MiniPod: Sentence Stress and Word Stress | Bad English Made Better

Jechootaa fi loqoda jechootaa adda tahan jabeessuun maaliif akka barbaachise hubadhaa. minipoodiin Inglish badaan gaariitti fooyyawe ykn The bad English Made Better jedhamu barnoota caasluuga Inglishii salphaa fi gabaabaa dha. .

Sentence stress and word stress are both important because they give English its rhythm. Credit: Klaus Vedfelt/Getty Images

Learning Highlights

• Sentence stress and word stress give English its rhythm.
• We put stress on content words that are important to get the message across.
• Putting stress on different syllables in a word can change its meaning
• This lesson is designed for intermediate (or medium) level learners.

Transcript:

(Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript.)

Hi everyone… and welcome to the BAD ENGLISH MADE BETTER podcast.

I am Ai-Lin, and I am an English teacher. I started teaching English in Japan around thirty years ago, and I now teach English in Melbourne, Australia.

Wait, I sound like a robot. Let me start that again…

Hi everyone. I’m Ai-Lin, and I’m an English teacher. I started teaching English in Japan around thirty years ago, and I now teach English in Melbourne, Australia.

Could you hear the difference? What I did there was stress important words in the sentences. And that, my friends, changes everything.

This is a show full of tips and tricks for people learning English. It's designed for intermediate (or medium) level learners.

EPISODE 3: SENTENCE STRESS AND WORD STRESS

So, let’s begin…

The topic for today’s lesson is sentence stress and word stress.

They’re both really important because they give English its rhythm.

They help others understand what you are saying because we put stress on particular words that are important to the meaning of the sentence.

Now, let’s look at exactly what kind of words we’re talking about…

They’re called content words. Have a listen to this sentence:

If it’s sunny, I’ll go to the beach.

I put stress on three words, sunny, go and beach… because these words are the ones that are important to get my message across.

So, if a friend asks me: Ai-Lin, what will you do this Saturday? Even if I drop the other words, and just say, sunny, go, beach…. you’ll understand what I intend to do.

We also stress negative words… words like not or never.

So, say we were talking about our travel experiences, and you hear: “I have never been to Alaska.” The stress is on never and Alaska, which are the important words.

Finally, there’s another kind of word that is important when we talk about stress. Words such as can, could, would, should, may, might, must, will.

When these modal words are stressed, they can also change the meaning of a sentence. Like this…

You must use a black pen

You may use a black pen

Next, let’s look at stress on one word in a sentence to emphasise something:

This can actually change the meaning of a sentence. 

For example, let’s have a listen to the different ways of emphasising just one word in a sentence and see what changes…

• I didn’t say you lied – That’s a plain statement. No real emphasis. But then…
• I didn’t say you lied – That’s right, somebody else did, but not you
• I didn’t say you lied – I think you did, but you deny it
• I didn’t say you lied – I think you implied it, but you didn’t say it directly
• I didn’t say you lied – Yes, fine. But somebody else lied
• I didn’t say you lied – Maybe you think I kept quiet instead

When you do emphasise just one word, you often draw it out longer, lingering on it for a beat. And that can definitely be long enough to change the meaning.

So, that’s sentence stress… when the main word or one word is stressed in a sentence.

But now it’s time to zoom in on actual words with a thing called syllable stress. And that refers to part of a word being stressed.

Have you ever noticed that words with two or more syllables have a stressed syllable?

Listen to this word, with a different syllable stressed each time.

• passenger
• passenger

Which one sounds correct? That’s right, it’s the first one - passenger

When you listen to English, you learn words and phrases with their stress, and when you repeat what you hear with the correct stress on syllables, it makes it easier for people to understand you.

But how do you know which syllable to stress? Here are the basics…

With words of two syllables, the stress is on the first syllable in nouns and adjectives. While in verbs, the stress is on the second syllable.

Here are a few words that follow the syllable stress rule…

• Present = We’re talking about the word for “gift”, which is a noun, so the stress is on the first syllable – Present
• Present = Equals “to show something”, which is a verb, so the stress is on the second syllable – Present

Okay, it's time to put you under some pressure.

Do you know the different meanings of this word when it is stressed differently?

• Object

…Time’s up. Did you know it? Object is a thing, right? Which is a noun, so the stress is on the first syllable… Object. But then there’s…

• Object

I’m sure you know it. Object means to disagree, which is a verb, so the stress is on the second syllable… Object

And, because it’s English, there are others, like…

• dessert
• desert

One is a sweet dish to rot your teeth, and the other is a dry landscape in the middle of Australia. Or…

• produce
• produce

One involves the making of something, and the other is the fruit and veg you buy at the supermarket.

It does make it hard to sound natural when you don’t quite get the stress on syllables or words right, but as with everything, practice makes perfect.

So, keep listening and noticing sentence and syllable stress as you go, repeat and mimic what you hear…

• Object Object
• dessert desert
• produce produce

…and soon you will find it natural to stress syllables and words as you speak.

I promise.

(Never trust an English teacher!)

Thanks for listening to BAD ENGLISH MADE BETTER.

I’m your host and teacher Ai-Lin Bhugun. Catch you next time.