Diffculties of hing school pupils in pronunciation of some english consonants

Do Mai Lien Graduation paper PART ONE INTRODUCTION I RATIONALE Phonemes are the different sounds within a language In the first place, of all the teacher and students have been asked, no one denied that pronunciation has a very important role This can be easily seen in teaching and learning English in Vietnam Even though it is one of the three language elements, grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation, the first two are heavily focused on but the last one is left with very little concerned As the matter of fact that pronunciation is of little concern, materials on this issues, therefore, are not always available in Vietnam This has much hindered student's acquisition of English pronunciation In addition, not many effective methods have been introduced to help teachers and learners improve their teaching and learning pronunciation These results in a very low quality of sound production in many students Furthermore, that Vietnamese sound system is far different from that of English is considered to be one of the barriers to the acquisition of English pronunciation This can be shown, for example, by the Vietnamese monosyllabic sound system which has caused students a great deal of difficulties as they produce some final consonants and consonant clusters Deriving from these above-mentioned reasons, the foreign learners need to be given some strategies for improving their pronunciation out of respect for listeners' ears Therefore, it is necessary for a research study on difficulties of high-school pupils in pronunciation of some English consonants to be made - - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper II AIMS OF THE SUDY This research aims at finding out some difficulties in pronunciation of some English consonants and giving some ways to overcome these difficulties for foreign language learners, especially for high-school pupils III SCOPE OF THE STUDY Within the limit of the study, the author will focus only on some theoretical matters related to English consonants and consonant clusters and some of the most typical and problematic consonants and consonant clusters made by the High School students in Haiduong Province They are the students of eleventh form in Chilinh High School English is one of their compulsory subjects; however, for the reason that is not their major, their level of English is quite various Nevertheless, the research is intended to be devoted to the pronunciation practice at a high school Also, non-professionals in general can benefit from the study IV TASKS OF THE STUDY As specific in the research topic, the research work will fulfill a number of tasks: To study the English sound, especially English consonants and consonants clusters To find pupils' errors when they produce consonants and consonant clusters On the basic of findings, possible solutions are given to reduce the pupils' errors V METHODS OF THE STUDY In order to attain the primary aims, the researcher has consulted several ideas from the Supervisor and people who fully master this topic All the theories have been carefully selected and gathered through reference books and documents in Internet websites as well - - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper In addition, a survey questionnaire has been designed as the key data collection instrument of the study Collecting, analyzing and discussing have been used VI SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY This research studies the phonemes and some difficult consonants By conducting a survey questionnaire, it shows difficult consonants students always meet as well as the reason for these difficulties Based on the cause discovered in the survey, solutions to help students overcome these difficulties as well as to improve their pronunciation correctly and effectively are also made Therefore, naturally the research has some significance to students, teachers as well as anyone interested On the part of teachers, with the help of the study, they may find the most effective teaching techniques to introduce English phonemes By considering the difficult consonants students always meet, they may have their way to help their students overcome these difficulties as well as to improve their students' pronunciation On the part of students, they can refer to the study in order to improve as well as enrich their knowledge of the English phonemes, English consonants and so on Furthermore, they can themselves overcome the difficulties they meet when pronouncing some English consonants by applying some suggestion solutions mentioned in the thesis The study is practical by nature; therefore it is useful for everyone who is interested in the phonemes and wants to improve pronunciation VII DESIGN OF THE RESEARCH WORK The thesis consists of three main parts: the introduction, the investigation, and conclusion Part one, "Introduction", introduces reason for choosing the topic, aims and scopes of the research, the research methods as well as an overview of the thesis - - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper Part two, "Investigation", consists of two chapters Chapter is entitled "Theoretical Background", which has two sections, knows as "Literature Review in Brief", and "The English sound and pronunciation" The chapter is entitled "Methodology, results and finding", which includes the procedures of conducting survey questionnaire In this chapter, the results are analyzed and the major findings are presented Based on the major findings, some solutions to the problem are also given Part three, "Conclusion and Recommendation", summarizes the keys points of the research, points out some limitations as well as provides a few recommendation and suggestion for further study - - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper PART TWO INVESTIGATION CHAPTER ONE THEORETICAL BACKGROUND I LITERATURE REVIEW IN BRIEF Every language has its own sound system on which people base on to produce sounds English therefore has its own sound system too The system of English sounds can be showed in the following chart: English sounds Consonants Vowels The term "vowel" and "consonant" have been in use for many centuries (Roach, 2000,p.31) There are some definitions of vowels and consonants have been given According to Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, vowel is a speech of sound produced without occluding, diverting or obstruct the flow of air from the lungs Vowels, as stated by Peter Roach(2000) " the most common view is that vowels are sounds in which there is no obstruction to the flow of air as it passes from the larynx to the lips" Meanwhile, in wikipedia, they have defined" in phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as English ah /a:/ or oh! /oU/, pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis." - - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper Linguists and phoneticians have carried out many researches on English consonants Each of them has their own way to define, discuss and point out features of English consonants In Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, consonant is a speech sound made by partly or completely stopping the flow of air through mouth Roach(2000) in his book entitled English Phonetic and Phonology defined that "consonants are speech sounds When we pronounce them the organ of speech always form an obstruction, the airstream is stopped before going out and the pronunciation is with or without vibration of vocal cords" In Better English Pronunciation, J.D O‟Connor (1980) refers to the English consonants He claims that consonants contribute more to making English understood than vowels Besides, consonants are generally made by a definite interference of the vocal organs with the air stream, and so are easier to describe and understand P Dale and L Poms (2005) in English Pronunciation Made Simple does not mention to definition of consonants They just consider to pronouncing the consonant of American English; therefore, they not pay much attention to the theories of consonants From the practical phonetic standpoint, it is convenient to distinguish two types of speech sounds, simply because the majority of sounds may be described and classified most appropriately according to one of two techniques: The types of sound which is most easily described in terms of articulation, since we can generally feel the contacts and movements involved Such sounds may be produced with or without vocal cords vibration (voicing) and very often have a noise component in the acoustic sense; these sounds fall generally into the traditional category of consonants The type of sound, depending largely on very light variation of tongue position, which is most easily described in terms of auditory relationships, since there are not contacts or strictures which we can feel with any precision Such sounds are generally voiced having no noise component; these sounds fall generally into the traditional category of vowels and will be known as vowels - - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper In short, the English consonants plays an important role in English pronunciation or English sound system Much research on English consonants and English pronunciation has been carried out but they are not very clear and complete They not mention much to difficulties of learners in pronunciation of some English consonants Therefore, it is necessary to have a full and understandable description of pronunciation of English consonants I.1.1 English vowels classification According to Roach, vowels are made by voiced air passing through different mouth-shape; the differences in shape of the mouth are caused by different positions of the tongue and of the lips The quality of vowels is determined by the particular configuration of the vocal tract Different parts of the tongue may be raised or lowered The lips may be spread or pursed The passage through which the air travels, however, is never so narrow as to obstruct free flow of the airstreams In the short way, Kelly (2000) described in his book that vowels are produced when the airstream is voiced through the vibration of the vocal cords in the larynx and then shaped using the tongue and the lips to modify the overall shape of the mouth The position of the tongue is a useful reference point for describing the differences between vowel sounds Thus vowels have been traditionally classified according to the four questions: - How high is the tongue? According to this criterion there are:  High vowels if they are made with either the front or the back of the tongue is high in the mouth It is raised above its rest position, such as /I:/,/u:/  Low vowels if they are made with the tongue below its rest position, such as /A:/  Mid vowels if the vowels are made with the tongue neither high nor low in the mouth, such as: /e/ - What part of the tongue is raised? Answering this question, we have:  Front vowels: are the vowels in the production of which the highest point of the tongue is in front of the mouth: /I:/  Back vowels: are the vowels in the production of which the back of the tongue is raised to the highest point: /O:/ - - Do Mai Lien  Graduation paper Central vowels are the vowels made with neither the back nor the front of the tongue The tongue is neither high or low in the mouth when central vowels are produced, like /V/ - How long or short is the vowel? Long vowels tend to be longer than short vowels in a similar context They are different from the short one not only on length but also in quality resulting from differences in tongue shape and lips position, for examples: /I:/,/I/,/O:/,/Q/ - How is the shape of lips? Although the lips can have many different shapes and positions, at this stage the researcher will consider only three possibilities( Roach P15) These are:  Rounded : where the corners of the lips are brought towards each other and the lips pushed forwards, like: /u/, /O:/, /U/  Spread: with the corners of the lips moved away from each other, as for a smile: /I/, /&/, /E/  Neutral, where the lips are not noticeable rounded or spread The noise most English people make when they are hesitating (written "er") has neutral lips position: /J/, /V/,ect I.1.2 English consonants classification Roach(2000) points out that consonants are the sounds of the production of which one articulator moves towards another or two articulators come together obstructing the airstreams and the airstreams cannot get out freely Consonants are classified according to criteria, place of articulation and manner of articulation Based on the first criterion people will know for sure if they put their speech organ in the right place to produce correct sounds As a listener, if one happens to listen to English sound he will immediately know how well the speaker is making the sounds English consonants are classified according to three criteria ( Kelly.p47,48) -According to the place of articulation: the place of articulation is the location of the obstruction of air stream in the articulation of the consonants It describes the point at which - - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper the articulation actually touches or it is at its closest Describing the consonant sounds this way gives more information about what the various articulators actually  Bilabials: are the sounds made with the two lips pressing together or coming together: /p, b, m ,w/  Labio-dentals: are the sounds which are produced with the lower lip touching the upper front teeth: /f, v/  Dentals: are the sounds produced with the tip of the tongue touching the upper front teeth, such as /T, D/  Alveolar: are the sounds produced with the tip of the blade of the tongue touching or approaching the alveolar ridge, for example : /t, d, s, z, n, l/  Palato alveolar : are the sounds produced with the tongue tip or blade coming close to the area between the back of the alveolar ridge and the front of the hard palate, such as in /S, Z, tS, dZ/  Post alveolar: is the sound produced with the front of the tongue towards the roof of mouth, but not let the tip touch: /r/  Palatal: is the sound produced with the front of the tongue coming close to the hard palate, the consonant: /j/  Velars: are the sounds produced with the back of the tongue touching the soft palate /k, g, N/  Glottal: are the sounds produced without the active use of the tongue and other part of the mouth /h/ - According to the manner of articulation: manner of articulation is the way in which the airstreams are obstructed and so altered the production of speech sound It describes the time of obstruction caused by the narrowing or closure of articulators  Plosives (stops): are the sounds in the production of which there is a complete closure of the articulators involved so that the airstreams cannot escape through the mouth Plosives sounds are also sometimes referred to as stops There are two kinds of plosives: Oral plosives: are the sounds which are produced with the airstreams being stopped in the oral cavity and the soft palate is raised blocking off the nasal cavity Then the two articulators come apart quickly and the air escapes through the mouth - - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper Nasal plosives: are the sounds produced with the airstreams being stopped in the oral cavity but the soft palate is lowered so the air can go out through the nose  Fricatives: are the sounds produced by letting articulators come close together but there is still a small opening between them so the airstreams is partially abstracted and an audible friction noise is produced Fricatives are continuant consonants, which means that speakers can continue making them as long as they have enough air in their lungs  Affricates: they occurs when a complete closure is made somewhere in the mouth, and the soft palate is raised Air pressure increases behind the closure, and then is released more slowly than in plosives  Lateral: is the sound made with an obstruction of the airstream at a point along the centre of the oral tract with incomplete closure between one or both sides of the tongue and the roof of the tongue  Nasals: are the sounds made when a complete closure is made somewhere in the mouth, the soft palate is lowered, and air escapes through the nasal cavity  Approximants: are the sounds in the production of which two articulator come close together but without the vocal tract being narrowed to such an extent that a friction noise is produced - Acceding to the voicing: with regard to this, the following terms are used: fortis and lenis A voiceless/ voiced pair such as [s, z] are distinguished not only by the presence or absence of voice but also by the degree of breath and muscular effort involved in the articulation We shall see that on the linguistic level, in certain situation, the voice opposition may be lost, so that the energy of articulation becomes a significant factor Those English consonants which are usually tend to be articulated with relatively weak energy, whereas those which are always voiceless are relatively strong Thus, it maybe important to define [s], for instance, as strong or fortis and [z] as weak or lenis Fortis consonants normally shorten the preceding vowels, while lenis consonants often lengthen the preceding vowels( Tam, p15-16) In spoken English, fortis happens to equate with unvoiced sounds, which in English happens to be voiced As far as English consonants are concerned, the distinction is most useful when it comes to distinguishing between sounds that are articulated in essentially the same way one using the voice, the others not - 10 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper In short, the root cause of these mistakes is that they did not know how to form sounds in their speech organs which results in the ill imitation of modal sounds II.2.7 The results of consonant clusters: II.2.7.1 Initial consonant clusters The following table includes initial consonant clusters which have been used in the research Table 11 Errors with initial consonant clusters Initial clusters Correct answer Females Males % /tr-/ 48 /gr-/ 44 /cr-/ 50 /str-/ 38 /spr-/ 3 38 In general, it was the fact that initial consonant clusters were quite a difficult issue for most of the subjects Although many subjects might have no trouble pronouncing a particular list of consonants if they pronounced each in isolation They always faced with a lot of problems when they combined two or more consonants to make a cluster For instance, they pronounced /t/ in „tend‟ and /r/ in „rend‟ without any problem, but up to 45% of the subjects had difficulty with this cluster Also, this sound seemed to be more difficult for females than to males The very common mispronunciation is that they always put /J/ between the two consonants to form a structure CVC This was effected by Vietnamese monosyllabic structure with each syllable is separated and there is not a so-called consonant cluster That is the reason why two syllables were made instead of one consonant cluster To the female subjects, only the subject of group could expose these clusters accurately and the rest could not - 48 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper Of the three consonant clusters, it seemed for almost subjects that they tended to omit one of three consonants in every cluster such as /str-/, /spr-/ They always inserted /J/ between /s/ vs /p/ and /s/ vs /t/, etc In the three consonant clusters For example, the word „street‟ was wrongly articulated as /sờrí t/ and „spring‟ /sờpring/ Even worse, some subjects tried to make /p/ aspirate so that they could not make a glide from /p/ to /r/ Consequently, most of the subjects (62%) encountered these clusters with a poor articulation Now, it is clear that consonants are really problematic for research‟s subjects When these consonants combined together to form consonant clusters, the difficulty seemed to double Beside putting /J/ between two consonants as mentioned above, some subjects even did not pronounce the consonant /s/ at the beginning of the cluster /str-/ This results in the fact that „street‟ was just pronounced as /trIt/ Even worse, it was distorted to become „chí t‟ in Vietnamese II.2.7.2 Final consonant clusters In addition to initial consonant clusters, another area that can be identified as a potential problem for these subjects refers to final consonant clusters The fact that English has no many words ending with clusters has caused problems for all of the subjects when they encountered these English words However, because of the limitation of the research, the researcher will focus on four final clusters The results of the study will be illustrated in the following table Table 12 Errors with final consonant clusters Final clusters Correct answer Females Males % /-sk/ 38 /-ps/ 33 /-sps/ 0 /-ksts/ 0 - 49 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper It is easily seen that compared to the percent of mispronunciation of final consonant clusters, the percentage of errors of final clusters is much higher The result from the table shows that only 38% of the subjects and 33% of them correctly pronounce the cluster /-sk/ and /-ps/ respectively For the others, these final consonants, „risk‟, for example, then was pronounced as „ris‟ only and /k/ was dropped out What is more, it was articulated as „rit‟ by some subjects Beside that, some of them rubbed out „s‟ and let „k‟ heard Consequently, „risk‟ was sounded as /rIk/ /-ps/ cluster appeared to be more challenging to the subjects because only 33% them could pronounce this sound correctly Commonly, they dropped out „s‟ so that „chips‟ /tSIps/ was only sounded like /chIp/ in Vietnamese The more consonants added to the clusters, the lower the percentage of correct pronunciation This is realized by the figures shown in the table with no one could make a sound right as they encounter the cluster /-sps/ or /-skts/ in „chips‟ and „texts‟ The thing is that they could not move their tongue quickly enough to form a glide from the first consonant to another and then to the third or the forth Instead, they either did not articulate them or, if yes, they pronounced them partially only For example, „crisps‟ was just articulated as /kờrí p/ or /krIp/ In such a difficult word as „text‟ it was only heard as /tekst/ From this research, a conclusion is that, in general, males are better than females in the pronunciation of these studied sounds Though the highest scores of both sexes mostly go to females, however, the third female group owns an extremely poor English pronunciation In conclusion, these pronunciation errors came as the reason that, firstly, there are not so-called consonant clusters in Vietnamese so that they not develop the habit of pronouncing them as they meet Secondly, many subjects did not pay any attention to the articulation of especially final consonants, let alone final consonant clusters Then, from the figures shown in the above charts and tables, it can come to conclusion that an urgent attention should be paid to English pronunciation especially to consonant clusters - 50 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper II.3 FINDINGS II.3.1 How to improve pronunciation learning It can be said that pronunciation plays an important role in learners‟ performance in learning language K‟ancar (2006) point out „clear and correct pronunciation is of vital importance A good pronunciation may help learners achieve fluency and confidence when speaking‟ In other words, fluency in English is accuracy with good pronunciation Thus, this part is aimed at introducing some effectiveness approaches to improve pronouncing learning There are: II.3.1.1 Approach 1: Try to learn each sound of English In order to learn each different sound of English it is useful to learn each different symbol that represent different sound of English So why learner should learn each symbol? As can be seen that in written English we use twenty-six letters of the Alphabet However, there are more than twenty-six sounds in English In fact there are over forty sounds in English Thus, it is not easy to show these only using the letters of the English Alphabet There is a system using group of these symbol It can be seen that some of the symbols are the same of letters /a, b, c, e/ and some of them are different, such as /T, D, S/ Learners can use the symbol to write out the pronunciation of words Sometimes, the pronunciation like the word itself but usually it is different So learner should learn each symbol and then each sound of English in order to have good pronunciation II.3.1.2 Approach 2: Listen to English as much as possible Listening skill does not only serve as a tool for students to improve their listening comprehension but also help them to improve their pronunciation Learners must hear English But just hearing it is not enough; learners must listen to it, and they must listen - 51 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper to it not only for the meaning but also for the sound of it When learners listen to the tape, or radio… they not feel satisfied so soon even when understand the content thoroughly Another thing learners should bear in mind that when they listen to the tape, it is also the time they train their pronunciation When listening, try to imitate the native speakers as accurately as possible By doing so, learners will not only get very good sound production but they also acquire stem, rhythm and intonation, experienced, when they keep listening to the tape many times, the sounds automatically absorb in the learners then learners get the correct sounds The tapes does also help in the way that they can records learners‟ sound production Then learners listen to it, closely and carefully, compare with the origin which is said by native speaker and see where the performance does not match the original; mark the place where they are dissatisfied, and practice these bit until it seems right Besides, to many students, whose pronunciation is very good, when they were asked about their experiences they said that they just listen to English songs and then they followed the way the singers performed When they are singing they are in very good mood so that their imitation might be better than when they listen to the tape with, as for them, certain pressure To some others, however, they have another way to train their pronunciation They just listen to their favorite program on T.V, which is also very good way to improve pronunciation To sum up, careful listening is the most important thing; and careful matching of matching performance with listening will bring learners near to the ideal of a perfect English pronunciation II.3.1.3 Approach 3: Focusing on pronunciation With reference to pronunciation in communication, Russell (2007) argues that learners of ten hesitate to speak because they are afraid of pronouncing the words wrongly In fact, it is difficult to correct a mistake in pronunciation later if learners not pay attention to it from the start He gives an advise that learners should try to pronounce the words right from the very first lessons It is necessary to be patient when pronouncing a new words If they makes - 52 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper mistakes in pronunciation, they should record the right pronunciation of those words and listen over and over again so that they will be familiar with them II.3.1.4 Approach 4: Practice to speak as much as possible As well as listening, speaking skill has another thing to be done other than getting the content of the passage or the attitude of the author Speaking aloud offers opportunities for the study of the links between spelling and pronunciation, of stress and intonation, and of the linking of sounds between words in connected speech It is no use practicing pronounce a word silently; all of us are much better at pronouncing if we it silently, silently, inside ourselves But it‟s worthless talking English inside yourself, it has to come out, so practice aloud Learners can surely train their pronunciation too After they finish their exercises relating to so much silent speaking only, it is now time for aloud speaking Choose some paragraphs, short story in English and then speak them aloud In this way, learners can roughly judge how good their pronunciation is Look up their dictionary to make sure that you get their correct pronunciation of the word that you are uncertain of how to pronounce it One thing learners should mention here is that make sure that you have good dictionary beside you Moreover, Russell (2007) assumes that „the most effective way to improve speaking skill is to talk to a native speaker‟ This is good way to train learners pronunciation because they can train first their reaction Then if learners have a chance to expose themselves to English speaking people, they might will get benefits That also means that the best language class is the one which has a native speaker as a teacher Learners are therefore advised to join such a class because such a foreign teacher usually uses only the language being learnt in the class and refuses to speak any other As a result, learners can become more familiar with the language they are studying because they are forced to speak it What is more, by exposing to something alive, learners will certainly have more motivations to improve their pronunciation as much as possible II.3.1.5 Approach 5: Have a good dictionary - 53 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper A lot of people not realize that good dictionary not only for definition of words, but also for pronunciation of each word So, why learners should have a good dictionary for good pronunciation? When learners get good dictionaries (e.g Oxford, Longman, Cambridge, Collin…, or whatever dictionaries that they feel comfortable with), making sure that it has pronunciation keys, which are those funny symbols tell learners how to pronounce a word Every good dictionary will have a small IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) chart, usually in its first few pages All learners when looking up a word is check which symbol links to which sound After doing this for a time, learners will get used to the symbols and be able to easily check and learn the correct pronunciation as well as definitions in the dictionaries II.3.1.6 Approach 6: Learn the stress, intonation of the words and sentences Every English word has its own stress, or intonation For example, the word "believe" has two syllables (be and lieve), but only the second syllable is stressed We say be'lieve and not 'be lieve Your dictionary will show the syllable stress by an apostrophe („) before the syllable to be stressed Word stress is important In fact, it is more likely that someone misunderstands you because of wrong word stress than because of the wrong pronunciation of a sound Many people from different countries have improper intonation because their teacher had improper intonation In many situations, being monotone is better than having bad intonation The worst is when someone goes up and down too much on every word Another thing learners should avoid is to end high at the end of a sentence To correct improper intonation, learners need to remember to start high and end low They cannot it any other way The author recommends learners should go to the interview section and listening to one of the audio files provided by a native speaker Learners will hear proper intonation After listening to the audio, record yourself and - 54 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper listen to it Does it sound the same? If not, then find the areas that are dissimilar and make the necessary corrections This advice is very trivial, but intonation is relatively easy to correct Learners can fix their intonation with only a little effort If they have a friend who is a native English speaker, they can usually fix intonation in a couple of lessons Recording themselves and listening to themselves might be tedious, but having correct intonation can go a long way PART THREE CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION - 55 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper This is a research on difficulties of high-school pupils in the pronunciation of some English consonants It is based on the theoretical back ground of phonetic and phonology The fact that the pupils who take pronunciation training seriously cannot be denied However, there exits the majority of them who pay no attention to it They just pronounce English sounds randomly which results in the wrongness in sounds production Today when the communicative approach applied to foreign language teaching is preferred, standard English pronunciation is not so demanding Foreign learners are sometimes satisfied with acceptable pronunciation Undoubtedly, this has its certain advantages However, personally, it does more harm than good for language learners The reason is that if they keep pronouncing as so, they will be understood only in their countries or in their certain communities where people have nearly the same pronunciation Yet, if they go outside and have an exposure to outside world where there are so many variants of English pronunciation how can they manage to be understood? That is the reason why standard English pronunciation is still preferred forever More than that, to students who want to train to become teachers of English, if they all have differences on the pronunciation they will make their students get confused because they not know which pronunciation is right and which is wrong Based on the findings, the graduation paper has given some recommendations, suggestions and limitations as follows The researcher, first of all, suggests that learners should try to learn each sound of English The second consideration is that learners should spend as much as they can to listen to English tape It is good for them when they are listening and practicing at the same time The third consideration is that learners should be patient when pronouncing new words and practice to pronounce the words accurately at the beginning Another issue of concern is that learner should spend as much time as they can on practicing speaking English it is better for them to ask a native speaker or someone who knows English well to practice with - 56 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper The fourth one is that learners should have a good dictionary in order to have a good review about the pronunciation of words Last but not least, learners should learn stress, intonation of words and sentences to have smooth pronunciation To sum up, in the light of theory on some approaches previously discussed as well as from findings of the survey, the researcher recommends that the best way for highschool pupils to overcome the difficulties of pronouncing some difficult English consonants is to listen to English tape, practice saying the words, focusing on pronunciation, speaking with native speakers, having a good dictionary, and learning stress and intonation of each word and sentences The research has attained some significant success in finding out some effective ways for high-school students to overcome the difficulties of pronouncing some difficult English consonants However, there are also some inevitable limitations existing Firstly, the researcher only concentrates on researching some English consonants that are difficult to be pronounced and three approaches to overcome these difficulties It is clear that there are more than six approaches to help the learners over the problems Secondly, within the scope of the research, the researcher only focuses on English consonants The researcher has not dealt with other issue that makes a good pronunciation Last but not least, the researcher has not studied a large number of pupils except those who are in the eleventh form coming from Chilinh High school It is likely that with other subjects and places, the research will have different results and findings It is hopeful that the findings of this research will make a small contribution to the learning and practicing pronunciation for non native language learners It may provide them with some effective ways to improve their pronunciation Because of the short time and limited knowledge of the researcher on the matter, mistakes, and shortcomings - 57 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper have inevitably remained Thus, the researcher warmly welcomes and highly appreciates all the comments, remarks and suggestions from the readers REFERENCES Baker, A (1982) Introducing English Pronunciation, A Teacher’s guide to Tree or Three and Ship or Sheep? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Baker, A (1983) Tree or Three? An elementary pronunciation course Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Hung, Nguyen Quoc A model to teach English pronunciation to Vietnamese Learners Hochiminh City: Ho Chi Minh Publisher - 58 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper Geoffrey, Finch (2000) Linguistic term and Concepts New York: ST.Matin‟s Press, INC Gerald, Kelly (2001) How to Teach Pronunciation London: Longman Gimson, A.C An introduction to the Pronunciation of English, 3rd London: Edward Arnold Klancar, N.I (2006) Developing Speaking Skill in the Young Learners Classroom Retrieved November 24, 2009 from the World Wide Web: http://www.iteslj.org/Techniques/Klancar-SpeakingSkills.html Ladefoged, Peter (1975) A Course in Phonetic Loa Angeles: University of California Krashen, S.D et al (1982) Age, Rate, and Eventual Attainment in Second Language Acquisition Rowley, MA: Newbury House O‟Connor, J.D (1967) Better English Pronunciation Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Oyama, S (1976) A Sensitive Period for the Acquisition of a Nonnative Phonological System Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 5,3 P Dale & L Poms (2005) English Pronunciation Made Simple New York: Longman Ponsonby, M (1987) How, now, brown cow? A course in the pronunciation of English Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Roach, Peter (1990) English Phonetics and Phonology, 10th ed Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Russell, M (2007) How to Improve Speaking Skills in a New Language Retrieved January 20, 1010 from the World Wide Web: http://www.fileblogs.com/HowTo-Improve-Speaking-Skills-In-A-New-Language&article_26525-48k Scarcella, R.C & Oxford, R.L (1992) The tapestry of Language Learning: The Individual in the Communicative Classroom Boston, MA: Heinle and Heinle Publisher Shumin, K (1997) Factors to Consider Developing Adult EFL Students‟ Speaking Abilities Forum, 35,8 Tam, Ha Cam (2003) Phonetics and Phonology Hanoi: Vietnam National University, Hanoi Press Tam, Ha Cam (2005) Journal of Science Hanoi: Vietnam National University - 59 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper Trim, J (1975) English pronunciation illustrated Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Xuan Ba & Quang Minh (2006) Luyện Phát âm Đánh dấu Trọng Âm Tiếng Anh HÀ NỘI: NXB HÀ NỘI APPENDIX QUESTIONNAIRE QUESTIONNAIRE FOR INTERMIEDIATE PUPILS (THE PUPILS OF THE ELEVENTH FORM AT CHILINH HIGH SCHOOL) TO CHECK THEIR ABILITY TO PRONOUNCE SOME ENGLISH CONSONANTS - 60 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper ( You look through all the sentences and dialogues in the questionnaire, then read loud all of these to me for recording your sounds It will give useful information to my graduation paper and your contribution is of great significance to the completion of my research Please read aloud all these sentences and dialogues bellows as well as you can) A- to check /S/, /Z/, /tS/, /dZ/ sounds: Sheila has finished her home work He was answered to the call of the „gold rush‟ in 1902 The mushrooms and shrimp are delicious She has to wash all the dished for her aunt‟s restaurant when she lived in Washington She usually watches television at home I heard an explosion in the garage She received a corsage for the occasion Charles‟s chicken was poached by a small poacher She gave a chuckle of delight 10 She choices to stay at home to prepare lunch instead of seeing him Dialogue 1: In an interview: A Good morning! Nice to meet you! B Good morning, sir Nice to meet you A Ok, let‟s start Could you please tell me your name, when and where you were born? B Yes My name is George Brown I was born on January 1983, at a small village called Phoenix near a large bridge named George Washington That‟s why my father named me George A Nice Why you want to become a car seller? B Well, because it‟s an interesting work as for me I really keen on cars And I have good knowledge about them A Ah, what kind of car you like? B A Jeep I had bought an old Jeep, I like it because it‟s comfortable and less dangerous when driving B-To check nasal and plosive Dialogue 2: At a market: - 61 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper A Hi, how can I help you? B I would like to buy a kilogram of apple A yes, here you are Anything else? B Ah, I still need two candle A Oh, sorry I haven‟t got any candle, but you can go to the table at the corner to ask for some B Thank you May I ask you one more question? A Yes, ofcourse? B Where can I buy a bunch of sunflowers? A You‟re a new comer, aren‟t you? You can buy them at „Secret Garden‟ on the Mountain street B Thank you very much C- to check some consonant clusters: 11 Shepherd tending their sheep 12 Loud screams rend the morning air 13 Sunshine is full in the spring street 14 Is there any risk of the bomb exploding? 15 This mug has chips in it 16 He wrongly reads some texts in the crisps the end - - 62 - [...]... result of being near some other phonemes belonging to a neighboring word we call this an instance of assimilation Thus, assimilation is the influence of one sound upon another neighboring sound so that they become more alike Assimilation is something which varies in extend according to speaking rate and style: it is more likely to be found in rapid, casual speech and less likely in slow, careful speech Sometimes... types of final three clusters; the first is pre-final plus final plus post-final helped /helpt/ bonds /bOndz/ The second type is one of post-final consonants can occur in a final cluster: final plus-final 1 plus post-final 2 (post-final two is one of /s, z, t, d, T/): fifths /fifTs/ lapsed /l&pst/ next /nekst/ * Four-consonant clusters Most four-consonant clusters can be analyzed as consisting of a final... Termination/ coda Final consonant Final consonant cluster (1 consonant) Final 2-consonant (> 1 consonant) Final 3-consonant Final 4-consonant cluster cluster cluster Consonant clusters definitions: In Introducing English Pronunciation, A Teacher’s guide to Tree or Three and Ship or Sheep, Baker (1982) defines that In linguistic, a consonant cluster is a group of consonants which have no intervening vowel‟... (has a higher information content) than walk I.4.6.3 Basic intonation patters There are various ways to use intonation in English, but there are two basic pattern: falling intonation and rising intonation * Falling intonation: this kind of intonation always shows the excitement, indignation, cold or impatient This can be found in:  Information question with „Who, What, Where, etc.‟ (if being asked for... is again made on the teeth ridge, the front of the tongue being some what depressed and the back raised in the direction of the soft palate, giving a back vowel resonance Both clear [l] and dark [l] are voiced, though partial devoicing may take place when a preceding consonants is fortis The actual point of contact of the tongue for /l/ is conditioned by the place of articulation of the following consonant;... can disappear in unstressed syllables: Example: I thick we should call the police ( /J/ can disappear) That‟s an interesting film (/J/ is not pronounced by many speakers 4 /v/ can disappear in of , before consonants: Example: My birthday‟s on the 12th of January That‟s the least of my worries I.4.4 Liaison (Linking) The linking final sound of a word with the initial sound of the following word for... as one of /b, d, g/ b Media position: depending on whether the syllable preceding and following the plosives are stressed or not, the medial plosives may have the characteristics either of final or of initial plosives c Final position: the final /b, d, g/ normally have little voicing: if there is voicing, it is at the beginning of the phase /p, t, k/ are, of course, voiceless The plosion following the... concentrates on analyzing the definition given by Well consonant clusters are a group or sequence of consonants that appear together in a syllable without a vowel between them (Well, p.834) Consonant clusters may occur at the beginning of a word (an initial cluster), at the end of a word (a final cluster) or within a word (a medial cluster) (Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistic, Longman... possible word final and initial sequences, whereas word final /-&/ and initial /tSrJ-/ do not occur Therefore, within the limit of the paper, the author will focus only on initial and final consonant clusters a Initial consonant clusters According to Gimson (1980) and O‟Connor (1967), there are two main kinds of initial consonants: - 21 - Do Mai Lien Graduation paper - /s/ followed by one of /p, t, k,... going up and down continuously causing the pitch change that we call intonation‟ Example: The 'girl gave the 'money to her 'brother I.4.6.2 Functions of intonation The ways in which intonation does are very complex, and many suggestions have been made for ways of isolating different function Roach (2000) in English Phonetic and Phonology has introduced four functions of intonation They are attitudinal ... difficulties of learners in pronunciation of some English consonants Therefore, it is necessary to have a full and understandable description of pronunciation of English consonants I.1.1 English vowels... the 12th of January That‟s the least of my worries I.4.4 Liaison (Linking) The linking final sound of a word with the initial sound of the following word for the convenience of speaking that... characteristics either of final or of initial plosives c Final position: the final /b, d, g/ normally have little voicing: if there is voicing, it is at the beginning of the phase /p, t, k/ are, of course,