How to Roll Your R’s In Spanish
The best way to learn how to learn how to roll your R’s in Spanish is to practice with tongue twisters. Before we get into the tongue twisters I have a very important tip about the placement of your tongue.
Where do you Place your Tongue for Spanish R’s?
When saying “erre” (air-ray), which is how you pronounce R in Spanish, your tongue lifts up in the front of your mouth, right behind your two front teeth. It hits the roof of your mouth. Air flows between the roof of your mouth and the top of your tongue.
Where do you place your tongue for English R’s?
In English, your tongue lifts up towards the back of the mouth. Just say the word, run. Notice where your tongue lifts up when you say, run? It’s exactly like the photo above.
Tongue twisters for rolling your r’s in Spanish
- The first tongue twister is saying the word “butter” over and over again as fast as you can for several minutes straight.
- You could also say, butter, butter, butter, butter, erre
- Another option is, Betty, butter, burro. Burro means donkey in English. Say the three words over and over as fast as you can.
- Pot of tea, over and over as fast as you can. The “T” has the same placement of the tongue as the R in Spanish.
- Finally, you could do the tongue twister my high school Spanish teacher taught me: erre, con erre cigarro, erre con erre barril, qué rápido corren las ruedas de Ferrocarril.
Listen to some Spanish tongue twisters
In the videos below I share how to practice some of these tongue twisters.