Importance of intonation in IELTS listening and speaking tests

What is intonation?

Intonation in English refers to the rising and falling of the pitch, stress patterns, and rhythm in the spoken language. We can express and indicate the real meaning of our context via shock, surprise, doubt, excitement, etc. It also plays an integral part in preparing for IELTS’s speaking and listening segments. Twenty-five percent of the scores depend on how well you balance good pronunciation and intonation.

Intonation, often referred to as ‘the music of language’, is a crucial skill for the IELTS listening test. In section three, you’ll be tasked with identifying the speaker’s mood based on their speech patterns. This element adds a human touch to communication, enhancing clarity, effectiveness, and precision in expressing ideas. Conversely, misuse can lead to misunderstandings, even when the words themselves imply a different meaning.

Patterns of intonation

Now that we understand the meaning and its relation to IELTS speaking and listening let us understand the crucial patterns in which it occurs. It is broken down into unique patterns like rising, falling, and fall-rise. Here is how they work.

Rising intonation (↗)

This is generally used when we question something and expect the answer to be either a ‘yes’ or a ‘no.’ Below are the example

examples for reference –

• Yes or No based questions:
  • Q- Are you ↗Indian↗?
  • Q- Can you speak ↗Hindi↗?

• Questions that clarify what you have heard:
  • Q- Do you mean those reports that you sent me yesterday?
  • A- ↗Yes↗, precisely those!
  • Q- Would you recommend taking public transport in Delhi?
  • A- ↗Yes↗ totally!

• Statements that include lists:
  • Q- How many pets do you have?
  • A- I have four pets, two ↗dogs↗ and two ↗birds↗ in cages. Though I am also thinking of getting an aquarium soon!

Falling intonation (↘)

This typically uses wh-questions like Who, Where, When, What, Why, Whose, Which, and other questions beginning with ‘How.’ The tone in such questions tends to fall at the end of the questions like –

• What is the capital city of your ↘country↘?
• Who do you respect the ↘most↘?
• How do you manage all the ↘ work↘?

Fall-rise intonation

This is used in complex sentences where a person may have both rising and falling intonation. These changes may occur at the end of a clause and before the beginning of the following clause. They are of the best use when you draw a comparison or contrast in your speech. Examples are given below –

• Despite the long working ↗hours↘, it is still crucial to focus on self-care and maintain a healthy work-life balance.
• I never visit flea marks, even though they are so ↗affordable↘.

Significance of intonation in IELTS listening and speaking tests

As previously mentioned, intonation, often termed the music of language, infuses sentences with depth and emotion. In the IELTS speaking and listening tests, proficiency in English is gauged not only through proper pronunciation but also by this critical element of speech. The following details the key roles this factor plays in enhancing your performance in the IELTS speaking and listening test.

Adds a grammatical touch

It has a grammatical function that allows you to pause, emphasize, contrast, and intone stress on the required words in a sentence. It works like punctuation in writing and guides the readers or listeners in interpreting and understanding a sentence’s meaning.

Emphasize keywords

It helps emphasize words and focus on specific meanings in a sentence. Thereby stress and intonation go hand in hand and allow the listeners or readers to comprehend the context easily. It is commonly found in sentences where you share information, answer a question or express meanings.

Express emotions and attitudes

The IELTS board assesses whether you can effectively communicate your ideas in English while expressing relevant emotions and attitudes in your speech. Intonation allows you to do just that. It reveals the speaker’s mood, emotions, and attitude, which helps you ace your IELTS listening test.

Communicate ideas

Your speaking test requires you to communicate your ideas effectively with the right pauses, emphasis, and pronunciation. While communicating an idea, the pitch of your voice rises as you begin and lowers as you finish, which is sometimes difficult to follow. Intonation, therefore, helps break more extended ideas into smaller and more manageable speech groups, which also helps the listener to understand and comprehend.

Remember ideas

You may only remember what was being conveyed with intonation in a sentence. It makes an idea easier to understand, remember, and convey to others, helping you score high on your IELTS listening test. When you understand pauses, emphasis, and frequent breaks in a sentence, you tend to remember it for long.

Express identities

It expresses your personal, social, and cultural identities through language. It is expected that non-native speakers face the additional challenge of learning pitch patterns and understanding the cultural context associated with it. Therefore, it is necessary to express such cultural references with confidence.

Key takeaways

Acing IELTS listening and speaking tests requires a thorough understanding of intonation. Understanding and mastering this art is vital to carve your English proficiency and score high on tests.

• Intonation is the phenomenon of rising and falling of the pitch and rhythm in the spoken language. It allows the listeners to understand the speaker’s emotions, attitudes, and ideas.
• It can be understood with its elective patterns of occurrence like rising intonation, falling, and fall-rise intonation.
• Adding intonation in the IELTS speaking and listening test is helpful as it allows you to be grammatically correct, emphasize keywords, express emotions and ideas, and more.
• It also helps you remember ideas for your IELTS listening tests and lets you showcase your cultural identity via the right tone and pronunciation.

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FAQs

1. Is using intonation necessary in the IELTS speaking and listening test?

Answer: Yes, intonation is an integral part of speech; it is simply impossible to understand the thoughts and expressions of a speaker.

2. Where are intonations commonly used in IELTS listening and speaking?

Answer: Some familiar intonations used in IELTS speaking and listening are generally in statements, questions, incomplete sentences, doubts, emotions, and incomplete sentences.

3. How to comprehend the intonation of a speaker in IELTS listening?

Answer: To comprehend intonation in IELTS listening, you must actively listen to the pitch of the speaker’s voice and analyze the pauses, emphasis, and highs and lows in the pitch.