Hi everyone! In this video you'll learn about stress in sentences.
In a previous video, I talked about syllable stress in American English. English is a
stress-timed language. This means that some syllables are stressed and some syllables
are unstressed. Take for example the word conversation. Conversation has four syllables,
and the third syllable, "sa", receives the most stress. If I were to say that word and
give each syllable the same amount of stress like this, conversation, I'd sound robotic,
and you would have a hard time understanding what I'm saying. We can talk about syllables
in individual words receiving stress, but spoken English is not just single words. When we talk,
we speak in phrases and sentences, and we will stress certain words in the sentence to give
the sentence a rhythm or a beat, and only the important words will receive the stress. Listen
to this sentence and see if you can hear which words are stressed more than the other words. I
spoke to him yesterday. Listen again. I spoke to him yesterday. Which words were stressed? Spoke
and yesterday - could you hear it? Listen one more time, and I'll say the sentence slowly. I
spoke to him yesterday. It's sometimes helpful to use the syllables "DA-da" in place of the
actual words when you're listening for stress. "DA" is for stressed syllables and "da" is for
unstressed syllables. So I'll say the sentence again using "DA-da". I spoke to him yesterday.
da-DA-da-da-DA-da-da. In spoken English, we stress the content words - the words that provide the
most meaning. Content words include nouns, main verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and WH words like who,
what, where, when, and why. In the sentence, I spoke to him yesterday, spoke is a main verb and
yesterday is an adverb. Listen to another sentence and see if you can hear which words are stressed.
Let's go - I'm getting hungry. Let's go - I'm getting hungry. da-DA-da-da-da-DA-da. Go and
hungry receive the most stress. Go is a main verb, and hungry is an adjective. One more sentence. The
kids are playing at the park. The kids are playing at the park. da-DA-da-DA-da-da-da-DA. Kids,
playing, and park receive the most stress. Kids is a noun, playing is a main verb, and park is
a noun. Thanks for watching, and let me know if you would like some help with stress in sentences.