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Last night I was teaching a live class.

Every month I teach a live class to the students in my Academy,

where I work with a student one on one.

And as I was teaching last night, I just have this moment where I thought,

it’s really about the basics and the foundation.

So in today’s video, I’m going to go over two things that came up in my live class

working with a student who was struggling,

and we’re going to talk about how you can apply that to yourself,

to your own language learning to help you speak English with more ease.

The first student I worked with was Alice.

Her native language is Chinese.

And she said that there had been something early on in my Academy

that she didn’t really understand, she didn’t feel comfortable doing it so she moved on.

And I realized what she was talking about was breaking up a word or sentence into its rhythm.

And I can see how that can be confusing,

but by not really understanding what we mean by rhythmic contrasts in American English,

and just moving on, she was never going to be able to really capture that quality of American English.

In that course, I have a little video where I talk about why you need to break something down.

And I tell the story of when I was trying to learn how to do a double under jump rope move at the gym.

This is when you jump rope but each time you jump, you do two rotations of the rope.

Now, I thought this was impossible.

That was me failing and trying to do this thing.

I was putting in an incredible amount of effort and working too hard.

My feet weren’t light enough.

The way I got to start to get the right feeling and rhythm, and touch in my body,

was when I started jumping rope without the rope.

Now, i’ve been having my students speak English without words for years,

so it was exciting to discover success in a similar situation.

In the next few lessons, you’re going to focus on speaking English without words.

So I have these exercises and you’ll see them on my youtube channel too

where we talk about the stress of a word, let’s take the word ‘probably’ for example.

It’s a three-syllable word with first syllable stress.

So instead of practicing probably, and trying to think about which syllable is stressed,

and which are unstressed, and then also all of those sounds, which I know are tricky,

I break it down to just the stress.

So instead of practicing ‘probably’, I have my students practice:

DA-da-da, DA-da-da.

Really long, up-down shape, and then two little dots.

DA-da-da, DA-da-da.

Let’s take the word ‘Chinese’, da-DA.

Let’s take the phrase ‘I don’t know.’

da-da-DA.

Let’s take the phrase ‘happy’, DA-da.

So these are all things, anything that’s spoken in English,

we can break down to just the rhythm on any syllable.

I’ve chosen D and AH, or the schwa for unstressed, da-da, da-da, da-da-da.

But when a student comes along whose native language is not stressed timed, but as syllable timed,

like Chinese, where every syllable is the same length, it can be really hard to think in this way.

Long, short? Short, long? What?

So i’ll have students that will come to me and they’ll say, let’s take the word ‘happy’ for example, happy.

And I get the stress, the one is higher,

the intonation is higher, the pitch is higher, but the length is too much the same.

Happy.

In American English, we want happy.

So the last syllable isn’t EE but it’s EE.

And so getting students to focus on this and to shorten up those unstressed syllables is really important,

because it brings in this very natural American character.

So when I learned that Alice was not comfortable with da-da, da-da, da-da-da-da,

and these rhythms, but moved on, I stopped her.

I said you need to go back and work on this foundation for about a week.

All right, when it’s a two syllable word we only have two options, we have da-da, like Chinese,

and we have da-da, like silly.

So I would just - let me just hear you say da-da, Chinese, let me just hear you say those two things.

• Two syllables.

• Yeah.

• First stressed.

• Second stressed. Like the word Chinese.

• Da-da.

• Yes. Exactly.

Do it again.

• Da-da.

• Right, and now make the first one even shorter.

• Da-da.

• Right, and now connect them, right now you’re doing da da, and the length is right,

but I wanna hear da-da,

I want to hear them » Da-da.

• Yes, exactly, do it again.

• Da-da.

• Yes. Again.

• Da-da.

• Right, and now you can go do all the two syllable words that are like that.

Chinese, about.

Too often we rush to get on to the next thing, and as adults, we put…

We put a lot of pressure on ourselves as we learn, I think, to learn quickly, to achieve it, to be done with it.

And when we’re doing something with our body, that’s brand-new,

that’s not something that we’re learning with our head, and that takes time.

So right now, we’re going to practice some rhythmic patterns together, how comfortable are they?

Please do practice out loud here.

Of course, you can watch it and understand, but can you do it with your own body?

Money. Da-da.

Dinner. Da-da.

Classy. Da-da.

Now, you’ll hear the exact same thing, you do it with me out loud.

Money.

Da-da.

Dinner. Da-da.

Classy. Da-da.

Da-DA.

Alive. Da-DA.

Until. Da-DA.

Again.

Now you’ll hear the exact same thing, you do it with me out loud.

Da-DA. Alive.

Da-DA. Until.

Da-DA. Again.

Da-DA-da.

Unlikely.

Da-DA-da. Forever.

Da-DA-da.

I think so.

Now, you’ll hear the exact same thing, you do it with me out loud.

Da-DA-da. Unlikely.

Da-DA-da. Forever.

Da-DA-da. I think so.

DA-da-da. Africa.

DA-da-da. Company.

DA-da-da. Holiday.

Now you’ll hear the exact same thing, you do it with me out loud.

DA-da-da. Africa.

DA-da-da. Company.

DA-da-da. Holiday.

Da-da-DA. Engineer.

Da-da-DA. Guarantee.

Da-da-DA. Recommend.

Now you’ll hear the exact same thing, you do it with me out loud.

Da-da-DA. Engineer.

Da-da-DA. Guarantee.

Da-da-DA. Recommend.

Thinking about stress this way can really help

when you’re working with a longer word that’s more difficult,

because focusing on the stress helps you figure out how to simplify things.

For example, the word ‘regularly’, that is a tricky word.

Reg-ularly.

–gularly, –gularly.

When you know that you can take those final three syllables and simplify them

so that you can say them more quickly, it will definitely help.

Then I met with a student named Grace.

Grace has been living in the US for quite some time and she’s from Brazil, her native languages Portuguese,

and she’s really done so well with so much of mastering American English,

but there were some things that were still difficult for her

and the thing that I wrote down as she was speaking, that I just noticed

as a flashing light, the biggest issue with her sounds was the R sound.

No surprise.

It’s extremely tricky for lots of people.

With her, she was putting in so much effort.

And it makes sense.

When we learn how to do something, we use our brain, we understand it,

and then we apply that idea to what we’re doing.

We try, we put in effort to make it happen.

And what was happening was as she did that,

it’s hard to do that so quickly in a word or in a sentence, as she did that, it brought in more attention,

it made it harder, so she put in more effort to try to get that R sound.

And her R ended up sounding like this. Ohrr.

More stuck in the throat, not a clean forward American feel.

Now, with an adult speaker, I do often describe what’s happening,

show them what’s happening with photos and videos

so that they understand how to make a sound like the R sound,

where you can’t see much because of the tongue position and the mouth position.

So with adults, I do give this kind of information.

But then sometimes that means you try too much to use your head to make it happen.

So with Grace, I decided to do something that was mimicking more the way a child would learn.

What we did is we said: you’ve got to throw out everything you know,

brainwash yourself, you know nothing about R.

You’ve never heard of it.

It’s a brand new concept to you.

You can’t see a photo of how it’s made, I’m not going to describe to you how it’s made,

your only resource for understanding the sound is hearing it.

So I’m gonna say it, and then you repeat it, and as you’re repeating it,

you just try to match that sound, use your ear to match the sound.

What am i hearing?

Is it like what Rachel did?

If so, good. If not what can I change?

Rely on what you’re hearing and turning that into your voice,

rather than relying on what you know and trying to make your sound out of that.

Focus less on what your tongue is doing and to focus a ton on the sound.

So.

I’m just going to make an R sound.

I want you to close your eyes and just try to find that sound with your mouth, try to match my sound.

I’m going to do it for about two seconds. Then you do it for about two seconds, then I’m going to do it.

We’re just going to go back and forth for several times.

Just see what you can find.

Don’t think about what you’re doing with your tongue, think about the sound, and matching the sound.

Okay? - Okay. -

Errrrrrrr.

• Errrrrr.

• Errrrr.

• Errrrr.

• Errrrr.

• Errrrrr.

• Okay, so a couple things are happening. It’s actually starting pretty good.

Then you’re kind of doing this with your jaw.

• I’m trying to move.

• Yeah. Actually that is making it less good.

So I asked her: what are you doing? And she said,

well I started making the sound, and then I thought about how I needed to make it more forward,

that was the problem.

She started thinking about how it needed to be.

And sometimes, we just need to shut that off.

So it’s important as an adult to learn everything about the sound,

and understand that, and practice it with that way some, but then it’s also really important sometimes

to just let that go and learn as a child learns when it comes to brand new sounds.

And when she did that,

when she brainwashed herself into thinking she knew nothing about the sound,

and she could only rely on trying to match my sound,

something beautiful happened.

She looked so much more relaxed, this sound was way more accurate,

and the sound was also more relaxed.

It just looked easier.

It looked like this is something that you can reproduce and work into your speech.

I think that actually what’s gonna work better for you with this sound,

because you have so much brain knowledge and so much effort,

and you’ve said, you know it’s “My R is a problem.

like you already have all of these ideas about the R, would be to just let them go.

We’re going to do it again.

and if you notice your mind saying oh my gosh, I need to move my jaw out

or something, just try to let the thought come and go.

I’m just gonna do it and have you do it back. Okay?

• Okay.

• Errrrrr.

• Errrrr.

• Errrr.

• Errrrr.

• Errrrr.

• Errrr.

• Okay. All three of those were way better than any r that you did previously.

I will say, they looked very relaxed.

They looked much less effortful.

So now you and me, we’re going to do it just like I did with Grace in my class, okay?

So we’re going to take the R.

Brainwash yourself right now. You know nothing about how the R sound is made.

You’ve never seen a picture of the tongue position.

You’ve never heard me describe what should be happening with the tongue or the lips or the jaw.

You know nothing.

It’s a brand new sound. How exciting?

So the way you’re going to make it is you’re gonna hear me do it, and then you’re gonna do it.

And if it’s not right, don’t worry, because in a couple seconds, I’m gonna do it again.

You’ll have the chance to listen again, and then you’ll try again.

Rrrr–

Rrrr–

How are you feeling? Is your mind still trying to come in, tell you how to do it?

Try to let that go.

Say, okay mind, I love you, you’re so helpful, for now, I’m going to put you aside,

I’m gonna listen to my body instead.

So you’re taking your ear,

your ear is taking what it hears, and it is telling your mouth what to do to make that sound.

As you’re making a sound, your ear can tell if something’s not quite the same,

and it will tell your body what slight adjustment to make,

and this is how we navigate and find the right sound, okay?

So let’s try it.

Three times, no, let’s say five times, I’m going to hold out the R for a few seconds, then you do it,

then I do it, then you do it. Don’t judge yourself, because that really doesn’t matter.

Just keep going forward, hearing it, and trying it. Okay, let’s do it.

Rrrr–

Rrrr–

Rrrr–

Rrrr–

And the last time.

Rrrr–

What’s happening? Are you finding a more relaxed sound?

I’m actually feeling very relaxed just thinking about how relaxed you are working on this sound.

So it’s about the basics, taking yourself back to the foundation.

So, with the first student it was about the foundation of rhythm, getting rid of

sounds and words and just working on rhythm.

With the second student,

it was about getting back to the basics, the foundation of learning the way a child would learn.

Now, i’ve built a whole Academy around training materials, so

that’s a sign that I don’t think that adults can learn exclusively by listening.

I think they do need some help, some guidance and a lot of training.

The other thing that I worked with a Grace on was how she felt about her R. Here’s what I said.

Because it is harder to change that habit when we think: I’m so stressed about this,

I’m so self-conscious about it. It’s such a problem for me.

That does, I think, make it harder to break the habit.

So we want to do, like, the good work of breaking the habit,

but we also want to do the important work of addressing what are we saying to ourselves about our habit,

and is it, like, slowing us down from meeting our goal?

So I think that maybe working on both of those things on the R will help…

Will help release you a little bit because I definitely see that tension in that effort

that’s going into making the R and sometimes, speaking in general, not always.

So you have to take care of yourself and watch how you

talk about yourself and your ability,

because if it’s not supportive of what you’re trying to do, then it’s gonna slow you down.

And I know it sounds kind of cheesy to say that, but it’s true and i’ve seen it happen, and

to help my students make the fastest,

best progress,

i’ve learned that I also need to take care of

how they see themselves, and that’s also something I do in the Academy.