MODULE 4
Teaching pronunciation
Unit One:
involve?
What
does
teaching
pronunciation
The concept of 'pronunciation' may be said to include:
- the sounds of the language, or phonology
- stress and rhythm
- intonation.
The first of these is perhaps the most obvious and clearly defined of the three.
However, this does not mean that the other aspects should be neglected: a learner
may enunciate the sounds perfectly and still sound foreign because of
unacceptable stress and intonation; in Oriental 'tone' languages intonation often
makes a difference to meaning.
Sounds
It is useful to be able to list and define the sounds, or phonemes, of the
language by writing them down using phonetic1 representations. Different books
vary as to exactly which, and how many, symbols are used; for teachers of (British)
English, the simplified, phonemic alphabet shown in dictionaries may be helpful.
Note that this is quite difficult to do the first time - it takes a good deal of practice
and learning to be able to transcribe quickly and accurately.
Rhythm and stress.
English speech rhythm is characterized by tone-units: a word or group of words
which carries one central stressed syllable (other syllables, if there are any, are
lightened).
Stress can also be indicated in writing: probably the simplest way to do so is to
write the stressed syllable in capital letters, another convention, normally used in
phonemic transcriptions, is to put a short vertical line above and before the
stressed syllable.
Intonation
Intonation, the rises and falls in tone that make the 'tune' of an utterance, is
an important aspect of the pronunciation of English, often making a difference
to meaning or implication. A native speaker usually has little difficulty in
hearing intonation changes in his or her own language; others, however, may not
find it so easy. The different kinds of intonation are most simply shown by the
symbols ∕over the relevant syllable or word in order to show falling and rising
intonations.The rhythm of English is, then, mainly a function.
Flow of speech
It is important also to be aware of the way different sounds, stresses and
intonations may affect one another within the flow of speech. For example:
- The way a sound is articulated is influenced by what other sounds are next to
or come immediately before.
- Intonation affects how we hear stress.
- A change in the stress pattern of a word will change its sounds as well.
Thus, it is useful to be aware of the way sounds, stresses and intonations
interact within entire utterances to produce easily comprehensible
pronunciation. Having said this, however, it is true that many, perhaps most,
words have a 'stable' sound, stress and intonation pattern that can be
confidently taught in isolation.
Unit two: Improving learners pronunciation
The objective
It needs to be said at the outset that the aim of pronunciation
improvement is not to achieve a perfect imitation of a native accent, but
simply to get the
learner to pronounce accurately enough to be easily and comfortably
comprehensible to other (competent) speakers.
Why do learners make pronunciation errors?
Learners' errors of pronunciation derive from various sources:
1. A particular sound may not exist in the mother tongue, so that the
learner is not used to forming it and therefore tends to substitute the
nearest equivalent he or she knows (the substitution of /d/ or /z/ for
the English th /d/ as in that is a typical example).
2.A sound does exist in the mother tongue, but not as a separate phoneme:
that
is to say, the learner does not perceive it as a distinct sound that makes
a
difference to meaning.
3. The learners have the actual sounds right, but have not learnt the
stress
patterns of the word or group of words, or they are using an intonation
from their mother tongue which is inappropriate to the target language.
The result is a foreign sounding accent and possibly misunderstanding.
Getting learners to perceive
The first thing that needs to be done is to check that the learner can hear
and identify the sounds you want to teach. The same goes for intonation,
rhythm and stress: can the learner hear the difference between how a
competent, or native, speaker of the language says a word, phrase or
sentence and how a foreign learner says it?
This can be done by requesting imitation; or seeing if learners can
distinguish between minimal pairs (such as ship/sheep, man/men,
thick/tick; see Gimson, 1978); or by contrasting acceptable with
unacceptable pronunciation through recordings or live demonstration.
Note that you can check perception of sounds using single words or even
syllables, but work on stress and intonation nearly always needs to be based
on longer units.
Telling learners what to do
The next stage for some learners may be some kind of explicit exhortation:
this is what it ought to be, this is what you are doing wrong. For sound
formation it may help actually to use a sketch of the mouth, and to describe
the pronunciation of a sound in terms of lips, tongue, teeth, etc. But for
other aspects of pronunciation a brief explanation is sufficient, followed by
demonstration and an invitation to imitate and practise.
PARTS OF
THE MOUTH
IDEAS FOR IMPROVING LEARNERS' PRONUNCIATION
- imitation of teacher or recorded model of sounds, words and sentences
- recording of learner speech, contrasted with native model
- systematic explanation and instruction (including details of the structure
and
movement of parts of the mouth)
-
-
imitation drills: repetition of sounds, words and sentences
choral repetition of drills
varied repetition of drills (varied speed, volume, mood)
learning and performing dialogues (as with drills, using choral work, and
varied
speed, volume, mood)
learning by heart of sentences, rhymes, jingles
jazz chants (see Graham, 1978)
tongue twisters
self-correction through listening to recordings of own speech
© Cambridge University Press 1995
Practising correct pronunciation
Finally - when we are satisfied that the pronunciation point has been
satisfactorily perceived and learners can, if they take care, produce an
acceptable version - we come on to the stage of practice: consolidating and
establishing the habits of acceptable pronunciation through exercises that
provide repetition and reinforcement.
Unit Tree: Pronunciation and spelling
In most languages there is a fairly clear correspondence between sounds and
symbols: certain letters or combinations of letters are pronounced in certain
ways, and if there are variations, these are governed by consistent rules: when,
for example the letter c in English is pronounced /k/ or /s/. There are, of
course, languages where there are many exceptions to such rules, many words
whose pronunciation could not be logically predicted from their spelling, and
vice versa - English being an example.
The basic sound-symbol correspondence is learned at the stage of learning the
alphabet. If the alphabet is a totally new one, then there is a lot to learn, but
it is clear that every new symbol needs to be taught with its pronunciation.
If, however, the learner is actually using more or less the same alphabet but
the letters represent slightly - or very - different sounds (as in the case of
English-speaking learners of Spanish, for example) you may have a more subtle
teaching problem.
Rules of pronunciation-spelling correspondence
Once learners have mastered the basic sound-symbol correspondence they
may in some languages be immediately able to decode and pronounce
correctly any written text - or, conversely, write down a spoken one. In
others, it may not be so simple. They may need a whole set of extra
sound-symbol rules: for example, that -tion at the end of a word in English
is usually pronounced //on/. Some of these - the more common and urgent for
successful reading and writing - you will need to teach consciously and early;
others the learners may pick up 'by the way' later on.
Words or sets of words with unusual pronunciation or spelling you may need to
teach and practise on their own.
Pronunciation and spelling activities
Some ideas that practise pronunciation-spelling correspondences may be
found in pronunciation books, such as those listed under Further reading; books
on spelling usually just give rules, lists of words and then through dictation and
spelling tests. Dictation is of course one excellent technique (see Davis and
Rinvolucri, 1988, for some imaginative variations); and spelling tests can help,
but there are many more possibilities, A number of ideas are listed in Box 4.6;
note that some of these may not be appropriate suggest practising if your
students do not share a common mother tongue.
BOX 4.6: PRONUNCIATION-SPELLING CORRESPONDENCE: SOME TEACHING
IDEAS
- Dictation: of random lists of words, of words that have similar spelling problems,
of complete sentences, of half-sentences to be completed.
- Reading aloud: of syllables, words, phrases, sentences.
- Discrimination (1): prepare a set of 'minimal pairs' - pairs of words which differ
from each other in one sound-letter combination (such as dip-deep in English).
Either ask learners to read them aloud, taking care to discriminate, or read them
aloud yourself, and ask students to write them down.
- Discrimination (2): provide a list of words that are spelt the same in the learners'
mother tongue and in the target language: read aloud, or ask learners to, and
discuss the differences in pronunciation (and meaning!).
- Prediction (1): provide a set of letter combinations, which are parts of words the
learners know. How would the learners expect them to be pronounced? The'n
reveal the full word.
- Prediction (2): dictate a set of words in the target language which the learners do
not know yet, but whose spelling accords with rules. Can they spell them? (Then
reveal meanings.)
© Cambridge University Press 1996
Notes
Pronunciation errors and their correction
Some pronunciation errors common to the speech of many speakers of English as
a foreign language are:
- difficulty in pronouncing the th;
- difficulty in pronouncing the neutral 'schwa' vowel (the first syllable of away.
for example);
- a tendency to give uniform stress to syllables that should be lighter or heavier;
- a tendency to shorten diphthongs and make them into monopthongs: for
example the sound /ei/ as in way tends to be pronounced more like a French e
You may well find more, or others, that are produced by your learners.
The errors which are most important to correct are those which may easily
lead to lack of comprehension, or which make the speech 'uncomfortable' to
listen to; by the same principle, errors which produce no comprehension
problems but simply make the speech slightly foreign-sounding may not need
correcting.
Ресурс – Ur Penny, A Course of Language Teaching, CUP, 2008 – 373.