(Video Transcript)
OK, that guy is boring.
Have you ever been told that you sound boring when you speak? Or have you noticed that people tend to look disinterested whenever you give a presentation at work? You could have perfect pronunciation of every vowel and consonant in American English, but if you sound boring, then you’re not going to be effective as an English speaker.
So what’s the best way to not sound boring when you speak? Use appropriate intonation in your speech. Your voice should sound exciting when you’re excited, and sad when you’re sad.
But it’s not that easy to learn American English intonation, especially for non-native speakers, because it’s difficult to hear the intonation in someone’s voice, and then to imitate that intonation.
Well, I’ve got you covered! In this video, you’re going to learn three super effective techniques that will help you become a pro at American English intonation.
How to learn American English Intonation: 3 Techniques
Here’s technique number one. We think of intonation as something we say and something we hear, but it’s also something we can see with our eyes. How is that possible, you might ask. Well, take a look at this:
This is the intonation of this sentence.
I’ll play that again. Watch the cursor as it follows the intonation of my voice.
This is the intonation of this sentence.
By combining what you hear, the auditory information, with what you see, the visual information, you can teach your brain how to understand the intonation of native speakers AND how to imitate the intonation of native speakers. It’s a very simple technique, but it’s very effective at teaching intonation.
In addition to drawing the intonation that you hear, you should use technique number two: loop the audio that you’re trying to imitate, so you hear just one section of the audio over and over again. If you’re trying to imitate a long speech, you’ll need to break up the speech into smaller chunks, no longer than five to seven seconds. Loop that small chunk of audio so you hear it ten times in a row. This looping technique will train your brain to hear the melody of the voice. Your brain will actually treat this chunk of audio as a song. Hum along to the melody, just like you would if you were singing a song on the radio while driving to work.
The third intonation-learning technique is to play the audio in slow motion. The voice can change its pitch and intonation within a split second, and just the slightest lift of the voice can have huge implications on the meaning of your message. It doesn’t take much intonation at all to entirely change the meaning of a word.
So listening to someone’s intonation in slow motion gives you the time to hear those small changes. Slow down the playback speed to fifty percent if you can, and play this slowed down version of the audio on a loop until you can sing along to the melody. Then slowly speed it back up to normal speed. Many students skip this part, and their intonation skills suffer as a result.
Are these three techniques time-consuming to implement? Yes, they are, especially when you are first learning how to use these techniques. But if you want your imitation and intonation skills to improve, then this is how you do it. There aren’t any short cuts. You’re going to have to work at it, but I hope you’ll have fun in the process. All of your hard work WILL be worth it!
So let’s practice imitating the intonation of native speakers using these techniques. I have audio recordings of three native speakers saying three different common phrases in English. We’ll analyze the intonation of each speaker using the three techniques I’ve described so far: drawing out the intonation, playing the audio in a loop, and playing the audio in slow motion.
I want you to get a pen and paper and complete the analysis with me. This is the type of practice you should be doing when learning intonation, and there’s no better time than now to start practicing!
First I’ll show you the script. Pause this video for a few minutes so you can copy it. Then we’ll complete the analysis together.
Intonation Practice #1
Here’s the first phrase:
The first phrase is “I’m so happy to meet you!” To help me play the audio, I’m using Audacity, but you can use any audio program you’d like, just as long as you can loop the audio and adjust the playback speed.
I’ve looped this audio ten times. Let’s listen to it, and while we listen to it, I want you to hum or sing along with the melody of the person’s voice. Don’t focus on the words or the pronunciation; just focus on the intonation.
Did you hear her intonation? All of it? Before we draw it out, let’s listen to it in slow motion and see if that helps us to hear the intonation even better. Remember to continue singing along with the melody of her voice.
Did you hear it that time?
Let’s try drawing out the intonation, and I’ll play the audio in slow motion to make sure that we’re doing it right.
I hear her start out relatively low and flat - I’m, I’m, I’m. Her intonation is flat on the word “I’m”.
Then she jumps up on the word “so”, “so, so, so” - her intonation is much higher here.
Then her intonation goes down in a stepwise fashion on each syllable until she gets to the end of the sentence.
And on the final word, “you”, her intonation continues to glide down, “you, you, you”. This final glide down in pitch is really important - it happens a lot in spoken English.
Now I’ll play the looped recording again, but this time you’ll hear the regular speed. Imitate after you hear it.
“I’m so happy to meet you!”
Intonation Practice #2
Here’s the second phrase:
Let’s do the same thing with the second phrase, “You’ve gotta be kidding me!”
I’ll play the looped audio at normal speed, and I want you to hum or sing along with the melody of the person’s voice. Don’t focus on the words or the pronunciation; just focus on the intonation.
This one was a little harder, wasn’t it? He’s talking faster than the first speaker, so his intonation just zooms by. This is why listening to the audio in slow motion is so helpful. Let’s do that now. Sing along to the intonation if you can.
Did you hear his intonation that time?
Let’s draw out the intonation that he uses, and I’ll play the audio in slow motion to help us out.
I hear him start out with flat intonation on the first word “you’ve” - “you’ve, you’ve, you’ve” - he uses the same pitch on this single-syllable word.
Then he jumps up quite a bit on the next word, “got”, and he reads the phrase “got to” as “gotta”, which is very common in spoken English. So the first syllable, “gah”, has high intonation, and the next syllable, “duh” is lower. “Gotta, gotta, gotta.”
The next word, “be” is even lower in intonation, “be, be, be”. It’s unstressed, so he says it with the lowest intonation of the sentence.
His intonation jumps back up on the first syllable of the next word, “kidding”. “Kidding, kidding, kidding.”
“Me, me, me” - He sort of lands on the word “me” with low intonation, and he glides his voice down slightly as he says “me” and dips into a glottal fry at the end. “Me, me, me”. This type of glottal fry is also common in American English intonation. “Me, me, me.”
Now I’ll play the looped recording again, but this time you’ll hear the regular speed. Imitate after you hear it.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me!”
Intonation Practice #3
And here’s the third phrase:
Let’s start with the looped recording at normal speed. Focus on the intonation only, not the words, and sing along to the melody if you can.
This is another fast one! How did you do? Did you correctly identify the speaker’s intonation? If you did, that’s great! But for most of you, you’ll need to hear it in slow motion to make sure you’re correct. Here’s the slow mo recording; sing along to the melody if you can.
Let’s draw out the intonation that he uses, and I’ll play the slowed down version of his audio to help us out.
I hear him start out with flat and high intonation on the first words “Take it or” - “take it or, take it or, take it or” - He’s quite high here, and he stays on the same pitch for all three words.
Then he jumps down quite a bit on the next word, “leave”, and his voice glides down slightly on the vowel. “Leave, leave, leave, leave”. This glide in intonation is very subtle, and it’s possible you missed it the first few times you heard this sentence. I’ll play just the word “leave” in slow motion; can you hear the glide?
The last word, “it” is even lower in intonation, “it, it, it”, and his voice drops into a glottal fry as he glides down in intonation. “It, it, it.”
Now I’ll play the looped recording again, but this time you’ll hear the regular speed. Imitate after you hear it.
“Take it or leave it!”
Thanks for completing this intonation practice along with me, using my top three intonation-learning techniques: drawing out the intonation that you hear, playing the audio in a loop, and listening to the audio in slow motion.
Yes, these techniques can take a little bit of time to use, but it will be time well spent. These techniques will completely transform your American English intonation skills!
Thanks for watching, and have a great day!
