1. Development of English 6
Spelling, pronunciation, vocabulary

2. Some distinctive characteristics of PDE pronunciation
stress-timing
use of intonation to convey meaning (e.g. stress, question, doubt, certainty)
relatively large number of diphthongs and triphthongs
plosive /t/, /k/, /p/
lack of guttural fricative /x/
/θ/, /ð/
/I/ - /i:/ distinction
the schwa sound /ǝ/ for some unstressed vowels

3. Some distinctive characteristics of PDE spelling
non-phonetic ‘leftovers’ from previous eras (one, night, etc.)
the use of final e and consonant doubling to indicate shortened or lengthened vowels
the use of upper-case letters to indicate the first word in a sentence, proper names, emphasis
the use of pairs of letters to indicate single phonemes (e.g. sh, ee, oo)

4. Changes in Spelling
Shortening, but not noticeably in formal prose: may become so in the future
A tendency towards American spelling where this is more rational.
Probably stabilization because of world-wide use of English and the enormous amount of text already available

5. Pronunciation
Assimilation
Elision
Strong and weak forms

6. Changes in pronunciation
Raising intonation for statements.
A tendency towards rhotic dialects
a tendency to use full vowels rather than schwa.