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  • Hello and welcome back to Easy English with James! Today we're going to have a

  • look at the letter 'e'. This is a special letter because it's the most common

  • letter in all of English and there are more ways to pronounce the letter e than

  • there are ways to pronounce any other letter in English, so if you want to know

  • exactly how to pronounce this letter and you want to master your pronunciation

  • stick with me as we learn all about the letter E!

  • [Music]

  • okay so the letter e it's a vowel letter the vowels in english are a e i o and u

  • the letter e is the second vowel letter in english after the letter a if you

  • want to learn more about the letter a check out my video up here okay the

  • letter e is a vowel letter that is actually the most common letter in all

  • of english so it's super important maybe the most important letter for you to

  • learn actually in english 13 or 14 percent

  • between 13 and 14 of all english writing

  • is just the letter e that means if you read a book or a newspaper

  • 13 of the letters is just the letter e okay it's the

  • letter e is everywhere nearly every word in english contains a letter e okay it's

  • really really important so how many ways do you think there are to

  • pronounce this letter have a think and today we're going to go

  • through all of those different ways and i'll give you advice on your

  • pronunciation we'll talk about some vocabulary that you can use some really

  • long words some crazy words and hopefully by the end of this lesson

  • you'll know all of the different ways to pronounce this and we'll have a little

  • test at the end okay so let's start with number one

  • okay so number one nice and easy to start with

  • the letter e obviously can be pronounced

  • e this is how it is pronounced in the

  • alphabet a b c d e e

  • we make this sound watch closely e

  • e your lips widen a little bit and your tongue sort of hovers

  • e e

  • e sometimes people call this the long e but don't always use that because it

  • doesn't have to be very very long it can be e e e okay but the important thing is

  • that your mouth gets wide e e

  • e we find this in really common words it's

  • very important because it's found in super common words like he

  • or she or we

  • or me

  • and also the verb to be

  • okay practice with me he she

  • we me

  • and to be

  • to be okay if you want to practice that better

  • or faster try going through all of them he she we me

  • he she we me he she we me okay and you'll get that

  • sound really really natural really really natural okay we can also

  • pronounce the letter e as e in words where it is a stressed syllable

  • so take a look at the word female

  • female okay female the stressed syllable is the first part

  • of that word fee and you can see the letter e there

  • that's the stressed part e so often in many words in english when

  • the e is the stressed part we pronounce it e

  • take a look at evening

  • evening evening

  • okay and female and even secret

  • secret okay female

  • secret evening

  • in those words one syllable is stressed the syllable with the letter e at the

  • beginning is stressed so we pronounce it e be careful because there are many

  • exceptions to this rule but in many words when the e is stressed we

  • pronounce it e okay you'll also find this

  • pronunciation of the letter e in words like chinese or vietnamese or japanese

  • okay e-s-e any word with e-s-e that e-s-e is

  • pronounced ease ease okay this is because of something

  • called magic e

  • don't worry magic e we're going to look at at the end of today's lesson but for

  • now look at words like theme and you can also see they have e then a

  • consonant and then another e that final e is called magic e okay and that's one

  • of the reasons why we pronounce these e japanese

  • chinese okay vietnamese

  • and theme and scene

  • okay practice those words we also pronounce the letter e as e in

  • greek words that means words in english that come from the ancient greek

  • language okay words like hercules you know the really famous

  • strong man hercules hercules okay but also plurals of greek words so the

  • single word oasis if you change that to the plural which

  • means many of you just add es oases same with crisis becomes crises and

  • thesis becomes theses okay that es on the end of words here is always

  • pronounced ease ease because they're taken from greek

  • okay so practice hercules

  • hercules and

  • feces and

  • crises and oases also we often pronounce the letter e as

  • e in words where it appears next to an a so the letters e a together if you look

  • at words like jeans

  • genes or meat meet

  • meet or even teacher

  • teacher teacher teach okay and

  • reach that ea here together is pronounced as

  • the e e okay so practice with me

  • teacher teach

  • jeans a nice pair of jeans and

  • meat meat

  • okay this is the same when we have two letter

  • e's together e e in words like free everybody loves free stuff right free

  • and agree agree

  • and the animal b okay the buzzing b

  • b agree and

  • free so when you see words with two e's together it's normally pronounced long e

  • sound e agree

  • be and free sometimes when you see the letters e and

  • i together e and then i in words like protein protein

  • sealing sealing and

  • receipt receipt okay when you go to buy

  • something you will get a receipt the e before the i is sometimes not always be

  • careful because there are many exceptions sometimes e before i is also

  • pronounced e in english e the best way to learn this is to listen to each new

  • word okay ask a native speaker or look up on an online dictionary for the sound

  • of each word when you learn it so you know is this e i pronounced e or not

  • okay so protein ceiling

  • and receipt

  • receipt okay also we can turn it around instead

  • of the e before the i we can put the i before the e

  • and that combination of letters is also pronounced

  • e in words like peace

  • peace and

  • briefcase briefcase when you go to work you carry

  • a briefcase also in the word believe believe you'll see the final syllable

  • there leave is iev so ieve believe believe okay so

  • e before i can be pronounced sometimes e and also i before e can sometimes be

  • pronounced e2 okay believe peace and briefcase

  • finally there are some special words in english where e is at the end of the

  • word and it's pronounced e usually they're words that are borrowed from

  • other languages especially japanese so words like karate

  • karate or karaoke karaoke both of those end in e

  • but they're borrowed from another language so we put the e at the end as a

  • e e sound okay practice again karaoke

  • karaoke and karate karate

  • okay so let's try some practice sentences with this

  • pronunciation of the letter e she is free to believe there is a bee

  • on the ceiling she is free to believe there is a bee on

  • the ceiling practice with me she is free to believe there is a bee on

  • the ceiling your turn

  • okay she is free to believe there is a bee on the ceiling you'll see all of the

  • different spellings in that sentence and hopefully the more you practice that

  • sentence you'll be able to get a good feel for when we pronounce the letter e

  • as e okay you can also try this sentence we see chinese genes on the beach

  • we see chinese jeans on the beach okay practice with me we see chinese jeans on

  • the beach your turn

  • okay well done let's have a look at the next way that we can pronounce this

  • letter okay the next way that we can pronounce

  • the letter e in english is as an e e

  • watch closely my jaw goes down e e

  • you'll know this from words like egg okay

  • this one is really simple to remember the letter e is pronounced er very often

  • in words that end in the letter e and then a consonant so look at the word get

  • you've got the letter e and then a consonant

  • the word met or bet or set or even longer words like hotel

  • hotel they all have the letter e followed by a consonant at the end of a

  • word okay there are exceptions to this rule too of course in english but

  • a good rule to remember is that if you see the letter e followed by a consonant

  • and it's at the end of a word especially short words like bet met set and let

  • it's usually pronounced

  • practice with me hotel hotel

  • get get

  • set set

  • and met

  • met okay well done

  • you'll also see the letter e pronounced air in words where you see the letter e

  • followed by a consonant and then another vowel so look at the word exit

  • exit you've got the letter e then you've got a consonant x and then you've got

  • another vowel i okay exit look at the word never

  • or ever

  • or level okay all of these words have the

  • letter e followed by a consonant followed by another vowel sometimes it's

  • another e like in never or ever or level okay

  • when you see that often in english it's pronounced e e

  • never level okay ever well done

  • also you'll find this in words where the letter e is followed by th okay things

  • like weather as in whether it rains