Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

θ	thin	ð	this	ʃ	she	ʒ	measure
tʃ	church	dʒ	judge	ŋ	sing	j	yes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

-s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
-ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
-ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

bear down

verb

Forms bears down bearing down bore down borne down

verb Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see bear, down.
verb (nautical) To steer away from the wind; to approach from windward.
verb (transitive) To push (someone) to the ground; to defeat, overcome.
verb (transitive, obsolete) To maintain one's position against (someone) in a debate; to stand one's ground against.
verb (intransitive) To intensify one's efforts. “It's 9:41, 58 degrees, and I'm flunking out. Time to bear down.”
verb (intransitive, with on) To approach in a determined manner.
verb (intransitive) To exert downward pressure on one's abdomen, as in giving birth, forcing out feces, and some similar bodily maneuvers.

Synonyms

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 — from the Wiktionary entry “bear down”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details