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The Importance of Teaching Pronunciation Content 1. The importance of correct pronunciation in language learning 2. The content of teaching pronunciation 3. General features of teaching pronunciation 4. Techniques for teaching pronunciation 5. When to teach pronunciation English pronunciation is one of the most difficult skills to acquire and learners should spend lots of time to improve their pronunciation (Aliaga García, 2007; Martínez-Flor et al. 2006; Pourhosein Gilakjani, 2016). Understandable pronunciation is one of the basic requirements of learners’ competence and it is also one of the most important features of language instruction. Good pronunciation leads to learning while bad pronunciation promotes to great difficulties in language learning (Pourhosein Gilakjani, 2012 Language as a complex sign system, naturally or artificially created and relate conceptual content and standard sound. When to teach pronunciation. Pronunciation teaching and its importance in the development of students listening and speech skills.The first impact of any language comes from the spoken word. The basis of all languages is sound. Words are merely combinations of sounds. It is in these sound sequences that the ideas are contained. Listening is the first experience; the attempt to understand accompanies it. The acquisition of good pronunciation depends to a great extent on the learner's ability of listening with care and discrimination. One of the tasks of language teaching consists in devising ways to help the learner “aud” the unfamiliar sounds. The hearing of a given word calls forth the acoustic image of that word from which a meaning is obtained. Therefore teaching pronunciation is of great importance in the developing of pupils' hearing and speaking habits and skills. language pronunciation sound Teaching pronunciation is of no less importance in the developing of reading and writing habits and skills, since writing (or what is written) is a graphic representation of sound sequences. In reading the visual images become acoustic images. These are combined with kinesthetic images, resulting in inner speech.
Pronunciation can be quite tricky when learning a new language, especially for adults. You’ll have to replicate lots of new strange sounds that are completely unknown to you. The language you are learning may have the same alphabet, but some letters will have an entirely different pronunciation. This can be confusing in the beginning, because it looks like words are not pronounced the way they should. But how important is pronunciation in language learning and what can you do to improve? Learning Pronunciation First.
Sounding like a Native Speaker. Many learners would love to sound like native speakers in their new language. But what does that mean exactly? English speakers from the UK and from the US have different accents, but they are simply different ways of speaking. Heck, we tend to generalize the UK and US accents, but it is said that there are over 50 different accents in the British Isles alone! But if you really do want to sound exactly like the native speakers of a certain area, you can simply spend lots of time immersing yourself in that particular accent. If you listen to a lot of material and constantly practice out loud, you can get there. Be warned though, this will take a lot of work. In Ouino, you can record your voice and compare it to the recording of our native speakers. You can listen for the little subtleties in the pronunciation and make the adjustments needed to sound more native. Don’t Let It Keep You from Speaking. One of the most important things is to never let pronunciation keep you from speaking. It’s important to practice speaking as much as possible. Spoken practice will help you improve your pronunciation and most importantly; your ability to clearly communicate. Even if your accent is so thick that you are not understood at first, the other person will simply ask you to repeat. Once they understand, they will likely tell you the proper pronunciation and you’ll naturally get better. Nothing should ever keep you from speaking. The Importance of Reading. There is a big difference between not saying words correctly because some sounds are difficult for you to reproduce, and not saying things correctly because you think that is how they are said. Reading can fix a lot of these problems. Once you know how each letter is pronounced, knowing how the words are spelled should help your pronunciation. Reading will help you in all parts of language learning. Once you know how to read, you can even practice your pronunciation by reading books out loud, which is likely one of the best ways to practice your pronunciation. Listen and Repeat. Whenever you listen to audio material, try to repeat after the recording. You can do this with movies, YouTube videos, songs or any audio you can get your hands on. Listen attentively, pause the recording, and repeat what you heard out loud. This exercise can also be done with the Ouino program. Repeating out loud is another way you can greatly increase your pronunciation skills. All that being said, remember what’s truly important: being understood. If you can do that, remember that having an accent is no big deal, it can even give you a certain charm Improving Your Pronunciation When Learning English as a Second Language Learning a new language is not an easy task. There are many things to consider, like difficult grammar rules, extra vocabulary, and even new pronunciation. As an English Second Language (ESL) learner, you might feel nervous about speaking and participating in long conversations. That’s totally normal! Fortunately, improving your pronunciation can help make you feel more comfortable during these times. Practicing your pronunciation is an important part of your studies. Here are some reasons why this is a great idea! Using Good Pronunciation Helps Others Understand You More Quickly
By using the correct sounds when you speak, others can quickly understand what you’re trying to say. If you are great at grammar and know many different words, good pronunciation will help others hear and understand you even more clearly. ESL course
Having Good Pronunciation Makes Learning English as a Second Language Easier As you’ll soon find out, learning English as a second language can be lots of fun when you make great progress. Believe it or not, improving your pronunciation can help you learn English more easily. This is because pronunciation forces you to listen to speakers more carefully, focusing on how they make the right sounds when they speak. By listening to how natural sentences sound, you are more likely to make them yourself. Besides, the more you listen to these sentences, the easier it becomes for you to understand and get used to them. Don’t let your pronunciation stop you from feeling confident in your speaking skills. The saying “practice makes perfect” really is true. For example, ASC’s new pronunciation class gives you a chance to practice difficult words and sounds. Keep trying, and you’ll definitely see great results! Good Pronunciation Can Help Improve Your Social Skills
Fortunately, having good pronunciation will make you more confident. You’ll be able to participate in conversations, getting to know your classmates and those around you much better. In this way, having good pronunciation can even help you make friends more quickly. Speaking will no longer be a hard activity—but a fun way to improve your English while making meaningful connections with other people. 2. The content of teaching pronunciation Proceeding from the aims and objectives the foreign language syllabus sets out, pupils must assimilate: 1. The sounds of the English language, its vowels and consonants. They should be able to articulate these sounds both separately and in different phonetic contexts. 2.Some peculiarities of the English language in comparison with those of the Russian language, such as: English vowels differ in quality and in length, whereas in the Russian language the length of vowels is of no importance; there are no palatal consonants, and if some consonants may be pronounced slightly palatalized, this does not change the meaning of the word. For instance, we may pronounce the word Me with dark [1] and light [1], i. e., slightly palatalized, the meaning of the word remains the same. In the Russian language there are palatalized and non palatalized consonants and palatalization changes the meaning of the word: e. g., был -- быль; кон -- конь; банка -- банька. Stress in a word and in a sen'ence, and melody (fall and rise). Pupils must be able to divide a sentence into groups and intone it properly. I 'don't 'know what his 'native language is. 'Do you 'speak 'English? Only when pronunciation is correct, when all main phonic rules are strictly followed, can one understand what one hears and clearly express one's thoughts in English. The teacher, therefore, faces the following problems in teaching pupils English pronunciation: 1) the problem of discrimination; i. e., hearing the differences between phonemes which are not distinguished or used in the Russian language and between falling, rising, and level tones; 2) the problem of articulation, i. e., learning to make the motor movements adequate to proper production of English sounds; 3) the problem of intonation, i.e., learning to make right stresses, pauses and use appropriate patterns; 4) the problem of integration, i. e., learning to assemble the phonemes of a connected discourse (talk) with the proper allophonic variations (members of a phoneme) in jhe, months, hard ^times', 5) the problem of automaticy, i. e., making correct production so habitual that it does not need to be attended to in the process of speaking. Consequently, discrimination, articulation, intonation, integration, automaticy are the items that should constitute the content of the teaching of pronunciation, i. e., pupils should be taught to discriminate or to distinguish English sounds from Russian sounds, long sounds from short ones; falling tone from rising tone; to articulate English sounds correctly, to use appropriate tone patterns; to integrate or to combine sounds into a whole and, finally, they should be taught to use all these while hearing and speaking the English language. Of course absolute correctness is impossible. We cannot expect more than approximate correctness, the correctness that ensures communication between people speaking the same language. The content of teaching pronunciation is connected with the aims and objectives pupils must assimilate. They include, first of all, the sounds of the English languages, its vowels and consonants. Pupils should be able to articulate these sounds both separately and in different phonetic contexts.Pronunciation is more than 'listen and repeat'. Pronunciation includes features of language (vocabulary and grammar) and skills (speaking and listening). Like vocabulary and grammar, we pronounce by noticing and understanding rules and patterns which lie beneath the surface of speech. For example, if an English word has two syllables, the stress is usually on the first syllable for nouns and adjectives, and the second syllable for verbs. Since pronunciation is part of speaking, it is also physical. To pronounce a new language, we need to re-train the muscles we use to speak. And pronunciation involves listening to how the language sounds. We can practise by focusing on connected speech while playing fragments from speech recordings.Our tongue, lips and jaw (vocal articulators) physically shape our pronunciation. When we learn our first language, we develop speech habits which we may not be conscious of developing. This is what makes pronunciation in a new language so difficult – we carry with us the speech habits from our first language. According to Tracey Derwing and Murray Munro, authors of Pronunciation Fundamentals, most people who learn a new language will keep accent features from their first language. However, an accent is not necessarily a problem. You can keep your accent and still be understood.English has become a lingua franca, or language which people use to communicate with one another globally. People with different languages use English to communicate, even if there is no native English speaker present. In her book The Phonology of English as an International Language, Jennifer Jenkins argues that English's role as a lingua franca has implications for teaching pronunciation. The goal is not to sound like a native speaker, but rather to communicate effectively in a global contextA learner's goal may be to communicate with other people from around the globe; not necessarily with native English speakers. With this in mind, you should focus more on aspects of pronunciation which aid understanding. Some features of pronunciation make the message clearer to the listener. For example, a clear difference between the /r/ and /l/ sounds. You can teach or practise intelligibility with communication activities. Using the /r/ and /l/ example, you can put pairs of words such as correct and collect into a game in which success depends on the learner being able to hear and say the difference. You can teach optional features of pronunciation to make words easier to say, such as saying gonna instead of going to. Gonna may be easier for a learner to say, and is closer to how many native speakers pronounce going to. However, it is optional because most listeners will understand gonna or going to.Notice what your lips, tongue, jaw and throat muscles are doing when you speak, in your own language and in English. For example, when you say the sound /t/, pay attention to the tip of your tongue. Does it touch the back of your teeth, or the ridge above them? How is it similar to the /d/ sound? How is it different? Become aware of your beliefs and prejudices about pronunciation. Many speakers of English say that they never use glottal stops (the sound we make when we close the glottis while speaking), but they do. According to John Wells in the Longman Pronunciation Dictionary, most people use the glottal stop to replace the /t/ sound in words like button.Deciding to learn English with a British or American accent is not a helpful target. Instead, focus on features of pronunciation which could distort your message. For example, speakers of Vietnamese may miss consonants from the ends of words, and speakers of German may confuse the /v/ and /w/ sounds. This might make it difficult for listeners to understand some words.The most serious pronunciation issues are the ones we are not aware of. For example, people who speak Spanish already make sounds which resemble the English /b/ and /v/. However, in Spanish, /b/ and /v/ are allophones – variants of the same sound. Spanish hearers may not notice the difference, because hearing a language – like speaking it – is a habit we form in childhood. If a difference is not significant in our mother tongue, we might not notice it in the language we are learning. Teachers need to help learners to notice such features in the target language. We can do that by teaching a short rhyme which includes many examples of a sound, so that it becomes noticeable to the learner.English spelling is unhelpful for learners. It evolved out of speech, but then speech and spelling went their separate ways. Consequently, there are often many ways of spelling the same sequence of sounds. This results in homophones like 'piece' and 'peace'. Conversely, the same sequence of letters may be pronounced differently, resulting in homographs like row (line) and row (argument). Homophones and homographs are challenging for learners of English, but they aren’t the main problem. They are extreme cases of a bigger issue – the irregular relationship between English spelling and sound across the language. It’s almost enough to drive a learner to despair, and we teachers don’t help much by throwing a lot of –ough words at the class while suggesting that there is no rhyme or reason in English spelling. In fact, there are actually many patterns and regularities.I give learners games and puzzles which help them to notice and become familiar with these patterns. For example, challenge learners to add the sounds /k/ or /g/ to the beginning of a list of words: aim
game
care cake quite clues Or, ask the learners to change the spelling of a list of words: plan
man ran hat at so they rhyme with Spain or late: plane/plain pain main rain hate ate/eight 3. General features of teaching pronunciation Teaching pronunciation is important not just because it is necessary to communicate one's ideas clearly. Articulation movements accompany the process of using the language not only when a person is speaking but also during listening, reading and writing. Hidden articulation movements were registered when a person seemed silent just listening to somebody else talking or when reading a text. The more difficult the cognitive task, the more obvious become sound articulations. Language articulation is thus closely linked to the language-and-thought processes. If the hidden articulation movements arc suppressed (in experiments the subjects arc asked to perform some movements with their tongue while doing a thinking task), the subjects find it difficult to perceive the words. Pronouncing one's thoughts or at least making hidden articulations facilitates the process. People often resort to pronouncing words while reading a text when they find the text ambiguous. Speech sound articulation is important not only to pronounce the words but also to recognize and to spell them. Russian learners of English often mistake the |t| sound for |ch| sound, believing that the words “teacher” is pronounced as |chichcr|, and the structure “it is”, is pronounced [ichis]. Mistakes in orthography can also be traced to erroneous pronunciation. The following words can be both pronounced and spelt erroneously by poorer learners of English. “Headache” is pronounced and spelt as [hedachj, “blood” as 1 bind I, “type” as |tup| becaasc “y” is associated with the Cyrillic letter and sound |oo|, “climate” as |climat|. An interesting example of substituting a more familiar word for a less familiar one is “extinct” which was both read and spelt by the learners as |instinct] (author's data). This interdependence word pronunciation, recognition and spelling is shown by the graph: The communicative approach since 1980 holds that pronunciation is important for teaching the language for the purposes of communication. The studies of the importance of sounds and intonation have shown that intonation appears to be more important for communication than speech sounds. Mistakes in intonation cause more comprehension problems than mispronounced phonemes. Mastering the pronunciation of a foreign language presents great difficulties for the learners. Russian learners-of English can find it difficult to distinguish between the sounds in the words “bed” and “bad”. They can equally find it difficult to distinguish the sound in the words "ten” and “tan”, etc. The reason for the difficulty is that Russian students of English do not have in their native tongue the distinction between open, half open and closed vowels, as well as between short and long vowels (as in “bin” and “bean”) and monophthongs and diphthongs (as in “pen” and “pain”). English rhythm and stress pattern of sentences arc also hard to master for the Russian learners. Russian speech is less rhythmical. Russian words do not have a primary and secondary stress. Russian learners of English arc no exception in their difficulties. Japanese students find it next to impossible to perceive the difference between “rice” and “lice”. Thai students find English intonation confusing because in the That language the word “haa” said with the falling tone means "five”, while the same word pronounced with the rising tone means “to look for”. Possible reasons for the learners making errors in pronouncing the foreign sounds arc that a particular sound may be absent in the mother tongue. A sound may exist in the mother tongue but with a different articulation. Similar native sounds may not distinguish the meaning as in the foreign language (e.g. long and short vowels). Learners may mispronounce the sound because they may mishear it. Conversely, the learners can mishear the sound because they mispronounce it. That is why the first thing that needs to be done is to check that the learners can hear and identify the sounds that arc to be taught. After the learners have acquired the sound-synibol correspondence, they may in some languages immediately decode any given word or write down any spoken word without much hassle. In the English language it is not so simple. This happens because in the English language the words have long changed their pronunciation but their original spelling still remains the same. The English orthographic system functions on the “conservative principle” while pronunciation appears to be more dynamic and changes with time. The goal of teaching pronunciation is not to make the learners sound like native speakers of English. Only few highly gifted and motivated individuals can achieve it. A more realistic approach is to enable the learners to pronounce the language without detracting from the ability to comprehend the message. This approach to teaching pronunciation is called approximating. The target of teaching pronunciation is to develop in learners phonetic competence, which is the knowledge of the English phonetic means such as phonemes, syllable formation, word stress and intonation Phonetic competence includes the knowledge of how speech sounds (phonemes) are used in actual speech production. This includes elisions (absence of sounds as in "Chris/t/mas”) and assimilation (where one sound merges in the next sound as in “hambag” standing for “handbag”). This is called “modification of phonemes in connected speech”. There arc some typical modifications of phonemes in connected oral speech. If these words arc spelt as they are pronounced they will look like: “GrapeBritain" (Great Britain), “stapement" (statement), “lasyear” (last year), “aspecs” (aspects), “cabnet” (cabinet), “libry” (library), etc. One of the reasons that the phonemes merge together in oral speech is that it saves speakers from making articulation efforts. Major components of teaching pronunciation are English sounds and intonation. English consonants are represented in the chart below: These sounds make up the target in teaching English consonants. Vowel sounds can be distinguished from one another by which part of the tongue is involved (front, central, back) and by how high the tongue is when the sound is produced (high, mid, low). These two dimensions are summarized in the vowel quadrant: A typically English feature of the vowel system is the diphthongs or vowel glides. The vowel glide in the English diphthongs is shown in the quadrant below: E.g.: play, near, town, pair, time, tour, toy, etc. English intonation can be introduced to the learners as the variation of the voice pitch levels. This can be compared to variations on the music stall. 'I he staff and an example sentence can be drawn as follows: Major intonation tone groups are: low rise and low fall, high rise and high fall, fall-rise (within one syllable), rise-fall (within one syllable), fall + rise (within a series of syllables) and rise + fall (within a scries of syllables), mid-level tone. Essential Pronunciation Features 1. Sounds Consonants & Vowels 2. Speech chunks Chunking & Pausing 3. Stress Word stress & Sentence stress 4. Intonation Pitch level & Direction 5. Connected speech Unstressed words and Linking 6. Vocal features Speed, Volume, Projection … 7. Voice quality Warm, Abrupt, Confident … UTS/ELSSA Centre/ Pronunciation Fact Sheet/ Stress/ HZ ‘09 Making Consonant Sounds Some researchers believe seeing and feeling how a sound is formed physically will help you develop the ability to make that sound. Others think what you hear is more important. For many learners of English, one of the hardest things to grasp about the language is its pronunciation. Not only are there many accents to get accustomed to – American, British, Australian, among others – but there are many fundamental sounds within the language that can be difficult to produce.To make things even worse, English’s spelling system is horrendous and seldom a reliable indication – even for native speakers – of how to pronounce most word. Because of this, it’s useful to try to depict the pronunciation of the English language through a set of symbols besides the Latin alphabet – namely, the International Phonetic Alphabet. Known as the IPA for short, this phonetic system might be familiar to you, and in my experience, it’s a useful tool for learning any language.The great thing about the IPA is that its symbols are meant to be universal. This means that if you learn the set of symbols used for English sounds, you can apply them to most other languages you might want to learn, from French to Arabic to Japanese.CONSONANTS The first set of symbols presented here represents consonant sounds. Most are fundamental to English pronunciation regardless of accent. Since you might be unfamiliar with some of the terms used to describe the sounds, here are some definitions you might find useful: Voiced: a voiced sound is a sound where the vocal cords vibrate, thus producing some sort of pitch. This is the kind of sound most people associate with regular talking or singing.It is not a perfect system, since its details can only be so fine, and nuances like tone and stress are often overlooked in IPA transcription, which can be a bit of a problem with tonal languages like Mandarin and Vietnamese. However, for our purposes with English, these phonetic symbols can definitely come in handy if you’re looking to improve your pronunciation.Fricative: a consonant sound where the airflow becomes noisy and turbulent because it only has a very small space to travel through in the mouth. Think of sounds like “f,” “s,” and “sh.” Most languages have fricatives, but not all. Nasal: a consonant sound where the airflow passes exclusively through the nose instead of the mouth. Think of sounds like “m,” “n,” or “ng.” Almost all languages have nasals. Affricate: a consonant sound that begins like a stop but then releases like a fricative, thus making it a sort of combination sound. Think of sounds like “ch” and “j.” Affricates are common, especially in English. Alveolar ridge: a ridge found on the roof of the mouth between the upper teeth and the hard palate, which is used in conjunction with the tip of the tongue to make many sounds Soft palate: the soft tissue in the back of the roof of your mouth, which is used In conjunction with the back of the tongue to make many sounds /P/
Voiceless stop made with both lips Found in words like: pen, spin, tip, happy Letters that usually represent it: “p” /B/
Voiced stop made with both lips Found in words like: but, web, baby Letters that usually represent it: “b”As you may have noticed, the only difference between producing /p/ and /b/ is the voicing, while all other factors remain the same. It’s common, including in English, to have pairs of words that are essentially the same, except one is voiced and the other is unvoiced. If you’re having trouble pronouncing certain sounds, try to identify a corresponding sound with a different voicing as a reference. /T/ Voiceless stop made with the tip of the tongue on the alveolar ridge Found in words like: two, sting Letters that usually represent it: “t” /D/
Voiced stop made with the tip of the tongue on the alveolar ridge Found in words like: do, daddy, odd Letters that usually represent it: “d”/K/ Voiceless stop made with the back of the tongue on the soft palate Found in words like: cat, kill, skin, queen, unique, thick, chaos Letters that usually represent it: “k,” “c,” “q,” “que,” “ck,” sometimes “ch” /G/
Voiced stop made with the back of the tongue on the soft palate Found in words like: go, get, beg, bigger Letters that usually represent it: “g” /F/
Voiceless fricative made by putting your upper front teeth on your lower lip Found in words like: fool, enough, leaf, off, photo, glyph Letters that usually represent it: “f,” “ph,” sometimes “gh” /V/
Voiced fricative made by putting your upper front teeth on your lower lip Found in words like: voice, have, of, over Letters that usually represent it: “v,” sometimes “f” /Θ/
Voiceless fricative made by putting your tongue between your teeth Found in words like: thing, teeth, Athens Letters that usually represent it: “th” If you’re curious about this symbol, it comes from the Greek letter “theta,” which makes the same sound in Greek./Ð/ Voiced fricative made by putting your tongue between your teeth
You might have noticed that both /θ/ and /ð/ are represented by “th” in English. Although sometimes there are rules as to when a letter or letter cluster makes different sounds, there really is no rule for “th.” Sometimes it’s voiced, and sometimes it’s unvoiced, and you’ll just have to memorize the difference as you come across each word with a “th” in it. This letter seems to be based off of the Greek letter “delta,” which makes the same sound in Greek./S/ Voiceless fricative made by putting the tip the tongue nearly on the alveolar ridge Found in words like: see, city, pass, lesson Letters that usually represent it: “s,” sometimes “c” /Z/
Voiced fricative made by putting the tip the tongue nearly on the alveolar ridge Found in words like: zoo, rose, clothes, asthma Letters that usually represent it: “z,” sometimes “s,” rarely “th”/Ʃ/ Voiceless fricative made by putting the tip the tongue a little bit past the alveolar ridge Found in words like: she, sure, session, emotion, leash Letters that usually represent it: “sh,” “si,” “ti,” sometimes “s,” /Ʒ/
Voiced fricative made by putting the tip the tongue a little bit past the alveolar ridge Found in words like: genre, pleasure, beige, equation, seizure, vision Letters that usually represent it: “g,” “si,” “ti,” “z,” sometimes “s” /TƩ/
Voiceless affricate made with the tip of the tongue on the alveolar ridge Found in words like: chair, nature, teach Letters that usually represent it: “ch,” sometimes “t” This is one of the two affricates in English, the other being /dʒ/. As stated in the definitions above, an affricate is a combination of a stop and a fricative, so the “ch” sound is actually represented by two IPA symbols. The same goes for the “j” sound. /DƷ/ Voiced affricate made with the tip of the tongue on the alveolar ridge Found in words like: gin, joy, edge, did you, judgment Letters that usually represent it: “j,” sometimes “g,” “dg,” sometimes “d” /H/
Voiceless fricative made by a forced breath through the glottis Found in words like: genre, pleasure, beige, equation, seizure, vision Letters that usually represent it: “g,” “si,” “ti,” “z,” sometimes “s” /ʔ/
Glottal stop made by shutting and releasing airflow through the glottis Found in words like: uh–oh, kitten, Manhattan, bet, important (American) Letters that usually represent it: “t,” “-,” the beginnings of vowelsYou might be a little confused by this backwards-question-mark-looking symbol, but the best way to hear and feel it is to say the word “uh-oh.” You’ll feel your vocal cords close for just a moment in order to block your airflow, which is what linguists call a “glottal stop.” You can also feel this stop happen every time you begin to pronounce a vowel without a consonant before it. The glottal stop is common in some British accents, but it’s especially common in American accents, where the letter “t” is often replaced by this sound in the middle and ends of words. Yes, it’s true. Most Americans don’t pronounce “kitten” with such a strong, harsh /t/ in the middle, but rather with a /ʔ/ instead. /M/ Nasal sound formed while the lips are shut Found in words like: man, them, hammer Letters that usually represent it: “m” /N/
Nasal sound formed while the tip of the tongue is on the alveolar ridge Found in words like: no, tin, winner Letters that usually represent it: “n” /Ŋ/
Nasal sound formed while the back of the tongue is on the soft palate Found in words like: ringer, sing, finger, drink Vowels and Consonants in English! ByChris Lee-May 24, 20214437947 vowels sounds consonants table english For many learners of English, one of the hardest things to grasp about the language is its pronunciation. Not only are there many accents to get accustomed to – American, British, Australian, among others – but there are many fundamental sounds within the language that can be difficult to produce. To make things even worse, English’s spelling system is horrendous and seldom a reliable indication – even for native speakers – of how to pronounce most word. Because of this, it’s useful to try to depict the pronunciation of the English language through a set of symbols besides the Latin alphabet – namely, the International Phonetic Alphabet. Known as the IPA for short, this phonetic system might be familiar to you, and in my experience, it’s a useful tool for learning any language. The great thing about the IPA is that its symbols are meant to be universal. This means that if you learn the set of symbols used for English sounds, you can apply them to most other languages you might want to learn, from French to Arabic to Japanese. It is not a perfect system, since its details can only be so fine, and nuances like tone and stress are often overlooked in IPA transcription, which can be a bit of a problem with tonal languages like Mandarin and Vietnamese. However, for our purposes with English, these phonetic symbols can definitely come in handy if you’re looking to improve your pronunciation. CONSONANTS
Voiced: a voiced sound is a sound where the vocal cords vibrate, thus producing some sort of pitch. This is the kind of sound most people associate with regular talking or singing. Voiceless / unvoiced: a voiceless or unvoiced sound is one where the vocal cords do not vibrate, thus making the sound very whispery and without a pitch. It can tend to make a letter sound harsher when pronounced. Stop: a consonant sound where the airflow is stopped completely by the mouth and then sharply released. Think of sounds like “p,” “k,” and “t.” All languages contain stops. Fricative: a consonant sound where the airflow becomes noisy and turbulent because it only has a very small space to travel through in the mouth. Think of sounds like “f,” “s,” and “sh.” Most languages have fricatives, but not all. Nasal: a consonant sound where the airflow passes exclusively through the nose instead of the mouth. Think of sounds like “m,” “n,” or “ng.” Almost all languages have nasals. Affricate: a consonant sound that begins like a stop but then releases like a fricative, thus making it a sort of combination sound. Think of sounds like “ch” and “j.” Affricates are common, especially in English. Alveolar ridge: a ridge found on the roof of the mouth between the upper teeth and the hard palate, which is used in conjunction with the tip of the tongue to make many sounds Soft palate: the soft tissue in the back of the roof of your mouth, which is used In conjunction with the back of the tongue to make many sounds seat would be written /si:t/) to represent the sounds (rather than the alphabet to represent the spelling).”10 Aspiration is another pronunciation technique which involves a puff of air occurring with such sounds as /p/, /t/, /k/, and /ch/ (which are most commonly aspirated at the beginning of a word). Encourage your students to hold a tissue in front of their mouth to see it move when the puff of air is produced from a word containing an aspirated sound. Nasal sound formed while the back of the tongue is on the soft palate Found in words like: ringer, sing, finger, drink Letters that usually represent it: “ng,” sometimes part of “ng,” part of “nk” The letters “ng” can be problematic because the /ŋ/ sound is sometimes followed by a /g/ sound, but sometimes it isn’t. Note the difference between “singer” and “finger,” where “finger” has that extra /g/ sound, but “singer” doesn’t. This difference is random and should be memorized, just like the “th” phenomenon, but there are a few tricks that can help. For example, if a word ends in “ng,” then there is never a following /g/ sound. There also is no /g/ sound if the word ends in “-ing,” which turns verbs into participles or gerunds. /ɾ/
A momentary stop-like sound called a flap or tap, caused by the tip of the tongue lightly throwing itself against the alveolar ridge Found in words like: better, hidden, hater, odor Letters that usually represent it: “t,” “d” This is another sound that might confuse you. This is because it’s primarily found in American accents and is essentially another way that Americans become lazy with the letter “t.” You saw previously that the glottal stop is a way to replace the /t/ sound in the middle and ends of words. However, Americans sometimes use the flap instead in the middle of words, though note that the /ʔ/ and /ɾ/ sounds are mutually exclusive. For example, an American would pronounce the word “button” with a /ʔ/ in the middle, but not a /ɾ/. Meanwhile, “better” is pronounced with a /ɾ/ but not a /ʔ/, at least in an American accent.ɾ/ is actually the letter “r” in many other languages like Spanish, Korean, and Arabic (the symbol even looks like some degenerate letter “r”). In terms of sound, consider it to be a softer version of /d/, which is why the letter “d” is often replaced by it, too 4. Techniques for teaching pronunciation There are two kinds of knowledge in mastering English pronunciation. One type of knowledge is intuitive, which is a language feeling. The other type of knowledge is analytic and is based on the knowledge of articulation. There are techniques for teaching pronunciation that have traditionally been used and are still being used in instructed settings. The traditional approach to teaching pronunciation that still survives is the "pronunciation drill”. Drills arc still very popular and there are a number of reasons for that. Drills engage the students in narrowly delined tasks. This provides emotional security for the learners and teachers. Drills are relatively easy to perform. They guarantee in most cases the immediate result of mastering the learning material. In other words a drill works and that is what matters. It is evident that one can't master pronunciation of the foreign language without some form of repetitive drilling. Repetition can be by the whole class, individually in the fixed order, slow tempo and fast tempo, repetition in small groups, etc. 1: Teaching English pronunciation with phonics exercises: Perhaps the most obvious and conventional method for teaching English pronunciation is through phonics. Phonics focuses on learning the individual sound of a letter or set of letters, vowels, and consonants when learning to read. One website has developed a useful diagram for understanding the process of phonics in learning pronunciation: “letters form sounds, sounds form words, words form sentences, sentences form stories, stories form meaning, meaning forms reading.”2 A new frontier for learning to pronounce words is through “visual phonics,” which teaches English pronunciation with animated texts, videos, and songs. Visual phonics physically animates sounds and words to help ESL learners internalize what they see and hear, distinguishing between different sounds, words, and meanings. According to one source, “visual phonics shows various reading skills, such as isolating sounds and syllables, segmentation, rhyming, and substitution, to help children visualize relationships between letters and sounds, sounds and words, and words and syllables.”3 Visual phonics lends a fun and creative atmosphere for learning English pronunciation. For older students, however, focusing on the pronunciation of keywords (content vs. function words) in a sentence is of greater importance because distinguishing between the two is critical for understanding the meaning of a sentence. Teach your older students to stress content words (nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs) in a sentence as function words (auxiliary verbs, prepositions, articles, conjunctions, and pronouns) are not stressed. According to one source, “knowing the difference between content and function words can help you in understanding, and, most importantly, in pronunciation skills.”4 There are various pronunciation exercises you can do with your students that distinguish between content vs. function words in a sentence. For my older students, I usually have them read a sentence or ask them to make their own sentence stressing the appropriate words. For example, I had one group of students practice saying this sentence: She’s going to fly to England next week. I then encourage my students to act out the sentence by pretending to fly, or I ask them where they want to fly.2: Use the different mouth positions to master English pronunciation: Voicing should be an active process in your student’s learning to pronounce words correctly. It is important for non-native speakers to master the different vowel phonemes in English as they may not be present in your student’s primary language. One teacher notes, “1.) Show them what they need to do with their mouth to make the sound, 2.) Create/give drills for them to build muscle memory, and 3.) Give feedback throughout the process.”7 For your older students, it may be helpful to show illustrations or to demonstrate with your mouth where to properly place the tongue and lips to create a specific sound. One source suggests, “have students use a mirror to see their mouth, lips, and tongue while they imitate you.”8 You need to ensure that your students know the difference between voiced and voiceless consonants. The voiced sounds (which include vowels and diphthongs) should produce a vibration in the throat whereas the voiceless sounds will not. You should encourage them to touch their throats to ensure that vibration occurs only with the voiced sounds. A potential game to help master this skill is to have students compare voiced and voiceless consonants such as ‘z’ and’s’ by repeating both and then creating sentences or words with the letters. You can even encourage them to act out the sentence, or you can provide illustrations or props modeling the sentence or sounds: ex. I went to the zoo and saw a zebra and a snake. You may find it helpful to teach the phonemic chart to your older students or those students who can understand it.9 One website advises, “instead of spelling new vocabulary out on the white board, try using phonetic symbols. seat would be written /si:t/) to represent the sounds (rather than the alphabet to represent the spelling).”10 Aspiration is another pronunciation technique which involves a puff of air occurring with such sounds as /p/, /t/, /k/, and /ch/ (which are most commonly aspirated at the beginning of a word). Encourage your students to hold a tissue in front of their mouth to see it move when the puff of air is produced from a word containing an aspirated sound. 3: Teaching methods for intonation, syllable stress, and vowel length: I have already touched on which words to stress in the discussion of content vs. function words (ex. Leon has lived in Spain for six months). Intonation indicates the way in which our voices rise or fall when speaking certain phrases or sentences to evoke a certain emotion or meaning. For example, when you ask the question “Did you eat breakfast this morning?” your voice should rise when you ask a yes or no question or when you are showing disbelief (He didn’t go to school today? Really?)12 Your voice should fall with regular statements or questions that expect more than a one-word answer. Syllable stress requires special attention. Specific activities and pronunciation exercises should be developed for mastering syllable stress. You should begin by teaching your students how to count the number of syllables in a word by clapping them out or singing along as each syllable is counted out. Another method is placing your hand under your chin, repeating the word, and taking note of how many times your chin touches your hand. This indicates the number of syllables in a word. There is a website called “How Many Syllables” that allows you to type in a word and see how many syllables there are if you struggle with counting syllables yourself.13 For your younger students, if you want to incorporate TPR, you can have your students act out the syllables with hand actions, call on them to hold up the correct amount of syllables on their fingers or ask them to represent the number of syllables with toys, pencils, stickers or other objects. You can teach vowel length with the same methods such as clapping hands to count out the length of a vowel or singing out the full length of a vowel. Teaching your students vowel songs are an excellent tool for learning to pronounce a vowel with the correct length.14 You can even try creating your own vowel songs and syllable songs using pictures, videos, props, and dance movements that the students can associate with the sound. The important thing to remember is to teach with creativity, engagement, and repetition so that your students exercise their mouth muscles and memorize the sounds. 4: Teach students to pronounce words by cross-referencing minimal pairs:
5: Use pronunciation exercises and teaching methods that address connected speech: I will make this topic quite brief. Connected speech refers to how words run together in conversational English that often confuses non-native speakers. For example: ‘wanna’ instead of ‘want to’ or ‘gonna’ instead of ‘going to.’ For a non-native speaker, this can sound quite confusing because there are no pauses, and the words run together, which confuses the meaning. If you are able to do so, you should teach your students how to hear and recognize connected speech. For example, linking is a common form of connected speech where the end of one word melds into another such as “cats or dogs” which becomes “Catserdogs?”17 Other forms of connection speech include intrusion, elision, assimilation, and geminates.18 Being able to recognize the way connected speech sounds and being able to reproduce connected speech will help your students speak more fluently and feel more confident about their English speaking skills. Hold up flash cards with the different forms of connected speech and have students form sentences, answer questions, or talk using connected speech. To conclude, English is a challenging language with many rules. Sometimes it is easy to get lost in all the rules governing pronunciation. The most important thing to remember is to ensure that your students feel confident in their English skills and to teach pronunciation using fun, creative, and engaging material and activities. I struggle with pronunciation myself, especially counting syllables and keeping track of stressed and unstressed words. There are endless resources; thankfully, that can help you improve your student’s ability to pronounce different words and create sounds. Other techniques to reinforce pronunciation are drilling games, listen and repeat, isolating sounds, and word games. You will be surprised at how much your own pronunciation of words and sounds and understanding their meaning will improve as you teach your students using these five methods. Download 154.95 Kb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: 
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