Hey.
Hello.
How's it going?
Really good.
I am so excited you're here, Stephanie.
Thank you.
Welcome.
Yeah, I'm glad to be here.
I should introduce Stephanie to you, if you don't know.
You might be familiar with me, Gabby,
but Stephanie is our teacher here at Go Natural English.
And she has a lot of experience, over 10 years
of English teaching experience.
Yeah, just like you.
Just like me!
Yeah!
So we have over 20 years experience
to share with you here.
And we both have our masters in Teaching English
as Second Language.
And you have your masters in African Studies.
Yeah.
So we know a lot of good stuff we want to share with you.
Yeah.
We're going to share everything with you in five minutes.
Everything we know.
Everything.
In five minutes.
So keep watching.
Before we share everything we know with you,
I want to remind you that, at gonaturalenglish.com/7steps,
you can come try a sample course to learn about the seven steps
to fluency.
Get you there fast and easy.
Check it out.
And it's awesome.
It's awesome.
So we have a really interesting question today.
Why does it seem like Americans speak so fast?
Did you catch that?
Why do we speak so fast?
Why do Americans speak so fast?
So I, actually, don't think that most Americans speak so fast.
I think that there's things that happen with the sounds,
like when sounds blend together.
Yes.
There's all kinds of crazy things that happen.
Like, for example, contractions, right?
So when we have should have, we say shoulda.
Shoulda.
Right?
Yeah.
When we say I'm going to, we say I'm gonna.
I'm gonna.
Right?
Yeah.
There's a few different contractions that we have.
But those are great examples.
Yeah.
And then, I mean, there's other things
that happen like when we have a phrase, not just
individual words.
And this is why I don't like when students
have to memorize vocabulary lists,
because those words are all by themselves.
They're all by themselves.
And they sound very different when
they're alone compared to when they're all in a phrase.
This is a big complaint that I hear from students.
They say, I know a lot of words, but I
don't know how to say them together
in phrases or sentences.
Right.
So we're going to help you.
Yes.
We have a really kind of fun example.
Yeah.
I'm going to have to read it because it's really long.
But I'm going to read this sentence as
if all the words were separate.
Very slowly.
I want to go to the beach and get some juice and ice
cream or popsicles.
OK.
Now I'm going to say it like a native speaker.
I want to go to the beach to get some ice
cream and some popsicles.
Wait.
I think I messed it up.
Let me say it again.
OK.
Oh, wait.
Here it is.
I want to go to the beach to get some juice and ice
cream or popsicles.
So listen how I said juicin.
Juicin.
What's juicin?
Yeah.
What's ice creamor?
Ice creamor popsicles.
What is ice creamor?
So those words and and or--
Is that what you put in your coffee?
Yeah.
Exactly.
Right.
It's really hard to understand unless you
know the secret of English, which
is that those little words, like, jump
onto the other words.
Yeah, they like, link.
We call them linking.
And we reduce them.
So instead of saying and, we say n.
Instead of saying or, we say r.
R.
And really quick, really quick and quiet, right?
It's such a funny little sound.
Like we almost take off letters, and we make a mix
with the word before it.
So in your English class-- I'm assuming
you took an English class before-- you
might have learned to say or.
Right.
But when do we say or?
We don't.
Ice cream or popsicles.
I mean, we really don't.
Yeah.
I would say, if you are pretending to be a robot--
An angry robot.
--an angry robot, or maybe if you're
giving a very formal speech, but even then, I mean,
I think of the way presidents speak.
Like even then, you probably wouldn't use or or--
And even with gonna and wanna, it's not slang.
No.
That's what I think is really important to understand.
You can't write them in an essay.
Yeah.
Don't write them.
But we say them.
Text message is OK.
Yeah.
Email not so much.
That's true.
Yeah, that's a whole nother topic.
That's another topic.
But yeah, so I hope you enjoyed this example.
It's just to show you why it sounds
like Americans talk so fast.
But it's not really that we're talking so, so quickly.
It's that things happen.
Yeah.
Funny things happen to the sounds when we actually
say words together, not just as a vocabulary list.
Yeah.
Ice cream.
Popsicles.
Right.
Beach.
That's not how we talk.
And you know, so if you want more practice
with your English, I highly suggest to take the Go Natural
English course.
Thank you.
It's awesome.
You can get feedback from native speakers.
They can help you sound more like a native speaker
and also understand native speakers.
This is really key.
And sometimes I forget to mention this
because I just want to give you great tips in these episodes.
But you have to know that, by joining a Go Natural English
premium course, you're going to learn more.
You're going to get feedback, personalized feedback
just for you.
And you can also join our members-only Facebook group
where you can ask questions and get more feedback.
So I've gotten a lot of good opinions
from the students who are in the courses.
And that makes me really happy.
So I know it's working.
It can work for you, too.
Yeah, it's awesome.
All right, so I hope to see you.
You can try out our free sample course
at gonaturalenglish.com/7steps.
So I'll see you there.
See you there.
By for now.
Bye.