English Accent Training — Practise Steps and Prose
Hello to all accent reduction people who are wishing to attain a British English accent — from an experienced English accent coach in London!
To be understood is not just beneficial, it is uppermost in any communication!
Over Spain, Greece, China, France, Russia, Italy, US, Middle East — there really is a worldwide aspiration to be able to speak with the neutral and highly desired British English accent. What speakers ask for is to reduce their habitual accent; to modify their accent sounds that are confusing listeners and to be fully and easily understood in any professional and social situation.
Accent reduction study, moving towards a British English accent, is a way to be understood at any public event, at any presentation you may be giving and in any newly made social interactions.
British English can bring with it an authoritative air and tone which may initially feel unnatural but it offers an important way to cut through any unclear communication that impedes your story being told and understood. It is an active and direct sound focussed at the front of the mouth aiming to land clearly and generously!
How we speak is so very personal and to change habitual sounds can feel uncomfortable at first. Professional accent support and guidance is most helpful!
Let’s begin by making the /th/
Finding this sound can create some resistance and sensitivity during practise.
To move our tongue forward through our lips when we have been keeping that particular part of our anatomy hidden, can be, well, embarrassing!
But, do believe me - it will only involve a very brief journey out for your tongue to enable you to make this important /th/ sound!
This means building muscle memory - strengthening muscles that have not been worked before and eventually these changes become so much easier with time, practise and repetition, creating a new habit.
As making the /th/ involves taking the tongue forward through the lips it will be helpful if, first, as a warm up, you exercise the muscle in question.
Using a mirror, move the tongue forward out of the mouth and hold it there for a few seconds. Then, let the tongue reach for your nose [hold] then your right ear [hold], chin [hold] and ending with your left ear [hold]. Do this sequence several times and gently increase the speed of movement. Always check you have no pain, just a feeling of the muscles being worked. Finish this warm up by taking the tongue fully round in a large muscular circle from the nose to the right ear, chin and left ear and move the tongue back into the mouth. Do this x3.
Now, let’s begin!
There are 2 /th/ sounds:
voiceless [as in thought, through, thing]
voiced [as in those, there, weather]
Try your hand [or your tongue] for this voiceless sound:
Step 1
Place your forefinger an inch from your lips.
Step 2
Allow the very tip of your tongue to lightly contact your gum ridge - that’s the bony ridge which holds in our top teeth.
So, now, tap that several times against the ridge [the English /t/ and /d/ consonants are made in exactly this place]
Step 3
From /t/ to /th/ direct your tongue gently through the lips feeling a soft cool air playing along the middle of your tongue, letting the tongue come into contact with your forefinger to form the /th/ sound. Take the tongue back into the mouth. Repeat 3 times. Tap the gum ridge, extend tongue and contact your finger. Use a mirror to see exactly what is happening.
Have a practise on some single words initially [3 times each is helpful]
thought thing third three thirty
Then try a sentence, or two….
Three thousand three hundred and thirty three breathtaking thoughts!
It’s always a good idea not to push or to ‘try’ too hard — just feel and sense the movement needed and where the contact is being made — here, for the /th/, it’s the tongue contacting with the upper and lower teeth and extending gently through the lips.
When you feel you have some confidence forming this new movement, try now for the voiced /th/. This involves the vibration of the vocal cords and the breath stepping in to give this sound a ‘buzz’.
Voiced /th/
Step 1
Allow your tongue to move forwards through the teeth and imagine you have a vocal bee ‘buzzing’ behind your upper teeth
Step 2
Feel your throat for the sound vibrations. This is a fuller sound with the vibrations apparent on your tongue and connecting with the upper and lower teeth.
Step 3
Practise these words sustaining the ‘buzz’ as long as possible:
those this then father leather
Practise this phrase:
Whether the weather is hot, or whether the weather is cold, I will manage the weather whatever the weather, because I’m incredibly bold!
Try now this piece of practise prose below, which includes a mixture of voiced and voiceless /th/ sounds. See how you go! I believe it’s helpful to mark out each /th/ sound and which of the voiced or voiceless they are before you begin. Then move through the text slowly and with accuracy, gently building up the flow of speech to help your confidence grow!
/th/ Practise prose
Martha was a thoughtful girl. She thought that things would not change.
When she opened her eyes in the morning there was a moth flying around her room. Three times the moth landed on her open window and she thought it would fly out. But it seemed to enjoy being there.
Martha counted up to thirty three and then got out of bed to shoo the moth away. But the moth was clearly enjoying the view from the window.
Martha called downstairs to her mother and her father to come and help with the moth.
Her father, Arthur, a rather thin man, was the first to arrive. Her mother, Bertha, a thrifty woman was making breakfast so was far too busy.
Martha thanked her father for coming to her rescue and pointed to the moth.
It looked rather happy clinging to the very thin lace curtain.
Martha’s father was rather forthright and asked Martha if she wanted him to
disperse of the moth without being too careful of the outcome.
Martha suddenly became very enthusiastic and thrilled about having the moth there and decided that it should stay where it was. Martha thanked her father for coming upstairs to help but said she was thinking about the moth rather seriously now and wished it would stay there.
So, thankfully, the moth remained on the curtain and Martha and Arthur went downstairs to Bertha and had a wonderful breakfast. The moth remained on the lace curtain until a breath of wind suddenly blew in and lifted the moth out of Martha’s room and gently away across the garden into the summer weather.
I hope you have enjoyed this practise!
If done each day, it will bear fruit within a couple of weeks! Clarifying the /th/ as voiced and voiceless will build towards a clearer diction and give you the confidence to move through your other changes gently and with a positive frame of mind!
Enjoy a sunny summer!
Ros