Now, if this is your first time visiting my channel

then let me just introduce myself.

I am an English teacher from England

and I teach English as a foreign language.

Now I've already done a video on 10 words

that non-native speakers tend to pronounce incorrectly

and today I'm going to talking about 10 words

that native speakers pronounce incorrectly.

So if you're a native English speaker then

keep watching the video and see if there are any

that you didn't know that you were pronouncing incorrectly.

When I did the research for this video,

I really surprised myself because there was a word

that I use quite a lot that I, up until today,

have been pronouncing incorrectly.

Non-native speakers, you are more than welcome as well

just to generally improve your pronunciation

and practise your listening with me here.

Disclaimer, you can pronounce the words however you want.

I really do not mind.

I also know that there are many differences

between British English and American English

and other English and I'm not saying

that American English is wrong.

My channel is about British English

so that's what I'm talking about today.

I actually think that American English

can be more logical at times so well done Webster.

Before we get started, I just wanted to remind you all

that if you really want to take your English learning

to the next level, then you should check out

the website called italki and this is an online platform

where you can connect with hundreds

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So if you're learning English or any other language

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you can visit italki using the link in the description

and your account will be credited with 100 italki credits

as soon as you make your first purchase.

And that's worth around 10 dollars so make sure

you take advantage of that offer.

Okay, back to the class.

Now the first word on my list,

there are 10 in total, is this one.

Yes, it's not really a word.

It's a letter, but it has been pronounced incorrectly

so many times by so many native speakers

and I must say I was a culprit when I was younger.

I used to say this incorrectly.

It should be pronounced H, H.

But a lot of people pronounce it H, H.

Now it does make more sense to pronounce the letter

that makes the h sound with the h sound

at the beginning of it, h.

But alas, that is not the official way.

Now no one's going to get cross with you

if you pronounce it incorrectly, but originally,

in the 19th century, words like herb, hotel and hospital

were pronounced erb, otel, and ospital.

And then it was a battle of the classes,

and then we started pronouncing the h on everything

and now the breathy h is a big part of the English,

of the British English language.

Now you might notice that Americans do actually still

pronounce herb, erb.

There are two accepted pronunciations.

You can say both herb and erb in America.

Now the next one is something that I eat for breakfast

most mornings which is, yeah I know.

This for breakfast?

It gives me a lot of energy.

This is pronounced salmon

but a lot of native speakers say salmon

but it should be salmon, but salmon.

So the L in salmon is silent.

Moving on to number three, this one,

much the same, almond, shouldn't be pronounced almond.

The L again is silent.

Then we have the word that I found out

that I had been pronouncing incorrectly.

So the word is, number four, this one.

How would you say it?

Go on, say it aloud, no one's listening.

It should be pronounced with three syllables.

Mischievous, but up until today,

I have always pronounced it mischievous

with four syllables.

Now I phoned up one of my friends

who coincidentally speaks Spanish and I asked her,

how would you pronounce a word for naughty

that begins with m, and she said mala.

(laughs)

Which I found quite funny but no, I talked to my friends

and they all pronounced it mischievous as well.

I did some research on this and for the majority

of under 35s, this is the way

that we pronounce mischievous.

So I wonder whether the word will evolve

and mischievous will become accepted

but really, it's not in the spelling,

so I wonder where that came from.

Now the next one is something that I often

hear pronounced incorrectly, but it's such

a tiny tiny mistake.

Some people pronounce this word et cetera.

Et cetera with an x like et cetera.

Or et cetera, et cetera but it should be et cetera.

Now the next one, number six, Italians, this is for you.

All the coffee lovers will know this.

It's not expresso, it's espresso, espresso.

There is no x in there.

We've got it mixed up with the word express.

So make sure you remember that one next time

you order a coffee.

Now the next one is another case of extra

syllables being added in.

This one is just two syllables but many people

pronounce it with three.

It should be athlete, athlete.

But many natives will say athlete, athlete.

So remember, two syllables, not three.

Now the next one is my personal favourite on this list.

It is this one and for all the non-natives, it might seem

quite obvious that it's pronounced specifically.

Specifically, but some people do say pacifically

so they get the wrong spelling as well

and the wrong pronunciation.

So, I guess pacifically comes from the pacific ocean,

I'm not sure but people have heard it,

written it down wrong and a couple of people, not many,

will say pacifically instead of specifically.

Now the next one, number nine, this one.

Now this is a word that I hear Americans pronounce

incorrectly more often than the British.

I don't want to cause any rivalry there.

We have our faults, I know we have our faults.

We add in extra us and we have funny spellings.

Now this should be, for British, ask,

and for Americans, ask.

But there are a few people that will say axe.

Now it is a notoriously difficult combination

of phonemes the sk together

so they just forget the first s sound and say axe.

Now the last one, the popular super food, not quinoa,

as I called it for quite a long time.

It's actually pronounced, quinoa,

but how would you know this by looking at it.

I had no idea, quinoa.

I feel a bit ridiculous saying quinoa.

It sounds too posh but yes, not quinoa, or quinoa, quinoa.

Alright guys, so that was my list of 10 words

that native speakers sometimes, quite often,

pronounce incorrectly so you learned the one

that I pronounce incorrectly, mischievous, not mischievous,

I must remember that.

And maybe you learned something too.

If you can think of any more words

that are pronounced incorrectly by native speakers,

make sure you comment below.

I'd love to hear them.

And I'll see you very soon for another English class.

Don't forget to connect with me on all of my social media.

I have my Instagram account, my Facebook,

obviously my YouTube channel.

I have a Weeber account and oh yes, I have Patreon.

So connect with me on there.

I love communicating with all of you.

Bye.