Top 10 Difficult Words to Pronounce

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Hello, I’m teacher Robin. Welcome to another livestreaming class. Welcome to my living room. If you are joining us for the first time, this is where I’m recording the classes during confinement. So I hope this video finds all of you. Well, in some countries, people are already starting to go back to work. There’s a confinement plan in action here where I live in Barcelona, we’re in phase point five right now, actually, so we’re slowly starting to go back to normal, but it’s it’s a slow process. But in the meantime, I am going to keep providing you with my videos from home every week. And today I have a very interesting topic that many of you ask about. And this is my top 10 difficult words to pronounce. So English can be difficult because of the pronunciation rules, the vowel sounds, exceptions to the rule, etc. So I have chosen 10 different words that I know many of you have trouble pronouncing. I’m going to pronounce them for you. We’re going to talk about the definition of the word and we’re going to look at an example sentence. And if you have any questions, feel free to write them in the comments as we go along.

Okay, my first difficult word to pronounce is Wi-Fi. Okay, this is internet access, and it is more important than ever. Now, because we need to stay connected, we need to make sure that we have internet wherever we go. So for example, if you go to a cafe, you can say “Does this cafe have Wi-Fi?”

My next difficult word to pronounce is difficult because it actually has two different pronunciations. And this is either or either, which means one thing or the other. For example, “Tonight, I’m going to have either pizza or pasta for dinner”. So here the pronunciation is actually correct. If you say either, or if you say either, both are correct. So you can use, you can use either one or either one.

My next word has the same pronunciation issues as the last one, and it’s neither or neither. Okay, so again, we have the same case here, neither actually means not either of the two. So this is kind of the negative of either, and both pronunciations are correct again, so for example, “Neither of them remembers that woman’s name”. So that means not one or the other. So, negative.

My next difficult word is available. So this is four syllables available. This means able to be bought or used. For example, if you go to a restaurant, you can say “Is there a table available for two?”.

My next word is comfortable, which should actually be four syllables comfortable, but most of the time, it’s reduced to three. So most people pronounce it comfortable. And it means relaxed. For example, “I don’t feel comfortable singing in public”.

My next word is library. Okay, this is difficult when you have two R’s together separated by a vowel, it becomes a little bit of a tongue twister. So the correct pronunciation is library. Okay, emphasis on the -brary, kind of open your mouth when you say “brary”, library. For example, “Tomorrow, I’ll go to the library to check out some books”.

My next word is often or often with a soft T. So this kind of depends on whether you’re speaking British English or American English and American English, the T is soft. So I would say often, for example, and in British English, it’s more pronounced often. And this means many times, for example, “We often go running on the weekends”.
My next one is the second month of the year. So this is February. Okay. Now this is difficult because it’s not pronounced how it’s spelled. So if you pronounce it according to the spelling, you would say February we have that “br” again, but actually, the R becomes silent and we say February. For example, “Today is February 14th”.

My next one is an ordinal number, and it’s sixth. Okay, so this is difficult because of this TH pronunciation at the end. So ordinal numbers represent an order of things a position. So in this case for the number six, the ordinal number is six. Okay, so practice that TH sound. For example, “George finished sixth in the race”.

And my last difficult word to pronounce is squirrel. Okay, this is the small animal with a furry tail, that you may see where you live, or you may not have them where you live. But for example, we can say, “I see a squirrel in my backyard”. And this is difficult to pronounce because of this “qu” sound so when we make a “qu” our mouth makes kind of an O sound, squirrel.

Okay. So now that I’ve given you my top 10, obviously, there are many, many more difficult words to pronounce. I want to hear from you. So tell me in the comments, what other words are difficult for you to pronounce? Maybe a word that you read in an article or you saw reading subtitles of something and you thought, how do I pronounce that word? So write them in the comments. And we’ll keep them in mind for future videos. So I’m looking forward to hearing what words, which words you have the most trouble with pronouncing, maybe it’s a specific, spelling a specific sound that’s difficult for you. And this is common depending on your native language where you’re from certain pronunciations like that TH sound we talked about before, is, can be more difficult for certain people. But don’t worry, the best way to improve your pronunciation is to practice obviously, as much as possible, but to listen and repeat. So this is something that you can do, especially in our course, in the ABA course, we have a speak section in every unit. So you listen, you watch a short film, and then you practice saying the same dialogue that the speakers do. So you listen to the native speaker, and then you record your voice saying the same thing and then you compare it. So this is a really great way for you to improve your pronunciation to compare to a native speaker. And just listen again, as much as you can watch movies, watch TV shows, listen to the radio. You can also practice with our fill in the lyrics exercises on Live English, listen to a song and fill in the lyrics and sing along and practice your pronunciation. So there’s lots of ways to do it. So don’t worry if you feel like you have trouble pronouncing, it’s normal. And the more you practice, and the more you speak, the more confident you’ll become and the more natural it will be for you. So again, I want to thank you for joining our class today. I hope you’re all well. Write in the comments which words are difficult for you to pronounce. And I look forward to seeing you next week. Take care, bye!