of scenarios where the speaker might get in a spot of trouble so let's go check

it out and see how we can improve upon these errors let's go

welcome to real English ah Chazz it was my mom's 60th birthday last night

congratulations to your mom Wow sixty that's old I mean that's young yes yes

she's 60 yes Oh what did you do for her did you get something nice? I made her a

lovely cake chocolate cake... nice was it tasty? oh it was gorgeous it was

delicious scrumptious luscious so anyway I was I was there till about 10:30 and

you know I like to get my head down early so I made my excuses had a little

bit more cake and then I left a turd at her house and then I just

walked home and it was a lovely night a lovely night you left a shit in your

mum's house on her birthday...Harry! in this scene Charlie was not best

impressed with me because according to my story I had left my mum an unwanted

surprise on her birthday by of course I am a lovely son I would never leave my

mum turd on her birthday and what I meant to say was that I left her a third

of the cake now it's quite important to point out that the large majority of

Irish people don't actually pronounce the 'th'

sound in third so they would also make the same mistake that I made but on the

whole as an English Learner it is highly recommendable that you do distinguish

these two sounds because it makes you much easier to understand as a

speaker so listen up for the pronunciation instructions and some

other minimal pairs for you to practice the sound in third is a dental

approximate consonant which means the sound is made by bringing your tongue

close to your teeth so put your tongue between your teeth

very close to the top row of the teeth and now you need to aspirate air

strongly through your tongue and your top teeth

yeah okay that's good yeah I can feel your pressing quite tightly with

your tongue against your teeth so maybe release it a little bit that's better

if there is no air smoothly passing through that means your tongue and teeth

are too close so you should technically be able to breathe while maintaining

this mouthshape

yeah yeah yeah I sound like Darth Vader I am your father for the sound in turd we

need to create an onstruent consonant which is one that stops the passage of

air through the mouth and then releases so place your tongue just behind your

top teeth so that it's actually touching them now

push air into your mouth so the tongue blocks the air and then let it go - good

so this should be a completely unvoiced sound so if you put your hand on your

throat you shouldn't feel any vibrations try it again.. yeah there;s nothing there okay so what do we do we

give and we take and what did I leave in my mummy's toilet ...turd.. repeat after

us third third turd turd third third

turd turd good good so minimal pairs for third and third what've

we got Harry taught and thought taught and thought you had to..think about that

we've also got Thai and thigh tie and thigh and finally we have tin

and thin tin and and thin so you'll never guess what Harry.. what... I went for a job

interview a week ago and I went to meet with the HR representative he sat me

down and then something weird happened..go on.. so I was sitting in the

office and then the CEO walks in and he's got a bear in his hands he had a

bear in his hand yeah I was so confused and a bit worried as well because I

thought he might throw the bear at me that's very strange

for a sales job was it an interview at a zoo or some kind of bear sanctuary?

what...Chaz you know my cousin Harriet.. the one that many men find attractive

yeah what about Harriet she's got a new pet and it's a little bit strange trust

her to get a stranger pet yeah what is it? she's got a pet beer

yeah yeah a pet beer yeah she takes it out for walks she feeds it she gives her

drink it's very peculiar is it a big beer?

You know pretty big haha.. of course in these two scenes we have seen Charlie

and I mispronouncing the words bear and beer which is a very common mistake

amongst foreign learners of English Charlie's potential boss actually walked

in the office with the alcoholic beverage beer in his hands and Harriet

got herself a massive furry bear for her cottage in the woods now we're going to

learn how we can create these two very important vowel sounds in English which

allow us to distinguish these two words which foreign learners often find quite

tricky listen up for the air sound in bear release your jaw so that your

mouth is nice and open but slightly less open than the 'ah' sound in the last

video that's it keep your tongue relaxed and just behind your bottom teeth and

then make a long voice sound a very very good very good chance now for the 'ear'

sound in beer we need to make a diphthong which is two sounds combined

within the same syllable meaning your mouth will have to change positions your

mouth will start in the e position like you are smiling and end in the position

'uh' which is a schwa where your mouth will be slightly more open and completely

relaxed so let's start with the e sound E

good and now on to the 'uh' sound and now combine them sliding from e to the 'uh'

.. good now a bit quicker ... good again .. what do you have on the

side of your face? a beer no what allows you to hear?...

my ear and if you cry what comes out of your eyes a tear very good repeat after us

bear beer bear beer so another minimal pair which contains the same phonemes as

this one is fair and fear fair and fear another minimal pair is tear and tear

tear and tear.. and one last one is share and sheer share and sheer depending on dialect and

styles of speaking there are common alternative pronunciations for these two

sounds for example the schwa that forms the

second part of the ear diphthong is often not pronounced especially in

connected speech so for this sentence a fully articulated pronunciation would

sound like this I shed a tear over the sheer size of my beer whereas others

with a more contemporary pronunciation would say I shed a tear over the sheer

size of my beer in regards to the air sound in bear you

may hear people saying this sound as a diphthong pronouncing a schwa after the

air sound so while Charlie and I say the unfair bear likes to tear my hair out

others may say the unfair bear likes to tear my hair out however nowadays this

pronunciation is considered quite old-fashioned and far less common than

the monophthong version which Charlie and I have taught today but it's still good

to be aware of these alternative pronunciations and if you want to adopt

a more traditional one then that's perfectly acceptable too - that's all for

today but we hope you have found these minimal pairs useful do remember to

keep practicing them out loud so that you can master them and do give us a

thumbs up if you want to see more videos like this but for now it's your turn to

get active and answer these questions in the comment section... do it so I can see

your face yeah okay wait wait okay good

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