Proper pronunciation tends to be a sore point for many English learners, especially those with a native accent that makes it more challenging to say certain words and sounds.
What’s worse is that we’re often ignorant about our shortcomings in this regard – it’s not rare for people to assume that their pronunciation is perfectly fine, only to be shocked when they hear themselves speaking from an outsider’s perspective for the first time.
The pandemic made this particularly obvious for some, frequently exposing us to Zoom and Teams meetings that are often recorded, giving many people a good opportunity to check how they actually sound.
If you’re concerned about this and want to ensure that your pronunciation is not that far off, there are some things you can do to verify that on your own. Ideally, you’ll always want to get the opinion of someone experienced with the language. But there’s still a lot you can do by yourself in the meantime. If you’ve been asking yourself “how do I check my English pronunciation, though?” and have no clue where to even start, here are some ideas.
Record Yourself
The easiest way to hear how you sound when you speak English is to simply record yourself and play it back later. You will often be surprised how different your voice sounds this way if you’ve never listened to a recording of yourself before, and this can come as a bit of a shock if you’re one of those people who’ve always assumed that there’s nothing wrong with the way they speak English in general.
Don’t worry though – recognising that you have a problem with your pronunciation is already a great first step towards taking measures to correct that.
Take Notes About Specific Issues and Work on Them
It’s not enough to just listen to those recordings though – you should actively take notes about things that bother you so that you can revisit them later. Go through that list of quirks and rank them from most to least irritating. That way, you’ll be able to start cleaning up your pronunciation as fast as possible by focusing on the things that actually matter the most.
Keep in mind that you might not have the most objective opinion here, especially if you’re not very experienced with the language from other sources. Getting someone else’s thoughts is crucial if you want to ensure that you’re focusing on the right issues.
Participate in Discussions with Speakers of Different Skill Levels
Try to talk to people in English as much as possible. However, don’t make the mistake of only going for the most experienced English speakers you can find. Try to mix things up a bit and include people of all different skill levels in those conversations. This will allow you to observe some common problematic patterns from the side, and it will provide you with some additional insight into your own speech issues.
This can be very productive if you do it often and mix it with as many different people as you can. If you can join a conversation group that holds regular sessions, that would probably be the best.
Use an App
There are some AI-driven apps that can help you figure out if you’re speaking clearly enough or if your pronunciation needs work,
the Callan Method App, is one of them. A great place to practise your English and improve your pronunciation. You can revise what you have learned in your Callan Method classes, repeat as many times as you want at your own speed. Audio and video are recorded by real Callan Method teachers. Includes exercises from the complete Callan Method - Stages 1 to 12.
Practice Is Key
This should go without saying, but once you’ve identified what problems you have to fix in your English pronunciation, the most important thing is to practice as much as possible. Don’t just speak randomly about anything that comes up in your head though – try to focus on topics that involve words that are giving you trouble and ask for feedback on how well you’re doing.
Sometimes you’ll get an interesting insight into your speech that you wouldn’t have considered otherwise, and in other cases you’ll figure out that you can work around a certain issue by replacing one word with another that flows more smoothly for you.
Whatever you do, don’t despair – English is not an easy language to learn, no matter what someone might tell you, and it takes a lot of work to get over some of the common pronunciation problems that you’ll encounter.
As long as you keep your head up and stay focused on addressing those issues though, you should be able to work on most of the things that bother you. Persistence goes a long way when learning English, especially when you dig deeper into the language’s peculiarities.
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