English Conversation Training Pronunciation Workout 2
Well hey there this is Emma from mmmEnglish!
What do you feel like doing today?
Do you want to practise your conversation
skills with me?
Good, that’s the answer I wanted to hear because today
we’re going to jump right into another English
Conversation Workout and the focus of today’s workout
is on making plans.
Now this is something that we do every day isn’t it?
We make plans for what we’re going to do together
in the future,
what we’re going to do in the next moment from now.
Making plans is also really awesome conversation
practice because we do this little dance together
back and forth, left and right.
We propose ideas, we share opinions
and then we find a solution that everyone’s happy with.
Today we’re going to practise some really common
English phrases that are used when making plans
and we’re going to practise saying them together
to help you sound cool and casual,
much more like a native English speaker
when you use them so stick around guys,
this is going to be a lot of fun!
Today’s workout was made possible by our friends
at Lingoda. If you haven’t checked them out yet
then you definitely should.
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If you’re a long time student of mine,
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Now I’ve put the link and the voucher code
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Alright guys we’re back, welcome to your next English
Conversation Workout. In case you missed the last one,
you can go back and check it out later up here
or look for this thumbnail in the playlist.
Once again, this workout is an intensive ‘repeat after me’
style lesson designed to help you
work those conversation muscles.
We’re going to strengthen your speaking skills
and your listening skills at the same time
and by the time you’re finished, you’re going to look,
you’re going to sound, you’re going to feel more natural,
more casual just like a native English speaker
which I know is what so many of you really want.
The most important part of these workouts is not
getting everything technically and grammatically correct
it’s about feeling relaxed, finding your rhythm
and letting the words roll off your tongue.
Don’t worry about being perfect let’s just have some fun!
I’m your English coach
and you’re about to start your daily workout.
This workout is going to follow a very similar pattern
as the last one. You’ll do four sets
of five similar phrases
and we’re going to practise each phrase three times.
You’ll listen to me first and then try it yourself.
You’ve got to join in, okay?
Make sure you’re somewhere quiet and be ready
to speak out loud at normal volume.
No whispering okay? Best not to use headphones,
use the speaker on your phone or on your computer
so that you can hear me and you can hear yourself
clearly as well. This is not a passive lesson,
this is a workout!
Get ready!
Now the process of making plans with someone almost
always begins with asking a question
and in English, the most common, casual
and natural way of starting this conversation,
especially with friends is simply to ask:
What do you want to do?
But I’m going to say it at natural pace now.
What you want to do?
So remember we’re not going to get too technical here.
We’re going for natural and relaxed pronunciation
so all you need to do is try to make the sounds
that I’m making. Here we go.
What do you want to do?
What do you want to do?
Now can you hear the intonation at the end
of that question? It goes down.
Now in some English questions,
the intonation goes up at the end.
Others, it goes down.
This lesson up here is going to explain why
but right now I really want you to focus on
taking the intonation down at the end of this question.
What do you want to do?
What do you want to do?
Alright so the next one. Let’s
add a time marker to that question, that same question.
What do you want to do this afternoon?
What do you want to do this morning?
Awesome stuff!
So what do you want to do tomorrow?
Great! Now let’s shift the focus in our sentence,
in our question a little. We want to
shift it to the subject, the person that we’re talking to.
What do you want to do later?
Notice how the pronunciation changes
when we stress ‘you’.
What do you want to do later?
Let’s add ‘so’ to the start of this question
because it signals that you’re about to talk
in a conversation and helps to bring the focus to you.
So what do you want to do when we get there?
So what do you want to do when we get there?
Great work! So again, let’s shift
the focus onto the person that we’re talking to.
So what do you want to do when we get there?
Fantastic! Last one now.
Let’s add a suggestion to the end of our question.
So what do you want to do?
Should we grab something to eat?
So what do you want to do?
Should we watch a movie or something?
Awesome! Wow you sound so natural now!
So what do you want to do?
Do you want to head into the city?
Great stuff! That last one was super casual.
Let’s keep going!
Now in everyday English, asking what would you like
to do is a very slightly, more polite form of asking
the same question.
So you might use it when you’re speaking with
work colleagues or customers to show that you really
want to know or do what makes them happy
and we’ll play around a little with a few variations
on this question so
I really want you to listen out for some subtle
changes in the intonation and the stress
as we go through the different examples.
Let’s go!
What would you like to do?
Now can you hear how the word ‘would’ and ‘you’
reduce down?
What would you like to do?
What would you like to do?
What would you like to do?
Great stuff! Now let’s add a time marker.
What would you like to do now?
Cool! So let’s stress that time marker.
What would you like to do now?
So what would you like to do next?
Excellent!
What do you feel like doing?
So this is another gentle way of politely
asking someone for their input.
What do you feel like doing?
What do you feel like doing now?
Great! Let’s keep going, we want to shift our focus
to the subject now using stress, okay?
What do you feel like doing?
What do you feel like doing later?
Okay and now let’s take the stress
back to the time marker.
What do you feel like doing tomorrow?
Great work guys!
This last one is a little tough okay? Are you ready?
So what do you guys feel like doing after work?
Okay let’s push the focus on to the people
that we’re asking now, okay?
So what do you guys feel like doing after work?
So what do you guys feel like doing after work?
Now let’s practise the way that you might
answer this question and to do this,
we’re going to start with an expression like
“I feel like”
So when someone asks a question, you know,
“What do you want to do?”
They’re usually asking your opinion, they want to
make a decision together. So even though they’re asking
what do you want to do,
you wouldn’t normally use the phrase “I want to..”
because it sounds a little selfish, okay?
I want to go shopping. I want to eat pasta.
So sometimes it might be a little better to say
“I feel like…” It’s softer.
Or we could use some language that helps us
to make a suggestion like “Let’s…”
or “We could…” or “Why don’t we…”
do something, okay?
All of these also make it a little softer
so should we practise a few of these examples?
I feel like eating pasta.
Did you notice there that the L at the end of
‘feel’ and at the start of ‘like’ pull together?
‘feel like’
Those words come together.
I feel like eating pasta.
Now you can also add a pause
while you think of what you like.
I feel like
eating pasta.
Or
you can also drag out the vowel sound in ‘like’
while you’re thinking.
I feel like
eating pasta.
Okay now let’s add some emphasis.
I definitely feel like eating pizza!
I definitely feel like eating pizza!
I really feel like eating pizza too!
Yes! You got it!
How about if we want to make a softer suggestion?
Maybe I’m not really sure what you want to do or eat.
I kind of feel like going to the beach.
Can you hear how I’m reducing ‘kind of’ to ‘kinda’?
Using ‘kinda’, I’m saying well I’m not a hundred percent
sure. I’m open to other options.
I kinda feel like going to the beach.
So now you try it!
I kinda feel like going to the beach
but I don’t really mind what we do!
You sound so natural, so good!
Now let’s add on our earlier question
just to invite the opinion
of the people that you’re making plans with.
I just feel like watching a movie
but what would you like to do?
I kind of feel like eating pizza.
What do you feel like eating?
I really want to go hiking tomorrow.
What do you want to do?
Fantastic! Awesome work!
Last one now. We’ll start with your opinion first
and then we’ll ask the other person a question.
Now these ones are super, super casual okay?
Listen to how I use intonation to show that I’m
asking a question.
I definitely feel like swimming. Keen?
I feel like eating pizza. You in?
I just feel like going outside somewhere sunny
and just hanging out. You?
Awesome stuff! Keep practising your intonation,
especially on these single word questions.
They sound really informal and really natural.
So are you ready for our last set?
So now we’ve practised asking and offering ideas
about our plans.
The last part of the conversation is of course about
finalising those plans.
Now there are going to be some super simple and super
common phrases with the question words
‘where’ and ‘when’.
So are you ready to keep going? This is our last set
so we’ve got to just stick at it a bit longer.
Right.
Where do you want to meet?
Where do you want to meet?
Good one!
Just a little bit more emphasis on ‘where’
okay? Notice how I drag it out a little?
Where do you want to meet?
And now the same for ‘when’.
When do you want to go?
Focus on all of those unstressed words
in the middle there okay? All of them are reducing down.
When do you want to go?
When do you want to leave?
This is actually the perfect example of how
stress patterns can highlight the really
important parts of our sentence ‘when’ and ‘leave’
When do you want to leave?
When do you want to arrive?
When do you want to get there?
Great! Now let’s add some time markers in for context.
What time do you want to meet tomorrow?
What time do you want to head off in the morning?
What time do you want to eat tonight?
Good! Now if you want to keep your options open,
we can also use ‘feel like’ here instead of ‘want’
When do you feel like leaving?
Where do you feel like eating tonight?
So what time do you feel like we should arrive?
So good! Nice work!
We’re up to the last one now so
what we’re going to do is add a prompting question
to our main question
and this is something that we do all the time to help
reach a decision faster.
We combine questions and suggestions together.
When do you want to leave? Should we head off early?
Remember that we really want to be casual
so we might even lose
the question structure here a little, okay?
And just use intonation to show that it’s a question.
When do you want to leave? Early?
Cool!
When do you want me to call? Before or after work?
What time do you want to go?
And where should we meet? Out the front?
Yes! You’re amazing! Well done!
Nice work for sticking with me all the way
through that training. Are you exhausted now?
This is a completely different type of
conversation training.
It’s training your mouth and your muscles and your
memory through repetition. We repeated many, many
common phrases in a really natural way
through that lesson
by reducing and linking sounds together to help you
sound more relaxed and like a native speaker.
Now of course you already know that the whole point
of a workout is not just to do it once and then leave.
I want you to save this video to a playlist,
a playlist with my other imitation lessons
and the other workouts. Make sure you come back daily
for your English conversation training.
And subscribe as well.
I’m making more English workouts for you
just like this one.
So let me know in the comments down below this video
what types of conversations you want to practise
and I’ll try and make those lessons for you.
Here’s another lesson or another workout right here
and a completely different one down there
if you’ve had enough training for today.
I’ll see you in there!