Words glue together
The first of the three things that hide words.
~35 minGet your three things ready
You need only these:
- Headphones — you cannot hear linking through a speaker in a noisy room.
- Your phone, to record one short voice note at the end.
- A notebook (paper or an app) for your Couldn't-Catch List.
Hear the problem for yourself
Read this sentence out loud, slowly, word by word:
Nine words. You know every one of them. Now say it the way a friend would say it across a kitchen table — fast, not careful:
Same nine words. But the gaps between them are gone, and three of the words shrank. That is why fast English sounds like one long word. It is not new vocabulary. It is the same words, glued.
Watch: how words glue together
Un-glue these yourself
Cover the right column with your hand. Read the left side, say what you think a fast speaker would actually say, then slide your hand down and check.
| You read | You hear |
|---|---|
| Pick it up. | Pi-ki-tup.the k jumps onto “it” |
| Turn it off. | Ter-ni-toff. |
| What are you doing? | Whutter-ya doin?“are” almost disappears |
| I need an apple. | I nee-duh-napple.d and n both jump forward |
| Come on in. | Cuh-mah-nin. |
| Is it a problem? | Zi-duh problem?even the first word shrinks |
Check yourself
Record your first voice note
Open the voice recorder on your phone and talk for about two minutes about this:
- Do not write a script. Just talk.
- Save it as “Week 1 — Voice Note 1”.
- Keep it. In Week 6 you will record the same thing again and hear the difference.
Start your Couldn't-Catch List
From now until your next class, every time someone says something in English that you could not catch — a person, a film, a video, a shop — write down whatever you did hear. Even “something-something tomorrow” is enough.