36 The Schwa /ə/ - LETTER, COMMA Watch the video lesson
The schwa usually appears in unstressed syllables. For example, here are some two-syllable words: pardon, second, today, police
The first two words are stressed on the first syllable PAR-don
SE-cond
The last two words are stressed on the final syllable: to-DAY
po-LICE
In all of these words, the letter ‘o’ is in the unstressed syllable and so it is pronounced as a schwa. It might be easier to imagine that there is no vowel sound at all here.
PAR-dn t-DAY
SE-cnd p-LICE
How do we know where to stress a word? We can either look in a dictionary, where you will see the stress mark. This looks like an apostrophe and it is placed before the stressed syllable.
second /ˈsԑkənd/ police /pəˈliːs/
Here are some 3-syllable words. In all of these words, the stress is on the middle syllable. The first and last syllables are unstressed and so they have a schwa sound.
together /təˈgԑðə/ supporter /səˈpɔːtə/ consider /kənˈsɪdə/
If a word is one syllable and it is unstressed it may also have the schwa sound – see the list of Weak words on the Schwa vowel worksheet. A link to this worksheet will be given shortly.
Note that not all unstressed syllables have the schwa sound – but most do. Now go to the next page
