When reading aloud, English speakers often pause. A pause is a short stop. When you pause in the correct place, your English sounds much more natural. There are 2 main places where people pause.
After some punctuation
Punctuation means the symbols in sentences that are not letters. Punctuation includes periods (“full stops” in British English), commas, question marks and more.
Add a pause after…
| periods | . | I went to the store. [pause] I bought some food. |
| commas | , | I went to the store, [pause] and I bought some food. |
| colons | : | There are two reasons I like snow: [pause] skiing and snowboarding. (but don't add a pause in clock times, like 7:30) |
| semi-colons | ; | I love the movie; [pause] it had a lot of great action. |
| question marks | ? | Where is John? [pause] He left his bag. |
| exclamation points | ! | I got 100% on the test! [pause] I’m so happy today. |
| quotation marks | “ | This isn’t exactly “[pause] fresh” [pause] fish. |
| parentheses | ( ) | My daughter ([pause] the oldest one) [pause] just bought a new car. |
| dashes | -- or – | This car is great—[pause] where did you buy it? |
Don’t add pauses after…
| hyphens | - | My self-esteem is low after that last test. |
| slashes | / | You should bring chips and/or dessert. |
| ampersands | % | Romeo & Juliet is a great play. |
| apostrophes | ‘ | Don’t steal Joe’s car. |
| other punctuation | @ # $ * etc. | The car costs $25,000. |
After nouns
Example
The cat [pause] and the dog [pause] ran to the house [pause] on Mission Avenue. [pause]
It is important to note that this does not include pronouns. We do not typically pause after subject and object pronouns.
- I want to eat lunch. [no pause after “I”]
- She told him to hurry. [no pause after “she” or “him”]
- I woke her up at 7am. [no pause after “I” or “her”]
- We want to talk to them after school. [no pause after “we” or “them”]
Important note: If there are two or more reasons to pause together, just pause one time.
Example
Joe said, "I think she's a great woman." (woman, period, and quotation marks all need a pause after--but just pause once, not three times!)
Exercise
Please open the exercise to continue.