A short instructional YouTube video by Hadar Shemesh (Accents Way) teaching how to self-practice accent/pronunciation using only smartphone features. It emphasizes two low-cost feedback methods: (1) use any voice-to-text/dictation feature to detect misrecognized words (revealing mispronunciations), and (2) record yourself (Voice Memos) and compare your speech to native/target models to identify unclear sounds. The video gives practical exercises (minimal pairs like leave/live and sheep/ship, full-sentence rehearsal, imitation of TED talks, and practice sheets) and stresses focused repetition to build muscle memory. A free download with additional tips is offered on the presenter’s website.
Chapters
Hey, it's Hadar. And this is the Accents way. Today I'm going to talk to you about how to practice your accent on your own using nothing but your phone. And no, I'm not talking about a specific application. I'm talking about features that exist in everyone's smartphone. So here's the thing. Maybe you've been practicing your accent for a while, watching videos, reading books, practicing audio on your computer. But you might be practicing the same sound over and over, but not knowing whether you're doing it right or not. You don't have someone to give you feedback to tell you you're doing the right thing. Or here, you need to open your mouth a little more. Now, dialect coaches are expensive and sometimes hard to come by. So here are two things you can do, starting from right now to help you give yourself feedback. So let's begin before I teach you how to give yourself feedback. First, let's talk about what you need to practice when you're learning a new sound. The only way to improve is by repetition, is by repeating the same old words over and over again. Now let's say you're not saying it correctly, then you're practicing the mistake. You're saying you're making the same mistake over and over and sometimes it's really hard to hear it or we don't know what to look for. And again, if we don't have someone to tell us what to do, that can get difficult to impossible. So to practice similar words, what you could do is to use any voice to text app on your phone. I'm going to be using notes on my iPhone, but of course you can use whatever you have. And if you have a smartphone, I'm sure that you can find it. So what I'm going to do, let's say I want to. I'm having difficulties with saying leave versus live. Let's say I say both of them live, right? Which is kind of like the middle sound between the tense e and the relaxed I. So I'm going to take my phone and record myself saying the word leave. Now, now I'm going to say it with an accent, so I'm not going to pronounce it correctly. Live. Now, since I'm trying to say leave and it recognized it as live, I know that I'm mispronouncing it. So now I'm going to watch my video on how to pronounce sheep versus ship and learn what I need to do in order to pronounce the e sound. And I'll put more Focus on that. For example, I'll pull my lips to the sides or push my tongue more forward. And then I'm going to try it again. Leave. This time I got it right. And it's not just for comparing difficult words or comparing similar sounds. It's also great to say full sentences. So, for example, you can just speak out your thoughts or practice a conversation that you're going to have. And then detect the words that are different than what you were saying. These are the words that were mispronounced. Then knowing that these words are not clear, try to figure out why. See if it is. Maybe there is an R there and the R wasn't clear. Maybe the vowel there was not specific. Okay, but this would help you to know what to focus on, which is the most important thing. Because you can't just practice everything that's out there. You want to practice only those things that are very specific for you. And the voice to text would really help you discover what those are. If you don't have anyone around you to tell you that, the next thing you can do is just use Voice Memo. Yes, Record yourself. And you're probably saying to yourself, oh, I hate listening to my voice. I don't want to record myself. I don't want to hear myself. But hey, here's the thing. If you want to improve, you got to know what you're doing wrong in order to improve it. And let me tell you this. We always sound differently in our heads than we actually sound in real life, okay? And the only way to discover that is by recording yourself and listening to it. And there are two ways to go about it. One is just record yourself and try to detect the sounds that are less clear. Try to pay close attention to what you're saying. And if you have a strong grasp of English, you'd feel that a certain word just doesn't sound right. Just doesn't sound the way it sounds in your head, the way you know it should be pronounced. And then focus just on that word. Or focus on a few words and see if there is a common denominator. Maybe all of them have an R. Maybe all of them end with an L. Maybe all of them have one specific vowel. Maybe they're all different. But you want to really explore what is the one thing that makes this word not clear or sound different. And then search for the materials online. You know, there is plenty of those. So record yourself and listen to it. Another way to practice is practice while you're imitating someone. So let's say you can Take a TED Talk and play the first line, pause it, record yourself imitating it. Okay? And then listen to both the original and the recording and try to detect the differences. When you detect a word that is pronounced differently because you have, you know the two options to compare from, then you'll know what is the word that you're saying unclearly and what you need to focus on. Okay. You can also practice practice sheets like the one I give out in some of my videos. For example, the O is in go, so there is a list of words. You can repeat the words while recording me and yourself and then see if the pronunciation is the same. If it is, kudos for you, you're doing great. And keep on practicing it just to develop muscle memory. If it feels different, then record yourself over and over and say it over and over. Change something small, small every time until you feel that it's coming closer and the pronunciation is the same. So to summarize, in order to give yourself accurate feedback when you're practicing pronunciation, you can do two things. The first thing is use any voice to text feature and then record yourself and look at the script and then see if it matches what you said. And if not, focus on the words that are different or the sounds that are different. Or you can record yourself and listen to it and see if it's different than the way it sounds in your head or the way other people say it. And when you discover the one sound that you're saying differently or that you need to practice, practice it over and over again until you develop muscle memory. And then that's the only way to improve. I actually have two more tips for you on how to practice on your own on top of these two. So if you want a reminder of what I was talking about and get the two new tips, go to my website and download the freebie for this episode. And practice. And practice. And practice. Because practice makes perfect. Okay, that's it.
