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Chapter 1: What is the main topic of the episode: close to or closed to?
This is the All Ears English podcast. Close to or close to? Can you hear the difference? Welcome to the All Ears English podcast, downloaded more than 200 million times. Are you feeling stuck with your English? We'll show you how to become fearless and fluent by focusing on connection, not perfection.
With your American hosts, Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer, and Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl. Coming to you from Colorado and New York City, USA. To get real-time transcripts right on your phone and create your personalized vocabulary list, try the All Ears English app for iOS and Android. Start your seven-day free trial at allearsenglish.com forward slash app.
Can you tell the difference when a native speaker says close to versus close to? Today, let's figure out how they're different and how to make sure you never get confused again.
Many English learners focus on grammar. They want their sentences to be correct. But fluency isn't just about correctness. It's about sounding natural, choosing the right phrase, responding quickly without translating every thought in your head. That's why someone can know a lot of grammar rules and still feel uncomfortable in conversations.
Real fluency comes from understanding patterns, tone, and natural expressions. Our free two minute fluency quiz helps you discover your level and what skills will move you forward. Go to allearsenglish.com slash fluency score. That's allearsenglish.com slash F-L-U-E-N-C-Y-S-C-O-R-E.
Hey there, Michelle, how's everything today?
Everything is good.
How are you? Feeling good, Michelle. Is there a new friend that you've gotten close to recently in your life?
Yeah, actually, I've gotten close to a lot of new friends recently. You know, I've talked about how I moved to the suburbs and I was really worried that it would be really hard to make friends because it's so different than the city life. But I've actually gotten close to a lot of people and I feel really lucky. Amazing. I love that.
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Chapter 2: Can you hear the difference between close to and closed to?
But what was interesting is I didn't really hear that D, Lindsay.
Yeah. No, you didn't hear the D. Yes. Oh, my God. That makes it even more complicated. The way we pronounce this in American English, we don't necessarily say closed to the public. We say, but it's closed to the public. It blends right in with the T sound in the tube. It does. It does.
Yeah. Yeah, definitely. So we're going to focus today on the difference in pronunciation between these two words so that you can both hear and say each correctly. But guys, before we get into it, we want to remind you to hit follow wherever you're listening to the All Ears English podcast.
Yeah, guys, don't miss your opportunity to make All Ears English drop into your listening queue five days a week. So make sure you are following if you're on Apple or Spotify. If you're on YouTube, make sure you are subscribed. Yes. All right. Michelle, let's break down the pronunciation and make it super easy for our listeners. Shall we? Yes, so first we'll start with close to.
So C-L-O-S-E, to, right? So this one has a soft S sound, right? And it's short, right? So close to, close to, right? This means physically near you. So let's do a little role play. Lindsay, what do you live close to? I live close to Trader Joe's.
I'd be so jealous. I'm not a big Trader Joe's person actually I don't feel like they're in my experience in the Trader Joe's that I've gone to their produce is not like the freshest
So I have heard that about Trader Joe's and sometimes I find it. It's where it's steamed because it's a very good price. But then you get it and like two days later, my tomatoes are done. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. They have a lot of good like package stuff. But yeah, people are either Trader Joe's fans or not. It's like you fall into one of two camps, you know? Yes.
Yes.
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Chapter 3: How does fluency relate to understanding patterns in English?
Exactly. What about you, Michelle? What do you live close to?
I live close to the baseball stadium. It gets noisy during games.
Yes. All right. So this one is all about proximity, right? Close to. It's shorter. It has a soft S. C-L-O-S-E. Yes.
So let's go over closed to. So that's C-L-O-S-E-D, to. So this one has more of a Z sound, right? It's not close to, closed to. Yeah. But also, as we were touching on before, the D is very subtle and you might not even hear it. Or, Lindsay, as you said, it could blend with the T in two. Yes.
Chapter 4: What are the common mistakes English learners make with pronunciation?
And this one means shut or unavailable.
Yes. Right. If you want to know more, guys, about letters blending with each other, check out our pronunciation course over at aldersenglish.com slash pronunciation. We went into all of this, all the different things that happen when letters and sounds collapse into each other, blend into each other. We show you everything in a study plan.
But, I mean, let's do a role play today just to see the differences here with close to, right? Okay. So, Michelle, is the library open today? Okay.
No, it's under renovation, so it's closed to the public for a while. Yeah.
Okay.
And let's do another one. Okay. Why is the road blocked?
Because it's Sunday. It's closed to cars, but it's open for pedestrians. It's the city's way of getting people out and about. It's closed to cars. It's closed to cars. I cannot tell the difference between where the D ends and where the T begins in two. Right. Right.
Exactly. So after the break, I think we're going to go and do a little game and see if we can tell the difference.
Yeah. And just a note here, we're teaching you American English today on this show and every day. Occasionally, we have British people on or Australians on. British people might pronounce the S and the Z sounds a little more softly, but you will still hear a difference. But just listen to British English to see that difference. Okay? Definitely.
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Chapter 5: What role does context play in using close to versus closed to?
So closed...
yeah it's too that's a good point michelle it's really more stretched out it's stretched out it takes longer to say close to the public close to the public instead of close to my house close to my house and that has more of an s sound right so close and close yeah yeah so um okay so here's the next one my office is close to the beach Tricky, but I think it is C-L-O-S-E. Close. Yep. Got it. Yep.
The gym is closed to the... Sorry, let's start again. Start again. Here we go. The gym is closed to members this week. Yes. So that's C-L-O-S-E-D. Yeah. Now, Michelle, are there any patterns that we can, I mean, we've given our listeners a few patterns. Is there anything else we can try to look for to know which one we're using?
Yeah. I mean, so we often say close to and a place. You know, we could say I'm close to my friend. Right. But often it's about a place. But we rarely say closed to and a place. Right. So so close to could kind of be either. Right. But closed to you don't really say like closed to. to Trader Joe's, right? That's pretty rare. It doesn't really make sense.
It's usually closed to a group of people like the public, visitors, customers, or things like cars.
Right. Because we're just saying this place cannot be accessed by these people, the public, the customers, the visitors, right? It's something is access is closed. Right. Closed. There we go. Closed. So yeah, I think we covered it, but should we do a role play? I think we should, Michelle. Let's do it. So here we're meeting during our lunch break and we're deciding where to go for lunch. Okay.
Hey, Michelle, where are we meeting today? Let's go to the cafe close to my office. Oh, I love that place, but it's closed to customers today. Oh, really? Why? Well, they're renovating this week, so it's close to the public. But it should be really cool when it opens back up.
Oh, okay. Bummer. There's also a cute French restaurant close to my office.
That's right. I've been meaning to try it. Let's double check to make sure it's not closed. Okay. Again, I mean, when we're speaking fast, it is really hard to hear the difference. But we've given our listeners some clues today. So hopefully they should be starting to pick up on this in the role play. So, Michelle, the first one you said was, let's go to the cafe close to my office.
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