Okay, so this is called, this session is
called an Introduction to Accent
Reduction, and, let me talk a little bit
about: the goal of working on your accent.
um, It is not the goal, the goal of
accent training is not for you to get
rid of your foreign accent. If you are an
adult and you learned English after the
age of about, I don't know 12 or so,
maybe some of you studied English when
you were younger than that, but usually
if you studied English when you were
younger than that, you didn't really pay
attention, and then in high school maybe
you worked a little more than, in college
or EPI(English Programs for Internationals),
coming over here, you realize
you're going to have to learn it. If you
learned a second language later in life
you're always going to have an accent. No
problem. So, the goal is not to get rid of
your accent. It's not to master English
pronunciation, but it's to increase your
intelligibility. You don't want your
pronunciation to interfere, with other
people understanding you. okay, and I just
really want to stress. um, a foreign
accent is not a bad thing as a matter of
fact, this is just part of American
culture, but a lot of times when people
speak with a foreign accent. Maybe Jason
can speak to this too, to me. Depending on
what country they come from, they sound
extra intelligent with an accent or
extra cultured or exotic, so it can have
a real you know positive side, but the
main thing is: you don't want it to
interfere with your communication, so
that's one of the goals of accent
training, and another goal of accent
training is to increase your own
understanding. You want people to
understand you, and you want to
understand other people.Now. How are
those connected, if you have
pronunciation difficulties in English,
then you are probably not hearing those
things when people are speaking to you
in English. I'll give you a quick example.
If I can figure this thing out. Okay this
is called document camera.
Okay. I speak Russian not that great, but
I learned Russian in university and, I
worked as a translator so, I was always
working with the written language.
And I'm going to write some Russian here
using just English letters, so you can
read it. But I learned that the word for
"now" is: you'd sort of write it like this
in English. seychas (сейчас /sʲɪjt͡ɕˈæs/), and the word for
"hour" is: "chas (час /t͡ɕˈæs/)", and actually this literally
means: "this hour", and this means: "hour", but
they use it to mean: "one o'clock". Like if
you say something's going to happen at
one o'clock you say: it's happening at
"hours". Anyway "chas (час /t͡ɕˈæs/)". Well I was in Russia
and I was with a group of people, and we
were supposed to be going into a concert,
and the Russian lady who was guiding our
group said: come on, come on, you got to go
in. And I said well: what time does the
concert start? And she said: "seychas (сейчас /sʲɪjt͡ɕˈæs/)" I
heard: "chas (час /t͡ɕˈæs/)". This doesn't that sound kind of
like it
"chas (час /t͡ɕˈæs/)" "chas (час /t͡ɕˈæs/)", and I said: at one o'clock,
you know one o'clock, and she said: no, no.
You know, I heard this, so I said: "chas (час /t͡ɕˈæs/)", and
she said: no, "seychas (сейчас /sʲɪjt͡ɕˈæs/)", and I said: are you
saying? "chas (час /t͡ɕˈæs/)". You know you see what I'm.
And she said no, I'm saying "seychas (сейчас /sʲɪjt͡ɕˈæs/)". Well she
was saying this word. But one thing I did
not understand is, that in spoken Russian
this syllable this is heard a little bit,
but this totally disappears. So to my
American ears, I thought she was saying
"one o'clock". She was saying "now" and, um.
Because of the fact that I wasn't aware
of that pronunciation feature, now when I
spoke I would say: "see jaws" for "now",
whereas the Russians were saying: "seychas (сейчас /sʲɪjt͡ɕˈæs/)".
I said it funny. They could still
understand me.
But I couldn't understand them. So you
see where I'm coming from. Working on
your accent will help you be understood,
but it will also help you understand
what people are saying to you.
Okay, back to laptop. So, um, let me say
something about, why you may have
difficulty pronouncing English. Several
things. Okay, let's try this.
Oops.
For one thing, pronunciation often is not
taught. Were any of you taught English
pronunciation when you were learning
English? yes, tell us about it. I mean how
much time was given to it, and what was
it like?
Yeah, okay, so you got the phonetic
transcription, okay. That's a big help
and by the way, it's a real advantage
these days, that you can get to the
dictionary online, you know you just
Google a word and then click the little
thing and it will say it for you. It's a
lot easier now too, if you can't figure
out the phonetic script, you can at least
get some audio. Okay. Did anybody else? Did
anybody have a pronunciation course as
part of your English training? No, so how
you supposed to have a handle on this? If
you were never taught? So, in many
settings, pronunciation simply isn't
taught and beyond that
you have to learn to hear
the sounds of English before you
can produce them. So let's say it wasn't
taught to you. But you're over here in
the States, and you're trying to learn to
pronounce things correctly, you're asking
how does this word pronounce? has that
word pronounced. If you are naturally
good at it. You might pick some of that
up, and you know some people are
naturally good at it, but others just
aren't going to hear it. Unless they're
given some instruction, on what to listen
for, you've got to be able to hear
something before you can produce it. It's
got to be in there, before it can come
out. Now y'all going to have to forgive
me, cuz I'm not used to teaching with
Powerpoint. I'm used to writing all over
a whiteboard. So continually going back
here. And what I want to do is write on
my screen and have it show up up there.
Which it won't do. But I'm just going to
work hard on going back and forth and
keeping my train of thought. Okay, here's
something else about pronunciation:
pronunciation is not knowledge, it's not
something that you can learn, and be told,
pronunciation is more like a skill, Okay?
Any basketball players here? Anybody like
to play basketball? Okay one at least. Any
basketball fans?
I think people too serious. Serious
students. When I was a girl in school I
played basketball, and they taught us to
make a certain kind of shot, called a lay-up shot.
We're here's the basket and you, you
come up to the basket, and we were taught
to come up on the right side, well to
make a right layup shot, you go off your
left foot, you take the ball and you do
this little hop thing, that's a lay-up
shot. Okay can you do it now?
Probably not. You might be able to. But
with a lay-up shot in basketball or
anything you learn that's a skill,
somebody has to show you, how to do it.
You know they break it down, and walk you
through it. And then you have to do it
about a hundred times, and then you'll
have it. Pronunciation is like that, first
you have to be able to hear, what it is
you're trying to do, and then you have to
do it, and do it, and do it, and do it, and
do it, and that can be very frustrating
for people who are more educated. Because
a lot of what you guys deal with, is
mastering knowledge, and content and
information. And pronunciation just
doesn't work that way. um.
And another thing dr. Norris Morris
Morissette, there could probably speak to
this when you're dealing with
pronunciation, you're dealing with making
sounds, you might not normally make, so
that's kind of having two laid out new
motor pathways, you're having to learn
new ways of moving muscles, and
coordinating muscles, and then when
you're trying to perceive things,
perceive sounds that aren't in your
language, then that's new information too.
And a lot of that is right brain stuff.
It has to do with pitch, with rhythm, the
hearing side of it does. And those are
the things that most of us are mastering
when we're children. You know basic motor
skills, and then grasping the basic sound
structure of our language. So it's just
harder for you when you're older. Okay.
Let's see what else makes English
difficult to pronounce: it's hard to
pronounce because you're not taught it,
you have to learn here, before you can
produce it, it takes so much skill. And
English spelling, can cause confusion I
don't have to, I don't have to explain
that to you guys, you know English
spelling is very complex, it's not
totally chaotic as it sometimes seems.
But the rules are complex, and there's
lots of exceptions, that all has to do
with the history of English. And if you
are a literate and educated person as
all of you are, you are. Very. Very
dependent on the visual channel for
learning. I mean even if you're a
kinesthetic learner, you still are very
influenced by what comes in through your
eyes. And I'll give you an example of
this: I was teaching a class a number of
years ago, a long time ago, and one of the
students was an older man from South
America, very educated older man from
South America, and I've given the
students some pictures. There was a very
low-level class, beginning class, given
some little pictures, and for each
picture, I was trying to teach just one
phrase. That went with it like this: was
the story of Joe's morning routine and
for the first picture, I said: "Joe wakes
up" and that elderly gentleman, he tried
to say it, and tried to say it, and Joe
wakes up, and then by the time we got to
the third picture, he'd forgotten the
first one again he. So we went over, and
over it, and over it, and then I said, here
let me write it on the board, so this is
what I wrote on the board. And he said: "Oh
Joe wakes up", you know, can you see
where he got that Joe wakes up, and I
said no, no, no, Joe wakes up, yeah, yeah,
yeah, Joe wakes up, Joe wakes up, and
that just lodged itself in his brain. And
he couldn't get it out. He, he couldn't
get it through his ears, and once he saw.
Something that came in, totally displace
what was coming in through the ears. Okay.
Now I gotta keep an eye on the time,
because I want to get to the useful
stuff, not just the information. um.
Let's look at some of the factors that
are involved in the success that some
people have with pronunciation. Some
people get better at it, than others. And
let me just go ahead, and say right now,
I'm giving you some information, and what
I'm trying to do is sort of give you
like a map of
the landscape. I'm laying out the
landscape for you. I want to talk about
what pronunciation is. What the different
elements of it are. And once, once you've
got that figured out. Then you'll have a
bit of a tool in your hand, for attacking
it. But then we're going to look at some,
some practical specific things. You can
do, to practice on it, and I'm also going
to give you some tips, of where you can
go from here. Because we can only do so
much in two hours.
But let's look here at some factors that
influence success: native language, the
farther that your language is from
English, the more difficult it is for you
going to learn English pronunciation, and
the gentleman from Vietnam, now you might
happen, you might not have a hard time
but as far as the sounds, and the ups and
downs, and the way things are put
together English and Vietnamese are
really far apart, English and Chinese are
pretty far apart, English and Bengali,
Bengal is a little bit closer, the
Romance languages are closer, it's easier.
So you can't do anything about your
native language, if you're from one of
the more distant languages you have more
ground to travel, however research has
been done that shows that the second
major factor influencing success is
motivation, and concern for good
pronunciation, so if you care about it, if
you're aware that it's important, and if
you work at it, you can go a long ways,
and that's under your control. um, the
third factor is exposure, and that's the
amount of time spent in practice both
listening and speaking, and what's
important the time is important, the
amount of time, but the quality is
important, not just the quantity, when I
say quality I mean if you learn to
listen for certain features, and then
practice them you'll get farther in a
short amount of time, than somebody who
hasn't learned to listen to those
features, and a large amount of language
goes by, and they still can't pick out
the important things the learners
natural ability, yeah, that makes a
difference. Some people like I say some
people are naturally better than others.
But hard work will get you far,
even if you're not naturally good at it.
And then this last one is important for
people in your position and that is a
sense of your identity, you have to kind
of be sure of yourself, and I've written
down here you need to be comfortable
sounding American. Sometimes there's
something about accent it's very
unconscious, it's very close to our sense
of who we are, and sometimes if you're in
a country where you're not loving the
culture, or maybe you're going through
one of those depressions that are very
normal part of culture adjustment, you
might not like the way English feels in
your mouth. So there's all kind of things
going on there but you. Some people say
that when you're speaking a second
language, it's like you, you get to have
another whole another facet of your
personality, you get like if you're from
China you have your Chinese voice, and
then when you're speaking English you
have your American voice. And does that
make any sense to you? Gain a little bit
of a sort of a different identity, but
anyway.
That's one thing that can make a
difference. I worked with a lady for a
while from Russia and her, this was years
and years ago, and her family had been
forcibly expelled from the country, and
she, um, her attitude towards English was
like: ah, that stupid language I can never
learn that stuff, and what that was
really representing was her grief at
being separated from her homeland,
because she wanted to be somewhere else.
She was here. She hated English because
it represented you know something that
was a source of real grief in her life.
okay?
Let me see where we are going next. Any
comments up till now? have I said
anything that makes sense to ya? yeah.
okay.
Let's see where we're going next. Okay. So
what's involved in pronouncing English.
As far as the landscape you tell me what
are some of the problems that you have,
or other people have with pronouncing
English, any hard things about English or
any mistakes, that you hear people make.
This american-style teaching you know
very interactive. Yes ma'am oh yes the
schwa sound, can you give me an example
of the schwa? of a word with a schwa?
probably every word, addeth Oh Allison.
yeah. Ali son like Allison is this is
this a Spanish word as well? as an
English word, oh okay.
Oh platano okay. oh. okay well the
countries that do say banana, can you
give us a good Spanish pronunciation of
that word? banana /bä.nä.nä/ in English
it's banana /bəˈnænə/. oh. okay.
So we have a schwa, we basically have
versions of schwa in both of those. okay.
excellent, give me another problem with pronouncing
English, what's wrong with connected
speech? or what's hard about it? or what
where does the problem happen?
we're now.
okay. okay. Let me put it this way
"run words together" or, yeah, connected
speech, so in other words you have to
know, what's coming next,
to UM get these sounds working together,
like they should is that what you meant?
okay. yeah. here's an example, I think, I
have this example on the handout. um. Did
you did you eat? did jus a, D followed by
a you sound, its sound comes out sounding
like a J([ʤ]). yeah. So, um, imporTANT
showing up there versus, imPORtant.
okay. I know more things are coming to
your minds. But y'all are being reserved.
decal Deco decal, yeah, you go in later
the representative I say it represent
which party, okay, where's where does the
stress go? alright.
uh-huh, academic. okay, actually you all
are giving me really good answers,
because you're giving me some answers
that deal with individual sounds, and
some that are dealing with stress, a lot
of people when they think pronunciation.
The only thing they think about is
individual sounds, like I can't make a
the th sound, or can't make an R, or a
schwa, or an /ɪ/, or an /æ/, so you guys are
already thinking beyond that, but let me
go back here. Laptop and the information
I have. That I'm going to be going
through, what's here is on your handout,
um, it's there for you to take notes on,
but you don't have to write everything
down, because I've tried to give you some
of it already. I'm going to talk about
the elements of pronunciation. And this
is on the front of one of those handouts.
There's a little chart there, that says
elements of pronunciation, and this is
actually over on the right side of that
little chart, and let's start by looking
at segmental features. Segmental features
are as I mentioned, individual sounds,
people have trouble with are th, vowels
sometimes other sounds. You see that. okay,
and I'm sure you guys can think of more
sounds that you personally have problems
pronouncing, but there's also the problem
of putting sounds together into what we
call sound clusters, like the word
structure, this cluster of three
consonants in a row, that particular
cluster is very common in English, and if
you come from a language that puts a
consonant and then a vowel or consonant
and a vowel consonant in the vowel,
and all of a sudden you've to put three
continents together. It can be very
difficult to get that out,
I had a Japanese student, and he said
something about the "tortoise ooh Kanu",(trash can)
"terrassa Kanu"(trash can), if I know what a "two-dose
econo"(trash can) is where you throw your "todas"(trash).
yet Japanese doesn't like TR being put
together, so instead of "trash" it was" to
to us", Japanese also doesn't like ending
a word in s, so he stuck a "u" on it:" to
Tatsu Kanu"(trash can). oh. That's a little hard to
understand "trashcan". okay.
And then in addition to individual
sounds and clusters of sounds, there's
what happens to sounds next to each
other, and one of our participants was
just talking about connected speech, you
mentioned that, now, here's what happens
when these words are right next to each
other. What did you do? here, how that
turns into a j (/ʤ/), What did you do? What
did you do? What did you do?
are you aware the fact that you hear
that all day long? you hear j (/ʤ/) when it's
done. and, yeah, What did you do? Another
thing is when you put sounds next to
each other, that are similar, and we've
got a whole hand out about this. I'll
talk more about this later, but these
sounds, are similar sounds, well first of
all, D and T are the same in your mouth,
they only differ for what's going on
down here in your vocal cords. But in
English we say "I need to stop talking".
okay. I need, so I close my D, and then I
open my T. "I need to stop talking". And
people who come from other languages,
often say "I needed to stop talking".
yeah. Makes sense, you think, okay, if I
pronounce all the words, it'll be nice
and clear, actually you pronounce,
although I mean excuse me,
all the sounds
separately,
if you pronounce all these
sounds separately, and introduce a little
sound between these two words, and a
little sound between these two words.
Americans, they have a lot of trouble
understanding what you're saying, because
there will be too many syllables
. "I
needed to start the talking" huh "I needed
to stop the talking"
it's just and have you ever had this
experience. You've probably had this
experience. um, even when you're listening
to English but you hear what somebody
says it's like: "huh oh yeah yeah yeah huh
oh yeah yeah huh". You know what I mean.
You can do that for a while but it's
very tiring. okay? So what happens there?
and then what happens if you have vowels
next to each other? "go in the door". It
sounds like there's a W after the o. "go
win the door". Why don't you say that?" "go
win the doctor", "go win the doctor". you're not
saying it, "go win the doctor". okay. How about
"I ate an apple", "I ate an apple", oh, that's
kind of down, there. I hope you can see it.
But between these vowels there's a W,
Between these. okay, so this is one chunk
of the landscape, what happens with
segments? all right let's take a look now
though at another chunk of the landscape.
And if you look at that little chart
that I gave you, one side says segmental
features, and the right side says, or left
side, says Suprasegmental features, these
are the features that are overlaid on
top of the segments, and here are three
of them. There are six features on this
side, that we were to look at, but one is
the whole question of syllables you have
got to pronounce, you've got to put the
right number of syllables in a word, not
too many and not too few, and I had a
friend years ago, named Scott, who went to
work in a country in Africa, where they
didn't like to have clusters, again, so
for the whole year he was there he was
called: "see kotti", "see kotti", well that was
kind of cute, actually he liked being
called: "see kotti", but you can see that if
the people in that country, were using
their languages phonological rules, and
putting those rules on English. And it
changed the sound of the English. If
you're from Korea, you don't like the
ch /ʧ/ sound at the end of the word,
Koreans often will say "churchy""
or "wifey". Here is that a problem
Americans have: I worked with a gentleman
from Africa and his name was John Nkola.
"Nicola" Americans can't say "cola", so
everybody called him "John Nicola", see
that's: Americans taking English rules
and putting them on something for
another language, And then just a moment
ago. so much row here set front row. Said
something about this word academic. I had
a student who took the whole exit class
with me last year, and the first thing I
did was have people record a little
interview, and discuss what their
academic work was, and he said "Mac Demick
field is blah blah blah", "Mac Demick", "Mac
Samak" and "Mac damn" it sounds to me like
a name of somebody from Scotland, like
McDonald's, you know McDonald's, macdennis.
I couldn't catch what he was saying. "Mac
Demick" and what he did is he took the, is
there saying: "my academic" with that yes
on "my Y academic", he, he just dropped this,
drop that syllable, and he dropped this
unstressed syllable, so too few syllables,
and it became difficult to understand.
Okay. I need to pick up the pace here. You
got to have the right number of
syllables. You have to have the right
syllable stress. And we've already talked
about that. You were talking about
important (imporTANT) versus imPORtant, and you've
all had trouble with knowing, where the
stress goes. And it's hard in English
because there's not a real regular rule.
But then there's the whole question of
basic sentence stress. Once you got your
word stress right, Are you guys having
trouble seeing the bottom of that? Can
you see it? okay. okay, once you have your
word stress right, there's the whole
question of sentence stress. And I want
to show you something about English that
you may not have been aware of. But I
hope that after being here tonight when
you go out, you're going to start hearing
this, everywhere you go, I have a sentence
here with
three words in it: "cows eat grass", okay?
now here is a sentence with five words
in it: allow me to pronounce these two:
"cows eat grass", "the cows eat the grass",
five words, but still the same number of,
takes about the same amount of time to
say it, let's go up to let's see: one two
three four five six words, but seven
syllables, "the cows are eating the grass"
let's go up to eight syllables, "the cows
have been eating the grass", so, let me
put it all together for you.
"cows eat grass", "the cows eat the grass",
"the cows are eating the grass", "the cows
have been eating the grass". Did you
notice? It takes the same amount of time
to say all those sentences. Even though,
the last one has eight syllables, and the
first one has three syllables. Do you
know about this Jason? okay, good.
That's because the way we do, the basic
rhythm of a sentence in English, the
basic stress pattern is: we stress
certain words and others are distressed.
English is what's called.
English is what's called, a "stress timed
language", that means, the length of the
syllables is irregular, the timing of
what we say number
of stressed syllables in a word. Let me
go back up here: "cows eat grass" if you
come from a language which puts equal
stress on all the syllables, then this,
this will get longer and longer "cows eat
grass", "the cows eat the grass", "the cows
are eating the grass", "the cows have been
eating the grass". See what I mean? As
Japanese is a language like that, I don't
mean to be making fun of any languages,
by anything I say. But Japanese has kind
of up up up up up up up up up up up up
up sound to it. Spanish is a little bit
more like this buff up up up up up up.
Regular syllables. But now, look at this
"the cows are eating the new grass", "the
cows are eating the new grass". I added an
additional stressed word, so this takes
look, this takes longer to say than the
ones above it. I want you guys to say
this with me. I want you to wake up and
I'm going to clap. We won't do that last
one will do. Don't do this one. Just do
these four. I want you to say these with
me. Just to feel the rhythm. Okay. "cows eat
grass", "the cows eat the grass", "the cows
are eating the grass", "the cows have been
eating the grass". Okay. Do you feel a
little rushed in between? What you have
to do with the stuff in between is
reduce it. Now sometimes people think, oh
to be understood, I need to say every
single word as clearly as I can. Well. No
you say every single word totally
clearly, and stress everything, and the
American is going to have a lot of
trouble understanding you. Because the
way we listen in English is: We listen
from one stressed syllable to the next,
so we're hearing: "cows eat grass", "the cows
have been eating the grass". I can
understand that the cows have been
eating the grass. But if you say: "the cows
have been eating the grass". Huh. Oh. You
know, there's that little
of a lag time, to understand. Alright. So,
what I'd like to do now is look at what
words are stressed, and what are not. And
this is on your handout. The words that
get the stress, are the words where the
main meaning is. Normally "nouns", "verbs",
"adjectives", "adverbs", and words like: "won't",
"can't", "isn't", so where the main meaning is.
The words that are unstressed, tend to be
the function words that just tie it
together grammar wise. Are: y'all finding this. I'm
not question. It doesn't look quite the
same on your handout, as it does on the
overhead here, Okay, Your function words:
"articles", "pronouns", "auxilary verbs",
"prepositions", and, so on. These, tend to be
reduced. They're going to be shorter and
more quiet. Sometimes you'll not hear
that when people are saying them. So I
want you to pick up your the papers. You
have there. There is a handout here.
It's the third page at the top. It says: "I
need to go to Walmart today". Can you find
that?
Okay. what I'd like you to do, is take
your pen or pencil and, I'd like you to
look at that first line, and underline
the words that you think would be
stressed. Using this basic sentence dress
pattern. Um. Using this as your guideline.
So, Jason mr. American, over there, why
don't you get us started, by telling us
what words you think would be stressed
in that first syllable. If first sentence
there. I need to go to. okay. "need", okay. "go",
"Walmart", "today". Okay. Underline that. "need",
"go", "Walmart", "today". Got that? "need", "go",
"Walmart", "today". Okay. What about the second
sentence there Jason? Well, it seems like
you would do you it. Depends on how you
say it. "Do you want to come". But. How about
if we just say it totally neutral? Okay.
Once, let's I keep thinking. It's up there
behind me. But it's not "want". Okay. We have:
"Do you want to come", so "want" and "come".
Okay. We got main verbs and when I say
main verbs. It means we're not using the
little helping verbs that are used in
tenses, like the present progressive, you
know where you say: "I am cooking". em, would
be a helping verb. Okay. So Jason, now,
Would you please read that whole first
line stressing the words that you just
told me?
Okay. Now I heard everything he said, but
here's how my ear follows it: "need", "go",
"Walmart", "today". What come so I can
understand in a hundred percent and my
brain is following those stressed words.
Does that make sense? what I'm saying. I
have you all noticed this pattern in
English that "nouns", "verbs", "adverbs",
"adjectives", are stressed. Okay. This is
what I'm seeing. This is what I want to
see. Or so give me some feedback. Okay? I
know, y'all are tired. I'm tired too. I've
been working with children all day. Okay.
Take these rules. And we're going to take
just a minute or two. Underline what you
think are the stressed syllables in the
rest of this dialogue. Okay. Let's do a
little comparison of results. And if you
didn't finish 100%. You can finish as we
go over this. What about the second line?
Does anybody want to volunteer?
That negative element. I didn't put that
here. I put negative contractions but
that negative element no. That'll be
stressed because that's main meaning.
Okay. "No don't think so".
Okay. "don't" is a negative element "thank"
is your main verb "so" is an adverb. It
can't matter what an adverb is. Don't
worry we're going to get your ears tuned
and you'll just start to pick this up.
But "no I don't think so",
"I" is not stressed listen: "no I don't
think so". mmm. Okay. Next phrase: "got lot
work do good", "got lot work do". Next line,
"want get anything there", yes, "do you want
me to get you anything there", "do you want
me to get you anything there", yes, Next
line, "well", "don't", "mind", Okay. "if", What's "if"? I
don't know what "if" is, but we usually
don't stress it. But, um, "don't", "mind",
"use", "some", "socks". "could" is one of those
some it's called a modal auxiliary "could",
"should", "would". Those usually aren't
stressed. Okay. "use", "some", "socks". Okay. How
about the next line: "no", "problem" they're both
stressed. "no problem". "glad", "get", "kind of". "glad",
"get". "I'll be glad to get them for you".
"glad to get them for you".
"them for you" those are all unstressed
elements. Okay. And then: "what", "kind", yep
stress, stressed.
"what", "kind". Next line: "just", "White", "Socks". "just",
"White", "Socks". Ok next line: "all", "need", "now".
"that's all I need for now". Okay, now
listen Jason, I'm just going to keep
roping you in. I hope you don't mind.
Oh, I need to pick on you to some read
but, I'll pick on him first. Okay, Jason
lets you and me read this, and we'll try
and just read it naturally, try not to do
it according to script. But let's just
try and do it naturally. And you see if
what we say matches up with what we have
there. Okay. um,
you be A, you've already done that first line,
so go ahead and do it again.
"no I don't think so I've got a lot of
work to do", "well if you don't mind I
could use some socks" "just white socks"
"that's all I need for now". Okay. I see
this is. What I'm saying. yeah. We're not
stressing it so it might be a little bit
difficult to hear. But you've got it
underlined,
and what I want you to do is: would you
turn to the person next to you, just for
a second and one of you is A one of you
B, one A one B, and would you just read
this dialogue and go ahead and stress it
extra, because I want you to get the
feeling for this like the first person
can say: "I need to go to Walmart today, do
you want to come", and the next person can
say "no I don't think so",
Okay, so emphasize a little bit so you'll
get the peel grab the person next to you
and if you're really tired and you don't
want to do this you can just listen to
other people do it, pair up as much as
you can. Okay, let me have your attention
can I have your attention, How does that
feel? to stress those elements. Does it
feel a little odd? Good! That means you're
doing it right. It means you're using
stress patterns that are foreign to you.
Because when you're speaking with a
foreign accent you're using familiar
stress patterns, when you're speaking
English. But to pronounce English
correctly you're going to have to use
stress patterns that feel foreign to you.
I just visits a little exercise but as
you go about your week. This week listen
to Americans just over. You know as you
can listen to conversations or watch
television just listen people. Will say
things like well listen to me just
listen to Americans just listen to
Americans listen to how Americans well
that's all stress how American speaking
but you're going to notice. if you can
pay attention you know earlier, I said
you got to hear it, before you can do it.
If you'll pay attention you will start
to notice this very regular stress
pattern. Now this gentleman here with the
black shirt on, who was reading with Reid,
I was listening to him do this, and you
sounded so easy to understand, so easy to
understand, he was working hard to get it
out but to me it was like: oh that's easy
to understand. I didn't have to work at
it. Okay.
Trying to motivate you all right now.
If you look at that same handout, there's
some information in the middle and I put
that there to distract you. Because I was
hoping you wouldn't look at the bottom
but now I want you to look at the bottom.
It's the exact same dialogue, fold your
paper like this and just look at the
bottom, just look at the bottom, the words
that I took out are, I took out most not
all but most of the unstressed words and
you've got to be able to understand what
the unstressed words are even when they
aren't given their full value so I'm
going to read the top to you. I want you
to look at the bottom and see if you can
fill in the blanks. Okay. oh I need to
look at the top "I need to go to Walmart
today do you want to come", see if you're
gonna write in those blanks "I need to go
to Walmart today", "do you want to come", "no
I don't think so",
"I've got a lot of work to do",
oh, "no I don't think so", "I've got a lot of
work to do", "do you want me to get you
anything there", "do you want me to get you
anything there". "well if you don't mind I
could use some socks", "well if you don't
mind I could use some socks", "no problem",
"I'll be glad to get them for you", "I'll be glad
to get them for you", "what kind", "just white
socks that's all I need for now"
"that's all I need for now". Okay, without
looking at the top just looking at the
part you were just looking at. Tell me
what goes in those lines "I need to to
Walmart today", yeah, "do you want to come",
but in normal speech we'll say: "do you
want to come" or "do you want to come". Okay,
"no I don't think so", "I've got a" or a yeah
"a lot of work to do". when you. one reason
you hear Americans say words like "gonna",
"gotta", "lotta", "hafta" is because of this
rule you've got a stressed element and
an unstressed element and it just turns
into sort of ah okay next line "do you
want me to get you anything there", "well
if you don't mind I could use some socks",
"no problem I'll be glad to get them for
you", "just white socks",
Oh. what kind is white socks that's all I
need for now yeah for now so these words
are coming out like "ta" "ah" "fur" "mmm". you
know just very small. Okay that is a
little information on basic sentence
stress. And I stuck this in the middle of
the page like I said just it was I was
trying to distract you so you wouldn't
look at the bottom but I thought this
was interesting. I found a little
exercise in one of the books that I'm
going to show you that gives a number of
sentences that have the same stress
pattern. And, um, this is just helpful for
sort of starting to get the feel for it,
listen to these sentence to these on
questions and they all have this stress
pattern doo doo doo Doo "did you agree?"
"did you apply?" "where had he gone?" doo doo
doo Doo doo doo doo Doo to hear that
let's do them together. did
oh sorry. "Did you agree?", "Did you apply?",
"Where had he gone=". And the answers have a
slightly different stress pattern. They
are: "I could not agree".
buh-buh-Buh-buh-Buh, "I could not agree",
was to the second one
"I applied today", last one, "He had gone to
town". Okay. I could not negative element
agree stressed syllable of the main
verb main verb and then whatever that is
adverb right adverb. okay.
gone to town verb noun all right.
so, that's just a little something. I
don't think that's on you. Is that on
your handout. But
different sentences. Okay. Alright. So if
you look back to your chart about what
are the elements of pronunciation. Back
to sort of our map again at the
landscape your segmental features. And
now we've looked at these three suprasegmental
features. And these three
features: getting the right number of
syllables, getting the right stress
within the word, and the right stress
within the sentence. This gives you the
basic rhythm of English. But then. There
are other things we do on top of that, to
help people follow the meaning. So we're
going to look now at a sec at that
second little group of suprasegmentals
features. The first one is called prominence or
shifting stress. And let me grab this so
that I know that I'm looking at the same
thing as you. okay?
The basic sentence stress pattern says
that basically, we stress "nouns", "verbs",
"adjectives" and "adverbs". But on top of
that. There's always one or two words
within a sentence that really stand out.
And, um, this business of having one or
two elements really stand out, it's most
often used in English, when you're
introducing new information, or when
you're, when you have a specific focus in
what you're saying. And let's first look
at new information. And I think if you
once you become aware of this, if you can
tune your ears to this, you'll start to
notice people doing this all the time. So
at the top of the page two of your
handout, there's a little dialogue here
and I'm going to read this to you. I'm
going to kind of overemphasize it, but
just it's let's see the one is this
elements of pronunciation on the front
on the back. There's a little dialogue at
the top a lot of paper that started my
trademark in teaching. I always create a
lot of paper. Okay. Listen to me reading
what's the matter?
I lost my hat. So in those first two
sentences we're going to stress "what's",
"matter", "lost", "hat". But now, from here on
you're going to be seeing new
information so listen: "what's the matter?",
"I lost my hat", "What kind of hat?" your how
that gets the main emphasis now what
kind of hat I already know you're
talking about a "hat". "hat" is now old
information. first time that hats
mentioned I lost my hat. But now it's old.
So I'm going to put it in the background.
What kind of hat?, It was a rain hat. Okay.
What color rain hat? the first time I
said rain I emphasized it, because it was
new
what kind of hat a rain hat, but now rain
goes in the background, what color rain
hat? It was white. White's the new
information. White with stripes. So it was
white now put white in the background
white with stripes
"there was a white hat with stripes in
the car" white hat with stripes his old
car is new there was a white hat with
stripes in the car yeah I heard somebody
say it which car the one I sold isn't
that neat. I'm seeing those tired looks
again but it is kind of neat. Okay,
breathe let's read read let's read read
"what's the matter?", "I lost my hat", "What
kind of hat?", "Was a rain hat", "What color
rain hat?", "It was white with stripes",
"There was a white hat with stripes in
the car", "Which car?" "The one I sold".
Did that go too fast? or Could you follow
that? the American ear hears this: "what",
"matter", "lost", "hat",
"what kind", "rain", "color", "White", "Stripes".
did it edit a car so the stressed
elements the new information is how we
follow it along we've got our basic
sentence stress and then we're pulling
out sort of the key elements now in this
case we're pulling out the new
information but another thing we'll do
is pull out specific information we want
to put in focus you perks of like this I
think on your handout I have just a
short example about only having pizza
for lunch no we're having pizza for
supper we're having chicken for lunch
but I have a longer example I want to
show you here on the overhead I've
written here the the sentence Sally will
be fought the Sally will be flying to
Colorado in July Sally will be flying to
Colorado in July noun verb noun adverb
what's now but it's an adverbial phrase
Sally will be flying to Colorado in July
that's your basic vanilla neutral
default basic sentence dress now I can
actually take each of those elements and
pull it up and make it the most
prominent one in the sentence so the
first one I can say Sally will be flying
to Colorado in July and I still have the
basic stress underneath but I'm pulling
up Sally because I want to contrast
Sally with something Sally if I'm going
to contrast do this one Sally will be
flying to Colorado in July Sally in
contrast to who do you see anything
there that would contrast nicely with
Sally how about Marie yeah Sally will be
flying to Colorado in July Marie isn't
free this year so since I stressed Sally
you know it's Sally
contrast to somebody else okay or I
could do this one Sally will be flying
the Colorado in July
yeah she's yes it's too long to drive so
she's not gonna drive she's gonna be
flying yeah focus their eyes I'm fine
how about this one Sally's going to be
flying well the rest of her kind of an
order Sally's going to be flying to
Colorado in July
yeah not New York the conference is in
Denver
okay Oh does she like the snow salad
will be flying to Colorado in July I
don't think she'll see much snow are you
with me on this okay let me wake you up
again if you are willing to work with
your partner for a second I would like
you to look at that Sally will be flying
to Colorado in July and at random decide
which of these stressed syllables you
want to point at pull out and make the
most important one and see if the person
you're working with can hear which one
you've stressed and then on the basis of
that they can give you figure out which
one goes with it got it okay let me get
your attention let me get your attention
y'all test me somebody give me that
sentence and pull out the word of your
choice and I'll see if I can understand
what you're trying to stress would you
like to do it
say it again
to tell you the truth they all sound the
same to me stress it even more and I got
I'll tell you something to get the
stress right to get English stress
you've got to do what feels like
overstressing to you seriously okay do
it again oh good because it's too far to
drive right it's too far to drive
alright yeah this English makes huge use
of stress to help follow meaning and I
remember I had a Japanese student one
time and he was joking he said you know
when you speak Japanese you speak like
this
those are 2002 when you speak English
you speak like this and you know he was
making fun of it but the thing is just
the normal English ups and downs sounded
extreme to him so you got to be willing
to go out of your comfort zone a little
bit and be extreme okay somebody else
try me yes ma'am Sally we flying to
Colorado because the conference is in
Denver right all right very good
and let me say something you just said
something which is very typically
Chinese and says there's a lot of
Chinese people here this is I'm glad you
did it I'm glad you did it um she
stressed the word Colorado and I was
able to catch her stress but let me show
you how she did it and then the American
way and see if you can pick the
difference she said Sally would be
flying to Colorado in July versus this
Sally will be flying to Colorado in July
yeah you made it louder which is good
and in English we make it louder and
also higher pitch
Sally will be flying to Colorado in July
yeah so louder and higher
okay let me hear you say that again
Sally will be flying the collar okay
better already better already somebody
else try me yes ma'am
oak she's not going to walk it's too far
to drive that I did I understand you
right okay good okay now do y'all need a
break do you need to just stand up turn
around no okay
let's I won't give you a break break of
course at any point you need to sneak
out and sneak back feel free to but I'm
going to give you a mental break and for
that I need your help as Jeb mentioned
at the beginning I'm working as a speech
pathologist right now speech and
language pathologist and so I work with
American kids who are having trouble
acquiring developing their own language
some of them just have problems with the
difficult sounds like L's and R's and
TH's and S's some of them are
stutterers and some of them have more
sort of language development problems
but uh I brought with me on my iPad okay
because I have an application I think it
only costs about $30 if any of y'all
have iPhones or iPads I was using with
some kids today and I thought oh wow
this would be useful for people people
learning English and I wanted to show it
to you it's okay it's called our tic
pics all right let's see how the volume
is
turn up just a tiny bit sure okay
leave back this up and show you how it
works this is not designed that but no
is going to bother you can you tolerate
it for a second maybe I'll turn down a
tiny bit
yeah high frequency whatever just have
to ignore it okay this is um is designed
for kids who are having difficulty
learning the sounds of their own
language and there is a free version
that you can download that just gives
you like one sound area to practice on
but these are the particular sounds like
the th sound L R SH and you may not have
trouble with any of these sounds but
here's what I noticed about this that is
helpful well I'll just get let's do
s blends okay now when when I use this
with kids I have one little girl she has
trouble with SW SP and SM she wants to
say small her tongue comes forward small
Bell and I'm trying to get her to keep
her tongue back and it's hard for her
with M P and W because those are front
of the mouth
those are pulling the s out anyway so I
worked with her today with this and it
it's got little um flash cards here oh
I'm not giving you her name so oh I put
myself in as the student there I am dr.
K they call me dr. K sweat yay yay and
this just allows me keep my data on
uh-huh
well how well they say it but if you
flip this over
I sweat when it's hot listen to the
rhythm I sweat I sweat when it's hot I
sweat when it's hot and I can practice
it and then record myself saying it I
sweat when it's hot I sweat when it's
hot now I'm going to compare myself to
this I sweat when it's hot I thought you
know that would be a very useful tool
when you're trying to learn English
because even though these are simple
short sentences the vocabulary is easy
you can practice the rhythm of
individual sentences and then compare
your pronunciation with the standard
voice sweet sweet
tell me something you have tell me a
sound you have trouble pronouncing in
English somebody has got to have a
difficult sound I don't have vowels
these are all consonants
th Thursday okay
yeah bath yeah bath bath bath mat don't
forget the bath mat I have a lot of it's
one of the harder sounds for
english-speaking kids to get to so I
have a lot of kids who want to say baths
mat or bath bath mat smoothie smoothie
smoothie smoothie smoothie whoops I do
it again smoothie smoothie ah doesn't
match smoothie so I just want to offer
that to you as something that if you've
got an iPhone or I touch you know I've
had touch or iPod Touch or iPad it'll
give you problem practice with
individual sounds but also I really
think that I think this is the most
valuable thing for you guys the thorn is
sharp The Thorn is sharp okay I have a
toothache I have a toothache so it's
also helping you with this business of
linking what happens on word borders
okay so that's a little break anybody
wants to come up and play with it
afterwards is welcome to
toothbrush somebody's got it already
okay so let me see if I can get my can
you switch me back over Reid okay now in
looking at our map we've done segmental
features Suprasegmental features part
one and part of part two we got a little
bit more here to finish and then I want
to give you some practical tips but talk
to me is this give is this some at all
helpful to you are you thinking oh
that's why that's hard to say or oh
that's what is any of this giving you
any aha moments sure I tell you what ask
the person next to you if there's
anything that we've talked about in this
last hour so anything this evening or
what the most interesting thing is that
they've heard so far this evening maybe
let's say ah nothing interesting or
maybe they'll say Oh
data data does is interesting okay so as
the person next to you if let me make
sure I'm Michael questions clear as the
person next to you what is interesting
to you from what we've talked about this
evening
Wow
you
right
like with
Oh
like
you
okay let me have your attention again
does anybody have anything you could
share with the group did the person you
were talking to have anything that
helped them so far this evening I'm not
looking for compliments on my teaching
I'm just wanting to see if anything's
connecting for ya actually this is a
teaching technique when you're trying to
get students to talk it's if I were
sitting where you're sitting I would be
sitting quietly I don't like to talk in
a class but um if you ever are in this
position of trying to get a class to
talk you toss out a question and nobody
says anything so then you say well talk
to your partner instead because then
people will share their ideas and then
sometimes people will be willing to
speak it in the whole group so that is a
teaching tip okay anybody want to share
what their partner found helpful or
interesting
we
we don't
okay good yeah that's good because yeah
you know there's a rhythm but what do
you define it and get that down to the
nuts and bolts okay good I'm glad that
was helpful
yes ma'am no it's not I think that read
are y'all going to offer it again in the
spring or sometime
okay so I think he's saying no right now
but unless you know go ahead and
graduate and get appointed to faculty
and yeah I don't know CPI ever do this
yeah is it open to graduate students
outside of EPI
(English Programs for Internationals) okay
okay so English programs for
internationals and burns building Jason
there is your source of information
about whether they have anything for you
guys okay
well let's go a little bit more with a
little more data and then we'll do a
little bit more practical see if I can
do something more practical for you this
evening and then I'll give you some
information how you can carry on
studying yourself so More Suprasegmental
features okay we got our
segments right over that we lay our
basic stress over that we pull out the
most important words and then I've got
my arm here representing the flow of
speech got all your words here to try
and get your sounds as right as you can
get your stress but then the next thing
is it's very important in English to
help your listener know what words go
together and we divide words into what
are sometimes called thought groups so
we take this flow of speech and we chop
it up and we chop it up using pauses and
a little bit of a follow of intonation
if it was writing you know in writing
there's a capital letter to start the
sentence there's an introductory clause
comma some more comma period you don't
have those commas in speech so in
English what we do is we use pauses in
place of that and I've gotten at a
couple examples here to show you that
where you put your pauses showing which
words go together will change can change
the meaning of what you're saying the
first sentence is John said Joe is lazy
yeah so who's lazy John's lazy the
second one is john said joe is lazy
now it's a short sentence so you'd
probably just say John said Joe is lazy
but if you wanted to be dramatic and
stretch it out a bit you could say John
said Joe is lazy because this is like a
little sentence that goes together
Joe is lazy John John said Joe is lazy
John said Joe is lazy okay I'm over
emphasizing it let me do it like normal
John said Joe is lazy John said Joe is
lazy
John said Joe is lazy can you hear the
difference okay then I'll make it more
emphasized again because the whole
business about training your ears to
hear this is because as it just goes by
you in everyday language it doesn't
necessarily obvious until it's really
been pointed out okay so the first one
John said Joe is lazy say it with me
John said Joe is lazy do it again John
said Joe is lazy okay now let's do John
said the slight pause Joe is lazy like
this
John said Joe is lazy
John said Joe is lazy okay you sounding
good let's try this this might be a
little bit um more down your alley for
some of you all a plus B times C is D
second one is a plus B times C is D okay
so say the first one with me and let's
really emphasize it a plus B times C
equals D again a plus B
times C equals D okay then a plus B
times C equals d again a plus B times C
equals D are you feeling it yes no okay
let me show you what this looks like in
speech and here I have a little story
about myself it doesn't have any
punctuation because it's supposed to be
speech not written English and let me
give it to you with no thought groups
some languages and I think this is true
of those of you who are from Bangladesh
your language I had a gentleman who
whose Lang made of language was he
wasn't Hindi but it was at an Indian
language and his his intonation was da
Dada Dada Dada added a very musical very
light and musical but it sort of sounded
like this when he spoke my name is Kay
and I've been living in South Carolina
for about 18 years before coming here I
lived in North Carolina which is the
state where I did the largest part of my
growing up with my brother and sisters
still live there one in Charlotte and
one in Asheville the Asheville area is
great if you enjoy outdoor sports like
hiking and camping and it ended kind of
going up do you hear what I'm not trying
to make fun of an Indian accent I'm just
but have you heard languages where duh
duh duh duh duh that they have a nice
little roll to them like that ok and
then the Americans going I'm not quite
sure which words go together I'm not
quite sure I understand you I understood
every word you said but I'm not quite
sure what you said ok so how many of you
come from languages that where
everything kind of rolls along smoothly
does Chinese do that what about Italian
up up up up up up up
ah Sicilian accent is different
different dialects in Italy okay
the Spanish should roll along like that
or Spanish is a little more punctuated
more punctuated okay
well there you go you couldn't figure
out what went together you had to stop
and analyze constantly oh it was in
Spanish okay well speaking in English
without using the adequate pause is to
show people what words go together is
like writing without any punctuation
it's very hard for people to understand
now your language and even the languages
that doesn't move along like that
they've got things going on that the
listeners can hear that I can't hear
because I'm an American but English
makes more of a use of pauses and stress
and falling pitch than most languages
okay so allow me to pause between
thought groups here what I'm going to do
is take all this language here and I'm
going to divide it into smaller chunks
and I'm going to let you know what words
to go together because I'll say some
words and then I will pause and I'll say
some more words and then I'll pause and
this isn't um there's not just one way
of doing this you can choose which words
you chunk together it does have to make
sense grammatically like I lived in
North Carolina I wouldn't say I lived or
I wouldn't say I lived in pause North
Carolina which pause that wouldn't make
sense grammatically you need to keep
things together to make sense but you
you know there's that speaker decides
exactly how to break this up but this
means I'm pausing between phrases and
this means the end of the sentence so
listen to this my name is Kay and I've
been living in South Carolina for about
18 years so my name is Kay I'm going to
pause and let my pitch go down a little
and I've been living in South Carolina
pause and my pitch goes down a little
for about 18 years my pitch goes down
farther
before coming here I lived in North
Carolina which is the state where I did
the largest part of my growing up both
my brother and sisters still live there
one in Charlotte and one in Asheville
the Asheville area is great if you enjoy
outdoor sports like hiking and camping
now I could have divided this is kind of
a long section I could have divided that
up more I could have said the Asheville
area is great if you enjoy outdoor
sports like hiking and camping it's
easier to understand isn't it okay would
you all do me a favor and just read with
me let's even though this is about me
and not about you let's read it together
and let's exaggerate these pauses okay
my name is Kay and I've been living in
South Carolina for about 18 years
before coming here I lived in North
Carolina which is the state where I did
the largest part of my growing up and
again
hold on a second I could break this up
more to I could say which is the state
where I did the largest part of my
growing up okay let's see both my
brother and sister still live there one
in Charlotte and one in Asheville the
Asheville area is great if you enjoy
outdoor sports like hiking and camping
okay um
now dr. Morris could you just for a
second what is something you talk about
all day long the brain maybe why don't
you just very briefly tell us what it is
you talk about all day long now y'all
listen to him but don't listen to what
he's saying listen to listen to the way
he and don't think about just talk
naturally okay and y'all listen to how
he puts words together in pauses so go
ahead you might get interested in what
he's saying but try not to okay try not
to get it
the different parts of the brain
hopefully learning something about the
how is that did y'all notice he he
chunked it very naturally did you also
notice that on the that he went up quite
a bit within each chunk on his focus
words so like um do you have any not
particularly about or insight into
stuttering do you know anything about
stuttering okay can't find a reason for
it
biologically okay thank you very much
dr. Morris okay
now let me give you one if you can slow down when you speak
English and pause between phrases that
will really boost your intelligibility
even if they're sounds that you can't
pronounce so that's one takeaway thing
from tonight I wish I could give you all
a whole 12-week course on pronunciation
which will get I wish we could take it
little by little and do lots and lots of
practice we can't do that tonight but
this is one thing to take away listen
how I'm speaking right now if you slow
down and pause between phrases people
will find it much easier to understand
you you're giving them time to catch up
if you speak quickly and there's
something people can't get there they're
going to get lost if you speak more
slowly and pause then they'll often be
able to figure out what you're saying
even if one or two sounds are off or the
stress is often a word okay slow down
pause a lot between phrases pause more
than feels natural okay it's not going
to feel natural to you alright
okay the last item on that chart under
super uh segmental features is just the
question of intonation patterns do you
know what direction an English sentence
goes as far as you know my name is Kay
my name is Kay and I've lived in South
Carolina for about eighteen years what
we do in a sentence is we jump up and
step down jump up and step down jump up
and step down and the jumps are
generally on those words that we're
trying to focus on like Sal Sally will
be going to Colorado in July not Marie
in July now July or money my name is Kay
you can slide all the way down on a word
but basically we jump up step down until
we get to our next focus word jump up
step down jump up step down
Jason could you say three or four things
about your time teaching in Korea like
um what was the best part about living
and teaching overseas I really
I really enjoyed being in a foreign
culture and learning a lot about the
culture did you catch that
okay read what are you doing besides
working at the Center for Teaching
Excellence one day I hope to be a
teacher can you hear it okay again just
one more thing tune your ears start
listening
now what about questions which direction
two questions go that's trick question
because it depends oh it's right there
okay another teaching tip sometimes when
students don't answer it's because the
answer is too obvious yes all right
WH questions tend to go down at the end
what is your name where do you live how
long does it take to get to your house
yes/no questions tend to go up at the
end
are you tired hungry you can do it just
on a word hungry hungry yeah
what's some let me hear everybody here
say are you hungry
it's not going up enough are you hungry
okay now you start to sound like a bunch
of Americans okay how about this run
what is your name oh you're really
starting to sound like a bunch of
Americans it's interesting to me
I've taught pronunciation for a long
time it's interesting to me that when
people start doing things that feel
funny to them they start sounding good
to me yeah I had a student I came here
where she I think she was Chinese and
she was the fruit apple she was always
saying Apple Apple and I said you got to
say Apple Apple
no Apple and I said you know look at my
mouth do this Apple and she went she
wants this Apple woohoo because she she
got the she hit the target but it felt
so strange because it just didn't exist
in her language you know so remember
that if it's feeling funny you're
getting close all right where are we how
important are these elements relatively
speaking okay I told you at the
beginning people usually think mainly of
this by what this hard sounds are when
they think about pronunciation but this
is just a part of a picture and this is
not terribly scientific but just from
observation and from from just what I
have read and what I've experienced and
what I've seen this is about 70% of
whether or not people can understand you
and this is about 30% if you make all
your sounds just right but your your
words dress is off or your basic
sentence stress is off or everything is
run together people cannot understand
you if this stuff is good you've got all
the syllables you're stressing your
words right you're stressing the you
know the stressed elements if this is
off it really doesn't matter if you've
got this you're much easier
understand okay let me see what time it
is
quarter tail okay I need to I need to
wrap this up then okay what's practical
what can you do to improve your accent
well I already told you this try to slow
down and pause between thought groups
little type of there try to slow down
and pause between taught groups
number two focus on developing your
listening skills just after being here
tonight and do a couple little exercises
you are now in a position where you can
be intentional about listening I had
this friend at church she had been on
Haley's Rodriguez she doesn't live in
company more but she'd been in Colombia
for 18 years and she said all you know
people have trouble understanding me on
the phone like I was trying to say the
word taco on the phone taco and they
couldn't understand me and I said well
that's because in English you know what
she was saying
taco taco in English we put a little
puff of air after the tea and the the
tongue in the cup taco and she was
saying taco with a beautiful Spanish T
it's correct
and awarded more Morris
Morris
yeah a little thing can throw people off
and now that is back oh that's that her
mistake was on this side of the chart
and not on this side of the chart
however my point is she had been in the
US for you know an enormous amount of
time she's been here for a long time she
spoke beautiful English but she had
never noticed that the English T and K
are different from the Spanish T and K
and I said you got to say taco put a
little air there and she and you know I
saw her like a week later and she said
that's all over the place everybody says
to and cut and put and you know once it
been pointed out to her she started
hearing it everywhere and so I hope that
you all can focus on developing your
listening skills listen for the pauses
listen for the ups and downs and once
you start hearing it then you can start
imitating it ok I told you that working
on pronunciation is it's a skill it
takes practice so you know you overhear
somebody in the office say boy it's cold
today and so you could say to yourself
boy it's cold today those are the you
know quite a prominent pattern there so
then you need to walk down the sidewalk
saying to yourself boy it's cold today
boy it's cold today I'm not kidding boy
it's cold today and just say it and say
it and say it and start to get the feel
of that wound pattern of English ok now
I've given you a few things tonight that
you can listen for but study courses
there are some things out there you can
do on your own and I will show them to
you I know you're busy I know know know
that everybody's really busy but I want
to mention three courses and I've got
them listed on your handout there this
one's been around for a while it's
called pronunciation for success and the
nice thing about this course
I've got it old videotapes but it's on
DVD now but the whole course with the
teachers is right here so the teachers
we'll give you a little lesson for
example on sentence stress they'll
demonstrate it and then they'll walk you
through the exercises in the book so
this one is pronunciation for success it
was done a while ago
so everybody's hairdo is about you know
15 years out of date but it's excellent
material and um let's see I guess it's
just I just have that you can also buy
CDs to accompany this so that once
you've you know watched one of the
little segments done a few the exercises
you can listen to the CD in your car or
you know put it on your iPod and listen
to it as you walk around campus because
you got to listen listen listen to this
stuff
okay another one this is the one we use
and in the course that we do with this
Center for Teaching Excellence American
accent training this is the least
expensive of the ones I want to show you
I think it's about twenty-five dollars
or so on Amazon but it's a book and CDs
and everything in the book is on the CDs
and so you know if you just sat down
read the book and listen to CD the CD is
reading the book to you but again
they'll explain a section and give a
number of practice exercises so if you
can carve out I don't know half an hour
once a week and and read through a
little section of the book with the late
you know listening to the lady then
listen to the audio portion as you walk
around campus or as you're driving in
your car that will really help you with
the training of your ears and also
you'll be practicing you know saying
over and over again this stuff and then
another one that one is American accent
training and then this one the American
accent guide is very similar same basic
idea it costs around 30 or 50 depending
on whether you get audio CDs or on this
one that I have has everything on an mp3
format so you can just flip it right
over to your mp3 player if you buy it
with the CDs you get eight CDs
so it's cheaper it's got more to work
with but again these are all designed
for independent study they're good with
a teacher but they're also everything is
here so if you can sit down a couple
times a week and take it little by
little and then do lots of listening
these are all really good courses I wish
I could do more for you but that's
pretty much it
oh I did give you one handout that we
didn't have time to go over and we're
not going to go over it but it's the one
that says linking words together we have
a little taste of that when we were
talking about linking and blending and
this just gives you the specific rules
so and I will go ahead and say one
specific thing to the Chinese students
if I may I had a lot of Chinese students
in my class some with the professors
when we did this class I've noticed that
students from China often speak very
precisely and look under their section
to where it says when a word ending in a
consonant is followed by a word
beginning with the same constant that
link these words together and say the
consonant only wants the first example
there says I've lived here a short time
I've lived here a short time because of
the nature of Chinese phonology Chinese
students who are trying to speak English
carefully will say I've lived here a
short time I've lived here a short time
instead of running them together it adds
an extra beat I've lived here a shorter
time I've lived here a shorter time or
with another example
look under number three she's a bit too
pale she's a bit too pale so it's
typical now I don't know some of the
rest you might do this not just not
aware of it but it's typical with
Chinese students Korean students do this
too when you have a word ending in a
consonant and another word beginning in
a consonant you put a little air in
between that makes you hard to
understand because it messes up the
rhythm so I'm just pointing that out
which we could practice it for 45
minutes but we can okay I am going to
step outside and get a little cool air
because you all are going to do some
evaluations of this session we want to
know if it was of any value to you at
all but before you step outside any
questions or comments okay if you want
to come up and play with my ipod
afterwards this little program see it
might be useful to you feel free to okay
thank you very much thank you for your
attention