Cloze Test

As any teacher of English (0) ------------------- a foreign language will tell you, teaching pronunciation isn’t easy. When it comes to replacing one sound system with another, it’s (1) ---------------------- to change the habits of a lifetime. So it’s no surprise that, (2) ---------------------- in the most fluent of English learners, with very few exceptions, there remain traces of the speaker’s (3) --------------------- language in their English accent. There was a time when that ‘foreign accent' was

(4) --------------------- learners wanted to eradicate. These days, teachers tend to be more relaxed about residual accents – as (5) -------------------------- as they don’t interfere with intelligibility – and learners are gradually coming to realize that they can be proud (6) ------------------------- them.

Just as native speakers of (7) ------------------------ are happy to ‘sound British, American, Australian ...’, so second-language learners can feel happy to ‘sound French, German, Japanese’ and (8) -------------------------- on – again as long as their speech is easily intelligible. Diversity is part of the richness of language, and there is no (9) --------------------------- why this should be restricted to native speakers. It’s an inevitable consequence of a language being used globally that there will be an increase in the (10) ----------------------- of identifiable accents reflecting the countries of origin.

(David Crystal, Sounds Appealing, London, Profile, 2019)

Word Formation  Exercise

Forensic phonetics may be the most obvious example of interest in the personal properties of pronunciation, and the one that attracts most public interest; but it is

by no means the only one. Speech (1) -------------------------------- also deal with pronunciation (2) ------------------------------------ . A wide range of medical and

(3) ---------------------------- conditions can result in speakers developing an abnormal voice quality, having difficulties in (4) ----------------------------- , or using a set of sounds that is so different from normal speech that it interferes with their

(5) --------------------------------- or makes them stand out in a way that they

find (6) ----------------------------------- or upsetting. An obvious example is stammering. Another is the slurred speech that can come from some form of

(7) ------------------------------ affecting one or more of the vocal organs. Another is the breathy voice that can be the result of abnormal (8) ----------------------------------- on the vocal folds that prevent them closing properly.

                 (David Crystal, Sounds Appealing, London, Profile, 2019)

1. therapy

2. individual

3. psychology

4. articulate

5. intelligible

6. please

7. paralyse

8. grow