WELCOME

Are you ready to practice English pronunciation from the comfort of your home?

If you are an English learner, you know pronunciation is an important part of language learning. Learning pronunciation means learning to accurately hear and pronounce the sounds of a language. However, some sounds of English may be more difficult for you, especially if those sounds don’t exist in your native language.

You can use the exercises on each page to practice hearing, pronouncing, and speaking with specific sounds. Each page has several sections:

• “Listen” – hear the sound
• “What is it?” – understand how to pronounce and spell the sound, as well as why it might be important for certain grammatical units.
• “Compare” – practice hearing and recognizing the difference between the sound you’re learning and similar sounds
• “Practice” – practice saying the sound you’re learning in many words and sentences
• “Use it!” – practice using the sound you’re learning in a natural communication task.

Tip: Record the “Practice” and “Use It!” sections and share them with a teacher or English-speaking friend for feedback. See “For Students” for further suggestions.

If you are an English teacher or tutor, you can use and modify these exercises to help your students improve their pronunciation. You are welcome to adapt the materials to fit your needs! (Please see the  Creative Commons licensing restrictions at the bottom of the page.) See “For Instructors” for further suggestions.

If you have feedback about the website, or if you notice a problem, please fill out the feedback form below.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Christine Wingate is a trained ESL and literacy instructor, who has taught in university and non-profit settings for over 8 years. She created “American English Sounds” because she saw her students’ desire to speak English more clearly in order to use English for work and social purposes. She believes every English learner needs something different in order to master pronunciation, so learners need opportunities to independently practice sounds that are difficult for them. “American English Sounds” was born out of a desire to empower students to take charge of their own learning beyond what traditional instruction can provide.

Thank you to the OpenHawks grant program at University of Iowa and to faculty members of University of Iowa’s ESL Programs for their assistance in making this resource possible.

©2024, Christine Wingate

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.