Shadowing Practice: Learn the IPA for English Consonants! - Learn English Speaking with Video

Choose a practice mode

Each mode opens a full-screen practice room.

426 sentences

If sentences are too short or too long, click Edit to adjust them.

So as we get into sounds, we should know a little bit about our speech organs.

Now, it's important to know that we do not have any specialized organs just for speech.

And what I mean by that is, of course, we have organs that are used for speech, but their primary function is biological.

And one of their secondary functions is to use for speech.

In other words, we've adapted those organs to be used for communication purposes.

So for example, what the lungs are doing is they're taking in oxygen.

So O2 comes in or just O oxygen, whatever.

I'm not a chemist.

And then carbon dioxide comes out, CO2 comes out.

So that's their primary function.

But in terms of what it's doing for speech is it's giving us air that we use to make our sounds.

Because if we couldn't shoot air out of our mouth while we speak, then we wouldn't be making any audible noises.

The larynx consists of the epiglottis, supraglottis, vocal cord glottis, and subglottis.

It's this little area down in here.

And in speech, it is used to produce voicing.

So in other words, the difference between an S sound

and a Z sound is just whether your vocal folds are vibrating or not.

So if you hold your thumb and your index finger

and you put it around the front of your throat and you make the sound S and Z, you'll notice when you make Z,

it will feel vibration in your fingers.

While if you make S, you're not going to feel any vibration at all.

So it is your vocal cords, your vocal folds that are vibrating, that are causing that difference between S and Z.

and your glottis is the area around or I should say in between your vocal folds where air is passing through.

So we'll take a look at a diagram in a bit

and hopefully it'll make a little bit more sense about why vibration occurs.

So when we take a look at voiceless and voice diagrams here

This is a top -down look through your neck.

So you can see the glottis here.

This is the front of your neck and this is the back.

And we see what are called arytenoid cartilages right here.

So I will write that there, arytenoid cartilage.

And what happens in a voiceless sound is they're pretty loose.

So as air flows up through your glottis out of your mouth,

these vocal folds, which I'll color in red right here, are pretty loose.

So they're not vibrating as air goes through.

But in voice sounds, you're going to have vibrations.

So what happens is these arytenoid cartilages tighten up, so they kind of pull forward.

These vocal folds get really, really close together and then

when air comes through air is coming through at such a high turbulence

and the vocal folds are so tight

that they begin to vibrate this is like a guitar string

so if you were to pluck a guitar string

when it's loose it wouldn't vibrate but if you were to strike it

while it's tight it would vibrate quite a lot

and instead of using your finger to pluck it instead the vocal folds are being plucked by air essentially

so there's some sound con sound contrast you can here like h

and high doesn't have any vibration the p

and lap you might get some vibration at the end

when the vowel comes out but just the p itself is not vibrating f and t and fort

if you make that f sound

and hold it you're not going to feel any vibrations and the K in like doesn't have any vibrations either.

In comparison, we have D, D, D has some vibration.

The G in G has some vibration.

If you hold an L sound, you'll feel a vibration on your throat.

And same with live, that V sound has some vibration too.

So when you learn voiceless and voice sounds, it is a good idea to learn some of them in pairs.

So for example, P and B are the same sound, except one is voiced, which you write VD, and P is voiceless, which you write VLS.

Same with the TD contrast and KG.

So these are all very similar sounds that only differ in voicing.

Some do not have voiceless counterparts like L and R.

It's just R but upside down.

It's the specific symbol that we use and then there's other contrasts like F

and V and S and Z and so on.

So we'll learn all of these.

Now, instead of learning the cymbals first and learning whether they're voiceless or voiced,

it's best just to play around with your throat and feel it to see if these sounds are voiceless or voiced.

So try it yourself.

Now in massive, sss, when you feel your throat, you do not feel any vibration at all.

This is voiceless, and I'll give you the symbol for this.

It is just s.

In the case of flavor, rrr, if you hold that, you definitely feel a vibration.

So this is voiced, and we use an upside down r to make this rrr sound.

That's the symbol for it.

Turnip.

There's definitely no vibration on the P sound.

So this is voiceless.

And we just use the letter P for that.

And then for the verb use, use, this one has vibration.

This is voiced.

And we use a Z symbol for this because this is the Z sound, use.

If you think of use as a noun, then things are a little bit different.

Because if you say use, suddenly this is voiceless, and we would use the S symbol for that, because that is the S sound,

voiceless, use, compared to use.

So the difference between a noun and a verb in this case is whether or not the sound is voiceless or voiced.

Now, we're going to segment our vocal tract into two different cavities.

So the vocal tract will be everything above the larynx, so consider it from this area up.

And our vocal tract is used to shape sounds.

So in other words, the tongue and the lips are going to do things to change the sound that we output,

and we could even let air through our nose to produce certain sounds.

So everything that comes out of the mouth is considered the oral cavity, and if it comes out of the nose,

then things are going through the nasal cavity.

Oh, let's ask ourselves, are these questions nasal or not?

So when we look at these certain sounds like kuh, n, n, and ss, or zs,

we have to ask if air is coming out of our nose.

And one way to check this is just to see

if you can pronounce the sound with your mouth completely closed

so sack now I gotta let air out of my mouth

so this is an oral sound

it's coming out of the mouth in the case of flaming

100

I can keep my mouth closed no air is coming out in fact

101

if I put my fingers in front of my nose flaming

102

you can kind of feel air come out of your nose so this is a nasal sound and we use this symbol.

103

It's an N with a little hook and that represents that NG sound we have in English.

104

What about turn?

105

You can hear the nasality in it.

106

So this is a nasal sound and this is just an N symbol.

107

And finally for use or use, air is clearly coming out of my mouth here.

108

This is an oral sound and depending on whether this is a noun or a verb, it'll either be S or Z.

109

a sack in the first one is just a K or our symbol.

110

Now we're going to learn the consonants before we learn the vowels.

111

And when we learn consonants, we want to be able to describe each sound and symbol.

112

So we have three different dimensions that we can describe them on.

113

We've already talked about voicing, but we'll review it anyway.

114

And there's also the place that the sound is taking place.

115

So in other words, which articulators in your mouth are shaping the sound?

116

Is it at your lips, like both lips?

117

Is it your bottom lip and top teeth?

118

Is it the little ridge in your mouth?

119

Is it right behind the teeth?

120

Is it more towards the back of the mouth?

121

That's going to be the place.

122

And then the manner of articulation is going to tell us

123

what the airflow is doing as it comes out of our vocal tract, either oral or nasal cavity.

124

So you can think about three dimensions.

125

There's the vocal fold vibration, there's the place that the sound is being shaped, and there's the way that the airflow is coming out.

126

So for voiceless sounds, these are sounds like TTK, SFH, so H, T, K, S, F, H.

127

And the voice sounds have that vibration, so B, D, G, S, V, M, M.

128

And then also, every single vowel that we have in English is going to be voiced as well.

129

So whenever you have a vowel, you don't have to worry about asking if it's voiceless or voiced.

130

It's going to be voiced.

131

There are some languages that do have voiceless vowels, but usually in very specific circumstances.

132

So if you go back to the IPA chart, what you're going to see in each box is usually a separation.

133

The one on the left is the voiceless sound, and the one on the right is the voiced sound.

134

So as we go through the different places of articulation, we'll also point out the contrast between voiceless and voiced.

135

And as you use them more, as you think about them more and feel your throat more,

136

you'll become more familiar with these sounds and it'll become quite second nature.

137

So we're going to illustrate a lot of these with face diagrams.

138

And if we wanted to check whether or not a sound is voiceless or voiced in our face diagram representation,

139

we're looking at this little line down here.

140

If it's wavy, that means that it's voiced.

141

If it's a straight line, this will mean that it's voiceless.

142

So this is just going to be a way to indicate on face diagrams whether

143

or not a sound is voiceless or voiced.

144

And this is not a bad way in order to see the sounds

145

and think about them if you can't visually imagine them inside your own mind.

146

So the place of articulation is the second dimension that we'll take a look at.

147

And when you learn these sounds, it is very important that you produce the sounds in your mouth

148

and you think about them and you try to feel where your tongue is

149

and what your lips are doing because the best way to learn phonetics is not to memorize things.

150

It is to use your mouth as a cheat sheet and to really understand how the sounds are being made.

151

So take time with sounds and consciously try to feel what is happening in your mouth.

152

So the first place of articulation error is the bilabial sounds.

153

In other words, bi meaning two and labial meaning lips.

154

I'm sure there are jokes you can make with the word labial, but we will not say them here.

155

Okay, so we have three bilabial sounds in English.

156

One is the puh sound, and this is a voiceless sound.

157

So pitch, happy, flap, pan.

158

There will be some differences in how it's pronounced.

159

For example, in pitch, it's a little bit more airy than in happy.

160

And in flap, it's not really released compared to pitch, we're happy.

161

But we'll talk about those differences a little bit later.

162

We have P's voiced counterpart, buh.

163

So this one is voiced in words like bar, rubble, job, or butler.

164

There's usually just one way to pronounce this.

165

Although at the end of a word like job, you may not release the B.

166

So it may just be like job with no release of air afterwards.

167

And then we have a nasal sound.

168

So this is voiced as well.

169

Anything that comes out of your nose is voiced.

170

So minus, hammer, wham is that M sound.

171

So these are the three bilabial sounds, and you'll usually denote them by having two closed lips at the front of your diagram.

172

There are more bilabial sounds, but these are just the ones in English.

173

Now we have two labiodental sounds in English.

174

So labio meaning lip again and dental meaning tooth.

175

So this is bottom lip and upper teeth.

176

So we have F and V.

177

F is the voiceless version and V is the voiced version.

178

So in flavor, half, rough, that F sound.

179

You can feel your bottom lip touching your top teeth.

180

And same with Venus, lives, save it's the same as F it's just

181

that your vocal folds are vibrating so if you know F you know V

182

if you know V you know F just feel your throat and you can feel that difference

183

interdental is exactly what you'd think it would mean dental meaning teeth

184

and inter meaning in between so we have a voiceless version

185

and a voiced version now in English both of these are just th sounds

186

but there is a difference

187

so in think bath ethereal these are voiceless you do not feel any vibration in your throat

188

when you say it but when you say this or though or father

189

you can feel vibration there

190

so we have two different sounds here

191

we have the theta symbol for the voiceless one it's the same as it's pronounced in theta

192

or theta depending how you want to say it.

193

And then we have what's called ed for the voiced one, which looks like a delta with a little squiggle through it.

194

And this one to me kind of looks like a D.

195

I also know that D is a voice sound, so that's just how I initially remembered it when I first learned these sounds.

196

We have a lot of different alveolar sounds, and this is your hard ridge that is right behind your teeth.

197

So if you put your tongue up against the back of your teeth and you drag it back,

198

eventually you're going to feel it start to move up.

199

That hard ridge right before you start to move up is what's called your alveolar ridge.

200

So T, D, N, L, the S and Z.

201

These are sounds that you make at that ridge.

202

So T and D.

203

are voiceless and voiced counterparts.

204

So as in trade, Matt and falter, you can not feel any vibration in your throat.

205

And then the D version, which is voiced for durable, tied, made, usually represented with the D letter in English.

206

Now we have a nasal sound, which is voiced our N noise, noggin, ban.

207

We have air coming through our nose when we pronounce the N sound

208

and then we have L which is also a voice sound in light fall and tremble.

209

There is a difference in the way that you pronounced L at the beginning and end of a syllable.

210

Light really comes off that alveolar ridge while fall if you pronounce

211

that like an English speaker you'll have your tongue bunched up a little bit at the back as well

212

when you produce fall.

213

So it would be the same in shremble.

214

It's at the end of a syllable, so we could have that little bunching up at the back, but these are still L sounds.

215

Now we have S, Z, and R as well.

216

So S is the voiceless version of Z, so S would be straight,

217

mass, rancid, and Z would be made zebra present, so you can feel that vibration in your vocal fold.

218

Sometimes S makes the Z sound, so we don't want to be trusting our letters.

219

We want to be trusting our pronunciation.

220

And finally, we also have R, which is voiced, so in running, far, attacker.

221

We use an upside down R for this.

222

The reason is because a right side up R, a regular R, is actually a trill.

223

So this is what they would have in Spanish when you have a word like perro with two r's.

224

I can't really do trills, but if you think of a traditional Spanish r, that is what the upside right r is.

225

Now we have four post -alveolar sounds, two voiceless voiced pair.

226

So the first two are sh and zh,

227

and your tongue isn't really touching the alveolar ridge or behind it,

228

but it's a little bit further behind the alveolar sounds and it's pretty close.

229

It's causing a lot of turbulence.

230

So in the case of shrimp bash and lashing, this is usually the sh letters in English.

231

Sometimes they appear in other letter formats, but think of your typical sh.

232

This is your integral sign and this is also called esh.

233

Now we have a j sound, which is just sh, but with vocal fold vibration.

234

So treasure, azure, vision.

235

And this looks like a Z with a little curve on it.

236

And this is called edge.

237

I don't know how you spell edge, but that is my guess for how you would spell it.

238

We have another voiceless voiced pair.

239

You see the j from before badge, jump, and fragile but we also have that ch version that is voiceless like chirp, bat, ch, chump.

240

So these two are combinations of other sounds.

241

So the voiceless ch is a combination of t and sh.

242

And if you pronounce those both simultaneously, you get ch, you get that ch sound.

243

And with badge and judge, it's like doing a d followed by a j immediately.

244

D j j j j.

245

So we need the tie bar on top to symbolize that this is one sound.

246

We have one palatal sound.

247

So this is kind of like in the dead center of your mouth near the top.

248

This is the Y sound.

249

We use the J symbol for it.

250

So words like young, yes, and yearn.

251

That is Y.

252

This one's a little bit harder to feel, but you'll feel the center of your tongue being pushed towards the top of your mouth,

253

but not quite touching.

254

Young.

255

And I should mention, this one is voiced as well.

256

Now, in terms of our velar sounds, which are almost the final sounds we have, we have kuh, guh, and n.

257

Kuh and guh are voiceless and voiced counterparts, so kick, call, toucan, while guh has that vibration in gone, grumble, and bag.

258

And finally we have ing, which is voiced, it's a nasal sound, and this represents that ng sound,

259

and occasionally sounds before the letter k or g.

260

So running, hitting, ink.

261

If you say ink, you can feel that ng at the back of your mouth, right up against the velum there. So ink.

262

If it were alveolar like a regular N, it would be ink, ink, and we don't say that.

263

That's a little bit difficult to say.

264

We say ink with ing at the back.

265

Now, our final two sounds are H and the glottal stop.

266

The glottal stop is considered to be voiced, I believe, and the H is voiceless this.

267

So it's a little bit hard to hear the glottal stop because basically it's no air coming out.

268

So, uh, oh, it's that middle sound between up and oh, oh, or even if you say the word button,

269

button, button, uh, there's like that little pause there, button, mountain.

270

It's that little space where you're not really pronouncing anything.

271

Basically air is getting trapped behind the glottis like where your

272

vocal folds are like the vocal folds are shut tight air is trapped behind

273

and then is released now with h happy aha aha these are voiceless sounds

274

and this is just air coming out of your vocal folds like a steady stream

275

so just a quick check

276

we take a look at some of these underlined sounds what is the place of articulation where we're making them

277

and feel where they are in your mouth try not to rely too much on the examples so in america where is

278

that being made well that's being made towards the back

279

this is a velar sound your tongue is pushed up against your velum

280

and this would be the k symbol in canada duh duh

281

this is at your alveolar ridge you can feel your tongue at

282

that hard little ridge there before it starts to go upwards in your mouth

283

and this is just a d sound new england england glen g g g g g

284

this is at the back as well right where the k is

285

and this would just be our g sound so this is also velar

286

and finally for washington it's not quite at the alveolar ridge it's a little bit further behind

287

so we call this a post -alveolar sound and

288

if we want to know the symbol for this this is esh this is our integral sign

289

so those are where the different sounds are being produced in our mouths now we can put things together

290

and describe each sound with a symbol a voicing any place

291

so I encourage you to try this

292

and this is the best way in order to build up

293

your knowledge is just to do this a bunch of times

294

and really start to feel where the sounds are in your mouth until it becomes second nature. So trick.

295

This is a voiceless sound.

296

There's no vibration in the throat.

297

And this is alveolar because it's being made up at hard ridge.

298

And this is just the T symbol. In catsup.

299

That's a voiceless sound.

300

It is made with your two lips.

301

So this is bilabial.

302

And this is just the P sound.

303

Now in leisure

304

or leisure doesn't really matter what the vowel is it's it's voiced we can feel the vibration

305

and this is where that SH sound is it's a little bit behind the alveolar ridge

306

so this is considered a post -alveolar sound and

307

if we remember the symbol for this this is the Z with a little curl at the bottom this is edge.

308

Now in the case of mapping NG, NG, air is coming out of our nose.

309

This is voice.

310

We feel vibrations too.

311

NG is made with your tongue against your velum in the back.

312

So this is a velar sound.

313

And this is the N with a little hook on it.

314

This is also written as engma, if you want to give a name to this sound.

315

Finally, in wither, wither, th, th.

316

This is voiced.

317

It's made with our tongue between our two teeth, our top and bottom teeth.

318

So this is going to be interdental.

319

And the symbol we have for this is our little delta with a squiggle through it.

320

So we're now able to describe sounds in terms of voicing and place.

321

We just have to learn about manner.

322

When we talk about manner of articulation, we're talking about what the airflow is doing as it goes through the vocal tract.

323

So either through the oral cavity or the nasal cavity.

324

So if we take a look at these two diagrams on the page,

325

You'll notice that if we draw airflow from our lungs out of our mouth on the left diagram,

326

we get some closure, some stoppage of air before it's released.

327

While if we compare the one on the right side,

328

then we can see that actually the air can continuously flow out through a very narrow passageway.

329

So what we would say is

330

that the sound on the left is representative of a stop where air is held before released,

331

while the one on the right would be an example of a fricative.

332

In other words, there's a little bit of frication there while the air is continuously escaping outside of your mouth.

333

So we'll go through each of the manners of articulation and show the sounds that represent each of those.

334

So the first one is stop and this is

335

when we have air that gets blocked behind an articulator in the mouth before it's released.

336

So in the left one this is a bilabial stop

337

and these are stops bilabial because the air is being held right behind the lips right before it's released.

338

So these are the sounds p and b and also m in this case although m is a little bit special

339

We'll talk about that in just a moment.

340

In the middle diagram, we see air being held right behind the alveolar ridge.

341

So these are sounds like T and D, and N will also be a special case.

342

Now in the third example, we can see it's voiced, and as air tries to get through,

343

it's being held right behind the velum here, but it has an escape passage through the nose.

344

So this is an example of a nasal stop in this case.

345

And we can have velar stops where we don't have it going through the nasal cavity, in other words, K and G,

346

but we do have that ang sound, which is what this diagram represents.

347

So when we think about stops, we shouldn't be thinking about it whether air is continuously leaving our mouth or nose,

348

but rather the fact that air is being stopped in the oral tract.

349

so the fact

350

that air is being stopped in this position behind the velum does mean it's a stop

351

but the fact that it's going through the nose it's being redirected makes it a nasal stop

352

so it's going to be the same with m

353

and with n in both of these cases you'll still have air being stopped inside your oral cavity

354

but air will also escape through the nasal passage at the same time

355

which means that you can hold those sounds

356

so all of the english stops are listed below the only one we haven't shown is the glottal stop

357

and that's because the stop is being made right where your vocal folds are right behind the glottis there.

358

So it's a little bit hard to show that in a base diagram when you actually have a glottal stop.

359

Now the second one is a fricative.

360

So this is where airflow is turbulent and continuous, leaving the oral cavity.

361

So what we don't have listed here are the labiodental ones,

362

F and V, but we do have S and Z on the left diagram there.

363

In fact, if I'm being perfect, I really shouldn't cross my Zs there.

364

So air is continuously coming out between the tongue and the alveolar ridge.

365

Now these are turbulent, so there's a very tight constriction there.

366

And what this means is

367

that the air pressure inside of your mouth is going to be more dense than the air pressure outside of your mouth.

368

So the fact that you have that difference in air pressure is what's causing that frication, what's causing that noisiness.

369

So that's S and Z in the left one.

370

In the middle we have palatal alveolars, so we have the sh and j sounds, and then on the right we have our interdental,

371

our th and th sounds.

372

So in the face diagram for the interdental, it's a little bit hard to see,

373

but there is space between your teeth and between your tongue and your teeth where air can come out,

374

but the air pressure inside is much denser than the air pressure outside of your mouth.

375

So with H, H is going to be down at the bottom where your glottis is,

376

and for the F and V sounds you would have the lower lip

377

and the top teeth with a little bit of space in between.

378

It would look a lot like the interdental one, but the lip would be facing upwards in that case.

379

Now we have affricates.

380

So you can think of an affricate as a combination of a stop and fricative, it begins as a stop,

381

and then immediately releases into a fricative.

382

So even when you think about how the sounds are formed in the cymbal, it's basically a stop plus a fricative,

383

with a tie bar above to say that these are simultaneously being made.

384

So it's a little bit hard in a face diagram to show these.

385

Here's an attempt on the right, where the black is where the tongue starts, so right behind the alveolar ridge,

386

and then it quickly moves up to release.

387

So you can hold these sounds a little bit, but it does start to sound like that sh sound at the end, or with j.

388

It does sound like at the end of it because that is where the tongue ends up.

389

So you can think of an affricate as a combination of a stop and fricative at the same time.

390

And other languages will have other affricates.

391

So for example, German will have the E and F affricate. And something like

392

Greek would have the P and the S together like in psychology, which would be pronounced something like psychologia.

393

You can hear that PS at the beginning.

394

Japanese would also have an example of a TS together like in the word tsunami

395

so in English you would write tsunami

396

and we'd probably pronounce it without the T

397

but in Japanese you would pronounce

398

it with the T as one sound with the S tsunami

399

now we have a couple special sounds called liquids these are kind of like fricatives but the airflow is much freer so

400

Lateral liquids, we just have one, which is the L.

401

We call this lateral because when we make this sound, the tongue is making contact with your alveolar ridge here.

402

The tongue looks a little bit like this if I were to draw it.

403

But air is flowing through the sides of the tongue.

404

You don't have any turbulence there, and the pressure inside and outside of your mouth is pretty equal.

405

In the case of the rhodic liquid, which is R,

406

it's very similar to L except the tongue is gonna bunch up a little bit in the back

407

it's gonna look a little weird with that diagram

408

but with rhodic liquids you get a little bit of tongue bunching at the end

409

and air is flowing pretty continuously you don't hear any turbulence

410

when you hear err err the airflow is pretty similar inside

411

and outside of the mouth now the last manner of articulation are glides and these are sometimes called semi -vowels.

412

They're basically consonant sounds that are nearly indistinguishable from their vowel counterparts.

413

So we have two, we have the voiced labio -velar glide W.

414

So labio here is for the rounded lips and velar is the place where you also have some tongue action.

415

So in a word like watch or ooh ooh or whimper, this is a glide.

416

It is very, very similar to the vowel sound ooh.

417

In fact, if you were to change the W to an ooh and go whimper,

418

whimper, you'd probably hear it as a W if you're an English speaker.

419

And then we have our voiced palatal glide, yuh.

420

So in yes, yearn, and value, the yuh sound is kind of hidden between the L and the U.

421

So if we were to actually write this out, val -u, we don't say val -u or va -u,

422

we say val -u, and we get that yuh sound right before our u sound.

423

So this is very similar to the sound e in terms of its actual pronunciation and articulation.

424

So you can think of these semi -vowels or glides as being like very quickly articulated,

425

there's not really contact with any point at the top of your mouth

426

so it does behave a little bit more like a vowel than a consonant in some ways

Download App

Everything you need to speak fluently

AI PronunciationScore every sentence

IPA PracticeMaster every sound

VocabularyBuild your word bank

Vocab GameLearn while playing

Scan QR

Download on theApp Store Get it onGoogle Play

FOR YOU

Recommend Video

56 sentences

Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson

This speaking lesson is built on the video “Learn the IPA for English Consonants!”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: sound, voiceless, voiced, mouth, vibration. This video has 426 sentences and 5405 words to shadow. The speech runs for 33:19. The speaker talks at a natural 162 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. Only 80% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.

Key vocabulary in this video

15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
vibration noun	/vaɪˈbɹeɪʃən/	The act of vibrating or the condition of being vibrated.
vocal adjective	/ˈvoʊ̯.kəl/	Of, pertaining to, or resembling the human voice or speech.
symbol noun	/ˈsɪmbəl/	A character or glyph representing an idea, concept or object.
ridge noun	/ɹɪd͡ʒ/	The back of any animal; especially the upper or projecting part of the back of a quadruped.
fold verb	/ˈfəʊld/	To bend (any thin material, such as paper) over so that it comes in contact with itself.
diagram noun	/ˈdaɪ.ə.ɡɹæm/	A plan, drawing, sketch or outline to show the function or operation of something, or to show the relationships between the parts of a whole.
pronounce verb	/pɹəˈnaʊns/	To declare formally, officially or ceremoniously.
throat noun	/ˈθɹoʊt/	The front part of the neck.
lip noun	/lɪp/	Either of the two fleshy protrusions around the opening of the mouth.
cavity noun	/ˈkæv.ɪt.i/	A hollow area within the body.
oral adjective	/ˈɔː.ɹəl/	Relating to the mouth.
tract noun	/tɹækt/	An area or expanse.
continuously adverb	/kənˈtɪnjuəsli/	Without pause.
counterpart noun	/ˈkaʊntɚˌpɑɹt/	Either of two parts that fit together or otherwise complement one another.
contrast noun	/kənˈt(ʃ)ɹæst/	The degree of this difference.

Phrasal verbs you will hear

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
come out verb	/ˌkʌm ˈaʊt/	To be discovered; to be revealed.
go through verb		To travel from one end of something to the other.
come through verb		To come into a room or other space through a door or passageway.
move up verb		To promote, put onto a higher level.
build up verb		To erect; to construct.
close together adjective		Near each other in time or space.
come off verb		To become detached.
come out in verb		to be afflicted by (a visible disruption of the body)

Sentences worth repeating

Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:

Is it at your lips, like both lips?
Is it your bottom lip and top teeth?
Is it the little ridge in your mouth?
We'll talk about that in just a moment.

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:

Structure	In the video
Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result	If you hold an L sound, you'll feel · If it's a straight line, this will mean
Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it	are called · being plucked · is voiced
Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing	version, which is · sound, which is · sounds, which are
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now	we've adapted · We've already talked · haven't shown

Pronunciation to watch

The speaker uses 73 contractions and reduced forms, such as don't, we'll, we're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.

The “th” sounds: throat /ˈθɹoʊt/, bath /bɑːθ/, tooth /tuθ/, thumb /ˈθʌm/, theta /ˈθiːtə/
The “sh” and “zh” sounds: vibration /vaɪˈbɹeɪʃən/, contrast /kənˈt(ʃ)ɹæst/, dimension /daɪˈmɛn.ʃən/, leisure /ˈlɛʒə(ɹ)/, pronunciation /pɹəˌnʌn.siˈeɪ.ʃən/
Long words — get the stress right: continuously /kənˈtɪnjuəsli/, simultaneously /ˌsaɪmlˈteɪnɪəsli/, pronunciation /pɹəˌnʌn.siˈeɪ.ʃən/, essentially /ɪˈsɛnʃəli/, occasionally /əˈkeɪʒənəli/

How to practise with this video

Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like vibration, vocal, symbol.

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

Shadowing technique: read the full step-by-step guide →

Shadowing Practice: Learn the IPA for English Consonants! - Learn English Speaking with Video

Choose a practice mode

Download App

Phonetics and Phonology: Introduction

The Schwa Sound | English Pronunciation Training

Your Voice Is a Wind Instrument | Matt Abrahams on Projecting Without Straining

Sentence Stress and Intonation in English (The Complete Guide)

English doesn’t have 5 vowels!

Why Native Speakers Swallow the T

Learn English with TIE: Rhythm

How to Perfect Your American Accent REALLY FAST | Master Vowel Sounds (A to U)

Unvoiced vs. Voiced: American English Pronunciation

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) CONSONANTS Part 1

Learn English Speaking in 30 Days | Day 4 | Daily English Conversation Practice

15 Minute Morning Pronunciation Practice for English Learners