56. What is articulation of speech?

By Olga Smith

What is the basis of English articulation? Why is it so important? What are the examples of other performers who use it too? Where you can learn it? When it is particularly useful? We will answer all 5 questions in this blog.

1. What is the basis of English articulation?
   It is called muscular warm-up and rhythmic exercises. These simple exercises strengthen our speech organs, particularly the tongue and lips. It is very good to do tongue-twisters to master your articulation. Here is a little example of a tongue-twister from our book Get Rid of your Accent, Part 1:
   She sells seashells by the sea-shore;
   If she sells seashells by the sea-shore,
   Then I’m sure she sells sea-shore shells.

2. Why is articulation so important?
   Because strengthening your speech organ muscles helps to master the articulation of English consonants which make your speech crisp and clear.

3. What are the examples of other performers who use warm-up exercises?
   Dancers, musicians and athletes warm up their muscles in order to perform better and avoid injuries..

4. Where and how you can learn articulation?
   You can master muscular warm-up and articulation exercises during speech lessons in a drama school, with a private elocution tutor or with our apps Get Rid of your Accent UK1, Elocution Lessons and Business English Speech., as well as with our video course Get Rid of your Accent Part Two.

5. When it is particularly useful to do articulation exercises?
   Doing warm-up and articulation exercises would be very useful before a job interview, a public speech, an important conference call, a presentation, a court appearance, teaching a class, giving a lecture, etc. We recommend that you do articulation exercises regularly, at least once a day for a few months if they have a goal to get rid of an accent and speak clearly.

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55. How to pronounce the /r/ sound in English

By Olga Smith

In this blog post, we will share with you great tips based on 25 years of teaching experience for the English/r/ sound and how to avoid mistakes associated with this sound.

Speech organs position for the English /r/ sound:
The tip of the tongue curls back slightly in the roof of the mouth, just behind the alveolar ridge, and the breath squeezes past whilst the tongue is still and not vibrating.

There are other pronunciations of the letter "r" or sound /r/:
In old fashioned RP, the /r/ sound was often pronounced with a single tap of the tip of the tongue behind the teeth in between two vowel sounds.

In other languages, the letter "r" is pronounced differently from English.
For example, the French vibrate the tongue towards the back of the mouth.
Russians, however slightly vibrate the tip of the tongue very quickly as the breath passes through.

In our experience of teaching speech, the English /r/sound is particularly difficult for Japanese and Chinese students. They often pronounce the /r/ sound using their lips and the result is the /r/ sound replaced with a /w/.

Tips to pronounce the /r/ sound correctly:

• Do not vibrate your tongue, keep your tongue still

• Do not use the lips to pronounce /r/

• Practice lesson 41 and articulation tongue exercises with our apps Get Rid of your Accent UK1, Elocution Lessons and Business English Speech.

More on Get Rid of your Accent | Elocution Lessons

54. 5 top skills to dominate a group discussion

By Olga Smith

There are situations when it is appropriate to dominate a group discussion:

• When chairing a meeting

• When presenting a topic/argument

• When leading a debate

The skills you need to master to dominate a group discussion are :

1. Quick reaction

2. Good voice projection and effective use of pauses

3. Confident speech and voice

4. Intellect and knowledge about topics discussed

5. Setting up goals and desired outcomes, and asking appropriate questions and wrapping up the discussion.

How to master the skills of dominating a group discussion:

1. Listen intently to the participants of the discussion. Prepare in advance for a discussion: learn about the participants of the discussion, their names, positions, achievements, strengths and weaknesses.

2. Master your voice projection and use of pauses for effect to make your speech powerful with the app Power, Pitch, Pace, Pause.

3. Make sure your speech is very clear and you have good articulation. You can master your speech with the app Elocution Lessons and Get Rid of your Accent UK1 for British English and with the apps American Accent App and Fluent American Speech for General American accent.

4. Do research on the topic of the discussion and make sure you understand it well.

5. In your mind, crystallise the desired outcome you want to achieve as a result of this discussion. Prepare questions and answers for them, see how you can wrap up with appropriate phrases, such as: “it’s clear now”, “let’s move on”, “we don’t have enough time to discuss this in great length now”, “let’s come back to that, but now we must address the…”

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53. Intonation, inflection and sentence stress in English

Why is intonation important? What is intonation? How does it influence your speech and the impression you make on others? I will answer all these questions in this blog post.

Intonation is the rise and fall of pitch in a phrase or a sentence. Each person will unconsciously copy the speech patterns of his native language or dialect, starting from the time he first begins to talk.

Inflection refers to the gentle rise and fall of the voice in a word or syllable. There are six main inflections in English. In this blog post, I would like to discuss the two most basic inflections:1

1.    Simple Rising
This inflection is used when asking questions. It sounds light and positive.

2.      Simple Falling
This inflection is typical to use for a statement.

I am Russian, and in Russia, we tend to use simple falling a lot. When I had just arrived from Russia and was not aware of the differences in intonation in English and Russian, I was perceived as too direct. When I asked someone to do something for me it sounded as if I was giving orders. I was using polite words like "please" and "could you", but my intonation was inappropriate for requests. I felt people hated me. Then I took elocution lessons with one of the top London speech tutors Linda James. Linda taught me that I should use a simple rising to sound polite when asking people to do something for me. It was amazing to experience the change in my life after I had adjusted my intonation for English, people started to treat me with respect and warmth because I appeared polite with my new intonation.

Another problem I had all my life was that I sounded very monotonous. My speech was boring and people would not listen to me. I had management positions in big corporations and had to speak to my team, but I felt then when I was speaking, I could not maintain people's interest. Linda also helped me with this problem. She taught me how to use sentence stress and stress the most important messages in each sentence. I felt that there are so many people like me in London who would benefit from the knowledge I gained from Linda and decided to share it in our books and apps. You can practice English intonation and sentence stress with the app Fluent English speech and with the book Get Rid of your Accent, Part Two, Advanced level.

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52. 6 rules of public speaking

By Olga Smith, 12 May 2020

6 rules of public speaking are:

1.       Good posture.
Stand in a good centred position with feet firmly on the floor, slightly apart, relaxing the knees and hips, and keeping the shoulders down, free from any tension. Feel your spine straightening with your head balanced on the neck, as if it was attached to the ceiling by a piece of elastic coming from the top of it. This posture is good for making you look and feel confident.

2.       Correct breathing
The basis for all speech is breath. In normal everyday speech, we use a small volume of breath to pass through the vocal chords to create a sound. When we need to increase the volume and produce louder speech, we need to increase the breath capacity in the lungs, allowing the voice to be projected forward with energy and attack. Correct breathing will help you relax during your speech.

3.       Use pauses effectively
The use of pause can be a very effective means of engaging with the audience for the public speaker. “Less is more”, say less with more pauses. There is nothing worse, when trying to impart a great deal of information to your audience, than discovering that because you are speaking quickly and without pauses, very little of this information is being listened to.

4.       Stress your key points
To convey the meaning in a sentence, native English speakers usually stress important words and throw away small, unimportant words. “Throwing away” means these unimportant words are not given the same length and vocal energy.

5.       Change your voice to show different emotions
The pitch of the voice changes with different emotions. For example, when a speaker is expressing anger, excitement or surprise the pitch will rise, but when expressing deep, sensitive, sorrowful feelings the pitch will fall.

6.       Know your audience and engage with it
The purpose of public speaking is to have a certain effect on the audience. Learn about your audience and adjust your speech accordingly. Show a real interest in your audience. Engage with your audience by asking them appropriate questions.

7. Make sure that your speech is crisp, clear and easy to understand. Record your speech several times and see how others can hear it. Download the app Get Rid of your Accent to master your speech clarity.

You can learn and practice public speaking skills with the app Power, Pitch, Pace, Pause and from the book Get Rid of your Accent Part Two Advanced Level.

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51. The most difficult sound in English "th"

By Olga Smith, 28 April 2020

There are two "th" sounds in English:

1. Voiced as in "that" 
2. Unvoiced as in "thanks".

In order to create the sound put the tip of the tongue between the top and bottom teeth to allow the air to squeeze past. It sounds very simple. Why then so many people can not pronounce the "th" sound correctly? The main reason is that the "th" sound doesn't exist in many languages and that's why many people struggle with it. Below are the main difficulties with the "th" sound for different nationalities:

1. Russians, French and Germans, for example, substitute "th" with "s" or "z" sounds. Instead of "I think" they would say "I sink", and instead of "that is " they would say "zet is". What is the difference between the  "th" and "s" and z" sounds? For "s" and "z" the tongue is behind the closed teeth, for the "th" always between the teeth.

2. Indians and Pakistanis, for example,  substitute the "th" sound with "t" or "d" sounds, instead of "that" they would say "dat", instead of "I think" they say "I tink". What is the difference between the "th" sound and "t" and "d" sounds?

The "t" and "d" sounds are plosive consonants and in order to create them you need two positions:

1. The tip of the tongue goes high up and touches the teeth ridge

2. Then you must drop the tongue and create a little explosion, that's why  "t" and "d" sounds are called plosives. The sound is short.

   The "th" sound, on the other hand, is a bit longer (it is a fricative consonant). In order to produce it, you must remember to breathe out and have a tiny gap between the teeth and the tongue so that the air can squeeze past. Many people make a mistake and bite their tongue and instead of the "th" we hear "t" or "d" sounds.

In order to master the "th" sound, we recommend that you:

1. Read the list of words starting with the  "th" sound very slowly, looking at your mouth in the mirror. Here are a few examples for you: thanks, three, third, thought, thumb, thing, thin

Do you see your tongue between the teeth"? Is there a tiny gap for the air to squeeze past?

2. Other sounds may create an extra difficulty when pronouncing the "th" sound, such as "r" after the "th" as in "three". We recommend that you separate the "th" and then pronounce the rest of the word a few times, then connect it and pronounce the whole word.

3. Practice lessons 36 and 37 from the apps Get Rid of your Accent UK1, Business English Speech, and Elocution Lessons.

Four things to avoid when pronouncing the "th" sound:

1. Avoid making a big gap between the teeth, you need to gently touch the tongue with your teeth.

2. Avoid biting your tongue, because it will not be possible to pronounce the "th".

3. Avoid putting too much of the tongue out between the teeth as the sound will be incorrect and it will create too much strain for your speech organs.

4. Avoid breathing in when pronouncing the "th", always breathe out.

50. The most important sound in English: [ə] - schwa, as in "the"

By Olga Smith

The schwa is the most used sound in English. It is important to sound fluent and natural. In our experience, almost all students of English make many mistakes with the schwa. Let’s have a look at this sound and sort it out once and for all! The schwa is highlighted in all examples below.

5 most important characteristics of the schwa [ə] are:

1. It is the shortest sound in English.

2. The schwa is always unstressed. It is pronounced in unstressed syllables and in a multi-syllable word there can be more than one schwa as in “conclusion, announcement, effortless”.

3. It is a very neutral sound; when pronouncing the schwa, remember that your speech organs should be relaxed and neutral

4. The schwa is used to make the speech more fluent because many unstressed syllables and even unimportant words are pronounced with the schwa.

5. It is used in contracting unimportant words for the meaning of the sentence or phrases.

   5 main classes of words that have the neutral vowel shwa [ə]:

   1. Endings of names: Linda, Michael, Olga, Richard, Spencer.

   2. Auxiliary verbs in unstressed position will often have the schwa: have, has, had, were, was, are, am.

   3. Articles, prepositions and particles in unstressed position will often have the schwa: a, the, to, of, as, for, from.

   4. UK counties ending in “shire”: as in Oxfordshire, Berkshire

   5. Names of places ending in “ford” as in Stamford, Stratford.

Below are the most common mistakes people make when they do not know how and when using the schwa:

1. They pronounce the words the way they are spelt. Many Latin words ending with “tion”,”sion” as in “emotion, confusion” are pronounced with the schwa at the end, but people whose native language is based on Latin, like Spanish for example, do not use the schwa and pronounce words the way they are spelt. English spelling and pronunciation are not the same. English pronounce unstressed ending “tion” , “sion” with the schwa. Prefix “con”, “ob” as in “conclusion”, “oblivious” are also pronounced with the schwa. But many wrongly pronounce [ɒ] as in “box”, instead.

2. They make the schwa too long. Remember that the schwa is so short, it is almost not there.
   When you make the schwa too long it is not good English and even the stress in a word can change to the wrong one.

3. Sometimes they pronounce [i:] as in “please” in the article “the”, they say thi: table. It is important to use the schwa. The only time you can pronounce “the” with a short sound [ɪ] as in “big” is when the next word starts with the vowel, for example, “thɪ illness.”

4. They pronounce the article “a” as diphthong [eɪ] as in “pay”. The article “a” is always unstressed and should be pronounced with the schwa.

5. They pronounce prepositions “of” and “from” with the sound [ɒ] as in “box”, these prepositions should be pronounced with the schwa.

6. Quite often, they pronounce “r” which is in spelling in words with the schwa as in “doctor, sponsor, wondered”.

   We teach the schwa in all our books and apps. Practice lessons 6 with the following apps:
   Elocution Lessons, Get Rid of your Accent UK1, Business English Speech; practice the schwa in lessons 5 and 6 with the app Fluent English Speech.

   Olga Smith

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49. 5 steps to improve fluency in English

By Olga Smith

The English tend to speak in phrases, often linking the words together. To sound fluent in English, liaise words that belong together in a phrase gliding from one word to another, almost pronouncing them as one word.

I would like to outline 5 connected speech patterns:

1. Consonants elision
   bus stop, soap powder

2. Liaising vowel to vowel
   go out, so easy

3. Liaising article and preposition with the main word
   at the cinema, in the woods

4. Liaising words that form compound nouns
   bank clerk, assistant manager

5. Use linking “r”
   car insurance, fair enough

You can find practical fluency exercises in our app Fluent English Speech and in our video course.

 Read our popular blog about the benefits of elocution lessons

48. How do I get rid of my native accent and get an American accent?

By Olga Smith

In order to get rid of your accent you need to:
1. Learn and practice how to pronounce sounds of General American pronunciation
2. Do articulation exercises to make your consonants clear and crisp.
This process has several stages:

The first stage is to make sure that you put your lips, tongue and jaw in the right position for the learned sound. If you fail to do so, the sound will not be precise and may be different altogether. Follow the instructions on the speech organ position given at the beginning of each lesson. Pronounce the sound several times, looking in the mirror to make sure you do it correctly.

When you have just started working on a sound your speech organs are not trained; therefore, they might not go automatically for correct placement. When you use the mirror, you can see yourself and adjust lips and jaw positions. When it comes to the tongue position, you need to think about its position and adjust it. When you feel that your sound is correct, start pronouncing the words, sentences and verses in the lesson.

The second stage is aimed at helping you learn a sound by repeating and imitating after the teacher. This exercise will help you to make the sound as correctly as possible and train your speech organs for the particular sound. The more you repeat, the better your pronunciation becomes.

The third stage gives you an opportunity to practice the sound on your own American accent app. You will be hearing yourself and mastering the sound. This stage is essential before recording yourself. We recommend that you practice each sound for about 20-40 minutes a day, with little breaks in between.

The fourth stage involves recording yourself and listening to the recording. It helps you to see whether you have progressed in mastering the pronunciation and to identify where you still make mistakes.

The fifth stage focuses on eliminating mistakes. Correctly repeating the words where you made a mistake will help you avoid repeating the same mistakes in the future.

The sixth stage has the purpose of helping you incorporate the learned sound in your everyday speech. It’s about paying attention when you speak. We say: think before you speak and slow down for the period of mastering your speech.

If you speak fast, you are likely to speak in your autopilot mode, with your accent. After the lessons, you will be able to correct yourself. This stage is also trying to find the learned sound in the newspapers, on the radio, on TV and when people are speaking English.

The next step in eliminating your accent is to develop fluency, by speaking in phrases rather than in separate words, while knowing how to correctly link words together. You can practice this with the app Fluent American Speech.
Finally, learn the patterns of American/English intonation and vocal techniques so that your speech is more close to native speakers.

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45. Queen Elizabeth II pronunciation and how it changed over time

By Olga Smith

In 1956 Nancy Mitford wrote in her book Noblesse Oblige: “It is solely by their language that the upper classes nowadays are distinguished – since they are neither cleaner, richer, nor better-educated than anybody else.” Indeed, the British aristocracy tends to speak with a particular accent, that is RP. But with time their RP is changing. Let’s see how.

I have been listening to the Queen's 21st birthday speech which was recorded in 1947. She speaks very much like her mother. Her vowels and diphthongs are rather tight.

If we listen to her latest speech of the opening of the Parlament, we can see that her speech changed. It has become more relaxed and natural. I assume that after the death of the Queen Mother, the Queen communicated with people whose RP is more general and now her RP sounds less tight and more relaxed.

When I have published my previous blog Elocution Lessons based on RP, I have mentioned Refined RP, which the Queen and her generation and class speak. Some of our students wrote back to me and said that they would like to have Refined RP. I remember when I started my elocution lessons in 2004 I also wanted to learn Refined RP as it seemed so beautiful to me. When I was listening to the Queen’s speeches I thought it would be a good idea if I learn to speak like the Queen. But my tutor Linda James told me that if I do I will become a figure of fun because no one speaks like that anymore, and I will sound very unnatural.

In fact, if you listen to the Queen's grandchildren Prince Wiliam and Harry, you would see that their speech is very different from the speech of their ancestors. There is a general tendency, nowadays, in aristocratic circles to sound more relaxed. In contrast, I have noticed, that some aspiring social climbers, who are not of aristocratic background, but who would like to mingle with the aristocracy try very hard with their RP and sound rather unnatural.

At the same time, not trying at all, such as not pronouncing word endings, not stressing important words, etc, sounds lazy and lacks clarity. Based on General RP and recorded by highly professional actors, our apps and books will make your speech clear by:

• Articulating consonants well

• Pronouncing the vowels and diphthongs correctly

• Mastering the flow of speech

The purpose of our elocution lessons is to help you sound educated and feel at ease in any environment.

Read our popular blog about the benefits of elocution lessons.

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41. How can improve my speaking skills in 3 months?

By Olga Smith

3 months is a perfect time to achieve this goal. Here is how you do it efficiently:

1. Speak every day for 10–30 minutes preferably to native speakers of English, or non-native speakers with good English. This will help you to overcome the barrier to speak. Don’t think about the grammar when speaking, think of the free flow of your speech.

2. Listen to an audiobook several times. When you listen to the book for the first time, you just get the main ideas; the second time write down words you don’t know; the third time and repeat a small section at a time after the audiobook. This way you will also learn new vocabulary. I like the books in the series Get Rid of your Accent as they help to learn new words and expressions quickly and with the correct pronunciation.

3. Write a few sentences about yourself, choose topics that you talk most about: your name, education, work, study, hobbies and interest. Write down a list of your professional vocabulary and practice it out loud. Then record yourself, listen to your recording and make a note of your mistakes. Correct them and then Record yourself again. Do these recording exercises for each topic.

4. After you have mastered the pronunciation of your most commonly used vocabulary, think about sentence stress and use of pauses in the correct places with the apps Fluent English Speech and 4Ps, Power, Pitch, Pace, Pause. The content of these apps are in the book Get Rid of your Accent Part Two, Advanced Level

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37. Why is it hard to get rid of an accent?

By Olga Smith

"The most difficult thing in life is to get rid of long-term habits," goes a Russian saying. Getting rid of a foreign accent requires hard work, repetition, and perseverance. The keys to success are the right teacher and the right accent reduction book and app!

The accent reduction process is very individual. It depends on several factors:

 1. When did you start learning English? If you have started working on your accent in your teens, then it will be easier than if you have started in your forties, which can be more difficult.

 2. Your hearing abilities and the ability to copy what you hear.

 3. How much time and effort you are prepared to invest in accent reduction training.

 4. What is your native language? For example, in our experience, people with a native language that has sounds similar to English can get rid of their accents faster. There are languages that are very different from English, such as Japanese and Chinese. For speakers of these languages, it might take a little longer to get rid of accents.

 5. How focused you are during the lesson and how much time you invest in doing your homework.

 6. How good your teacher is. There are not that many trained teachers who can help people to get rid of their foreign accents. There are many teachers who can help one to learn basic and intermediate English, but to improve pronunciation requires a qualified speech tutor.

 7. On the method of training. Apps and books in the series Get Rid of your Accent have proven successful and helped thousands of people to reduce and eliminate their foreign accents over decades of time.

This is what students experience when working on their accents: First, I reduced my accent to the point where people understand me clearly. Then I reduced it again so that people can no longer tell what country I am from. This is the level most of the students want to get to. They are not pretending that English is their native language, but it is easy to have a conversation and it’s not all about them being French, Spanish or Russian. They are not put in a box.

30. Accents face discrimination

By Olga Smith

 On 27 November 2019, Sky News revealed accents that face the most discrimination in the UK. https://news.sky.com/story/revealed-why-your-accent-could-be-holding-you-back-11871382

 Although some activists want to think that an accent should not be a decisive factor, people with strong foreign and regional accents miss out on wonderful opportunities. Since the times of George Bernard Show's play Pygmalion and up until now, people who aspired to get ahead in life realized that without RP many doors will never be opened to them.

Received Pronunciation is a Pronunciation taught for many decades since it was popularised by the BBC. In the past, it was called Queen’s English and Oxford English. Therefore, this accent is associated with a certain social and economic position and the quality of one's education. It is interesting to note that a study revealed, that the more refined is the RP of a person the higher is their social status. A higher social status often means a better economic situation.

There are two main types of Received Pronunciation:

1. General RP, which is used as a teaching model and used in pronouncing Oxford and Cambridge dictionaries. Therefore it is the most understood version of the English accent. General RP is also a compulsory accent to learn in London drama schools.

2. Refined/heightened RP is associated with the aristocracy, certain professions such as officers in the navy of a certain generation. It is spoken, for example, by the Queen. General RP is spoken by the Queen’s grandchildren.

In the article, Fiona Hill, a British-born US security adviser suggested that "her accent would have held her back if she still lived in the UK". My American ex-husband lives and works in the USA now and is often involved in recruiting IT specialists in Silicon Valley. He told me that many Indian and Chinese born IT specialists get lower paid positions because of their strong accents. He added that a strong accent distracted him from focusing on his work and was hard to deal with during conference calls.

When I had a very strong Russian accent I felt that people looked down on me. I was also very annoyed that people often asked me to repeat myself, as they didn't always understand what I was saying. But after I studying with Linda James, one of the top RP teachers in the UK, I noticed that people started to treat me differently, with respect and consideration. I was very surprised. Also, my communication with people became much more enjoyable.

 I thought that there are many people like me in London who might benefit from learning RP. Linda and I wrote a book, and to my amazement, it became an international best-seller. Today we have published five books and eight apps in the series Get Rid of your Accent. Recently we have also published two video courses on Udemy to support our books and apps with demonstrations of the speech organ positions for each RP sound, sentence stress and English intonation.

Many people benefited from our books, apps and video courses. The most successful of our students book their speech analysis with us and enrol on accent reduction courses to be more effective in their study.

29. Prince Andrew technical speech analysis

By Olga Smith

Speech has always been the number one tool for ruling classes. Today everybody is talking about Prince's Andrew speech content. I have analyzed his speech from a technical point of view. I was paying attention to sentence stress, the use of schwa to throw away unimportant words and even whole expressions. In my opinion, his speech is a great resource for speech raining.

I receive a lot of questions about how to make one's speech less monotonous, what to stress, how to stress important messages and which words convey the most important meaning. There is a number of speech techniques that you can learn from our books Get Rid of your Accent Part Two and apps Fluent English Speech and 4Ps, Power, Pitch, Pace, Pause. Michael Knowles, the actor in our audiobooks and apps sounds very similar to the Prince.

In this blog, I will outline a few of these techniques.

1. In natural speech, it’s important not to emphasize or stress too many words in a phrase or sentence. As a general rule, we tend to pick out the words which convey the meaning and lean on them, giving them a little more vocal energy. Prince Andrew's speech is a good example of it. He is very economical with the stress, but when he stresses a word it really stands out. He stressed words:"never", "absolutely not", "certainly", "always", "sole", "inappropriate", etc.

2. There is no consistent rule as to which words to stress and which "to throw away". It depends on what message a speaker wishes to convey to his/her listener.

3. “Throw away” unimportant words. This often means neutralizing vowels, increasing the pace and diminishing the volume. It is a difficult skill to learn, particularly for non-native speakers of English. and one should take time to master it. Prince Andrew threw away "fill in" expressions such as: "as it were", "if you see what I mean", "you see, this is the problem", "that would be", etc.

The quickest way to master your speech is to book your speech analysis and follow up with a few Skype sessions.

27. 5 tips to change a monotonous speech into an engaging one

By Olga Smith

The Greek word for "one tone" is monotonia, which is the root for both monotone and the closely related word monotonous, which means "dull and tedious." A continuous sound, especially someone's voice, that doesn't rise and fall in pitch, is a monotone. When someone speaks in a monotone, his voice is flat and boring — plus listeners don't know how the speaker is feeling when everything sounds the same.

When I started my speech training, one of the first things I wanted to learn was how to avoid sounding monotonous. I wanted to be popular and felt that I have wonderful ideas to share, but I felt that no one wanted to listen to me. I was listening to some native English speakers and their ideas were not more interesting than mine, but the way they spoke was so engaging, so they could easily manage to grab people's attention. I said to myself I want to speak like that.

in 2004 I found Linda James, a drama school speech tutor with 35 years of experience. My speech and my life changed in a month. I found Linda's speech training so useful that I have decided to share this knowledge with others and to write and publish a book. To date, Linda and I have published six books and eight apps for English speech mastery.

In this blog post, I would like to share with you a few tips about how to break from monotone and make your speech interesting to listen to. 

 First, I would like to outline the main patterns of a monotonous speech.

1. Number one is that all words in a phrase or sentence unstressed, or all words in a phrase or sentence stressed. Namely, all words are pronounced with the same vocal power, with the tone of voice and with the same pitch level.
2. Number two is the incorrect use of pauses or no pauses at all.
3. Number three is that there is the speaker doesn't show the colour or the emotion of words.

 What you can do to overcome these unhelpful patterns:

1. Stress words, which are important for the meaning of a phrase or sentence.

2. "Throw away" unimportant words.

3. Liaise prepositions and articles to the main word.

4. Use pauses in place of a comma, full stop and before stressed words.

5. Think about the meaning of words and put appropriate emotions to make words alive.

You can practice these speech tools with our apps "Fluent English Speech" and "4Ps, Power, Pitch, Pace, Pause" and with the book "Get Rid of your Accent Part Two, Advanced Level" by Linda James and Olga Smith.

16. Business English Speech is our new app

Olga Smith

Tuesday, January 1st, 2019

Here at BATCS, we work hard to bring you the latest and greatest books and apps for accent reduction. So we’re very proud to announce the availability of our newest app, Business English Speech. It’s the best single tool on the market to help you get a job and perform well in your current job and throughout your career.

The thing that makes BATCS stand out the most is our full line of apps, which complement our books. In some cases, we even have several apps to go with a single book.

It took us longer than usual to get this new app, Business English Speech, ready. Why? Because it’s one of our most ambitious apps.

The business book and app both use the speech style and vocabulary of leading business professionals, as you see in leading publications such as the Financial Times (also called “the FT”), The Economist, and The Times of London. And it’s the same speech style and vocabulary that you hear on the BBC and Sky News. The book and app include interviews with top UK professionals in areas such as finance - still the leading business in London - marketing, politics, diplomacy, and the law.

As you use this app, your speech will increasingly resemble what British people see and hear every day on TV and the radio, and read in the British press. This is the style of English that’s historically been called the King’s English or the Queen’s English, depending on whom was regnant at the time, and more recently called BBC English.

 The improvement in your speech makes people more open to and interested in the ideas you are expressing. You become more influential and more effective. As you use the app, it becomes much easier to get a new position and to advance in the role that you already have.

 Our lead app developer, Yury Kravchenko, has made this deep and interesting content available within the same app framework used across all of our Get Rid of your Accent apps, as shown in our app video.

 In the app, you can easily find the most troublesome sounds for your national language of origin. Then, you drill on those sounds, using business-oriented and professional-level vocabulary. The app will record you and help you compare your own pronunciation to pronunciation in a crisp and clear British English accent.

 For the book, we have been told again and again by customers that it immediately helps them to improve their performance at work. The app is exactly what you need as a professional who would like to succeed in this competitive world.

Note: We also recommend that you use our other apps and books to complement your work with the Business English Speech app. Why? Because you will get more complete training. In particular, we recommend two topics. The first is our Beginner book and app because they have the most-used vocabulary that will help in all of your conversations. The other is the advanced level, specialty app, Power, Pitch, Pace, Pause. This app will improve your speaking skills in meetings and presentations.

9. What some English people feel when there hear foreign accents

By Olga Smith

We have recently conducted research. We contacted native English people who work with non-native English speakers. We asked them what they thought about colleagues with a foreign accent that is difficult to understand.

These were their replies:
· Frustration
· Anxiety;
· Doubt if they are being understood;
· Accent distracting them from what is being said.

We run courses for diplomats and professionals in London. We have had people on our courses who have been living in England for many years, but because they never learned how to pronounce English sounds correctly, they sounded as if they had only just arrived in this country. They told us they felt inadequate because they were being asked to repeat themselves because of their bad pronunciation. Only a few days ago, on 24 September 2017, there was a BBC program about a Polish lady who decided to get rid of her accent. Here is the link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/magazine-41361662/i-want-to-get-rid-of-my-polish-accent

Find more information and tips on www.batcsglobal.com

8. Motivations to get rid of an accent

By Olga Smith

You probably heard how sometimes English people call foreign accents sexy and charming. Why do you think people want to get rid of them? I will tell you why in this article.

We have been running accent reduction courses for diplomats and professionals for the last 12 years. We help people make their English clear and precise and they are no longer being asked to repeat themselves.

Moreover, if you speak with the right accent, namely Received Pronunciation (RP) it also open doors to high society, respect associated with it, and last but not least much more money. Let me present a few examples given to us by our students:

"I work as an IT consultant, but because I speak with a strong Spanish accent and not all what I say is being understood, I am not invited to meetings. I know if I don't start to speak more clearly, I will be starring at the PC screen and have the same salary for many years to come..."

"After your accent reduction course I got promoted to an area manager, and now I want to master my speech even more as it became absolutely clear to me that communication is power."

 "I am a dietician in Chelsea and all my clients have a posh accent (RP). In order to be trusted by my clients, I need to improve my accent".

Our Turkish student working as a Stock Exchange trader in London told us what her manager said to her: "If you don't lose your accent you lose your job". On the trading floor, people are so stressed and have no time to understand thick foreign accents.

My business partner from Silicon Valley told me that many Chinese and Indian IT specialists working there earning peanuts because it's difficult to understand their English. He further specified: they are making $100k now, but if they changed their accent they would make $400.

All I can say the choice is yours - you are either stay sexy and charming earning peanuts, or you sort out your speech and make serious money.

We start our next Accent Reduction course on 22 May, all details are on www.batcsglobal.com

I wish you all prosperity!

Find more information and tips on www.batcsglobal.com 

7. Don't learn English - just speak it!

By Olga Smith

For the last two months, I have been travelling to Thailand, Spain and Israel. I tried to speak with local people in English and realised that the conversation didn't go beyond twenty words of very basic vocabulary. People told me that they learned English for five to seven years in schools, but according to their level of speech, it felt they learned it for two days maximum. How come? It turned out they learned spelling and grammar for those seven years, but rarely spoke.

Also, I met many people who have been living in the UK for thirty years and they still speak in pidgin English. Some of them were PhDs and they complained to me that people treated them like morons because of their primitive English. Well, the reason for their poor English was that they made a choice to stick to their native community (Iranian, Russian, Spanish etc.) and to not pursue English. Interestingly enough, their passive vocabulary was often very good as they could write well, read books and papers, but they didn't dare to use this vocabulary in their speech, because they were not sure how to pronounce it and it made them shy to use it.

One of my friends is a Chinese lady who has been living in London for seven years and has an English boyfriend. She is still hesitant to speak English, she constantly repeats: "I learn English, but it's very difficult... I am not good, it's very hard". No wonder, she learns English for an hour twice a week, but then she speaks in Chinese for the rest of the time.

I decided to do a little experiment with my Chinese friend. Firstly, I told her to say to herself and others that English is easy and that she speaks good English because when she was constantly repeating that her English was bad, to me it sounded like a self-programming for having bad English. Secondly, I gave her three new short phrases a day and asked her to repeat them five times several times a day. Thirdly, I asked her to reduce the time she speaks in Chinese and gradually increased the time she speaks in English and use the new phrases. After just a week her confidence to speak was so much higher and she felt powerful as a person.

For all who learn English I want to recommend three things:

1. Stop learning English, and start speaking it by repeating three new useful phrases several times a day. Your speech organ muscles will get used to English, you will enlarge your vocabulary and gain the confidence to speak. Repeating, repeating and repeating, like parrots!

2. Reduce the time of speaking in your native language and increase the time you speak in English.

3. Listen to English TV and Radio channels, make a note of phrases you hear and repeat them five times several times a day. In the past, I met Greeks, Dutch, Danish, Swedish and their English was advanced. Guess what these countries have in common: English TV channels that are not translated into their native language.

If you have been struggling with your English and want to improve it write to oriana_r@hotmail.com to get free guidance, get our paper-back books with CDs from Amazon, audiobooks in the series Get Rid of your Accent from Audible or download our apps: get rid of your accent uk1 from Google Play and AppStore, and Fluent English Speech from the AppStore.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/developer/olga-smith-batcs-limited/id673687756?mt=8

All our products have audio tracks recorded by trained actors, just listen and repeat after them.

I wish you to be empowered by your outstanding English!

Find more information and tips on www.batcsglobal.com

6. Liaisons and fluency

By Olga Smith

Today I would like to talk about how to achieve fluency in English.

Once you have sorted out your English sounds, your next step would be to work on fluency.

What does this work involve:

1. Using schwa, or neutral vowel in prepositions (for, from, to, etc) and articles (a, an, the), thus "throwing away unimportant words", an expression used by actors.

2. Liaise prepositions with words (eg: in common, at home, etc.), do not make pauses between words and prepositions they belong to.

3. Speak in phrases or "word blocks", rather than in separate words, connecting words in a phrase.

For example in the phrase "I'd like a cup of tea", we have two blocks: 1. I'd like, and 2. a cup of tea.

In our book Get Rid of your Accent, Advanced level, ISBN 09553300017 we give you many practical exercises to master fluency.

More on our web site: www.batcsglobal.com