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Frequently Asked Questions
Click to jump straight to the question. Please do contact
us if you have any further questions not covered here.
Why work with us?
You will be in very safe hands! The main reason you should work with Speak Easily is the quality of our teaching. All our voice and accent coaches are MA qualified in accent and voice training on the globally renowned Voice Teacher MA at the Central School of Speech & Drama, London. We select the most talented and creative teachers to graduate from this course to join our team, after they have already built up years of experience.
We pride ourselves on being able to quickly and accurately assess your needs and respond with practical, effective and creative techniques. So you get lasting results, easily, enjoyably and efficiently. Our coaches are engaged by a wide range of prestigious companies and organisations. They are also employed as voice and accent specialists by many of the leading Drama Schools, theatres and film production units in the UK. Only entrust
your unique, valuable voice and speech to an expert.
What does it cost?
Private tuition with our MA qualified teachers in our Central London studios costs £80 an hour with reductions for bundles of 5 or 10 sessions. Our Elocution/Accent Reduction Evening Classes cost £295 for a 6 week course in groups of just six. More complex needs may require an individual quotation. You can find more detailed information here.
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Can I take a Trial Session?
Our Taster Sessions (see here
for fees) can be taken on their own with no need for a longer
committment. They give you the chance to experience the work
and be sure that the training is right for you. It also gives
our trainers a chance to analyse your voice and accent in
person and give you the best advice possible as to the amount
of training you need to achieve your goals. Most people then
take a course of 10 sessions for voice work, accent and elocution
training. Public speaking is often more dependent on the particular
situation.
What can I hope to achieve?
Over
time you can make radical changes to how you speak. However, it is worth noting that your body took
many years to develop, and it took you many years to learn
how to speak. Changing how you speak and produce your voice
requires you to re-train muscles and the brain from the way
they have always done things. It is better to think of voice
training as a complex process like learning to drive - you
would not expect to achieve that in one session. You will need a similar committment to make big changes to your voice, speech and performance abilities.
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How long does it take?
Your trainer will help you improve as rapidly
as possible, and if you practice at home and try to use the
work in daily communications you will soon start to gain control
over your voice and speech. Remind friends and colleagues
not to expect instant change. And give yourself several months
to truly incorporate the work.
You need to progress through several stages.The
first stage is Incompetent Incompetence -
not knowing what you are doing wrong. The second is Conscious
Incompetence - knowing what you are wrong but not
yet being able to change it. The third is Conscious
Competence - you know what you are doing but need
to concentrate on it to get it right. The last stage is Conscious
Competence - your body knows and remembers what to
do and it happens automatically.
Relax and enjoy the work as you progress from stage to stage
until you reach your goal and your voice and speech are changed
for good.
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What happens in a class?
This depends on you and your exact aims and
if you are working on your speech, voice or public speaking.
If you are working on your accent and speech
you can expect to do exercises to stretch out and strengthen
the mouth and tongue; exercises to be able to identify and
shape the correct speech sounds of English; exercises to understand
how the different sounds are represented in English spelling
(not obvious); exercises to adopt the stress, rhythm and tune
of English; exercises to make all of this effortless.
If you are working on your vocal production
you can expect exercises to help you find correct posture
alignment; exercises to release excessive tension that is
interfereing with the voice; exercises to release tension
in the throat and mouth; exercises to find correct creation
of sound and connection of that to speech; exercises to help
you increase pitch range and resonance.
If you are working on your public speaking
you can expect us to work directly on a speech (either a real
or imagined one). We will look first of all at how you structure
the story of that speech and relate it to the audience. There
will be exercises to help you find a relaxed, grounded physicality
when speaking; exercises to help you centre and release the
voice; exercises to help you keep an open mouth and make clear
consonants and vowels with this; exercises to help you befriend
and contact the audience; exercises to help you use tune,
gesture and rhythm to illustrate the material; exercises to
help you find and highlight the 'plot' of your speech building
suspense and interest throughout; and exercises to eradicate
any desire to waffle!
What is RP (Received Pronunciation)?
RP or Received Pronunciation is the name commonly
given to the standard, non-regional version of British English.
There is more information about RP here.
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Why is English spelling
so difficult?
The problem with English spelling is that the
pronunciation of English has changed radically over the centuries
whilst our spelling has barely altered at all. This issue
was noticed way back in the 16th Century! Big changes took
place to vowel sounds around then. Another big change, not
pronouncing r’s after vowels, happened in the 19th century,
whilst our spelling was standardised in the 18th century.
Add to this that we have 20 vowel sounds and only 5 alphabetical
vowel letters, and that the Latin alphabet doesn’t have symbols
for all our consonants, and you begin to see the problem.
George Bernard Shaw (the famous writer of My
Fair Lady) tried to get changes made to our spelling at the
beginning of the 20th century, but nothing was done. So we’re
stuck with it.
Your trainer will try to familiarise you with
what rules there are, however, so you can guess the likely
pronunciation of unknown words.
What is Phonetics?
As English spelling is so varied, it is very
useful to learn to identify the sounds by the phonetic symbols.
These are symbols that directly represent the actual sounds,
so there are, for example, 20 different symbols for the 20
different vowel sounds in British English. Yes, I know, 20
vowel sounds!. If you get familiar with the phonetic symbols
you make, you can look up the correct pronunciation of words
in the dictionary.
The symbols are different for the vowels, but in many cases
similar for the consonants.
For example:
"Perfectly" in phonetics is /’p3:fIktli:/
In a dictionary, the phonetic version will come
just before the definition (be sure you have a British English
dictionary though, American phonetics are different). The
symbols above may not make any sense yet, but you'll absorb
them effortlessly during the course, and by the end they should
allow you to pronounce the word ‘perfectly’ perfectly!
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Will it change my accent
in my native language?
No. Every language has its own pattern of movement
and our faces and mouths adopt a certain comfortable position
to easily allow this pattern of movement. So, once you learn
to adopt the comfortable position for RP/Standard English,
you can still return to the comfortable position for your
own language or accent. You have simply made your face and
mouth more flexible and created another option. It is remarkably
easy to switch between the two accent positions once you have
the habit. Native speakers of English (Australians, South
Africans, Americans etc.) can make the choice whether to permanently
adopt RP as their accent, or be able to switch in and out
as feels appropriate. You may, however, find some positive
benefits to how you speak your own language. Making your speech
system more flexible can improve your vocal tone, articulation
and clarity in your own language, it just won't change the
accent in the mother tongue.
What is a Voice & Accent Coach?
Voice and Accent coaches are professionally qualified specialists in speech. They mostly work in Drama training, film and theatre to optimise the vocal projection, speech impact and accent accuracy of actors. Voice coaches are highly skilled in the anatomy and physiology of voice and speech, and in the accurate training of individuals to develop these skills. They also have the highest level of practical accent alteration knowledge to help actors adopt different accents
for theatre or film roles. This expert skill can also help people with strong foreign or regional accents to bring them closer towards Standard
English (RP).
What qualifications should
a Voice and Accent coach have?
Many of the best qualified voice and accent coaches in the UK,
including all of Speak Easily’s Trainers, are qualified specifically in voice
and accent teaching at the Central School of Speech and Drama,
London. Such trained coaches are in general highly skilled,
with an advanced knowledge of phonetics, voice and speech
production, and the teaching abilities necessary to translate
this into physical exercises for their students.
We do not advise you to work with an untrained coach; that is someone who has only taken a small amount of voice training as part of an acting course; or a TEFL teacher who has only taken a 2-week phonetics course, as they will not have the depth of specialist training knowledge to safely and effectively help you change your speech. There is a considerable amount of specialist knowledge required in order to work safely and effectively with voice and speech issues, and to know when it is necessary to refer to an alternative specialist.
Are phonetics qualifications (IPA Certificate) the same thing as a Voice Studies MA?
In a word, no. The IPA certificate is just a 2-week course in phonetics. It does not cover speech and voice pedagogy, in depth accent analysis and accent training techniques, or the wider issues of voice/speech/communication that are relevant to accent reduction/alteration training.
For a non-native speaker, there are three main stages to studying pronunciation/accent.
- STANDARD TEFL TEACHER: If you still need work on your basic language skills, grammar, vocabulary and basic pronunciation, then a TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) teacher can be perfectly adequate. They will often have a small knowledge of phonetics. These are the cheapest teachers to work with, but their understanding of phonetics and ability to guide and correct your accent will be very limited, and if they have a UK regional accent, they may not fully understand the difference between this and Standard RP English.
- TEFL TEACHER PLUS A BIT OF IPA PHONETICS TRAINING: If you are an advanced speaker of English and want to learn about the basic phonetic structures of English, but without really changing your day to day speech, then a TEFL teacher who has done the IPA certficates in phonetics (the International Phonetic Association Certificate of Proficiency) may be skilled enough to help you. This is a little more expensive than an ordinary TEFL teacher. And there are companies that offer this basic phonetics training in London. These teachers do have a deeper understanding of phonetics, but do not come from a voice and accent coaching background and therefore do not have the expertise in speech and accent training that will help you transform your speech in a natural, efficient way.
- FULLY TRAINED VOICE & ACCENT COACH: However, if you really wish to change how you speak, - to transform your accent, to sound clearer and more impactful, and to understand and use the whole phonetic system of English in a practical way to improve your communications. Then you need a fully trained, MA qualified, accent and voice coach, preferably one specialising in Accent Reduction/Softening.
MA qualified voice and accent coaches have an advanced knowledge of phonetics and how it applies to 100s of different accents, including your own. They have extraordinary 'ears' for accents, and the ability to transform what they hear you do into precise physical instructions to help you change it. They will help you move speech muscles you didn't even know that you had! Qualified voice/accent coaches are trained in accent analysis and alteration to MA level. This includes a level of phonetic training well beyond the IPA certificate, but also training in voice and speech generally, in the pedagogy of voice/speech training and a whole range of other skills including actor training and public speaking. They are highly prized and quite rare, and therefore a little more expensive. But you can be assured you are in the hands of an absolute expert. All of Speak Easily's coaches fall into this category.
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Do I get a Certificate for
completing a course?
We can give you a letter from Speak Easily with
details of the training you have undertaken. We also provide certificates for our Evening courses. These are not official
qualifications from an awarding institution, but they offer proof of the work you have done with us.
Is there a Course Book to
accompany the course?
All courses are accompanied by
materials - texts, information sheets and images - which add
up to your own personal workbook for your training. Our Vocal and Public Speaking Confidence workshops/classes both come with a coursebook to give you a practical and useful reminder of everything you have covered.
Accent Reduction courses are also accompanied
by a CD with over three hours of audio practice materials
and access to our online Flash and Video materials. Our Accent
Reduction Resource book is included free with our Evening Classes
and Private Tuition courses of 10 sessions. We also provide interactive course books/diaries for all our evening courses. The resource book and CD is available
to purchase for students taking less than 10 sessions with us. At
present it is only available to our clients.
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