your hands and your elbows

and your shoulders and your hips

when you bring the club above you,

and then you need to think about and learn

what you need to do next

to then hit the ball and follow through

so that the ball goes straight.

And most people here will watch YouTube videos

so that they can learn how to swing a golf club properly,

or they'll buy a book, or they will take private lessons.

And this part is important for later.

So you might learn from YouTube

or by having a private teacher who's going to say,

do this with your hands.

Stand like this, lean back,

head straight, back straight.

Okay, what you need to do next is this, etc.

So once you learn how to swing a golf club,

the next thing you do is you practice this skill.

You're not playing a game of golf.

Instead, you are practicing

how to swing the golf club properly.

So you are practicing this skill.

You have learned how to do it, and now it's time to try it.

So you swing your golf club and you hit the ball.

The next thing you get is feedback.

Feedback.

And you can do this in a few ways.

You can give yourself feedback

in terms of what happens to the ball.

If you hit the ball well, then that's good feedback.

If the ball trickles,

which means goes slowly along the ground,

then you know you need to make some changes,

but you can also get feedback by having a teacher,

a golf instructor watching you

and telling you what you need to do to change.

So they might say, "Okay, next time,

"keep your elbow straight,"

or, "Next time, keep your head down,"

or, "Next time, keep your back straight."

And then the other way to get feedback

is to record yourself swinging a golf club,

and then comparing your swing to the way you are learning,

which might be a YouTube video.

And then you can look at what you need to do

and what changes you need to make

so that you get better at this skill.

And this is a constant loop.

It's a cycle.

You learn what to do, you practice,

you get feedback, and you make changes.

So with the feedback, you're learning more and more.

With the practice, you're trying it,

you're trying the skill.

And then, with the feedback, you're making changes.

And then there are two more steps here.

The next step is to get repetition

when you can do the things correctly.

So let's say that you are correctly holding the club

and you're using your hands in the right way.

Getting repetition gives you muscle memory

and it makes it effortless.

And I'm sure you've heard other people say,

repetition is the key to everything.

By repeating something, you learn how to do it effortlessly

and you gain that muscle memory.

But playing golf would be boring if you didn't play golf.

So you have a game of golf.

You go around a golf course.

This is fun.

This is why people practice golf,

but it's also a way to do two more things,

which is to perform under pressure,

to perform under pressure,

to be able to hit the right swing or use the right swing

when you're playing a game,

and also, learn more about where you need to improve.

So maybe you need to improve your putting,

you need to improve your drives, or maybe your short game,

but the game of golf is where you are enjoying yourself,

you're having fun,

but you're also learning how to perform under pressure

and learning what you need to do to improve some more.

Now, this podcast isn't about golf,

but this analogy really helps

because learning English pronunciation

and being able to speak English

is exactly the same as what I have just described,

where you learn how to do something,

you practice it, you get feedback, you get repetition,

and then you use it in a more natural way,

you perform under pressure.

Let's take two sounds in English as an example.

These two sounds are minimal pairs.

The V sound and the F sound.

They're two similar sounds,

but there's a big difference here.

And to be able to make these sounds correctly,

you need to know what to do with your mouth

in order to get this right.

You need to know what to do with your throat and your teeth

and your lips and your tongue

in order to get the sounds correct.

So let's just practice this a little bit.

The V sound is where your top teeth

touch your bottom lip behind, inside your mouth.

And you make the V sound.

Very.

Very.

And there's a key part to this.

Your throat vibrates.

It's a voiced sound,

one where your throat vibrates.

So very.

Practice after me.

Very.

Very.

Good.

Now, the F sound is similar

because your mouth does the same thing,

but your throat does not vibrate.

It's an unvoiced sound.

So (making F sound)

Fun.

Fun.

Let's say two words that are similar now

to practice with V and F.

Very.

Fairy.

Very.

Fairy.

Very, fairy.

Very, fairy.

Very, fairy.

Now, if you can notice the difference

between those two sounds, that is great.

The key here now is to think, okay,

how can I master this?

How can I really learn these two sounds in a way

where I can just say them effortlessly?

Well, again, learn what to do,

learn about your teeth and your lips and the vibration,

like I just explained, then practice.

Practice these sounds.

But the key part as well here is that you need feedback.

So after practicing, you need feedback to know

if you're doing it correctly or not,

and this is where I believe most learners

should really put a lot of attention on,

and it's this: to record yourself.

Record yourself saying these two words,

and record yourself when you practice pronunciation

and speaking in general.

Now, you can have somebody evaluate you.

You can have somebody evaluate your English

and the way you speak.

And I'll talk about more how I can help you with that soon.

But recording yourself is so powerful

because when you record yourself,

you can listen to the way you speak

in a much more meaningful way.

When you're just speaking and you're not recording yourself,

it's very difficult to notice any mistakes you make

or any changes you need to make.

But when you record yourself, it's more observant.

It's more obvious to notice what you need to do to change.

So learn how to say these sounds as in this example,

practice yourself saying them,

and then record yourself and make changes.

Think about the changes you need to make

in order to say these sounds correctly.

And then once you can do that, get repetition.

So repeat the sounds over and over again in a smart way.

So you're not just repeating it a thousand times today,

but you're repeating it a few times today,

a few times tomorrow, once or twice in four days, etc.

That's the type of repetition that is really efficient.

Okay, so, so far what we're doing

is we're thinking about the best way

to master the sounds of English

and master English pronunciation.

Step one is knowing what to do with your mouth

to make the sounds.

Step two is practicing.

Step three is recording yourself.

Step four is making changes.

And then this is a loop cycle, okay?

Maybe I need to do this with my teeth.

Let's learn what to do again.

You practice again.

You record yourself.

You think that's better, but it's not perfect.

So you make some more changes

until you are happy with the way you say it.

And then step five is to get that repetition

so that you build the muscle memory.

You can build muscle memory in your mouth,

just like people build muscle memory playing golf,

or playing soccer, or working out,

anything really, where it just becomes effortless.

And that's the stage we want to reach.

Now, practically, if you want to say,

okay, over the next three months,

I really want to focus on this area,

and I recommend you do.

I recommend exploring this area at least,

but then focusing time each week,

maybe each day, to pronunciation.

Then I think this is a really good idea.

Firstly, learn the sounds of English.

Learn the different sounds of English.

The consonant sounds, vowel sounds, etc.,

the schwa as well,

and use the method that I've talked about

in order to do this.

Now, this might take some time.

You're going to get frustrated.

Sometimes it might be a little bit boring,

but like I've talked about in the past,

try and make it as fun as possible

and be motivated to know that, by doing this,

it's really going to help the way that you speak English.

Now, it also means working on things

like stress and intonation.

Stress and intonation.

And I'm gonna give a good example of this in a second.

And then finally, it's working on things

like retractions and linking.

And working on these areas

is not just going to improve the way that you speak

with accuracy and fluency,

but it's going to help your comprehension too,

because if you can say these words

and use retractions and use linking,

things like, I coulda done it, I coulda done it,

which is a retraction of, I could have done it,

we're also linking, I coulda done it, I coulda done it,

then you'll better understand other people,

English speakers, when they're using this, too.

And people use retractions and linking all the time.

It is so common.

So in order to understand people,

this will be really useful for you.

So find a course or anything, really,

just research these areas of the sounds of English,

stress and intonation, retractions and linking,

and go through the different areas,

practice, get feedback, etc.

Now, I do want to say that I have a program for this.

I'll leave a link in the description

that goes through all these areas.

And then you can also send in your recordings to me

and I will evaluate these recordings for you

and tell you what I think you need to do to improve.

So I've worked with hundreds of students on this area,

and I know the common mistakes that people make

and why they can't execute a certain sound

or they can't use retractions in a natural way.

And then, like I say, make this part of your study plan.

So really commit to this

because it's just going to make you become more confident,

more fluent and more accurate when you speak English.

And then going back to the golf analogy,

we talked about having a game of golf

where you perform under pressure

and you learn what you need to do to improve,

this equivalent here is having conversations in English,

or talking to a teacher,

or having a language exchange partner

where you put everything together.

You have to be able to use the correct sounds

while speaking, which is a much more complex task

than just repeating phrases, let's say,

and repeating the sounds of English.

That's gonna help you just improve in general.

It's fun to have conversations.

This is why people want to learn English.

And then also, it's gonna give you a good indication

of where you are and what you need to do to improve.

Now, I do want to practice a phrase here

because I'm going to look at retractions and linking,

but also stress and intonation.

Okay, so the phrase is, I could have done it,

like I mentioned before.

Now, could have becomes coulda.

I coulda.

I coulda.

I coulda.

And then done it, done it, done it

becomes, well, there it is.

It links together,

and we also use the glottal stop, dunnit.

Dunnit.

Dunnit.

And then all together, I coulda dunnit.

I coulda dunnit.

Now, I also want to just highlight some word stress here,

because listen to this now.

(stressing I) I coulda dunnit.

I coulda dunnit.

Now, this is the stress with the emphasis on I.

That's the most important part of the sentence

because I'm stressing it like that.

I coulda dunnit.

I coulda dunnit.

And then listen to the intonation here.

I coulda dunnit.

I coulda dunnit.

It goes a little bit high at the end, too.

So there are different things that you can do

with stress and intonation.

With intonation, there's the falling intonation,

the rising intonation,

and then the rise and fall intonation.

But all these things are inside my program,

the To Fluency program,

or you can look them up individually

or take a different course on pronunciation.

The key though is to think about

if this is an area you would benefit from

if you spent some time with it,

and then going through that cycle

where you learn how to make the sounds,

or how to use intonation,

or how to use the schwa, then you practice it,

you get feedback, you make changes,

you keep learning, you keep practicing,

you keep making changes,

and then you get the long-term repetition

so that it just builds into muscle memory

so that you can speak English fluently and accurately.

Okay, so there's quite a lot here.

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