When To Use Correctly GONNA How To Speak English

Is ‘gonna’ bad English? Is it wrong? 
Is it improper? Yes and no. And also,  

you have options. You certainly don’t want to be 
saying ‘going to’ all the time. Let’s explore. 

Personally, i don’t like a ‘gonna’ in writing 
at all. I wouldn’t use it in a text or an email  

to a friend, but that’s personal preference. 
Some people think it’s not a problem. However,  

it would be absolutely inappropriate to 
use it in something like a cover letter.  

So don’t use it in professional writing. 
And if you’re not sure, just don’t use it. 

Spoken English, however, is an entirely different 
thing. Reductions like ‘gonna’ are a natural part  

of spoken English, and have a place there. Whether 
it’s a conversation with a friend, or in an  

important professional environment. Professional 
English is not English where each word is  

clearly and fully pronounced. This is not natural 
English in any setting. This example: And you’re  

so determined to get there, that you’re just 
gonna crash through any obstacle. Can you do that? 

A business person in a professional setting, 
giving a speech, use not only gonna but also  

wanna. We’ll get into that more and other good 
pronunciations and reductions for ‘going to’  

in a minute. But first, you need to know some 
grammar about when you can and can’t use ‘gonna’. 

It has to be followed by a verb. If you’re gonna 
use gonna. Did you hear that? Gonna use. The next  

word, use, a verb, it’s okay to pronounce ‘going 
to’ as gonna. But you can’t use it in these cases.  

The word after ‘going to’ is not a verb. 
Going to my friend’s house. My, not a verb,  

can’t reduce to gonna. Going to the grocery 
store. The, not a verb, can’t say gonna.  

So we can’t say: i’m gonna my friend’s house. 
Or: i’m gonna the grocery store. Instead, say:  

i’m going to my friend’s house. Or: i’m going to 
the grocery store. But let’s change the sentences.  

I’m going to drive to my friend’s house. 
I’m going to go to the grocery store. Now,  

what comes after ‘going to’? Drive and go. Both 
verbs. So ‘going to’ in both of these sentences  

can be pronounced gonna. I’m gonna drive to my 
friend’s house. I’m gonna go to the grocery store. 

Every once in a while I’ll get a comment from 
someone or an email when I’m teaching reductions  

that’s like this: this is horrible English! 
How dare you call yourself an English teacher?  

But show me one example where reductions 
aren’t present in American English.  

I’ve never found one in fact, once I got 
an email from someone complaining about  

Obama using ‘gonna’ and the ‘‘to’ reduction. I 
pointed out that these reductions are an important  

part of spoken English, and that Trump, who is 
present at the time, uses reductions as well.  

Anyone, everyone, rightly so, uses reductions. 
But she never emailed me back. You know,  

most native speakers just have no idea 
about their own pronunciation habits.  

You know what? Let’s hear a ‘to’ 
reduction from Trump. He’s gonna say  

‘to protect our families’. To, to, to protect.
Brave law enforcement officers who risk their  

lives every day to protect 
our families in our country. 

To protect. Okay, but would he use 
gonna? Yes! He uses it twice here. 

Other people aren’t gonna bring it back, 
certainly the person that we’re dealing  

with is not gonna bring it back.
So love reductions. Embrace them,  

presidents use them. Gonna is extremely common. 
Now, we just mentioned the ‘to’ reduction.  

You can use a ‘to’ reduction in the phrase ‘going 
to’ instead of gonna. You can say: going to,  

going to, to, to, to. We almost never pronounce 
that ‘going to’. Going to– I’m going to be a  

little bit late. So ‘to’ reduction, T, schwa, tt– 
In a minute, we’ll hear more examples of that. 

Another common reduction is instead of 
saying ‘gonna’ or ‘going to’ is to say:  

going to- A flap T. Going to– dadadadada going to

I’m going to be a little bit late. So we can 
say: gonna, going to, or going to- All of  

these are good reductions for any situation, 
and will sound more natural than ‘going to’.  

You know, if you’re a non-native speaker, 
and you didn’t learn these reductions,  

and they’re not that comfortable for you, I 
get that. I’ll include a training session at  

the end of this video so you can get more used to 
making these sounds, so they become more natural  

and comfortable for you. But now, let’s listen 
to some real world examples. I went to Youglish,  

and for American English, I typed in ‘going to’.
Now the kinds of videos that usually show up on  

Youglish tend to be talks. Ted talks, 
presentations, that kind of thing.  

So perhaps a little bit more professional than 
conversational English. But still, even in these  

professional settings, gonna is dominant. 
I listened to a hundred examples of ‘going  

to’. The reduction ‘gonna’ happened 58 times. 
The other examples had a different reduction.  

The full pronunciation of ‘going to’ didn’t 
happen. Let’s listen to a few examples of ‘gonna’. 

Gonna. Gonna. Gonna. Gonna. So much gonna. Get 
really comfortable with this pronunciation. As I  

said, i’ll give you some pointers and help you 
train in the second part of this video. Now,  

we’ll listen to some examples where the word 
‘to’ is pronounced ‘tuh’. True T, schwa,  

going tuh– going tuh– This 
happened 24 out of 100 times. 

And finally, the reduction where ‘to’ 
is pronounced ‘tuh’, with a flap T,  

going tuh– going tuh– going tuh– 
This one occurred 18 times out of 100. 

If you’re wondering what’s the difference between 
these reductions, when you should use one,  

when you should use another, don’t worry about 
it, they’re interchangeable, it doesn’t matter.  

It’s probably easiest to learn 
gonna and stick with that one.  

So to answer the question, is ‘gonna’ 
wrong? If you don’t already know, is no,  

absolutely not. It’s very right in spoken 
English. Now, let’s get into some training.  

G consonant, UH vowel, very relaxed, guh guh 
guh, low placement, guh, not gah, gah, gah,  

not high placement, guh, guh, guh, gonna,  

gonna. The tongue flaps quickly on the roof 
of the mouth for the N. Gonnnanananananana–  

Gonna. Gonna. And a schwa at the end. 
That second syllable should be as short,  

as fast as you can make it. It’s not uh, 
it’s uh, uh. No longer than that. Gonna.  

Gonna. First syllable, a bit longer, second 
syllable just as short as you can make it.  

Gonna. Gonna. I say it, then you repeat it back 
out loud. Training is pointless if you’re not  

gonna do it out loud. Train it with me focus on 
the rhythm and making that second syllable as  

short as you can. Focus on the placement, nice and 
low. Guh guh guh gonna. Repeat after me ten times.  

Make your whole face relaxed.

Gonna.

Good.

Now, we’ll get into some sentences. We’ll train 
ten sentences. You’ll hear just ‘gonna’ then  

some fragments, then the whole sentence. Each time 
you see the word repeat, say what you just heard.  

You’ll listen and repeat to each part three times. 
Be careful that you’re not over pronouncing.  

There might also be other words in the sentence 
that reduce or are unstressed, say them quickly,  

just like the last syllable of gonna. You’re 
going to have to simplify your mouth movements  

to match the speed of what you hear. Rely on 
your ear, maybe even you want to close your eyes.  

Maybe you don’t even want to see the text 
on the screen. Just rely on your ear and  

repeat what you hear. You can do this.
In this audio file, you’ll hear sentences  

with the reduction of gonna. You’ll 
hear each sentence fragment three  

times. Repeat each time.

You know, if you’re interested 
in reductions and training,  

I have a course dedicated to reductions in my 
academy, and each example has tons of audio  

to train with. Visit rachelsenglishacademy.com 
check it out, sign up, you’re going to love it. 

You’re going to love the transformation that 
takes place when you have the right materials  

to train with. And be sure to come back every 
Tuesday for new videos on the English language.  

Keep your learning going right now with this 
video, and please do subscribe with notifications.  

I love being your English teacher. That’s it 
and thanks so much for using Rachel’s English.