Here are a few samples I wrote for practicing academic English. These are short descriptive passages for practicing consonants, especially fricative and palatal consonants and consontant clusters. They are also suitable for practicing rhythm. I wrote these and other materials because most pronunciation practice materials are boring and often have no meaningful context. These and other future posts will hopefully be a bit more useful.
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In the zoo at night, silence fell as the zoo visitors left. Crickets chirped as church bells rang out from an adjacent district. In the cages, crocs guarded their eggs as ducks lapsed into slumber. The elks cringed as already satisfied tigers nearby loudly belched. The asps blitzed about their dens, while hedgehogs rummaged for grubs, and black bats emerged from the warmth of their crypts. A lynx triumphed over its prey and plopped it down before its mates, as wolves glimpsed at the skunks kept safe from them by a chain link cage, and loathed the four-legged morsels that they could not grasp.
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Out by the oaks, ants who had waltzed amongst each other in the daytime relaxed for the night, as did ant lions that had delved into the sands. Spiders in their orbs wrapped their desiccated bugs and other victims that they had bagged in spider silk, like limbs set in casts. Under the light of the street lamps, various insects made their attempts at acts of courtship, but the less lucky dating applicants were jinxed by the heat of the light bulbs.
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A nice day with a wind is breezy, and a bad person may be sleazy. Good jazz can be jazzy, and things fancy can be jazzy or snazzy, or full of pizazz. Things pleasant can be peachy, besides your peach. With much cheese, pizza can be cheesy, but cheap things can also be cheesy, like songs from boy bands.
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The Internet is often for the outlandish, the selfish, and sometimes not the squeamish. It brings a deluge and a barrage of things – some of it’s to your advantage, and some of it’s just garbage. So many sites, some full of verbiage, some to besmirch, some to analyze, some just to polarize. And let’s get it straight – there’s only one Internet, nothing different, no plural ‘Internets’. Yes, there are intranets, and the old ARPANET, and hairnets, and fishing nets, but no ‘Internets,’ please.
- So much is in English on the web, but also in any language, like Flemish and Turkish, and Danish and Scottish. You can read all about spuds and arthropods, find a favorite beverage or an erudite adage, harass your parliamentarians or in general be contrarians, or find a church or befriend a Lurch.*
*[Lurch is a character from the old Addams Family TV sitcom and movie.]
Cognitive communicative language teaching 