Most of the phonetic mistakes are caused for two reasons ¨C either because some sounds don¡¯t exist in Spanish or because they pronounce every word in the same way as it¡¯s written.

The following sounds do not occur or are pronounced differently in Spanish:

a). /b-/v/. The Spaniards don¡¯t make differences between the voiced sound /b/ and voiceless /v/ because in Spanish they pronounce both as voiceless. E.g. very, button ¨C the same sound in Spanish language.

To correct the problem with /b/ and /v/, students can do the following exercises. Before that, the teacher has to explain that one of them is ¡°bilabial¡±(b) and the other one is ¡°labiodental¡± (v).

Listen to the teacher and repeat these words:

Vacation       button       vomit         basket

Very             cover         problem     verb

Listen to the tape and put a tick to the word you hear:

Vine__     Labial___     Job___     Very_____ Blue___  Liberal___

Bad____  Very____     Ball___ Van______ Vocal___ Brother____

Watch and listen to the film and write down same words with the sound /b/ and /v/.

b). /¡Ò /-/s/. The Spaniards don¡¯t have the sound /s / and it is a little bit difficult for them to pronounce words with this sound. To differentiate /s/ and /¡Ò / students can do this exercise.

Listen to the teacher and repeat these words:

Shower         vacation      shock     

Graduation    shoes          question

Listen to the tape and put a tick on the word you hear:

Question___ vacation ___ special___ science ____

Shock__­­­_ space ____condition____ some____

c). /dz/ - /h/ The Spaniards don¡¯t have these sounds in their mother tongue. For them it¡¯s very difficult to produce these sounds. E.g. just, luggage /dz/, history, honey /h/.

To produce the sound /dz/ in a correct way the following exercises can be done.

Listen to the teacher and repeat these words:

Just                 sandwich        job                jog

Luggage          pigeon          percentage    cage

Listen to the tape and put a tick on the word you hear:

Just ____ jump ____ garage ____ pyjama _____ cabbage ____ jumper ___

Watch and listen to the film and write down some words with the sound /dz/.

2. The Spanish pronounce every word in the same way as it¡¯s written. E.g.women ¨C they say /women/ instead of /wimin/.Bird ¨C  they say /bi:d/ instead of /b3: d/. Table ¨C  they say /table/ instead of /teibl/.

To correct this reading/pronunciation problems, this exercise can be done:

Listen to the tape and choose the appropriate form:

Woman- /wimin/-/w¦Ôman/.

Layer- /leja /-/lajer/.

Philosophy- /filosafi/- /pilosopi/

Bird- /bi:d/-/b3:d/.

Moreover, they also tend to pronounce an e before the s at the beginning of the words starting with s to make easier their pronunciation. E.g. Spanish-espanish. Small-esmall. Spell-espell.

To correct this problem these exercise can be done:

Listen and repeat these words:

Spain        Slovak        Spell          Spoon

Ski            Sweater      Spanish      Small