Pronunciation and Accent Guide
Improve clarity, stress, and intonation while keeping your natural accent.
概要
IELTS examiners value intelligibility, not accent elimination. Focus on four pillars: individual sounds, word stress, sentence stress, and connected speech.
Tune Individual Sounds
Target troublesome vowel and consonant pairs using minimal-pair drills.
重要なヒント
- Record yourself reading sentences containing ship/sheep, cut/caught, law/low
- Use online IPA charts to map mouth positions and airflow
- Practise tongue twisters slowly, increasing speed once accuracy is stable
Master Word & Sentence Stress
Stress guides listeners to your main idea—misplaced stress makes speech harder to follow.
重要なヒント
- Mark primary stress in new vocabulary (sus-TAIN-able, in-NO-vative)
- Highlight content words in each sentence and drop pitch on function words
- Practise “shadowing” news clips to mimic rhythm and emphasis
Use Connected Speech Naturally
Linking words and using reductions makes your speech more fluid and native-like.
Linking Consonant to Vowel
アクション： Practise phrases like “find out”, “move on”, “look up” focusing on seamless transitions
Contractions & Reductions
アクション： Use natural reductions (gonna, wanna) in informal answers and contractions in formal ones (I have → I’ve)
Feedback Loop
Combine self-recordings with external feedback for measurable progress.
評価の焦点
- Intelligibility: Can a non-native friend or AI transcription app capture your sentences accurately?
- Consistency: Do you maintain stress patterns when speaking spontaneously?
- Confidence: Does your pace remain steady under time pressure?
結論
Practice little and often—ten minutes of targeted pronunciation drills daily will transform clarity within weeks.