Category Archives: Speak English Better

accent reduction, idioms and slang, grammar, vocabulary, ESL challenges.

Canadian English Pronunciation

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Today, July 1st, is Canada Day – our birthday. I thought this might be of interest to those who enjoy the sound and study of Canadian English.

Canadian English (CanE, en-CA) is the variety of English used in Canada. More than 26 million Canadians (85% of the population) have some knowledge of English (2006 census). Approximately 17 million speak English as their native language. Outside Quebec, 76% of Canadians speak English natively. Canadian English contains elements of British English in its vocabulary, as well as several distinctive “Canadianisms”. In many areas, speech is influenced by French, and there are notable local variations. However, Canada has very little dialect diversity compared to the United States. The phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexicon for most of Canada are similar to that of the Western and Midland regions of the United States, while the phonological system of western Canadian English is identical to that of the Pacific Northwest of the United States, and the phonetics are similar. As such, Canadian English and American English are sometimes grouped together as North American English. Canadian English spelling is a blend of British and American conventions. (source: Wikipedia)

I would also like to add my two-cents to this. I was born in a small town and now live and work in Toronto. I personally hear different English dialects here in Canada. I hear the standard “mid-west” accent that Hollywood and the media love to use, although it is split up into 2 accents. One is the ‘professional’ accent which you will hear in the big cities and in professional circles. The vowels are tighter, proper grammar rules are adhered to and the vocabulary is richer.

The other accent is the ‘relaxed’ English, which you can hear in small towns and in manual labour or “blue collar” circles. In this dialect, the people do not mind purposefully breaking some grammar rules, have a variety of rich and colourful slang and favourite expressions used, and sound more “American” in their pronunciation of longer, stretched out vowels.

There is also the distinctive French-Canadian or “Quebecois” accent (Think Georges St.Pierre from the UFC) which is quite different from accents from other French speaking countries. There is the distinctive “East-Coaster” accent, due to the previous immigrants from Ireland and Scotland (hence Nova Scotia – New Scotland) and finally there is the native/Inuit/aboriginal accent.

A few resources to study Canadian English Pronunciation:

http://www.accentoncanadianenglish.com/
http://www.lulu.com/content/e-book/3vc-accent-reduction-program-description/7349543
http://voicetoword.ca/index.html
http://www.voiceandspeech.com/
http://www3.telus.net/linguisticsissues/britishcanadianamericanvocabcanadianpron.html
http://www.ic.arizona.edu/~lsp/Canadian/canphon3.html
http://www.esl-guide.com/links/search.cgi?Country=Canada

I apologize that most of these resources are Ontario-based. Please do a local search to see what in-house or online resources are available to you. Find a good teacher, tutor, coach or trainer with experience and references, and for goodness sake – ask if he or she was born in Canada!

Happy Canada Day!

Acronyms for Crime and Policing

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To continue from a previous blog entry, here are some popular acronyms that you may hear on cop shows or cop films. Plus, if you apply to become a police officer, you should be aware of these acronyms. Our company proudly helps YRP – York Regional Police – with communication skills assessments and training of their recruits and officers.  Some are immigrants and we believe that having English as a second language should not stop you from enjoying dramatic shows or applying to serve your community!  Feel free to share this with those you know are applying to become a police officer in their community too.

E.T.A. – Estimated Time of Arrival
D.O.A. – Dead On Arrival
M.O. – Modus Operandi – Latin for mode or style of operation or the way a ‘perp’ performs crimes. The pattern s/he follows.
C.O.P. – Citizen or Constable On Patrol – “cop” is the common nickname for a police officer.
D.U.I. – Driving Under the Influence (of drugs or alcohol)
B & E – Break and Enter – burglary
P.I. – Private Investigator
C.I. – Confidential Informer/Informant – someone the police use to get inside info from the streets or criminal gangs.
B.O.L.O. – Be On the LookOut for – notice to all officers to search for or be aware of a particular person.
A.P.B. – All Points Bulletin – also known as a citywide – same as BOLO.
C.Y.A. – Cover Your Ass – Do the job right, by the book, and document everything to prove that you did everything correctly.
S.W.A.T. – Special Weapons And Tactics team/squad – highly trained paramilitary officers, used in hostage situations and other dangerous events. On TV and in film, they are always dressed completely in black.

That should be enough to give you a better English base for policing.
Memorize them and then incorporate them, and stay safe.

Cop Talk – Learning the Idioms and Slang of the Police

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Do you enjoy watching police TV shows like COPS, CSI, Law & Order etc. and police films in English? There are lots to choose from for sure. Or perhaps you want to apply to become a police officer? I have the pleasure of working directly with a local police service (YRP – York Regional Police) to offer English communication assessments for new recruits and also to train current officers in communication skills required by the job.  You NEED to learn a lot of idioms and slang, whether English is your second language or first.  You need to know a lot of ‘everyday idioms’ like “It’s pouring rain” (raining really hard – do not use the old idiom ‘raining cats and dogs’), it came from “out of the blue” (surprising, unexpected) and “The real McCoy” (genuine, the real deal, not a fake) but you also need to learn more industry-specific slang and idioms to do with policing and crime. For example:

There’s a “wino” in the alley – Wino means stereotypical alcoholic homeless person.

“Reefer. Blunt. Chronic. Mary J. Grass. Weed” – These all refer to Marijuana. There are many more too!

“Cuff him and stuff him” – handcuff the perp (perpetrator or suspect) and put him in the back of the squad car.

“Something’s going down right now!” – means some illegal action like a drug trade is happening right now.

“Hooker, Pro, Lady of the night, Streetwalker” – all refer to a woman who is a prostitute.

“I smell bacon” – bad guys say this when cops are around – refers to old nickname of calling the police ‘Pigs’.

There are literally hundreds more, and I will add a few acronyms for you next entry.

If you want to improve your English in police slang in order to apply to be a constable or just to further enjoy your favourite TV shows and movies, take a little time to improve your Cop Talk first!

Coach Ric

So, what are the qualities of a good speaker?

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Here are a list of the qualities and characteristics of a good public speaker/presenter.

Make sure you include these points when you have to speak in public.

1. They talk to us as though we are having a conversation
2. They speak our language
3. They look as though they are enjoying themselves.
4. They inspire us to find out more about the subject
5. They tell stories/use the human-interest angle
6. Someone who conjures up pictures in our mind
7. They don’t talk for hours
8. They let us know where we are going
9. They look at us – not their notes
10. They stress important points and pause to allow ideas to sink in
11. The talk appears well prepared but has an air of spontaneity

By Sean McPheat – included in his ‘ConfidenceWorld’ program.

Comparing Communication and English Conversations Skills

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What are the English Language Conversation Skills?

English Language Conversation Skills include language abilities, conversation skills, social skills, culture knowledge and non-verbal communication skills.

Non-verbal communication skills are classified as posture, body movements, gestures, facial expressions, proximity and eye contact.

In English speaking countries the non-verbal messages can represent from 50-93% of the meaning.

Social skills and culture knowledge can be generalized as “what to say, when to say it, where and why to say it, and most important how to say it”.

When learning English Language Conversation Skills ESL students must learn: language abilities, conversation skills, social skills, culture knowledge and non-verbal communication skills. ESL Students need everything if they actually want to converse with native English speakers.

ESL Students can not just learn English vocabulary or English pronunciation as it represents less than 50% of most conversations.

What are some of the Professional Communication Skills?

The ability to add charisma to your speaking and interpersonal communications.

The ability to create initial rapport even on first phone calls or meetings.

The ability to build rapport easily in meetings, networking functions, or conversations.

The ability to use specialized industry or business English using industry-specific vocabulary for accuracy.

The ability to emote the appropriate emotion at the correct level.

The ability to create and deliver persuasive and dynamic presentations and speeches.

The ability to display confident leadership and competent management or knowledge.

Other specialized skills include customer service, handling complaints, conflict management.

There are many similarities between conversation and communication skills. Both are very important. One could generalize that communication skills add extra dimensions to conversation skills. One example: Conversations can transmit information where communication skills can transmit trust.
(original post by Ross McBride – ESL in Canada. Reprinted with permission)

Idioms from Snow

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Well it is the season for this topic, at least here in Canada and the northern U.S.
(I have modified these from http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/snow)

To be (as) pure as the driven snow:

Pure and chaste (Often used ironically.)
E.g. Jill: Sue must have gone to bed with every man in town. Jane: And I always thought she was as pure as the driven snow!

A snow bunny:
1. Someone learning to ski.
E.g. This little slope is for snow bunnies. They call it the ‘bunny hill’.
2. A young, attractive female at a skiing lodge.
E.g. Some cute little snow bunny came over and sat beside me. This place is swarming with snow bunnies that have never even seen a ski.

Snowed in:
Trapped (somewhere) because of too much snow, most likely due to a recent snow storm.
E.g. The snow was so deep that we were snowed in for three days. Luckily we had enough food to last us a while.

Snowed under:
Overworked; exceptionally busy.
E.g. Look, I’m really snowed under at the moment. Can this wait?

A snow job:

An attempt to persuade or deceive someone by praising them or not telling the truth.
E.g. Dane will need to do a snow job on his Dad if he’s ever going to borrow the car again, after getting into so many fender-benders (minor car accidents).

Enjoy and stay warm!

Who Cares That GSP Has an Accent?

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Hey everyone,

I know this post is not really communication-related, except if you consider that GSP (Georges St.-Pierre) has a thick French-Canadian accent, but I just HAD to write a quick WOO-HOO and congratulations to our home-grown UFC champion (MMA – Mixed Martial Arts) Georges “Rush’ St.-Pierre on defending his title against BJ ‘the Prodigy’ Penn, from Hawaii. BJ is a great fighter, but I am relieved that GSP won and proud that he did it in such a convincing way. When you are THAT good, no one CARES that you have an accent!!!

Don’t ever let an accent slow you down or convince you that you can’t follow your dreams and ambitions. Ever!

Swimming Idioms Part 1

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(from http://www.business-english.com/swimmingidioms/menu.php with some modifications)

If you are ‘out of your depth’, you don’t have the necessary knowledge, experience or skill to deal with a particular situation or subject. In North America, a common replacement is ‘out of your league’, as in major league baseball.
• When she started talking about quantum physics, I felt completely out of my depth/league.
• I’m an engineer. I feel out of my depth when we discuss accounting problems.
• That woman is so beautiful. She is definitely out of my league!

If you are on ‘the crest of a wave’, you are being extremely successful or popular. If something is popular, you can try to ‘ride (on) the wave’.
• That singer is on the crest of the wave in the pop charts at the moment. You can hear his music everywhere.
• He became successful riding on the wave of using British actors as villains in Hollywood movies.

If you don’t get any training before you start a job or activity, you are ‘thrown in at the deep end’.
• Everyone was off sick so I was thrown in at the deep end.
• The best way to learn the job is to be thrown in at the deep end.

If you are struggling to spend less than you earn, you are trying to ‘keep your head above water’.
• Since they increased my rent, I’ve been struggling to keep my head above water.
• With the new sponsorship, the team should be able to keep its head above water.

If a company has to stop business because of losses, it ‘goes under’.
• The company couldn’t afford to pay its suppliers and it went under.
• In this economic climate, a lot of businesses will go under.

If you are in a very difficult situation, you are ‘in deep water’.
• If the bank doesn’t give us this loan, we could be in deep water.
• He was caught stealing from his company and now he’s in deep water.
• Note: this has been commonly replaced with the more street-slang phrase ‘in deep sh_t’. This of course is a curse-word.

Swimming Idioms Part 2

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If you ‘make a splash’, you get a lot of public attention.
• We need to make a splash by holding a cocktail party for journalists.
• She made quite a splash when she wore such a small dress to the film premiere.

If a noise is ‘drowned out’, you cannot hear it because of other noises.
• The sounds of the telephone were drowned out by the noise from upstairs.
• His speech was drowned out by the chanting from the demonstrators.

If you ‘test the water’, you try to find out what you or people think about an idea or a situation before you take action.
• Before you decide to sell your house in England and move to Spain, why not go there for a trial three months to test the water?
• This is a big project. We should test the water before making such a large investment.

If a situation is ‘sink or swim’, it either fails or succeeds.
• Either this works or we are all out of a job. It’s sink or swim.
• You’ll get no training here. It’s sink or swim.

If you ‘dive into’ something, you do it without really thinking about what you are doing. Also ‘dive into it head-first’. This highlights the lack of preparation and thought.
• He dove into the project with a lot of enthusiasm but not much thought.
• Let’s take our time. There’s no point in diving into this without thinking.

If you are ‘treading water’, you are staying in the same place without making any progress.
• I’m just treading water, waiting for a job with a better salary.
• People lose motivation if they think they are just treading water in their careers.

Can you think of other idioms to do with swimming to add to this list?

Saying the Oath of Office Again

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Dear Mr. President (if he really were listening…),

Don’t worry about having to take the oath again. Even though both of you were understandably nervous during the inauguration, it was not your fault. If the other guy would have simply spoken 3-4 words only at a time, and waited for you to repeat them, then went on to the next 3-4 words (instead of saying sentences of 5-10 words at a time) it would have gone a lot smoother! Think of wedding vows – same rule applies, no matter how much you practice the vows ahead of time. Being nervous is natural and understandable, and that is why the lead-speaker needs to slow down, speak clearly and absolutely ‘chunk’ up the sentences to manageable small parts.

Common sense I know, yet…President Obama had to take the oath twice.  🙂