Why good pronunciation is important

Learning how to pronounce English like a native speaker is difficult but not impossible. The better your pronunciation is, the better people will understand you and the easier you will find to understand them.

Tuning your ears and practising listening comprehension

It is extremely useful to spend some time tuning your ears to English sounds and rhythms. You can do this by listening to the language as much as possible via the radio, TV, movies and native speakers in your neighbourhood. There are  English online radio stations for various English accents, such as: http://www.abc.net.au/radio/ (Australia), http://www.cbc.ca/programguide/radio/ (Canada), http://www.rte.ie/radio/ (Ireland), http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/ (UK), http://www.voanews.com (USA), http://www.voiceamerica.com (USA)

When you first try listening to these stations, you probably won't understand everything, but don't feel discouraged because understanding every single word is not the point. If you continue to listen to English as much as possible, you will gradually become familiar with the the sounds and rhythms of the language and start to be able to pick out words and phrases. Eventually, if listening to online radio stations becomes a sort of habit,  you'll be able to understand most if not all of what you hear in English.

There are a number of things you try to help you understand radio and TV broadcasts:

• Rather than just listening or watching at random, find out what programmes are on and choose one that sounds interesting. In this way you will have an idea of what the programme is about.
• Set yourself goals, for example when listening to the news try to work out the main points, names, dates and times.
• Brush up relevant vocabulary before tuning in. For example if you're planning to watch a cooking programme, revise food words first
• Even if you can't understand very much at all, try to identify word and sentence boundaries
• If possible listen to the news in your native language first, then when you listen to it in English you'll already be aware of the mains stories.
• Don't try to listen to or watch too much in one go: if you're finding it a struggle, take a break and/or do something else.

Listening to songs in English is another way to improve your listening comprehension, especially if you have the lyrics written out so that you can follow them as you listen. A whole bunch of lyrics from various artists is available at: www.lyrics.com . Try singing along too. It's a fun way to work on the pronunciation and rhythm. You could also try learning to recite poems and stories. Listening to songs in English is an enjoyable way to improve your overall listening comprehension, as well as pronunciation.

Learning pronunciation

With your ears tuned to the sounds and rhythms of English, you'll find learning how to pronounce the language less difficult.

It is very helpful that your language course includes a native speaker. Ask them to speak slowly and to enunciate each word clearly. Then try to mimic them. Pay attention to the shapes their lips make, and also to their posture and any gestures they make.

Having all this in mind, learning English pronunciation is not a far cry. It’s important to listen to native speakers as much as possible (radio and TV broadcasts, songs, instructors etc), and mimic the sounds you hear. However, don’t do it only once a month – try doing it as often you can. Viewed in this light, the immortal saying: “Language learning is over-learning; anything less is of no use!” really makes a lot of sense.