Accent Training Podcast

#081 Complete Vowel Sounds with Y Glides (Part 1)

November 08, 2021 Season 4 Episode 81
Accent Training Podcast
#081 Complete Vowel Sounds with Y Glides (Part 1)
Show Notes Transcript

In order to take control of your spoken English using an American accent, it's essential to understand what makes vowels sound the way they do. What do Americans do differently from yourself, and what can you do to harness these subtleties in your own speech?
Y glides are a major key to vowel sounds, and today we dive into a number of examples that you can get started using in your daily life, right away!

Keep an ear out for these idiomatic expressions when listening to really get the hang of this

  • Play along Pretending to cooperate / reinforcing a lie
    If they ask anything, just play along with what I say.

  • On thin ice Someone is losing patience
    He's on thin ice, he had better not mess up again. 

  • Make a killing Make a lot of money
    After making a killing on stocks, he bought a house.


Check out my instagram @en.outloud for more tips!


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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the English out loud podcast, a podcast where I give you tips on how you can enhance your spoken English. My name is pat I'm from Toronto, Canada, living in Mexico at the moment. And, uh, well, I've, I've taken a break for a couple of months. It's been a rough couple of months. I got sick. Some other family members got sick and, and it's been tough. But, uh, of course, of course I have many people, many listeners and students here who want more, you know, people who, who want to keep boosting their spoken English. And today folks, I've got some hard hitting information for you that will help you boost your use of spoken English. Particularly of course, the American accent. You see something that I like to apply to my own life is what we call the 80 20 principle, the 80 20 principle. Now I'm sure many people listening have heard this. It also goes by the name of the Pareto principle and others listening may have never heard of this. And that's all right, too. Here's what the 80 20 principle states, it states that 80% of what we achieve is done with 20% of our effort. That means 80% of the effort that we put into something only achieves this 20% of the results. This is something which I suggest looking into because it applies to all aspects of human nature and human life. Sociologically it's even studied as an aspect of human nature. And this is an interesting one because if we apply it to our learning, well, then we can learn a lot faster as well. Can't we, and for myself as a teacher, this is a method that I like to apply to my learning. And so for today, we're going to look at the 20% of work that you can do to see an 80% improvement. This is per vowel sounds. This particular topic of today's all about vowel sounds, tense, vowels, or long vowels. They're also called, do you ever wonder what the difference between your vowels and those of American speakers is? Do you ever notice how it seems like Americans maybe stretch their vowels out a little bit more, but not quite in the same way? The letters like ay, ay. Interesting sounds. Ay. Ay, ay, ay, ay, ay. I'm not just saying I neither am I just saying a, a lot of people will mix those up. These are tens vowels, tens vowels are vowels that use two movements to make them. We also call them diphthongs diphthongs. Like I along eyes sound I or a a along any sound. A now these sounds are a little tricky to get the hang of, but once you see what they have in common, there's a lot. It makes sense. Now, before we get into that, I've got to tell you folks about something video course, content is coming out because that is another thing I've been working on. That's something I've been dedicating myself to, uh, over the last couple of months that I've taken a little break. I have been putting together for you a course on the T stress T stress that is coming out very soon. And I'm talking I'm in the recording stage now. So all I've got to do is record edit. And honestly, I think it will be ready to go pretty soon. So folks that is coming and if you've got any interest in that, send me a message on Instagram where you can find me at E N dot out loud. And I'll give you a little information about this upcoming T stress course. Of course, I'll be posting a lot of information on there as well. And that also goes to say, give me a follow on Instagram. You know, you want to get these kinds of tips in my Instagram. I like to regularly post tips and post things that you know, help you boost your spoken English throughout the day. So check me out on Instagram, Ian dot out loud. You can find a ton of great stuff on there, which, Hey, if English isn't your first language, even if you've been speaking it for years, I bet you I've got a few tips on there that can help you take it to another level. And beyond that, while you give me a follow on Instagram, make sure that you hit subscribe or follow or whatever it says on the podcasting app that you're listening to this on. Because if you like the kinds of tips that I'm giving out here, you want to make sure that you're updated. Whenever new information is coming out and rest assured a lot of new information is coming out in the days to come. My friend, so hit follow, hit, subscribe, and take control of your spoken English. Now let's see a major step on taking control of your spoken English. Why glides and tense, vowels, why glides intense vows. You see a glide glide literally means to move with one smooth unbroken motion tense. Vowels are diphthongs and diphthongs are vowel sounds that use two positions in one single syllable, one single part or unit of sound. We call these two positions. The pure vowel and the glide glides are extra unwritten sounds use to distinguish tense vowels. Like when I say I or a, those are tense vowels. Remember they're using two positions I a and this distinguishes tense, vowels and links them to surrounding words. Glides will sound like a Y or a w depending on the vowel sound used. We're going to look at, like I said, the why, why glides today? The difficulty here is that many people don't use glides because they don't know that they exist in Spanish. Glides don't exist in I'm sure many other languages as well, glides do not exist. Many of my students who speak Mandarin and Japanese or Korean all feel that why glides truly helps them to open their eyes to the American accent because you see leaving glides out of your speech may make it sound a little choppy and incomplete to American listeners. Like I said, American listeners are listening for these vowel sounds to be fully pronounced. Here's where, why glides come into play? So why glides are used with four different sounds in spoken English? We've got a, I E an oil. These are all diphthongs and diphthongs. They're all made with two parts. Like I said, two parts sounds the pure vowel and the glide. Now for today, we're only going to look at the eye and a, just to break this down so you can focus on one step at a time. So repeat back to me now, first, this sound, ah, ah, and now how about another here? Eh, eh, that's that pure vowel? Ah, just one motion. Now, the second, the glide quick and fading. Ye Y sound. That's why we call it a wide glide. Ye. Now when that wide glide comes right after a pure vowel, we get the sound. I, I real slow motion. It's like, uh, I, but quickly I, I, I hope so. And then let's do that again to make a, we take the air. We add a ye a, Hey, I ate it. I ate, I ate it. Let's get the hang of this with a handful of words here, just with his eye and a sound like I said, I don't want to confuse you folks. I just want to see that you see some steady improvement. First off let's practice this wide glide in some common words. Could you repeat back to me a bull, a bull I'm able to help. I'm able to help another one here. Same, say the same thing, this same thing. So notice both of those words, stretching out that a long a sound. Just after that. We've got day. This is a very common ending. Is it not a why? Day, middle of the day. Let's see that 10 sign. Now. Now we've seen some of those. Let's see that tens. I have. I con I con click the icon, click the icon. Another good one here. Fly that won't fly. That won't fly. Here's another one. I notice a lot of people mix this one up sign S I G N people pronounced sign as if the G is strong. It's a silent G sign sign above the line, the eye and sign. Same as the eye in line. Sign above the line. You hear those pretty good ones. Pretty good. Now let's see just a couple of quick phrases, some common phrases. So you can start to use this in your daily life. Take it away and notice the flap T in there, the T in the word, it becomes a D take it away in a state of shock in a state of shock. Why won't you? Why won't you every time, every time, notice that every time, every time. And how about a couple of quick little phrases? Repeat these back to me. Be polite and clean. Your space is a good one. Be polite and clean your space. Say what you said to me the other day and noticed, by the way, with the word said, I'm not saying Sade with S a I D. It is spelled as though it should be Sade, but we actually say said, say what you said to me the other day. This drive may take a while this drive may take a while. That's real slow motion, slow motion is okay. While you're practicing folks, this helps your muscles adjust. This drive may take a while. Okay? So, so far so good. We've seen a handful of sentences where we've gotten a little practice and I truly hope I've opened your ears to this, this fact of spoken English. Cause this is very consistent in spoken English. Let's see. Now just a handful of why glides in some idiomatic expressions. See what we've got the first one here. Repeat back to me. It just pretend like I'm listening. Pretend like this is a free class that you're taking right now. And repeat back to me, play along, play along, just play along with what I say. That means. Pretend to cooperate or reinforce a lie. If you play along then, you're kind of joining in on a lie. That's a blunt way to put it, but that's what we say. Play along another one here on thin ice. I on thin ice. What does that mean? If someone says, Hey buddy, you're on thin ice. He's on thin ice. He'd better not make another mistake. He's on thin ice. That means that somebody's losing their patience with you. They're losing their patients. Folks. They say, Hey, you're on thin ice. This means you and I have a problem. I'm I'm losing my patience. You're on thin ice and notice pay patients. It's got another, a in that patients. Keep your ears open. Keep your ears open my friends. And here's one more. Here's one more. My previous episode about money, idiomatic expressions, episode, number 80, all about money expressions. So here's an expression for you, which is commonly used with money. Make a killing, may make a killing. If you say we made a killing, made a killing, it means that you made a lot of money. It can also just mean that something is very successful. Like I could actually say that money episode made a killing for my podcast. That episode did exceedingly well. I'm glad to hear you folks want to know all about money. That's good news. And if you say you made a killing, you know, you could say, after I made a killing in the stock market about a new house, you made a killing, you bought some Bitcoin, you bought some Ethereum, you made a killing, you bought a house and congratulations. If that's you congratulations. And if not, well, look into investing folks, look into safe, investing, not this gambling. You don't want to do gambling. Look at some strategies on how you can do it safely, or, you know, see a bank advisor. But the fact is, you know, you want to be smart with your money. Do you not? You want to be smart with your money. You let your money work for you. That's what they say. Is it not let your money work for you? That's another good. Is that an idiom? I don't know if it's an ADM or what you can say. Hey, I bought some bank stocks instead of just leaving my money in the bank. I bought stocks of a bank and now I'm making money every quarter, every three months, you're getting some dividends. If you make your money work for you. All right. Anyway, that's all I've got for today. Folks, like I said, we're not going to do this full wide glide business today. That is coming. That will come. This is part one of a two part series of why glides and you've heard episode number one. So I'm happy for that. And thank you by the way, for checking out, episode number 81, I've been working arduously arduously look it up. It means working very hard, strenuous effort. I have been working. Arduously on getting some new material together for you so that you, as somebody who's looking to take full control of their spoken English can take it a step further with some accent reduction classes. Now one-on-one classes are one thing which I do offer. I do offer indeed$16 American and 25 cents for each 25 minute session. And I'm happy to show up weekly folks. You do it from your house. I'll do it from mine. Messaged me on Instagram. If you're interested in one-on-one classes, however, this video course is going to come out and it's going to knock your socks off. It's going to be a similar style to my one-on-one classes. And you might even say it has some advantages over one-on-one classes. Considering you'll be able to review the video as many times as you like, and you'll have your lessons all cut up and ready to go for you to learn from. So if you're interested in that, send me a message on Instagram. I'm happy to give you a little information about the T stress and the American accent, and, uh, set you up with a video course. That's going to blow your mind. It's going to blow your mind. Thank you for listening on in today. Folks. I hope that you learned some valuable information. I'm certain that you did, and I'm proud to have been an active member in you learning this valuable information, have a wonderful day, enjoy your breakfast, your lunch, your dinner, enjoy your food. Enjoy your food. These days I'm eating healthier. I'm eating a little healthier. I'm back on the cucumber water. I took a break from cucumber water for awhile, have spoken about that in a past episode, once or twice cucumber water, which is great stuff. By the way, cucumber water helps you lose weight. It lowers your blood sugar and diabetes is getting high all around the world these days. So we've got to control our blood sugar. We're human beings folks, and we're filling our bodies with all this toxic candy and grease and delicious sludge this and that just syrup on ice. And we just slurp it up through a straw to wash down our greasy hamburgers. But God it's good. It is delicious. Is it not? I love greasy hamburgers. In fact, I miss McDonald's in Canada because there you can get poutine alongside your burger. You can change your fries for a poutine and poutine. I don't know if I've spoken about it much in the past, but poutine is a delectable Canadian dish of French fries with some cheese curds, which if you don't know what cheese curds are, just look them up. You'll find you'll find them or just look up poutine. You got French fries, you put cheese curds on top, like these little, you know, kind of, uh, blocks of cheese, teeny little spongy cheese kind of fat cheese pieces. And then you pour gravy. On top of that, I have a great recipe for poutine that I used to cook here in Monterey and I used to sell around Monterey and I had a lot of fun doing that. It's just, you know, if I teach online, oh, I don't have to buy a food truck. You know, I could, I just needed to buy a microphone to do this microphone set up my sound system by some things to muffle the sound around the room and ready to go. Whereas if I wanted to keep selling poutine, which I loved it, I was like, okay, number one, I'm contributing to Mexico's diabetes rate. This isn't good. This isn't good. I love cooking. And I love cooking poutine and I love serving it to people. Maybe if I hung out outside of McDonald's around here, I'll just, you know, set up a little stand outside of McDonald's selling poutine. And I'll say, Hey, if you wanted that, I'm trying to petition for McDonald's to start selling poutines here in Mexico, because it's delicious and everybody's going to love it. And I've got a great cheese. It's a Mexican cheese and it's not quite cheese curds, but it's pretty close, pretty close. And so I use that and I can easily make a killing outside of McDonald's financially. Anyway, anyway, I'm not going to do that though. I'll just keep making. If I do that, it's going to take time away from the podcast. Take time away from making videos. And, uh, and you folks are going to get bored waiting. You're going to get bored waiting. So I got to say welcome back to the English out loud podcast. Also, I'm going to be doing a little bit of rebranding in the days to come. Rebranding is most certainly going to be happening. Uh, changing the name, changing the name, pretty much changing the name, changing the name, maybe changing some styles of some things. Maybe I'll get a new song or something. I can use a new song, new intro, play around with that kind of stuff. And, uh, keep you folks interested with a little bit of change. Good change. Good change. I'm here to educate folks. I'm here to educate and good change. Uh, it helps us both. Anyway, I was about to wrap it up. I was already on the food thing. Enjoy your food and have a good one.