British and American slang

Watch this video, where British actor Hugh Laurie is quizzed in the popular American tv show Ellen. Could you tell the meaning of these British and American slang words, after watching the video?

British vowels

Psychics video

Describing speech and language ability

Listen to this podcast:

The Italian who went to Malta

Problems with long/short i? Watch this video!

The black list

Here's the list of students who haven't sent me their Initial Oral Test:

• CURIA, CLELIA

• MORALES OLIVA, FRANCISCO

21 accents

Check this out! It's 21 accents in a nick of time. Can you tell the difference between any of these accents? Someone on the forum said they wanted this type of activity, so here it is.

INITIAL ORAL TEST

Next week I will give you the results of your initial test. As I announced in class, it is not possible to get a grade in this course without doing FIRST this test.

American sense of humor

I sometimes use cartoons in class. One of my favorites, if not THE favorite, is Gary Larson. Check out this one, and see if you understand it. If you cannot read the caption underneath the image, just click on the picture and it'll zoom in.

INITIAL ORAL TEST

IMPORTANT INFORMATION! For those of you who have joined the course recently (like today!), please read the Initial Test document on the course's webpage. Follow the instructions there and send me the test ASAP (As Soon As Possible).

Don't waver!

Who are The Who?

I was surprised that the other day, in the course of one of my many classes, I mentioned the rock group The Who and nobody knew who the heck I was talking about. If you watch CSI: MIAMI or CSI: Las Vegas the theme song in both is a song by this group.

As an English instructor, I feel you have to check this video out:

Class materials

I am sorry most of the students had to leave the class yesterday to buy the booklet, but if one wants to improve their pronunciation a lot of practice is needed. I assume that everyone agrees on this.

I have taught the course several times and it always happens that someone doesn't bring the material, although I have never seen the entire class in this situation.

I am confident that in the future we won't have this problem anymore. I am an instructor, not a policeman!

DEADLINES

"Deadline" is a word that to Spanish speakers at least may have negative connotations. The "dead" part of the compound is responsible for this.

The students of this course seem to experience trouble meeting deadlines. I had to set another deadline for the Initial Oral Test. Let's see what happens in the future. Exciting, innit?

The Initial Oral Test

I have received very few Initial Tests, and I begin to worry because the deadline is Oct 9, 2009.

Please remember: October 9 is the deadline for submitting your Initial Oral Test. The sheet I handed out in classs is:

Fonética correctiva

Initial Test

Instructions

You have to record a text and a series of sentences on your computer and send it via email to the instructor.Please make sure that the recording is in a .wav file. Follow these steps:

1. Record the following passage:

Please call Stella. Ask her to bring these things with her from the store:

Six spoons of fresh snow peas, five thick slabs of blue cheese, and maybe a snack for her brother Bob. We also need a small plastic snake and a big toy frog for the kids. She can scoop these things into three red bags, and we will go meet her Wednesday at the train station.

2. Record the following sentences:

1. Please be seated in these three seats

2. I live in this big city since Christmas

3. That bad class can’t add fast

4. Mother loves to buy another rug

5. We saw a small dog walking

6. The good cook put too much sugar

7. The girls heard many birds

8. Peter Pan picks a pin

9. The teacher told us to take it

10. They did what their daddy told them to do

11. I give everyone five days of vacation

12. I breathe smoothly in this weather

13. My crazy cousin loses his keys

14. Shine my shoes and wash the dishes

15. The judge jokes in college

16. The river really rolls

17. The woman walks while we work

18. You can spend a year in Europe

19. He’s happy and handsome like Henry

3. Send the recordings as an attachment to an email where you have to write your first and last name.

4. Send the email with the attached .wav file to this address:

phonetics_professor@yahoo.es

6. The deadline for sending the final test is October 9, 2009.

5. You’re done!

As I will show in class today, on the classroom's PC, to read some of the material I will make available you need to install a set of phonetic fonts. For windows, do the following:

1) just click here Font Download Charis SIL 4.106 (official release)

2) next click on Charis SIL 4.106 font release - SIL PUA 5.1a (Windows, Macintosh and Linux)

3) finally place the Charis fonts in the folder for fonts that you will find in "Paneles de control"

If you use, like me, a Mac, let me know and I will give you some new instructions.