Learn how to pronounce the words REST, RUST, RENT, RUNT, RANT with this American English Pronunciation Lesson.
Definitions:
REST to relax
RUST a reddish flaking coating on iron or steel
RENT a regular payment for property
RUNT the smallest animal in a litter
RANT to speak loudly in an impassioned way
Pronunciation:
REST: R-short e-S-T or /rɛst/
RUST: R-short u-S-T or /rʌst/
RENT: R-short e-N-T or /rɛnt/
RUNT: R-short u-N-T or /rʌnt/
RANT: R-short a-N-T or /rænt/
Sentence:
He needed to rest after working to remove to remove the rust from the iron fence.
Don’t rant about the high rent.
The runt of the litter is the cutest pup.
Transcript:
Hi everyone it is Jennifer from Tarle speech with your question of the week. Our question today is how do I say the word
rest to relax
rust a reddish flaking coating on iron and steel
rent a regular payment for property
runt the smallest animal in a litter and
rant to speak loudly in an impassioned way
All right so let’s give these words a look and jump right in. Let’s start with this r sound. Okay! Most of my students have to work on this sound and that’s okay. Let’s do a little bit of a deeper dive here today. To say the r sound in english the tongue never touches the teeth. You are not going to tap the teeth with your tongue. You’re not going to touch the teeth with your tongue. It is just going to be hanging out in your mouth. Your tongue tip is either pointed down or you can flip it back. The key is again, do not touch your teeth with the tip of your tongue. Do not touch it. The back of your tongue will be pulled up very high towards the roof of your mouth.
If you tend to say a w try pulling your lips back and smiling a little bit more. So instead of saying pull your lips back,
I always say try to think of making your lips square and tense and that helps a lot of people. All right! So we have that r out of the way.
Now let’s look at these endings we have the ST and the NT.
What’s the difference here? Let’s start with that s t to say an s most of my students can do this. You are going to have the tip of your tongue pointed down or just going to be behind your top teeth and the air is going to move out of your mouth. What you’re going to do next is quickly touch the tip of your tongue to the back of your top front teeth for that t.
And after you touch again, you’re going to pull it down rather quickly. So tongue is back for the s or pointed down.
All right and then for that nt
The difference here is your tongue starts by touching the back of your top front teeth for that n – air is moving out of your nose. Then as you pull your tongue down and away to make that t sound, air must puff out of your mouth.
All right, what about these vowels. Let’s take a look at those. For the short EH sound in rest and rent, your mouth is going to be relaxed and slightly open. The tip of your tongue will just be peeking out between your top and your bottom teeth.
My tongue is relatively flat and it’s in the middle of my mouth. For uh the short uh sound just going to have a super relaxed mouth, uh, and my tongue pops down a little bit from that eh.
So again for that eh sound I am holding my mouth just slightly open and then for the uh it’s completely relaxed and my mouth is just relaxed and open.
Now for the ah in rant you’re going to open your mouth very wide. Tip of the tongue is going to be very low, back of the tongue is going to be pulled up, mouth, think of being in an open wide circle shape. AH AH
So again, we have EH UH AH EH UH AH
Let’s put these all together. We have:
rest rest rest rest
rent rent
runt runt and
rant rant
Let’s try them a little faster.
rest rust
rent runt rant
rest rest
rent runt rant
And now for a few sentences:
He needed to rest after working to remove the rust from the iron fence.
Don’t rant about the high rent.
The runt of the litter is the cutest pup.
So give it a try I know people are going to notice the difference. If you found this helpful, we would love it if you shared us with your friends. If you need help you can check out our products and our classes at Tarle Speech.
Thanks so much everyone have an amazing weekend!