Possible pronunciation difficulties


 * This article is about difficulties trying to repeat a word after listening to it. For reading difficulties see Decoding difficulties.

Possible pronunciation difficulties refer to the anticipated difficulties students may encounter with the characteristics of English pronunciation. Depending on their mother tongue (L1), they may have difficulty distinguishing between certain vowel and consonant sounds, not to mention consonant clusters.

More often than not, these supposed difficulties depend more on the interference of L1 than on the actual difficulties posed by English, and many, if not most students will greatly improve their pronunciation by simply becoming aware of certain differences - together with a minimum of practice.

This page outlines some of the difficulties of certain sounds in individual words and links to pages with specific exercises. Intonation, linking and stress, both for individual words and for sentence stress, are also, of course, of vital importance not only in speaking "better" English, but also in understanding speech.

Vowel sounds

 * /əʊ/ vs. /ɒ/ (most vs. lost)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /əʊ/ vs /ɒ/


 * /ʌ/ vs. /æ/ (cut vs. cat)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /ʌ/ vs /æ/


 * /ɪ/ vs. /iː/ (fill vs. feel)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /ɪ/ vs /iː/


 * /eɪ/ vs. /aɪ/ (late vs. light)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /eɪ/ vs /aɪ/

Consonant sounds

 * /b/ vs. /v/ (ban vs. van)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /b/ vs /v/


 * /d/ vs. /t/
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /d/ vs /t/ (bad vs. bat)
 * See: Past tense pronunciation (logged vs. locked)


 * /d/ vs. /ð/ (den vs. then)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /d/ vs /ð/


 * /dʒ/ vs. /tʃ/ (edge vs. etch)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /dʒ/ vs /tʃ/


 * /l/ vs. /r/ (lock vs. rock)
 * See: Lesson:L vs R


 * /s/ vs. /z/ (ice vs. eyes)
 * See: Pronunciation and decoding exercises: /s/ vs /z/


 * /ʃ/ vs. /tʃ/ (ship vs. chip)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /ʃ/ vs /tʃ/


 * /θ/ vs. /ð/ (thing vs. there)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /θ/ vs /ð/


 * /ʒ/ vs. /ʃ/ (vision vs. mission)
 * See: Pronunciation exercises: /ʒ/ vs /ʃ/