When first speaking a new foreign language, your accent will naturally be very different from those of native speakers. As an English speaker, your speech will naturally reflect the many learned aspects of English you’ve been using all your life.
There’s stress, intonation, rhythm and a host of other elements of English speaking that end up playing into how the newly-acquired words roll off your tongue, many of which will go against those used in your target language. However, there’s a way to immediately see a massive improvement using very simple tweaks and it has to do with your pronunciations.
Two things you should watch out for, in particular, are:
1. Pronouncing the letter “r”; and
2. Rolling off on your vowels
The first one is important because “r” is pronounced very differently in English as it is in many languages. If you’re trying to sound like a capable speaker early on, try finding how the “r” sound is used in speech (check your foreign speaking software) and integrate it.
For the second one, it’s almost habitual for many Americans to skip vowels in their pronunciations, something that is rarely done in other languages. Note how you pronounce words like “comfortable” (most likely, you say it as “cumft’ble”) and “generally” (“gen’relly”), for example. You skip some vowels and rush through others. In many languages, vowels are clearly enunciated the same way you do with consonants. Be very mindful of those.