Our English accent and pronunciation training is focused on progress and successful performance, not just knowledge. That’s why we call it “advanced”. Your lessons are truly tailored to you (no matter your current level).
- Private, face-to-face accent reduction lessons in Melbourne’s CBD
- Analysis, guidance and feedback in every session
- Adapted to your goals and progress, every step of the way
- Printed, web and audio material to build knowledge and skill
- New materials whenever appropriate
And, uniquely, we can also guide you in English conversation skills, vocabulary development, culturally appropriate language, and more at the same time (if you want).
If you are outside Melbourne: see our online Accent Reduction at Home program.
Your accent. Your goals.
It doesn’t matter whether your accent is subtle (but annoying you) or massively difficult for others to understand. We know you have your own unique experience of learning and speaking English.
We want to help you speak clearly and confidently in the local context. (We follow your goals: you might want to learn an Australian accent or just improve clarity.)
You aren’t locked into fixed courses and preset programs, and you don’t pay for timewasting “diagnostic” tests, because we’re analysing your speech in real-time from the moment we meet and in every appointment.
We don’t waste your time. We don’t treat you like a child. We give you solutions to fix accent and pronunciation problems, and we make you practise them in real-life communication.
Are you ready to work hard so you never need to repeat yourself again?Expert analysis
We know how languages are structured, and what happens when two (or more) languages come together.
We know how language learning works, in children and adults, in classrooms and in real life.
Dr Duncan Markham wrote his PhD thesis on accent learning and has been training multilingual speakers of English in Australia for two decades.
Dr Debbie Loakes is an active researcher in current Australian English pronunciation and accent.
- We know why a speaker of English with a Vietnamese accent will sometimes pronounce B in three different ways.
- We anticipate that clients with a Malaysian Chinese accent will find the vowel in words like day and cake unusually difficult.
- We help Russian-accented speakers understand the importance of твёрдые согласные in their English accent.
- We know that Portuguese speakers will have different problems depending on origin: English R will be often be harder for cariocas than paulistanos.
- We know Hindi speakers need to be shown that थ does not have the same pronunciation as English TH (except in the Indian English accent).
Advanced guidance
Anyone can call themselves an accent coach (see our discussion of this here), but almost none have the specific expertise and training to provide accent training that actually changes your performance!
You will find that most providers are either speech therapists, former English teachers or theatre/voice coaches who just had a business idea, or linguistics undergraduates on tutoring platforms or Gumtree.
They are probably well-intentioned, but none (not even speech therapists) have detailed training in the core areas of language structure and learning that make accent training significantly better than textbook knowledge. At Ear & Speak, we’ve helped many clients who have wasted significant time and money on services like that. Thankfully they weren’t disappointed when they finally found us.
Serious training. Now.There are many causes of English pronunciation problems. We have the skill to give you solutions, and endeavour to teach you how to change your accent in whichever manner best suits your learning style and challenges.
When we tailor your accent training, we’re not copy-pasting from Wikipedia or pulling out a page called “Chinese accent problems”.
We focus on solving problems and making crucial changes. We don’t waste your time on pronunciation basics that you’re already getting right.
And unlike any other provider in Australia, our expertise means we can help you with conversation, grammar, vocabulary and cultural skills at the same time.
- We know if 拼音 will be helpful for Mandarin speakers trying to fix their English pronunciation, depending on where they grew up.
- We know tricks to help speakers with a Spanish accent better interpret English spelling.
- We can explain problems in physical, muscular, linguistic, phonetic and everyday terms.
- We’ve developed special materials to enhance sound differences that people find hard to hear or pronounce.
- We use our own linguistically up-to-date and culturally relevant materials, developed and updated based on our clients’ needs.
- Our clients have exclusive access to special online resources that we have developed.
Questions
Should I fix my foreign accent?
No-one needs training just because they have an accent. Unless you have good reason to believe your accent is affecting your career or social life, or causing you some other sort of identifiable problem, save your time and money to enjoy what life offers you!
If you often have to repeat yourself to others, then it probably means your English is not clear enough to make communication work smoothly, so in that case it is worth learning to speak more clearly.
If you aren’t getting jobs when you have equivalent skills to other more successful candidates, then perhaps your English language skills need to be stronger, clearer, or more local in style.
If you’re tired of being asked where you’re from or how long you’ve been here, then you would certainly benefit from accent modification.
Is my problem pronunciation or accent?
Probably both. Most people don’t actually make a reliable difference between the two terms, so it’s best to regard “pronunciation” and “accent” as referring to similar things, although there is a technical difference which we discuss in more detail on this page.
Putting it simply, if you pronounce a word wrongly in English, it could be because you don’t know how to interpret the spelling, or because you have transferred pronunciation patterns from your first language or dialect into your English.
People with moderate to strong accents will definitely have both types of issue.
People with very mild accents are still likely to have some pronunciation errors, even after many years, but the accent is probably what they need to address if the concern is about “fitting in”, etc.