Russian and its role in the world

• Russian is the language spoken in Russia and all the other countries that were once constituent republics of the USSR.
• Russian belongs to the family of Indo-European languages and is one of the three members of the East Slavic languages.
• Russian is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia and the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages.
• It is also the largest native language in Europe, with 155 million native speakers.
• Russian is the eighth  most spoken language in the world by number of native speakers and the fourth by total number of speakers.
• It is also one of the six official languages of the United Nations.

Lesson 1: Let's begin to learn how to read in Russian

The Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters. Among them there are 6 Russian letters that match their English counterparts by pronunciation and form.

Aa - sounds like "a" in after. In pronouncing this sound, the mouth is open a bit wider as compared to English.

Ее - sounds either like "ye" in yes or like "e" as in ebony. It is pronounced with preceding y in the beginning of a word or after a vowel.

Кк - sounds like "k" in kite. Try to avoid the puff of air after the sound typical for English.

Мм - sounds like "m" in mobile.

Оо - sounds like "o" in more (without the 'r' sound). Try protruding and rounding your lips a bit more than you do in English. In unstressed positions, this letter sounds like "u" in under, but more lax.

Тт - sounds like "t" in task. The tip of the tongue touches the lower teeth, as opposed the upper gum ridge in English.

Try to read:  

та, мак, там, мат, так, Кама, от, мот, ком, том, кот, Тома, ем, моет

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