How to Stop Confusing Similar Vowels in English | Core Training with Hadar

Hey. Hey, everyone. Welcome to day three. How are you doing? The seven day pronunciation challenge is moving along and this is day three. I'm super excited to talk to you today about vowels. But first, let's say hi in the comments. How are you doing? I was so excited to get started. Usually I'm just like, you know, getting organized, preparing, look at, looking at my slides. And three minutes before 4pm, which is when I'm broadcasting, I was like, okay, let's get started. Let's get started. What's going on? So I'm happy to have you here. I'm looking at the chat. I see Martha and Ghee and Karina and Maria and Alex, Noreen. We have people inside of like watching this on Facebook and watching this on the website. So hello to everyone. Luciana, Milan, Eric, Jorge, George, Souk, Catherine, Tatiana. So hello to everyone and I'm happy that you're here with us today in day number three. Today we're going to talk about how to stop confusing similar vowels in English. Yesterday we talked about consonants, and today we are going to talk about vowels. And here's what we're going to learn today. First of all, we're going to talk about what are vowels. Then we're going to talk about the most critical vowel related challenges in English from all speakers of English. Then we're going to talk about what is ipa. IPA is the International Phonetic Alphabet. There, I just told you what it is and why do we need it. So for those of you who ever wondered if you need to learn ipa, if you don't need to learn ipa, we'll talk about that. And also I'll tell you why it's even more important when it comes to vowels versus consonants. And then we're going to practice confusing vowel pairs. I'm going to teach you some of the key vowels in English and how not to confuse similar vowels. All right, Are we good for today? Excited. All right, all right, all right. Let me see. Yes, I'm on board with all the comments. Good. Vowels are speech sounds that we produce without blocking the air. So yesterday we talked about consonants and we said that consonants are sounds that are stopped, partially stopped or interrupted. Like. Vowels are continuous sounds, always voiced sounds in American English or in English in general that are not interrupted, meaning that there is space in the mouth as you produce them. Ah, E, o. Okay, all of these are vowel sounds. And more. There are actually more. Now remember that we talked at the beginning about the priority chart. I don't teach all the vowels flat out or all the consonants Flat out. I first teach the sounds that are more challenging or the critical challenges that I see most speakers experience. And like we said, we always look at high priority challenges, medium priority and low priority. And today we're going to talk about vowel related challenges. So here are some of the high priority vowel related challenges. First of all, vowel insertion, sometimes in some languages it's not. There is a constraint where, or a limitation where you actually cannot have syllables or words ending with a consonant or several consonants. And sometimes one of the ways to solve that, because the person speaking, if they're not used to having to saying words with several consonants at the end, one of the ways to solve that would be to eliminate the consonant. So that is a challenge that we discussed yesterday. But another way to solve this problem is by adding a vowel. So basically, you take one word, for example, bag, that ends with a consonant, and you turn it into a word with two syllables, bagu, right? And then you're adding a vowel. Sometimes you might hear it in, at the beginning of words. For example, Spanish speakers, when there is the sp cluster or sk, for example, like scream or Spain, what would happen is that another vowel would be added espain a scream. Because in Spanish in particular, it's not allowed to have a word beginning with two consonants. Now, sometimes vowel insertion, which is the case that I'm talking about now, is more challenging for your clarity, and sometimes it's a little less. So it really depends on the, on the, on the specific sound and where you're adding it. But know that generally you don't want to add vowels that don't exist into your word. And sometimes people tend to drop vowels or drop complete syllables. So just to backtrack a little bit, just so you know, a syllable is a unit within the word. Every word has to have at least one syllable. And some might have 5, 6, 7, and sometimes 10. Sometimes it's 10 syllables. Okay? And a syllable is comprised usually of consonants and vowels. A syllable has to have a vowel to be a syllable. So a full vowel comprises of a syllable. And if we have two vowels in a word, that means that we probably have two syllables. Okay? We could have a syllable without consonants. For example, in the word about, the first syllable is a, the second syllable is bout. But we cannot have a syllable, a small unit in the word without consonants. So when we add another syllable, another vowel, or delete a vowel, we're actually playing around with a number of syllables. And it's hard for people to perceive that because how they understand the word or retrieve the Word is according to the number of syllables, the primary stress, and only then the sounds. So if you're turning one word into with one, a word with one syllable into a word with two syllables, people are going to think that you are referring to another word. So another example that I often see is that sometimes parts of the words are dropped. For example, in the word practice I sometimes hear, especially my Brazilian Portuguese speakers, students say, pract, pract, dropping completely the sound at the end, right? And when you eliminate a vowel, you basically eliminate a syllable. And that could be a challenge for your clarity. So these are the high priority challenges. Medium priority vowel challenges are vowel swapping when similar vowels sound the same. And we're going to talk about that today. For example, sheep versus ship or pool versus pull. Sometimes we have this thing called diphthong simplification. Diphthong simplification is basically when you take a diphthong, a diphthong is a vowel that changes, like o. So it's two vowels but within the same syllable. So it's actually one vowel that changes. One long vowel that changes. Go late, hi. Okay. And if you don't get to the last part, go wet, ha. Then it's going to affect your clarity because people are going to think that you're talking about another sound or you're referring to another sound. And then sometimes we have just mispronunciation of certain vowels, like for example, the schwa, which is always. A lot of times people, they don't replace it with another sound that exists in English, but they just add a sound there like about or computer instead of about and computer. So if this is all confusing, don't worry. You have the priority chart available to you. Remember, you have it available on the website. So you can go and check it out and see what vowel related challenges might be relevant for you. But probably you're going to be looking around the medium priority challenges because that's where most of the vowel related challenges exist. Are we good? Is that clear? Good. So how to identify the different sounds? When learning and practicing, especially when it comes to vowels. Here's the challenge. In American English, There are between 16 to 18 vowel sounds, depending on the dialect. But how many vowel letters do we have in English? Let me know in the comments. Okay, good. Thank you for responding because it's really helpful to know if we're on the same page. If you have questions, please ask your questions. Okay. And Amar, if you don't mind us, please send me on Slack the document with all the questions that you collect for me. Because I don't have it. Okay, so 16. Yes, 16. 16 vowel sounds. How many vowel letters do we have? Okay, I see six, Five. Five plus one. Okay, what is the one? So, yes, we have five vowel letters. A, O, U, I, E. A, O, U, I, E. Vowel letters. The Y sometimes. Maybe that's what you're referring to. The Y sometimes represents a vowel as well. But we have five vowel letters and about 16 vowel sounds. Okay, Sounds, not letters. So how do you represent 16 vowel sounds with five vowel letters? The result is that you're going to have the same letter representing different sounds. Okay, for example, the word. Wait, let me move it around. Hold on. So, for example, if we think about the word the letter o, specifically the letter O, the letter O could be okay, as in go, that's the vowel sound, right? Can you. Can you notice the difference? There is a letter o, but when it appears in the word go, it actually represents the sound O. Go. But in the word computer, it represents the schwa computer. In the word company or love or month, it represents the cup sound, which is like a stressed schwa. It's a little longer and more stressed. Love, company. But then in the word Office, it's an open ah sound. Ah, very different from the. Or the o. And in the word look, we have two O's, but it's right. And in the word thought, when there is also a U sound there, it's an ah sound, and sometimes ah. So as you can see, the same letter could represent different vowel sounds. And this is why IPA could be very helpful. It's not a must. You don't have to use it when you learn English. But this is why it was created. So there is always one symbol that we all agree on that represents one vowel sound that exists. And that vowel sound may exist in all languages or. Or in some languages. So English is not a phonetic language. And the letter can represent different sounds, like I said, the A in gate or in apple. But a sound can also be represented by different letters. For example, zoo and president. So that's the same with consonants as well. A Z sound can be represented with several different letters. Or a letter could be silent, like the word knife when you think about it, right? The K is not pronounced. The E is not pronounced. A letter can represent more than one sound. Exit, G, Z, G, Z. Right? Two sounds, a G and a Z exit. And one sound can be represented by several letters. Duck. Right. One K sound, two letters. English, if you didn't know that already, is not a phonetic language. So there is A system of symbols in which every symbol represents only one sound. Either it's a vowel or a consonant, and every sound has its own symbol. When it comes to consonants, it's a little easier because usually it's the letter that represents the sound, but sometimes it's a little different. So when you go to pronunciation dictionaries or most dictionaries, and you'll see those funky letters, know that this is the ipa, the International Phonetic Alphabet, and it represents the sounds because the letters or the spelling just doesn't. They don't do a good enough job with telling us how to say something. So if you want to expand your. Your ability to read every possible word by looking at the IPA transcription, then it might be useful for you to learn the ipa. I am not one of those people who thinks that you have to learn IPA to learn pronunciation. I think it's important that you understand the sound and whatever representation you'd like to use for it. So I like to use just phonetic transcript, loose transcript. For example, for the ah sound, I may use a or ah. Right. And for the ah, just one single A. Sometimes I use that when I feel that it would be more intuitive, and sometimes I use ipa. I'm not saying that there is the right way or the wrong way. You know, the best way for you to learn and what. What registers better. And if you feel a little overwhelmed by all these symbols, don't do this work. Don't work with ipa. But if this gives you clarity and you're excited about it, then this definitely could be something that you could kind of like explore a bit more. On YouTube, I have a video which is called the Vowel Masterclass, where I actually break down this particular chart, this IPA chart of vowels in English. And I teach every single sound separately. So if you want to go and explore it a little deeper, then you're invited to do that. It's on my YouTube channel, and I think it's linked to the resources. All right. How many vowels are In English? Between 16 and 18, depending on the dialect. Yes. 16 vowel sounds with five letters. The reason why I'm saying is because in the British dialects, there are more sounds than in American dialects. Okay, why King two times? Probably a mistake. Let me see. Yeah, it's a mistake. Ignore it. Okay, so here's an example of a vowel pair represented by the IPA symbols. And that is the tense E. The first one is a high E sound, as in the words we see. And he read Lisa, E, E, E, E, E. And as you can see, we've Used different spelling patterns. Lisa has an I, but we has an e, and Reed has E. A, C, S, E, E or S E, A. Okay, so different spelling patterns will represent the same sound. And the second one is the I sound, the lax sound, as in the words ship, kid, finish. Simple. Listen. Usually spelled with an I. So usually the tense e is spelled with two vowel letters and the lax is spelled with. With a. With the I. Usually. Not always. Okay, so to pronounce the high e, the tongue rises up, right? Rolls forward almost to a point that it touches the upper palate. The sides of the tongue touch the sides of the teeth. E. And the lips fall to the sides a little bit. E, E, E, E. Don't use your cheeks so much. And don't. You don't use your mouth so much. You're supposed to be able to say the E sound without moving your. Your lips to an extreme. I'm saying that because sometimes people depend on their lips and their cheeks to produce this sound. And really, it's just a matter of what your tongue is doing. E, E, E. Now, actually, if this is a hard sound for you, let me know if it's a. How is it on a scale of 1 to 10, one being very easy and, you know, like, I have it in my first language, and 10 being very, very hard. How. How easy or hard is it for you to pronounce this sound, the high E sound? Now, notice that it's not a neutral E sound that exists in most languages. Pay attention. So if in your language, there are usually five vowel letters. So if you're a Spanish speaker, Italian speaker, more seven, six vowel letters. Vowel sounds. Most languages have less. Less vowels, and usually there is only one E sound, and usually it's shorter and the tongue is lower. So pay attention and notice that it's not exactly the same. E, E versus E, which would be E in most languages. Okay, good. So you want to feel almost vibrations up here. So I can see it's not a very challenging sound for most of you. Great. Remember that it's usually a long sound. But for those of you who do struggle with this sound, because I see a little bit of a few nines and fives and higher numbers. If you know how to pronounce the y consonant, as in the word yes. Yes. You know how to pronounce the high E sound because it's exactly the same. E, E, E. Yes. Yes. Just opens up to another vowel. But. And yes, are the same. That's the high E sound. The second one is more challenging because it doesn't exist in most languages. And that is the sound somewhere between E and E. E. E. You drop your jaw. The tongue lowers a little bit. Lips are relaxed. Kid, Finish. Listen. Simple. Do it again with me. Kid, finish. Listen. Simple. On a scale of 1 to 10, how challenging is this sound for you? Okay. Yeah. Noreen says this one is a bit more difficult, and I get it because the tendency is to make it like an E sound. Sheep. Finish. Simple. Which, again, totally fine. You're still going to be clear. But it could get confusing when you get to some similar vowels. Yeah, I see higher numbers here because this is a bit more challenging. I get it. So let's practice it. So let's say that the default sound, the one that is easier for us to pronounce, is the first one, the high E. From there, we just need to learn how to move into the sound that is more challenging. So if the high E sound is easy, let's do it together. Sheep. Then the second one, you want to drop your jaw, lower your tongue a little bit. Imagine like you're saying, eh, a little bit. Ship. Sheep. Ship. First, I want you to hear the difference between the two when you make those sounds. Sheep. Sh. Create space. Imagine like you just don't care. You're like, ship. You're lazy. Ship. Kid. Finish. Sheep. Ship. Okay, but make sure you're not getting to E. Shep. That's an S sound. Sheepship. Shep. Sheepship. Beat. Bit. Steal. Still. Can you hear the difference between the two? Put yes or no. Steal. Still. Good. When I have to pronounce words, it's okay, but in a sentence, it's harder. I know, I know. This is why we have to practice it first in words, so that we know always what to do with the tongue to get good. You can hear the difference. Very good. To get to that sound. So drilling words, then drilling short phrases. Sit down. You have to finish it. It's a simple mission. And then you want to use it in longer sentences, and then you can. You know, in our programs, we produce a lot of materials for you to practice it gradually from words to phrases to minimal pairs to sentences with a lot of those sounds so that you gradually teach yourself how to use it, how to move from words into sounds. Good. Seen. Sin. Okay, so let's do. Let's do a quick sprint. Let's do all four sheep. Ship. Beat. Bit. Steal. Still. Seen. Sin. And notice that the length is a little different, too. Seen. Sin. Long. Short. Okay. Lillian says, I think before pronunciation. And yes, that is not the point, if you still think about the pronunciation before pronouncing it, it means that it's not a habit, yet you know how to do it, but it's not a habit. Okay? It's like you can play the scales and the piano, right? But you have to really look at it carefully. You can't do it in the middle of the night, and your fingers won't know exactly how to. How to find the keys. So it's really the same thing. And the only way that you don't like that, that will allow you to not have to think about it is just the repetition in the practice. But it's important to do it in a fun way so it's not boring, so it's not repetitive. Okay? I cannot easily differentiate between this sound and the schwa sound. Great point. And I also have a caveat here, because these are two different sounds. So let's take the word sit, for example. Sit. And let's say I replace it with a schwa. When I do it like this, slowly, in isolation, can you hear the difference? Sit. Sut. The energy is different, the quality is different. Sit. Okay? So you want to look for that brightness in the sound, and then you know it's that sound. However, the sound when it's unstressed, like in the word believe, okay, There is an. At the beginning, believe could be pronounced as a schwa. So sometimes when the. Is unstressed in a word, in American English, people will pronounce it as a schwa. So could be that what you're hearing is a schwa. You know that there is an sound there, and you're like, it's so confusing. It sounds the same. And maybe because it's actually pronounced as a schwa and not as an sound. So just so you know that this is a possibility. So in American English, the schwa is an allophone of an unstressed sound. Richard is asking a really good question. How do you recognize those sounds when we are in front of new words? So first of all, you're not necessarily supposed to recognize it. If you come across a new word and you can't hear it, I would just go to the dictionary and look it up, okay? But there are some. Some. Some tricks or patterns that the more you go into this pronunciation work, you'll see that there are patterns. For example, if you say a word with three syllables. No, a word with three. Three sounds. Consonant, vowel, and a consonant. And the middle sound is an I, you'll know that it's probably an I and not a Tense E. Because this spelling pattern is usually associated with a relaxed I, kid, sit, thin and or sim. And usually right when there are two vowel letters, it's going to be the tense I and not the lax I. The word been. I've been. There is one of the only words that have two vowel letters but pronounced as an ih sound. So you. You learn to associate certain patterns with vowels. Another example, like if the I is going to be in a primary stress of a long word, then it's probably going to be pronounced as an sound as well. It's just more common. So when you drill lists of words, you also see the common spelling patterns of each sound. And that helps you organize the sounds and the spelling subconsciously, even if you don't have the clear rules in front of you. But I have to say that there is nothing wrong with looking up a word if you're not sure how to pronounce it. I. I still do it to this day if I see a word. Usually I have a strong intuition as to how to pronounce it. But I might double check myself and I'm not always correct. Okay, let's continue with a few more vowel sounds and then I'll answer more questions. What happened to my slides? I want to talk about the tense oo and lax, the cousins, the back cousins of the sheepship vowel pair. So the small U is the tense oo, as in food. A long oo sound. U. Food too. Oo. Can you hear it? Oo. The lax. The second one is a relaxed sound. The mouth drops a bit more, the lips round, and it's somewhere between u. And if you have pure vowels in your language, you get what I'm saying, right? It's not oo, it's not o, and it's not a book. Imagine like you have a hot potato in the back of your mouth. Cook. Look. Foot. OO feels like the sound goes through some this journey inside the mouth. You. You. You too. Blue. Food. Foot. Foot. So now you're probably asking yourself, okay, the word food and the word foot look almost the same. Same spelling. And yes, sometimes you can distinguish between the two. You have to know the vowel sound. But when you're aware that there are these two sounds, you start listening to these words differently and listening to English differently, and you become more aware of those two sounds. Food. Foot. Let's look at a few more examples. Pool. Pull. Tense. Long journey. Pool. Especially because of the dark L. There's like an extra tension there. Pull. Again. Pool. Pull. Fool. Full. Luke. Look. It's not look, but it's look hot potato at the back of your mouth. Imagine like you're coloring it with O. Look suit soot Good. One more thing. You know, we looked at two pairs, and I see one comment here that reminded me of something to tell you if you're. If you're not sure about the pattern I taught you. Now, a long vowel and a short vowel, right? Tense U lacks the lax vowel is the short vowel, usually tense I and lax I. When you see a word and there is a vowel at the end, right? And there is no consonant after, like in the word we or say or happy, you cannot have an open vowel at the end of a word as the final syllable that is also a lax, a relaxed vowel, a lax vowel, a short vowel. So you'll never have the sound at the end of words. You will find the tense oo shampoo you blue do. But the cook look book would always have a consonant to close it. Same thing with the tense e and lax. We see be, but sit, kid, finish. Okay, so that's another rule of thumb that you can use to distinguish between or to identify the sound and connect it to the word. Okay, William, you're asking about loose versus lose. Actually, the vowel is exactly the same here. Loose, lose. What's different? L, O, o S E vs L O, S E is the consonant. Loose has an S. Lose has a Z sound in it. But what's different is the vowels, the vowel letters. Go figure. Okay, exactly. Bad and bad. Okay, so here we have the E as in red, that is actually a little more open than the neutral sound in a lot of other languages versus one of my favorite sounds in English, as in cat. I think it's my favorite sound because it was one of the hardest sounds for me to get when I used to learn it or pronounce it in my early 20s. It would always sound like ah or maybe something closer to an E, right? I would alternate between the two, but I didn't get to that. Nice, bright ah. And then when I did get it, it was a little too nasal, right? And until I found that nice balance that I'm going to teach you right now, which is the ah. Drop your jaw, make sure that there isn't a lot of tension. Again, don't keep tension here. A happy last cat passion bat after casual Canada E bed. A bad E said, yes, I'm responding to you. A sad. I got a question about that. Said S A I D. No I There. It's an s sound versus sad. Let's look At a few more words. And here, this is A. This is pretty clear. The E, as in red, is associated usually with the letter E. You will not see a word spelled with a that represents the E sound alone. I mean, you will see it if it's AI or E. A, but not if the A is alone. It will never be an E sound. Okay, let's read the first. All the words with the sound. Bed. Set. Said. Better. A. Bad. Satisfaction. Sad. Batter. Batter. I mix my batter to make cookies. Batter. Okay, so now let's compare. Bed. Bad. Set. Sat. Said. Sad. Better. Batter. Good. So what's different here is the jaw drop and the position of the tongue. Eh. Ah. Ba. Batter. It's really hard. I'm practicing for long. For so long. Not there. Can you tell me. I can't see your name. Can you tell me what's hard? First of all, which sound and what does it sound like? Does it sound more like an E sound? Are you stuck here, bed? Or does it sound like ah bod? Option 1, E. Your a sound. If the ah sound is a challenge, let me know, okay? And then I'm going to give you a few more tools. But tool. But tools. But when you try to get to the ah sound. Yeah. Okay. So the option. The first option, it depends on you opening your mouth a bit more. Okay? So that's the. The first thing that is blocking you. Because if you're not opening your mouth, but it's not enough to open your mouth, you also have to drop your tongue. Try this, right? Make those funny sounds. Or like a lamb. Do it with me, everyone. Or when something's really funny and you're like, that's funny, that sound. You know, your mouth knows how to make that sound. You just need to associate that sound that comes out when you make those funky sounds and associate it with the words that you're so used to pronouncing a certain way. Ah. Ah. Ah. Ah. And it also means it requires of you to let go. It requires of you to try something that is not comfortable and really let go the muscles of the muscles as well. And make sure that the tongue is low, because if it's high, it's going to sound like an eh. Ah. Happy. Another way to get to the ah sound is to go from E to a. And then. I got it. Sometimes it feels fake. I mean, it always feels fake at the beginning. It always feels fake. You just need to make it your own. Also, you're probably putting in a lot of effort ah. To get there. So make sure that it doesn't go out through your nose. Plug your nose, and if you feel vibrations here, just let go. Try to bring your voice here and bring more softness and easiness. You. You'll find it. Practice it today. Okay, Moving on. So that sound is still there, but now we're shifting from the comparison between E and a to the three A sounds. A Ah. Cap, cup, cop. The first one. Ah. We talked about it. The middle one is like a sharp punch. Your tongue is in the center. It's like a stress. Chwa. Cup, love, fun, honey, cousin, run. Right. Usually words that are spelled with U, O, U, or o, but they're pronounced as. This is the most. The closest sound to a neutral ah sound that exists in a lot of languages. Ah. Right. Like in Spanish and in Russian. And in Russian is closer to the. The. The back one. But eyes is very common in a lot of languages, and it's the closest one to it. And then we have the back open. Ah. Ah. Ah. The tongue is all the way in the back. Low. The tongue is low all the way in the back. Lips are relaxed. Mouth is really open. Ah. Ah. Father. Ah. Ah. Now, this sound, even though I. I paired it in the 3ah sounds, is actually usually spelled with a letter O. A. Coffee. The back one, the one that has the A symbol. Coffee. Honest. Possible in American English only. In British English, this sound is a bit more rounded, and in ipa, you'll see it flipped, reversed. Okay, let's practice some triplets. Ready? Cap, cup. A. Front of the mouth, middle. Ah. Back, cap, cop. Ah. Ah. Cap, cup. Next. Stack, stuck. Stock. Stack, stuck. Stock. Next one. Last. Lust. Lost. I can't hear you. Let's try it again. I can't hear you. Usually when I do it in my classes, I have, like, an entire zoom screen with a lot of people practicing, so at least I can see their mouths, and then I can tell them, okay, you're doing it right. I can't. Okay, just fake, pretend. Just put the words in the comments so I'll feel like you're saying it. If you're actually repeating it. If you're actually saying it after me, then write it in the comments. Hat, hut hot. If you're not saying it with me, then why are you here? You got to say it with me. You can't learn pronunciation through listening, so I want all of you to write it in the comments right now. Hat, hut. Hot. Okay. Yes, I am. Okay. Yes, I am is fine, too. I get it. Hat, hut hot. Good. Ah. Ah. Hat hut hot. Again, from the Beginning, cap, cub, cop, Stack, Stuck. Stock. Okay, now I see everyone commenting. Good. It's always in delay. And then I say something and no one responds. And I'm like, okay, I'm totally alone here. And then I get a flood of comments. Good. You're all repeating with me, Last, last, last. Hat, hut, Hot. Good. It's just like music. You guys don't think of it so much as, like, sounds and consonants and. Oh, my God. It's complicated and it's hard, right? Just think of flipping around sounds in your mouth just like singing Happy birthday, cap, cup, cop. What are sounds frequencies inside your mouth? Sounds. That's what it is. Just like notes that you're singing. Your mouth is capable of making every possible sound that a human mouth can make. Your mouth can make it too. Maybe you never felt how it feels like. Maybe you have opinions about how you pronounce something, but you are capable of doing it. There is nothing holding you back. So sometimes I get people saying, no, my teeth are too far out, so I can't pronounce the th. Or it's like, what? In people who are native speakers who have the th in their language don't have teeth that are, like, crooked or too far forward or tongues that are a little shorter. I get these excuses all the time, oh, no, my tongue is tied. Or my tongue is too short. I can't pronounce the R. Your mouth is capable of pronouncing every single sound a human mouth can produce. You. It's. You find it hard because, A, you don't know what to do with your mouth. B, you already have opinions about how it needs to sound, and maybe you're preventing yourself from actually kind of like trying it out, critical about how it sounds. And C, you just. Maybe you've pronounced it and you think that you haven't. So. So you're not even able to perceive it, but your mouth is capable of making it. Okay, practice, practice and practice. Okay, let me take a look at the chat. I can hear a clear difference. Good. So bad and last kind of similar sound. Please say them one more time. Yes. Bad and last have exactly the same vowel sound in them. Bad. Last. Bad. Last. If I pronounce the A in last as ah, last, last night, then in American English, it might be perceived as lost. L, O, S, T. There is a group of words. Anyone here from England or from Australia, let me know in the chat. There is a group of words that have the A as in cat that in British English are pronounced as ah. For example, last and Laughed in British English in some dialect would be pronounced as lost and loft and dance instead of dance and France instead of France. So there is a group of words that might actually be pronounced as the ah sound that in American English, this ah sound is usually associated with the letter O. Am I confusing you? I gave you a lot of information. This was a little, a little more advanced for the people who are more exposed to British English. We are doing great. Thank you, Wendy. Thank you. Good to see you, Wendy. Long time. Okay. I pronounced last wrong all my life. Don't. Okay. But not. I'm sure you were understood. Okay. I'm sure you were understood. And in England, if you pronounce it as lost, then you just sounded British. That's it. See, we can find. We can find the positive in everything. Okay, before I go stuck in stock. Yeah. Okay. Cup. Spanish speakers, Brazilian Portuguese speakers, you might have a harder time distinguishing between the cup and the cop. Bus. Bus. Stuck. Stock. Right. So the secret here is really the jaw drop and the position of the tongue for the sound. Think of it more like a Spanish don't take it to an cup. Love month. Money, not mony. Money. Country, not country. Because then it's going to sound closer to an ah sound. Okay. And the ah is more open. You bring the quality to the back. Ah. Okay, let's, let's, let's, let's. Same for Greek speakers. Yes, exactly. I forgot to mention Greek, but yes, absolutely. Let's wrap it up and then I'll answer questions today just to remind you what you've learned. It's important you've learned what vowels are because I don't want you to leave today and be like, oh, okay. I learned how to pronounce capcup and cop and forget everything that we talked about at the beginning because that's what usually happens. We talked about what vowels are. Sounds that are not interrupted, unlike consonants that are interrupted or stopped. We talked about the most critical vowel related challenges. We talked about swapping vowels. We talked about dropping vowels, adding vowels, mispronunciation of vowels. We talked about IPA International, the International Phonetic Alphabet, and why we need it or why we don't need it sometimes. And then we talked. We practiced together confusing vowel pairs. Now your daily task is to review the priority chart and choose one vowel sound or vowel pair that's on your medium or high priority list. And I actually have a fun surprise for you. I have a listening task waiting for you on the website. So you can go there. You can. It's linked from your workbook but also you can just go to the challenge website and go to resources and you'll find it there. So you'll be practicing your listening because remember, if you can't hear it, you can't make it. Right? If you can't hear it, you can't make it. So the listening task is going to help you practice your ability to notice the difference and then to help you identify what vowel sounds are more important for you. Now, you guys, this is a seven day pronunciation challenge. I'm not expecting you to actually practice all the sounds that are challenging for you. This takes a lot longer. You need more time. Time is of the essence there. Like, it's really important for you to take the time to practice sounds so they, so they land. Okay? But this pronunciation challenge is designed to give you tools to know what you need to focus on. And then after the challenge, whether you continue with us into new sound or whether you decide to do it on your own, you're going to get tools to do either one. You will start putting it into practice and practicing everything. So don't stress yourself out. You're not supposed to practice all the sounds. Okay. You're just supposed to start hearing it different and start putting things into practice and to know what is critical and important for you. I want you to watch the mindset talk. Today we talked about criticism and other people's opinions and what's stopping you from showing up in English. Potentially. Potentially. And tomorrow, before I go into questions, I just want to tell you that you do not want to miss out on this session and try to attend live. Because in the session I actually answer your questions and we get to practice together. It's a lot more fun. So if you can attend live, make sure you come live. I'm going to be teaching you about pitch, rhythm, intonation, stress, what, distress, what does that even mean? Connected speech, tone of voice, and all of that great stuff in under 60 minutes. So I hope to see you there. Let's take some questions. We have 10 minutes and. And I will grab the document that I did not open ahead of time. So Bethlehem is asking, is Y sometimes a vowel? Absolutely. So the Y often represents either the lax I sound as in the words gin you gave it as an example. And sometimes when it's at the end of a word, when the Y is at the end is always a high E sound. Happy lady candy. And sometimes it's a part of a diphthong like say so why? Technically it function is a consonant, but yes, it could be representing a vowel sound. Luciana is saying, is the stir sound the R in word were considered a vowel. Isn't it a consonant like R? This is a great question. It's an R vowel sound. It's. It's technically a vowel. Okay. Why? Because I can completely drop the R as I would do in other dialects like st. First, this is how it sounds like. And it's called an R colored vowel where the tip of the tongue goes up as I'm pronouncing the vowel and it gives it the color of a vowel. This is what it's called. So the ST is an arc colored vowel. I usually teach it when I teach consonants, because in American English it does feel like there is an R there and the R is represented in the spelling. But technically, that is a very good question. It's an R colored vowel, R. But again, if you treat it like a consonant, it would be easier for you to categorize it in your brain and to perceive it. Same thing with a schwa. A schwa sound, as in the word sofa, is a neutral small vowel sound. But we also have an R colored schwa, like in the word super. Per. Per. Right. I don't say supa super, which is basically a schwa sound with an R. Okay. What is the difference between as in cat and oz and hot? So I think you might have asked it before I. I explained it. But the A is a front vowel. That means that the tongue pushes forward. The back of the tongue is high, ah and ah. The back of the tongue is low and the sound resonates in the back. Okay. C versus C. Homophones, same sound. High E sound. C, C, C. How to hear the difference between cheap and ship? So first of all, look for length. The high E is a little longer. The lax E, it's a little shorter. And also the quality is different. So the E sounds like a. It's a little tensor. You hear vibrations there. It sounds like a Y sound. Y, E. Tensity, friction, vibrations. And the E is a bit more open, relaxed, and closer to an E. So sound as in red. Right? It's closer if you categorize it. You know, if you're. You're thinking of the five neutral vowel sounds. A, E, O, U. It's going to be closer to an E. Okay. Is the sound lacks A. You don't open your mouth. No, lacks I. You don't open your mouth. You open it slightly. For the E, the mouth is more closed. For the. It's a bit more open. Maybe a finger between the top and bottom teeth. How would I say the word luck. Is it the second? No, this is good. This is a good question. If you were to pronounce the word luck with lax, you would get the word look. Luck. Look. These are minimal pairs. They're confusing as well. So let's break it down. Luck. The tongue is in the middle. Don't bring it closer to an o or oo sound. It's like a neutral ah, like the Spanish ah. Ah. Luck. The look. The tongue pulls back closer to an O sound. Lips round a bit. Look, Look. Luck. Lucky. Look. Well, if you know the show, it's like Lucky Luke, but lucky. It's a lucky look. Look. Okay, it's like I'm telling jokes that only I understand. Better versus butter. So let's talk about eh, Better. Eh, Better versus a cup. Butter. But now I'm going to make it even more confusing and I'm going to add the A batter with an a. So better batter. Butter. Bought her. Botter is last name. Right? Or I bought her. I bought her a car. Botter. Four vowels. Listen again. Better. Tell me if I'm too fast. Better. Better. Butter. Botter. I see a question in the chat. Examples for the upside down A. This is an honest vowel. It doesn't exist in American English. Okay? If you take the A that I taught Oz and father. Coffee. Lost. And you flip it around, the symbol flips around mirror, like. Then it's going to be O. Honest, lost. Coffee. Coffee. Relevant for British English, not for American English. In American English, this sound doesn't exist. The as in cup is not soft. What do you mean by soft? Do you pronounce it with a punch? I mean, you don't have to pronounce it with a punch, but it's a. It's a. It's a pungent sound. It's like an U sound. It does fly out of your mouth really quickly. It's short. It's sharp. Cup. Love. Fun. But if you're speaking softly, I love you, then of course you're not gonna throw it out at someone. Love. Right? Of course you can say it softly. Sometimes I think I use that to explain the sound to people or the quality of the sound. But of course, it really depends on how you speak and how you use your voice. Okay. Boss versus bus. Bus. Boss. B. Cup. Cup. Cup. A ba. It's a little longer, more open. You hear the quality of the back sound. Ah, Bus. Bus. Okay. Okay. For hat. I think we need to do flat more than for hut. Okay. Kim, I don't know what flat means, so I'll try to just to explain. For hat again, it's the A. You want to pull the lips to the sides of it. Ha. In the word hut, as in Pizza Hut hut, the lips don't move. Really? That's the cup sound. Cup, love, hut. Hat, open. Very American. Right? Very open. American. You use your jaw. Ah. Versus more contained. Okay. Said versus sad. Angel. Said, sad. Bed, bad. That's the A versus A that we practiced. Said, sad, bed, bad. The L in last is light or dark. It's light. The rule is, when the L is before a vowel, especially the beginning of words, then it's going to be a light L. The. The dark L is only at the end or before consonant. How to pronounce later versus letter. Oh, this is good. This is the E versus A. Okay. We haven't talked about it. E as in red bed. Said versus A. That's a diphthong, as in, say, way, day. A diphthong is a changing vowel. And we want to get to the second sound. Day. Way. So what was the question? Said. No, what was it? Letter. And later. Okay. Because I had all these pairs running around my head like sell versus sale. Right. Letter versus later. If you don't pronounce the second part of the word of the diphthong a later, it's going to sound like letter, letter, later, letter, later. Say said. Not a good example. Sell, fail, Bet, bait. Okay, good. We have another triplet here. Bet, bat. And. But. So if you look at the vowel chart, you'll see how it's organized in the mouth. So the E is a front sound, the A is a bit lower, and the is in the middle. It's like right there in the middle. Okay. How long did it take it to speak this English? So good English. So. Thank you. I. It's hard for me to look back and say exactly how long it took me, but I can tell you that, first of all, when I moved to the US I had a full year of working there in English, which obviously helped my confidence and my fluency. And then I spent an entire year. I had a year in between. I moved back to my home country, and then I went back to New York to study acting. And then that first year is when I studied speech and pronunciation. And that is the year where I made the biggest difference in my speech. And I learned all those sounds and all those beautiful things that I'm teaching you here and inside my programs and more. So I think that it. So I was like, gradually developing, and between the first year and second year of school. I spent the summer really drilling down on the sound and practicing really well. Because during the year, I didn't have a lot of time because I was doing all these other things. You know, I was. All the scenes that I had to memorize and I had to do, you know, like, all these different classes, and I had to work every night, so I didn't have time to invest into my speech lessons. So the. I took the summer to really develop that, and it was, like, a matter of two months where I reached a real breakthrough in terms of how I use my sounds. And I remember, like, going back in the second year, like, like. And, you know, and these are people whom I haven't seen in two months, and they were listening to me. It was like, oh, my God, Your. Your. Your accent has really, really improved. Because they knew that I was working on my accent, and I took private classes during the summer, so I was exposed to it. And I did a lot of work during the year, but the two very intense months that I've developed and. And. And put in a lot of work, I think they have made the most sen. Significant impact. But I can, like, I cannot isolate it. It wasn't just that. It was everything prior to that as well. Okay, One last word. There are a lot of questions here, and all of them are really good, you guys, What to do with close people who want to help me with my accent, but are always correct me. Okay. Jessica, do you mean that they correct you even though that you don't ask for it? Okay, I'll tell you this. When people who are close to you give you feedback on your accent in your pronunciation, and they're not trained to do so, it could probably do more harm than good. And you need to set boundaries, especially if you feel that it's not helping you. Now, there are exceptions. For some people, it would be great. But I believe that when you give feedback on someone's pronunciation or speech, it's not enough to say, oh, this is how you say it, because it doesn't register. You hear it once, and then you will go back to pronouncing the same way that you always have, usually. Because to change a habit, it has to be more than just you hearing it correctly, because obviously you hear that. Let's say you mispronounce the word inventor and you say inventor. Okay? And it's not like you don't hear it around you. There is something here that prevents you from. From saying it in the correct way or the way that you've. You're Exposed to maybe something about how you organize the sounds, maybe a habit that you've gotten used to pronouncing when you were younger and it just stuck. Maybe it's how you perceive spelling and sounds. So there is a deeper reason why you're not pronouncing something correctly. And just hearing the correct form is not always helpful. All I'm not saying that it's not helpful. If you're in the mindset of learning, you're likely to learn. But if you're in the. In a state where you're just trying to express yourself and you're focused on delivering a message and not on your pronunciation, and all of a sudden you get feedback on your pronunciation and you're not in this learning mode, you're not going to. It's. You're less likely to remember it. So such feedback is not that effective anyway. On top of that, when I give feedback, I don't just say, here's the correct form. I explain why they make that mistake. I say inventor. You're saying it with an o because you see the O and you think there is an o sound. But English is not a phonetic language. And usually when there is, or at the end it's a schwa r, you reduce it, especially if it comes after a primary stress. Inventor. Because English doesn't like a lot of stressed sounds. And then we practice creator, inventor. And then you start understanding it and building a new habit, and then maybe you will practice it a little bit and then you can change. And when you change a certain pattern, you don't have to practice every single word. In American English, when you change a certain pattern, it starts affecting this pattern in other words as well, because it all makes sense. Your brain is looking for logic all the time. And when you create logic by understanding something, your brain is such an incredible machine, it will put things into place really quickly, but you have to be in the learning mode. And lastly, when you get feedback, when you're trying to communicate and you might already have some issues with how you perceive yourself and your pronunciation, you use that as validation for how. But your English is not yet good enough. So what it does is not only that you're not learning it also defeating and depleting, and you're like, crap again, what did I say wrong? Getting feedback is something that you need to want and to ask for it. And if you don't, and I don't know if that's the case, but I know it is the case for a lot of people. If you have to communicate that this is not helpful, or to tell, wait, don't fix me when I'm speaking, at the end, you can tell me. So I'll be in a receptive mode and not a defensive mode. So how you get feedback is really important. But I also recommend that if you want to work on your pronunciation, it's best to work with someone who you don't have emotional connection to, because sometimes there is more that comes into this feedback or how you receive feedback when it's someone that you love, your spouse, your parent, your child. So sometimes you might want to go to a professional or learn how to do it yourself. I teach my students how to give themselves feedback so that they know themselves what they need to work on. So they are not always dependent on someone giving them feedback. So if you're not comfortable with feedback but you think, oh, but it's important, know that first of all, it's probably not that effective. And second, the most important thing is that you feel comfortable. What comes next is how other people feel or even your pronunciation. You feeling comfortable, you feeling confident, you feeling free and expressive is more important than the correct pronunciation. Always. Okay. And now she'd be like, no, that's not really what I meant. I meant that I want them to give me feedback, and they don't. They're not willing to. And if that's the case, then direct the people around you on how it's best for you to get feedback. Be honest with yourself. When you get good feedback, it's not supposed to bring you down. Okay? This is how you know if it's good feedback or bad feedback. When you get feedback in the correct way, in the right time, you will be receptive. You will gain clarity. You will be excited about doing the work. If you feel resistance, if you feel like you want to curl in and you back up and you feel defensive, it's probably bad feedback. The person giving the feedback is not bad. They're great. Their intention are. Intentions are good. But you need to declare or to know for yourself when it's good for you to get feedback and when it's not. Your English is not. Or your sounds are not the property of everyone. It's your own. So you decide what to do with it and how people can use it. Okay? All right. My dear, dear friends, we are out of time. It was beautiful as always to talk to you. Today I started with a little less energy. Today it's been a long day, but today I feel so energized. I feel like I want to go jogging outside thank you so much. Tomorrow is prosody day. Make sure to show up live. And if not, make sure to watch the replay. It's going to be a lot of fun. I love you all. Take care, my friends. Do the listening task and I'll talk to you tomorrow. Bye, my friends.