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Reference material Information on Sentence stress and Rhythm,

Exercise on 2 word stress and consonant clustures.

Information about sentence stress and rhythm

and how to do it
. The important words for meaning are stressed
An easy way of demonstrating this is to give the students just the stressed words from a sentence
and then just the unstressed words, and then ask them to see which version is easier to more or
less understand the meaning of. For example, for the sentence Students who dont do their
homework dont pass tests you get Students dont homework dont tests and who do their
pass- neither of them is grammatically correct or unambiguous in meaning, but the one with just
the unstressed words could mean anything. Students can then analyse other sentences for which
words are most important to understand the meaning and listen to check whether those are
stressed or not. This is especially important for listening comprehension, where listening for the
stressed words (which is easier than listening for everything or the unstressed words) can help
them pick out the important information from a recording without having to understand every
word.
2. Content words and grammar words
Another way of students doing the analysis above is to analyse the parts of speech and mark the
stress on the nouns, main verbs, adjectives etc (content words) and not on the prepositions,
auxiliary verbs etc (grammar words). They can then listen to the real sentence and check the
sentence stress.
3. Contradictions
A very clear and even entertaining part of sentence stress is when it is used for saying the
opposite of what you just heard, e.g. I heard you have 10 brothers. 10 brothers? Are you
crazy? I have ten COUSINS! There are many fun practice activities for this, e.g. giving one student
the false sentence and the other the true one. The person with the incorrect sentence has to
listen carefully to the stress in the correction in order to work out which bit they should change to
guess the right answer, e.g. I heard that the Eiffel Tower is three hundred and thirty three feet
tall. It isnt 333 FEET tall I guess the Eiffel Tower is FOUR hundred and thirty three feet tall
then Listen carefully. It isnt 433 FEET tall. Ah. Is it 333 METERS tall? Yes, thats right
4. New information
A more general way of looking at the rules of sentence stress that includes contradictions is that
the main stressed word or words in a sentence are often the information that is new, e.g. if I say
I heard that Walter went to PARIS with Jane I think that the person listening didnt know or
would be more interested in the place, whereas if I say I heard that Walter went to Paris with
JANE the new information is the lack of the presence of his wife. The natural gossipy reaction is
to say Paris?? Really? I thought he was just going camping in Bognor. How come he never spent
that much money when he was going out with me? or Jane?? Why would he go with her? She

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isnt even pretty!, and students can be asked to listen to their partners sentences (which have
the stresses marked on them) and to try to respond with suitable similar sentences.
5. Shifting stress
A similar way of analysing sentence stress is to get students to analyse how the stress moving in
the sentence changes the meaning, e.g. the difference between Im terribly sorry and Im
TERribly sorry.
6. Sentence stress and contractions
One aspect of the point described above that is well worth covering in most classes is the
difference between Im a boy and I AM a boy a very substantial difference in this case!
Having this pointed out can help make students see that using contractions in speech is not an
added extra or even, as some traditional teachers would have it, a sign of sloppy speech, but
something that has a real communicative purpose. The (oversimplified) rule I usually give them is
that they should use contractions when speaking, unless they want to stress their meaning in
sentences such as I DONT love him (because you are being teased).
7. Weak forms
The opposite way of approaching the same analysis is to teach students the two different
(stressed and unstressed) pronunciations of words like for, at and can, so that they know
when they sound like fer, ut and cn the stress must be on other words in the sentence. This
can also help them hear the difference between the words that are theoretically homophones but
are usually used in the unstressed form in the one case and dont have an unstressed form in the
other, such as to/ too and can (try)/ cant (try).
8. Schwa never stressed
A more general way of analysing the language as described above is to tell students that the
schwa sound (the last sound in computer) is never stressed, and so if they hear a one syllable
word with the schwa sound in it (as in the unstressed forms of from or to), they know that it
isnt where the beat falls in the sentence.
9. Regular beat
Although there are seemingly endless debates on whether English really has an equal amount of
time between stressed syllables, for classroom purposes we can say for sure that getting students
to practice saying an English sentence as they tap a pencil on the table in time with the stressed
syllables is both a kinaesthetic way to practice something that more analytical students often find
easier and something that works for most people. The same thing can be illustrated by students
chopping down on one open palm with other, by the teacher conducting the students when
they do activities like Shadow Reading, etc. By no means all natural conversations are in reality so
regular in beat, but it should be possible to make up one that is in order to illustrate the point, or
nursery rhymes and other poems and songs can be used.
10. Stress timed and syllable timed
The same debates as mentioned above exists on whether languages really can be divided into
stress and syllable timed ones, but again we can at least say without any doubt that for teaching
purposes this is a useful concept. For example, Brazilian Portuguese is traditionally put into the
syllable timed category of ratatat ratatat ratatat languages along with Italian, whereas in Portugal

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the rhythm is more like the daDA dadiDAdaDAdadidadiDA rap-like rhythm of English, and this is
reflected in the greater problems Brazilian students have with listening comprehension and
pronunciation in English. This is also one of the reasons some people find Indian English especially
difficult to understand, as unlike most varieties of English it can be classified as syllable timed. A
fun activity for students, especially ones dealing with particular nationalities on the phone, can be
to read descriptions of languages that they dont know and listen to short extracts of students
speaking their own language or English with a lot of L1 interference and identify each one.
11. Squashing sounds up
A factor associated with the idea of stress timed languages is that between the regular beat of
stressed syllables in the sentence there might sometimes be just one syllable but sometimes
three or more. If the rhythm is indeed something you can follow on a metronome, those greater
number of unstressed syllables obviously need to be squashed up to take the same amount of
time as when there is just one syllable (or even just a pause) between stressed syllables. This task
can be broken up to make it easier by practicing the squashed up unstressed syllables said as
quickly as possible first, e.g. yer and onterther in Wouldnt you go onto the beach?, and
then adding the stressed sounds in between.
12. Intonation and sentence stress
Although the simplest and most used way of showing intonation of sentences such as the
difference between Y/N questions and Wh- questions is to draw a squiggly line like a wave over
the top of the whole sentence, in fact the intonation changes are focused around the main stress
in the sentence. This can be clearly illustrated when showing our shock and incredulity when
pronouncing He shot a SPARROW with a shotgun?? Other feelings students can express and
have fun with in the same way include irritation, impatience, delight and sarcasm.
13. Marking stress
The important things about marking stress are that even sentence stress is concentrated on one
syllable rather than a whole word, and so should be drawn over the correct syllable in the
stressed word.
14. Stressed equals both louder and longer
This can be introduced when showing that a schwa sound cannot be extended (showing length)
or by putting an open hand palm down higher and lower as you speak (showing loudness).
15. Stress and gestures
As well as tapping your finger, pencil or whole hand as suggested above, you can also open your
fingers up wide with your palm towards the class (like when you illustrate an explosion or
fireworks) to show a main stress and do a smaller version of the same thing (similar to showing a
hand puppet opening and closing its mouth) to show the words with less stresses.

Two word expressions.

Like the example below, frame short sentences by stressing on the
first word & then the second word, with the meaning they convey.

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Practice them

Example :
LIGHT bulb
Shines with electricity

Light BULB
A bulb that is not heavy
..
1.Dark room, Dark room
2.A cold fish, A gold fish
3.The paper box, The paper box
4.An old key, A door key
5.A nice watch, A wrist watch
6.A sticky web, A spider web
7.A clean cup, A coffee cup
8.A toy gun, A water gun
9. A bright star, A movie star
10. A new ball, A foot ball
11. A sharp knife, A steak knife
12. An old brush, A hair brush
13.A dry leaf, A fig leaf
14.A pointy tack, A thumb tack
15.A blackboard, A black board
16.A green house, A green house

Some more practice on Consonant Clusters:

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Consonant clusters

Say these words and sound aloud & practice :

For any doubt on sounds log on to (m-w.com: Type the word in the search option and you will
know the pronunciation of the word will the sound file)
beginning with voiced / l /
lmd (final) ------filmed
lmz (final) ------elms, films
lp (final) --------help
lpt (final) -------helped
lps (final) -------helps
lbd (final) -------bulbed
lbz (final) -------bulbs
lf (final) ---------self
lfs (final) -------twelfths, Alfs
lft (final) --------elfed
lvd (final) -------delved
l (final) --------health
ls (final) -------tilths
lnd (final) -------kilned
lnz (final) -------kilns
lt (final) --------difficult
ltst (final) -------waltzed
ld (final) --------cold, held

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ldz (final) -------holds, worlds

ls (final) --------else
lz (final) --------fills, girls
lt (final) -------filched
ld (final) ------bilged
lt (final) --------welshed
lk (final) --------milk, silk
lks (final) -------milks
lkt (final) -------milked
lkts (final) ------mulcts

beginning with voiced sound ------ / r / ---rm (final) -------silent before a consonant in England & Wales
-"alarm" / l:m /, "arm" / :m /, "warm" / w:m /
rm (final) -------generally pronounced (& sometimes rolled) in Scotland & Ireland
- "alarm" / l:rm /, "arm" / :rm /, "warm" / w:rm /
The / r / within these consonant clusters is generally pronounced in Canada most parts of the USA.

The / r / is pronounced by all English speakers when it precedes a vowel sound, as in "angry" / r / or
"zebra" / zebr /.
/ r / can precede several other consonants sounds, though in these contexts it is rarely pronounced in
England and Wales

Beginning with voiceless - sound --- / /

t (final) -------hitched, matched, watched

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Beginning with voiceless sound ---- / /

- (final) ------caged, edged, forged, judged, waged

Beginning with voiceless sound /t/

-t d(final) -------cashed, fished, mashed, washed

Beginning with voiceless - sound --- / / --- d (final) -------leisured, measured, pleasured, treasured

Consonant clusters

/s/

/z/

Say these words and sound aloud &

practice :
For any doubt on sounds log on to (m-w.com: Type the word in the search option and you will
know the pronunciation of the word will the sound file)
Practice exercises beginning with voiceless /s/

sp (final) -------clasp, crisp, gasp, lisp, wasp

st (final) -------chased, first, pursed-------* note rules for deletion of / t /
sts (final) ------thirsts
sk (final) -------ask, desk, dusk, risk-------or /sks/ (final) for plurals-------asks desks risks

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/ *zd / (final) ------- Note that voiced / z / is followed by voiced / d / abused accessorized,
acclimatized, accused actualized, advertised advised aggrandized, alkalinized, alkalized,
alphabetized, aluminized, Americanized, amortized amused anathematized, anatomized,
anglicized, anodized, antagonized, anthologized, apologized, apostatized apostrophized,
appeased apposed appraised apprised aroused atomized, attitudinized, authorized, baptized,
barbarized, bemused bestialized, bloused braised ,browsed bruised brutalized, bureaucratized,
burglarized
/ *st / (final) -------Note that voiceless / s / is followed by voiceless / t / abased abscessed accessed
accursed addressed amassed oppressed, aspersed assessed based biased blessed bossed grassed
,bused bussed buttressed bypassed canvassed caressed cased ceased censed chased chassed
chorused classed coin- passed collapsed condensed confessed conversed convulsed, cornpressed, coursed conversed creased crisscrossed crossed cursed cussed debased deceased
declassed decompressed decreased degassed degreased deloused depressed digressed disbursed
discoursed discussed disembarrassed dismissed dispensed dispersed dispossessed distressed
dosed dossed doused dowsed dressed eclipsed elapsed embarrassed embossed immersed,
encased enchased encompassed endorsed expressed finessed immersed impressed incased
incensed increased indorsed intercrossed jessed kissed lapsed leased licensed loosed loused
massed messed misaddressed missed mortised mused mussed nonplussed non-posed noosed
nursed obsessed oppressed outclassed out-crossed out-gassed outguessed overdosed
overdressed over-impressed passed posed possessed practiced, preaddressed preplaced
processed predeceased premised prepossessed pressed pre-stressed processed professed
progressed prolapsed promised pulsed purchased purposed pursed engrossed readdressed
reassessed recessed recompensed repressed expressed redressed refocused, reclosed regressed
re-harnessed rehearsed re-housed reimbursed relapsed released relicensed re-passed
repossessed repressed reprocessed repulsed repurchased retrogressed reversed rinsed sensed
showcased soused stressed subleased submersed succussed surpassed tear- gassed tensed tossed
traipsed traversed trespassed dressed trussed, unadvised, unaddressed un-assessed unbiased
unblessed un-confessed uncrossed under-assessed underdressed under leased undiffused
undisbursed un-distressed undressed unembarrassed unendorsed unexpressed unharnessed
unhorsed unimpressed unendorsed un-kissed un-leased unlicensed unloosed uncompressed unpossessed un-practiced un-pressed unprocessed unprofessed unrecompensed, underdressed,
unrehearsed
beginning with voiced sound---- / j / ---/ t / + / j / is often replaced by / / in words such as "nature" / ne /, "future" / fju: /, "feature" /
fi: /, and "creature" / kri: /.
/ d / + / j / is often replaced by / / in words such as "gradual" / grl / and individual / .

beginning with voiced sound ---- / / ---

(final) -------length

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t (final) -------instinct
ts (final) ------instincts
d (final) -------longed
st (medial) -----minced
z (final) -------things
k (final) -------think
g (final) -------thing

beginning with voiceless sound plosive---- / k / ---k (final) -------sixth

ks (final) ------sixths
kt (final) -------fact, worked
kts (final) ------conflicts, contexts, expects texts
ks (final) -------six, works
kst (final) ------context, next, oversexed, pretext, text

beginning with voiced sound ---- / g / ----gd (final) -------bagged, hugged, logged, tagged, wagged
gz (final) -------eggs, figs, mugs, rugs

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