SPEAKING & Pronunciation TIPS: you are too shy to speak? there are some hints here!

Thank for your sharing. I am not confident in my pronuciation. But i don''t know how to improve it. Practising myself or studying in the speaking coure, which better ? I am too busy to study in 2 hours or more everyday

I think both of them are good and you''d better combine 2 ways to practise and improve your pronunciation. Attending a course to study instructions and self-practising at home. I will post some more pronunciation tips and methods. Hope that it works for you.

Learners often neglect their pronunciation. They think that if they can communicate in English with other students in their class, they will be able to talk with native speakers too. They only realize they were wrong when they go to an English-speaking country and discover that people can''t understand them!
In my opinion, pronunciation is one of the most important language skills. You may be proficient at grammar and have a huge vocabulary, but if you pronounce words wrongly, you just won''t get understood. And even if you speak in an understandable way, you still have to work on your pronunciation. It''s the first thing people notice about your English when you talk to them. They will judge you by the way you speak. If your accent is pleasant, they will enjoy talking to you.
Studying pronunciation will also help you understand English better. If you know how different words are pronounced, you will understand more.
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Why you should study English pronunciation
First impressions
Pronunciation is definitely the biggest thing that people notice when you are speaking English. Let us tell you a personal anecdote about this:
We once went to a conversation class taught by native speakers (Americans). Before the class started, the teacher said to us: "So, do you speak good English?". Tom replied "We think so", and the guy said "It sure sounds like you do".
Notice that we just said three words, and the teacher could already tell if our English was good or bad. Why did the teacher think our English was good? Because of the difficult words we used? No. Because we used advanced grammar structures? No. It was our pronunciation.
When you meet a person, and you just say a sentence or two, do you think they will notice your poor vocabulary or bad grammar? Probably not. But they will notice if your pronunciation is good or bad. If your pronunciation is poor, they will immediately think about you as "the guy/girl who speaks bad English". Your pronunciation creates the first impression you make.
Communication
Good pronunciation should be one of the first things that you learn in English. You can live without advanced vocabulary â?" you can use simple words to say what you want to say. You can live without advanced grammar â?" you can use simple grammar structures instead. But there is no such thing as "simple pronunciation". If you don''t have good pronunciation, you have... bad pronunciation.
And the results of bad pronunciation are tragic. Even if you use great vocabulary and grammar, people may simply not understand what you want to say.
For example, if you pronounce sleep like this, and not like that, or if you pronounce ghost like this instead of this, native speakers will have serious problems understanding you! In our opinion, you should know how to say English sounds like the ee in sleep or the o in ghost, before you even learn words like sleep and ghost.
Here is another anecdote about this. After coming back from a vacation in the USA, a friend of Tom''s said:
"Whenever I spoke to a person in America, they kept asking me "What? What?". I would repeat my sentence again and again. Finally they would say "Ah-ha!" and then say my sentence, using exactly my words! It was very humiliating. I knew my words and grammar were good, but nobody would understand me, just because of my pronunciation. I am very motivated to learn English now."
Can you communicate in English?
Almost all English learners say "I don''t need to study pronunciation. I just want to communicate in English." Many of them think that they can communicate in English because they can communicate with their teacher and other students.
Do not make this mistake! You have to remember that:
Your teacher has been listening to bad English for years. He or she can understand it much more easily than the average person.
Other students are usually from the same country as you. Therefore, they speak English like you and they make the same mistakes. So it is easy for them to understand you.
The only true test is: Go to America or Britain and try to talk to "normal people" â?" a clerk at a supermarket, a bus driver, etc. If they can understand you, then you can say that you can communicate in English.
Unfortunately, many learners ignore pronunciation. They can communicate in class, so they think that they are good enough. After a few years they go to England or the USA and... nobody understands what they are saying. Remember Tom''s friend who went on vacation to America and couldn''t communicate? He was the best student in his English class.
Michal wrote a short story about people living on two islands where English is spoken. The story is for those who say: "I don''t need to learn pronunciation because I only want to communicate."
Communication is not enough
If you can communicate in English with people from other countries, congratulations! It''s a big achievement. But it may not be enough.
If you are at Level 2 of pronunciation skill, your English is understandable, but you have a strong foreign accent which is unpleasant for other people.
We have already said that your pronunciation is important because it makes your first impression. This is certainly true â?" nobody will say that you speak good English if you have a strong foreign accent. But there is more. If you have a pleasant accent, people will simply enjoy talking to you. They will want to spend time with you. On the other hand, if your accent is bad, people may be even avoiding you (consciously or unconsciously).
The good news is that you can work on your pronunciation until you speak "understandable and pleasant English" (we simply call it good pronunciation). For example, you can learn the sounds of English, listen to recordings, watch English-language television, etc. But first you have to realize there is a problem! Most English learners don''t.

Short story:
Two islands â?" a short story about pronunciation
Somewhere, a long way from here, there are two islands.
On the first island, everyone can speak English. English is not the native language of people from this island. Every person on this island has a broken accent. And they all have a similar accent, they all speak with the same broken accent. When they talk in English among themselves, they can always communicate easily.
People on the other island can also speak English, and English is not the native language there, either. On this island people also have a broken accent, and they all have the same broken accent. When they talk in English among themselves, they can always communicate easily. But the accent here is very different from the one on the first island.
Sometimes two persons from the two islands meet and try to communicate. Their native languages are different and they have to use English. So when they meet, they try to communicate in English. And they are always surprised that they cannot. People from the first island cannot understand the accent of the second island. And people from the second island do not understand the accent of the first island.
Once an American visited both of the islands. First he visited the first island, and then he visited the second island. He could understand people on the first island very well. But he did not like the island. The local accent was so unpleasant for him that he was always tired in the evening. In fact, he could only speak with the islanders for three hours a day. When he tried to speak longer, he got a headache.
People on the first island did not know that their English was unpleasant to their guest. They were always eager to talk to him and they were glad that he understood them. They were happy that their English is so good that they can communicate with an American. But the American was not happy on the island and he went to the other island.
But the situation on the second island was even worse. The American had difficulty understanding the islanders. Out of courtesy, he decided not to show it. He pretended to understand everything and tried to smile and laugh when he did not understand. The islanders liked him very much and enjoyed talking in English with him.
The American was smiling and laughing all the time so the islanders thought that the conversation was very pleasant. They were happy about their English because they could have a pleasant conversation in English with an American.
After visiting the first island and the second island, the American came to a third island. On this island, there was a scientific conference.
The American was delighted to hear good English at the conference. Every scientist spoke with a very pleasant accent. Some of the scientists were native speakers of English, but most of them were not, and they had all sorts of foreign accents. Every scientist spoke differently, but they all spoke clearly and it was pleasant for the American to listen to them.
Here, at this conference, the American had no headache, and he did not have to smile and laugh out of courtesy. He simply enjoyed every conversation with the scientists.

What is good English pronunciation?
There are three levels of English pronunciation:
Level 1: People often don''t understand what you want to say. You use the wrong sounds in English words. (example: http://www.antimoon.com/how/verybad.mp3)
Level 2: People understand what you want to say, but it is unpleasant to listen to you. (example: http://www.antimoon.com/how/unpleasant.mp3)
Level 3: People understand you, and your English is pleasant to listen to. (example: http://www.antimoon.com/how/pleasant1.mp3)
Level 3 will be called good pronunciation. Notice that good pronunciation is not "perfect American or British accent". You don''t have to sound like the Queen of England or the President of the United States of America.
Why not? Because there are many regional kinds of English. In England, people from Newcastle speak English differently from people in London. In America, people from New York City, California, and Texas each have their own pronunciation. So it is no problem if you have your own accent.
But your accent must be close to the standards (American and British English). What does it mean? Turn on your TV and watch channels like CNN International, NBC, EuroNews, BBC, or Sky News. You will hear many different people (news anchors, reporters, etc.) from Germany, France, and other non-English-speaking countries. They all have good accents â?" easy to understand and pleasant.
The rule is: If you are close to the standard, you can always communicate, and your English will be pleasant. If you are far from the standard, sometimes you won''t communicate successfully.

How to study pronunciation?
English pronunciation can be tricky. For example, the pronunciation of the word put is /put/ (click on the transcription to listen to a recording of the word). But other words which contain these three letters can be pronounced differently! For example, putty (a soft whitish substance used to fix glass into window frames) is pronounced /''p^ti/. The spelling of a word doesn''t tell you how to pronounce it. How to learn pronunciation then? Read tips below.
Tip 1 :
Learn the phonetic alphabet
Most good dictionaries give you phonetic transcriptions of words. They tell you how the words are pronounced using symbols of International Phonetic Alphabet to represent sounds.
A lot of words are pronounced differently in British English and in American English. You have to choose the kind of pronunciation you like most.
To understand the symbols used in the transcriptions, download and print this pronunciation table: Phonetic alphabets reference :
http://www.antimoon.com/misc/phonchart-print.htm
p/s: other tips will be posted later.

to be honest, I am lazy to read all these long posts telling you how to improve your English speaking skills...^^. My advice is to create an English environment to live in not only to study in. Talk shows such as "Jay Elenor late night show" or "Conan O''brien" should be good to be on all the time you''re around, you don''t need to listen to understand every single words, just let them talk and you do whatever you want.
Friends is my favorite show, I love Pheobe and Chandler, if anybody shares the same interest, chat chit about ''Friends'' here

I was so shy to speak English, you can see that I got a lot of mistakes in using it also. However, I think I passed it., I would make mistake than say nothing.Honestly, I studied English more than 10 years, and never used it until entering the University, all the subjects are taught in English.
Now I''m not so shy to speak, just so shy when someone laugh at my English, a little bit then.....well, I''m talkative again

Shy is a positive adjective because it makes you kindly think about what you say. It helps you have good communication. All people are shy , until they prepare enough to hiding it. I am so confident when someone says about my strong major, but i am so shy when hearing something new and too difficult to understand. It is not my major, and I don''t know how to join the talk. It is more difficult in English talk, because i am not believe in my english speaking .
Maybe I have to prepare good when speaking English
I hope to speak more and more. Can FJX help me ?

Oh God! Just know this post today
Last weekend I went out with my friend, a foreign man. It''s more than 3 months since the last time we met. He said I changed a lot, more beautiful and...more intelligent. I wish you could see my face at that time
In fact, we don''t know which point we are strong if we don''t try it. I did think that my English has been like a mess, and it''s never been improved. The 1st semester in my University was a nightmare...
I don''t know how to speak more and more like you, and we...need to help each other. I saw your message but I''m not using Y!M, we may take time to meet directly, ok?