How to Say the Days in English

How to Say the Days in English
The Days of the Week

My name's Joe and right now we are going to learn how to say the days of the week correctly. I'm British so will start with the British way to say the days, and then the American way. They are very similar.

English is a difficult language to speak, to pronounce, as it has a long history of using words from different languages. The days of the week come from Latin and Anglo Saxon.

In English we have stressed syllables and unstressed syllables, sounds. Day is an unstressed syllable. Day. Listen carefully and you will hear D plus the /ei/ diphthong, as in pay or stay. Listen for the E sound at the end. Day.

So let's start with everyone's favourite day, Monday. It's spelt with an O but we use the /uh/ sound as in money. M - un - day.

Next we have Tuesday, which is more difficult to say. In British English we say Tue as in tune, then the voiced Z. Tuesday. The American version sounds more like the number two. Twozday.

Wednesday has a silent D, and the S is a voiced Z. Wenzday.
So next to Thursday. This word starts with an unvoiced TH sound. We place the tongue just behind the front teeth and let air vibrate between the tongue and the teeth. After the TH we use the schwa. If you are not familiar with the schwa, and you should be as it's the most common sound in English, click here for a video about the schwa. So, TH plus schwa then the voiced Z. Thursday.

Now, my favourite day of the week, Friday. Fri as in to fry an egg. The same I you find in fine. Friday.

Next up we have Saturday. First the British way. Sa then T plus schwa. Saturday. Americans use the Flapped T which sounds more like a D. Sadaday. Now for a bonus. Londoners, people from London like me, use the Glottal T. A sound that comes from the throat and sounds like this. Saturday.

Finally, we have Sunday. It's similar to Monday, but starts with S not M. Sunday. Sun as in that big light in the sky.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.