IMPROVING VOCAL DELIVERY AND

CLARITY IN SPEECHDr Vandana Lunyal

DirectorRegional Institute of English

IMPROVING VOCAL DELIVERY AND CLARITY IN SPEECH

Objectives

• to understand speech sounds, stress rhythm and intonation to acquire a good pronunciation of English

• to appreciate how stress, rhythm and intonation • improve vocal delivery and clarity in speech;• change the meaning of a word, sentence or a

message

Communication

Communication

Vocal DeliveryVocal delivery includes components of speech delivery that relate to your voice• rate, • volume, • pitch, • articulation, • pronunciation, and • fluency

Our voice is important to consider when speaking:

• vocal delivery can help us engage and interest the audience.• vocal delivery helps ensure that our ideas are communicated clearly.

Rate of speaking

Rate of speaking : how fast or slow you speak.

Speaking too fast: • disadvantage: your audience will not be able to absorb the information

you present. • advantage: signals enthusiasm in the speaker about his or her topic.

Speaking too slow: • disadvantage: • the audience may lose interest. • lead the audience to infer that the speaker is uninterested, uninformed, or

unprepared to present his or her own topic.

Objective: speak at a rate that will interest the audience and will effectively convey your information. The key of good delivery

• vary your rate of speaking in a middle range, • staying away from either extreme, in order to keep your audience

engaged.

Volume of SpeakingVolume : how loud or soft your voice is. Avoid the extremes of being too loud or too soft Vary your volume within an acceptable middle rangeSpeaking situation:

• one to one interaction: just loud enough that the other person is able to hear

• typically sized room or office setting with capacity of 25- volume a few steps above a typical conversational volume is usually sufficient.

• larger rooms- there will be need to project your voice.

look for nonverbal cues from people in the back rows or corners, like leaning forward or straining to hear, to see if you need to adjust your volume more.

• audiences use volume to make a variety of judgments about a speaker. Softer speakers: judged as meek, which may lead to lowered expectations from the speech or less perceived credibility.

• Loud speakers: judged as overbearing or annoying, leading audience members to disengage from the speaker and message.

Pitch of SpeakingPitch of speaking: how high or low a speaker’s voice is.

• People have natural variations in their vocal pitch. • People have more physiological limitations on the control over pitch• Each person has the capability to intentionally change their pitch

across a range large enough to engage an audience. • Changing pitch can communicate enthusiasm, emphasis or closure.

In general, our pitch goes up when we are discussing something exciting. Our pitch goes down slightly when we emphasize a serious or important point.

Lowering pitch is also an effective way to indicate transitions between sections of your speech or the end of your speech, which also has an impact on your audience reaction. for example: applauding at the end.

Vocal variety Vocal variety includes changes in your

• rate, • volume, and • pitch

It can make you sound more prepared, seem more credible, and be able to engage your audience better.

• Employing vocal variety is neither a god -gift nor does it need advanced skills training. • It comes with little awareness and practice. • Everyone can do it.

Be aware of how you use your voice when you speak (and the best way to do this is to record yourself.)

In our regular conversations, we use enough vocal variety naturally

We think that this tendency will translate over to our speaking voices.

Speaking for clarityTo be an effective speaker

• your audience should be able to understand your message • digest the information you present.

Audience judge the competence and credibility of speaker on how they speakMany people are not aware that they have habits of speech that interfere with their message clarity. Most of our conversations are

• informal • take place with people we know,

People don’t make a concerted effort to articulate every word clearly and pronounce every word correctly, and most of the people we talk to either don’t notice our errors or don’t correct us if they do notice.

Public speaking: Emphasis on clarity of our speech.

Articulation Articulation : Clarity of sounds and words we produce.

• Articulate people speak words clearly, and • Speakers should strive to speak clearly.

Poor articulation results when speakers do not speak clearly. For example, a person may say

• dinnt instead of didn’t, • gonna instead of going to, • wanna instead of want to, or • hunnerd instead of hundred

Two main impediments to good articulation:• Unawareness• Laziness

Most people are unaware that they regularly have errors in articulation. Recording yourself speak and then becoming a higher self-monitor are effective ways to improve your articulation.

Laziness, on the other hand, requires a little more motivation to address.

Mumbling and slurring are examples of poor articulation. In informal settings, this type of speaking may be acceptable, but in formal settings, it will be negatively evaluated.

PronunciationPronunciation: Speaking words correctly, including the proper sounds of the letters and the proper emphasis.

Mispronouncing words lead to gaps in meaning can damage a speaker’s credibilityThe word Pronunciation is commonly mispronounced, saying “pro-NOUN-ciation” instead of “pro-NUN-ciation.”

In such a case, it would not be unwarranted for the audience to question the speaker’s expertise on the subject.

We make many kind of mistakes in pronunciation.

Most common is that of word stress.

Features of Word Accent

• It’s longer.• It’s louder.• It’s clearer.• It has a higher pitch.• It involves more movement of your

mouth and lips to make the sound

Word stress

• Word accent or stress is the relative degree of prominence with which different syllables of a word are pronounced.

For example:1. pro-mi-nent 1st syllable is accented

2. per-cieve 2nd syllable is accented

3. in-ca-pa-ci-tate 1st & 3rd syllables are accented

4. pro-nun-ci-a-tion 2nd & 4th syllables are accented

Noun/Adjective Verb'absent ab'sent'object ob'ject'conflict con'flict'desert de'sert'record re'cord

Commonly Mispronounced Words

ClothesThis word has only one syllable, the ‘e’ is silent and the ‘s’ makes a ‘zzz’ sound. Be careful not to say ‘clothe iz’.ColleagueThis word only has two syllables ‘koh-leeg’. Make sure not to pronounce the ‘ue’ on the end. When it’s a plural, the ‘s’ makes a ‘zzz’ sound like in ‘clothes’.FebruaryMany people have trouble pronouncing English words which have two ‘r’ sounds close together. Make sure to pronounce both ‘r’ sounds: Feb-roo-a-ree, not Feb-yoo-a-ree. Similarly, ‘library’ should be pronounced ‘li-bra-ri’.AthleteBe careful to avoid adding extra syllables in the middle of words. For example, make sure there are only two syllables in ‘athlete’: ath-leet, not ath-a-leet.Escape and especiallyPutting an extra ‘x’ sound in words with ‘es’ is a common mistake in English. Make sure to say ‘escape’ and ‘especially’ rather than ‘excape’ or ‘expecially’.WednesdayWatch out for silent letters. In the ‘Wednesday’, the ‘d’ is silent. The word is pronounced ‘wenz-day’.PrescriptionIf you go to the doctor, he or she might give you a prescription to take to the pharmacist so you can buy any medicine you need. Sometimes people mix up the ‘re’ with ‘er’ and say ‘per-scrip-tion’ instead of pronouncing it correctly as ‘pre-scrip-tion’.Ask/deskMixing up the ‘s’ and ‘k’ in ‘ask’ is a very common mistake that many native-speakers make. Make sure to say ‘ask’ not ‘ax’ so that it sounds correct to people all over the world.NuclearAgain, this is a word where people often get confused about the order of the sounds and pronounce it ‘nu-cu-lar’. Remember to get the sounds in the correct order and pronounce it ‘nuc-lee-ar’.

Some moreneighbouraccessorychaoscachecoupcupboarddebrisextemporehyperboleespresso

Some other Reasons for lack of clarity

(hesitation during conversation)

1. Embarrassment

2. Unwillingness to be specific

3. Unwillingness to answer a question

4. Unwillingness to reveal one’s true reaction

5. Unwillingness to take up an opposite point of view in order not to offend

6. Uncertainty about a following phrase of number or measurement

7. Changing the trends of one’s ideas or their order

8. Collecting one’s thought before speaking

9. Not knowing how to express a delicate personal question

10. Not knowing how the following suggestion or statement will be received

ActivityI like tea

ActivityI asked you to buy me a bunch of white roses

Thank you