How to Pronounce: Games with Vowel Sounds, Part 15

Hello! I’m John Russell. Let’s continue our exploration of vowel sounds. If you want to reduce your accent or sound more like an American, it is worth paying careful attention to the differences between vowel sounds. A nice place to start is with developing your ability to recognize the vowel sounds. So, let’s do an activity with two sounds we have explored in recent videos. In International Phonetic Alphabet (or IPA), they are written like this: /oʊ/ or /ɑ/ /oʊ/ appears in words such as “boat” /ɑ/ appears in words like “father” So, we have our two vowel sounds: /oʊ/ and /ɑ/. You will hear me say two words. Listen to what I say, think carefully about the vowel sounds you hear, then say the words. Let’s start. Listen: walk slowly Listen: walk slowly Now think carefully about the vowel sounds you heard. Which word had which vowel sound? Now say the words “walk slowly” The first word, walk, involves the /ɑ/ vowel sound. The second word, slowly, involves the /oʊ/ vowel sound. You might hear someone say “walk slowly” if the ground is slippery or dangerous. That’s all for today! Keep up the good work!