（带文稿）0209 VOA答小听众：如何提升自己的发音水平？

张老邪叨哔叨：

        这则里出现了前天讲悍马的那则新闻里提到过的单词 hum，还记得是什么意思吗？这个单词和提升发音水平难道有什么关系？话说老邪在十八线小城市上中学的时候，用的还是Crazy English疯狂英语，虽然创始人后来陷入domestic violence scandal （家暴丑闻）但不得不说那是迄今对我发音影响最大的一本书，一码归一码吧~

Transcript

        Many people want to sound more like native English speakers. So they send questions about pronunciation to us here at VOA Learning English. We often get asked:

        Question:

        “How can I improve my English pronunciation?”

        Answer:

      Today we will look at two simple things you can do to improve your pronunciation.

        Speak loudly enough

        The first is to speak loudly enough.

        Many people learning a foreign language worry about having an accent or saying words differently because of their mother tongue.

        Yet there are plenty of people who have learned English as a second or even third language. Take, for example, Hollywood actors Antonio Banderas and Jackie Chan. The two are non-native English speakers. Banderas has a Spanish accent, while Chan has a Chinese accent. But both men are easy to understand, partly because they speak loudly and clearly.

     When speaking, the goal should be communicating to be easily understood, not removing your accent, which is often hard to do.

        To read more on this subject, see our story called Keep Your Identity While Changing Your Accent.

        Listen for patterns

       The second thing you can do to improve pronunciation is to listen for patterns.

        English sentences have a rhythm. In other words, you will find a kind of systematic arrangement, or order, to the words and expressions. When you listen to someone speaking English, try humming along with the rhythm of their sentences. Think of yourself making sounds like that of an insect.

        Here is an example: What are you doing in there?

        The line shows how the voice changes:

        Here’s what it sounds like to hum this sentence.

        It is easy to make sounds while keeping your mouth closed.

      Some English learners like to listen to music and sing songs. These exercises will help you to learn the rhythms of the language.

     For more exercises, see our story Improve Your Pronunciation by Training Your Ears.

        Next time, we will talk about some more things you can do to improve your pronunciation.

        And that’s Ask a Teacher!

        I’m Jill Robbins.

Words in This Story

accent – n. a way of pronouncing words that occurs among the people in a particular region or country

mother tongue – n. native language

pattern – n. a repeated design; a kind of system or order

rhythm – n. a regular, repeated pattern of sounds or movements