erinja:Anyone who can say "tests" without making it "tesits" can say "scii" correctly, it's just a matter of practice.

The difference is that in English there are no words (that I'm aware) that can begin with the STS sound. Much for the same reason, the common Asian surname Nguyen is frequently mispronounced, because the Ng sound never appears at the head of a word in English. Hence the confusion ...

Tempodivalse:

erinja:Anyone who can say "tests" without making it "tesits" can say "scii" correctly, it's just a matter of practice.

The difference is that in English there are no words (that I'm aware) that can begin with the STS sound.

Is this ever a problem? In so many cases the word is either preceded by a vowel (mi, ŝi, li, ni..etc) or another verb ending in 's', In the first case the vowel helps and in the second case the final 's' of the first verb and the beginning of scii more-or-less run together.

Vestitor:Is this ever a problem?

Back when I was in high school - decades ago - I took German as one of my foreign languages. There were other students in the class who absolutely could not correctly pronounce any German word starting with a "z". Try as they might, they simply could not do it. There are at least several German words that start with a "z", so this actually was kind of a problem for them. Luckily, semi-rural Oregon high school teachers don't tend to sweat it much if you don't pronounce German* words precisely right, so "problem" might be a bit of an overstatement.

Even after three years of class, some of them still couldn't do it.

I have no problem whatsoever with the initial TS sound. On the other hand, I can't roll my r's to save my life. Sounds that are easy for me are surprisingly difficult for others, but there are other sounds that are easy for others that my mouth just will not make.

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* The German language just wasn't part of our local economy. Spanish, however, was, and the students of Spanish were drilled in proper pronunciation to a far greater extent than were either the French or German language students (of which I was both). Which, looking back on, I think is kind of a shame.

My problem is I can't hear or say the different between s and z

Therefor I always spell the word konfuzi incorrect

To those who has problems with 'sc-': is pronouncing 'esc-' easier for you?

jagr2808:My problem is I can't hear or say the different between s and z

Therefor I always spell the word konfuzi incorrect

Yes, that is the point. Every language has some differences from Esperanto and something you will have to learn which might come easy to other speakers of other languages.

English speakers must learn to pronounce clean vowels and if not roll then at least tap their R.

Spanish speakers must learn to pronounce words starting with S without adding a vowel infront of it.

And in our native language we don't differ between S and Z and thus this is something we need to learn.

Armand6:To those who has problems with 'sc-': is pronouncing 'esc-' easier for you?

This is how I got my tongue around it, actually! Worked on saying escii, and then dropped the e when I was more comfortable.