Intonation videos

Hi everyone!

The seminars were great! Today I´m posting some cool videos that talk about pronunciation and intonation. They are good for those who would like to reduce accent and make the English sound more natural.

Teacher Jennifer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2bHdXcszJ4 INTONATION LESSON 10a

I love this teacher! She´s so didactic and has such a sweet voice! There´s no way you can´t learn with her!

There are 4 lessons for intonation with this teacher (I think her name is Jennifer) . I put the link for the first class and you can find the other classes directly on Youtube.

Mr. Duncan in England

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPcBJfBTlNo&feature=fvst

Honestly, I don´t get the British sense of humor, but this teacher explains the difference between pronunciation and intonation. It´s a good video though, very very British indeed!

Accent Reduction

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSms8DYnjGs&feature=related

This is from an Accent reduction institute. It´s so interesting and real! It actually shows a class and an excellent teacher teaching phonetics. Loved it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSVk61szem0

I don´t like this video as much as I like the previous ones, but still, if you´re really in the mood, go ahead and watch it.

OUR SEMINARS

Hey everyone!
I´m writing to promote our traditional SEMINARS.
I will be presenting the seminars in English, so, I´m going to explain the purpose of each.

PRONUNCIATION FOR BRAZILIANS HAVAD BARÃO GERALDO 14/06 7PM

This seminar focuses on the basic principles of phonetics applied to English as a Second Language. I will talk about most common mistakes Brazilians make when they speak English, mistakes that many times cause embarrasing communication breakdowns. There will be many examples of mispronunciations as well as tips and mnemonics to improve these unwelcome errors.

INTONATION: HOW TO MAKE YOUR ENGLISH SOUND MORE NATURAL HAVAD TAQUARAL 16/06 7H30PM

Intonation helps to create the "music" of a language. There are high notes and low notes when we speak. If we didn´t have intonation in languages, our voices would all sound very robotic and boring, wouldn´t they? The problem is that the intonation patterns in Portuguese are different from the intonation patterns in English. So, sometimes we speak English, using the intonation in Portuguese and the result of this could be funny, weird, unintelligible or even misunderstood. This seminar is aimed at explaining the most common intonation patterns in English.

Everybody is welcome to attend! Do your inscriptions by taquaral@havad.com.br or barao@havad.com.br

Places are limited

OFF versus OF

Hi everyone!

Hey, what´s the difference (in pronunciation) between OF and OFF? Don´t know? One thing you must know for sure: neither of them is pronounced "ófi"!

So, let´s get down to business.

OFF: it´s pronounced ÓF

Turn off the phone

I need to put off the meeting

She asked me to take my shoes off

This is the easy one, right? Let´s check the other one now...

OF: it´s pronounced ÂV

What??? V sound?

EXACTLY!

So, time to practice:

A friend of mine (ÂV mine)

the storm of the century (ÂV the century)

Because of this (ÂV this)

See?

Living and learning!

POCAHONTAS AND AVATAR- the same movie?

Hey everyone, for those who don´t know me, I am a cinephile.
I have a daughter, and since last April, I´ve been watching the Disney Movie Pocahontas with her about... 4 times per week, AT LEAST! And the funny thing is that I cry every time! What a sad endind, Pocahontas and John Smith don´t stay together... (oops, sorry for the spoiler!!!)
Oh well, I was surfing the net and started to find many things comparing Pocahontas with Avatar. And it was like a revelations, because whenever I was watching Pocahontas, it did remind me of Avatar! Then, I found this file about the synopsys of Pocahontas, crossed out with Avatar info! Indeed, they are very similar! And I particularly liked the abbreviation that this guy used at the end: "IMHO", which stands for IN MY HUMBLE OPINION! HAHA, loved it.
So, I found many videoclips comparing these 2 stories/movies, it´s very interesting!
Check them out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGOCodaM4UM&feature=related

Also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UajX9NZlONE&feature=related

And there´s this very funny guy comparing these movies on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wn84d2VUlvQ&feature=related

Anyway, I don´t care!

I love Pocahontas and I love Avatar, even though they are most likely, to say the least, the same story!