Module _: Basic English

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Table of Contents
1. Introduction ...............................................................................................................................3
a. English is the Language of global communication............................................................................ 3
b. English is the Language of Business .................................................................................................. 3
2. Basics of English Language ..........................................................................................................4
3. Basic Parts of Speech ..................................................................................................................5
• Conjunctions ...................................................................................................................................... 5
• Articles............................................................................................................................................... 5
4. Punctuations ..............................................................................................................................6
• Capitalization .................................................................................................................................... 6
• Colons ................................................................................................................................................ 6
• Semicolons ........................................................................................................................................ 6
• Parentheses ....................................................................................................................................... 6
• Apostrophes ...................................................................................................................................... 7
5. Sentence Construction ................................................................................................................7
a. Simple or Declarative Sentence: ....................................................................................................... 7
b. Command and Imperative Sentence: ................................................................................................ 7
c. Question or Interrogative Sentence: ................................................................................................. 7
d. Exclamatory Sentence:...................................................................................................................... 7
6. Tenses ........................................................................................................................................8
a. Simple Present Tense: ....................................................................................................................... 8
b. Simple Past Tense:............................................................................................................................. 8
c. Simple Future Tense: ......................................................................................................................... 8
d. Present Perfect Tense: ....................................................................................................................... 9
e. Past Perfect Tense: ............................................................................................................................ 9
f. Future Perfect Tense: ........................................................................................................................ 9
g. Present Continuous Tense: ................................................................................................................ 9
h. Past Continuous Tense: ................................................................................................................... 10
i. Future Continuous Tense:................................................................................................................ 10
j. Present Perfect Continuous Tense:.................................................................................................. 10
k. Past Perfect Continuous Tense: ....................................................................................................... 10
l. Future Perfect Continuous Tense: ................................................................................................... 10

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7. Pronunciation ........................................................................................................................... 12
Patterns of stressed and unstressed syllables ..................................................................................... 13
Chapter 2. Consonants ............................................................................................................................ 16
a. Single consonants............................................................................................................................ 16
b. Consonant clusters ...................................................................................................................... 19
a. Single vowels ............................................................................................................................... 20
b. Diphthongs .................................................................................................................................. 21

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MODULE _____: Basic English
1. Introduction
In today’s global world, knowing English is almost a mandate. Let us try and
analyze, why it is so important to know English.

English is the language of science, of aviation, computers, diplomacy, and tourism.

Knowing English increases your chances of getting a good job in a multinational
company within your home country or for finding work abroad. It’s also the
language of international communication, the media and the internet, so learning
English is important for socializing and entertainment as well as work!

a. English is the Language of global communication

English may not be the most spoken language in the world, but it is the
official language of 53 countries and spoken by around 400 million people
across the globe. Being able to speak English is not just about being able to
communicate with native English speakers, it is the most common second
language in the world. If you want to speak to someone from another
country, then the chances are that you will both be speaking English to do
this. The British Council projects that by 2020 two billion people in the
world will be studying English. Learning English is important as it enables
you to communicate easily with your fellow global citizens.

b. English is the Language of Business

English is the dominant business language and it has become almost a
necessity for people to speak English if they are to enter a global workforce.
Research from all over the world shows that cross-border business

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 communication is most often conducted in English and many international
companies expect employees to be fluent in English.

Therefore, learning English is probably no more an option but more of a mandate.

The question is where to start.

The Foundation of English language lies in understanding grammar and sentence

construction. Therefore, in this module, emphasis has been given on these two
aspects of English Learning.

2. Basics of English Language

Like any other language, the foundation of English language lies in constructing
sentences. The aim of these sentences is to express something as clearly as
possible. Therefore, it is important to start understanding the basic aspect that a
sentence comprises of.

Basic to any language is the sentence, which expresses a complete thought and
consists of a subject and a predicate

• The subject is the star of the sentence; the person, animal, or thing that is
the focus of it.
• The predicate will tell the action that the subject is taking or tell something
about the subject.
These subjects and predicates are then weaved with another aspect to complete
a sentence which is the Basic Parts of Speech.

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3. Basic Parts of Speech
Following comprises the basic parts of speech:

• A noun names a person, animal, place, thing, quality, idea, activity, or

feeling. A noun can be singular, plural, or possessive.
• A verb shows action and can be a main verb or a helping verb, like "were"
or "has." Verbs also indicate tense and sometimes change their form to
show past, present, or future tense. Linking verbs link the subject to the
rest of the sentence and examples are: "appear" and "seem."
• An adjective modifies a noun or a pronoun. It adds meaning by telling
which one, what kind, or describing it in other ways.
• An adverb will modify a verb and tell more about it, like how much, when,
where, why, or how.
• A preposition shows a relationship between nouns or pronouns. It is often
used with a noun to show location, like "beside," "in," or "on". It can also
show time, direction, motion, manner, reason, or possession.
• Conjunctions connect two words, phrases, or clauses. Common
conjunctions are "and", "but", and "or."

Mention needs to be made about other types of words that are considered by
some to be parts of speech.

• One of them is the interjection. It shows emotion and examples are

"hurray", "uh-oh", and "alas."
• Articles are very useful little words. Indefinite articles are "a" and "an" and
"the" is a definite article.

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4. Punctuations
Another aspect of a sentence which is very important, is punctuation. It provides
the right amount of pause to a sentence, thus helping it to reflect the actual
meaning that the sentence tries to convey. Some basics of punctuation rules are
as follows:

• Capitalization is important. All sentences must start with a capital, or

upper-case, letter. Titles of people, books, magazines, movies, specific
places, etc. are capitalized. Organizations and compass points are
capitalized.
• Every sentence needs a punctuation mark at the end of it. These include a
period, exclamation mark, or question mark.
• Colons are used to separate a sentence from a list of items, to introduce a
long, direct quote, or between two sentences (or clauses) when the second
one explains the first.
• Semicolons can take the place of a conjunction and are placed before
introductory words like "therefore" or "however." They are also used to
separate a list of things if there are commas within each unit.
• There are a lot of rules for commas. The basic ones are that commas
separate things in a series and go wherever there is a pause in the
sentence. They surround the name of a person being addressed, separate
the day of the month from the year in a date, and separate a town from the
state.
• Parentheses enclose things that clarify or numbers and letters that are part
of a list.

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 • Apostrophes are used in contractions to take the place of one or more
letters and also to show possession. An apostrophe and "s" is added if the
noun is singular and an apostrophe alone is added if the noun is plural.

5. Sentence Construction
The subject and the predicate when combined with the correct parts of speech
and punctuations, forms a complete sentence. Such sentences can be of different
kinds which are as follows:

a. Simple or Declarative Sentence: These sentences are used to state

information. They are the most commonly used sentence type. Most
academic writing employs simple or declarative sentences. Declarative
sentences end with a period.

For example: Research on the topic suggests that grammar is essential to

success.

b. Command and Imperative Sentence: These sentences give commands or

make requests. Imperative sentences end with a period.

For example: Open the window.

c. Question or Interrogative Sentence: These sentences ask questions.

Accordingly, they end with a question mark.

For example: Did you complete the assignment?

d. Exclamatory Sentence: These sentences express emotion and, as such, end

with an exclamation mark.

For example: She is going to fall!

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6. Tenses
While expressing an event through a sentence, it is also important to understand
the time at which an event has taken place or is taking place. Chronology, or
events and dates set in order of their happening, is expressed by English speakers
through verb tenses. Each tense indicates the connection between two or more
time periods or the exact time an activity occurred, which underlines the
importance of English grammar tenses. They can be used to create different
meanings from the same verbs and help to anchor the listener understand the
meaning behind your story. Thus, English has a lot of verb tenses with some
expressing a connection between two time periods whereas others indicate the
exact timing of an activity. There are about 12 basic verb tenses which are very
important in order to give meaning to a sentence. They are as follows:

a. Simple Present Tense: The present tense can be used in two ways: to
express a recurring action and to represent a common belief. Below, you’ll
find an example of how the present tense is used in each of these
instances.
• The tallest buildings are on 42nd and E Street.
• On warm days, the students run home from the park.
b. Simple Past Tense: While writing or saying, if we want to express, that we
started and finished an activity in the past, then we would want to use a
simple past tense verb.
• We jumped off the diving board and into the pool.
• We drove through the night to make it home after the party.
c. Simple Future Tense: In its simple form, the future tense signifies
something that is going to happen in the future.

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 • My team will finish the report on Friday.
• The race starts early in the morning before the sun rises.
d. Present Perfect Tense: Communicating events with indiscrete times can be
tricky in English. The present perfect tense is supposed to make this easier.
If we want to explain an event that happened at an indefinite time in the
past or that began in the past and continues into the present, then we need
to use Present Perfect Tense.
• My friends have seen the movie so many times, they lost count.
• People have gathered together to celebrate each other’s birthdays
for hundreds, if not thousands, of years.
e. Past Perfect Tense: When we are talking about multiple events that
happened in the past, then the past perfect tense will be useful for us. This
verb tense allows us to discuss or write about an event that took place in
the past, but before another past action.
• All the cars had parked alongside the road to watch the meteor
shower.
f. Future Perfect Tense: Just like we can discuss the relationship between two
events in the past, we can also do so for those occurring in the future. The
future perfect tense describes an event that will occur before another in
the future.
• When I finally visit Japan, I will have traveled to every country.
g. Present Continuous Tense: Often times, it is useful to explain that an
occurrence is happening at the same time of our explanation or writing. In
English, the verb tense we would use to show that an action is happening at
the same time of the explanation is called the present continuous form.

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 • The students are studying for their exams for the next few weeks.
h. Past Continuous Tense: Aside from using a continuous verb tense to show
that an event is occurring at the time of the statement, they are also used
when talking about events that happened in the past. A past continuous
tense can be used to show an action that was happening at the same time
as another in the past.
• I was sitting in the lobby when the clock struck midnight.
i. Future Continuous Tense: Like the other forms, the future continuous
tense also uses verbs that end in -ing along with will be/shall be and
am/is/are + going to be. This tense is most commonly used in conversation
and when writing to describe a future event that will be ongoing.
• My friends will be spending some time with us next Saturday.
j. Present Perfect Continuous Tense: This verb tense describes an event or
action that started in the past, continues in the present, and may continue
into the future. This form is created by using has or have been and a verb
ending in -ing.
• For the past two weeks, the team members have been debating who
will be the next team campaign leader.
k. Past Perfect Continuous Tense: This verb tense gives the ability to talk
about a past action that was ongoing and completed before another past
action occurred.
• We had been baking for the holidays when we heard our friends
knock at the door.
l. Future Perfect Continuous Tense: The future perfect continuous tense
describes an event in the future that is ongoing but occurs before an

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 arbitrarily specified time. One can create this form by using will have been
and a verb ending in -ing.
• By the end of the century, we will have been using the internet for
over forty years.

Please Complete Assignment 1!!

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7. Pronunciation
What is Pronunciation?
Pronunciation refers to how we produce the sounds that we use to make meaning
when we speak. It includes the particular consonants and vowels of a language
(segments), aspects of speech beyond the level of the individual segments, such
as stress, timing, rhythm, intonation, phrasing and how the voice is projected
(voice quality).

Why is it important?
Pronunciation is important because it does not matter how good a learner’s
vocabulary or grammar is if no one can understand you when you speak! And to
be understood, a learner needs a practical mastery of the sounds, rhythms and
cadences of English and how they fit together in connected speech. Learners with
good pronunciation will be understood even if they make errors in other areas,
while those with unintelligible pronunciation will remain unintelligible, even if
they have expressed themselves using an extensive vocabulary and perfect
grammar.

Each one of the 26 letters in the alphabet has its own ‘sound'. This is very
different to how a letter is ‘said' in the alphabet.

For example:

‘a' in ‘arrow’ ‘b' in ‘bat’

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Chapter 1. Stress Patterns
Stress patterns are really important. In English, we listen both for how many
syllables there are and the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in order to
decipher what a person is saying. If there is something that is not quite right
about a person’s syllable stress pattern in a word or across a series of words in
connected speech, we might find them difficult to understand and might even
hear something completely different to what they are trying to say.

How many syllables?

In English, every syllable in every word must have a vowel. The number of
syllables in a word or a group of words in connected speech is the number of
vowels you say when you say the words out loud.

Patterns of stressed and unstressed syllables

In words that have two or more syllables, one syllable is always stronger than the
others, or stressed. Stressed syllables tend to have more force, so they might
sound louder, longer, or have a different pitch (higher or lower) from unstressed
syllables around them. They also have full, clear vowels, while in unstressed
syllables the vowel is usually shortened or pronounced as a neutral vowel.

Words with more than one syllable have a fixed stress pattern. For example, the
words electric, relation, and presenting all have the same stress pattern because
they have:

(1) the same number of syllables (they all have three), and

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(2) the same pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables (the second syllable is
stressed).

Stress patterns in words are usually marked in dictionaries by a mark before the
stressed syllable, as in eˈlectric, reˈlation, and preˈsenting. Sometimes in books
and teaching resources capital letters are used to show stressed syllables and
lower case for unstressed syllables (eLECtric, reLAtion, preSENting). A useful way
to represent stress patterns is to use different sized dots to represent stressed
and unstressed syllables and positioning the dots under the vowel in each
syllable, as in:

When a word with more than one syllable is stressed in a sentence it is the
stressed syllable in the word that is stressed in the sentence. So, the syllable
stress patterns of individual words contribute to the syllable stress pattern of
connected speech.

All things being equal, it is often the final word in a sentence that has the most
stress, as in:
He doesn’t make going to school.
⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫ ⚫
Our New couch Is really expensive.
⚫ ⚫ ⚫ ⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫⚫⚫
We drove to Kingston in my sister’s new car.
⚫ ⚫ ⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫ ⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫ ⚫

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However, the word that has the most stress in a sentence can depend on the
word the speaker wants to emphasize in a particular context. For example, in the
first sentence above, if you wanted to contradict someone’s idea that he does like
going to school, the word doesn’t would be the most stressed. In some contexts,
one of the function words might even be the most stressed, as in:
He doesn’t like going to school... (but his sister does)

⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫ ⚫
He doesn’t like going To school... (but he doesn’t mind
coming home)
⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫ ⚫⚫ ⚫ ⚫

This means that we use stress to show our meaning, and we can change our
meaning without altering a single word, simply by changing our stress. This also
means that we might misinterpret the meaning of what someone is saying if they
stress the wrong words.

Please complete Assignment 2 !!

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Chapter 2. Consonants
When we are listening to English we rely heavily on consonants to help us
recognize words. While this is particularly the case at the beginning of words, they
are also important at the ends of words as they provide important grammatical
information, such as plurals and past tense markings, and because of the way we
run words together when we speak.

a. Single consonants
In English there are 24 consonant sounds or phonemes. A phoneme is a sound
that can make a difference in meaning and can therefore be used to distinguish
one word from another. For example, in English, /t/ and /d/ are phonemes
because if you change the initial sound of the word ten from /t/ to /d/, the word
changes to den. Each consonant sound can be represented by a phonemic
symbol.

While in most cases these symbols look pretty close to the usual written letter
used in regular spelling, this is not always the case because there are some
consonant sounds that can be spelled by a number of different letters or letter
combinations.

The phonemic symbols that represent the 24 English consonants are:

p – pie k – car θ – thing ʃ – shoe m – milk l – like

b – boy g – go ð – these ʒ – usually n – nose r – rice
t – tea f – fire s – safe ʧ – chair ŋ – sing w – winter
d – day v – very z – zone ʤ – joke h – house j – yes
We need to use these phonemic symbols in order to be able to write down how a
particular word or group of words sounds. We usually write them between two

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forward slashes to show that we are recording how something sounds and not
how it is written (eg, /t/, /d/, /v/).

How consonants are made

Consonants are made by blocking or restricting the airflow from the lungs by
using the lips, teeth, and tongue. A useful way of describing consonants is by
considering:

• where the blocking or restriction occurs in the mouth (place of articulation)

• how the air passes through the mouth (manner of articulation)
• whether or not the vocal chords are vibrating (voicing)

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 All 24 English consonants are listed in the table. You will notice that there are
pairs of sounds where the only difference is whether they are voiced or voiceless,
that is, whether we use our vocal chords to say them. Put your hand on your neck
at throat level and say bee. You should feel your vocal chords vibrate right from
the beginning of the word because they vibrate when you say /b/ and continue
vibrating for the vowel. Now do the same for pea. You should only feel your vocal
chords vibrating when the vowel is pronounced. Voicing – that is whether or not
we use our vocal chords when we say a sound – is an important feature that
distinguishes between English consonant phonemes. There is another difference
between pea and bee that you should also be able to feel and hear. You should be
able to feel a puff of air when you say pea, but hardly anything when you say bee.
This puff of air (aspiration) is an important feature of the voiceless sounds /p/, /t/,
and /k/, as it distinguishes them from their voiced partners /b/, /d/, and /g/.
LIPS TONGUE VOCAL CHORDS
+ alveolar open vocal chords
both + + alveolar ridge1 and + hard + soft
+ teeth
lips teeth ridge1 hard palate2 palate3
palate2
Blocking Air
1. Sudden release of air p b t d k g
2. Slower release of air ʧ ʤ
3. Air diverted through m n
Ŋ
nose
Restricting Air
1. Air escapes on both
sides of contact, no friction l
can be heard
2. Air passes through
narrowing, friction can be f v θ ð sz ʃ ʒ H
heard
3. Air passes through
narrowing, no friction can w r j
be heard
1. The alveolar ridge is the bumpy ridge just behind your top front teeth.
2. The hard palate is the bony part of the roof of your mouth.
3. The soft palate is the soft part towards the back of the roof of your mouth. It is the part of the roof of your mouth that moves
when you say ‘ah’’.
Note: Voiced consonants are marked as bold and the others are voiceless.

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b. Consonant clusters
A group of two or more consonants pronounced with no vowels in between is
called a consonant cluster. In English:

clusters at the beginnings of words can have two consonants (e.g., /pr/ as in
pretty) or three consonants (e.g., /str/ as in street)

clusters in the middle or at the ends of words can have two consonants (e.g., /gr/
as in degree, /ft/ as in sift), three consonants (e.g., /ntr/ as in entry, /sks/ as in
asks), or four consonants (e.g., /nstr/ in instrument, /mpst/ as in glimpsed).

Consonant clusters are important at the ends of words as markers of grammar.

For example, they can be markers of plurals (e.g., /nts/ at the end of students,
/ks/ at the end of books), past tense (e.g., /kt/ at the end of cooked, /md/ at the
end of climbed), and present tense verbs (e.g., /vz/ at the end of loves, /ŋks/ at
the end of thinks).

Please complete assignment 3!!

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Chapter 3. Vowels
When we are listening to English we rely on vowels to recognize words. The way
vowels are pronounced in stressed syllables is particularly important. Vowels in
stressed syllables have actually been described as ‘islands of reliability’ because
they are prominent and less variable than their counterparts in weak syllables,
and we rely on them when we are trying to work out what someone is saying. In
this chapter we will look at the way English vowels are pronounced and consider
some of the difficulties that a learner might have. In English there are 20 distinct
vowel sounds (12 single vowels and 8 diphthongs that is, two vowel sounds said
close together), and as with consonants, each can be represented by a phonemic
symbol (see Part 2, Chapter 2). The phonemic symbols commonly used in
dictionaries and teaching resources that represent the 20 English vowels are:

Single Vowels Diphthongs

Short Long eɪ - play

ɪ - bin i: - see aɪ - buy

e - pen ɑ: - heart ɔɪ - boy

ӕ-
ɔ: - four ǝʊ - phone
man
ʌ - fun u: - blue aʊ - loud

ɒ - hot ɜ: - bird ɪǝ - cheer

ʊ - look eǝ - hair
ǝ-
ʊǝ - cure
about

a. Single vowels
Single vowels can be described in terms of how long they are, as well as the
position of our tongue and the shape of our lips when we say them

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Length
The colon (:) following the phonemic symbol signals that the vowel is long. Say a
short vowel and then a long vowel from the above lists and feel the difference in
length. We must remember though that although vowels are described as short
or long, the length of a vowel also depends on whether it is stressed, so short
vowels might seem longer in a stressed syllable and long vowels might seem
shorter when in an unstressed syllable.

Tongue position
Vowels can be described according to where we put our tongue when we say
them. We usually describe this position by referring to the horizontal position
(that is, how far forward or back) and vertical (that is, how high or low in the
mouth) it is.

All 20 of the single vowels in English are listed in the table below according to the
horizontal and vertical position of the tongue.

Front Central Back

High /i:/ (as in see) /ɪ/ (as in bin) /ʊ/ (as in look) /u:/ (as in blue)
Middle /e/ (as in pen) /ǝ/ (as in about) /ɜ:/ (as in bird) /ɔ:/ (as in four)
Low /ӕ/ (as in
/ʌ/ (as in fun) /ɑ:/ (as in heart) /ɒ/ (as in hot)
man)

b. Diphthongs
Diphthongs are a combination of two single vowels. We say them by starting with
one vowel and gliding into another. Although they are made up of two vowels
they are heard as one phoneme not two. Diphthongs can be described according
to the vowel they glide to, as we can see in the following table. Say the two
vowels in each of the diphthongs separately and then glide from the first to the

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second to hear how they combine to form the diphthong. When we pronounce
diphthongs, we put more emphasis on the first vowel than on the second.

Diphthongs that Diphthongs that Diphthongs that

glide to /ɪ/ glide to /ǝ/ glide to /ʊ/

/e/ + /ɪ/ à /eɪ/ (as in /ɪ/ + /ǝ/ à /ɪǝ/ (as in /ǝ/ + /ʊ/ à /ǝʊ/ (as in
play) cheer) phone)

/ɔ:/ + /ɪ/ à /ɔɪ/ (as /ʊ/ + /ǝ/ à /ʊǝ/ (as /ɑ:/ + /ʊ/ à /aʊ/ (as
in boy) in cure) in loud)

/ɑ:/ + /ɪ/ à /aɪ/ (as /e/ + /ǝ/ à /eǝ/ (as

in buy) in hair)

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