(SKKN 2022) some methods of teaching word stress to improve communication skills for 12th graders at tinh gia 3 high schools

Therefore, before each Language Focus lesson of Units 3, 4 and Unit 5, I ask students to preview the "stress position" at home, divide the class into groups of 6 students and ask the gro

1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 The reason of selecting the topic

English is a subject that has been and is being innovated at the forefront of high schools The Ministry of Education and Training has developed a project to

improve the quality of foreign language teaching and learning across the country It can be seen that English in particular and foreign languages in general are the focus

of attention and strong development In order to innovate and improve the quality

of foreign language learning, it is necessary to have many synchronous solutions, first of all, to innovate teaching and learning methods

English is currently being taught in a communicative and learner-centered way To

be able to communicate in English, students must use both listening and speaking skills well So what must teachers and students do to achieve this goal? This

requires many factors, in which helping students master the stress of words in English is relatively important The correct pronunciation of English word stress will help the communication in English be conducted more smoothly, avoiding misunderstandings in communication

From the practice of teaching English for many years, I realize that the language knowledge in general and the knowledge of English stress in particular are being taught in the high school program only at the level of practice, not explanation Students only need to listen and repeat correctly some given words

The content of English stress is only introduced in the Language focus section of Unit 3, Unit 4 and Unit 5 of grade 12 Students can only listen to tapes on how to read stress in some words, some sentences and then that repeats However, in tests and exams for high school graduation, for excellent students, or for university and college entrance exams, there are often questions about stress Through studying the results of students' tests, I found that students often do not correctly answer questions on knowledge of stress In addition, I also noticed that most students when speaking English do not pay attention to the stress of words, the stress of sentences, but only speak evenly, which reduces the effectiveness of using English

Brother That's why I decided to choose a topic called "Some methods of teaching word stress to improve communication skills for 12th graders at Tinh Gia 3 high schools".

1.2 Objectives, tasks, methodology and scope of research

1.2.1 Objectives of research

1.2.1.1 For the students

- Provide learners with an overview of how to deal with the word stress

- Realize the importance of using correct English accents, thereby helping them to

be aware of stress in training their communication skills

- Sspeak English correctly, ensuring the standard of subject knowledge, thereby helping students solve the question about stress knowledge in tests, exams, or other assignments and university exams

1.2.1.2 For the teachers

- Find out the most effective methods to improve students’ pronunciation

- Know how to stimulate students to improve students’ pronunciation

- know how to help students to do stress exercise better

1.2.2 Research tasks

- Find out the reason why most of students cannot stress a word correctly.

- Apply my research to teaching practices, then compare, contrast the implementation of the topic

- Evaluate and conclude the effectiveness of topic

1.2.3 Research methodology

I write this topic based on:

- The method of studying theory

- The method of investigating

- Applying the topic to real teaching English at Tinh Gia 3 high school

- Comparison, collation and summary of the result, effect of the topic

1.2.4 Scope of research

I mainly focus on:

- It is about effective methods to stress an English word

2 PROBLEM SOLVING

2.1 Rationale and reality

2.1.1 Rationale

2.1.1.1 What is word stress?

Word stress is the most commonly taught item in this area It can be defined as the way in which syllables in words are pronounced with different levels of ‘force’ A couple of important rules to remember about word stress are:

1) Only one syllable in a word can carry the main stress (though others may be pronounced with slightly less force as secondary stress)

2) Stress only affects the pronunciation of vowel sounds The vowel is the heart of

a syllable, and carries the stress therefore there is no such thing as a stressed

consonant

3) Stress affects the way in which vowels are pronounced Most vowels have ‘full’ and ‘reduced’ or ‘weak’ forms, depending on whether they are stressed in a word or not A weak form is where a vowel is pronounced as a schwa (/ə/)

4) Schwa is never stressed, therefore can never appear in a strong syllable

5) long vowels and diphthongs can never appear in weak syllables - they are

already strong and effortful to pronounce, so must be in strong or neutrally-stressed syllables

With these rules in mind, your teaching of stress on words and sentences can be much more precise, and your learners can think about these rules as they practice their speaking

2.1.1.2 Why word stress is important?

Mistakes in word stress are a common cause of misunderstanding in English Here are the reasons why:

 Stressing the wrong syllable in a word can make the word very difficult to hear and understand; for example, try saying the following words:

o O

b'tell

O o

hottl

e

 And now in a sentence:

"

I carried the b'tell to the hottle."

Now reverse the stress patterns for the two words and you should be able to make sense of the sentence!

"

I carried the bottle to the hotel."

 Stressing a word differently can change the meaning or type of the word:

"

They will desert* the desert** by tomorrow."

o O

desert*

O o desert*

*

 Think about the grammatical difference between desert* and desert**

I will look at this in more detail later

 Even if the speaker can be understood, mistakes with word stress can make the listener feel irritated, or perhaps even amused, and could prevent good communication from taking place

2.1.1.3 How to learn word stress ?

Like all language knowledge, stress also has its own rules Learners can buy books about stress and learn the rules in them With fixed rules, learners only need to memorize and do lots of exercises However, there are exceptions to the rules Learners need to pay more attention to these exceptions

In addition, learners can learn stress in many different ways such as: learning in the process of communication, learning when listening to teachers lecture, learning when listening to programs broadcast in English, or by looking up a dictionary And only practice and regular practice can help people learn successfully on the road to conquering the language

These three reasons tell me that word stress is an important part of the English language, and it is something I should help my students with

2.1.2 Reality

Through polling many colleagues and students, and through teaching practice, I found that when students learn English from secondary school to the end of grade

11 of high school, they hardly learn about the importance of English sound Most teachers do not have the time or attention to guide students in this regard When correcting students' mistakes, teachers only pay attention to word usage,

grammatical errors or mispronunciations, but do not correct errors in stress Most students have no concept of stress when pronouncing English

Students can learn about stress by looking at the Glossary section at the end of the textbook However, many students do not see this part or do, but only pay attention

to the meaning of the word without paying attention to the pronunciation or stress

of the word

Before implementing the topic, I conducted a survey on students' understanding of stress in grade 12A1 and 12A6 in the 2020-2021 school year of Tinh Gia 3 high school, which is a basic board class I gave each student a card with 5 questions about English stress and asked them to do it within 5 minutes The words on the card are selected from UNIT 1 of the 12th grade English program when students have just finished this lesson The questionnaire has the following contents:

Choose the word whose stress pattern is different from that of the rest

1 A pressure B secure C speacial D caring

2 A family B whenever C solution D obiedient

3 A biologist B generally C responsibile D security

4 A confident B importance C together D exciting

5 A secondary B household C nightshift D stuitable

The results

Table 2.1 The correct answers

Class students Correct

5q

Correct 4q

Correct 3q

Correct 2q

Correct 1q

Wrong 5q

From the above results, it can be seen that only about 30% of students achieve an average level or higher with the knowledge of stress and about 20% of students do not get any questions about stress correctly Thus, it can be seen that students' knowledge of stress is relatively weak Even those who know the theory are weak

in practice

From the above situation, I have taken a number of measures to improve the use of English accents of students in grade 12A1 and 12A6 Measures are taken during the English lessons according to the program distribution and the block-based refresher classes in the afternoons

2.2 Measure implementation

2.2.1 Measure 1:

When teaching new words, I always focus on the stress of the words by using the stress on the new words and ask the students to write the whole part in their

notebooks When I let students read words, I also pay attention to correcting

students if they see that they have not read the right stress by correctly pronouncing the word they misread and asking them to read it correctly

2.2.2 Measure 2:

When using English, I always pay attention to speaking with correct stress and intonation to guide and create the habit of correct listening for students To do this,

I always have to practice my speaking skills properly in many ways such as:

listening and practicing on tapes, using a dictionary to look up words I'm not sure about, listening to radio programs in English on television or radio,…

2.2.3 Measure 3:

This is a measure used in Language focus lessons of Unit 3, Unit 4 and Unit 5 Because the time spent on stress position in each Language Focus lesson is only 10

to 15 minutes, there is only enough time for students to listen Tape and repeat the pronunciation of words Teachers do not have time to explain to students some general rules regarding stress Therefore, students only know the stress of words in the textbook Therefore, before each Language Focus lesson of Units 3, 4 and Unit

5, I ask students to preview the "stress position" at home, divide the class into groups of 6 students and ask the groups to find add words with similar stress,

written as multiple choice questions on stress, to the table first Each group

prepares 3 questions

In class, I proceed to teach the accent as follows:

- First, I let the students listen to the tape once to recognize the stress of the words, then ask the students to repeat the tape twice

- I check the position of the stress of the words to see if the students have grasped it

- Have students listen to the part “Practise reading aloud the sentences” and call

on some students to read it again

- Finally, I organize groups to exchange sub-boards with each other, do exercises

on those sub-boards

2.2.4 Measure 4:

This is the most important measure of this topic based on the idiom “Practice makes perfect” Before each class, I prepare 2 multiple choice questions about stress with the requirement "Choose the word whose stress is differently placed from the other words" The words selected in these 2 questions are the words that will be used in that lesson These two questions can be written in advance on the whiteboard, or prepared in an electronic lecture for presentation on a projector At the end of each class, I spend from 30 seconds to 1 minute for students to answer those two questions and pronounce the words in them The student who has the correct answer and correctly pronounces the stress of the words will receive a scorecard his card is used to add points for students to the 15-minute test or oral test according to the ratio:

+ From 2 votes to 6 votes = 1 point on the 15-minute test, or oral test

This measure is implemented in the teaching hours of 16 lesson units Thus, after each lesson, students will master the stress of 8 words through 16 lesson units, with 640 words

When I take this measure, I find that students who want to answer correctly and read correctly will have to listen more attentively At the same time, the bonus scorecard has the effect of stimulating students to pay attention to study and

enthusiastically volunteer to answer questions

To help students easily remember and deepen their knowledge of English stress, I have given some simple and easy rules of stress for students to practice:

1) Stress falls on the first syllable:

- Most nouns and adjectives have 2 syllables, the stress falls on the first syllable Examples

- Nouns : PREsent, EXport, CHIna, carrot, candy

+ adjectives: PREsent, SLENder, CLEver, HAPpy, active

Exeption: patrol, possess , guitar, machine, mistake, alone,

- For verbs, if the second syllable contains a short vowel and ends with no more than one consonant, the stress will fall on the first syllable, usually the endings er,

en, ow,

Example: enter, trevel, open, follow, borrow, promise, answer, listen,

- Three-syllable verbs whose last syllable contains a long vowel or diphthong or ends in more than one consonant, the stress is on the first syllable

For example: parachute, exercise,

2) Stress on the second syllable:

Most verbs with two syllables have the stress on the second syllable

Example: to preSENT, to exPORT, to deCIDE, to beGIN

- If the second syllable contains a long vowel, a diphthong, or ends with more than one consonant, that syllable is stressed

For example: proVIDE, proTEST, aGREE, a'rrive(V), a'ttract (V), co'rrect(A), per'fect(A) a'lone(Adv) in'side(prep )

- For 3-syllable verbs: If the last syllable contains a short vowel or ends with no more than one vowel, the stress falls on the second syllable

For example: deTERmine, reMEMber, enCOUNter

3) The stress falls before the syllable before the affixes:

–ic, ical-sion, tion, ity, ial, ially, itive, logy, graphy, try

For example: domestic, practical, condition, mission, ability, essential, artificially, sensitive, technology, geography,

Exception: TElevision has stress on the first syllable

4 Compound words:

- For compound nouns whose stress falls on the first part: BLACKbird,

GREENhouse, RAINcoat, BEDroom

- Compound adjectives whose first word is an adjective or an adverb, the stress falls on the second syllable, ending in -ED:

Example: bad-TEMpered, SIGHted, ill-TREAted, well-DONE,

short-HANded, old-FASHioned

- Compound adjectives have the stress on the first syllable:

Example: HOMesick, AIRsick, WAterproof, Lightning-fast

Exception: duty- free snow- white

- Compound adverbs and verbs have the stress on the second syllable

Example: upsTAIRs, head-FIRST, north-EAST, downSTREAM

5 Stress in words with numbers:

- Stress falls on the first syllable: THIRty, NInety,

- Stress falls on the second syllable: thirTEEN, eightTEEN,

6 Some words that are both nouns and verbs are:

- For nouns, the stress is best on the syllable

- For verbs, the stress falls on the second syllable

'record(N) re'cord (V) , 'comment (N) com'ment(V), 'present(preznt/(n),

pre'sent/prizent/(v), import, export, increase…

7 The stress usually falls on the syllable standing one syllable from the suffix - ate,

- ary:

Example: JAnuary, DICtionary, CONsiderate

Exceptions: ex'traordinary, docu'mentary…

Note:

1 The prefix does not change the main stress of the word:

un, im, in, ir, dis, non, en, re, over, under

'happy,' patient, com'plete, 'regular, 'honest,'violent, rich, write, come, weight

2 The affixes do not affect the sentence stress:

-able, -al, -en, -ful, -ing, -less, -ment, -ous, ship, hood,nessise/ize, er/or,ly,

Examples: 'comfort, 'nation,strength, 'wonder,be'gin, thought, em'ploy , 'danger, friend, child, 'memory, actor,

3 The affixes themselves receive sentence stress: -ain(entertain),

-ee(refugee,trainee), -ese(Portugese, Japanese), -ique(unique),

-ette(cigarette, laundrette), -esque(picturesque), -eer(mountaineer),

-oo (bamboo), -oon (balloon

Exceptions: COffee, comMITtee, ENgine

The questions for this section are listed in the following table:

Unit 1: home life

Lesson A: reading

Rule: syllable nouns and adjectives have the stress on the first syllable, two-syllable verbs the stress on the second

1 A caring B attempt C pressure D running

Lesson B: Speaking

Rule: the suffix causes the stress to fall before the sound

1 A responsibility B supportive C mischevious D decision

2 A university B.responsible C security D biology

Lesson C: Listening

Rule: the suffix does not affect the word stress

2.A suitable B frankly C Personal D relationship

Lesson D: Writing

Rule: stress falls on long vowels, diphthongs, or endings with more than one

consonant

1.A relationship B caring C supportive D obedient 2.A suitable B important C decision D solution

Lesson E: language focus

Rule: stress does not fall on /ə/, /əu/

Unit 2: cultural diversity

Lesson A: reading

Rule: syllable nouns and adjectives have the stress on the first syllable, two-syllable verbs the stress on the second

Lesson B: Speaking

Rule: the suffix causes the stress to fall before the sound

1 A equality B generation C attractive D romantic

Lesson C: Listening

Rule: the suffix does not affect the word stress

1.A physical B Partnership C equally D attractiveness 2.A dependent B engagement C socially D significantly

Lesson D: Writing

Rule: stress falls on long vowels, diphthongs, or endings with more than one

consonant

Lesson E: language focus

Rule: stress does not fall on /ə/, /əu/

UNIT 3 WAYS OF SOCIALISING

Lesson A: reading

Rule: syllable nouns and adjectives have the stress on the first syllable, two-syllable verbs the stress on the second

Lesson B: Speaking

Rule: if all the sounds are short, the stress falls on the first syllable

Lesson C: Listening

Rule: stress falls on long vowels, diphthongs, or endings with more than one

consonant

1 A verbal B reasonable C marvelous D regulation

Lesson D: Writing

Rule: the suffix causes the stress to fall before the sound

1.A situation B expression C.permission D expensive

2.A interruption B terrific C admission D objection

Lesson E: language focus

Rule: the suffix does not affect the word stress

1.A waving B walking C pointing D.sucessful

2.A signal B social C.sailing D supposing

UNIT 4 SCHOOL EDUCATION SYSTEM

Lesson A: reading

Rule: syllable nouns and adjectives have the stress on the first syllable, two-syllable verbs the stress on the second

1 A subject B publish C crucial D systerm

Lesson B: Speaking

Rule: the suffix does not affect the word stress

1.A optional B lower C upper D.independent 2.A national B government C.generally D historical

Lesson C: Listening

Rule: the suffix causes the stress to fall before the sound

1 A mathematics B examination C Education D academic

2 A disruptive B essential C supportive D politics

Lesson D: Writing

Rule: stress falls on long vowels, diphthongs, or endings with more than one

consonant

1 A nursery B primary C translate D crucial

2 A increasing B statistics C juvenile D tearaway

Lesson E: language focus

Rule: stress does not fall on /ə/, /əu/

Unit 5: HIGHER EDUCATION

Lesson A: Reading

Rule: syllable nouns and adjectives have the stress on the first syllable, two-syllable verbs the stress on the second

1 A explain B parents C campus D scary

Lesson B: Speaking

Rule: the suffix causes the stress to fall before the sound

1 A information B.application C university D identity

2 A inflation B proportion C majority D examination

Lesson C: Listening

Rule: the suffix causes the stress to shift three syllables from the end

1 A certificate B identity C majority D organise

2 A organise B graduate C apologize D.modernize

Lesson D: writing

Rule: stress falls on long vowels, diphthongs, or endings with more than one

consonant

1 A scary B reason C tertiary D education

2 A.polite B supply C creative D application

Lesson E: language focus

Rule: the suffix does not affect the word stress

1.A demanding B engineering C requirement D.considerable 2.A geographical B engineering C evening D biological

Unit 6: FUTURE JOBS

Lesson A: Reading

Rule: syllable nouns and adjectives have the stress on the first syllable, two-syllable verbs the stress on the second.

1 A Nevous B stressful C honest D express

Lesson B: Speaking

Rule: the suffix does not affect the word stress

2.A boring B interesting C receptional D journalist

Lesson C: Listening

Rule: stress does not fall on /ə/, /əu/

1 A salary B teacher C economy D company