Streaming Speech AC is based on eight recordings of spontaneous speech by people from around the United States and Canada. Six of them have standard American accents. Nick has a Canadian accent, and Travis a mid-Western accent.

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photographs above. You will hear a short
extract from their recording.
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Streaming Speech AC has ten chapters, plus an introduction. The first eight chapters form a complete pronuncation and listening course; Chapter 9 provides you with a choice of voices on which to model your pronunciation of the vowels and consonants of English; Chapter 10 is a teacher-training chapter.

Chapters 1-8: A course in Listening and Pronunciation

Chapters 1-8 have a four-part structure: Introduction, Listening, Learn about speech, and Pronunciation.

Introduction

The introduction consists of two pages, a Welcome screen and a Goals screen. The Welcome screen introduces the speaker whose recording will be used in the chapter. The Goals screen sets the agenda.

For Chapter 1 the agenda is to work on the short vowels of American English, on merging (linking) words together in fluent speech, and on understanding speech with speeds up to 420 words per minute. When you buy a subscription, this is the type of screen you will work with.

Listening - comprehension

Listening comprehension questions focus on the fastest, meaning-bearing parts of the recording - those parts which are likely to present problems of both perception and understanding.

Questions also focus on important features (rhythm, intonation) of the stream of speech, and which then become the learning focus.

Listening - focus

After answering the comprehension questions, you see extracts from the recording which have the evidence for the answers. You see, you click, you hear the original spontaneous speech.

Try it now: click on the speaker icon, and on each line. When you buy a subscription, this is the type of interaction you will have with the materials.

Learn about speech - Discourse Features

In the central section of each chapter, you will learn the patterns of everyday speech: linking, rhythm, speed, intonation. Two questions motivate the syllabus of this section.

Question 1: Why is speech not a series of isolated words separated by pauses?

Question 2: What are the patterns of speech which make speech like a stream?

This section constantly compares slow paused speech, and natural fast streamed speech.

Pronunciation

Pronunciation work begins with a reminder of the relationship between sound and symbol - using the tables such as the one below left. (When you buy a subscription, you can click on the green text and hear samples of real natural speech.)

The main work on pronunciation is done with tables (above right) of speech units taken from the original recording. There are two units for each speech sound. The task is to listen, imitate, record yourself, and compare yourself to the original.

Chapter 9: Segments workshop

This chapter provides you a choice of voice model to work with on the complete set of vowels and consonants of North American English. You have a choice of three female and three male speakers. Thus, if you like Ellen's voice and style of speaking (from Chapter 1), you can use her as a model; on the other hand if you like Omira’s voice and style of speaking (from Chapter 2) you can use her as a model. In addition to these two, you can choose from Kaili, Kennon, Jeffrey and Nick. There is also a 'cluster-buster' where you can practise consonant clusters with extracts from a number of different speakers.

Chapter 10: Speech units - A window on Speech

This chapter is a teacher-training chapter. It helps teachers who want to learn and use Streaming Speech's approach in their teaching and in materials design. It has three sections. The first deals with the speech unit – its different types and shapes. The second deals with tones and key – the different tunes that English has. The last gives transcription practice – four extracts of increasing difficulty which test your command of the concepts, and train your ear to hear the patterns of everyday speech.