SESSION 2: VOICING, S and Z
Session 15. Reading Passages by jeffreythai
Introduction
Welcome!
Congratulations! You
are about to embark on a very exciting program.
Learning to speak English clearly, with proper pronunciation is the
single most important skill you must have to communicate effectively in today’s
world market. The Pronunciation Workshop Video Training Program will enhance
your English speaking abilities and vocal skills, improve your self-confidence
and will greatly increase your chances for success. This course is based on
years of linguistic research and has produced dramatic results for thousands of
individuals around the globe. It is designed to help you sound “more American”
for oral presentations, interviews, teaching, business situations, telephone
conversations and general daily communication.
When a person learns English as a Second Language, they are
speaking English “filtered” through their first language. They are using their native language’s
“speech rules” of pronunciation (and often grammar) on their new language… They
are not aware of the American set of “speech rules”. This is basically what the Pronunciation
Workshop program teaches you… “The
Speech Rules of American English”. There are many schools and classes which
teach English all around the world; however, very few of them address the “speech
rules” that you will learn in this course.
This is because many of the teachers who are providing English training,
do not know of these “speech rules”.
Many of them are even making errors themselves and teaching them to
you! We hear this daily from our
clients. When you were a child and learned your first language, you constructed
a mental inventory of your native language’s speech sounds. Those sounds became a part of your speech
repertoire. Unfortunately, you are now
inserting these speech sounds into your English. Today, when you speak English, you reach into
that inventory and come out with many substitute sounds, something that is
close, but nonetheless incorrect.
These repeated errors in conversation often cause you to be
misunderstood. Some people call what we
do “Foreign Accent Reduction”…this is not quite accurate, for you are not
reducing your foreign accent...you are actually gaining an American Accent - -
you are adding new sounds and new “speech rules” to your speech inventory. While
you progress through this program, you will be learning things you were never
aware of before. You most likely will
find yourself saying, “Wow! I never knew
that!” Changing your old speech habits
takes time. At first you may possibly be
apprehensive using the learned techniques.
However, eventually you will relax and the words and sounds will flow
smoothly and clearly on their own. Once
you complete each session, it should not be your objective to start speaking
differently right away. Your focus
should be on listening to the sounds of your speech and the speech of those
around you. For example, when you say
“Tank you” instead of “Thank you”, your focus should not be on saying it
correctly…but rather, “Oops – I just said that word wrong…I should have used a
TH sound”. It is this AWARENESS that
will eventually lead you to the improved pronunciation skills you are striving
for. Each video training session has its own accompanying chapter in this
manual with practice material. You will
notice during the video classes that I often speak slowly and exaggerate
certain target sounds. I do this
purposely so that you can ‘hear’ and understand what I am teaching you. I recommend that you try practicing the
material a little everyday using the learned techniques.
Practice speaking VERY SLOWLY, out loud, in a strong voice
and exaggerate the mouth movements. You
will be retraining the muscles of your mouth and tongue to move in new and
different ways while mastering your new pronunciation patterns. Theoretically, once you understand the
concepts and have retrained yourself, eventually these new speech patterns will
progress into your own spontaneous conversational rapid speech. To receive
maximum benefits, we recommend that you take our course over a period of two to
three months, focusing on one session per week.
Try to practice daily with the videos.
The program you are about to begin was created to help people “sound
American” for the purposes of teaching, interviewing, lecturing, business and
general daily communication. Although America
has many regional pronunciation differences, the accent you will learn is that
of standard American English as spoken and understood by the majority of
educated native speakers. Changing your
old speech habits takes time. At first,
the information presented on the videos may seem unusual, but eventually, you
will see that these techniques will transform your speech, providing you with
clearer, more intelligible English speaking abilities.
Good Luck and have fun!
I hope you enjoy this program as much as I enjoy teaching it!
Paul S. Gruber MS, CCC-SLP
Speech Language Pathologist
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