A teacher who calls himself Coach Shane has a YouTube channel for daily dictation practice. Dictation means somebody says or reads something for you to try to write down. I must point out that in his first video he misuses the verb "dictate" a little bit. To dictate is to say or speak some words that you want someone else to write down. Coach Shane tells you to listen, then do your best to "dictate" the sentence, but he should be telling you to listen, then do your best to write down what you hear. The action of writing down what you hear is called "transcription," not dictation.
My suggestion: The nice thing about Coach Shane's videos is that you don't just listen to the teacher say things (although he does have very clear pronunciation). He plays recordings of different voices saying things--cartoons, newscasters reading headlines, actors' lines from movies or television shows, etc. In one video, you listen to a sentence several times and try to write down what you hear, without seeing the actual words. In the very next video, Coach Shane reveals the answer--what you should have written down. He then explains the changes that happen when the written sentence is spoken out loud, like vowel reductions, strong sounds that "win" over weak sounds in English, or what sounds Americans connect in casual conversation. He also explains the context of what you heard--maybe it was a famous line from an American movie, or a news headline about an important world event.
LINK: Click on this link to the first video--
Or click on this sample video:
My suggestion: The nice thing about Coach Shane's videos is that you don't just listen to the teacher say things (although he does have very clear pronunciation). He plays recordings of different voices saying things--cartoons, newscasters reading headlines, actors' lines from movies or television shows, etc. In one video, you listen to a sentence several times and try to write down what you hear, without seeing the actual words. In the very next video, Coach Shane reveals the answer--what you should have written down. He then explains the changes that happen when the written sentence is spoken out loud, like vowel reductions, strong sounds that "win" over weak sounds in English, or what sounds Americans connect in casual conversation. He also explains the context of what you heard--maybe it was a famous line from an American movie, or a news headline about an important world event.
LINK: Click on this link to the first video--
Or click on this sample video:
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