Teacher Discussion Forums

Hi all.

I'm wondering if anyone could recommend a software program that will allow me to play the individual phonetic sounds on my computer (rather than playing them from a web-page).

I'm about to start teaching the phonetic sounds and would ideally like a 'model' sound to compliment my own pronunciation.

I downloaded what I thought was a good one from the Macmillan website, but the BIG problem with that is that it plays a sample word a couple of seconds after the 'phonetic sound' - which is a bit annoying (and possible confusing for the students) when I'm trying to teach the sound in isolation.

Ps - I'm also looking for software that can translate words to the phonetics. So for example I type the word dead and it displays the phonetics /ded/ etc. Kind of like an on-line dictionary does, but I need it to be on my computer as I don't always have internet access when I teach.

Thanks.

Why not just turn the sound down or mute it before the sample word kicks in? And provided that you explain that the word is providing extra context (/^/ > /k^p/), I 'm not sure why the sample word being played should be such a big problem. Anyway, you might like to consider getting the paper dictionary + CD-ROM pack of the learner dictionary that offers the largest number of pronunciation-related features (there are usually guided tours available, e.g. Googling 'ldoce cd-rom guided tour' produced http://www.pearsonlongman.com/ldoce/ as the first search result, which leads on to a 'Take a guided tour of the CD-ROM' sublink/Flash pop-up).