TEACHERS CORRECTIVE FEEDBACK ON THE PRONUNCIATION OF ENGLISH FRICATIVES AND AFFRICATES BY NON-ENGLISH MAJOR FRESHMEN

PART A: INTRODUCTION I. Statement of the Problem and Rationale of the Study Of four English skills, speaking plays an integral part in every school’s English curriculum in Vietnam. In the process of improving speaking skills, many learners face the problem of pronunciation. In fact, according to many foreigners, Vietnamese learners can speak English; however, not many of them have intelligible English pronunciation so that they can be understood easily in direct communication with foreigners (Duong, 2009). In her view, the low level of communicative competence of learners is directly attributed to their deficiencies in pronunciation, not vocabulary and grammar. This is the justification of why teaching pronunciation needs to be given priority. For two years working at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam (DAV), the researcher has realized that most of her first-year students show few improvements in pronunciation after two semesters although they are required to speak English in all English lessons. In other words, their frequent mistakes tend to be maintained as the first days they entered the Academy. Through direct observation in many English speaking lessons at DAV, of 24 English consonants, two alveolar fricatives /s, z/, two alveo-palatal fricatives /ʃ, ʒ/ and affricates /ʤ, ʧ/ have been identified as the most common pronunciation mistakes of the researcher’s students. They have also been more confirmed after considerable discussion with many teachers at DAV. For instance, most of the students tend to pronounce the word social as / ˈsəʊsl/ instead of /ˈsəʊʃl/, or television as /ˈtelɪvɪzn/ instead of /ˈtelɪvɪʒn/. The fact remains that learners with poor pronunciation at the segmental level are not always at an advantage. Yates (2002, p.1) believes, “we often judge people by the way they speak, and so learners with poor pronunciation may be judged as incompetent or lacking in knowledge.” That is the reason why the researcher finds it necessary to teach her first-year students how to pronounce individual sounds correctly because it will serve as a foundation for better speaking competence in the 1 next three years. In order words, they need to start with individual sounds before moving on other complicated aspects of speech such as intonation, stress, etc. With regard to the coursebooks used by freshmen in English speaking lessons at DAV, namely Let’s talk 2 in the first semester and Let’s talk 3 in the second semester, they do not consist of any sort of pronunciation work on individual sounds. Instead, they contain a variety of speaking activities for the purpose of developing students’ oral communication skills and fluency. However, in many situations, when a student delivers a talk, mistakes like /ˈsəʊsl/ and / ˈtelɪvɪzn/ seem not to be perceived. Furthermore, those who are less likely to notice such pronunciation mistakes are non-English majors. From the researcher’s viewpoint, the problem lies in the fact that students do not receive adequate feedback from the teacher on their pronunciation performance. In other words, they need to be assisted by the teacher to realize their problems. It is suggested that Teacher’s Corrective Feedback (TCF) can be used to help learners perceive and discard what is unacceptable or inappropriate from their interlanguage. Considering the benefits TCF can bring to learners of English, the researcher wants to determine if TCF can solve her students’ pronunciation problems in terms of the six English consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ in English speaking lessons where pronunciation work is not included. Last but not least, research into TCF on pronunciation mistakes in English speaking lessons at university level in Vietnam is quite small in number. All the aforementioned reasons have motivated the researcher to conduct this quasi- experimental research on Teacher’s Corrective Feedback on the pronunciation of English fricative and affricate consonants by non-English major freshmen at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam. II. Aim and Objectives of the Study The study aims at helping non-English major freshmen at DAV improve their pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/. To be specific, the primary objectives of the study are as follows: 2 • To examine the effect of TECF on the pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ by non-English major freshmen at DAV; • To investigate the experimental students’ opinions about TECF on their pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ after the experimental period. III. Research Hypothesis and Research Questions III.1. Research Hypothesis A hypothesis is constructed for the purpose of achieving the aim of the study: H 1 : Non-English major freshmen who receive TECF make more significant improvements in their pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ than those who do not receive TECF. If the above hypothesis is fully accepted, the following null hypothesis will be obviously rejected or vice versa: H o : There is no difference in the pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ between non-English major freshmen who receive TECF and those who do not. In order to identify which hypothesis will be accepted, the first research question, posed in Section III.2, needs to be satisfactorily answered. III.2. Research Questions Based on the aim and objectives of the study, two questions were formulated and needed to be satisfactorily answered: (1) What is the difference that Teacher’s Explicit Corrective Feedback brings about in the pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ by non-English major freshmen at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam? (2) What are the experimental group’s opinions about Teacher’s Explicit Corrective Feedback on their pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ after the experiment period? 3 IV. Scope of the Study Initially, corrective feedback as stated in the research title is, in fact, confined to Explicit Corrective Feedback. Regarding English fricative consonants, the study focuses on two English alveolar fricatives /s, z/ and two alveo-palatal fricatives /ʃ, ʒ/. When it comes to English affricate consonants, they are /ʤ, ʧ/. Only issues concerning the pronunciation of these sounds are taken into consideration. Finally, it should be noticed that 36 non-English major freshmen in the class KT40B at DAV were involved in the study but only 34 students were eligible to become its main subjects. V. Methodology A quasi-experiment was adopted in this study so as to test the research hypothesis stated in Section III.1. First, based on a pre-test of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ administered to 36 students in the class KT40B, 34 participants were selected and assigned into two groups, control and experiment. Then, they participated in a ten-week experiment, in which a 30-minute instruction on the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ was delivered to both groups at the beginning of every lesson. Afterwards, they got involved in a number of the same speaking activities; however, only the experimental group received TECF on their pronunciation mistakes regarding /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/. Meanwhile, the control group got feedback on the content of their statements or arguments. After the experimental period, both groups sat for a post-test (version of the pre-test). The pre-test and post-test scores were analyzed by means of paired-samples t-tests to find out the answer to the first research question. Besides, a short written questionnaire was employed as the supplementary instrument to investigate the experimental students’ opinions about TECF on their pronunciation mistakes regarding /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ after the experiment. VI. Significance of the Study: 4 The study would be of great benefit for two reasons: Initially, the research outcome could be used as evidence of the impact of TECF on Vietnamese university students’ pronunciation. As for English teachers in general and English teachers at DAV in particular, they could base themselves on the results of the paper to make informed decisions on whether TECF should be encouraged or not. In fact, if there exists a positive link between TECF and students’ pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/, it can bring about a significant change in many English speaking lessons at colleges and universities, where pronunciation work is not included. In addition, this study can serve as a reliable source of related literature and a basis for other researchers, who share an interest in the topic, to start their future work from. VII. An Overview of the Rest of the Paper: PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW CHAPTER II: METHODOLOGY CHAPTER III: RESULTS CHAPTER IV: DISCUSSION PART C: CONCLUSION PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW I.1. The Importance of Pronunciation Teaching and Learning I.2. Aspects of Pronunciation I.3. The Aim of Teaching Pronunciation: Intelligibility I.4. General Description of Consonants and English Consonants I.5. English Fricative Consonants I.6. English Affricates 5 I.7. Previous Studies on Vietnamese Learners’ Pronunciation of the Six English Consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ I.8. Teacher’s Corrective Feedback I.8.1. Definition of Teacher’s Corrective Feedback I.8.2. Types of Teacher’s Corrective Feedback I.9. Teacher’s Explicit Corrective Feedback I.10. Theoretical and Empirical Background on TECF I.11. Research Gap CHAPTER II: METHODOLOGY II.1. Context of the Study The study was conducted at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam, which is located at 69 Chua Lang Street, Dong Da, Hanoi. On average, freshmen and sophomores at DAV spend about nine hours per week on learning English, which is divided into four sessions. Each session lasts for 135 minutes and only focuses on one English skill. Generally, students at DAV are divided into two major groups, namely, English majors and non-English majors. English majors refer to students who enroll in the discipline of English and non-English majors are from five disciplines of International Relations, International Laws, International Economics and International Communication. Both groups have to complete an English foundation course in the first three semesters. In the fourth semester, there is a difference in the learning programs of two groups. English majors have sessions of Phonetics, Grammar, Pragmatics, etc. Meanwhile, non-English majors participate in the ESP programs. With regard to speaking skills, the teaching materials for non-English major freshmen are two books Let’s Talk 2 (used in the first semester) and Let’s Talk 3 (used in the second semester). These books include a variety of interesting and 6 innovative topics that encourage students to develop their oral communication skills. Nevertheless, it is noticed that there is no room for teaching pronunciation in the two books. It cannot be certain that students who sail through the university examination for group A1 and D1 are good at English pronunciation because the English test they take is in the form of a written one. Furthermore, as mentioned in the first chapter, many non-English major freshmen at DAV are observed to make a lot of pronunciation mistakes when speaking; meanwhile, the teaching materials skip the English pronunciation part. Therefore, it is necessary to improve their current situation of learning English in general and English pronunciation in particular. II.2. Study Design The researcher decided to choose the following quasi-experimental design: First, a pre-test was administered to 36 students in the class KT40B for three purposes: • To select the main subjects of the study. To be specific, the subjects having much lower or higher scores than the rest of subjects (in statistics, they are called “outliers”) would be ruled out from the sample. In other words, the main subjects, who later were assigned to the experimental and control group, were roughly at the same pronunciation level of English alveolar fricatives, alveo-palatal fricatives and affricates. • To assign the subjects to the experimental and control group. • To compare with the post-test to find out the answer to the first research question. After that, in ten weeks, the intervention (TECF) was administered to the experimental group whereas there was no intervention in the control group. Finally, after ten weeks, both groups sat for a post-test whose structure was similar to that in the pre-test. The method of scoring is also the same. The pre-test and post-test scores of both groups were used for comparison so that the answer to the first research question can be found. 7 Besides, a short written questionnaire was used as the supplementary instrument to explore the experimental students’ evaluative opinions about TECF after the experiment period. This quasi-experimental design is feasible for the researcher to conduct the present study. The results of the study were presented in numerical expression (e.g., test scores) and then analyzed by trustworthy and powerful statistical computer software. To be specific, in this study, the link between the pre-test and post-test scores of both groups was brought to light by paired-samples t-test with the assistance of the computer software SPSS version 16.0 (Statistical Package for Social Science), which is widely-used for statistical analysis. II.3. Selection of the Main Subjects for the Study To select the main subjects of the study, a test on the six English consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ was administrated to 36 students in the class KT40B. To be specific, the subjects having much lower or higher test scores than the others would be ruled out from the sample. In other words, the main subjects who later were assigned to the experimental and control group were roughly at the same pronunciation level of the above-mentioned sounds. In statistics, outliers are cases that have data values very different from the data values of the majority of cases in the data set. The way a subject having the test score that differs significantly from the other test scores in the sample are ruled out is similar to the way an outlier is found. Two outliers were found. They are case 7 scoring 79 points and case 30 scoring 61 points. Hence, for the purpose of the study, the two students were ruled out from the sample. The main subjects of the study are 34 students in the class KT40B. II.4. Assignment of Subjects to the Experimental and Control Group After the main subjects were selected, they were assigned to the experimental and control group based on their pre-test scores. The process is clarified as follows: 8  The subjects were placed in matched pairs and closely matched pairs for random assignment.  Coins were flipped for both matched and closely matched pairs. If the coin came up heads, the subject was assigned to the experimental group; if tails, the control group Though the assignment of subjects in seven closely matched pairs to the experimental and control group, decided by flipping a coin, cannot guarantee that both groups are equated on the most important variable – prior achievement level, it is confident to say that both groups are closely matched on this variable. When “the intervention and comparison groups are very closely matched in key characteristics”, valid results are likely to be produced (Jon Baron, 2007, p.5). In this way, threat to the internal validity of the study can be reduced. II.5. Instruments for Data Collection  Instrument One: Pre-test and Post-test The pre-test was designed mainly based on Vietnamese learners’ common pronunciation problems regarding the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ as mentioned in the Literature Review chapter. It consists of 100 test items and is divided into two main parts, namely paper-and-pencil and sound production. The maximum score that a student can get is 100 points. The paper-and-pencil part contains ten questions. In each question, the test takers had to choose one out of four words, which has the same sound as the underlined part of the given one. Each correct answer is rated one point. The maximum score that a student can get is 10. The time allowance for the test is 10 minutes, excluding the time of delivering the test paper. The whole class KT40B sat for the paper-and-pencil test at the same time on the same day. The test was administered under the surveillance of the researcher and another English teacher at DAV to make sure that no student could copy the others’ answers. When it comes to the sound production part, there are 90 test items regarding the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/. First, the test takers were required to read aloud 30 individual words which contain target sounds in the final position. Afterwards, 9 the examinees had to read aloud three dialogues and four passages at normal speed. In these dialogues and passages, there were 60 test items regarding the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ prepared by the researcher in advance. Before reading aloud, they were given several minutes for preparation. Scoring is straightforward with points counted only for the individual items being evaluated (Marianne, Donna and Janet, 1996). The total score of the sound production part is 90 points. Correct pronunciation of each test item will score one point. With regard to some words that appear in the part more than once, one point will be equally divided based on the frequency of the word. After the experimental period, the post-test, the version of the pre-test, was used again to measure the performance of two groups. The most important thing is that in the post-test, the test items were reordered in order to make a more objective evaluation of the students’ performance. The steps of administering the post-test were the same as the pre-test. The post-test took place in May.  Instrument two: Audio-recording Audio-recording was utilized in the process of scoring because (1) the use of a small recording machine was assumed to reduce the subjects’ anxiety during the recording process; hence, they were likely to produce more natural English sounds and (2) the digital sound quality might be better than that captured by regular cassette recorders.  Instrument three: Written questionnaire A short written questionnaire with three-point likert scale was administered to the students in the experimental group to explore their evaluative opinions about TECF after the experiment. The steps of administering the questionnaire were also well-prepared. First, before the questionnaire was distributed, the experimental students were made to feel relaxed and comfortable to give their true responses because their own opinions were for study, not for any other reasons. Next, they were asked to show their opinions about seven statements in the questionnaire in three ways. If they agreed 10 [...]... CHAPTER IV: DISCUSSION IV.1 Discussion of Both Groups’ Pronunciation Gains Scores and Post-test Scores after the Experimental Period IV.2 Discussion of the Experimental Group’s Opinions about TECF on Their Pronunciation of the Six Consonants /s , z , ʃ , ʒ , ʤ , ʧ / IV.3 Recommendations for the Application of TECF in English speaking lessons The current study first showed that the role of TECF is relatively... Pronunciation of the Six English Consonants /s , z , ʃ , ʒ , ʤ , ʧ / The results of the questionnaire indicate that almost all the participants in the experimental group showed positive opinions about TECF which was implemented in a period of ten weeks In other words, they acknowledged the 14 positive impact of TECF in teaching pronunciation of English fricative and affricate consonants in English speaking... practice pronouncing these sounds at segmental and word level These activities aimed at helping students gain basic knowledge about the correct pronunciation of the six target consonants From week 2 to week 11, both groups worked on these sounds at word level The vocabulary items for each week were chosen under the condition that they contained the six target consonants and were related to the topic of the. .. When the textbooks do not include any sort of pronunciation work and there is a concern that students’ pronunciation mistakes will be fossilized if they are not corrected by the teacher, it is necessary to integrate TECF into different English speaking activities 15 CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION I Conclusion As a quasi-experimental design, this study aims to help DAV non -English major freshmen overcome their pronunciation. .. subjects’ feedback to the questionnaire was an affirmative answer to the second research question That is, most experimental students had positive opinions about TECF They acknowledged that they were capable of acquiring the pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ through TECF and that TECF became an effective way to develop their pronunciation in the future In short, the greatest impression... Control Group 11 At the beginning of every lesson, Ms Julia, a native English teacher at BBC English Center, delivered a 30-minute instruction on the six consonants / s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ to both the control and experimental group In the first week, students in both groups were offered instructional videos illustrating the correct pronunciation of the six target consonants Afterwards, they took it in turns... the speaking lesson at the Academy When students were confused about the pronunciation of a certain sound in the six ones, instructional videos were played again to help them After 30 minutes of instruction, based on the given vocabulary items, Ms Julia led students to the topic of the speaking lesson Then, both groups participated in the same learning activities designed beforehand The learning activities... those in the control group In all activities, the instructors in the control group provided corrective feedback on the content of the students’ statements or arguments, e.g Your arguments need more evidence, right? and vocabulary, e.g In this case, you can use the word “sufficient” II.8 Integration of Pronunciation Targets into the English speaking lessons  Activity 1 – Picture description  Activity... between the experimental and control group in terms of English fricative and affricate sound production Though both groups made certain progresses in their pronunciation after ten weeks, the improvements made by the experimental group who received TECF was significantly greater than that made by the control group who did not receive TECF III.2 The Experimental Group’s Opinions about TECF on Their Pronunciation. .. that only the use of TECF positively impacted these improvements There might be other factors such as motivation, beliefs, individual interests, etc contributing to these achievements This definitely raises the question of internal and external validity of the test This limitation makes it hard to generalize the findings The final limitation of the study is attributed to the limited time for the experimental . research on Teacher’s Corrective Feedback on the pronunciation of English fricative and affricate consonants by non -English major freshmen at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam. II. Aim and Objectives. examine the effect of TECF on the pronunciation of the six consonants /s, z, ʃ, ʒ, ʤ, ʧ/ by non -English major freshmen at DAV; • To investigate the experimental students’ opinions about TECF on their. REVIEW I.1. The Importance of Pronunciation Teaching and Learning I.2. Aspects of Pronunciation I.3. The Aim of Teaching Pronunciation: Intelligibility I.4. General Description of Consonants and English