Fluency, rhythm and intonation

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Fluency, rhythm and intonation

• A top-down look at English

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Starting from the top

• Fluency, rhythm and intonation the overall
  structures of language sound
• Does it make sense to start by focusing on these
  large structures rather than on individual
  sounds?
• We are probably more used to thinking bottom-up,
  particularly concerning sounds
• The overall structures obviously depend on the
  smaller units it is difficult to become fluent
  without knowing how to pronounce the individual
  sounds

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• However, communicative language teaching means
  that we want to present the pupils with texts
  that have meaning to them from the very beginning
  (such as songs and rhymes)
• This means that rhythm, intonation and fluency
  are factors that in the teaching we do will be
  there from the beginning

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Starting from the top

• Pronunciation is in many ways the one area where
  we are most dependent on thinking wholeness from
  the very beginning
• Working with vocabulary, we will usually have a
  gradual and (to some extent) controlled
  introduction of new words
• Working with grammar, starting with a few simple
  structures and then introducing more and more
  complicated ones is at least an option
• Controlling the teaching material on
  pronunciation criteria (using only words with
  sounds which has been specifically taught) is
  hardly an option
• We must often let the children start with the
  tools they already have (their Norwegian sound
  system), and adjust it gradually
• As a counterweight to this, it is useful to have
  them listen to and think about what English
  spoken language sounds like overall (in
  manageable chunks) from the very beginning

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Starting from the top

• Children who learn their first language start
  mimicking the sound of connected speech, often
  before they can make meaningful words or the
  language sounds are firmly established
• This also means that they have to relate to quite
  complicated sound patterns from the beginning
• In foreign language teaching, this should be an
  opportunity, not a problem most children enjoy
  playing with sounds
• We need to work with pronunciation from the top
  down and from the bottom up simultaneously

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The structure of the workshop

• Fluency
• Stress and rhythm
• Intonation
• I will at times put in bits of text written in
  phonemic symbols you do not have to read these
  to follow my points, so this is primarily meant
  to make you used to seeing them

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Fluency

• Fluency in pronunciation is about the ability to
  speak at a suitable speed without too much
  hesitation and false starts
• In this sense all skills in (oral) language get
  together in fluency pronunciation of individual
  sounds, vocabulary, grammar, rhythm, intonation
• BUT we cannot wait until everything else is in
  place before we start focusing on fluency
• It must be in focus from the beginning

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Fluency

• This means we have to find a balance between
  accuracy training and fluency training
• Accuracy training is necessary for fluency in the
  long run, but may hinder it in the short run

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Fluency

• Fluency training training which focuses on
  producing connected speech at natural speed
• Part of this must be focused on unplanned
  communication conversation training
• However, training rhythm and intonation are also
  central elements in fluency training

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Stress

• In speech, some syllables will be pronounced
  with greater force they are stressed
• Tension /"tenSn/
• Perform /p_at_"fOm/
• If you look in a dictionary, the vertical line
  which marks stress is placed before the first
  phoneme

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• We can look at stress in two ways
• Word stress
• Sentence stress

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Word stress

• Where does the stress go in a word spoken in
  isolation (word stress)
• In relation to natural speech, word stress tells
  us where the stress may come, but it does not
  have to come anywhere in the word not every word
  is stressed in natural speech.

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Sentence stress

• Sentence stress the syllables in an actual,
  spoken sentence which receive stress.
• Syllables that receive stress when a word is
  pronounced in isolation will often lose it in
  connected speech
• our /"aU_at_/
• If you think our cars dirty, you ought to see
  our house.
• /If jU TINk au_at_ "kAz d3tI jU Ot_at_ si aU_at_
  haUs/

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More on word stress

• Getting word stress right is important in order
  for our words to be understood by the listener
• Stress on the wrong syllable is more likely to
  cause misunderstanding than the use of a wrong
  sound
• In two-syllable words, stress is normally on the
  first syllable.
• In words of Three or more syllables, stress tends
  to come on the second- or third last syllable

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Where would you put the stress in the following
words?

• Participation Claustrophobia
• Neutrality Potential
• Philosopher Necessity
• Inform Intonation
• Dialect Horseradish
• Outgun Uncool

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Sentence Stress

• While word stress is simply a part of the
  pronunciation of a word, sentence stress is
  connected to the meaning we want to express.
• In connected speech only the words most important
  to the content of the sentence will receive
  stress.
• These tend to be the content words or lexical
  words nouns, verbs (not auxiliaries),
  adjectives, adverbs.
• The other words are known as form words or
  grammatical words auxiliaries, articles,
  prepositions, conjunctions etc., will normally be
  unstressed in a sentence.

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• The pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables
  are very important in English (think poetry)
• English is fundamentally stress-timed, not
  syllable timed.
• The length it takes to pronounce a sentence
  depends on the number of stressed syllables, not
  the total number of syllables.
• This is the same in Norwegian, but remember some
  of our students may have a background from a
  language which is fundamentally different where
  all syllables are the same length

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• Invariably rude (5 syllables)
• Very rude (3 syllables)
• I have heard your excuses (7 syllables)
• I wont listen to any more of your silly
  excuses (15 syllables)
• The two phrases in these pairs should take
  approximately the same time
• The unstressed syllables are pronounced very
  quickly, and therefore tend to be reduced

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Your tools for teaching rhythm

• Probably your most important tool is your own
  pronunciation make sure that you use rhythm and
  weak forms appropriately
• However, there are many types of exercises which
  are appropriate for this purpose, e.g.
• Rhymes, poems, songs
• Growing sentences
• Forward- and back-chaining

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Nursery rhymes/childrens rhymes

• Clear rhythmic pattern
• Rhymed lines easy to remember
• Often used as part of skipping games further
  emphasis on rhythm
• May help the speaker achieve a natural speaking
  speed, which also makes it more natural to get
  the weak forms right
• Of course, the rhythm in such verses tends to be
  exaggerated, but this exaggeration is likely to
  be automatically evened out in real speech

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Childrens rhymes

• Georgie Porgie pudding and pie
• Kissed the girls and made them cry
• When the boys came out to play
• Georgie Porgie ran away!
• (Note how the number of syllables in pudding
  and forces each syllable to be shortened)

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Older children

• When the children become too big for traditional
  nursery rhymes, there are other types of rhythmic
  poetry that can be used or there are of course
  twists on (or twisted versions of) the rhymes
  they already know (if you want to subject
  children to such brutality)
• Mary had a little lamb Tommy had a pup Alfonzo
  had a crocodile That ate the others up
• Mary had a little lamb You've heard this tale
  before But did you know she passed her plate
  And had a little more

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Limericks

• Again, the clear rhythm makes these a useful
  tool.
• There was a young lady of Niger
• Who smiled as she rode on a tiger
• They returned from the ride
• With the lady inside
• And the smile on the face of the tiger
• Here the strict form also means that students can
  produce these themselves

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Growing Sentences

• A sentence begins with the most important content
  words, and id then expanded, mainly with function
  words. The number of stresses, and therefore the
  time it takes, remains unchanged, and the added
  words are likely to be unstressed many of them
  weak forms.
• Clyde robbed banks
• Bonnie and Clyde robbed banks
• Bonnie and Clyde must have robbed the banks
• Bonnie and Clyde must have been robbed by the
  banks
• Bonnie and Clyde must have been robbed by the
  greedy banks

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Forward-chaining

• Building a sentence by beginning at the first
  word and then adding new items noticing how the
  rhythm changes. Note that the focus of the
  sentences keeps moving, since the most important
  item of information tends to come last
• Priscilla
• Priscilla played
• Priscilla played the lead role
• Priscilla played the lead role in an amateur
  production
• Priscilla played the lead role in an amateur
  production of Twelfth Night.
• Priscilla played the lead role in an amateur
  production of Twelfth Night which was an
  enormous success.

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Back-chaining

• Note how with back-chaining the focus of the
  sentence and thus the intonation pattern
  stays the same
• Restaurant
• Really nice restaurant
• At a really nice restaurant
• Dinner at a really nice restaurant
• Bought me dinner at a really nice restaurant
• My aunt bought me dinner at a really nice
  restaurant
• Strangely enough, my aunt bought me dinner at a
  really nice restaurant.

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Finding rhythmic patterns

• Mark likely full stresses in the following list
  and group the words or sentences into four groups
  of four, so that each group has the same stress
  pattern. Then transcribe all the sets
• Consideration Remember
• Terminology Banana
• I met some artists Nevertheless
• We left her Electricity
• Merry-go-round Characteristic
• So you lost again Lets face it
• Hes a countryman Jack-in-the-box
• Under the window They ought to know

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Intonation is

• Continuous changing of the pitch (tone) of the
  speakers voice to express meanings (Bradford)
• It is linked to rhythm, because rhythm and stress
  decides where we get pitch-changes

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Changes in pitch that express meaning

• Pitch changes are not used in English to
  distinguish between words with different basic
  meaning, as it is used extensively in e.g.
  Chinese (and even in Norwegian to a much smaller
  extent håpet vs. håpe.)
• They are used to mark the communicative function
  of an utterance (is it a question or a
  statement?) and to mark emotional attitude.

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• This may well be the psychologically most
  difficult part of language to copy for foreign
  speakers it may also feel like giving up part
  of your personality.
• It is important to keep ears open, observe and
  copy.

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General points on English intonation

• Pitch within an utterance tends to start low and
  be kept low until the first stressed syllable (if
  the first syllable in the utterance is stressed,
  we will start off at a high pitch level).
• The first stressed syllable usually jumps to a
  higher pitch
• The pitch then tends to stay on a high and fairly
  even level
• At the main communicative focus of the sentence,
  the stressed syllable will have a glide either up
  or down.

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• The communicative focus of an English sentence
  tends to lie towards the end
• If the focus moves towards the front, this needs
  a more special context to be natural
• The main pitch change will therefore also lie
  towards the end

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Where would the main stress naturally go? What
happens if we move it?

• I always take the bus.
• Would you like some tea?
• We first met them in France.
• I thought John had fixed that.
• Can you hear that strange noise?

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• Note particularly that the pitch tends to stay
  even (and relatively high) from the first
  stressed syllable until the tonic syllable
• In Norwegian, every stressed syllable tends to be
  emphasised by a pitch-change from the speaking
  tone, but this is not the case in English
  stressed syllables except for the first one and
  the tonic one tend to have the same pitch as the
  surrounding unstressed ones.

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• Two points we should think about when we speak
  English (or try to teach it to others) are
• Keeping the speaking tone from the first stress
  to the main focus of a meaning unit high and
  relatively even
• Having a clear focus of each spoken unit, marked
  by a clear pitch-change

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Chunking

• Rhythm and intonation come together in the
  concept of chunking
• Breaking your spoken language into manageable
  chunks
• If you make them too short, fluency will suffer
• If the chunks become too long, intonation will
  become flat and difficult to follow