Speaking Accurately PT1

• Word Stress

  -it is the emphasis we place in a specific syllable of a word when pronouncing it.
• Word Stress

  -in English, we usually don’t pronounce every syllable with the same weight, so each syllable in a word can be stressed or unstressed.
• General Patterns in Word Stress

  1. Stress frequently falls on the first syllable in two-syllable words.

  Ex. WONder HOUses REAdy
• General Patterns in Word Stress

  2. Two-syllable noun: the stress is on the first syllable.

  Ex. The class REcord was not accurate. That is an interesting PROject.
• General Patterns in Word Stress

  2. Two-syllable verb: the stress is on the second syllable.

  Ex. I reCORD everything students say. She proJECTS an image of success.
• General Patterns in Word Stress

  3. Main stress is frequently placed on the first word in hyphenated or joined compound nouns.

  Ex. PLAYground GREENhouse
• Vowel Glide

  • Also known as a semi-vowel or a glide vowel.
• • It is a sound in which the vocal cords move from a vowel sound to a consonant sound or vice versa.
• The vowels /i/ (as in “bit”), /e/ (“bet”) and /æ/ (“bat”) are pronounced differently when they appear at the end of a word than when they occur elsewhere.
• • These sound are produced by transitioning smoothly from a vowel sound to a consonant sound, creating a glide-like sound.
• • They can also be heard in diphthongs.
• • Vowel glides are important in speech because they help to create smooth transitions between sounds and can affect the overall sound and rhythm of a language.
• a sound formed by the combination of two vowels in a

  single syllable, in which the sound begins as one vowel and moves toward another
• Monophthong

  -there is only one vowel sound in a syllable.
• *A good way of telling monophthongs and diphthongs apart comes from the pronunciation.
• When pronouncing a diphthong, your mouth should create two distinct shapes without closing. Ex. beer, your mouth should change from a spread shape to an open shape.
• In contrast, when pronouncing a monophthong, your mouth stays relatively still throughout the entire word.