Linking Consonant Sounds in English - When I Mould

Learn British English idioms, phrases, expressions and vocabulary, and improve your British English pronunciation and English accent.
I was speaking to a student today about pensions.
We were discussing the problems faced when you get old and grey and are forced to live on a pension.
Now, English teachers are not known for their wealth, that’s for sure.
Nevertheless, I said that I would hopefully be okay financially when I’m old.
Hearing my student mirror back to me “mould?”, I realised that we had a good example of consonant linking which I could share with you in this video English lesson.
Consonant linking happens when a consonant sound at the end of a word is followed by a vowel sound.
When pronounced, the consonant links to the vowel and we hear something unexpected.
In this case the student heard “mould”.
The consonant /m/ at the end of I’m was linking to the vowel sound /əʊ/ at the start of old.
When I’m old. / wenaɪməʊld /
Because the sentence “When I’m old” is a speech unit with no natural breaks, we don’t pause between any of the words.
Were we to pause, you would hear “when I’m old”, which is how many students would tend to pronounce it.
You see, students tend to give each word its own space.
They pronounce each word as if it were isolated from the rest.
Native English speakers, however, join all the words together as one long sound.
“When I’m old.” / wenaɪməʊld /
Because the stress is on the main content word, and the main content word is “old”, we have the stress pattern, weak, weak, strong. ooO
“When I’m old.” / wenaɪməʊld /
This makes it seem as if the word “mould” is being spoken, rather than the word “old”.
This is one of the speech features of English that can make fast spoken English difficult to understand.
Often, the context helps us understand the words we ought to be hearing.
Funnily enough, though, from the context of our discussion, the sentence could well have been “When I mould”, as things that grow old often mould.
I hope when I’m old I don’t mould like a mouldy old cheese.
When I’m old,
I hope to be told,
My lessons are gold
And fine to behold.
For reassurance, after I finished the class, I asked my wife:
“Will you still love me when I’m old and grey?”
She said, “Of course I do!”
So, maybe it’s too late anyway.
I hope before I’m old and before I mould, I can get a million subscribers to my YouTube channel.
If you’re not already one in a million, please subscribe now.
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