How to Pronounce r as in ‘red’, /ɹ/ – Part 1 – American Accent English



Learn how to pronounce the letter r as in ‘red’ and ‘rain’ in English, /ɹ/. Learn important tips and correct tongue and mouth position. Practice saying words and sentences with r, /ɹ/. Explore my playlists for more great videos.

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Starting times for sections of this Part 1 video:
2:07 R Confusion
10:46 How to make r
17:32 Practice words – beginning, middle, end

In Part 2 video:
0:01 Minimal pairs – r vs. l
6:01 r and l in same word
9:16 Minimal pairs – r vs. w
13:43 Quiz
17:10 Sentences

Confusing English Words

Word Practice

English Vowels

English Consonants

Recommended Dictionaries are below

Online Dictionaries

The Free Dictionary

Cambridge Dictionary

Collins Dictionary

Merriam-Webster Learner’s Dictionary

Paper Dictionaries – Beginning to High-Intermediate

Merriam-Webster’s Essential Learner’s English Dictionary
USA

Longman Dictionary of American English
USA

Paper Dictionaries – High-Intermediate to Advanced

Merriam-Webster’s Advanced Learner’s English Dictionary
USA

Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
USA

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20 Comments

  1. Your teaching way is so organized and so is the explanation of the whole mouth positions, hey your drawing smile too, woke me up from half still sleeping without strong coffee yet! don't laugh out, just barely smile it at, man! it's tough task teaching to a young teen whose mother tongue is noi English, eap. When they're getting bored or sleepy, then, a good smile or scary voice eyes or some little dancing, to me I am a singer so I sing them from Elvis to Eminen.

  2. Hi Teacher, would you please have a class for the sound Tr? I have a trouble pronouncing Troy, truce, trap, Train, trouble, trembling and ect. Thank you I really appreciate it.

  3. hi, what's the difference between retroflex r and bunched r.

    is the (retroflex r ) the front R, the first sound of a word, as in (red) and the R sound comes before a vowel sound, as in great.

    for the (bunched r ) the back R sound will appear towards the back of the word or the end of the word as in (car) or, before a consonant sound as in ( park )

    Combination R sound of the front R sound and the back R sound. When R between two vowels sounds… as in sorry or Erin. Use the back r (bunched r) for the first R, for the second part use the front R sound (retroflex r) .

    is that right?

  4. Hi..my name is Mohammed Shanu. How r u ? Hope doing great .I had been trying to improve my pronunciation and over all English for a very long time .. Finally I by the grace of God(Allah) I found ur videos and it helped me a lot .I don't have words to thank u though I wanna thank u from the depth of my heart .I will never ever forget ur way of teaching, u made things easy for me

    I wanna request u something ie. to make a complete set of videos on syllable stress in words nd word stress in sentence nd rhythm in sentence.

    Thank u so very much.May God(Allah) bless u!!

  5. Hi Denise ! You're helping me so much, Thanks a lot. I've been watching all your videos, they're very useful. I wrote to you two weeks ago, I talked to you about possibility some videos on the words The Americans eat, would be wonderful. I would be happy to watch them soon. Your lessons are best. I hope I explained myself, sorry for mistakes I'm Italian😂

  6. So glad to have you back Prof Denise, we really appreciate for what you’ve been doing , it’s a great help for all the people whose english is not a first language. God bless you :)🙏

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