See the difference
This drawing shows one common way of making r, with the tip curled back. Many English speakers bunch the tongue instead and it sounds the same. What both ways share is that the tip doesn't touch anything and the lips round a little.
Try it
- Say "lll" and notice your tongue tip pressing on the ridge behind your top teeth.
- Keep the sound going and slowly pull your tongue back until it comes off the ridge. Don't let it touch again. Round your lips slightly.
- You should hear the sound change from l to r. Hold the r for two seconds.
- Now say "rrr-ight", then "light", then go back and forth.
R in the middle of a cluster is harder, as in "grass" or "fry". Start with words where r comes first, then move on to those.
Pairs to practice
- ricelice
- roadload
- fryfly
- grassglass
- correctcollect
Does practice work?
Most of the research on this pair comes from Japanese and Korean speakers, so it may not carry over exactly. In a study of 65 Japanese learners, teaching the English r along with being corrected in conversation moved it in controlled and free speech, while teaching alone did not. Seeing the speaker's face also helped with r and l. And mixing these two up does hurt how well you're understood, so the work is worth doing.
What to do next
Reading how a sound is made helps, but a page can't tell you whether your own tongue got there. In Language Boss, every sound you say in a scene is scored after the call, and you're told what it came out as. X-ray Mouth draws the tongue and lips over your own cheek while you say a phrase to the camera, so you can see what to change. X-ray Mouth is free.
Questions
Do Chinese speakers really mix up r and l?
Less than Japanese or Korean speakers do at the start of a word, because Mandarin has both an l and an r-like sound. The trouble is usually that the Mandarin r isn't the English one, and that r and l are hard inside clusters and at the end of a word. Speakers of some southern varieties have more trouble, so it varies by person.
Should my tongue curl back for r?
It can, but it doesn't have to. Curling it and bunching it both produce an English r. Use whichever gets you there, as long as the tip doesn't touch the roof of your mouth.
