Speaking pronunciation: five self-checks

Pronunciation is a quarter of your Speaking band

• Speaking is marked on four criteria, and Pronunciation is one of them — a full quarter.
• You can prepare for it with specific, audible practice instead of trying to imitate a particular accent.
• A British or American accent is not required. What matters is whether the listener can understand you without excessive effort.
• Speech patterns differ among learners, including speakers of different Chinese varieties. Use the five checks below to find your priorities; they are not a complete list or a diagnosis.

A dictionary can show stress marks; it cannot lift your tongue for you.

1. Check final consonants

• Some English final consonants and clusters may be unfamiliar if your other languages do not use them. Test what your recording actually contains.
• Compare desk / des and helped / help. If your recording makes a pair sound alike, practise the contrast in a sentence.
• Final sounds can carry important word and grammar information. Whether this is your main priority depends on what listeners actually hear.
• Practice: say cat, cats, cap, caps, cast, casts slowly, finishing every word. Then read a paragraph aloud and finish every word in it.

2. The -ed and -s endings are grammar too

• If an ending cannot be heard, the listener may miss tense or number. Examiners assess your whole performance across the criteria; there is no automatic double penalty for one sound.
• -ed has three sounds: walked is /t/, needed is /ɪd/, lived is /d/. The rule is the sound before it, not the spelling.
• -s has three sounds too: cats /s/, dogs /z/, buses /ɪz/.
• Say the pairs: walk / walked, live / lived, need / needed, cat / cats, dog / dogs.

3. The sounds Mandarin does not have

• /θ/ and /ð/ — think, this. If you merge them with another sound, try placing the tongue tip lightly between the teeth and compare recordings.
• /v/ and /w/ — if very and wary sound too similar in your recording, practise /v/ with the top teeth lightly touching the lower lip.
• /l/, /n/ and /r/ at the start of a word — light / night, read / lead.
• /i:/ and /ɪ/ — sheep / ship, feel / fill. The short one is not just shorter; the tongue is lower.
• Pick one or two contrasts that a listener actually finds unclear, then return to the others later.

4. Word stress can affect recognition

• Many multisyllabic English words have a main stressed syllable. Placing it differently can make a word harder to recognise even when its sounds are accurate.
• phoTOgraphy / PHOtograph / photoGRAPHic. eCONomy / ecoNOMic. DEvelop — no, deVELop.
• Stress can move when a suffix is added, so check related words separately.
• When you learn a long word, learn where the stress goes. The IPA line under every word in this site's vocabulary lists marks it with ˈ.

5. Sentence stress and intonation

• English often gives prominence to meaning-bearing words such as nouns, main verbs and adjectives; smaller words may be quieter. Try I'd LIKE to GO to the LIbrary.
• A flat, evenly stressed delivery is heard as monotonous, and it is harder to follow, not easier.
• Practise a rising tone before the end of a list and a falling tone on the final item. Many statements fall; yes/no questions often rise, while other questions may fall.
• Record yourself for two minutes and listen back for one feature at a time. If you cannot hear the difference, ask a teacher or partner.