Pronunciation with Wlodek Barbosa

[Włodzimierz Sobkowiak]

Tonight we practiced stress patterns of 4-syllable words: first with the homework notecard (40 most common 4-syllable words in English), then with an activity (Get'm'all - collecting words with given stress patterns from other players - see player one notecard below), finally with the finder game (the finder will locate a wooden cone if a word is typed with the proper stress pattern - go to my launchroom to try this one). The 4-syllable level turned out to be a good choice. Three syllables would have been too easy with my students :-) To have more challenge we're going to try 5 syllables next time!


Get them all! (word-stress game; 4 syllables) - player 1
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(C) Wlodek Barbosa

In this game you'll practice stress patterns of some 4-syllable words in English; only words with primary stress are used here, no compounds. With one stress and four syllables, there are logically four combinations of stressed/unstressed syllables: Oooo, oOoo, ooOo and oooO. There are altogether 36 common words. Each player gets a notecard with 9 words of varying stress patterns. The patterns are shown next to the words. S/he must collect from the other players the remaining words and categorize them according to their stress pattern. At the bottom of each notecard all words are properly categorized (so do not look there before you finish!).

Words for player 1
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ability oOoo
agriculture Oooo
altogether ooOo
aluminium ooOo
automobile Oooo
available oOoo
catamaran oooO
caterpillar Oooo
community oOoo
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36 4-syllable words, categorized according to their stress pattern
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oooO
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catamaran
entrepreneur
hullabaloo
misunderstand
overreact
superintend

ooOo
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altogether
aluminium
conversation
expedition
independent
individual
manufacture
mathematics
revolution
situation

oOoo
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ability
available
community
diameter
equivalent
experiment
identify
particular
society
variety

Oooo
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agriculture
automobile
caterpillar
dictionary
military
necessary
ordinary
secretary
television
territory


Some hard words:
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caterpillar - a small creature like a worm with many legs that eats leaves and that develops into a butterfly or other flying insect
superintend - to be in charge of something, and control how it is done
hullabaloo - a lot of noise, especially made by people shouting
catamaran - a sailing boat with two separate hulls