‘Very’ can be very hard to say. Learn how to practice this word by breaking it down sound by sound, knowing what’s stressed and what’s not. Then put it all together to feel confident using this word in American English conversation.
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Video Text:
This week’s Word of the Week is ‘very’. ‘Very’ is a two-syllable word with stress on the first syllable. Ver-y, ver-y, very, very. It begins with the V consonant sound. If you come from India, look out. You might want to make it a [w], ww, where your lips round. But it’s a V, vv, where the bottom lip comes up and makes contact with the top teeth. Vv, vv, ve-. Then we have the EH as in BED vowel. The jaw needs to drop for that. Ve-, ve-. Next we have the R consonant. That can be tough. And in this word a lot of people will want to flap the R, where the front part of the tongue bounces off the roof of the mouth. We do not want this position. We want this position, where the middle part of the tongue stretches up and touches the roof of the mouth, about here. Ver-. The front part of the tongue doesn’t touch anything, and you should be able to hold out that sound. Very. And finally, the EE as in SHE vowel, unstressed, to finish the word. Very, very. I’m very sorry.That’s it, your Word of the Week. Try it out yourself. Make up a sentence with the word, record it, and post it as a video response to this video on YouTube. I can’t wait to watch it.
That’s it, and thanks so much for using Rachel’s English.