Word stress
Mark the stressed syllable in hotel and hostel.
hoˈtel is stressed on the second syllable, ˈhostel on the first.
What is the vowel /ə/ called, and where does it occur?
Schwa. It occurs in unstressed syllables and is the most frequent vowel sound in English.
Is English stress-timed or syllable-timed?
Stress-timed. The stressed syllables come at roughly regular intervals.
Give the weak form of the before a consonant and before a vowel.
/ðə/ before a consonant (the book) and /ðɪ/ before a vowel (the end).
Which is the compound, a greenhouse or a green house? Where is the stress?
A ˈgreenhouse is the compound, stressed on the first element. A ˈgreen ˈhouse is a phrase with two stresses.
A pupil says stuDENT and muSIC. What is the likely reason?
Transfer from Swedish, where student and musik are stressed on the last syllable. English has ˈstudent and ˈmusic.
Most English nouns and adjectives of two or three syllables are stressed on which syllable? Give an example.
The first syllable, for example ˈminister, ˈelegant or ˈlibrary.
Which letters in banana are pronounced /ə/?
The first and the last a, /bəˈnɑːnə/. Only the stressed middle syllable has a full vowel.
Name a language that is usually described as syllable-timed.
For example Spanish, French or Italian.
Give the weak and the strong form of can, with an example of each.
Weak /kən/, as in You can go. Strong /kæn/, as in Yes, I can.
Noun or verb? a REcord and to reCORD
a ˈrecord is the noun and to reˈcord is the verb. Nouns are often stressed on the prefix, verbs after it.
Suggest a quick way to make pupils feel the stressed syllable of a new word.
For example clapping or tapping the beats or humming the pattern (da DA da).
Mark the stress in catastrophe and analysis. Which rule explains it?
caˈtastrophe and aˈnalysis. The antepenultimate rule places the stress on the third syllable from the end in words of four or more syllables.
Compare English machine with Swedish maskin. What happens to the first vowel in English?
It is reduced to /ə/, as in /məˈʃiːn/. In Swedish the vowel keeps its full quality.
How many beats are there in The cats will have chased the mice?
Three, on cats, chased and mice. The unstressed words are squeezed in between.
Weak or strong form of for in Who's the letter for?
Strong, /fɔː/. A preposition at the end of a clause takes its strong form.
An English teacher can be a compound or a phrase. What is the difference in stress and meaning?
An ˈEnglish teacher (compound) teaches English. An ˈEnglish ˈteacher (phrase) is a teacher from England.
A pupil pronounces every vowel in banana fully. What would you point out, and how could you practise it?
Only the middle syllable is stressed, and the first and last vowels are /ə/. Practise with the rhythm da DA da and compare with Swedish banan.
Mark the stress in photograph, photography and photographic.
ˈphotograph, phoˈtography, photoˈgraphic. The stress moves when suffixes are added, and -ic stresses the syllable before it.
Which reduced vowel is heard in the unstressed syllables of orange, wanted and begin (RP)?
/ɪ/, as in /ˈɒrɪndʒ/, /ˈwɒntɪd/ and /bɪˈɡɪn/. Many speakers, especially of GA, use /ə/ in some of these words.
Which words normally carry sentence stress, content words or function words? Give two examples of each.
Content words, such as nouns, main verbs, adjectives and adverbs. Function words, such as articles, auxiliaries, prepositions and pronouns, are normally unstressed.
Weak or strong form of that? I know that it's true. I like that book.
The conjunction in the first sentence is weak, /ðət/. The demonstrative in the second is strong, /ðæt/.
I didn't say SHE took the money. What does the speaker mean?
That somebody else took the money. The extra stress on she signals contrast.
A pupil reads I want to go to the bank with equal weight on every word. Suggest an activity.
Tap the beats on the stressed words (want, go, bank) and practise the weak forms /tə/ and /ðə/, or build the sentence up from the end (backchaining).
Where is the stress in engineer, refugee and Japanese, and why?
On the last syllable, engiˈneer, refuˈgee, Japaˈnese. The suffixes -eer, -ee and -ese carry the stress themselves.
How many syllables do chocolate and comfortable usually have in natural speech? Why?
Chocolate usually has two syllables (choc-late) and comfortable three (comf-ta-ble). Unstressed syllables can disappear in natural speech.
What happens to the stress of fourteen in fourteen people? What is this called?
ˌfourˈteen becomes ˈfourteen ˈpeople. The main stress moves to the first syllable so that the stresses do not clash. This is called stress shift, or the rhythm rule.
Name three situations in which a function word takes its strong form.
At the end of a clause, for contrast or emphasis, when the word is quoted, and when it has another function (demonstrative that, place adverb there).
Correct this statement with contrastive stress. Stockholm is the capital of Norway.
No, it's the capital of SWEDEN (or OSLO is the capital of Norway). The corrected word receives the extra stress.
Describe a listening activity that makes pupils notice weak forms.
Read short sentences at natural speed and let pupils count the words (What do you want to do? has six). Then show the sentence and discuss which words were weak.