Hey, it's Hadar and this is the Accent's Way and today we're going to talk about the 10 pronunciation mistakes
Spanish speakers make.
These pronunciation mistakes happen because of patterns or sounds that exist
in English, but don't exist in Spanish.
And sometimes we know it, but we don't know what we need to do in order to change it, and sometimes we don't
even recognize that we are making these substitutions or making these mistakes.
So this video is here to help you, first of all, understand what are the common mistakes.
And I'm also going to give you tools to overcome these challenges and improve your pronunciation.
Sounds are dropped at the end of words. For example, instead of saying
'text'
You may say
'tex'
Instead of saying
'mind'
You may say
'mine'
In Spanish, there are no words that end with more than one consonant.
Where there is a sequence of a few consonants, like in
'texts'
or
'worked'
or
'mind'
Right, where you have a consonant sound and then another consonant sound right after.
So people, without even noticing, they may drop the last consonant, because it's very difficult to pronounce.
If you concentrate you may pronounce it well, but then when you go into conversation
you may drop those end sounds, because that's how it is in Spanish and we always want to go back
to the comfortable place, right? Go back to old habits the way we pronounce it in our native tongue.
So this is how you should practice it.
First of all make a list of words that have two, three, and even four consonants at the end.
And then practice them slowly, making sure that you're hitting every single sound.
Even if it sounds exaggerated.
'mind'
'worked'
'scripts'
Right? Exaggerate every single sound until you teach your tongue to pronounce all
consonants, without taking any breaks, without adding vowels in between and without dropping any sounds.
Now, this is a good place to remind you that if you want a list of those top ten mistakes
made by Spanish speakers and also a list of words to practice with, click on the link below and download
the practice sheet I prepared for you.
M turns to N at the end of words.
In Spanish, there is the 'M' consonant sound but it never appears at the end of words.
So when it does in English, for example in the word 'Game', Spanish speakers often turn it into 'N'.
So 'Game' will sound like 'Gain'.
Because that does happen in Spanish, you do have words that end with 'N'.
So it turns to 'N'and it happens usually automatically without even people noticing it.
'some' turns to 'son'.
'comb' turns to 'cone'.
'beam' turns to 'bean'.
Does that sound familiar? So here's what you need to do.
First of all, be aware of it. And when you have words that end with 'M', make sure that your lips are closed
because for the 'M' you close the lips.
'M'
And release air through the nose, for the N the tip of the tongue goes up and touches the upper palate
and still, you release air through the nose.
'N' 'M' 'N'
So first of all, practice these two sounds, go back and forth from 'M' to 'N'.
'M' 'N'
To gain control and to be more aware of your articulation organs.
'M' 'N'
And then, practice words that end with 'M' and make sure that you close your lips every single time.
'seem'
'comb'
'ham'
And use a mirror if you need to.
A z sound in the middle of words turns into an s.
In Spanish, there is no 'Z' in the middle of the word.
So again, the common substitution would be to turn it into the closest sound that does exist in Spanish.
In this case 'S'.
So a word like husband, that needs to have a 'Z' sound in the middle, will be pronounced as
'hussband'
'reason' will sound like 'reasson'.
When you speak with a lot of 'S' sound instead 'Z', it may affect your clarity and overall quality of speech.
You want to make sure that you pronounce those 'Z' correctly.
The difference between an 'S' and a 'Z' is whether your voice is activated or not.
So for example, let's try this, put your hands here and pronounce an 'S' sound.
'S'
Now just activate your voice and keep on doing whatever you're doing.
'Z'
'S'
'Z'
You want a few vibrations here.
'Z'
And then keep this sound as you pronounce words with a 'Z'.
'is'
'was'
And yes, I know all of these words have an S in the spelling.
But you have to remember that an S
represents a 'Z' sound a lot, in many of the cases in the middle of words, at the end of words.
So we need to be aware of it, and you need to make sure that you know where these words are.
So make a list of words that have a 'Z' sound and repeat them over and over again
making sure that you feel those vibrations.
And that you're actually pronouncing the 'Z' sound.
And if needed record yourself and listen to it, because sometimes we think that we're pronouncing
a certain sound, but we don't really, and only if we listen to ourselves from the outside
if we listen to our recording, then we can tell whether or not we're pronouncing the right sound or not.
The y sound is pronounced as j.
And then, a word like 'years' may sound like 'jears'.
And 'young' may sound like 'joung'.
The difference between the 'y' sound and the 'j' is the placement of the tongue.
For the 'y', the back of the tongue goes up and almost touches the soft palate in the back.
'y', you feel the sides of the tongue touch the insides of your teeth.
'y', so you need to bring the back of the tongue back.
'y', and 'j'.
So again, in order to be able to master this challenge, you have to first control your pronunciation.
And the best way to do it is to shift from one sound to another, so do it with me.
'y'
'j'
'y'
'j'
'young' and you want to make sure that you don't hear that 'j' sound.
'y' 'y' 'young'
'year'
'you' and not 'jou'.
'you' make sure it's a little cleaner than the 'jou' sound.
And 'yellow'.
And it shouldn't sound like 'jello', because jello is a different word.
And on the other hand, make sure that words that begin with the 'j' sound like
'job' and 'just'
are not pronounced with a 'y' sound like
'yob' and 'yust'.
Okay? So this substitution can go back and forth.
So be aware of these two sounds and remember that the 'y' sound is usually represented with the letter Y.
Similar vowels are pronounced the same. And then 'leave' and 'live' will sound the same, 'leave' 'leave'.
'pool and 'pull' will sound the same, 'pool' 'pool'.
Alright, so here we need to understand that these are two different sounds.
There is the tense 'e' as in
'he'
'we'
'see'
And the relaxed 'e', as in
'sit'
'kid'
'list'
The tense 'e' is usually spelled with two vowel letters like ee, ea, ie.
And the relaxed 'e' is usually spelled with the letter I, not always but usually.
And the relaxed 'e' is somewhere between 'i' and 'e' in Spanish.
Okay?
'kid'
'list'
'sit'
versus
'he'
'we'
'please'
And then we have
'sheep' and 'ship'
'reach' and 'rich'
'sheet and 'shit'
Same thing with 'pool' and 'pull', the tense 'u' is 'pool', a little longer, in comparison to 'pull'.
It's not the same sound!
'food' should not sound like 'foot'.
Even though it's spelled the same, these are two different sounds. Again
'food'
It's a longer vowel sound, in comparison to 'foot'.
If you want to practice more the 'sheep' - 'ship' and the 'pool' - 'pull', then
I'll post a link to those videos in the description below.
The v turns into a b.
In Spanish, when there is a V in the spelling it is pronounced as a very soft B sound.
'b' 'b'
And then, when the V appears in English they pronounce it the same and then the word
'very' may sound like 'berry'.
Now, these are two different words in English, so this substitution makes you sound unclear.
When you pronounce a V sound, you want to make sure that the bottom lip touches the top teeth.
'v'
A 'v' is a continuous sound.
'v'
And the top teeth need to touch the bottom lip.
'v'
A B is a stop sound where both lips touch together.
'b' 'b'
Even if they touch really softly.
'b' 'b'
It's still a different sound, it's still gonna sound more like a B rather than a V.
So whenever there is a word that begins with a V or has a V in the middle you want to make sure
that the bottom lip touches the top teeth and the air passes.
'very'
'video'
And to practice it, you have to hold out the sound, to make sure that you're able to make it a continuous
sound and to recognize that your top teeth touch the bottom lip.
'v'
'very'
'video'
'Valentine'
'vibrations'
Because you want to feel vibrations when you're pronouncing the sound.
The American r turns into a short Spanish R.
'R'
Instead of
'r'
And then the word 'boring' may sound like 'boRing'.
'right' will sound like 'Right'.
And then, what you need to do is, first of all understand that the tip of the tongue should not touch anything
when you pronounce the R sound, unlike in Spanish where the tip of the tongue touches the upper palate.
It gives it a high five.
'R' 'R' 'R'
'BoRing' 'Right'
Right? So you don't want that you want to pull back your tongue and hold it out.
'borrr...'
You need to curl your lips, and then pull the tongue back, the sides of the tongue
touch the insides of the upper teeth.
'r'
'ring' 'right' 'ready' and not 'redy'.
'ready'
A good way to do it is to hold out the sound and to make sure you're pronouncing it correctly.
And if you want to practice your 'r' a bit more then click on the link here and watch my video
about how to pronounce the American 'r'.
In Spanish, whenever there is an H it is silence, you don't pronounce it. So whenever it appears
in American English, people tend to create a different sound for the H, which is instead of a
'H' sound, more of a 'g' sound.
So the word 'ahead' may sound like 'agead'.
The word 'hi' may sound like 'gi'.
'g' g' g'
Instead of
'H'
You have to remember that for the H sound everything needs to be open in the back
and it's like you're just whispering.
'H'
'hi'
'horse'
'hello'
and not
'g' 'g' 'gello'
The 'g' sound happens when the tongue is high up and the body of the tongue
almost touches the soft palate, doesn't leave a lot of room for the air to pass
and therefore you hear this 'g' sound.
We don't want that whenever there is an H in English. We want a lot of open space
'H'
So first of all, practice the sound alone.
'H'
It's like 'H' 'H', when you're warming up your hands when it's really cold.
'H' 'H'
'H' 'hi'
'ahead'
'hello'
And yes, I have a video about the H sound, when you pronounce it, when you
shouldn't pronounce it and I'll post a link to it in the description below.
Adding vowels at the beginning of words that begin with st.
So instead of 'street', you'll hear 'estreet'.
In Spanish, every time there is a word that starts with st, there is always a vowel before.
So what you're probably doing is applying this pattern automatically and every time there is a word
that begins with st, and there are plenty of those in English, you add a vowel before.
'street'
'strange'
'stripes'
And this is how you should practice it. Start with an S sound.
'ssssss'
Make sure that you know what your tongue is doing for the S.
'ssss'
And from there, move on to the rest of the word.
'sssssstreet'
'sssssstay'
'sssssstaff' and not a 'estaff'
'stay'
And again, I believe that awareness is key. So you'll notice that once you are aware of it
you'll stop doing it, or at least you'll know that you're doing it and gradually be able to
stop doing it as you speak.
The th turns into a t or a d.
So 'think' turns to 'tink' and 'they' turns to day.
In most Spanish dialects, there is no th sound.
In American English you have to stick the tongue out for the th sound.
'th'
In Spanish, people tend to keep the tongue inside and then it sounds like a T.
't' 't' 'tink'
'teory'
Instead of 'think' and 'theory'.
You've got to make sure that the tongue sticks out and air passes between the tongue and teeth.
Just like with a V, it's a fricative.
So you have to feel the air flowing between the teeth and the tongue.
'th' 'think'
That's the voiceless th and it's substituted with a T sound, in comparison to
'th' 'they'
The voiced th, which is substituted with a D sound.
'day' 'day'
So make sure that the tongue is out and it's soft and you allow the air to pass.
And you can stretch this sound forever.
'th'
Okay, that's it! Thank you so much for watching.
These are the top ten pronunciation mistakes made by Spanish speakers.
Now, of course, these mistakes are common for not only Spanish speakers, but other speakers as well.
But the combination of the ten is very common for many speakers of different dialects of Spanish.
Leave a comment below, tell me if you find yourself making any one of those mistakes.
And tell me where you're from.
Thank you so much for watching. Don't forget to subscribe and I'll see you next week in the next video.