1
Ruth Wigglesworth
TESL 525
Robison
4.7.14
Pronunciation Needs Assessment
Background of Learner
Tori, a native Chinese speaker, began learning English as a foreign language in her native
China in the sixth grade. Now, at the age of 23, with 12 years of English instruction and
experience, she studies at Azusa Pacific University's American Culture and Language Institute
(ALCI) program and is in level four. Although she started learning English at a fairly young age,
Tori did not have any native English speakers to practice with on a regular basis. Not until she
enrolled in university did she have American professors to converse with in order to sharpen her
English skills. It was at this time that Tori was actually able to practically apply what she had
learned in middle school and high school. After graduating from university, Tori applied for and
was admitted to ALCI in January of this year. Now that she lives in America, Tori has used her
English for academic and non-academic situations, while growing familiar with American
cultural norms and behaviors.
Even though Tori’s speaking and pronunciation continue to develop, she has an obstacle
to overcome as she lives solely with native Chinese speakers. Mandarin Chinese is the primary
language used in her residence. For the most part, Tori uses English only when she needs to, such
as at school or church; however, even at her church, most of the members are native Chinese
speakers. Tori wishes she could live in a dorm where she would be able to interact with native
2
English speakers, but APU does not allow grad students to live in dorms. Tori’s long term goals
include obtaining her MBA at an American university; after graduation, she hopes to continue to
live and work in America. With these goals in mind, Tori has made a concerted effort to improve
her pronunciation so her speech more closely resembles that of a native speaker. Finally, Tori’s
native speaker identity does not depend on her original Chinese accent - she does not mind
developing an NAE accent to further improve her intelligibility and comprehensibility.
Procedures Followed
In analyzing my data for Tori’s pronunciation needs, I interviewed her for about an hour
and a half. I first read aloud and then had her read aloud the sample passage on p. 481 of the
CBG text. Tori had a difficult time pronouncing some of the longer, lower frequency words in
the passage, which affected her speed and comprehensibility negatively. Then, I had her
pronounce all of the consonant and vowel sounds, found in the appendix on page 71 of the
course-pack. Finally, I recorded ten minutes of her spontaneous speech. She discussed what she
likes about living in America and critiqued her time so far at APU.
Pronunciation Competence
Tori’s pronunciation competence varies with each aspect of pronunciation. Both her
segmentals and suprasegmentals reveal specific areas of weakness, occasionally creating
miscommunication and lowered comprehensibility for the listener. Some areas of weakness that
will be expanded upon in following paragraphs include word and sentence stress, intonation,
producing long and short vowel sounds, and producing clusters. Tori's areas of strength, on the
other hand, include distinguishing between the /l/ and /r/ sounds, producing most consonants
accurately, and pitch.
3
Suprasegmentals
Tori’s clarity, speed, and loudness are all satisfactory, so there is no need to focus on
those aspects. Her intelligibility is fine, but her comprehensibility needs improvement. It takes
some work to listen closely and carefully to each word she says. When reading aloud the
diagnostic passage, Tori reflected a strong understanding of thought groups, punctuation marks,
and rhythm patterns. She knew when to pause shortly after a comma most of the time, and when
to pause longer after a period. Only once did she not correctly pause after a period, perhaps
because she did not notice it ahead of time. When punctuation was not there, Tori still knew how
to group thoughts together. In the diagnostic passage, she read, “Another factor that influences
your pronunciation is your first language,” smoothly connecting the words together so that they
maintained flow and fluency. However, when reading aloud another sentence, Tori did not have
the rhythm or focus on thought groups. For instance, in the sentence, “We also know that older
learners usually have an accent, though some older individuals also have learned to speak
without an accent,” Tori did not pause at the comma after “accent” as a native speaker would
have. This was most likely due to the fact that she read the word “though” as “through.”
Conversely, in Tori's spontaneous speech, she knew when to pause and how to separate
thought groups. For example, in the sentence, “As a graduate student, we can't live in the dorm.
We have to live off campus,” Tori grouped the first part together, paused, and then grouped the
last part together, just as a native speaker would. Nevertheless, as illustrated, Tori was not
consistent enough with using thought groups or pausing in her read aloud and spontaneous
speech, indicating her need for some assistance in those areas.
Intonation
4
Tori’s intonation tended to rise at the end of most of her statements, each time sounding
like more of a question than a statement. For example, when Tori says, “I love because I think
here I can meet a lot of people, different cultures, especial I mean Los Angeles, and I think they
are very nice to different culture,” her intonation rises after every comma, causing the listener to
think that she is unsure about what she is stating. Tori will need to work on this particular
weakness in her suprasegmental communication. As Firth suggests in her Pronunciation
Syllabus Design chapter, “Intonation practice should be included in the pronunciation syllabus
whether students are beginners or advanced. With more basic classes, the focus should be on the
use of appropriate intonation patterns and the appropriate pitch range of English” (Firth, 1992, p.
179). Tori's pitch does not require much work, but I would definitely make it a priority to teach
her appropriate intonation patterns.
Stress and rhythm
“Word and sentence stress combine to create the rhythm of an English utterance --that is,
the regular, patterned beat of stressed and unstressed syllables and pauses” (CBG, 2010, p. 209).
Tori’s weakness in stress and rhythm was much more noticeable in her read aloud speech than it
was in her spontaneous speech. Capturing appropriate rhythm created problems as indicated
when she read aloud from the diagnostic passage, “If not, your foreign accent may show people
that you came from another country.” Here, Tori does not put the correct stress on “accent” and
“another,” causing the flow of the sentence and the overall rhythm to sound interrupted and
choppy.
Tori's connected speech has not seemed to cause her any problems, but she can still learn
more about such topics as connecting final and initial consonants together.
5
Segmentals
Producing long and short vowel sounds was a challenge for Tori. Tori did not always
lengthen her vowel sounds properly, failing to produce diphthongs by clipping her vowels
sounds. An example of this would be in a word such as “people.” Tori will say the /e/ sound, but
cut it short abruptly. She likewise tended to replace a short /e/ sound with a short /a/ sound, and
vice versa. With words such as “red,” “said,” or “met,” Tori produced a short /a/ sound instead.
This can be cause for a breakdown in communication, so I would classify improving her
segmental aspect of speech as a priority. Tori's production of the /i/ sound as in “meet,” “teach,”
or “speech,” has shown to be an issue as well since such words are easily confused with other
similar words spelled with different vowels.
Regarding consonants, Tori elicited few problems, with the notable exception of /s/ and
the voiceless /th/ sound, a problem that some native mandarin Chinese speakers have. For
example, in her pronunciation of “something,” it came out as “thomething.” Only in her read
aloud speech did Tori make the mistake of pronouncing the voiceless /th/ sound as an /s/ sound.
So, in my instructional program, I would have her focus on that area of speech when practicing
reading aloud since it did not come up in spontaneous speech. She also needs to work on
producing clusters, as in “helpful,” “English,” and “children.” When she says the word
“English,” it comes out sounding “Engwish,” replacing the /hw/ sound for the /l/ sound. This is
unexpected, since most native Chinese speakers encounter difficulty with the /l/ sound,
producing the /r/ sound instead.
Expected Pronunciation Problems
According to Jones (1991), producing /l/ and /r/ sounds, the wide-open mouth sound of
6
/a/, as in hot, lot, spot, voiced and voiceless /th/, short /ae/ and /e/ sounds, word stress, and timing
all tend to be expected pronunciation problems with native mandarin Chinese speakers. Tori
struggles, to some degree, with each of the problems that a Chinese speaker would be expected
to have except for the /l/ and /r/ sounds, and, generally, the voiceless /th/ sound.
Instructional Program
As part of my instructional program for Tori, I would direct most of my attention toward
improving her intonation, stress and rhythm, and production of segmental sounds. Since Tori
struggles with falling intonation patterns, I would instruct her to listen intently to correct forms
of falling intonation, noticing the patterns. Once focused on solving the problem, she should be
able to improve intonation. A quick illustration of the issue with rising and falling intonation
appears in the CBG text, describing the phenomenon, “If the utterance is pronounced with a rise
on the prominent syllable followed by falling intonation, then it signals speaker certainty, which
often corresponds to a declarative statement. However, pronounced with a drop on the prominent
syllable followed by rising intonation, the same sequence of phonemes signals uncertainty and
corresponds to a special type of yes/no question with statement word order but rising intonation”
(CBG, 2013, p.231). To help Tori improve her intonation, I would give sample statements and
questions, and have her mark which ones are the statements and which are the questions. Another
helpful exercise would be for Tori to read open-choice alternative questions, in which “the
listener has a free choice of the alternatives being offered” (CBG, 2013, p. 237). She would have
to know which would to put the stress on. Of course, Tori does not need to know the technical
terms involving intonation to improve, but by recognizing and pinpointing the area of weakness,
she should be able to understand what needs to be addressed in her speech. Even though
7
intonation does not affect intelligibility, it does affect the speaker’s comprehensibility. As noted
in the CBG text, “While segmental instruction may still be important for accent reduction in the
long run, it is essential to give priority to prosody in pronunciation instruction since it results in
better comprehensibility in the short run” (CBG, 2013, p.33). As such, intonation would be a
priority for Tori to master as she continues to develop her English speaking skills.
Regarding stress and rhythm, Tori first must understand that English is a stress-timed,
rhythmic based language. As such, there are thought groups, “a term that refers to a discrete
stretch of speech that forms a semantically and grammatically coherent segment of discourse”
(CBG, 2013, p. 221) in sentences that are meant to be said together. Knowing this simple fact can
provide a more focused direction when producing English sentences. In her free speech, she did
consistently put the right stress on words. One example of this occurred when she commented,
“Because APU looks like more local university, not very, not so many Asian people.” Here she
incorrectly places the stress on the “a” in “many” and on the “eo” in “people.” This does not
affect her intelligibility, but word stress is still an important part of pronunciation, and I would
include it in my instructional program for her.
Regarding consonants and vowels, since Tori tends not to put final consonants on certain
words, especially omitting “m,” as in “from,” “them,” or “tram,” she needs to focus her attention
on finalizing words. If the final consonant is not pronounced, it sounds like a different word and
more miscommunication ensues. Since mandarin Chinese does not have many final consonant
sounds at the end of words, the tendency for mandarin Chinese speakers to produce weak final
consonant sounds or to omit the sound altogether is commonplace. Language transference, in this
case, is Tori’s main issue. One thing to help her improve in this area of speech might be to have
8
her specifically listen to native speaker(s) producing final consonant sounds, and then practice
making final consonant sounds, especially the /m/ sound.
For segmentals, Tori needs to work on producing the /i/ sound, as in heel, to differentiate
between other short vowel sounds, such as the /I/ sound as in hill. Minimal pairs would be the
best exercise for Tori to develop her sound distinguishing abilities. This segmental aspect of
Tori’s speech is more of a priority since more misunderstandings can be prevented. Tori would
need to learn the right way to place her mouth in order to produce the /i/ sound. Showing her
mouth diagrams, having a native speaker demonstrating mouth placements, listening to the
proper pronunciation of the long e sound, and then practicing her own production of the vowel
sound using a mirror are all important steps for Tori to correct her speech.
Tori’s overall pronunciation has not caused her any major communicative issues, only
fairly significant pronunciation errors. With the analysis that has been completed on her NAE
pronunciation, she has a clear outline of what needs to work on and what her priorities are. Now
that her attention has been brought to the preceding areas of weakness, Tori should be able to
continue to practice and improve her English pronunciation.
9
References
Celce-Murcia, M., Brinton, D.M., & Goodwin, J.M. (2010). Teaching Pronunciation: A
Course Book and Reference Guide. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Firth, S. (1992). Teaching American English Pronunciation. Oxford University Press.
Jones, C. (1991). Speaking American English for the Non-Native Speaker. Wadsworth
Pub. Co.
10
Appendix - Transcription
Introduction -Free Speech - NAE Transcription
10
Introduction - Free Speech - Standard English Orthography
So far, I feel so good. I love because I think here I can meet a lot of people, different
cultures, especial I mean Los Angeles, and I think they are very nice to different culture. I think
it’s different from East Coast, so I don’t want to go to East Coast. So cold. And maybe, I don’t
know, some people tell me people in East Coast not very friendly so I think here I can learn more
about other culture I can meet other people. They have Asian looking, but they all Americans.
Very interesting thing.
I learn more about human rights. Is that too serious? (laughs). Yeah I watched the news,
it’s very different from the news in China. Yeah that’s...we always heard about the freedom in
America, but when you’re really here you know what American care about. Not only the human
rights, also the animal rights. I heard so many crazy things. Like chimpanzee. They have rights.
And something news about that. Very different from China. Now I think it’s very very different.
Super cool. Made me open my mind. Like animal rights. Or I learned more about the
homosexual. You know, in China, we don’t talk much about that. Everybody maybe don’t think
about that. Because it’s illegal. Just opened my mind. And I’m here in APU I learned about
Christianity. It’s super cool.
Diagnostic Passage (Celce-Murcia, 2013, p. 481)
Standard English Orthography
Is English your native language? If not, your foreign accent may show people that you
come from another country. Why is it difficult to speak a foreign language without an accent?
There are a couple of answers to this question. First, age is an important factor in learning to
pronounce. We know that young children can learn a second language with perfect
11
pronunciation. We also know that older learners usually have an accent, though some older
individuals also have learned to speak without an accent.
Another factor that influences your pronunciation is your first language. English
speakers can, for example, recognize people from France by their French accents. They may can
also identify Spanish or Arabic speakers over the telephone, just by listening carefully to them.
Does this mean that accents can’t be changed? Not at all! But you can't change your
pronunciation without a lot of hard work. In the end, improving appears to be a combination of
three things: concentrated hard work, a good ear, and a strong ambition to sound like a native
speaker.
You also need accurate information about English sounds, effective strategies for
practice, lots of exposure to spoken English, and patience. Will you make progress, or will you
give up? Only time will tell, I’m afraid. But it's your decision. You can improve! Good luck, and
don’t forget to work hard.
Diagnostic Passage - NAE Transcription
12