美式英语翻译
语听力与发音技巧 第5期（“h”音的略读）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on sound linking.
Remember that although written English has spaces between every word, spoken English doesn’t have pauses after every word. As a matter of fact, long strings of words are all linked together. And it is this linking, which often makes it difficult for learners of English to understand native speaker’s talking. Today’s tip is to notice how the “h” sound is often dropped in personal pronouns such as “he”, “him”, “his” and “her”. And when it is dropped, what is left is a vowel sound, and the vowel sound is always linked to the preceding word.
Let’s look at an example. Give her a book. Giv-er a book. Notice how the “h” is dropped and how “give her” become “giv-er”. Look at another example. Tell him to ask her. Tell-im to ask-er. Did you notice that “tell him” became “tell-im” and “ask her” became “ask-er”? This happens very frequently in spoken English, especially when “he” follows an auxiliary verb. For example, “what will he do?” becomes “What will-i do?” “Where will he go?” becomes “Where will-i go?” “When will he come?” becomes “When will-i come?” “Who will he meet?” becomes “Who will-i meet?” “How will he know?” becomes “How will-i know?” “Has he gone?” becomes “Has-i gone?” “Had he done it before?” becomes “Had-i done it before?” “Must he go?” becomes “Must-i go?” “Can he do it?” becomes “Can-i do it?” “Should he leave?” becomes “Should-I leave?” it’s important to accustom yourself to the dropped “h” sound in sound linking. This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第6期（辅音连续）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on sound linking.
When 2 identical or similar consonants are in a row, most sounds are not pronounced. For example, stop Peter. “stop” ends in the sound “p”, and “Peter” begins in the same sound. Together the words are linked as “sto-peter”. The words aren’t pronounced stop Peter. To pronounce two identical sounds one after another, would sound like someone stuttering. English words are always linked smoothly. Similar but not identical sounds such as voiced and voiceless pairs of consonants are also linked in this way. For example, it’s a big cake. “big” begins in the sound “g”, cake begins with the sound “k”. “k” and “g” differ only in that “k” is voiceless and “g” is voiced. When they are next to each other in a phrase they’re linked smoothly by not aspirating or pronouncing fully the first of the 2 sounds. Listen carefully as I read the example again. It’s a big cake. Notice how the first sound “g” is not released. If the pair of sounds is reversed, like in “I like goats.”
it is the “k” sound which is not pronounced. Listen closely. I like goats. I like goats.
There’re 8 pairs of consonants that differ only in the presence or lack of vocal cord vibration. Listen as I give one example of sound linking for each pair.
v, f : I love France.
δ,θ: Let’s bathe three times.
z, s : She is Susan.
з,∫: The garage should be cleaned.
dз,t∫: He has a huge chin.
b, p : Put the cap back on.
d, t : Dad told me.
k, g : I like Gavin. (? )
It is important to include this type of sound linking in your speech if you want to achieve fluency. It is also important to be aware of how this linking affects how spoken English sounds. Otherwise you may not understand native speaker’s speech. This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第7期（冠词“a”）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on using or omitting the English article “a” correctly.
There’s no single rule that explains how to choose whether you should use “a”, use “the” or not use any article at all. Sometimes there’s only one correct choice, and in other cases, different choices change the meaning of the sentence. Today let’s discuss the most frequently occurring differences between using the article “a” and using no article. All English nouns can be divided into 2 classes: those that are countable and those that are uncountable.
It is the meaning of a noun as it is used in a sentence which determines whether it is countable or uncountable. For instance, in the sentence “She has long hair.”, “hair” is uncountable. But in the sentence “There’s a hair in my soup.”,” hair” is countable. This can create some interesting mistakes. For example, “I like a dog” does not mean 我喜欢狗, that should be “I like dogs.” If you say “I like dog”, that means you like to eat dog meat. If you say “I ate a hamburger”, that means 我吃了一个汉堡, but if you say “I ate hamburger”, that means you ate raw ground beef. If you say “I ate a cake’, that means you ate a whole cake, which is very unlikely. You should have said, “I ate cake”, then it means you ate some cake.
Notice how the use of the article “a” means that the noun it precedes is countable, and therefore you’re talking about a whole one, an entire one. If you omit the article “a”, then it means that you can’t count the noun it precedes, and therefore you are talking about a piece or a quantity or something. So remember to pay careful attention to whether nouns are being used to a countable or uncountable meaning, and be sure to use or omit the article “a” accordingly. This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第8期（冠词的用法与读音）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on using the articl
es “a”, “an” and “the” correctly.
Every student of English has my sympathy in his struggles with the English articles. They are one of the most difficult parts of learning English. First of all, I urge you to do this. Listen to native speakers. When you listen, listen carefully, since the articles “the” and “a” are almost never emphasized, they do not stand out prominently in speech, but they’re pronounced. You will have to train your ears so that you will recognize that the little sounds before certain words are articles, and not meaningless noises. Also, get in the habit of pronouncing the articles in the way native speakers do. As little sounds that are part of the word they precede. For instance, think of and say “the boy”as one word. Listen to this short sentence. The boy likes the girl. Say it naturally, the boy likes the girl. Did you notice how the articles are just small sounds linked to the nouns? Listen to another example. There is a pen on a desk in the classroom. Say it naturally, there is a pen on a desk in the classroom. Did you notice how all the sounds, especially articles are linked together? The article “an” is used before nouns beginning with a vowel sound, such as “an apple”. Notice how the “n” sound is linked to the word which follows it. Also notice that words that spelled with the letter “h” in the beginning such as “hour” also use the article “an” because the “h” isn’t pronounced. So we say, “an-our”, not “a hour”. And some words spelled with the letter “u” in the beginning such as “unicycle” use the article “a” because the first sound is the “y” sound “j”. So we say, a unicycle, not an unicycle.
It’s also important to note that the pronunciation of the article “the” changes to “δi :” before words beginning with a vowel sound. So we say “δi :” elevator, not “δэ”elevator.
Another tip is, do not be misled by newspaper headlines, advertisements and titles of book and so forth. They frequently omit articles which are necessary in complete sentences in both spoken and written English. Knowing when to use “a”, when to use “the”, and when not to use any article at all is undoubtably one of the most difficult aspects of learning English. We will talk about this topic more in an upcoming daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第9期（句子中的重音）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on word stress on sentences.
In general, it is true that content words are stressed whereas function words are not stressed. Content words usually convey the meaning of the sentence. Function words make the sentence grammatically correct. Content words are: nouns, main verbs, adjectives, adverbs, this, that, these, those, and “wh-“ words, who, what, when, why, how, which. Function words are: articles, such as “a” and “the”; po
ssessive adjectives, such as “his”, “my”, “your”; prepositions, such as “in”, “on”, “of”; conjunctions, such as “and”, “but”; personal pronouns, such as “ I”, “he”, “she”; the “be” verb, “am”, “is”, “are”, “was”, “were”; and auxiliaries, such as “do”, “does”, “did”.
Take for example the sentence “Andrew brushes his teeth every morning.” The content word alone can convey the meaning of the sentence, namely “Andrew brushes teeth every morning.” The functional word “his” only makes the sentence grammatically correct. So “his” is unstressed, the other words are stressed. Why isn’t “his” stressed? Because of course he brushes his teeth, not your teeth, or my teeth. This we would naturally assume. If, however, Andrew brushes someone else’s teeth beside his own, then it would be very important to let your listener know that by stressing whose teeth he brushes.
So, what words should be stressed? The simple answer is whatever words are important to the meaning you are trying to convey. if someone write the sentence on the board out of context and asks, “Which words are important? Which words should you stress?” You should answer, “That depends on the context.” Stress is used to let your listener know what is important to your message. If you stress words properly, your listener will have an easy time understanding your message. If you stress every word equally, then your listener will have to listen very carefully and try to guess the main point of your message. If your stress the wrong words, the listener will misunderstand your message or just feel very confused. So remember to stress the important words to your massage.
This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第10期（断句）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the use of pauses in English speech.
Although written English has spaces between every word, spoken English doesn’t have pauses between each word, rather words are linked together. However, people do not normally speak without pausing at all. We do pause in speech. While in written English, there are periods, commas, semicolons and question marks. But we also pause in long sentences without punctuation marks. Let’s look at some examples. My mother listens to the radio in the evening. This sentence can be said without pausing, because it isn’t very long. But if I were to pause, I would say, “My mother/ listens to the radio/ in the evening.” Why? Because pauses come between thought groups----groups of words that express one thought.
For example, “in the evening” is a thought group. Let’s make the sentence longer. My mother listens to the radio in the evening, plays tennis in the afternoon, and cleans the house in the morning. Now it is necessary to pause because the sentence is very long. Pauses co
me between thought groups, and help the listeners organize the information they hear. Listen to sentence again. My mother listens to the radio in the evening, plays tennis in the afternoon, and cleans the house in the morning. If you pause in the wrong places, listeners will have a harder time organizing the information. Listen to the sentence read again with improper pausing. My mother listens to the radio in/ the evening, plays tennis in /the afternoon, and cleans the/ house in the morning. Now the sentence is almost impossible to understand, so remember to pause between thought groups, to help your listeners easily organize what they hear.
This has been today's tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第11期（定语从句前的停顿）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on when to use pauses before adjective clauses.
Let’s take an example. In the sentence “My sister who lives in San Francisco is a doctor”, the adjective clause is “who lives in San Francisco”. It describes my “sister”. There’s no pause before the adjective clause. So, it means that I have more than one sister, and the one who lives in San Francisco is doctor. There’s a pause after an adjective clause because it is a long sentence. But there can be no pause in the group of words “my sister who lives in San Francisco”. Because this is one idea or thought group. Listen to the sentence again. “My sister who lives in San Francisco is a doctor.” The same words used in that sentence have a different meaning if there’s a pause before the adjective clause “who lives in San Francisco”. Listen to the new sentence. “My sister, who lives in San Francisco, is a doctor.” Now there’s a pause before, and a pause after the adjective clause, and in writing, there now is a comma before and a comma after the adjective clause. This sentence means that I have only one sister. She is a doctor, and by the way, she lives in San Francisco. The information conveyed by who lives in San Francisco is not necessary to understand whom I am talking about, as I only have one sister. I just added it in passing.
If you say, “My girl friend who drives a BMW is a good dancer.” You’re saying that you have more than one girl friend. “My boss who is very generous gives me a raise every year” means I have more than one boss. “Hawaii which is an island in the Pacific is a poplar tourist spot” means there’s another Hawaii not in the Pacific. So remember to pause before and after adjective clauses only when it is referring to something or someone of which there’s only one.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English.
第一篇美语听力与发音技巧 第1期
Welcome to Daily tips on Learning English. Today's tip is on distinguishing “can” and “cannot” in spoken American English.
“Cannot” is usually contracted to “can't”.
So many learners of English 美语听力与发音技巧 第12期（问句的语调）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the intonation of questions.
Remember that intonation is the rising and falling of the pitch of your voice. So “she’s here.” is a statement, but “she’s here?” is a question. But it isn’t true that all questions have a rising intonation. Today, let’s just look at the intonation of three types of questions: “Yes/No” questions, “Wh-” questions and choice questions.
“Yes/No” questions have a rising intonation. “Wh-”qusetions have a falling intonation. And choice questions have a rising intonation for every choice except the last choice, which has a falling intonation.
“Yes/No” questions such as “Do you like Taiwan?” “Can you speak Chinese?” have a rising intonation. The listener must answer either “yes” or “no”. “Wh-” questions start with the words “who”, “what”, “where”, “when”,” why”, “which” and “how”. “Wh-” questions have a falling tone. For example, “What time is it?↘” “Where do you live?↘” Don’t say “What time is it?↗” “Where do you live?↗” In choice questions, the listener is expected to choose one item from several. For example, “Would you like juice, Coke, Tea or coffee?” A rising tone is used for every choice except the last, which has a falling tone. Listen to another example. “Do you like basketball, baseball, soccer or football?”. So remember that “Yes/No” questions, “Wh-” questions, and choice question have different intonation patterns, and make sure to intone them properly.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
语听力与发音技巧 第13期（是YES还是NO）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on answering “Yes/No” questions correctly.
In English, “Yes” is always followed by affirmative statements. “No” is always followed by negative statements.
This means you can’t say, “Yes, I haven’t eaten dinner yet.” Or “No, I did my home work.” Chinese allows this, but English does not. There’re different kinds of “Yes/No” questions. Simple “Yes/No” questions such as “Do you speak English?” “Are you hungry?” pose no problem. But negative questions such as “Don’t you speak English?” “Aren’t you hungry?” require the same answers. “Yes, I do.” “No, I don’t.” or “Yes, I am.” “No, I’m not.” Chinese learners of English are often misled by negative questions, and answer, “Yes, I don’t speak English.” Or “Yes, I’m not hungry.” by accident. Another type of “Yes/No” questions is to use a rising intonation with a statement. For example, you ask a Chinese person, “Did you eat dinner?” and he says, “No, I didn’t.” You’re surprised, so you ask, “You didn’t eat dinner?” and he a
nswers, “Yes.” instead of “No”. Don’t use “yes” to mean “是的”. You should say, “That’s correct.” In the example above, “Yes” means “Yes, I ate dinner.” Not “Correct, I didn’t eat dinner. Let’s look at another example. I think that all Chinese people like to eat rice. So, when my Chinese friend tells me that he never eats rice, I was very surprised, and I ask, “You don’t like to eat rice?” and he answers, “Yes.” This is wrong. Because in English, you can not say, “Yes, I don’t like to eat rice.” He should answer, “No.” or “That’s correct.” So remember, “Yes” must be followed by affirmative statements, and “No” must be followed by negative statements.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.语听力与发音技巧 第14期（“t”的发音）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the pronunciation of the letter “t”.
Of course the letter “t” is usually pounced “t”. But you may have noticed that in fluent speech, native speakers sometimes pronounced the “t” as “d”. That happens when the “t” comes between two voiced sounds.
Do you know what sounds in English are voiced? Well, there’re 15 voiced consonant sounds in English. b, d, g, m, n, ɡ, z,δ, l, r, dз,з,j,w. Also, all vowel and diphthong sounds in English are voiced. So let’s look at some examples of words in which the “t” may be pronounced “d”.
No.1 “matter”. “matter” is often pronounced “mader” as in “What’s the matter?”
No.2 “atom”. “atom” is often pronounced “adom” as in “The first atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.”
No.3 “twenty”. “twenty” is often pronounced “twendi” as in “That will be twenty dollars, please.”
No.4 “little”. “little” is often pronounced “liddle” as in “He got a little angry.”
No.5 “city”. “city” is often pronounced “cidi” as in “Did you grow up in the city or the country?”
No.6 “butter”. “butter” is often pronounced “buder” as in “Pass the butter, please.”
When people speak slowly or emphatically, however, they usually pronounce the “t” like “t”, not like “d”. Also, a “t” does not sound like “d” when it comes before a stressed vowel as in “return”.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.美语听力与发音技巧 第15期（助动词的强调）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on when to stress auxiliary verbs.
Although auxiliary verbs are not usually stressed, when we want to strongly emphasize a verb, we stress the auxiliary verb. And if there’s no auxiliary verb, we add one. These sentences are called emphatic sentences. For example, compare the sentences “He’s done his home work” and “He has done his home work.” Usually we would say, “He’s don
e his homework.” And the auxiliary verb “has” would not be stressed. But if we want to emphasize the meaning of “has done”, we stress the auxiliary verb “He has done his homework.” This is an emphatic sentence. Sentences which don’t usually contain an auxiliary verb has an auxiliary verb in emphatic sentences, and it is always stressed. Emphatic sentences are usually used after someone has expressed the opposite meaning. For example, “-You didn’t finish your homework.” “-I did finish my homework.” “-Maybe she doesn’t know how to drive.” “-On the contrary, he does know how to drive.” “-You don’t speak Chinese, do you?” “I do speak Chinese. I just wanted to give you some practice speaking English.”
Did you notice how I said “I did finish” instead of “I finished”, and “she does know” instead of “she knows”, “I do speak” instead of “I speak”. The auxiliary verbs “did”, “does” and “do” were added to make the sentence more emphatic
Be careful though not to use emphatic sentences unless you have a reason. Don’t think that you can not learn the past tense of every verb and just say “I did eat”, “I did go” instead of “I ate” and “I went”. If you do this, your listeners will be confused. Your listeners will be thinking, “Why is that so important?” “Why is he stressing that so much?” This is not just another way of saying “I ate” and “I went”. You can only say “I did eat” and “I did go” when there’s a reason for stressing this.
So remember that although auxiliary verbs are not usually stressed, in emphatic sentences they are. This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
美语听力与发音技巧 第16期（附加问句的语调）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the intonation of tag questions.
Tag questions are used in two very different ways, and the difference depends on whether you use a rising or falling pitch at the end of the tag question. One way tag questions are used is to get your listener to agree with you about something you think is a fact, or must be true.
If you think a lady is beautiful, you say, “She is beautiful, isn’t she?↘” You expect the listener to say, “Yes, she is.” If you know a man is not rich, you say, “He isn’t rich, is he?↘” You expect the listener to say, “No, he isn’t.” When you use a tag question to get your listener to agree, you must use a falling intonation. “She is beautiful, isn’t she?↘” “He isn’t rich, is he?↘”
The other way tag questions are used is to ask for information. You don’t know the answer, so you ask in a question. “She is beautiful, isn’t she?↗” “He isn’t rich, is he?↗” when you really don’t know the answer, you should use a rising intonation. So, “He isn’t rich, is he?↘” you know that he isn’t rich. But, “He isn’
t rich, is he?↗” you don’t know whether he is rich or not.
Listen to another example. “You like Taiwan, don’t you?↗” “You like Taiwan, don’t you?↘”
So remember to use the proper intonation when you use tag questions.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.美语听力与发音技巧 第17期（自然的连续）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on sound linking.
When certain sounds are linked together, the resulting sound is merely the combination of the two original sounds. For example, “one apple” is pronounced “one-napple”, and “four apples” is pronounced “four-rapples”. However, when other sounds are linked, there’s a blending of the sounds. The sounds are linked smoothly without any break. For example, “two apples” are pronounced as if there’s an additional “w” sound “w” in between the words. “two apples”, “two apples”. And when the words “three” and “apple” are linked, it sounds as if there were an additional “y”sound “i” between the words. “three apples”, “three apples”, “three apples”. This is because the sounds between the words are linked smoothly without any break. “two-w-apples”, not “two” “apples”. “three-i-apples”, not “three apples.” Pay careful attention how sounds are blended together.
Another good example is how words ending in a “t” or “d” sound “t” or “d” are linked to words beginning with a “y” sound “j”. For example, “Did you do it?” becomes “Did-you do it?” “Would you do it?” becomes “would-you do it?” Notice how together “did” “you” becomes “Did-you” and “would” “you” becomes “would-you”, and “do” “it” becomes “do-it”. Listen again as I give more examples. “Did you do it?” “Did you do it?” “Would you do it?” “Would you do it?” “Should you do it?” “Should you do it?” “Could you do it?” “Could you do it?”
And also notice when a word ending in the “t” sound “t” is followed by a word beginning in a “y” sound “j”, you get the sound “t∫”. For example, “Can’t you do it?” “Can’t you do it?” “Didn’t you do it?” “Didn’t you do it?” “Couldn’t you do it?” “Couldn’t you do it?” “Shouldn’t you do it?” “Shouldn’t you do it?” “Wouldn’t you do it?” “Wouldn’t you do it?” “It’s nice to meet you.” “It’s nice to meet you.”
Today’s tip is to pay careful attention to how words are blended together, and how the resulting sound is often very different from the original sounds. This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.美语听力与发音技巧 第18期（数字的发音）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on how to distinguish the numbers 13, 30, 15, 50, 14, 40 and so on.
There’s often a lot of confusion when people use these words. People often have to ask, “Did you say 16 or 60?” If you look at the sounds used in this pairs of words, you will notice that the only difference is in the final “n” sound “n” in the “-teen” words. Do people listen for this sound to tell them which word has been said? Do people say this sound loudly and clearly so that people will know which word they are saying? Native speakers don’t.
They use different stress patterns to distinguish the words. In the “-teen” words, it’s the last syllable which is stressed. In the numbers 30, 40, 50 and so on, it’s the first syllable which is stressed. Also, when a syllable is stressed, that syllable’s vowel sound is lengthened, and when a syllable isn’t stressed, the vowel is shorter.
Listen to me say the words, and notice the different syllables being stressed. 13, 30, 14, 40, 15, 50, 16, 60. Now listen to the length of vowels in the different syllables. I will exaggerate them first so it’s easier to notice. 13, 30, 14, 40, 15, 50. Now I will say them naturally. 13, 30, 14, 40, 15, 50, 16, 60, 17, 70, 18, 80, 19, 90. When you say these words, give specially care to stressing the right syllable, and to the length of the vowel sound in the stressed syllable. This has been today’s tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
美语听力与发音技巧 第19期（轻重音的重要性）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on stressed and unstressed syllables.
Every English word has more than one syllable, and every complete sentence has at least one stressed syllable.
A stressed syllable is pronounced more prominently than surrounding syllables. Simply put, we say it louder and we lengthen the vowel sound. Unstressed syllables are just the opposite. They are not as loud and the vowel sound is usually reduced. Vowel sounds are most often reduced to “э”or to “ⅰ”. For example, in the word “purpose”, the first syllable is stressed, and the vowel of the second syllable can be reduced to either “э”as in “purpose” or “i” as in “purpose”. Let me give you a complete sentence. “I didn’t do it on purpose.” “I didn’t do it on purpose.” The following word has three syllables. Which syllable is stressed? “banana”. That’s right. The second syllable is stressed. Listen now for the lengthening of the vowel in the stressed syllable. “bana-na”, “bana-na”. It’s very important to stress the proper syllable, to lengthen stressed syllables, and to reduce unstressed vowels. This is essential if you want to achieve a proper English rhythm. If every syllable is given equal stress and length, what you will sound like is a robot. “I didn’t do it on purpose.” “I didn’t do it on purpose.” Proper rhythm comes from stressing only certain syllables, and lengthening those syllables, while reducing the others.
Listen again to
the example sentence, and notice how only certain syllables are stressed and lengthened. “I didn’t do it on purpose.”……
We will talk about how to figure out what syllables or words to stress at the sentence level in an upcoming program. But today’s tip is to make sure when you learn words of more than one syllable, you give special care to learning which syllable or syllables are stressed, and to remember to lengthen the vowels in those syllables.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.美语听力与发音技巧 第21期（及物和不及物动词）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is to be aware of how some verbs in English, transitive verbs, require an object.
Not using an object after a transitive verb is a common mistake made by learners of English. For example, although in Chinese, you can say, “我喜欢”or “我不喜欢”without mentioning what you are talking about, in English, “like” requires an object. So you can’t say, “I like.” or “I don’t like.” You must say, “I like it.” or “I like them.” “I like her.” “I like you.” “I like Taiwan.” or “I don’t like it.” “I don’t like them.” “I don’t like him.” “I don’t like singing at KTVs.” You must use an object after “like” because it is a transitive verb. Another common word which is misused is “want”. “want” is also a transitive verb and must be followed by an object. You cannot ask “do you want” as in the Chinese “你要不要？”“你要吗？”You must ask “Do you want some?” if you are asking about something uncountable like coffee or tea. “Do you want it?” if you are asking about a singular countable object like the last piece of pizza. “Do you want them?” if you are asking about plural countable objects such as some books. And “Do you want to?” or “Do you want to do it?” if you are asking about doing something like going to a movie or going to a concert. The two verbs “like” and “want” are the two most commonly misused transitive verbs as in “I like” or “I want”. Be careful to complete the meaning of these transitive verbs by adding an object. And when using a pronoun, be careful to choose the proper pronoun. In English, certain verbs are used only transitively, some are used only intransitively, and some are used at times transitively and at other times intransitively.
Today’s tip is to pay special attention when learning verbs, to learn whether or not the verb is transitive, and not to neglect adding an object if it is. This has been today’s daily tips on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
美语听力与发音技巧 第22期（a 和 the 的用法）
Welcome to Daily Tips on learning English. Today’s tip is on using the articles “a” and “the” correctly.
More specifically, today’s tip is on the difference between using “a
” or “an” before a singular countable noun and using “the” or “the(i:)” before a singular countable noun. Most frequently, both “a” and “the” are used to refer to a specimen of a group of things, for example, “a table” and “the table” both refer to one table out of the group of all tables. When people say “the table”, they mean the table that we’ve been talking about and which you know about. So if you begin to talk about a new object about which your listener knows nothing, you must use the article “a”. But after you have introduced the object, or future references are preceded by the article “the”. Let’s take a simple example. “I bought a table yesterday. The table is in the living room. I really like the table.” Did you notice how the article “a” was used first, and then after that, the article “the” was used. If you said, “I bought the table yesterday” instead of “I bought a table yesterday”, you would mean that you and the listener are talking about some table previously. If you hadn’t talked about any table previously, the listener would be confused and would probably ask you, “What table?”
Let take another example. “I put together a jigsaw puzzle yesterday. Really? How often do you put together a jigsaw puzzle?” Notice that the article “a” was used in both sentences before “jigsaw puzzle”. That’s because the question, “How often do you put together a jigsaw puzzle” was not referring to the same jigsaw puzzle mentioned in the first sentence. If you ask, “How often do you put together the jigsaw puzzle?” you would be asking how often the listener put together the same jigsaw puzzle, you would be saying the person puts together, then takes apart, then puts together the same jigsaw puzzle over and over again. And that’s a silly thing to ask.
So remember, “the” is used to refer to a previously mentioned specimen, something about which the listener knows. The article “a” is used to refer to a specimen which hasn’t been mentioned before, something which the listener doesn’t know about.
This has been today’s tip on learning English. Tune
美语听力与发音技巧 第23期（如何使用 the）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on using the English article “the” correctly. The article “the” is most frequently used to refer to a previously mentioned object. The use of “the” indicates that your listener should know which object you are referring to. One reason the listener might know which object you are referring to is that you were just talking about it earlier. However, sometimes the article “the” is used even when the object hasn’t been mentioned previously. A speaker can use the article “the”to indicate that the object is very familiar to the listener. For example, a man and his wife might have a conversation about their car.
“I’m going to pick up the car at the garage on th
e way to the health club. Make sure to check the radio to see if the mechanic fix the power button.” Although the things car, garage, health club, radio, mechanic and power button had not been mentioned earlier, both the husband and wife know that the are talking about their car, the garage and health club they always go to, the radio in their car, the mechanic at the garage they always go to, the power button of the radio in their car.
Another reason why the article “the” is used is that the object is so frequently referred to that every body knows which one is being referred to. Although there are many suns with many moons orbiting them, when we say the sun and the moon, we mean those which we see every day and night. Similarly, we use the article “the” for objects present at the time of speaking. For example, the floor is the floor we are standing on. Other words used like this include the air, the earth, the world, the sky, the rain, the whether, the wind and the Bible. So remember that when an item is very familiar to the listener or very frequently referred to, or the only one present at the time, we use the article “the”.This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第24期（那些词重读呢）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on contrastive stress.
If you listen to previous daily tips, you will recall that content words, such as nouns, main verbs, adjectives and adverbs are normally stressed, and function words, such as personal pronouns, possessive adjectives and prepositions are normally not stressed.
However, there are exceptions to this rule. The exceptions to conform to the universal rule for word stress, namely, you should stress the words that are important in the context. Let’s look at some examples. The sentence “I put your pen in my desk” would normally have the words “put”, “pen” and “desk” stressed, but if the listener didn’t hear me clearly and started looking for his pen on my desk. I would change the stress to the word “in”. I would say, “No, I put your pen in my desk, not on my desk.” The information conveyed by the preposition “in” has now become the most important word, and so receives the greatest stress. So now he looks in my desk and finds the pen. But he says, “This isn’t my pen. This is your pen.” Although the possessive adjectives “your” and “my” are not normally stressed, here they are very important to convey the message and so they receive the greatest stress.
Let’s look at another example. Two people are ordering in a restaurant. One says, “I will have a ham and cheese sandwich and a small bow of soup.” And then the other says, “I will have a ham and egg sandwich, and a large bow of soup. Did you notice how the second person who order stresses the word “egg” and “large”? That’s because those words were different from w
hat came before. This is called contrastive stress.
Today’s daily tip is to make sure to stress the most important words in your speech. Tune in tomorrow for another daily tip.
美语听力与发音技巧 第25期（短句的断句）
Welcome to Daily Tips on learning English. Today’s tip is on the importance of pausing to mark the boundary between phrases or thought groups.
In a previous tip, I mentioned how in long sentences, it is necessary to pause between thought groups. However, relatively short sentences may also require pauses to help the listeners organize the stream of sounds correctly. Let’s look at some examples. In the question “what time do you come in in the morning?” It is necessary to pause between the two prepositions “in”. If you pause after the word “come”, “what time do you come / in in the morning?” Then the listeners will be confused, because “come in” and “in the morning” are two separate thought groups. Here’s another similar example. “Look your papers over over the weekend.” You need to pause between the two “over”s to help your listeners organize your words. If you pause somewhere else like “Look your papers / over over the weekend”, nobody will understand you. Sometimes pausing in the wrong place will change the meaning of what you say.
For example, let’s take two sentences. Sentence 1: “I usually eat sushi for lunch.” Sentence 2: “I ate noodles today.” When you put the two sentences together in speech, you must pause slightly between them. “I usually eat sushi for lunch. I ate noodles today.” If you pause after the word “sushi”, the meaning changes. “I usually eat sushi. For lunch I ate noodles today.” So remember to use pauses to group ideas together. If you pause in the middle of ideas, or group pieces of different ideas together, your listeners will have a hard time understanding you.
This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第26期（不定式和动名词）
Welcome to Daily Tips on learning English. Today’s tip is on verbs which are followed by infinitives or gerunds.
Some verbs are followed by infinitives, such as “I plan to go”. “to go” is an infinitive. Some verbs are followed by gerunds, such as “I enjoy teaching English”. “teaching” is a gerund. You cannot say, “I plan going” or “I enjoy to teach English”. Most verbs are followed by either the infinitive or the gerund, and when you learn the verb, you must make sure to memorize which one is used since there is no rule to tell you.
There are only nine verbs which can be followed by either the gerund or the infinitive with no difference in meaning. These verbs are “begin”, “start”, “continue”, “like”, “love”, “hate”, “prefer”, “can’t stand” and “can’t bear”. These verbs can be followed by either the infinitive or the gerund with
no difference in meaning. So “I like listening to the radio” and “I like to listen to the radio” both mean the same thing. There are also five verbs which can be followed by either an infinitive or a gerent but which have different meanings depending on whether you use the infinitive or the gerund. These verbs are “remember”, “forget”, “regret”, “try” and “stop”. Pay special attention when using these verbs, as the meaning of the sentence will change depending on which you choose.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip美语听力与发音技巧 第27期（remember 的用法）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the difference in meaning between “remember doing something” and “remember to do something”.
Let’s take an example. What’s the difference between “I remember locking the door” and “I remember to lock the door”? Well, “remember doing something” means you recall doing something you did in the past, and “remember to do something” means to remember to perform a responsibility, duty or task at the proper time.
So, “I remember locking the door” means in the past, I locked the door, and now, I still recall doing it. There’s still a memory in my mind. I haven’t forgotten what I did. On the other hand, “I remember to lock the door” means at the moment I leave my house, I should lock the door. At that moment, I always remember to lock the door. It’s not my habit to forget to lock the door when I leave my house. Therefore, if you are reminding someone to do something in the future, you say, “Remember to turn off the light.” “Remember to feed the dog.” “Remember to say ‘please’.” On the other hand, if you are telling someone about memory you have or don’t have, you say, for example, “I remember closing the door. Who opened it?” “I don’t remember meeting you before. Are you sure we have met?”
So pay special care when using the verb “remember”, you must choose the right form of the verb you use after it. This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
美语听力与发音技巧 第28期（forget 的用法）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the difference in meaning between “forget doing something” and “forget to do something”.
Let’s take an example. What’s the difference between “I will never forget to lock the door” and “I will never forget locking the door”? Well, “I will never forget to lock the door” is a promose to lock the door in the future. You are saying that every time you leave your home in the future, you will remember to lock the door. On the other hand, “I will never forget locking the door” means that you locked the door one time in the past. And that for some reason, the memory of locking the door that time will never be forgotten. Maybe you lo
cked yourself into your house and couldn’t get out for a week.
So, if you are reminding someone to do something in the future, say, “Don’t forget to bring your keys.” “Don’t forget to come early tomorrow.” Or “Don’t forget to turn off the TV.” On the other hand, if you are telling someome about a memory of doing something in the past that you will always remember, you say, “I will never forget seeing the Statue of Liberty for the first time” or “I will never forget getting lost in Tokyo.” “forget doing something” is always used in the negative “I can’t forget” “I won’t forget” “I will never forget”. So the meaning is the same as remember doing something.
Pay special care when using the word “forget”. You must choose the right form of the verb you use after it. This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
美语听力与发音技巧 第29期（regret 的用法）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the difference in meaning between “regret to do something” and “regret doing something”.
Let’s take an example. What’s the difference between “I regret to tell you that your father died” and “I regret telling you that your father died”? Well, “I regret to tell”, “I regret to say” are used to inform someone of bad news in a polite way. Before you tell someone bad news, it’s polite to warn the person that he is about to get some bad news by telling him you feel sorry about it. “regret to” must be followed by a verb which means “say”, for example, “tell”, “inform”, “announce”, “report”. Verbs that do not have this meaning cannot be used. On the other hand, “regret doing something” means you wish you had not done something. So, “I regret telling you that your father died” means you wish you have not told someone his father died. Maybe, because after hearing the bad news, he tried to kill himself. Or maybe because it was a mistake and his father had not actually died.
Let’s look at another example. “I regret to inform you that the basketball game has been cancelled.” In this sentence, I’m telling someone some bad news. The bad news is that there will be no basketball game tonight. Here’s another example. “I regret eating so much.” This sentence means that I ate too much in the past, and now, I wish I had not eaten so much.
So, if you have to tell someone bad news, say “I regret to tell you…” But if you wish you had not done something, say “I regret doing it.” And if you are glad that you did something, say “I don’t regret doing it.”
This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip on learning English.
语听力与发音技巧 第30期（stop 的用法）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the difference in meaning between “stop doing something” and “stop to do something”.
“stop doing
something” means not to do that any more, but “stop to do something” means stop one thing in order to do something else.
Let’s look at a clear example. “We stopped dancing.” “We stopped to get some drinks.” These sentences can even be put together to form “We stopped dancing to get some drinks.” Is the meaning clear? We were dancing but we got hot and thirsty, so we stopped. Why? Because we wanted to get some drinks. After we stopped, we got some drinks. Before we stopped, we were dancing. So, can you hear the difference in meaning between these two sentences? “We stopped to study” and “We stopped studying”. The first sentence “We stopped to study” means we are studying now. We were doing something else, maybe talking or watching TV, but we stopped doing that in order to study. On the other hand, the second sentence “We stopped studying” means we are not studying now. We were studying before but we stopped, maybe because we were tired or hungry.
Let’s take another example. “We stopped talking” and “We stopped to talk”. “We stopped talking” means it is quiet now because we are not talking anymore. “We stopped to talk” means we are talking now. Maybe we were walking on the sidewalk, saw each other, and stopped walking so that we can talk for a while.
So remember to be careful when choosing the verb form after “stop” as it changes the meaning of the sentence. This has been today’s daily tip. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
美语听力与发音技巧 第31期（try 的用法）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the difference in meaning between “try to do something” and “try doing something”.
“try” plus an infinitive, that is, “to” plus a verb, such as “try to learn” “try to open” “try to read” means to make an effort to do it. “try” plus a gerund, that is, verb-ing, such as “try opening”, “try turning on”, “try giving” means to experiment with a new or different approach to see if it works.
Let’s look at some examples. “I’m trying to learn Taiwanese.” This means I’m making an effort to do it. I’m taking a Taiwanese class, doing my homework and speaking in Taiwanese whenever I can. Here’s another example. “I tried to open the window.” This sentence means I pulled the window up, but it did not go up, so I pushed the window up, but it still did not open. I made an effort to open the window, but I could not open it. On the other hand, “I tried opening the window” means that I did open the window and that I opened it for a reason. I was hot and I wanted to cool off. I tried opening the window, but that didn’t help. So I tried turning on the fan, but I was still hot. So I tried taking off some of my clothes, but that didn’t work either. Finally, I turned on the air conditioner, and that finally succeeded in helping me cool off. I experimented with many things to see what would wo
rk.
So remember, “try to do something” is to make an effort, and “try doing something” is to experiment with different way to achieve your purpose. This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
美语听力与发音技巧 第33期（表示过去的能力）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on expressing ability in the past.
There are two ways of expressing ability in English. One, “can” or “could”. Two, “be able to”. In negative sentences, there’s no difference in meaning. So, “I couldn’t lift the piano” and “I wasn’t able to lift the piano” mean the same thing. However, in affirmative sentences about past ability, “could” usually means “used be able to”. The use of “could” usually indicates that the ability existed in the past, but does not exist now.
For example, “When I was young, I could run fast” means that I can not run fast now. On the other hand, if the speaker is talking about an ability to do something at one particular time in the past, “was/were able to” can be used in affirmative sentences, but “could” cannot.
For example, your car broke down. It stopped working. So you took it to get fixed two days ago. When I saw you today, you told me that the mechanic fixed your car. If you said, “The mechanic could fix my car yesterday”, that sentence is not correct. You must say, “The mechanic was able to fix my car yesterday” or “The mechanic managed to fix my car yesterday.”
Let’s look at another example. I have been looking for a CD I like for a long time. I could not find it. I was not able to find it for a long time. But yesterday I was able to find it. Yesterday I managed to find it. But you cannot say, “Yesterday I could find it.”
Remember “I could not” and “I was not able to” are the same, but “I could” and “I was able to” are not the same. “I could” means I used to be able to, but now I’m not able to. “I was able to” means I have the ability at one particular time in the past.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.美语听力与发音技巧 第32期（使役动词）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the causative verbs “make”, “have” and “get”, and the verb “let”.
Let’s look at some examples. “I made my brother carry my suitcase.” “I had my brother carry my suitcase.” “I got my brother to carry my suitcase.” “I let my brother carry my suitcase.” “make”, “have” and “get” can be used to express the idea that “X” causes “Y” to do something.
When they are used with this meaning, they’re similar but not identical. “I made him carry my suitcase” means I give him no choice. I insisted or forced him to do it. “I had him carry my suitcase” means that he did it just because I asked him. I didn’t have to ins
ist. “I got him to carry my suitcase” means I managed to persuade my brother to carry my suitcase. I didn’t insist. I persuaded him, possibly by offering to give him something or do something for him. “I let him carry my suitcase” means he wanted to carry my suitcase. He asked me if he could, and I said “OK”. I give him my permission to do it.
Chinese learners of English often use “let” when they should use “make”. Remember that “make” is similar to “force”, and only if you do not want to do it can someone make you do it. And remember that “let” is similar to “allow” or “permit”, and only if you need someone’s permission to do it, and you want to do it can someone let you or not let you do it.
Also be careful with using the verbs “let”, “make”, and “have” with these meanings. Say “let me do it”. Do not say “let me to do it”. Say “make him do it”, do not say “make him to do it”. And say “have her do it”, do not say “have her to do it”.
This has been today's daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
assume that in order to distinguish between “can” and “can't”, one must listen for the final “t” sound /t/. And when speaking, one must pronounce final ‘t’ sound /t/ clearly. However, this is not in fact how native speakers distinguish “can” and “can't”. People do not say ‘I `can drive a car, but I can’t drive a motorcycle.’ People say ‘I can `drive a car', but I `can't drive a motorcycle.’ The difference between “can” and “can't” is in stress. “Can” is not stressed, the verb after it is. “Can't” is stressed. The verb after it is not.
Also since ‘can’ is not stressed, the vowel is reduced to /a/, so “can” is actually pronounced “can”. Listen to another example. “I `can't go on Saturday, but I can `go on Sunday.” Did you hear the 't' sound? Did you notice the difference words being stressed? Listening again. “I `can't go on Saturday, but I can `go on Sunday.” If you want to understand whether someone is saying he can or can't do something, you have to be listening for a stressed “can't” or a verb stressed after “can”. What does this mean? “I can `speak Japanese, but I `can't speak Taiwanese.” That's right, I can speak Japanese, but I cannot speak Taiwanese. When you are speaking it is very important that you follow this rule too. When learners of English say I `can help you, native speakers often unsure what is meant because of improper stress. So remember, you can stress “can't”, but you `can't stress “can”.
This has been today's tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.
语听力与发音技巧 第2期
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on how syllable stress can affect the meaning of words.
Remenber that stressed syllables are said louder and are lengthened, and unstressed syllables are pronounced m
ore softly, and often have the vowel sounds reduced.
Sometimes, this difference can be the difference between a verb and a noun, or an adjective.
There are at least 14 pairs of words in which syllable stress alone makes this difference. Some examples include `addict, a`ddict, `convict, con`vict, `perfect, per`fect. Each time the second syllable is stressed, the word is a verb. When the first syllable is stressed, the word is either a noun or an adjective. Let’s look some examples more closely. `Permit, per`mit, a `permit is a noun, it is a piece of paper which authorizes you to do something. For instance, a fishing `permit allows you to go fishing. Per`mit is a verb. It means to allow. For instence, fishing isn’t per`mitted here without a `permit.
Another example is `perfect, per`fect. `Perfect is an adjective. It means 100% correct, no mistakes or errors. The verb is per`fect, it means to make something perfect. For example, “I want to per`fect my English” means “I want to make my English perfect”. Make sure you stress the right syllable. It can be the differece between different parts of speech. This has been today’s daily tip. Till then, tomorrow, for another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第3期（清浊辅音结尾对元音的影响）
Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on how different vowel lengths are used to differentiate words ending in voiced and voiceless consonants.
Let’s take an example. There’s something in my eyes. There’s something in my ice. The last words in the examples, eyes and ice differ in 2 ways. One difference is the word eyes end with the sound “z”, and ice end with the sound “s”. The other difference in the pronunciation of “eyes” and “ice” is how the vowel sound “ai” is pronounced. In the word “eyes”, it is longer. In the word “ice”, it is very short.
Listen to the examples again, and note that the final consonant sound is not as clear as the difference in the length of the vowel. There’s something in my eyes. There’s something in my ice. Listen again. There’s something in my eyes. There’s something in my ice. Listen to some other examples of words that are identical except for the final consonants and the vowel length. Cap, cab, plate, played, seat, seed. Today’s tip is to pay more attention to the length of vowels, as this difference is very important in distinguishing some words. Till then, tomorrow, to another tip on learning English.
美语听力与发音技巧 第4期（连音）
Welcome to daily tips on learning English. Today’s tip is on sound linking.
Although in written English, there’re spaces between every word, in spoken English there’re always never (1)pauses between words. In order to understand spoken English, it is (2)essential to understand how this linking is done. Today let’s (3)concentrate on the most common sound linking situation. Whenever a word ending in a c