IPA 

Our aim is to promote the teaching and learning of English phonetics in Hongkong. We provide high quality English phonetics (IPA) and pronunciation courses for people at all levels of spoken English.

The course "Practical English Phonetics and Phonology" is one of our most popular choices. We are very proud to say that the quality and popularity of this course has been key to establishing the good reputation of IPA (HK). Mr Derek Kwok, the Course Lecturer, is an experienced phonetics educator with over 10 years teaching experience in English phonetics. His innovative teaching techniques and moderate sense of humour make the complex phonetics principles all the easier to understand.

The courses "English Phonetics Classes for Students" and "Practical English Phonetics and Phonology for Teachers" have provided students and teachers of English in HK with a better channel through which to understand the most important theories and key skills in pronunciation and many other features of spoken English.

As this Web Site comes into existence, we can now offer our students of phonetics with continuous learning and practice support. The pages under our "Club News" section are especially dedicated towards this goal. We believe that through this Web Site, the students of IPA (HK) will be able to further enrich their knowledge of English phonetics and pronunciation even after they have completed our courses.

 

Today's selected word:

propose, purpose
讀音注意:
1. 留意以上二字最後兩個字母同樣是se, 讀音卻不同: /s/ /z/ (我們要非常仔細聆聽才能察覺)
2. propose及purpose第二音節同樣由字母o組成, 但讀音不同, 分別為 /əʊ/ 及 /ə/ , 主要原因是重音位置不同. propose重音在第二音第, purpose重音在第一音節. 而重音音節外, 使用弱化元音schwa( IPA為 /ə/ ) 是很正常的. 但是我們除了參考生字的音標(IPA), 無法單靠生字的串法而得知重音位置. 所以學習字母拼音(Phonics)的香港學生"拼讀"生字, 當遇到schwa音的音節時, 往往十分誇張, 這亦是普遍香港人發音的最大問題. 香港有部份學校教授學生phonics以望改善學生串字, 但我看不到它對串字有多大幫助, 學生的發音及聆聽水平卻被犧牲了.


-Derek Kwok
E.D.530468