TRANSCRIPT OF THE ABOVE VIDEO: 'How To Pronounce The S and Z Sounds In English - Improve Your Pronunciation and Speak More Clearly'

Hi everyone, its Nicole here and I'm answering another pronunciation question This time we’re looking at the S sound and the Z sound - the ssss and the zzzz.

Again, this is quite a tricky one, especially because almost every word ends in an S. You know, all nouns can be plural. So we have to add an s on the end, and just because it's written as an s doesn’t means it’s pronounced as a ssss because it can also be pronounced as a zzzz, so I thought I'd look at the difference and answer that question for you, and make life a little bit easier.

So, just like the previous pronunciation explanations I've given you, these are a pair of sounds, the S and the Z belong together because you're doing exactly the same thing with your mouth to form the sound - the only difference between these two sounds is that with one of them you use your voice, and with the other you don't, so one is voiced, and one is unvoiced.

So, we've got the ssss and the zzzz - so how do we form that sound? Well, basically you smile, and you push the air out between the gaps in your teeth, basically, you’re putting your tongue here, resting it, and letting that air push out, ssss, here, ssss, ssss.

You know that every language has an S. I think you all know how to make an S. The difference is the z sound.

So you're doing exactly the same thing, ssss, but this time you're adding your voice. That's all. So, ssss, zzzz, ssss, zzzz, if you put your hand here, you can feel the vibration. ssss, zzzz, ssss, zzzz, perfect.

There you go, that's all you need to know. So, you've got your s sound and your z sound, they are voiced and unvoiced, ok, so we've got Sue, sound, century, search, or zoo, zigzag, zipper, zebra, so, what I'm doing there is I'm holding that z sound, that vibration, for about a second, just so that you can hear it, ok.

At the end of a word we might have genius, talks, aerobics, cats, cooks, or with the z ending, are you ready? Just because the spelling is an s doesn't mean we pronounce it an s, we've got eyes, runs, cars, arrives and years. Well done. There you go.

So, the s and the z belong together, make the same sound, the only difference is with the z you add your voice, you add that vibration.

Well done, go and practise and listen out for all the s and the z when you're listening to people talk.

Have a great day. I really hope that helped. Bye.