WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.220 Did you know the letter A has six different vowel 00:00:03.220 --> 00:00:06.780 sounds in American English? You might have pronounced 00:00:06.780 --> 00:00:09.960 them incorrectly before, but this episode will 00:00:09.960 --> 00:00:13.560 help you master them fast. Welcome back to the 00:00:13.560 --> 00:00:16.100 Learn English Podcast, the podcast teaching English 00:00:16.100 --> 00:00:18.899 in context so you can learn naturally. On today's 00:00:18.899 --> 00:00:23.460 episode, I want to focus on discussing a particular 00:00:23.460 --> 00:00:26.789 vowel in the English language. Now in English, 00:00:26.829 --> 00:00:29.870 we have multiple vowels and we also have multiple 00:00:29.870 --> 00:00:33.549 sounds for each vowel. That makes it very confusing 00:00:33.549 --> 00:00:35.770 and very difficult for people who are learning 00:00:35.770 --> 00:00:38.450 English to try to figure out how to correctly 00:00:38.450 --> 00:00:40.750 pronounce words that have these different vowels 00:00:40.750 --> 00:00:44.030 in them. So on today's episode, I just want to 00:00:44.030 --> 00:00:48.710 focus on the vowel A. So you can better work 00:00:48.710 --> 00:00:51.689 on your English pronunciation. So if you're interested 00:00:51.689 --> 00:00:54.689 in learning more about how to correctly pronounce 00:00:54.689 --> 00:00:57.969 this vowel, then follow along because we're about 00:00:57.969 --> 00:01:06.510 to begin. Before we get started, I want to remind 00:01:06.510 --> 00:01:08.890 you to look at the description of this podcast 00:01:08.890 --> 00:01:12.269 episode. There you will find a list of the words 00:01:12.269 --> 00:01:14.829 and phrases that I used in the episode, so you 00:01:14.829 --> 00:01:17.010 can take them, study them, and build your English 00:01:17.010 --> 00:01:20.109 vocabulary. Now let's just talk a little bit 00:01:20.109 --> 00:01:23.750 about vowels. In English, we have multiple vowels, 00:01:23.909 --> 00:01:27.310 and like I said, they have multiple sounds. However, 00:01:27.629 --> 00:01:30.650 you are going to notice a pattern when it comes 00:01:30.650 --> 00:01:33.969 to vowels. When we are looking at the vowels 00:01:33.969 --> 00:01:38.810 A, E, I, O, and U, there is a commonality. between 00:01:38.810 --> 00:01:41.370 them. They all have something in common, and 00:01:41.370 --> 00:01:44.250 that is that they all have something we call 00:01:44.250 --> 00:01:48.109 the short vowel sound and the long vowel sound. 00:01:48.290 --> 00:01:51.349 So those are the first two vowel sounds that 00:01:51.349 --> 00:01:54.890 we're going to go over for the vowel A. When 00:01:54.890 --> 00:01:59.010 we talk about a short vowel sound, that is usually 00:01:59.010 --> 00:02:02.349 a shorter sound that we make when we're pronouncing 00:02:02.349 --> 00:02:05.829 the vowel. It does not sound like the actual 00:02:05.829 --> 00:02:11.669 letter. The short vowel sound for a is a, a. 00:02:12.169 --> 00:02:17.569 That a sound is a sound that usually occurs when 00:02:17.569 --> 00:02:20.569 you have single syllable words, when you have 00:02:20.569 --> 00:02:24.490 words that are very short. For example, the words 00:02:24.490 --> 00:02:31.330 cat, mat, bat all have that a. vowel sound. They 00:02:31.330 --> 00:02:35.409 all are one syllable words. They have a consonant, 00:02:35.750 --> 00:02:39.530 the letter A, and then another consonant. If 00:02:39.530 --> 00:02:41.710 you don't know, a consonant is just a letter 00:02:41.710 --> 00:02:44.090 that is not a vowel, so something that is not 00:02:44.090 --> 00:02:49.110 an A, E, I, O, U. When you do see those one syllable 00:02:49.110 --> 00:02:52.449 words, very short words with an A in the middle 00:02:52.449 --> 00:02:55.069 of the word, most likely you're going to have 00:02:55.069 --> 00:02:57.449 this vowel sound, so you're going to want to 00:02:57.449 --> 00:03:02.189 pronounce the A as an A. It doesn't just occur 00:03:02.189 --> 00:03:07.090 in single syllable words. It can also occur in 00:03:07.090 --> 00:03:10.129 longer words or multiple syllable words. For 00:03:10.129 --> 00:03:14.789 example, the words apple and happy also have 00:03:14.789 --> 00:03:18.870 that a sound. If you listen closely while I pronounce 00:03:18.870 --> 00:03:24.389 them, you will hear it. Apple. Happy. For both 00:03:24.389 --> 00:03:27.289 of these words, the letter A is immediately followed 00:03:27.289 --> 00:03:30.370 by the letter P, and that's one of the things 00:03:30.370 --> 00:03:32.889 that can help you when you're trying to distinguish 00:03:32.889 --> 00:03:36.710 which vowel sound the letter A makes. If the 00:03:36.710 --> 00:03:40.469 letter A is followed by the letters P, T, N, 00:03:40.610 --> 00:03:45.289 or D, it usually has this A vowel sound to it. 00:03:45.610 --> 00:03:49.090 That is the short vowel sound. Now let's talk 00:03:49.090 --> 00:03:51.969 about the long vowel sound. This is when the 00:03:51.969 --> 00:03:54.389 vowel is actually pronounced like the letter. 00:03:54.550 --> 00:03:57.270 So when I pronounce this vowel sound, I'm going 00:03:57.270 --> 00:04:01.530 to say the letter A as the sound I make for the 00:04:01.530 --> 00:04:04.729 vowel in the particular word that I am pronouncing. 00:04:05.289 --> 00:04:08.129 When we are here in the United States as young 00:04:08.129 --> 00:04:11.229 children learning to read at school, we actually 00:04:11.229 --> 00:04:13.930 are taught about these short and long vowel sounds. 00:04:14.229 --> 00:04:17.610 And one of the rules that we are given to help 00:04:17.610 --> 00:04:20.750 us differentiate, which means tell the difference 00:04:20.750 --> 00:04:23.829 between something. So the rule that we get to 00:04:23.829 --> 00:04:27.009 differentiate between the short and the long 00:04:27.009 --> 00:04:31.230 vowel sound is that if the word ends with the 00:04:31.230 --> 00:04:35.379 letter. It usually changes the vowel sound from 00:04:35.379 --> 00:04:39.100 a short vowel to a long vowel sound. Let's go 00:04:39.100 --> 00:04:41.660 through some examples so you can see what I mean. 00:04:41.839 --> 00:04:45.339 When we did the short vowel sound, we said that 00:04:45.339 --> 00:04:51.639 bat, mat, cat were all short a vowel sounds with 00:04:51.639 --> 00:04:56.269 that a sound. If we take those exact same words, 00:04:56.410 --> 00:05:00.350 but we just put an E at the end, we change the 00:05:00.350 --> 00:05:03.230 pronunciation because we create a long vowel 00:05:03.230 --> 00:05:12.470 sound. Bat becomes bait. Mat becomes mate. Cat 00:05:12.470 --> 00:05:17.870 becomes ate. Now that we've learned these rules, 00:05:18.089 --> 00:05:21.350 let's see if you're able to do them. L -A -T 00:05:21.350 --> 00:05:30.079 would be... Lat, L -A -T -E would be late. Do 00:05:30.079 --> 00:05:32.220 you see the pattern? Are you able to pronounce 00:05:32.220 --> 00:05:34.920 those correctly? Let's do some more practice. 00:05:34.980 --> 00:05:41.959 We have the words cake, name, and face. All of 00:05:41.959 --> 00:05:44.819 those, again, end with the letter E, so you have 00:05:44.819 --> 00:05:48.540 this long A vowel sound. Now, an example of this 00:05:48.540 --> 00:05:51.379 vowel sound with a word that does not end with 00:05:51.379 --> 00:05:55.360 the letter E is play. Play ends with a Y. When 00:05:55.360 --> 00:05:57.899 we talk about this vowel sound, you will see 00:05:57.899 --> 00:06:01.040 that sometimes the Y acts like an E or sounds 00:06:01.040 --> 00:06:04.139 like an E. In this case, it is taking it and 00:06:04.139 --> 00:06:07.610 making it into that long A vowel sound. Our third 00:06:07.610 --> 00:06:11.689 vowel sound is called an open or a broad a vowel 00:06:11.689 --> 00:06:14.569 sound and this is when your jaw is physically 00:06:14.569 --> 00:06:16.889 more open when you're pronouncing this sound. 00:06:17.050 --> 00:06:21.589 This case, the a is pronounced as an ah sound. 00:06:21.949 --> 00:06:24.290 If you're watching on YouTube, you can see the 00:06:24.290 --> 00:06:28.310 difference in my jaw position when I am pronouncing 00:06:28.310 --> 00:06:31.850 this particular vowel sound with the short vowel 00:06:31.850 --> 00:06:36.319 sound of ah. my jaw is pretty closed and a little 00:06:36.319 --> 00:06:39.180 bit more wide. With the long vowel sound of A, 00:06:39.560 --> 00:06:43.279 my jaw is a little bit more open, but my lips 00:06:43.279 --> 00:06:45.600 are a little bit closer together. And then with 00:06:45.600 --> 00:06:49.060 this one, the open or the broad A vowel sound, 00:06:49.180 --> 00:06:52.579 my jaw is the most open because I am pronouncing 00:06:52.579 --> 00:06:56.699 it as an ah sound. One way to tell this vowel 00:06:56.699 --> 00:07:00.500 sound is if you have the letter A followed by 00:07:00.500 --> 00:07:04.540 a W. In English, when we are writing out the 00:07:04.540 --> 00:07:08.040 sound ah, this is how we write it. And so you 00:07:08.040 --> 00:07:10.939 will see words that have this spelling and that 00:07:10.939 --> 00:07:14.139 is a very big cue for you to use this particular 00:07:14.139 --> 00:07:17.420 vowel sound. Examples of these words are paw, 00:07:17.699 --> 00:07:23.509 law, straw. All of those have an A -W right next 00:07:23.509 --> 00:07:25.990 to each other in the spelling, and that's when 00:07:25.990 --> 00:07:29.129 we're making this ah sound. The A -W spelling 00:07:29.129 --> 00:07:31.370 is the easiest way to know that you're going 00:07:31.370 --> 00:07:34.709 to make that sound. However, there are some words 00:07:34.709 --> 00:07:38.029 that don't have A and W in the spelling, but 00:07:38.029 --> 00:07:41.310 still use this pronunciation. Usually, these 00:07:41.310 --> 00:07:44.529 are words that have the A followed by the letter 00:07:44.529 --> 00:07:49.660 M, R, or L. But not always, and that's what makes 00:07:49.660 --> 00:07:51.939 it a little bit tricky. Here are some examples 00:07:51.939 --> 00:07:54.800 of words that do not have the AW spelling, but 00:07:54.800 --> 00:07:58.680 still have this AW pronunciation. The word spa. 00:07:58.939 --> 00:08:03.699 S -P -A. It does not end with a W, but that vowel 00:08:03.699 --> 00:08:08.720 sound of that A does become an AW sound. Spa. 00:08:09.360 --> 00:08:12.720 Another example is father. Again, it doesn't 00:08:12.720 --> 00:08:15.620 have a W, but it still has that ah sound. And 00:08:15.620 --> 00:08:17.740 if you're watching on YouTube, you can see how 00:08:17.740 --> 00:08:20.939 my jaw opens when I pronounce the first syllable, 00:08:21.040 --> 00:08:23.899 which has the A in it, compared to the second 00:08:23.899 --> 00:08:28.899 syllable of the word. Father. Father. The fourth 00:08:28.899 --> 00:08:32.100 vowel sound is the schwa sound. And this is another 00:08:32.100 --> 00:08:35.759 thing that is common in all of the vowels. The 00:08:35.759 --> 00:08:39.909 schwa vowel sound can actually be any... vowel 00:08:39.909 --> 00:08:43.389 and it occurs when the vowel is pronounced as 00:08:43.389 --> 00:08:46.970 an uh sound. So you get this sound that is uh 00:08:46.970 --> 00:08:52.610 and it could be an a, an e, an i, an o. It really 00:08:52.610 --> 00:08:55.909 could be any vowel and there are examples for 00:08:55.909 --> 00:08:59.590 every single vowel with this sound. For example, 00:08:59.690 --> 00:09:04.370 I live in the United States of America and in 00:09:04.370 --> 00:09:07.809 that word we actually have the schwa vowel sound. 00:09:08.009 --> 00:09:11.539 Did you hear it? If you didn't, let me try to 00:09:11.539 --> 00:09:14.120 pronounce it one more time and see if you can 00:09:14.120 --> 00:09:19.299 hear that schwa vowel sound. America. America. 00:09:20.159 --> 00:09:25.139 In the word America, there are two A's. The mer 00:09:25.139 --> 00:09:28.320 part of America is the syllable that is stressed. 00:09:28.840 --> 00:09:33.090 America. America. That means that the other two 00:09:33.090 --> 00:09:37.029 syllables are not stressed. So the beginning 00:09:37.029 --> 00:09:41.950 A and the ending A, those two syllables that 00:09:41.950 --> 00:09:44.889 have those two letters are not stressed. And 00:09:44.889 --> 00:09:47.389 because they're not stressed, they get pronounced 00:09:47.389 --> 00:09:51.690 as an uh sound. I have noticed that people who 00:09:51.690 --> 00:09:54.149 are learning English, people who are not from 00:09:54.149 --> 00:09:56.990 the United States, tend to pronounce America 00:09:56.990 --> 00:10:00.730 more in a way that actually makes an A sound, 00:10:00.889 --> 00:10:04.389 maybe a short A or a long A. And that's not how 00:10:04.389 --> 00:10:07.009 a native speaker is going to pronounce it. We 00:10:07.009 --> 00:10:09.330 turn those into schwa sounds. So when you pronounce 00:10:09.330 --> 00:10:12.149 it, you really want to turn it into that schwa 00:10:12.149 --> 00:10:16.629 sound, a UH type sound, and pronounce it America. 00:10:17.669 --> 00:10:21.649 America. Another example here is the word banana. 00:10:22.049 --> 00:10:25.289 Banana has multiple A's. And I've noticed with 00:10:25.289 --> 00:10:27.769 especially my Spanish speaking students, they 00:10:27.769 --> 00:10:30.289 will want to pronounce every A in that word. 00:10:30.370 --> 00:10:32.129 That is not how you're going to pronounce it. 00:10:32.190 --> 00:10:35.009 You want to make sure you are not stressing that 00:10:35.009 --> 00:10:37.490 last syllable. And because it is not stressed, 00:10:37.730 --> 00:10:40.629 you need to turn it into a schwa sound. So we're 00:10:40.629 --> 00:10:45.740 going to pronounce this banana, banana. The fifth 00:10:45.740 --> 00:10:49.639 vowel sound is called an R -colored A vowel sound. 00:10:49.799 --> 00:10:53.419 This is when you have the letter A followed by 00:10:53.419 --> 00:10:56.259 the letter R. Usually when you put these two 00:10:56.259 --> 00:10:59.559 letters together, it gets pronounced like air, 00:10:59.759 --> 00:11:04.659 like the word A -I -R, the air that we breathe. 00:11:04.740 --> 00:11:07.220 That's usually the pronunciation that we use 00:11:07.220 --> 00:11:10.120 when we see this spelling. Examples of this are 00:11:10.120 --> 00:11:16.450 care, bear, dare. All of them have that A followed 00:11:16.450 --> 00:11:21.610 by the R consonant. Another example is parent. 00:11:21.789 --> 00:11:26.049 If you look at the spelling, it has P -A -R -E 00:11:26.049 --> 00:11:29.509 -N -T. So because you have an A and an R, we're 00:11:29.509 --> 00:11:32.610 going to pronounce that as that air vowel sound, 00:11:32.950 --> 00:11:37.470 parent, parent. You can also get this sound when 00:11:37.470 --> 00:11:41.669 you have A -I -R, like in the word air, also 00:11:41.669 --> 00:11:46.570 in the word fair or fairies. That still has that 00:11:46.570 --> 00:11:50.570 same vowel sound in it. And the last vowel sound 00:11:50.570 --> 00:11:52.970 is actually not that common. This is not one 00:11:52.970 --> 00:11:56.409 that I use in my accent, but it might be something 00:11:56.409 --> 00:11:59.090 that you hear, especially if you go more on the 00:11:59.090 --> 00:12:01.509 eastern coast of the United States. There is 00:12:01.509 --> 00:12:05.389 a very particular accent that can have this sound 00:12:05.389 --> 00:12:08.169 to it. If you visit the city of New York, if 00:12:08.169 --> 00:12:10.669 you meet someone who is a New Yorker, someone 00:12:10.669 --> 00:12:14.389 who was born and raised in Brooklyn or the Bronx, 00:12:14.610 --> 00:12:17.330 somewhere in New York City, they might have this 00:12:17.330 --> 00:12:19.690 accent. Again, this is not very common, but it's 00:12:19.690 --> 00:12:22.549 just kind of fun. And if you watch a TV show 00:12:22.549 --> 00:12:25.330 that has a character who is clearly a New Yorker, 00:12:25.350 --> 00:12:28.460 they might have this accent when they talk. This 00:12:28.460 --> 00:12:32.460 is when you take the letter A and you kind of 00:12:32.460 --> 00:12:37.519 make it more into an O sound with an O -W. So, 00:12:37.539 --> 00:12:41.539 for example, the word talk. T -A -L -K. I pronounce 00:12:41.539 --> 00:12:44.539 it talk. However, if you're someone who uses 00:12:44.539 --> 00:12:47.879 this vowel sound, you will pronounce it talk. 00:12:48.559 --> 00:12:53.139 Talk. I'm talking. The way I talk? What's wrong 00:12:53.139 --> 00:12:57.419 with the way I talk? Very different from my vowel 00:12:57.419 --> 00:13:00.580 pronunciation, but again, it might be something 00:13:00.580 --> 00:13:04.240 that you hear. If you have ever seen the TV show 00:13:04.240 --> 00:13:07.360 King of Queens, there is an actress on that show. 00:13:07.419 --> 00:13:09.720 She's actually the main actress. Her name is 00:13:09.720 --> 00:13:12.960 Leah Remini, and her character in the show has 00:13:12.960 --> 00:13:16.000 that accent because I believe she has that accent 00:13:16.000 --> 00:13:19.000 herself. She was born and raised, I believe, 00:13:19.059 --> 00:13:22.120 in Brooklyn. If you want to hear more examples 00:13:22.120 --> 00:13:25.740 of this accent and this pronunciation, I would 00:13:25.740 --> 00:13:28.919 recommend watching that TV show and you can hear 00:13:28.919 --> 00:13:32.139 how her character speaks in that show. Work on 00:13:32.139 --> 00:13:36.779 your trouble words again. Talk. I'm sorry, did 00:13:36.779 --> 00:13:39.559 we start spelling talk T -A -W -K and no one 00:13:39.559 --> 00:13:43.659 told me? No. I know English is difficult. I know 00:13:43.659 --> 00:13:45.860 there are so many vowel sounds and it can get 00:13:45.860 --> 00:13:48.639 really confusing. So I hope that this helped 00:13:48.639 --> 00:13:50.799 you. Like I said, my goal in the future is to 00:13:50.799 --> 00:13:53.139 do more episodes about the different vowels, 00:13:53.279 --> 00:13:55.639 the different vowel sounds, so you can keep practicing 00:13:55.639 --> 00:13:58.740 and improving your pronunciation. If you want 00:13:58.740 --> 00:14:00.440 me to continue with this series, if you want 00:14:00.440 --> 00:14:02.379 me to do more pronunciation episodes, please 00:14:02.379 --> 00:14:05.039 leave me a comment. Let me know if you want more 00:14:05.039 --> 00:14:08.000 episodes like this. And if the podcast is helping 00:14:08.000 --> 00:14:10.659 you learn English overall, please consider leaving 00:14:10.659 --> 00:14:13.559 us a rating on whatever app you are using to 00:14:13.559 --> 00:14:16.220 listen to this podcast on. You can also tell 00:14:16.220 --> 00:14:18.240 a friend, tell a family member, tell someone 00:14:18.240 --> 00:14:20.259 who's learning English so we can continue to 00:14:20.259 --> 00:14:22.580 grow our audience. You can follow us on social 00:14:22.580 --> 00:14:25.700 media at Learn English Pod. The website is learnenglishpod 00:14:25.700 --> 00:14:28.580 .com and remember to like and subscribe so you 00:14:28.580 --> 00:14:30.580 don't miss our next episode when it comes out 00:14:30.580 --> 00:14:33.080 next week. Until then, keep learning English.