Learning pronunciation in a new language is about more than knowing how to make each sound—it's also about having the confidence to speak and connect with other speakers. You want to be understood!
Our English course offers learners a tool especially for practicing English sounds in a way that’s efficient, effective, and (as always!) fun: our pronunciation practice tab.
How does Duolingo teach English pronunciation?
Learners in Duolingo's English course will find a special tab dedicated to pronunciation. Here, you'll focus solely on listening comprehension and the pronunciation of English sounds. Look for the mouth icon at the bottom of your screen to check it out! Vowel practice appears at the top, and consonant practice is further down.
| English vowels | English consonants |
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Did you know that English has many more sounds than letters? That's part of why it's hard for English learners to determine what sound a letter or group of letters make.
In the pronunciation practice tab, each square represents one sound in English, with a symbol (for example, “æ”) that represents a sound, and a word that contains the sound (such as cat). When you tap on a square, you’ll hear the sound associated with the symbol.
When you tap on “Begin lesson,” you'll begin a lesson that focuses on pairs of sounds that you'll hear in various contexts. That way, you can practice recognizing similar sounds and saying them out loud with new exercises designed to improve your ability to differentiate between them. Pronunciation lessons appear in a specific order determined by our learning experts, so you can be confident in your learning!
How does the pronunciation tab teach English sounds?
In the pronunciation tab, you’ll find exercises that are entirely focused on sounds. Our learning designers created them to boost your English comprehension—which in turn improves your pronunciation. You're getting two skills for the price of one!
Lessons in the pronunciation tab introduce you to sounds without also teaching new vocabulary or grammar. Here, pronunciation is the only focus!
| Exercise for identifying an important sound | Exercise for distinguishing similar sounds | Matching exercise |
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Here’s how the exercises work:
- Distinguish between English sounds (and not letters). There’s often a considerable difference between the sounds of a language and how they’re represented in spelling. In some languages, spelling patterns are pretty predictable. English, on the other hand, has plenty of letters that are used to represent many different sounds, as well as single sounds that can be represented by a variety of different letters (or combinations of letters)… English is anything but simple! 😵💫 This feature gives you new symbols to help you think about individual sounds, and not just written letters.
- Practice important contrasts. There's a good chance English has more vowels, or more consonants, or more of all sounds than your own language! For example, depending on the dialect of English, you might hear 12 or more different vowel sounds. It’s often difficult for learners to distinguish between similar-sounding vowels in English. There are subtle differences between the vowels in sit and seat, bat and but, and should and shoe. In our pronunciation exercises, you’ll train your ear to be able to distinguish between these extremely similar sounds.
- Focus on just two sounds at a time. It’s important to practice pairs of sounds so your brain can focus on the difference between them. You can also tap on any of the squares to listen to a particular sound whenever you want.
Unleash your pronunciation potential!
With the English pronunciation tab, you’ll study each English sound with a variety of exercises that allow you to train your ear, hear the most important differences between two sounds, and have fun while you learn!
