Miss Elise
Pronunciation Coach
Transform Your Students’ Pronunciation in One Hour
Comprehensive lesson plans designed for in-depth, engaging classes.
Elevate your ESL teaching with structured, one-hour pronunciation lessons. These detailed plans provide everything you need to guide your students toward confident, clear American English. Perfect for teachers looking to create impactful learning experiences with practical techniques and proven methods.
Or, dive deeper to discover essential habits and techniques for mastering American English pronunciation with confidence.
The Sound of E, Part 3
Part 1: Lead in, 5 min warm up.
Choose one student to read the quote to the class, and then ask your students what they think of the passage. Do they agree or disagree? Why?
“You learn more from failure than from success. Don’t let it stop you. Failure builds character.”
— Unknown
Part 2: The Sound of E, as in Over
The teacher will read the description of how the letter E (as in over) is formed and have students mimic her movements. The teacher will then read out just the ER sound and have the students repeat it until everyone feels confident that they can adequately produce it.
Description: To produce the vowel sound ER (as in over), the front of your tongue (not the tip) needs to be raised and slightly curled back towards the roof of your mouth, and your mouth needs to be slightly rounded and tensed while you expel your breath in a murmur.
Practice the ER sound with students by repeating the following, making only the sound:
ER, ER, ER
ER, ER, ER
ER, ER, ER
ER, ER, ER
Part 3: ER Words
Once your students feel confident that they can produce the ER sound, the teacher will read out the ER words slowly, emphasizing the ER sound and reviewing any challenging words. Students will repeat after each word is pronounced. The teacher will repeat this exercise twice.
Her, ern, per, fern, doer
Perm, germ, herb, verb, over
Gamer, timer, Ernest, ruler, piper
Mercy, tiger, verse, sober, eager
Alert, outer, alter, Roger, laser
Later, fiber, river, serve, upper
Part 4: Practice complete sentences emphasizing the ER sound.
The teacher will read out one sentence at a time and have students repeat reviewing any challenging words. The teacher will repeat this exercise twice.
1) Roger was both a writer and a baker.
2) They liked the weather in Denver and decided another visit was a must.
3) When she entered the chamber, her sister was bantering with the buyer.
4) The tower was built using superior materials because it served a higher purpose.
5) Peter’s bitter anger at his error thankfully passed quickly.
6) The powerful river was too fierce for the fisherman to handle, and he returned home.
7) The buyer lowered the offer, much to the seller’s dismay.
8) The inner and upper lining were both leather, insisted the clever dealer.
9) The butler opens the door for the preacher every single day.
10) The lawyer gathered his clients together and delivered a superb speech.
Part 5: Student Practice
When Part 4 is finished, the teacher will ask students if they have any questions or need help with the words and sentences they just practiced. If all is well, then students will be placed in pair groups and will take turns reading out loud the ER words and the sentences to each other, emphasizing the ER sound.
Part 6: Informal student test
Once the above exercise is finished, the teacher will randomly choose a ER word or a sentence and pick a student to read it out loud, correcting any target pronunciation errors as they are made.
Part 7: Tell a ER Story
Below you will find a list of names, nouns, verbs, and adjectives with the letter ER. Place students in small groups or pairs and give them about 10 minutes to create a ER story that they will recite to the class. Make sure that they correctly pronounce the ER sound as they develop their story with their classmates. Circulate around the class, correcting target pronunciation as needed. They may use words outside the list, but whichever group can use the most ER words (logically!) and tell the best story wins. This is great for laughs!
Angela
Alder - Enter - Power - Falter - Butter
Runner - Denver - Gather - Broker - Weather
Sister - Lakers - Dexter - Preacher - Number
Banter - Ladder - Mother - Casper - Chamber
Grandfather - Supper - Register - Water - Walter
Linger - Chowder - Lawyer - Brother - Earth
Part 8: Game Time!
If you have time, there is no better way to wrap up a class than with a short game. Just like starting a class with a warmup quote to get students in the learning zone, ending a class on a happy, fun note is a wonderful way to get them excited about returning to your next class. There are numerous pronunciation games, including bingo, rhyming activities, and sound chains. I have attached a few links to get you started.
You can also choose to wrap up your class with something completely different, like placing students in pairs and tackling a few questions from the Conversation Topics or playing a game of hangman or sinking ship.
https://www.tefl.net/elt/ideas/pronunciation/top-fun-pronunciation-games/
https://www.fluentu.com/blog/educator-english/pronunciation-games-esl/
https://blog.youragora.com/adult-english-learning-esl-games-for-adults