Word Stress Should not be Ignored

Despite being the world’s most spoken and studied language, the arguably most important aspect of understanding spoken English is often ignored by teachers and students.  That aspect is word stress, which is really the magic key for understanding how to properly speak English.

SEE ALSO: Tips for Speaking English with Proper Intonation

If it is so important, then why do many teachers and students ignore it?

First, it is also one of the most difficult parts of the English language to teach.  Second, students often look over it because they do not recognize its importance.  However, this is a perception that has to change.

Too many times I’ve had a student from South Korea, France, Japan or South America that had a good understanding of grammar and academic writing, but could hardly be understood by the rest of the class.  Why? Because he or she simply was never taught word stress or never took it seriously.

What the heck is word stress?

English is a stressed-based or stressed-timed language.  In other words, each syllable (part of a word) is not stressed or pronounced the same.  This differs in comparison to other languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French and so on in which each syllable or part of the word is pronounced the same way.

Of course, intonation exists in every language, but the stress of certain syllables in English is very strong, which ultimately creates huge headaches for English students all over the world.

One point to remember is that for each word in English, ONLY ONE SYLLABLE CAN HAVE A PRIMARY STRESS! However, the tricky part is knowing which syllable should be stressed.  In the word ‘communiCAtion’, the syllable before the suffix ‘tion’ is stressed.

The word ‘present’ can be stressed as PRESent (noun) or preSENT (verb) depending on whether it is a noun or verb.  There are no 100 percent definite rules to follow for word stress, but general rules or patterns to follow that can help students greatly improve their English speaking skills.  Please check out another article I wrote, The Importance of Word Stress, to get a better understanding of word stress rules to follow.

Why do students need to study word stress and when should they start studying it?

Word stress needs to be studied because it is an INTEGRAL part of the English language.  Moreover, understanding word stress patterns in English can help students improve their speaking skills in a matter of weeks rather than years.

It is essentially the magic shortcut for speaking better English.  However, students and teachers need to first recognize the importance of word stress, teach it, study it and take it seriously.  It is probably better to begin teaching word stress at the intermediate level since students need to first obtain a basic foundation of English grammar, writing and vocabulary.

Of course pronunciation is also paramount for improving speaking skills, but word stress is just as important and the fact that it is often overlooked makes it that much more vital! You may be a popular and well-liked teacher, but you are not doing your best to help students if you are not teaching word stress!

Author Bio

 

James Soller has been teaching ESL for several years.  He spent four years teaching English in Japan and has been teaching ESL in the United States since 2011.  He is also an adjunct instructor of political science.  He has a master’s degree in political science and a TESOL certification.  He has spent significant time in Asia and in South America.  You can find out more about him on his ESL website.