Lesson 3

Intonation, Speech Rate, & Projection

Explore

Activity 1: It’s Emotional

View the video below and determine what kind of emotion (s) or tone (s) is being expressed by the
speakers.

VIDEO

1. Flattering
2. Demanding
3. Worried/Annoyed
4. Relieved
5. Amazed

Activity 2: Speedster

Get your phone and prepare the sound recorder. Record yourself while reading the paragraph below.

Here is the perfect system for cleaning your room. First, move all of the items that do not
have a proper place to the center of the room. Get rid of at least five things that you have
not used within the last year. Take out all of the trash, and place all of the dirty dishes in
the kitchen sink. Now find a location for each of the items you had placed in the center of
the room. For any remaining items, see if you can squeeze them in under your bed or
stuff them into the back of your closet. See, that was easy!

After you’re done reading, check the duration of your recorded audio. Which of the following three
numbers is it closest to: 0:37, 0:45, or 0:58? Take note of your answer as it will be discussed later
on in the reading material.

Activity 3: Detective Work

View the video below and detect as many of its ineffective speech qualities as you can.

VIDEO

Now, if you listened to the audio, you may notice some of the qualities being pointed out in this
answer guide.

Answer Key:

- The speaker is not giving emphasis to words and phrases such as “did not” (which sounded like
“dinot”) and “rely on” (which sounded like “relied”).
- The speaker lacks placing emphasis on key clauses such as “they have become an essential part of
our society”.
- In the last part, the speaker was talking too fast.
- The speaker is too monotone.
- The speaker sounds too nasal (not properly projecting her voice).

Firm Up

Reading Material: Prosodic Features

Intonation
In our previous lesson, we discussed about pitch and volume. This topic is related to those aspects of
prosody. Intonation is the rising and falling of your voice when you speak. Its main use is to
communicate different emotions and allow you to avoid having a flat or monotone delivery of speech.
There are two basic kinds of intonation we will be discussing here: rising and falling intonation. In
rising intonation, you have to increase the pitch of your voice towards the end of your sentence or
clause while in falling intonation, you have to decrease the pitch towards the end. Let us go back to
the activity we had earlier. Re-watch the video and see the rising/falling intonation of those sentences
below.

As you can notice, we use rising intonation for yes/no questions, offers, and enumerations. On the
other hand, we use falling intonation for statements, wh-questions, commands, invitations, ends of
enumerations, and exclamations.

Speech Rate
The term Speech Rate refers to the speed at which something is said. WPM (Words Per Minute) is the
unit of measurement being used here. A person's speech rate refers to how quickly or slowly they
talk. Along with loudness and pitch, rate is a part of speech's paralanguage which goes along with
everything you say and can express mood and sentiment. Based on the feelings you're experiencing or
the type of message you're sending, you can change the pace of your speech. For example when you
are happy, you will speak quickly, while when you are surprised, you will speak even faster. You
normally talk at a rate of around 125 words per minute. If you're giving a slide show, though, you
should talk at a much slower pace of about 100 words per minute.

When communicating, you can speak at a variety of speeds to highlight key points in your message.
You will also choose to adjust the rate depending on the message's mood or sentiment, as well as the
occasion. When you're speaking at a pep rally, you'll automatically talk louder than if you're speaking
at a wake, where you'll naturally speak slowly whether you're depressed or contemplative. Of course,
when you are nervous, you will tend to speak too fast (or too slow, depending on how mood affects
your speech rate as a person). You may also be speaking faster than the average person. In order to
determine whether you are too much of a fast-talker or a slow-talker, you can get a recorder and
check your average words per minute. You can check your speech rate in this website
https://debatrix.com/en/tools/speech-calculator/.

The activity earlier lets you do exactly this. Now, what was your result? If you got something near
0:37, then you are a fast talker. If you got something near 0:45, you have an average speaking rate. If
you got something near 0:58 then you are a slow talker. However, you may have adjusted your
speech rate based on the content of the paragraph you read. That paragraph is an instructional
paragraph that is probably directed at teenagers, and thus, a normal speech rate is in order. You may
have even adjusted your speech rates throughout reading. If you did this, then you are already an
expert in terms of speech rate.
Projection
The power of speech or singing while the voice is used forcefully and distinctly is known as voice
projecting. It's a tactic that can be used to demand recognition and attention, such as when a teacher
addresses the students, or just to be heard distinctly, as an actor in a theater. Proper breathing
technique is crucial for effective speech projection. Unlike regular speech, which uses air from the top
of the lungs, a correctly projected voice uses air streaming from the diaphragm expansion.
Maintaining vocal projection requires well-balanced respiration, which is particularly necessary in
effective vocal technique. The aim is to separate and relax the muscles that regulate the vocal folds so
that stress does not affect them.

For a clearer and more detailed instruction about how to train yourself to have proper voice
projection, watch these two helpful Youtube videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NFzQISvWe4&t=4s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYsY9hcykeg

Now, let’s return to the video in Activity 3. Observe how different it is to this video with the same
speech content but different delivery.

VIDEO 2

Deepen

Activity 4: Speedtuations

Identify what kind of speech rate is needed for the following situations (fast, slow, or moderate) and
write your own explanation about why this is the needed rate.

1. Amber is giving instructions to kindergarten children on how to make a paper bird origami.
2. Kaeya is telling a joke at a party where everyone is in the mood to have fun.
3. Albedo is providing easy cooking instructions to his fast-learning sibling Klee.
4. Jean is getting to the part of her speech which will be crucial in strengthening her organization's
public relations.
5. Noelle is comforting Amber for the loss of her pet bunny.
6. Ningguang is trying to get the attention of the public by telling them to gather at the stage where
she will make a speech.
7. Childe is calling the ambulance and explaining what happened at the scene of the accident.
8. Bennett is telling his order of five types of food to a server at a very busy restaurant.

Activity 5: Up and Down

1. Where do you want to go next?

2. Let’s get moving. We’re not frozen in place
3. Please go to the market and buy me crabs, lemons, and cheese.
4. Do you want to borrow my ballpen?
5. Coco, what are you doing? Stop chewing on that chocolate!

Transfer
Activity 6: Radio Play

Look at the objects presented below. Choose any one of these images. Create a 1-minute dialogue in
which you act as two characters talking about a topic related to the image. Record an audio of this
self-made dialogue. Make sure to emphasize speech rate, intonation, and voice projection.