Pronunciation Tips

Unit 1: Nice to meet you

• Focus: The English alphabet.
• Additional Practice: Listening and repeating spelled names from the unit’s dialogues, such as R-O-B-I-N-S-O-N, M-I-L-L-E-R, T-H-O-M-P-S-O-N, and D-A-V-I-D-S-O-N.

Unit 2: Home and abroad

• Focus: Numbers ending in -teen vs -ty.
• Additional Practice: Distinguishing between fourteen/forty, fifteen/fifty, sixteen/sixty, seventeen/seventy, and nineteen/ninety.

Unit 3: My favourite things

• Focus: Plural noun endings (-s) pronounced as /s/, /z/, or /ɪz/.
• Additional Practice:
  • Words ending in /s/: wallets, parents
  • Words ending in /z/: bags, cars, sisters, pens
  • Words ending in /ɪz/: watches, briefcases

Unit 4: Whose are these clothes?

• Focus: The vowel sounds /u:/ vs /ʊ/.
• Additional Practice:
  • Long /u:/ sound: excuse, whose, boots, shoes
  • Short /ʊ/ sound: book, woman

Unit 5: Upstairs downstairs

• Focus: The vowel sounds /i:/ vs /ɪ/.
• Additional Practice:
  • Long /i:/ sound: these, read, three, keys
  • Short /ɪ/ sound: this, pink, it

Unit 6: Work and leisure

• Focus: Intonation of questions.
• Additional Practice:
  • Falling intonation (Wh-questions): “Where are you from?”, “How do you get to work?”, “Who’s got my mobile phone?”
  • Rising intonation (Yes/No questions): “Are you an architect?”, “Is this your pencil?”, “Have you got a car?”

Unit 7: Lifestyles

• Focus: Third-person singular Present Simple endings pronounced as /s/, /z/, or /ɪz/.
• Additional Practice:
  • Verbs ending in /s/: makes, looks, meets
  • Verbs ending in /z/: goes, plays
  • Verbs ending in /ɪz/: finishes

Unit 8: In town

• Focus: Sentence stress in the imperative.
• Additional Practice: Identifying the main stressed words in commands like: “Don’t call him,” “Take a taxi,” “Don’t go by bus,” and “Go to school.”

Unit 9: What would you like?

• Focus: The consonant sounds /tʃ/ vs /ʃ/.
• Additional Practice:
  • The “ch” sound (/tʃ/): peach, teacher, cheap
  • The “sh” sound (/ʃ/): finish, shirt, mushroom

Unit 10: April showers

• Focus: The consonant sounds /n/ vs /ŋ/.
• Additional Practice:
  • The “n” sound (/n/): green, rain, win
  • The “ng” sound (/ŋ/): having, playing, listening

Unit 11: How much is that?

• Focus: The consonant sounds /ð/ vs /θ/.
• Additional Practice:
  • Voiced “th” sound (/ð/): leather, there, this
  • Voiceless “th” sound (/θ/): bathroom, theatre, thing

Unit 12: You can do it!

• Focus: Strong and weak forms of the verb can.
• Additional Practice: Practicing the contrast in statements and short responses like:
  • “He can sing, but he can’t dance.”
  • “Can you fix the car? No, I can’t.”
  • “Can you play the guitar? Yes, I can.”

Unit 13: Looking back

• Focus: Past Simple verb endings (-ed) pronounced as /ɪd/, /t/, or /d/.
• Additional Practice:
  • Verbs ending in /ɪd/: visited, needed
  • Verbs ending in /t/: liked, stopped
  • Verbs ending in /d/: called, explored

Unit 14: Tech world

• Focus: Stressed syllables.
• Additional Practice: Finding the main stress in other multisyllabic words like printer (first syllable) and Brazil (second syllable).

Unit 15: Not my lucky day

• Focus: Silent letters.
• Additional Practice: Identifying specific unpronounced letters:
  • The “l” in should, would, and half
  • The “gh” in night and bought
  • The “t” in castle
  • The “n” in autumn
  • The “k” in know

Unit 16: Pack your bags

• Focus: Strong and weak forms of to.
• Additional Practice: Noting the difference in pronunciation between embedded phrases and short responses:
  • Embedded phrase: “Do you want to have dinner with me?” or “I want to have a big party.”
  • Stressed short response: “Would you like to go shopping on Saturday? Yes, I’d love to.” or “I would like to, but I can’t.”