シャドーイング練習: Component Focus #4 - “How Do I Control My Soft Palate?” - Voice Breakdown - 動画で英語スピーキングを学ぶ

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Hi everyone, my name is Brendan Hodek and I am an instructor here at New York Speech Coaching in New York City.
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Welcome to another one of our component focus videos.
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Our component focus videos are different than our typical voice breakdown videos.
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We will not be teaching a specific voice today.
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In order to imitate any voice, you simply need to figure out six components.
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But many of you have mentioned how certain components give you a bit of a hard time.
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So we thought it would be best to make videos that specifically focus on one component, giving you some exercises to gain more control over that component.
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Today's episode will be focused on the soft palate.
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The soft palate is that mushy feeling place at the back of your mouth.
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Let's get familiar with the soft palate and all of the other landmarks in the mouth.
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Begin by touching the tip of your tongue to the top front teeth like this.
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Then, we are going to slide the tongue backwards slowly, always maintaining contact with the top of the mouth.
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The first things you feel, as we said, are the front teeth.
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Slide that tongue back a little more and you will feel a bumpy area known as the alveolar ridge.
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If you're not sure where that is, it's that place where you burn your mouth on pizza.
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Keep that tongue touching the top of the mouth and slide it back a little more.
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You will feel the tongue all of a sudden go drastically upward, touching something that is very hard.
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We call that the hard palette.
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Then if you keep sliding the tongue backward, you will eventually feel it turn all mushy.
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That is your soft palate.
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If you look in your mouth, you can see your soft palate.
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The uvula, or the punching bag in the back of the throat, hangs down from our soft palate.
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The soft palate can rise and lower.
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When it does, it acts as a trap door, controlling whether air and sound are directed through the nose or the mouth.
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Sending sound into the nose will give the voice a brighter quality
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while sending it into the mouth will give it a darker and more rounded quality.
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This component can be difficult to control.
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We have heard lots of feedback that it is hard to get a sensation of the palate moving.
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We have some exercises today to help you with that.
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This exercise we call "In and Out".
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There are four steps to this exercise.
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For all four steps, keep your jaw relaxedly open.
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Do not let your mouth close.
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Step one, with your jaw relaxedly open, breathe in through your mouth and out through your mouth.
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Ah.
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Ah.
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I Step two, with your jaw relaxedly open, breathe in through your nose and out through your nose.
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- - Thank you.
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Thank you.
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- Thank you.
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Step three, again with your jaw relaxedly open, breathe in through your nose, but then out through your mouth.
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Thank you.
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Thank you.
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And finally, step four, with your jaw still relaxedly open, breathe in through your mouth and out through your nose.
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Ah.
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- Thank you.
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Ah.
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Yeah.
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After this, you can repeat this process, but on the exhale, make sound.
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Hmm...
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Thank you.
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Haaaaaa Hmm...
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These are all of the different combinations of the ways you can breathe.
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But the big question is, How in the world are you doing that?
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How did you control which way the air or sound went?
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You did this by manipulating the soft palate and the back of the tongue you just didn't even notice.
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Do the exercise again, but this time while looking into a mirror.
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You will see when breathing through the mouth how the soft palate naturally goes upward and the back of the tongue lowers.
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This blocks air or sound from going into the nose.
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Then, as you breathe through the nose, you will see how the soft palate lowers and touches the back of the tongue,
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forming a blockade, so that air or sound cannot go through the mouth, but is forced to go into the nose.
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Practice this exercise and start to become mindful of what muscles you feel activating as you do this.
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Your entire life you have done this passively, but as you focus you'll be able to get a sense of the muscles that are at work.
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Exercise number two is the "ung -ah".
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Our last exercise taught you how to manipulate the soft palate, but it pretty much only told you how to put it all the way up or all the way down.
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For many of our voices, you have heard me give you percentages of nasal resonance, lowered soft palate versus oral resonance raised soft palate.
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We need to learn how to gradually move between complete nasal
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and oral resonance so that we can fine tune this and create the brightness or darkness we are looking for.
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Bring in the "NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN Start out on the NG sound.
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Let's be clear that NG is not N or G, but is its own sound, NG or Mm -hmm.
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You made this sound before when you were exhaling through the nose and making sound.
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If you can't find it, simply say the word sing and hold out the last sound.
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Sing!
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Make sure the front tip of your tongue is downward and not upward, but that the back of your tongue is upward, touching the soft palate.
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Mmm.
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Mmm.
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Then try to very slowly transition from the /ŋ / sound to the /ɑ / sound.
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If you do it too quickly, you will hear the tongue and soft palate moving away from each other, causing a little click pop or abrupt transition.
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Ngaa...
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Nga.
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Mmm...ga...
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That popping sound is your indicator that you are not going gradually enough.
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The goal is to be able to go back and forth between ㄴ and ㄴ without hearing any abrupt transitions.
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*Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm Notice the change in sound quality over the course of the exercise.
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The only change physically is the coordination of the soft palate and the back of the tongue.
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Exercise number three we call "Speaking Through the Nose".
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As a matter of habit, we tend to make our sounds with a certain amount of nasal resonance.
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There are three sounds in English that have their sound 100 % in the nose.
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These are the M, Mm.
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n, n, and ng sounds.
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But for the rest of our sounds, we send them primarily through the mouth with some nasal resonance at times.
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Thus, it can be tricky to add some nasal resonance to specific sounds while doing one of our voices.
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The best way to do this is to first learn how to speak entirely through the nose, not allowing any sound to go through the mouth.
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That sounds like this.
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To do this, you will need to first hold out an NG sound.
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Aaaaaaaaaa Then see if you can articulate while keeping the back of the tongue and the soft palate fixed.
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You'll find that on some sounds you will want to raise the palate and drop the tongue a bit, but try not to.
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Exercise number four: Voice imitation for a raised palate.
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To speak with a raised palate, there are certain voices we can imitate to help us.
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Speaking like your nose is clogged, Bob.
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Man, I'm sick.
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"Mom, my nose is stuffed !" will give you a mouth -only sound.
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If you think about when you are sick, your nose is full of junk.
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Therefore, sound cannot resonate in the nasal cavity.
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Also, doing a stereotypical opera voice can help to raise the palate.
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One more exercise.
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Exercise number five we call plosive buildup.
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There are a few sounds in the English language that we call plosives.
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These are B T.
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the "K" and "G".
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In order to make these sounds, air pressure needs to build up and then explode.
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In order to get that air pressure to build up, however, the soft palate has to raise up all the way.
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If that soft palate did not raise up, sound or air could escape through the nose, and we wouldn't be able to make these sounds.
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Huh.
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What?
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Huh?
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Therefore, one great way to feel the palate raising is to build up air pressure like you're going to do a plosive.
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Let's use the sound "b" for example.
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And as you build up that air pressure beforehand, you'll actually feel your palate go up.
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Ooh.
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Buh! or Bah!
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If you don't release the explosion, you'll feel the palette raise up and then drop back down.
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Mm.
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Mm -hmm.
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Hopefully these exercises have given you better control over lowering and raising the soft palate.
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Use a mirror often to see if you can see the palette moving.
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Raising your eyebrows
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or doing a gasp like you are scared will help to cause the palette to move
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and you'll be able to see this in your reflection.
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Be sure to focus and be as mindful as possible to gain better awareness of
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when the muscles activate to move the soft palate.
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Over time, you will be very aware and have complete control.
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Be sure to check out future episodes of Voice Breakdown, the show where we teach you how to imitate some of the most iconic voices.
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See you next time.

なぜこの動画で話す練習をするのか?

この動画では、ソフトパレットの制御を向上させるための具体的なエクササイズが紹介されています。ソフトパレットは、声の質を左右する重要な部位です。練習をすることによって、声をより明るくしたり、深みを持たせたりすることが可能になります。IELTS スピーキング対策を行うためにも、このコンポーネントのコントロールは欠かせません。また、エクササイズを通じて発音の改善が期待でき、実際にコミュニケーションをとる際にも自信を持って話すことができるようになります。

文法と表現のコンテキスト

動画内では、以下のような文法や表現が使用されています。

  • 命令形:エクササイズの指示を出す際に使用されます。例: 「口をリラックスさせてください。」
  • 感嘆文:体験や感覚について話す際に使われることがあります。例: 「それがあなたのソフトパレットです!」
  • 質問文:参加者の反応を確認するために使用されます。例: 「これが感じられますか?」

これらの表現は、shadow speechやshadowspeakの練習においても非常に役立ちます。

一般的な発音の罠

この動画内で特に注意すべき発音のポイントは以下の通りです。

  • ソフトパレットや硬口蓋といった難しい単語の発音。これらをしっかり練習することで、より自然なアメリカ英語の発音に近づけます。
  • 流暢さ:エクササイズの中でリズムやテンポを意識しないと、話す速度が遅くなってしまうことがあります。
  • 発声の質:鼻腔と口腔の振動を意識し、変化させることが声の明るさや深みを生み出します。

これらのポイントを意識して練習することで、スピーキングのスキルが向上し、shadowing siteや他のリソースを活用して更なる進歩が望めます。

この動画の文法

話し手がよく使っている文型を、動画の実際の表現とともに紹介します。

文型動画での表現
条件文 if + 節, will/would + 動詞 — 条件とその結果If you don't release the explosion, you'll feel
現在完了形 have/has + 過去分詞 — 過去の出来事が今も関係しているhave mentioned · have heard · have done
受動態 be + 過去分詞 — 誰がするかより、何が起きるかに焦点を当てるwill be focused · are directed · is forced

シャドーイングとは?英語上達に効果的な理由

シャドーイング(Shadowing)は、もともとプロの通訳者養成プログラムで開発された言語学習法で、多言語習得者として知られるDr. Alexander Arguelles によって広く普及されました。方法はシンプルですが非常に効果的:ネイティブスピーカーの英語を聞きながら、1〜2秒の遅延で声に出してすぐに繰り返す——まるで「影(shadow)」のように話者を追いかけます。文法ドリルや受動的なリスニングと異なり、シャドーイングは脳と口の筋肉が同時にリアルタイムで英語を処理・再現することを強制します。研究により、発音精度、抑揚、リズム、連音、リスニング力、そして会話の流暢さが大幅に向上することが確認されています。IELTSスピーキング対策や自然な英語コミュニケーションを目指す方に特におすすめです。

シャドーイングのやり方: ステップ別の完全ガイドを読む →