A Pronunciation Guide to London - Pronunciation Studio From Southwark to Borough, Cockney to Posh and food to grub – here’s the Pronunciation Studio survival guide to life in London: Zone 1. /ˈzəʊn ˈwʌn/ Let’s start in the centre: Leicester Square /ˈlestə ˈskweə/, Grosvenor Square, /ˈgrəʊvnə ˈskweə/ and Gloucester Road /ˈglɒstə ˈrəʊd/ all have confusing silent letters. Audio Player Suburbs. Moving to the suburbs, or ‘burbs’ /ˈbɜːbz/ for short, might give you more space, but it won’t solve the pronunciation issues. Audio Player Accents. A typical London accent is working class, a bit of cockney /ˈkɒkni/ in there, innit /ˈɪnɪʔ/? Food. Fortunately, particularly if you believe what they say about English cuisine, London has food from all over the world. Grub. But what about English food, or “grub” as it’s locally known? Film. There are three types of film set in London: inoffensive romantic comedies (Romcoms /ˈrɒmkɒmz/), generally with Hugh Grant wandering around nice areas like Notting Hill /ˈnɒtɪŋ ˈhɪɫ/ and being charming and foppish. Markets.
How English learners can improve intonation What is intonation and how can you improve this aspect of your pronunciation? Fazle Muniem, a teacher at the British Council in Bangladesh, explains. Imagine you are asking a cab driver if he will take you to a shopping centre five kilometres away. He replies – in the most chilling, low, flat voice you have ever heard – 'Sure. Now imagine there is another cab behind him. If you choose the second cab, it is probably because the driver's intonation has made you feel more welcome: 'Oh, he seems much nicer', you think to yourself. But what is intonation, really? What we mean by intonation Intonation is a feature of pronunciation and common to all languages. At its simplest, intonation could be described as 'the music of speech'. We can therefore think of intonation as referring to the way we use the pitch of our voice to express particular meanings and attitudes. Different functions of intonation in English Attitudinal Grammatical Ways to improve your intonation
IELTS Speaking: Using technology to improve your vocabulary - IELTS blog Using the language as a regular part of your life Being successful with English, in IELTS and beyond, means finding a way to make using the language a regular part of your life. That means gearing your studies to your hobbies, interests, work and daily life. The problem is that more interesting materials can be difficult to find and can also be difficult to understand. Podcasts Podcasts are short audio programs produced on a variety of subjects. Mindfulness: feel your stress melt awayWhy do we feel pain? So you can see that I am interested in health and fitness. How can you use these podcasts to practise for IELTS Speaking? Choose a topic from your podcast list, for example the future of meat.Give yourself one minute to plan a short talk on the topic, just like in the IELTS Speaking test.Give the short talk and record yourself. The advantage of this approach is that it will help IELTS Listening, IELTS Speaking and IELTS Writing too. YouTube Be precise in the right context
Quiz: Most Common Pronunciation Mistakes Heard in Class and How to Use this Quiz | Blog de Cristina I’m not going to lie to you and tell you this is one of those quick posts that you can throw together on a whim because it’s not. It has taken some time to gather all the data needed to create this quiz. Jotting down common mispronunciations is not something you do in a day. You need to be a patient person. With all the papers that clutter my desk while teaching, it has also helped tremendously to have a large post-it note on my desk where I could easily and quickly store all these mistakes I have been hearing repeatedly in class. I could easily tell my students to do this quiz at home as homework and I will probably do it. Procedure: Why a game and not just the quiz? Ideally, students will work in pairs.Give each student a card with A written on one side and B written on the other side. Follow -up: At the end of the class, do the exercise again. And here’s the quiz. Up to a little challenge?
Youglish-Improve your English using Youtube IELTS Speaking: The grammar challenge - IELTS blog You might be surprised to hear that grammar is one of the four criteria used to assess your IELTS Speaking test performance and that it carries 25% of the points. Many test-takers assume grammar in speaking is only about accuracy and not making any mistakes. This is only half the story. Making errors is natural, and IELTS understands this: even IELTS Speaking Band 7 expects that ‘some grammatical mistakes persist’. To avoid mistakes, it helps to think about the tenses you use, and ensure these tenses relate to the questions being asked. However, grammar is also about showing a range of grammatical structures. How can you demonstrate a wider range of grammar in your speaking? Let’s look at an example Part 2 prompt: Describe your favourite film. You might have thought of some of these tenses: Practice task Practise this process with other Speaking Part 2 prompts. As Part 3 of the Speaking test is a broad discussion, you also have the opportunity to demonstrate a range of grammar.
Phrasal verbs | Grammar - Intermediate to upper intermediate Look at these examples to see how phrasal verbs are used. This is the form. Please can you fill it in?Why are you bringing that argument up now?Police are looking into connections between the two crimes.We need to come up with a solution. Try this exercise to test your grammar. Read the explanation to learn more. Phrasal verbs are very common in English, especially in more informal contexts. I called Jen to see how she was. In terms of word order, there are two main types of phrasal verb: separable and inseparable. Separable With separable phrasal verbs, the verb and particle can be apart or together. They've called the meeting off. However, separable phrasal verbs must be separated when you use a pronoun. The meeting? Here are some common separable phrasal verbs: I didn't want to bring the situation up at the meeting. Non-separable Some phrasal verbs cannot be separated. Who looks after the baby when you're at work? Even when there is a pronoun, the verb and particle remain together.
Teaching speaking - Unit 3: Individual Sounds In the video, you will see John Kay and teachers giving suggestions and demonstrating activities on how to help students with difficult sounds in English. This unit contains the following elements: A short video A downloadable series of reflection tasks and activities. The downloadable material asks you or your trainees to think about what special pronunciation problems your students have. The videos in this series express the view that “English language teaching has the same challenges the world over”, but that the solutions to these problems depend very much on the local context, and for this reason the approach taken focuses on tasks that enable the participants to relate the video to their own specific practice and experience.
Pronuciation app New Version (February 2016) includes: - New improved interface (including Tablet improvements) - English Dictionary search - Text translations for: Spanish, Korean, Chinese (Simplified and Traditional) (English version only) Future updates will contain a speech anatomy section. This application was originally designed at the University of Iowa to help students learning how the sounds of different languages are produced. Since its production, it has become a milestone for phonetics teaching tools around the globe. Sounds of Speech™ provides a comprehensive understanding of how, physiologically, each of the speech sounds of American English is formed. Please send any questions or issues to soundsofspeech.uiowa@gmail.com. (If you bought the version prior to Jan 2nd 2014 and would like an update to the newest version please contact us at uirf@uiowa.edu, thank you and we apologize for the inconvenience )
Ten dos for the IELTS speaking test Is it OK to correct yourself in the IELTS speaking test? Chris Pell, winner of the British Council’s Teaching English blog award for his post helping IELTS students with pronunciation, gives us his advice in the first part of his list of dos and don’ts for the IELTS speaking test. Do warm up What would happen if a footballer decided to play a game without running or stretching first? Do practise at home Speaking is a skill and just like any other skill it requires many hours of practice. For a more detailed guide on how to prepare for the IELTS test at home, see these 25 online tools for learning a language at home. Do ask the examiner Many students don’t know that you can occasionally ask the examiner to repeat the question if you didn’t understand it, or to ask them to explain what one word means. Do extend your answers It is not a good idea to give very short answers in the IELTS test and you should try to extend your answers. Do master functional language Do use natural spoken English
Future continuous and future perfect | Grammar - Intermediate to upper intermediate Look at these examples to see how the future continuous and future perfect are used. In three years' time, I'll be studying medicine. In five years' time, I'll have finished studying medicine. Try this exercise to test your grammar. Read the explanation to learn more. Future continuous We can use the future continuous (will/won't be + -ing form) to talk about future actions that: will be in progress at a specific time in the future: When you come out of school tomorrow, I'll be boarding a plane. we see as new, different or temporary: Today we're taking the bus but next week we'll be taking the train. Future perfect We use the future perfect simple (will/won't have + past participle) to talk about something that will be completed before a specific time in the future. The guests are coming at 8 p.m. We can use phrases like by or by the time (meaning 'at some point before') and in or in a day's time / in two months' time / in five years' time etc. I won't have written all the reports by next week.