Did you know that English has sounds that simply don't exist in Spanish? Likewise, Spanish has some sounds that don't exists in English. Often, these unique sounds are the reason non-native speakers have an accent. You might not even hear certain differences until you know they exist and know what to listen for!

This website, based on a Speech Pathology and Audiology project from the University of Iowa, has Flash animations of the way each of the sounds are made in English and Spanish (and German, which we won't be studying much in Spanish class, but there it is). Try playing with the different sounds, and see if you can imitate the shapes of mouth, tongue, throat, lips, teeth, etc. along with the animated models. It's kinda fun! Can you find any sounds you didn't know about before? Try to master them!

Need to type accent marks on the computer?
Here's how:
Instructions depend on what kind of computer you are using (Mac vs. PC, etc.), but this page has most operating systems:
http://www.studyspanish.com/accents/typing.htm