Voice Tones
There are many different reasons as to why many of you are learning English as a second language, some are learning in order to create more opportunity others require English for use socially.
Whatever the reason, we all share one common goal and that is to be understood. My pronunciation classes have been based on my experience of teaching over 350 Skype classes.
My experience with different nationalities include; Russia, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Netherlands, Japan, France and Korea and have highlighted some common factors between all my students, these are indicated bellow:
Sh- sound
Ch- sound
Th- sound
V- sound
B- sound
Y- sound
J- sound
L- sound
S- sound
Ed- sound
All of the above have proved to be challenging sounds, my classes have a unique way of hitting that correct sound. I achieve this by breaking words and transforming the spelling to reflect how the word actually sounds. Of the research conducted nearly 80 percent of Students wanted to perfect pronunciation without compromising their accent. One of the reasons stated was the need to demonstrate emotion.
To clarify, in this context it was referred to as anger, happiness, disappointment, interest and a want to reflect these characteristics in their normal speech patterns.
Taking all these factors into account, I designed a series of lessons based on the ability to develop the correct voice tones used to express emotion in everyday situations. Some of these are shown bellow:
- you are at a coffee shop, having ordered a coffee, you are angry that it has been served cold.
In this example, you want various levels of anger to be reflected in your speech;
" excuse me, my coffee is cold, could you give me another one please.
" excuse me, I am not happy, I have just ordered a coffee and it's cold!
" could I speak to the manager please, I have paid good money for this cup of coffee and I expect it to be hot! I am really not happy with the service here!"
" this is just not good enough, I have just bought a cup of coffee and I am really angry that having paid good money for it, it has been served cold! I would like to see the manager please!"
Other lesson examples include:
A delay at the Airport
Short changed at a retail shop
A delay with your order at a restaurant
Being charged for something that you have not bought
Excited about some good news
Anxious about something
My lessons are very role play based and tend to take you away from your own routine lives, placing you in very different scenarios where you have to think in English and apply very different types of sentence constructions rather than just reading about them.
Voice Tones
Consider the voice of a worker at a fast food restaurant- " hello, may I take your order?", most of us have learnt to accept that their voices reflect monotone sounds. Now picture the same words but this time applying emotion to them. It would certainly surprise you and may even influence your decision to return to the same restaurant.
On a serious note, voice tones can influence whether you have a ' job' or a ' career', it could also be the difference between a successful business and a failing one.
If you think that I can help develop your conversational skills, contact me today!
Sanj Saigal
Whatever the reason, we all share one common goal and that is to be understood. My pronunciation classes have been based on my experience of teaching over 350 Skype classes.
My experience with different nationalities include; Russia, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Netherlands, Japan, France and Korea and have highlighted some common factors between all my students, these are indicated bellow:
Sh- sound
Ch- sound
Th- sound
V- sound
B- sound
Y- sound
J- sound
L- sound
S- sound
Ed- sound
All of the above have proved to be challenging sounds, my classes have a unique way of hitting that correct sound. I achieve this by breaking words and transforming the spelling to reflect how the word actually sounds. Of the research conducted nearly 80 percent of Students wanted to perfect pronunciation without compromising their accent. One of the reasons stated was the need to demonstrate emotion.
To clarify, in this context it was referred to as anger, happiness, disappointment, interest and a want to reflect these characteristics in their normal speech patterns.
Taking all these factors into account, I designed a series of lessons based on the ability to develop the correct voice tones used to express emotion in everyday situations. Some of these are shown bellow:
- you are at a coffee shop, having ordered a coffee, you are angry that it has been served cold.
In this example, you want various levels of anger to be reflected in your speech;
" excuse me, my coffee is cold, could you give me another one please.
" excuse me, I am not happy, I have just ordered a coffee and it's cold!
" could I speak to the manager please, I have paid good money for this cup of coffee and I expect it to be hot! I am really not happy with the service here!"
" this is just not good enough, I have just bought a cup of coffee and I am really angry that having paid good money for it, it has been served cold! I would like to see the manager please!"
Other lesson examples include:
A delay at the Airport
Short changed at a retail shop
A delay with your order at a restaurant
Being charged for something that you have not bought
Excited about some good news
Anxious about something
My lessons are very role play based and tend to take you away from your own routine lives, placing you in very different scenarios where you have to think in English and apply very different types of sentence constructions rather than just reading about them.
Voice Tones
Consider the voice of a worker at a fast food restaurant- " hello, may I take your order?", most of us have learnt to accept that their voices reflect monotone sounds. Now picture the same words but this time applying emotion to them. It would certainly surprise you and may even influence your decision to return to the same restaurant.
On a serious note, voice tones can influence whether you have a ' job' or a ' career', it could also be the difference between a successful business and a failing one.
If you think that I can help develop your conversational skills, contact me today!
Sanj Saigal
Posted with Blogsy
Comments
Post a Comment