hello I'm Jill from engvid and today's
lesson is about the little word sir
and how to say it how to pronounce it
you might think what I know how to
pronounce that word but there are two
different ways of pronouncing it and
this lesson is designed to show you how
to work out which way to say it okay so
the simple rule is before a consonant
you say tha but before a vowel sound you
say thee so it's either the or thee so
let me just go through some examples too
to show you how that works
so before a consonant sound the the
banana the dog but then we get our first
exception which is confusing because
this word begins with an e which is a
vowel letter but the way it's pronounced
it has a year at the beginning yeah
European European so we say the European
okay so that's a slight confusion to be
aware of continuing on the flowers the
house the man the people another
exception again because this word begins
with a u which is a vowel letter but the
actual sound when you say this word is a
year university university it's not
anniversa t its university so the
university okay
and finally the woman the woman so
that's the before a consonant sound so
let's have a look at the other column
before the vowel sound
we say thee so the Apple the elephant
the ice-cream the orange the umbrella
you can see here umbrella also begins
with a you just like University but it's
not pronounced umbrella it's pronounced
umbrella so the umbrella the umbrella
okay and finally here's another funny
one
it begins with an age so you might think
well that's a consonant but it is
actually a vowel sound because we don't
pronounce the H in this word you may
know the word air which we had in
another lesson about using a and an the
air is usually well male and the air s
female but often the word air is used
for female as well nowadays for reasons
of equality so but the air s air so it's
an air air s so that's a vowel sound so
the air s okay so that's another one to
remember
along with the sound here so it's purely
the way you say it which decides whether
it's the of--they okay so now we'll move
on to a second screen and we'll do some
sentences for you to work out how to
pronounce each time the word the or the
appears so okay so what I should have
said at the end of the last section was
the word air and air s I didn't explain
what they meant so if you hadn't seen
the other lesson you wouldn't you might
not know that so and air or an air s is
someone who in
it's something often money or property
something like that so okay right so
here is the test for you of how to
pronounce the word
th e the or thee and as you can see we
have some sentences here and every time
the word appears I've underlined it in
red just to help you to see it so first
sentence mmm ferry crossed an Irish Sea
so how would you pronounce the word
there okay so the goes before a
consonant sound so f is a consonant so
the fairy the fairy frost and what about
this one I is a vowel sound so it's the
irish sea the irish sea
so the ferry across the Irish Sea okay
next one mmm right way is only way okay
so how would you pronounce those two so
R is a consonant so the right way the
right way is only that begins with an O
which is a vowel only so the only way
the right way is the only way okay next
one we have three examples in this
sentence so hmm answer is at mmm back of
M
so what would you do there answer back
book so answer begins with an A which is
a vowel so it's the answer the answer is
at back and book begin with B which is a
consonant so the back of the book okay
next one hmm fire hasn't reached hmm
upper floor upper means at the top of
the building at the up at the top okay
so fire begins with an F so that's a
consonant so the fire the fire hasn't
reached upper begins with you which is a
vowel sound so it's the upper floor the
fire hasn't reached the upper floor okay
right next one
mmm girl felt at home in mmm empty house
so if you feel at home you feel
comfortable you like your surroundings
okay
so girl begins with G which is a
consonant so the girl the girl felt at
home in empty begins with E which is a
vowel so the empty house the girl felt
at home in the empty house okay next one
I will join mm Union in mmm morning
so Union is a to do with your profession
for your employment rights and so on and
you pay a subscription to join so I will
join Union begins with au which is a
vowel sound so ah no hang on this is one
of those exceptions Union so I nearly
caught myself out there it's so yeah
sound so the Union it's not the onion
because onion is a different word
altogether with an O an onion is a
vegetable so this is the Union okay so I
will join the Union in M consonant the
morning the morning okay so that's a
funny little exception there next one
say you're in a big department store
with lots of flaws and they have
escalators going up and down and you
can't decide which department to go to
you first so you you're with a friend
you might say shall we take up escalator
or down escalator okay so which one
would you use the or thee so before up
up letter U is a vowel sound up so it's
the up V up shall we take the up
escalator or and then before down do
is a consonant so the the down escalator
okay and then finally here's another one
a little exception because there's an H
here which is not pronounced so the word
honor honourable it sounds like an O we
don't pronounce the H so it's honorable
thing to do which which would you use
there okay so it's the Honorable this
one the honorable thing to do
okay so I'm sure you've got those all
right and we also have a quiz for you to
test that a little bit further on the
website in vidcom so do go to that and
and try that see how many points you can
get and I'll see you again soon okay bye
for now