Clear communication skills are essential
Your career success depends greatly on your skill as a communicator. Every day, you have to understand and express yourself with others who have a variety of language backgrounds. You must speak clearly, without sound distortions, to exchange information efficiently and accurately. Even if English is your second language, you can master the art of clear communication. In fact, if your English is clear, your accent will be an advantage for you by making you more memorable to clients, customers, patients, supervisors and potential employers.
Communication breakdowns caused by accents
Foreign Accents spoken by individuals for whom English is a second language
If you learned English as a teenager or an adult, you probably have an accent. That is, you may be using the sounds and intonation patterns of your native language when you speak English. Differences in grammatic systems may also be interfering with your understanding and use of English grammar. If you have an accent, your speech may be unclear and difficult to understand. Thus, your accent can interfere with your communicative effectiveness - and your professional effectiveness -- in the work place.
Regional Accents
If you are a native English speaker who was raised in the South, Midwest, or on the East Coast, you may have regional pronunciation variations that affect your vowels and occasional consonants. These variations may call attention to your speech or interfere with listener understanding.
Communication repair following treatment
Accents can be modified through increased awareness, tongue exercises, word and sentence drills and practical speaking assignments.
Our professional speech trainers will identify the sounds and intonation patterns that reduce the clarity or call attention to your speech. You will then modify these patterns through practical speaking experiences like improving voice mail messages and giving presentations. Students who attend class regularly and practice at work and home can expect 50-60% fewer pronunciation errors and significant improvement in the clarity of their speech.
Listen to our clients:
"I would recommend this course to my friends, because I have learned pronunciation skills I had never learned before. The individual attention was very helpful in improving my pronunciation skills."
-Xiao-Ning Wang, Ph.D., Research Scientist
"This program has helped me enhance my communication skills; particularly in the area of grammar and pronunciation. I wish I had known about this speech improvement course long ago before taking many other English classes."
-Yukiko Girton, Bank Employee
"Before I took this class, I really thought I had a good command of spoken English, but I found I had to repeat myself frequently. After taking this class, I understand how I mispronounced many simple words."
-Navareto Alfaro, Electrician
"I would encourage my friends and coworkers to take this course because it promotes self-confidence."
-Vita Candela, Realtor
Our staff
The instructors at JKS & Associates are professional speech and language trainers, many with 20 years of experience in teaching English. Licensed by the state of California as speech-language pathologists, these instructors have also completed advanced training in accent reduction, voice improvement, the Wilson Reading System (based on Orton Gillingham) and the Lindamood-Bell Learning Processes including Visualizing and Verbalizing, the Phoneme Sequencing Program and Seeing Stars: Symbol Imagery, and On Cloud Nine Math. The instructors' backgrounds and experiences include teaching school, acting, singing professionally, as well as producing speech training videos and writing textbooks.