A key question for you is: What do you want for your English speech communication skills?

Probably first on your wish list is for people to understand your words. The professional term for that is “intelligibility.”

Wikipedia states that intelligibility is a measure of the degree to which speech can be understood. Most important is that you need clear English speech sounds or accurate English pronunciation. Intelligibility is usually measured as a whole word intelligibility or understandability score.

Native born speakers get an average of 90 to 95% on whole word pronunciation accuracy or intelligibility. In comparison, average intelligibility for new students tested before they start our program has been 38% in quiet surroundings and 30% with background noise. (The range over 314 recent students has been 2% to 85%). For more information on intelligibility, see this: http://www.cleartalkmastery.com/what-we-do/intelligibility/

Above is an accent reduction video tip of one of the most frequent error sounds or mispronounced sounds in English, the short vowel “i.” Also, you can hear the word “intelligibility” in this speech tip video.