Poems for Pronunciation
When children learn to speak any poetry aloud, and also when they learn songs, children improve their pronunciation of English, especially in the areas of stress - word stress and sentence stress.
However, for practice in pronouncing particular phonemes, nothing beats a good old-fashioned "tongue twisters"!
It is not my intention to "reinvent the wheel", nor to step on any toes with regards to copyright. So, first of all, here are some links to sites that have tongue twisters for ESL learners to practise.
Download ESL - this site has graded tongue twisters, and also offers MP3 files so you can listen to them.
The Internet TESL Journal has a page full of links to other sites with tongue twisters.
ESL Mania has five rather long tongue twisters, with sound files, which are not really suitable for young children, but maybe good practice for the teacher!
Charles Ian Chun has tongue twisters designed around particular pronunciation problems of Korean students - and a lot of them are the same problems Malaysian students have so it's worth a look.
Uebersetzung has tongue twisters in many languages, this is a page of 500 English ones (not all of them are useful!)
Busy Teacher is a growing site you should know and connect with. Here is a page of worksheets related to tongue twisters.
However, for practice in pronouncing particular phonemes, nothing beats a good old-fashioned "tongue twisters"!
It is not my intention to "reinvent the wheel", nor to step on any toes with regards to copyright. So, first of all, here are some links to sites that have tongue twisters for ESL learners to practise.
Download ESL - this site has graded tongue twisters, and also offers MP3 files so you can listen to them.
The Internet TESL Journal has a page full of links to other sites with tongue twisters.
ESL Mania has five rather long tongue twisters, with sound files, which are not really suitable for young children, but maybe good practice for the teacher!
Charles Ian Chun has tongue twisters designed around particular pronunciation problems of Korean students - and a lot of them are the same problems Malaysian students have so it's worth a look.
Uebersetzung has tongue twisters in many languages, this is a page of 500 English ones (not all of them are useful!)
Busy Teacher is a growing site you should know and connect with. Here is a page of worksheets related to tongue twisters.
Create Your Own Tongue Twisters
It's really not that hard to create a tongue twister to order. (If you are really stuck, use the contact form at the bottom of this page and ask us to make you one.)
3. Now think of some other words with the sound(s) in, possibly at different places in the words (medial or final as well as initial).
4. Incorporate this words - nouns, verbs and adjectives - into sentences that may be quite silly.
For example: Lucky Lena rarely carries rabbits in her rucksack, but Rich Robbie likes to look at lollies.
- Choose the sound / s you want the students to practise.
- Think of a name with two words both starting with the same letter - maybe use one of the students' names and put an adjective starting with the same sound before it.
3. Now think of some other words with the sound(s) in, possibly at different places in the words (medial or final as well as initial).
4. Incorporate this words - nouns, verbs and adjectives - into sentences that may be quite silly.
For example: Lucky Lena rarely carries rabbits in her rucksack, but Rich Robbie likes to look at lollies.