English Pronunciation Tips with Rachels English
hi i’m vanessa from speak english with
vanessa calm today i’m here with a
special guest rachel from Rachel’s
English if you have studied American
English pronunciation I’m sure that
you’ve watched some of her super helpful
and popular videos Rachel runs the
wildly popular YouTube channel Rachel’s
English let’s see what she has to say
about pronunciation
hi Rachel thanks so much for joining me
today I’m really happy to have you here
you’re welcome it’s my pleasure yes so a
lot of my audience might already know
who you are if they’ve studied anything
about pronunciation I’m sure they’ve run
across you but can you tell us a little
bit about yourself and how did you get
into American English pronunciation yeah
definitely it’s been a while I started
my youtube channel back in 2008 and I
was living in Europe and I was studying
a lot of foreign language I was an opera
singer at the time since retired
um but yeah it was I was working with a
friend of mine who was in one of my
German classes with me and he wanted to
sound more American he was interested in
American English because of all of the
movies and the shows that Hollywood
produces and so I was giving him some
tips and I was sort of relying on my
singing background to to help me know
what to say and how to say it and he
said wow you’re really good at that and
I said oh well thank you and so I
started making some videos that’s
awesome so your singing background
really gave you the skills to know how
to use the certain muscles and to how to
explain it kind of gave you the language
to use to talk about pronunciation yeah
I think so it gave me a very different
take than an academic track of studying
teaching English
I was totally relying on my body what I
felt how I thought about things and
because of having Sun opera for so long
I was very tuned into you know all the
fine things that happen with the voice
yeah I think that’s one thing that makes
you really unique as far as
pronunciation coaches or teachers or
instructors goes is you’ve got a
different background you haven’t just
been doing pronunciation but you’ve also
got that opera singing background so
that adds a different element that I
think your your students probably really
enjoy yeah I think so yes yes so I would
like to ask you a couple questions about
pronunciation because you are the go-to
person for pronunciation and there’s a
question I get all the time that my suit
asked me and that is should I focus on
pronunciation how important is it what’s
your take on that question well the
answer there is how are you going to be
using English if you’re going to be
holed up in your room only writing
emails then know your pronunciation
doesn’t matter at all but most people
are studying in foreign language because
they want to speak it and they want to
communicate with it that’s the whole
point is communication so if your
pronunciation is terrible it’s really
going to get in the way of communication
I’m not in the business trying to tell
people you should not have an accent I’m
just trying to help people be understood
um that because that’s really what it
boils down to if you’re studying English
but no one can understand you then all
of that time is sort of wasted if you
study pronunciation as you’re learning
new vocabulary and learning grammar and
how pronunciation relates to grammar
then you’re really doing yourself a
favor because you’re not gonna have to
go back and correct anything and you’re
going to be able to be understood so I
think it’s extremely important yes yes
and that’s a huge boost for confidence
to when an english learner can say
something without being asked what did
you say that sounds great to just be
immediately understood so your goal is
to help English learners be understood
and sound as natural as they can not to
feel bad about their accent but to speak
as well as they can correct and for some
people that are living in in America
they do want to be able to speak and
sound totally American because they feel
like it’s getting in the way of their
communication with people people are
always noticing and thinking oh that
person’s not from here which I wish
wouldn’t matter to anybody but I know
does matter to some people so it’s
really the goal of the student do you
want to sound absolutely American you
know then there are ways to try to get
there it’s really hard but if your goal
is just to be understood that’s a more
realistic goal and there’s you know I
have a lot of videos to help people get
there definitely definitely and it seems
like a lot of your videos are also
gonna help people to tweak their English
enough to be able to be more understood
and maybe lose some of their accent but
to be clearer in general which is the
goal that’s the most important thing
right yes yes well I’d like to ask you
another question which is kind of about
problems that English learners some of
your students people who watch your
videos might make are there any problems
you think that English learners make
when they try to study pronunciation any
kind of mmm errors that they might run
across
well definitely there’s a huge
misconception I’ve found is that people
want sounds they think when I get all of
the sounds I’m going to be fine and that
is not even half of it I would say it’s
like a third of it maybe the sounds are
important to know and a lot of people
might be coming from a language that has
many fewer vowel sounds or something for
example so understanding the differences
in the vowels and how these make
different words it is very important but
you’re not going to be done when you’ve
learned the sound and you actually need
to learn much more about the character
as you’re learning the sounds then
people think long versus short the the
melody the cadence of the voice this is
really where my opera singing background
I think comes in handy is you know
hearing the melody talking about how how
we use the voice linking words together
what’s the character that makes up
American English I think when people
master the character even if some of
their sounds aren’t quite accurate it
puts people at ease when they’re
listening because it’s really easier to
understand when the character is there
that person becomes easier to understand
and so that is the main issue I come
across is people focusing purely on
sounds and not understanding that sounds
are just part of this broader character
that needs to be understood right and
people want their personalities to come
through when they speak English so
getting the right natural intonation or
character as you said is going to be a
big point for that definitely yes yes
well I’m curious do you have any
cific things that english learners who
are watching this video can take away
right now what is something they could
do now to improve their pronunciation it
actually starts with listening
comprehension the two are linked very
closely um a lot of people have a hard
time understanding Americans we speak
very quickly but there are actually
tools that we’re using that are allowing
us to speak quickly but still be
understood and I’m actually publishing a
video on Tuesday that I’m working on
right now that goes over five important
tips for improving your listening
comprehension um studying reductions
studying linking there are specific
things that you can study that will help
you understand how Americans are
speaking so quickly we’re and once you
figure out how to listen for those and
find them then you can start imitating
them yourself so when your listening
comprehension improves then you know
what to work with a phrase with a
reduction if you hear the reduction then
you think oh this is a phrase I can use
you practice it over and over and then
the next thing you know your
pronunciation of that phrase is better
but it has to start with understanding a
native speaker saying it so you’ll - yes
yes and can you just to clarify some
vocabulary here could you clarify what
would be a reduction maybe for people
watching this who haven’t hurt you use
that term before yeah sure a reduction
is when a sound is changed or dropped I
always use the example of the word for
fo R and when we say in a sentence we
don’t say for we typically say fur and
it’s very fast it sounds like there’s no
vowel and we use this word all the time
this is for work this is for later today
and if you’re expecting to hear four and
a full pronunciation like that then if
you just hear fur so quickly you’re
probably not going to catch it so not
only will your listing comprehension be
off but your pronunciation will be off
because you’re pronouncing it for fully
and clearly in a way that Americans
don’t so that would be an example of a
reduction great thanks so much for
giving us that I think those are the
small things that
you listen to English if you don’t catch
those small things you might miss the
whole meaning so catching that first is
going to be the first step in using it
and improving your own pronunciation
right exactly
yes so I’d like to ask you a final
question about this awesome ebook that
you’ve got out can you tell us a little
bit about your American English
pronunciation book
yeah so I had been creating YouTube
videos for something like six years
before I started writing the book and
one of the questions that I always got
was where do I start you have so many
videos how do I work with them and I
realized that was a really hard question
to answer in an email um and so I
thought you know it’s important it’s
time to take all of these little ideas
that I’ve produced and come up with and
put them into something comprehensive
that someone can use to start somewhere
and then get somewhere get to where they
want to be so that was sort of the
inspiration for it and so that’s what
I’ve done it’s about 290 pages and I as
I was writing it I had my catalog of
videos there and I just integrated them
into the book so the book has text um
but then it links to a lot of the videos
that will further illustrate what I’m
talking about and then I’ve also put in
some audio about two and a half hours to
train a concept so when you learn the
concept by reading about it looking at
images watching the video then there’s a
little bit of audio that you can use to
do some listen and repeat with excellent
excellent so it seems like there is
reading listening and they can also
imitate after you and try to shadow and
speak and use it themselves that’s a lot
of material that’s going to be so
helpful for just organizing I think
that’s a huge thing you’ve got so much
material that English learners love but
having it so organized like that can
save time alright to know that they’re
following the right path they’re not
just spontaneously watching the next
video they’re following what you think
is the best order and method that’s
awesome
and then any video that they happen to
come across later they can sort of fit
it into their broader idea of the
concept of studying also I did work with
my friend Tom who’s been in several
videos and so the audio is both male and
female so that people can you know
sometimes males don’t like imitating the
female voice and vice versa so there’s
examples of both um in the in the audio
excellent thanks so much for telling us
about that and just for creating such a
great resource for pronunciation it’s a
important piece of speaking English and
I think you’re also so much for
explaining some about your background
giving us some pronunciation tips and
introducing yourself I really appreciate
it
sure my pleasure and I hope that we can
see you back soon to explain more about
pronunciation all link to everything
that you mentioned the listening
comprehension video your your ebook all
your information below this video so
everyone can check it out awesome sounds
great great thanks so much Rachel talk
to you later thanks bye bye to learn
more with Rachel click on the links here
on the screen or below in the
description I’m sure you won’t be
disappointed you will love learning
pronunciation with her
thanks so much and see you later bye if
you enjoyed this video be sure to
download my free ebook where you can
learn 5 steps to becoming a confident
English speaker you can share it on
Facebook upgrade the listening audio
version and don’t forget to check your
email to get the free ebook let’s see
what it is alright here is the free
e-book you can download yours today just
click on the link and it will be in your
email within a few seconds thanks so
much for learning with me bites