10 English words that are hard to say correctly

Описание: Did you know that 'ths' can sound like a 'z'? Or that 'tt' can sound like 'd'? In this lesson, we look at ways to pronounce some common vocabulary that English learners often find difficult or confusing. Beyond the ten words we cover in the video, I'll share my pronunciation methods, so you can apply the techniques seen here to learn other difficult words.

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TRANSCRIPT

Hi. Welcome to engVid. I'm Adam. Today's lesson is a pronunciation lesson. I'm going to talk to you about 10 words that many people find very difficult to pronounce, especially non-native English speakers, but even sometimes native speakers have some trouble with some of these. We're going to look at the first five and I'm going to show you two things, two ways to look at this word. One... Or these words. One is the phonetic, basically just: How does it sound? And two is looking at the actual phonetic alphabet to see how it's spelled according to the phonetic alphabet, and I'll talk to you about that as well. So we're going to look at: "months", "clothes", "little", "queue", "chaos". So you already heard me saying them, but I'll go through each one carefully.

A lot of people try to pronounce the "th" in this word: "months", "months", you're just confusing your tongue, you're confusing your listener. Don't try to always put "ths", they don't always work. Even native speakers don't bother trying to separate the sounds. What... The way it sounds like to us, like the way I say it is: "muntz". The "ths" I just switch to a "tz". So if you think about the word "plants", you know... Everybody knows how to say "plant", one plant, many plants, this is the same sound as here: "tz". So this is the same sound here: "mun", like "sun", "run", "munt", "muntz". Okay? Again, don't try to separate them. This is what it looks like in the phonetic.

Now, if you want to really improve your pronunciation and sound like a native speaker, you must learn the International Phonetic Alphabet. I took this phonetic spelling from the Merriam-Webster's Dictionary, that's the American dictionary if you want to get the North American accent. Look at the Oxford Dictionary, for example, if you want to get the British phonetic spelling of things, if you want to get the different accents, etc. Get to know these symbols. This is like an "ah" or sometimes even an "uh", as we're going to see in other words. Make sure you understand the different symbols and what sounds they represent, that way any word that you want to pronounce correctly, you can do according to this. Now, you can also go online: m-w . com or just www . Merriam-Webster . com, you can hear all of these words and you can practice saying them and saying them correctly.

Now, this word, and it's the same idea. You still have your "t", "h", and "s", but you have the "e", the extra vowel in the middle. A lot of people try to say: "clothes", but if you say "clothes" to a native speaker... Okay, usually the context will help them understand what you're saying, but if you say the word out of context they actually won't know what you're saying because we don't have a word "clothes". Okay? It sounds like "cloze". Close the door, wear clothes, sounds exactly the same. And again, the phonetic with be "o" there, "k", and the "z". We don't have the "th" because we don't pronounce it. So most words that have a "th" and an "s" very close together, we generally just basically squeeze them in into a "ts" sound or a "z" sound. Okay? "Clothes". So when... After you take the clothes out of the closet, close the door. Okay? Clothes.

"Little". Now, some people try to say "little", which is okay. Everybody will understand you if you say "little", but most people in, again, native... Native speakers in everyday sound, everyday speech, everyday pace will say: "lidol". I have a little bit. Little bit. So it sounds like a "d", the "tt" sounds like a "d". This "i" is almost not pronounced. It's more like the "d" drops into the "l". This is what it looks like here, that's where the "t" drops. They put it as a "t", but when you have two t's together and in normal speed, it sounds like a "d", so: "lidle". Some people say: "I have a little bit", some people will say: "I have a lidle bit." Little. Okay?

Now, this word, this word is very frightening because everybody who doesn't actually know this word will actually try to pronounce it. But you have to remember English is a crazy language. We have many words that don't sound anything like they look. Okay? So this is not "queue", nobody says "queue", because nobody will understand what you're saying. This word basically means "q" or is pronounced-sorry-"q". It means a line up. When you go to the bank and you go to the teller, but there's a lot of people, get in queue and wait until your turn.