Introduction to Intonation

Welcome to today's class and I have an interesting topic in English Language I want to teach here.

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Definition of Intonation
Intonation refers to the the variation in the rise and fall of the voice in speech. It is the variation in pitch during utterance.
The falling tone shows that the speaker is certain while the rising tone suggest doubts.

The fall and rise of the voice in speech results in two (2) types of tones in English, they are falling tune and the rising tune.

1 The falling tune; The falling tune is used to express statements, exclamations, commands and questions, specifically questions which begin with wh-words called wh-questions such as who, where, what, which, why and when. It is falling tune because it starts on a high level from the first stressed syllable and then falls gradually till the end of the last stressed syllable. Examples;
A Statement(a) There goes the man.

B Command(a) Don't disturb me.

C Wh-questions(a) Who are you?

D Exclamations(a) What a mess this is!

2 The rising tune; The rising tune is used for polar questions. These are questions that requires "Yes/No"for an answer.

The rising tune is also used for making polite requests.

It is also used with question tags which suggest that there is something more to be said e.g You are going to see him.Aren't you?
All the question tags used in the rising tune are used to show that the speaker expects a response from the listener.

The rising tune is also used for listening of items until the speaker comes to the last item e.g The boy closed the door,parked the refuse and burnt them.

To rap it up, intonation is an important aspect in English Language which one has to converse with it because it is used on daily basis especially when it has to with dialogue.

You are free to ask questions where you don't understand properly but for now, see you in the next class.