American accent training. Welcome back English  practicer. Thank you for practicing your English speaking with me again today. This is going  to be a basic review of some of the uh core components of the American accent. First, let's  practice some key sounds of American English. The R sound. The American R is strong. Strong and  everywhere. It's everywhere. It's strong. It's American. All right. The um sound as in her. Work.  Hear the in there. Work. Work. Word. Word. Yo, word up. Let's get to work. Did you see her?  Her work word. All right, let's try the R sound.

R. Car. Start part. Car start part. That one's  easy. All right. The or sound or for more story for more story for more story.  Continue or. All right. Good.

Let's just go through these quick. Car car part work work early early girl.

Right, right, around around right right around the corner. There was a girl.  She was working early on part of her car. Oh, look at that. I made a whole story with those  words on the spot. Ad living. All right, here's some uh pairs here. Cod  card. Cod card. Cod card. Cod card.

Caught. Caught. Caught. Caught. Caught. This one's  a longer sound. Caught. Caught. Caught. Walk.

Work. Walk. work. I walk to work. Do you walk to  work? Yes, I walk to work. I try not to get caught when I sleep on the cop. All right, here's a  t sound. Water. Water. Water. What? It's not a T sound. It's a D sound. Water becomes water.  Water. Water. Drink some water. Better. Better.

You better do it. You better You better drink some  water. City city. I live in the city. City. I'm a city boy. Waiting. I'm waiting. I'm waiting to  get some water in the city. Are you waiting?

It's better to put water in a bottle.  It's better to put water in a bottle.

It's better to put water in a bottle.  It's better to put water in a bottle.

Good. He's waiting in the city. Where's  he waiting? He's waiting in the city.

All right. The vowel length is important  and the quality of the vowel sound. Cat.

We're going to exaggerate here  so that we can really reduce our accent. Right. Cat. Bad.  Bad cat. Don't be a bad cat.

Jacket. Jacket. Father. Father. Father.  Are you hot? Take off your jacket.

Hot hot father. Oh, I'm a hot father. Yeah. Okay,  that's enough of that. [laughter] All right, here's some more vowel length and quality. Cup.  Cup. Luck. Luck. Above. Above. Bird. Bird. Her her first first her first bird above the cup.  That's a bad sentence. I'm just trying to make something up. Okay. Now, word stress  is important, too, right? Like table window.

American or America. America American English.  American English. I often get asked, well, where do I put the stress? Ah, that's  so hard. There's there are rules, but it's it's so difficult. You just need to  do lots of repetition and practice and hearing and listening and it becomes natural.  You just know where to put the stress.

That's the best I can do for you there,  man. Sorry. All right. Misstressing a word can make it hard to understand. For example,  photography or see I I messed up. [snorts] This is photography and this photograph. This  is a photograph. This is photography.

Photography. photograph. You see where the stress  is can change the meaning of the word even though it's spelled the same. All right. Sentence stress  in a sentence. Content words, that's the nouns, the main verbs, the adjective adverbs, those  get more stress, the content words. And the function words a, the, to, of, and, can, do, etc.  Those are reduced. Not always. This is generally speaking. I want to go to the store. I want to go  to the store. All right. So, we're comparing that to we're stressing want. Go. Store. Those are the  important words. These are not so important. Well, they're they are important, but less. So, they're  reduced a bit. Huh. I want to go to the store.

This is a general advice, not not standard across  everything. Let's look at some connected speech.

Native speakers don't pronounce every word  separately. They connect words together. You know this, right? Like linking patterns. Go  out. Go out. Go out. I'm going to go out. Are you going to go out? I'm going to go out. See it?  Do you see it? Do you see it? I see it. I see it.

Take it. Take it. Here. Take it. Do you see it?  Yeah, I see it. Go ahead and take it. Take it and go out. Go out. I'm going to say those  nice and slow. I was going too fast. Go out.

Go out. See it. See it. Take it. Take it. All  right. So, you can also re reductions for two, four, and these. These are common. You know  these, right? Going to going to Are you going to go? I'm going to go. Want to wanna I want to  go. For becomes for in fast speech. What for?

What [snorts] for? That sounds weird. What for? Um  I'm going for I'm going for a walk. I'm going for a walk. Do you want to come with me? I'm going to  go for a walk. There we go. I'm going to go for a walk. Do you want to come with me? Rock and roll,  baby. Rock and roll. So, the and becomes in. Rock roll. I can't think of any other ones right off  the top of my head. Um, yeah, hot and cold. Also, here's some advice. When practicing speaking  English in my videos, pay attention to connected speech, common linking patterns, and reductions.  then gradually include them in your own speech as you become more comfortable using them. It takes  time. It takes lots of exposure. It takes lots of listening and it takes lots of trying to mimic  and repeat to finally get the feel for it. It takes time. So, how do you reduce your accent? You  want to reduce your accent, use focused imitation.

That's what we do. Imitation. You imitate  me. You shadow me. You try to copy me. You try to reduce your accent. You build your muscle  memory. The the way your mouth moves. You have to listen carefully to the sound I'm making and then  mimic that sound. That's muscle memory buildup in your mouth. Listen carefully to the sounds, the  rhythms, the stress and inonation and then mimic what you hear. This is basic good advice, right?  You know this. And that was our basic review of American accent training. Thank you so much for  practicing with me again today. This has been an English coach Chad presentation. Boom. Good  workout. Keep moving forward. One step at a time.

Having some fun while we practice English. Hey,  I'll see you in the next English speaking video.