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Pronunciation Websites

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Hello! If you are looking to improve or practice your English pronunciation, please check out the websites below. Enjoy! –Sarah Harkleroad, University Foundations Program Teacher

http://www.shiporsheep.com: Use this website to help you to learn and study the phonetic alphabet so that you can easily write down the pronunciation of English words.

Manythings.org/pp: You can find pronunciation exercises with minimal pairs here. Can you hear the difference between “the” and “z”? How about “cup” and “cop”? Start practicing by listening to the audio files here.

http://www.englishclub.com/pronunciation/index.htm: This website features audio files to listen to and has advice on many topics, from word stress to how to link words together.

Fun Easy English: American English Pronunciation
Howie Hayman
http://funeasyenglish.com/american-english-pronunciation.htm
As set of lessons, including video clips, focusing on forty-four sounds of English. The general site is designed to provide free information and resources for students and teachers.

A Sample of Pronunciation Resources on the World Wide Web
Accessible as of April 1, 2009
Exercises and lessons for Students
American English Pronunciation Practice
Charles Kelly (2001)
http://www.manythings.org/pp/
Twenty-four minimal pair lessons with sound files, plus a song, a limerick, and a few tongue twisters.

ESL Learning Centre: English Pronunciation
EnglishClub.com
http://www.englishclub.com/pronunciation/index.htm
Includes lessons on word stress, sentence stress, pronunciation of –ed, and pronunciation of “the.”

Fun Easy English: American English Pronunciation
Howie Hayman
http://funeasyenglish.com/american-english-pronunciation.htm
As set of lessons, including video clips, focusing on forty-four sounds of English. The general site is designed to provide free information and resources for students and teachers.

Online Intonation
John Maidment, Department of Phonetics & Linguistics, University College London
http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/johnm/oi/oiin.htm
A set of exercises intended to provide practice in associating the sound of an intonation pattern with a commonly used system of notation.

Plato
John Maidment, Department of Phonetics & Linguistics, University College London
http://www.btinternet.com/~eptotd/vm/plato/platmen.htm
A set of exercises in perceiving tonic stress (sentence prominence; “Plato” = “Place the Tonic”). User sees and hears a sentence and then manipulates onscreen arrow keys to place stress on the correct syllable.

The Vowel Machine
John Maidment, Department of Phonetics & Linguistics, University College London
http://www.btinternet.com/~eptotd/vm/vowelmachine/vowelmachine.htm
Multiple-choice listening exercise for isolated words, focusing on distinguishing vowel sounds. Uses British pronunciation.

Toni
John Maidment, Department of Phonetics & Linguistics, University College London
http://www.btinternet.com/~eptotd/vm/toni/tonimenu.htm
A set of exercises in perceiving final intonation contours (called nuclear tones). User sees and hears a sentence and then chooses from seven possible contours. Sentences are spoken in British (RP) English.

General Pronunciation Sites & Additional Links
Authentic American Pronunciation
Eva Easton
http://evaeaston.com/pr/home.html
Part of E. L. Easton language teaching site. Requires a lot of navigation, but rich in audio files and links to other resources.

English Pronunciation
about.com
http://esl.about.com/od/speakingenglish/Speaking_English_Pronunciation_and_Conversation_Skills.htm
Covers both British and American pronunciation. Good resources if you can put up with the advertisements.

English Pronunciation/Listening
The New Okanagan College
http://international.ouc.bc.ca/pronunciation/
Includes QuickTime movies of dental fricatives.

English Pronunciation Tip of the Day
John Maidment, Department of Phonetics & Linguistics, University College London
http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/johnm/eptotd/tiphome.htm
Includes audio files. Pronunciation is British English.
ESL Independent Study Lab—Pronunciation

Michael Krauss, Lewis & Clark College
http://www.lclark.edu/~krauss/toppicks/pronunciation.html
This is an organized list of web resources, graded by level.

ESL: Pronunciation
Internet TESL Journal
http://iteslj.org/links/ESL/Pronunciation/
A list of pronunciation links of interest to both teachers and students. See also the “Links for Students” at the top, then select “Quizzes,” “Quizzes with Sounds.”

Pronunciation
eslGold.com
http://www.eslgold.com/pronunciation.html
A variety of resources, including diagnostic readings, exercises, minimal pair lists, links, and textbook recommendations.

Pronunciation
ESLPoint.com
http://www.eslpoint.com
Similar to eslGold. From the above link, click on “Pronunciation.”
Pronunciation Sites for International and ESL Students

Student Learning Centre, Flinders University, Australia
http://www.flinders.edu.au/current-students/slc/whatweoffer/pronunciation.cfm
A list of links to WWW resources especially chosen for students. Includes a link to audio files of various accents of English, male and female versions.

Sites for Teaching Pronunciation
Donna Brinton and Chris LaBelle
http://www.public.iastate.edu/~jlevis/SPRIS/brinton.html

Listening
Hotlist on Real World Listening
Linda Grant
http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/fil/pages/listlisteninli.html
Provides links to authentic speech samples, including a site with recordings of historic speeches. Some links are out-of-date.

IDEA: International Dialects of English Archive
Paul Meier & Shawn Muller
http://www.ku.edu/~idea/
A well documented collection of recordings of accented English from throughout the World.

Randall’s ESL Cyber Listening Lab
Randall Davis

Randall’s ESL Cyber Listening Lab


Scripted listening exercises with multiple choice questions. Includes link to related Randall site, “Train Your Accent,” which focuses on relaxed pronunciation.

Speech Accent Archive
S. Weinberger, George Mason University
http://classweb.gmu.edu/accent/
Provides an English passage read by speakers from many different language backgrounds.

The Audio Archive
Igor Merfert
http://alt-usage-english.org/audio_archive.shtml
A collection of sound files for listening to a variety of English dialects from “center countries” plus India.

Worldwide Accents of English
Gabriele Azzaro
http://www.gazzaro.it/accents/files/accents2.html
Well-organized sound clips of a variety of English dialects. Site includes a commentary on RP, GenAm, Scottish, USA Southern Mountains, Texan, Russian, Black African, Asian Indian, and Nigerian.

Phonetics
English IPA Sounds
Rebekah Mattox (“Becks”)
http://www.tutorpal.com/slideshow/
Unusual site showing lip position and side diagram of vocal organs for English sounds. Unfortunately, the position of the velum (velic closure) is inaccurate.

English Phonetic Alphabet
English Department of Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo
http://ipap.calpoly.edu/epa/index.html
Includes consonant and vowel charts with recorded segments of each sound. Video animations of the oral tract are unfortunately inaccurate.

: The Sounds of Spoken Language
University of Iowa
http://www.uiowa.edu/~acadtech/phonetics/#
An excellent resource for articulatory descriptions of consonants and vowels. Includes animated cut-away side views. You may find this site useful to prepare for the test.

Fonetics.org
http://www.fonetiks.org/
Sound clips of selected sounds in a variety of English dialects, as well as other languages.

Interactive Sammy
Daniel Currie Hall
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~danhall/phonetics/sammy.html
Using “radio buttons,” this interactive page allows you to manipulate the setting of the lips, tongue, velum and vocal cords on a “Sammy” diagram, and displays the IPA symbol for the sound corresponding to each configuration you construct.

International Phonetic Association
http://www2.arts.gla.ac.uk/IPA/ipa.html
Includes complete chart of all IPA symbols for all language sounds.

Symbols for American English Vowel Sounds
George L. Dillon, University of Washington
http://faculty.washington.edu/dillon/PhonResources/newstart.html
A reference chart of English and British vowels and diphthongs. Point to a key word to hear it pronounced. A link to “British/American Vowels” provides companion vowel charts of the two dialects. Vowels in each can be heard by pointing in the same way.

The Anatomy of Vowel Production
Patrick Leary
http://www.departments.bucknell.edu/linguistics/ln105/vowel/index.html
Side view of mouth showing tongue position for 13 different vowel sounds. Click on a vowel to hear it and see the tongue position.

The Sounds of English and the International Phonetic Alphabet
antimoon.com
http://www.antimoon.com/how/pronunc-soundsipa.htm
Includes audio (.mp3) of minimal pairs, some for both American and British English.

UCLA Phonetic Lab Data
Peter Ladefoged, UCLA
http://hctv.humnet.ucla.edu/departments/linguistics/VowelsandConsonants/
Includes a web version of the CD that accompanies Ladefoged’s latest books. Includes film of larynx in action. Also includes recordings of sounds from many of the world’s languages.

Resources for Teachers
Common Mistakes in English by Language Background
Ted Power, English Language Learning and Teaching
http://www.btinternet.com/~ted.power/phono.html
Common pronunciation errors for learners of English from 20 different language backgrounds.

Dave’s ESL Café Idea Cookbook: Pronunciation
Dave Sperling
http://www.eslcafe.com/idea/index.cgi?Pronunciation
A vast inventory of pronunciation activities submitted by readers.

English Tongue Twisters
Michael Reck
http://www.uebersetzung.at/twister/en.htm
Part of the “1st International Collection of Tongue Twisters.” Lists 404 English tongue twisters.

Non-native pronunciations of English
Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-native_pronunciations_of_English
A useful but non-authoritative resource. Like “Common Mistakes” above. Includes 38 language groups.

Sounds of English
Sharon Widmayer, George Mason University
http://www.soundsofenglish.org
This site is rich in resources, well worth spending a lot of time in. Includes a variety of exercises for students, some imbedded in “handouts” from presentations. Includes handouts for three presentations and two Pre-Convention Institutes from the TESOL 2007 convention.

Supports for Pronunciation Teaching
John Murphy, Georgia State University
http://www2.gsu.edu/~esljmm/ss/furtherreading.htm
A list of references, most of which are included in the course bibliography. Includes links to annotations of some references and to some authors, in case you would like to make e-mail contact.

TESOL Speech and Pronunciation Interest Section
An excellent resource.
http://www.soundsofenglish.org/SPLIS/
Speech Recording and Analysis

Audacity
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
Free, downloadable software for recording and editing sound files.
Praat: Doing Phonetics by Computer

Paul Boersma and David Weenink, Institute of Phonetic Sciences, Univ. of Amsterdam
http://www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/
Offers free downloadable software that teaches vowel and diphthong production by means of vowel chart plotting.

Vocal Anatomy
Laryngeal Video Recordings: Pitch
James P. Thomas, MD
http://www.voicedoctor.net/media/video/normal/pitch_movie.html

“Slow motion” video of female vocal cords, comparing high and low pitches.
Normal Larynx Video
Kevin Cavanagh, MD
http://www.entusa.com/normal_larynx.htm
21 second video of female larynx, singing a high note.

Voice & Speech Source: The Larynx
Eric Armstrong
http://www.yorku.ca/earmstro/journey/larynx.html
Provides anatomically accurate and clearly labeled images of the larynx. Also, “IPA charts” in the side bar links to a chart of IPA symbols. Clicking on a symbol activates an audio file of the corresponding sound; consonants are pronounced in initial, medial and final position, vowels with both level and falling intonation.

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