How confident do you feel about your English pronunciation? If the answer is ‘not as confident as I would like’ or ‘sometimes I’m not sure how to say…’, then you’re not alone. Researchers have found that pronunciation errors account for around two-thirds of miscommunication in English. Getting it right is not easy, but we’re here to help!
My name is Jenny Dance, and I’ve been teaching English and preparing students for exams for over 20 years – in the UK, France and Portugal. Before that, I worked in international banking, where I saw first-hand how important clear English communication is. My passion in teaching is to help learners improve their speaking, listening and confidence using English.
How do our English pronunciation sessions work?
In our monthly English pronunciation live sessions, we help you work on your speaking and listening and show you free activities and resources you can use to improve your pronunciation. We focus on the core aspects of speaking English clearly – not with a particular accent, but to make yourself understood in many different situations (International Intelligibility).
We explain the sounds you need to make to say words clearly, and how to make them. We’ll help you to be understood more easily when you’re speaking English, and to understand others, too.
How do you say…?
We start each English pronunciation session by asking you for words you’ve been practising or find difficult to pronounce. If you’re watching us in a quiet space, we encourage you to copy what we’re saying, and practice with us!
After that, we look at 2 or 3 learner questions in more detail. We explain:
- The sounds in each word, looking at the International Phonetic Alphabet as a reference
- How many syllables a word has, and where the stressed syllables are
- How you physically make the sounds – where should your tongue, lips and teeth be positioned
- Other examples with similar sounds, or contrasting sounds
- How you use the word in context
As we guide you through English pronunciation learning and practice, we like to keep it fun by telling jokes, playing word games and using props to explain different points.
And we give you lots of opportunities to join in, asking questions like:
- How many syllables does this word have?
Where’s the stress?- Do these words rhyme?
- Are these words pronounced the same, or differently?
- What’s the noun/adjective/verb form of this word?
We’re happy to answer your questions about pronunciation, speaking, fluency, listening, preparing for speaking exams…so why not come and join us in our next session?
Upcoming sessions
Want to join our upcoming sessions or watch our previous pronunciation lives? Click the buttons below.
Jenny Dance is an English teacher and exam trainer with more than 20 years of experience. She has a passion for pronunciation learning and is also the Founder of Phona, publishers of the Say It: English Pronunciation app. Jenny regularly presents Pronunciation Live sessions on Facebook and Instagram with the Learning English with Oxford team. Follow Learning English with Oxford to hear about the next live event, or check out our bank of pronunciation resources for more English pronunciation tips.
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