Pronunciation as one of the Speaking Section Assessment Criteria is often the most misunderstood (not understood in detail) area of the IELTS Speaking test. Most students generally understand and satisfy other criteria – Fluency & Coherence, Lexical Resource, and Grammar , but fail to understand and enhance pronunciation features practically. And just because of less score in pronunciation criterion, their overall score is rounded down to 5.5/ 6.5, which makes it harder to meet band 6 or 7 requirements to apply abroad. So let’s learn about the pronunciation criterion of the IELTS Speaking Section.
There are four features in the pronunciation criterion which students need to master to get a 7 or a higher bandscore. These include Word Stress, Sentence Stress, Intonation, and Chunking.
1. Word stress
Word stress is stressing certain syllables of a word when talking. E.g. caPAcity, CHIna, etc. Stressing the wrong syllable can make the pronunciation of a word and the meaning of a sentence unclear. Remember, the word stress of a certain word changes in different parts of the word family. E.g., PHOtograph, phoTOgraphy, photoGRAphic.
2. Sentence stress
Sentence stress in speaking is the stress given to a particular word or words to emphasize them in a whole sentence. We speak slightly louder when we say that specific word we want to focus on.
With sentence stress in English speaking, in a complete sentence, we stress certain words, while other words are spoken quickly. To illustrate this, for questions in Part 1 of the Speaking Test, we are mostly asked about our likes and dislikes- e.g. ‘What is your favourite food?’. When the candidate tells the answer, he has to emphasize the name of the food – ‘My favourite food is –PIZZA–.’ When he says ‘PIZZA,’ he has to focus on the word, speak slightly louder and give a short silence before and after that word. This way of talking is how we provide sentence stress. Most students answer questions like this in one straight flow, without focusing on any words, which will cost you a lower score in the pronunciation criterion.
During your talk in Part 2 and 3, there will be certain words that you might want to emphasize to add more meaning to the talk. Therefore, you should consider sentence stress throughout the whole speaking test.
3. Intonation
Intonation is the change in the pitch of your voice when you talk. Your voice goes high and low when you express different feelings in your native language, but students give a monotonous speech when speaking in English. Pay attention to how robots talk, see how Siri and Google assistant talk on your mobile phone. They speak in a flat tone without any change in the tone of their voice. This way of speaking is called monotone pitch.
There is a high and low tone in the voice of a natural English speaker. Students who memorize answers often deliver the speeches in a flat tone in the IELTS Speaking test, and examiners are trained to find memorized answers from students. If there is no intonation in your speech, it will have a negative impact on your score.
4. Chunking
Chunking is speaking groups of words together with short silences in between. Most students talk as if they have just started to learn to read a book. E.g.,– ‘Many. News. Reporters. Are. Writing. Fake. News. These. Days. This way of speaking is speaking an individual word at a time. You are not chunking words here. Instead, you should talk like this –’ Many news reporters’ (3-4 words together) – short silence – ‘are writing fake news these days’ (5-6 words together). Consider chunking words next time you practice English speaking.
About the Author
Merina is an experienced English Tutor, Exam Trainer and Head of the IELTS Teaching Department at BeatMockTest. Merina is also a Freelance Examiner and Materials Reviewer for IELTS Resources.