Spoken English

Pronunciation

The first English lesson should deal with pronunciation. When

you don't do pronunciation first, you have to do something else

than pronunciation. And then whatever you do and if it involves

speaking, then bad pronunciation habits are formed.

If you don't know how to pronounce and yet you pronounce your

own way at the beginning of your learning, then you are building

your habits in the wrong way. Learning words without pronunciation on the first lesson is damaging.

There are two possibilities that are recommended: (1) learn pronunciation from the beginning and speak from the beginning, (2)

learn without pronunciation, but do not speak (you will start speaking at a later stage - after learning pronunciation).

The idea is not to have 'perfect' pronunciation from the beginning

but 'correct' - understood in the following sense: (1) use the right

sounds - perhaps your own versions of the English sounds, but

make sure that there is a clear correspondence between your own

sounds and the English sounds (2) always stress the right syllable.

Additionally, it's a good idea to be able to phonetically transcribe

your own English output. This means that you will have conscious

control over your output. You will have a 'digital perception' of

your pronunciation - as opposed to an 'analog perception', which

is usually developed by learners.

1\ Pronunciation 25 11

If you have a digital perception of your pronunciation, you have

the following advantage:

If, through practice, you have mastered the ability to produce a

particular English sound, say [@], you will be able to incorporate

this new ability into each occurrence of this sound in your utterances because in every word you utter you know whether it contains this sound or not. (Learners who don't have a digital perception can learn to perfectly pronounce 'cat' and still be unable to

say 'man' properly.)

Definition of Good PRONUNCiATioN

Definition of good pronunciation is:

( 1) easy to understand by advanced users of English,

(2) pleasant to hear for advanced users of English,

(3) easy to pronounce for oneself.

DON'T WORRY AbOUT flUENCY'" SPEAkiNG slowly is OK.

English learners are often worried about their lack of fluency. They

need much time to build sentences and this worries them. They

would like to speak as fast as in their native language.

Please notice that building sentences in a foreign language is a

real challenge for the brain. There are chemical processes that

take place in the brain before a sentence can be built in a foreign

language. Those processes take more time than building sentences

in one's native language. At least in the beginning. Fluency comes

with time and practice and it should not to be expected in the

beginning of learning.

If you are an English learner who worries about lack of fluency,

please remember these words: When you speak too fast, your

brain does not have the time to build correct sentences. You have

to speak so slowly that your brain has the time to think about

building sentences in English.

It's a general opinion that it is a good habit to speak slowly and

carefully in a foreign language.

Learners should accept the fact that speaking in a foreign language is more difficult than speaking in one's native language.

There is no need to worry about this. There is little fluency in the

beginning and this is okay. Don't worry about lack of fluency.

HOMOPliONES

The following list of 70 groups of homophones contains only the

most common homophones, using relatively well-known words.

These are headwords only. They will help you in speaking individual words with correct pronunciation. No inflections (such as

third person singular's' or noun plurals) are included.