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  • In this video series, you will learn how to pronounce the 100 most common words in American

  • English.

  • I got this idea when I saw a couple of other videos on this topic, and I was horrified

  • at what I saw.

  • In those videos, people were teaching the full pronunciation of these words, like: THAT,

  • HAVE, TO.

  • So many of the 100 most common words are function words and they reduce.

  • It is completely unnatural to fully pronounce each word in American English.

  • Let me show you what I mean.

  • This sentence is four words, and each one of these words is in the 100 most common words

  • list.

  • This is for work.

  • That's the full pronunciation of each of those words.

  • And if that's all you learn about the pronunciation, then this is how you would pronounce that

  • sentence: This is for work.

  • This is for work.

  • Well, I don't want any of my students thinking that that is the correct way to pronounce

  • that sentence.

  • It's not.

  • It's not natural.

  • This is for work.

  • This is for work.

  • Is and for are not fully pronounced.

  • Rhythm in American English is extremely important for capturing the character of the language:

  • for understanding Americans when they speak, and for sounding natural and being easily

  • understood when you speak.

  • Some syllables are long, and some are very very short.

  • This contrast is the rhythm of American English.

  • In order to make those short syllables really short, some words in American English, some

  • of the most common words, reduce.

  • This means a sound changes or is dropped.

  • And everybody studying English should know these.

  • Let's take our sentence again and talk about the real pronunciation of it.

  • This is for work.

  • Two words are longer.

  • This.

  • Work.

  • And two words are shorter.

  • Is, for.

  • This is for work.

  • This is for work.

  • So it's not iz but is.

  • And it's not for but fer.

  • This is for work.

  • Rhythmic contrast.

  • So as we go through the 100 most common words in American English here, we're going to

  • talk about rhythm and reductions at the same time, to make sure that you're learning

  • the correct pronunciation, not the full pronunciation, which is rarely used in most function words.

  • Okay, let's start at the beginning.

  • The number one most common word is THE.

  • In the sentence it will become the, the.

  • Very fast with a schwa.

  • This is when the next word begins with a consonant.

  • For example, “the most”, the, the most.

  • It's usually pronounced with the EE vowel, the, the, the.

  • If the next word begins with a vowel or diphthong, for example, “the other”, the, the, the.

  • The most important thing about the pronunciation of this word is that it should be said very

  • quickly.

  • The cat.

  • It should never be THE CAT, THE CAT.

  • Always 'the cat'.

  • The, the, the very fast.

  • The next word is 'be', and I assume this means the verb TO BE, conjugated.

  • I am, you are, he is, she is, it is, we are, they are.

  • The important thing to know about these pronunciations is that they will almost always be said in

  • a contraction, 'I am' becomes I'm, I'm, I'm.

  • Said very quickly, I'm.

  • Sometimes you'll even hear as just.

  • the M sound: M'sorry.

  • M'sorry, mm, mm, mm.

  • This is a natural pronunciation.

  • YOU ARE, you're, reduces to 'you're'.

  • Super fast.

  • basically no vowel.

  • You're, you're.

  • You're gonna be okay.

  • You're, you're.

  • Very fast.

  • HE IS becomes 'he's'.He's.

  • SHE IS is she's.

  • She's.

  • IT IS, it's, it's, it's.

  • Sometimes we reduce this even further we change a sound, we dropped the vowel.

  • We say just 'ts'.

  • Ts, ts. 'ts cool! 'ts awesome!

  • Ts.

  • Have you ever heard that?

  • 'Ts cool.

  • 'Ts raining.

  • It's a common reduction.

  • WE ARE, we're, becomes 'we're'.

  • We're running late.

  • 'we're', 'we're'.

  • Very fast.

  • THEY ARE, they're becomes 'they're'.

  • Very fast, the vowel changes, they're.

  • They're okay.

  • They're, they're.

  • Word number three: to.

  • Almost never pronounced this way, to.

  • We use a reduction: the vowel changes to the schwa.

  • To, to, said very quickly.

  • And sometimes, the true T at the beginning changes to more of a D sound, or a Flap T.

  • Let's go to the beach.”

  • Go to the.

  • Go to.

  • Go to.

  • How is 'to' being pronounce there? to to, go to.

  • A flap of the tongue, and the schwa.

  • Said very quickly.

  • Go to.

  • Go to the beach.

  • It's nothing like TO, is it?

  • OF.

  • Again, we don't fully pronounce this word.

  • It's not OF, it's of.

  • Schwa, very light V, said very quickly.

  • And actually, you'll often hear this word without the 'v'.

  • Then it's just the schwa, and we pronounce it this way all the time in the phrases 'kind

  • of' and 'sort of'.

  • kinda, sorta.

  • For example, I'm kinda tired.

  • Kinda.

  • Kinda, uh, uh, uh.

  • Schwa, very fast.

  • Kinda.

  • Ok, we're only four words in, but let's review.

  • I'm going to put up a sentence.

  • Look at it, find the reduction, and then say the sentence with the reduction.

  • Say the reduction very quickly.

  • Here's one sentence:

  • I am remember becomes I'm.

  • How quickly did you make that first word?

  • I'm running late. I'm running late.Try it as just the M sound.

  • Mmm, mmm.

  • M'running, M'running.

  • M'running late.

  • Sorry guys, I'm running late.

  • So natural.

  • When you learn the reductions in American English, and you start to really use them

  • in your speech, you gain a native feeling.

  • Also, understanding Americans becomes easier because you can start to identify the reductions.

  • One more for you to try out loud now: I want you to try reducing the word 'to'.

  • Look at it, think about it, now try it out loud.

  • “I know how to do it.”

  • How to, how to, how to.

  • I'm making that the Flap T and the schwa.

  • Are you?

  • Try it again.

  • How to, I know how to do it.

  • Alright, we'll keep going with number 5: AND.

  • And.

  • Another word that we rarely fully pronounce.

  • There are a couple of different ways to reduce this.

  • We'll start with the full pronunciation, and we'll reduce from there.

  • AA vowel followed by N consonant: the tongue is lifted in the back for AA, Aaaa.

  • Then relaxes before the N. Aa-uh, aa-uh, aa-uh.

  • So it's not a pure AA sound.

  • Aa-uh, aa-uh.

  • And, and, and, and, and.

  • First reduction is just dropping the D. “An', An'and I think it will be okay.”

  • An, An' I, An' I.

  • No D, just the N into the next word.

  • An' I think it will be okay.

  • Another reduction, more common, is to just say the N sound, “N'.

  • N' I think it will be okay.”

  • N', N', just straight from the N into the next word.

  • N' I, N' I think it will be okay.

  • Cookies and cream, salt and pepper, black and white, up and down, left and right.

  • All of these, I'm just making a quick N sound, linking the two other words.

  • Up and down.

  • Number 6.

  • Okay, we're actually going to do 6 and 32 together, because they're related.

  • They're the articles A and AN.

  • Now, we don't say A and AN.

  • We say 'a' and 'an'.

  • Schwa.

  • Very fast, very little movement for the mouth.

  • A, a, a coffee.

  • A, a or An, an example.

  • An, an.

  • A, an.

  • Number 7.

  • IN.

  • We don't drop or change a sound here.

  • We don't reduce.

  • But it is still unstressed.

  • This mean it should be really short, less clear.

  • Instead of saying 'IN', we would say 'in'.

  • He's in love.”

  • In, in.

  • She's in a hurry”.

  • In, in, in.

  • So be careful.

  • It's not IN.

  • That sounds stressed.

  • It's 'in'.

  • Number 8: THAT.

  • You know what I realize?

  • I already have a video for a lot of these reductions.

  • I have a video on the pronunciation of THAT and how we really pronounce it in a sentence.

  • So I'll give a brief description here, but I'll also link to that and other related

  • reduction videos in the video description.

  • THAT is a word that can be used lots of different ways in American English.

  • And in some cases, in many cases, we reduce the vowel from AA to the schwa, uh.

  • So THAT becomes 'that'.

  • Now the ending T: the pronunciation of that sound depends on the beginning of the next

  • word.

  • If the next word begins with a vowel or diphthong, it's a Flap T: That I, d d, d that I.

  • If the next word begins with a consonant, then it's a Stop T. That she.

  • That, that That she.

  • I know, it's a little confusing.

  • Check out my video on the word THAT for a longer explanation and more examples.

  • But just note that we often don't pronounce this word, that.

  • We often reduce it so it has the schwa that.

  • Number 9: the verb HAVE.

  • Just like the verb 'be', this will often be used as a contraction in spoken English,

  • which is already a reduction.

  • We're already changing sounds for that: I HAVE becomes I've, I've I've I've

  • I've.

  • “I've been wanting to see that.”

  • I've I've.

  • YOU HAVE becomes 'you've.'

  • HE HAS becomes 'he's'.

  • He's he's.

  • You've you've.

  • He's been waiting.

  • He's.

  • Here's something interesting: the pronunciation of the HAS contraction.

  • With 'he' and 'she', it's pronounced as a Z. Hiz.

  • Hiz been, hiz been.

  • But with Shes shiz shiz.

  • But with it, its, it's been raining, then it's an S sound.

  • It's.

  • He's, Z it's, Ss S. WE HAVE becomes 'we've', we've' we've' and THEY HAVE becomes

  • 'they've' which sounds like deiv when it's unstressed.

  • Number 10: the pronoun I.

  • Usually said very quickly, it's not “I” but “I”.

  • I think so.

  • I, I, I. I think, I.

  • If you're speaking really quickly, you can maybe get away with something more like 'aa'

  • than 'I'.

  • I think so.

  • Aa aa aa.

  • I think so.

  • When it's said so quickly, you can't really tell if I'm doing the full diphthong I or

  • not.

  • Wow.

  • Okay, we just did the ten most common words in English, and none of them are fully pronounced.

  • They're all words that are unstressed or reduced.

  • Interesting.

  • Keep your eyes out, that's an idiom that means to look for something.

  • We'd expect to it will be coming in the future.

  • So keep your eyes out for future videos in this series where we'll go over the rest

  • of the words in this list.

  • Here's playlist, and as I create the new videos, I will add them there.

  • When will we find our first stressed word in the 100 most common words of American English?

  • We'll have to find out.

  • That's it, and thanks so much for using Rachel's English.

In this video series, you will learn how to pronounce the 100 most common words in American

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