Term Phono.docx

UNIVERSIDAD TECNICA PARTICULAR DE LOJA ENGLISH PHONOLOGY: Pronunciation Second bimester assignment Student: David Vasquez

TERM STRESS

WORD STRESS

DEFINITION AND EXAMPLES Stress is a prominence relation between syllables; certain syllables are longer, lauder, higher-pitched, or more clearly articulated than those around them (Fasold. R,2006). In other words, stress is an emphatic or more prominent and for stress syllable we have three features: loudness, pitch change and a longer syllable. Example: QUIet – SPEcial. Words are formed with one, two, three until seven syllables. One of those syllables will sound louder than the others, stress can fall on the first, middle or last syllable of words, so the stress placement may also have a grammatical function – changing the stress to another syllable can change the part of speech or the meaning of the word. Examples: (Energy, three syllables, stress in the first syllable ‘Ooo’)(multiCULturalism, seven syllables, stress in the middle ‘o.O…o’)(PREsent two syllables, stress in thefirst syllable a noun meaning ‘a gift’/preSENT, stress in the second syllable now a verb meaning ‘to present someone or something’.)

CLASS ACTIVITIES Exercise 1. First activity in a class of children between 10 to 12 years old, we will use shapes and colors, to identify which syllables are stress or unstressed. 1. Write 10 words, 2 columns of 5 each one. 2. Then choose a shape circles or squares 3. The important thing is the bigger shape represent the stress syllable and the small ones represent unstressed syllable. 4. The whole class will try to identify with a specific color and shape the stress syllable for the first column 5 words. 5. Then in their notebooks do the same with the second column, to be more independent. 6. Finally in two groups repeat the pronunciation. Example:

Happiness Exercise 2. Second activity, we will do a physic method, because when you do something, you can remember easily. (the same group of age) 1. We can use the same

words on the board for the next activity ‘clapping’. 2. In pairs they will practice but this time clapping the syllables. 3. Don’t forget, the stress syllable clapping one another very hard, and in unstressed syllable clapping individually. Example:

Pronunciation SENTENCES STRESS

Now we know where to put the stress on each individual word in English, however you need to know which words to stress as part of the sentence as a whole. This is how English stress patterns are related to the rhythm of English and help create the ‘music’ of a language. In fact English speakers tend to put an emphasis on the most important words in a sentence in order to draw the listener’s attention to them. The most important words are the words that are necessary for the meaning of the sentence. Word stress is important for clarity. (nouns and verbs are the most important parts of a sentence, adjectives, adverbs and conjunctions add more information but they are not absolutely necessary to understand the meaning) Example: THE CAT SAT ON THE MAT WHILE EATING ITS FAVORITE FOOD.

Exercise 1. This activity is for advance levels so first the instructions will be very clear:

The name of the game is “Telegrams”: explain a telegram was something like a precursor to a text message—a message in which all the structure words or were deleted: “Mom sick. Come home.” Give out a page of “telegrams.” Have students add the structure words and practice reading with appropriate sentence stress. In two groups try to do very fast this exercise then show the message to the class and try to conduct this activity and focus in the sentence stress. You can change this activity with popular songs, it depends of the teacher and the group that you have. Exercise 2. Now we have a listening activity so explain what we have to do, Give the students

‘The most important words here are: ‘cat’, ‘mat’, ‘eating’ and ‘food’. Even if you only heard those words, you would still be able to understand what was happening in the sentence from hearing which words are stressed. Clearly, it is the nouns and verbs that are the most important parts of the sentence, as these are the ‘content words’ that help with meaning’. FUNCTION WORDS

CONTENT WORDS

RHYTHM

the tape script to a listening before they hear it and ask them to predict which words they think will be stressed. Play the tape to check the predictions. Play a fairly short listening extract, maybe a paragraph in length, students write down the important (stressed) words they hear. You can play the tape several times. Discuss with students the aim of this activity to show how native speakers listen and understand the language, taking note of the important words, usually stressed ones, and using their knowledge of the language to build meaning.

Function words, which are structural such as auxiliary verbs, pronouns, articles and prepositions because these words help us to make our sentences grammatically correct. Since function words don't give us the main information. Examples: are, was, were, it, the, some, any, I, he, they. They are words that have meaning like: nouns, main verb, adjectives and sometimes adverbs). These words help us form a picture in our head; they give us the contents of our story and tell our listener where to focus his or her attention. Examples: Milk, cars, run, draw, quickly, slowly. When someone speaks in Exercise 1.For this activity, we English, the speaker alternates will use flash cards for animals, between stressed and and form a rhythm. unstressed syllables in regular 1. On the board put the intervals, with the stresses falling flash cards and draw a within content words. This is music notes symbols like called the Rhythm Rule. this: Examples:  Doit as you planned, I’d choose to stay at home.  Whois the woman on the phone? You’ll have to

 

call her again. Tellthem why you don’t agree, Do remem I will find the keys for you, and you must finda place to park the car.

2. Then you can compose a lot of rhythm s and you can use more animals, increase the level, and depend of the vocabulary of the unit. Exercise 2. In this activity we made a quick test, 3 questions and 3 possible answers. Questions 1. How many dogs do you have? 2. I’ve been to Paris 3. Why do you learn English? Before to show the possible answers the teacher read, obviously with stress and rhythm, so the students try to predict the possible answers. Answers: 1. I have, too 2. I have to 3. I have two In conclusion in this exercise the native speakers stress some words and the others not, so automatically they produce the

rhythm and show the meaning that they want to express.

UNIVERSIDAD TECNICA PARTICULAR DE LOJA ENGLISH PHONOLOGY: Pronunciation Second bimester assignment Student: David Vasquez a. Intonation and its functions INTONATION definition Intonation refers to the way the voice goes up and down in pitch when we speaking, intonation helps to express and understand our own thoughts and ideas. In fact use melody and includes rise and fall of voice when speaking, so ‘the term INTONATION refers to linguistic uses of pitch to convey meaning at the sentence or discourse level’. (Fasold, R. 2006) FUNCTIONS OF INTONATION Grammatical Attitudinal Discourse Accentual Definition: They are Definition: In this Definition: It Definition: It refers of directly related, function helps us contributes to the the emphasizing the Intonation can covey express emotions, communicative value of words which are more grammatical meaning of feelings, and attitudes a speech, you can important to the a sentence, so the as we speak, so analyzed two points of meaning of an function of intonation intonation reflects the view, the learner’s utterance. works like a attitude or emotional attention and Examples: punctuation, divides state of the speaker. regulation of . I want to know where subject and predicate in Examples: conversational he’s \travelling to. a sentence. behavior. Examples: .Stop \talking. Examples: Note: The word “to” is a .Shall we go ↑ Note: Fall tone – it .He’ll be v TWENTY in p preposition here, not a tomorrow? means “finality” or ↓ AUGUST. lexical word, therefore .Where shall we “definiteness” .He’ll be↓ TWENTY in r it is not stressed. go↓tomorrow? . Can you /help me? V AUGUST. Note: The rule in the Note: Rise tone – Most Note: In the first .I don’t want to know yes/no questions are functions attributed to sentence the listener is where he’s travelling rising intonation, rises are nearer to told of when a mutual \/from. wh/questions are falling grammatical than acquaintance will have tone. attitudinal. his twentieth birthday, Contrastive placement .They are coming on↓ Listing – /Red, /brown, whereas in second one Note: In a similar way, Tuesday↓aren’t they? /yellow, or \blue (note the date is already the stressed can be .They are coming on↓ the fall on the last item known and the listener place in other positions

Tuesday↑aren’t they? of enumeration; that is Note: in tag questions normal) depend of the attitude of the speaker. Encouraging – It won’t /hurt.

is told how old the acquaintance will be in August. Notices that the referring tones allow speakers to call on Note: Rise-fall tone – it shared knowledge and means “surprise” or opinions, which have “being impressed” not so far been verbalized in the conversation.

for the purpose of emphasis. Below are two examples, the first is non-emphatic and the second is emphatic.

b. Differences between Spanish and English intonation patterns and examples

Spanish English 1. In Spanish nouns are masculine or 1. In English, only people, animals and a few feminine (there also is a less-used neuter nouns, such as a ship that can be referred gender), and adjectives or pronouns must to as "she," have gender. Even in those match in gender the nouns they refer to. cases, the gender matters only with Even inanimate objects can be referred to pronoun use; we use the same adjectives as ella (she) or él (he). to refer to men and women. 2. Spanish takes a different approach to 2. English has a few changes in verb forms, conjugation: Although it also uses adding "-s" or "-es" to indicate thirdauxiliaries, it extensively modifies verb person singular forms in the present tense, endings to indicate person and tense. Even adding "-ed" or sometimes just "-d" to without resorting to auxiliaries, which also indicate the simple past tense, and adding are used, most verbs have more than 30 "-ing" to indicate continuous or forms in contrast with the three of English. progressive verb forms. To further indicate For example, among the forms of hablar tense, English adds auxiliary verbs such as (to speak) are hablo (I speak), hablan (they "has," "have," "did" and "will" in front of speak), hablarás (you will speak), hablarían the standard verb form. (they would speak), and hables (subjunctive form of "you speak").

c. Class activities to teach INTONATION to EFL students

Exercise 1. In this exercise we put ONE LINE emotional practice, it is a fun and effective way for students to practice English intonation. It will help students learn how intonation can be used to express emotions, feelings and attitudes in English. For this activity, assign each student a specific emotion or feeling (such as “excitement,” “fear,”

“sadness,” “confusion” and so on, just like in the popular kids’ movie “Inside Out”) and have them communicate using the emphasis and pitch that reflects their feeling. For beginner classes, you might want to create the sentences (or pull from the resources mentioned above) beforehand in order to save class time. But for your intermediate and advanced classes, feel free to have them come up with their own sentences that coincide with their assigned emotion. Exercise 2. Put your students in groups of two or three and give them a number of different stages, such as: Meeting a friend for the first time in years A couple breaking up Arguing with a stranger A doctor and a very sick patient Every stage has a different type of emotion that can be expressed through intonation. Reconnecting with a friend should have an intonation that demonstrates excitement or happiness, while arguing with someone would be sarcastic or angry. You can let students discuss and prepare in groups and then perform one by one for the class, or simply call up volunteers to improvise together. Depending on your class’ proficiency level, you may want to have some general lines written out that students can build off of. Keep each role-play brief (just a couple of minutes) so that the focus stays on intonation. Afterwards, students can pose questions or discuss what they heard and how they might’ve changed their own intonation.

Exercise 3. English Poems to following the instructions: Choose a short extract from a poem that you like (about 4 - 8 lines). Work out the number of syllables and decide which ones are stressed. Mark the syllable pattern on the board showing unstressed syllables as dots and stressed syllables as boxes. Teach the poem to the class by saying it yourself and getting learners to remember and repeat it, line by line - but without writing the text on the board. Be careful with the intonation; when you read it, offer a consistent model. Learning a poem in this way is challenging - but they may come away with something they'll remember all their lives!