Using videos to improve 10th graders english pronunciation at nong cong 1 high school

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Using videos to improve 10th graders english pronunciation at nong cong 1 high school

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PART 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale for the study In recent time, English, as a language of international communication and lingua franca, has been widely used and spoken worldwide for education, business, communication, and others purposes Admittedly, English has become a means of international communication and one of the most popular languages in the world It is used for almost all aspects of human life, such as mass media, business, sports, science and technology, education culture and so on Therefore, the knowledge and skills of English are highly valued As a result, some educational institutions in Vietnam have introduced English since the pre-elementary level Moreover, in high schools, it is one of three core subjects tested in the National Examination When speaking a foreign language, pronunciation is of great importance If you cannot pronounce correctly you are not able to make yourself understood A language is a tool of communication but bad pronunciation can never be a good tool of communication Therefore, tremendous misunderstandings are caused by inappropriate pronunciation This mispronunciation during daily communications is sometimes so significant that we should pay much attention to avoid it Admittedly, in the real context of teaching and learning English as foreign language in Viet Nam, pronunciation is one of the problems that need tackling As a teacher of English with more than 17 years of experience at Nong Cong high school, I noticed that my students are not motivated and qualified enough to practice pronouncing English confidently, naturally compared with students of other regions nationwide One reason for this is that they were not exposed to natural speaking environment at their lower secondary school as well as other practical setting to speak English More importantly, they are not taught or instructed in an appropriate way to English pronunciation For them, learning English means doing grammar exercise, reading tasks, writing sentences instead of speaking during their English lessons Despite their considerable knowledge of phonetics, the students fail to use the knowledge to articulate their sentence to communicate in real-life situations This results in the lack of confidence, demotivation to communicate in spoken form For the reasons above, I have decided to carry out the study entitled “Using videos to improve 10th graders’ English pronunciation at Nong Cong high school” I hope that this study will be helpful method to tackle the teaching of pronunciation in order to help students with their English pronunciation and in turn they would be the best model for their future students as well 1.2 Purpose of the study and research question The study aims: - to examine whether or not the audiovisual (videos) method can improve English pronunciation ability of 10th grade students at my school - to identify what students’ perceptions are when videos are used as a teaching learning media in pronunciation practice In order to obtain the exact response to the aims, two research questions were raised: (1) Does the use of videos help students improve English pronunciation? (2) What perceptions students have about using videos to help them improve 1.3 Scope of the study This study limited itself to focus on improving the 10 th graders’ pronunciation at class 10B5 of Nong Cong high school Forty students involved participation focusing on the effectiveness of using audio visual (videos) to develop high school students’ English pronunciation by improving six final consonants (/s/, /z/, /l/, /ð/, /f/, /v/) The pronunciation standard used is American standard 1.4 Method of the study This study using qualitative and quantitative research method aimed to determine whether video can enhance students’ pronunciation o r have a positive affect on the ability of students to utilize the phonetics knowledge they have learned to enhance their speaking The author used data collection instrument to gather information about the students involved, monitor the progress of the students when they are exposed to some common audiovisuals during their lessons and determine the effectiveness of videos in teaching and learning pronunciation based on the students’ reflection and pre-test, post-test result The pre-tests were necessary to assess pronunciation competence the students possessed in single utterances as well as in full presentation before the intervention of the strategy and used as a baseline score The post-tests were used to determine the effectiveness of the strategy used by the students during the experiment process by comparing the pre-test scores to the posttest scores taken at the end of the study to conclude the hypothesis PART 2: DEVELOPMENT 1.1 Literature Review 2.1.1 Definition of pronunciation Pronunciation is one of the important aspects in English, especially in oral communication Every sound, stress pattern, and intonation may convey meaning The non-native speakers of English who speak English have to be very careful in pronouncing some utterances or he may create misunderstanding Therefore, having an intelligible pronunciation is necessary rather than having a native-like pronunciation Lado [7: p.70] has stated that pronunciation is the use of a sound system in speaking and listening Here, pronunciation is merely treated as the act that happens in speaking and listening Sharing the ideas, Kristina, Diah, et al [6: p.1] defined that pronunciation is the act or manner of pronouncing words; utterance of speech In other words, it can also be said that it is a way of speaking a word, especially a way that is accepted or generally understood In the senses, pronunciation entails the production and reception of sounds of speech and the achievement of the meaning This second definition gives a briefer pronunciation’s definition It contains some important keys in pronunciation: act, speaking, production and reception of sound According to Oxford Advanced Learner’s English Dictionary, pronunciation is a way in which a language or a particular word or sound is spoken This definition has affirmed that pronunciation is a way of producing something and the product of this act is language or word or sound 2.1.2 Definition of Consonant According to Bertil Malmberg [1; p.32], consonants are sounds characterized by a constricting or a complete closing of the air passages Every consonant may be defined according to its place of articulation and manner of articulation In term of Place of Articulation, consonants are classified as Bilabials (/p/, /m/, /b/); Labiodentals (/f/, /v/); Interdental ([ð, θ]); Dentals (/t/, /d/, /n/, /l/); Alveolar (/n/, /t/, /d/, /s/, /z/, Alveo-palatal (/ʃ/, /ʒ/, /tʃ/, /dʒ/, /j/), Velars (/ɳ/, /k/, /g/); Glottal (/h/) Regard to Manner of Articulation, Peter and Susan, [8; p.18] refers Manner of articulation to the way in which the obstruction of the air-stream, which characterizes all consonants, is achieved at the different places of articulation in the mouth He grouped consonants as Stops, Fricatives, Nasals, Laterals, Trills: rsound 2.1.3 English Phonetic Symbols Given the complexity of sound-spelling correspondences in English, it would be difficult to use the Roman alphabet to symbolize English sounds Some problems would arise when English spelling system is used to represent sound English Pronunciation has distinctive sound classes It is divided into two basic groups: segmental and supra-segmental In the segmental group there are vowels, diphthongs and consonants In supra-segmental group there are stress and intonation Table English Phonetic Symbols 2.1.4 The objectives of teaching Pronunciation Teaching pronunciation in a high school is very essential Teacher should give certain attention in teaching pronunciation and decide the area of sounds that become the basic need for students Native-like pronunciation is difficult for most young learners to achieve in a foreign language The achievement of it requires not only skilled teaching but also a high level of internal motivation of the student Most young learners are satisfied with reasonably intelligible speech in the second language and this is an acceptable goal for the English Foreign Language teacher The teacher should give assistance during the regular speaking lesson to students who are having difficulty with particular sounds The particular sounds that students will find it difficult will differ for different language backgrounds Celce- Murcia, et al [2; p.8] stated that the pronunciation should enable learners to surpass the threshold level so that their pronunciation will not detract from their ability to communicate a Ability b Consistency: the pronunciation should be smooth and natural c Intelligibility: The pronunciation should be understandable to the listeners (Kenworthy [5; p.3]) d Communicative Efficiency: The pronunciation should help to convey the meaning that is intended by the speaker Based on the goals above, the intelligibility is considered the main goal of pronunciation since the idea of pronunciation is to enable the listeners to understand what the speaker says Kenworthy [5; p.7] states that the main goal of pronunciation for the learners is can be comfortably intelligible It means that the conversation between the speaker and the listener can be “comfortable” It’s not the condition where the speaker and the listener speak a native-like pronunciation, but both the speaker and the listener understand each other 2.1.5 Definition of Audio-visual aids Linguistics researchers have stated about the definition of audio-visual aids that the audio- visual aids are tools of record to improve speaking skills that are used for several times and more than others It is where the object picture section and gestures have been systematically used with audio-visual work to elucidate meaning Others stress that in audio visual aids, both the listening (ears) and viewing faculties (eyes) are involved Such aids include television programs, video films, motion pictures, synchronized audio-slide projectors, computers and computerassisted instructions and so on Cartoon films are also a useful medium for developing, and chiseling the skills of the students Subathra [10; p.57] emphasizes the best side of audio-visual aids that they made the process of learning has become quite exciting for the students with the audio-visual aids It helps the students in generating an open mind for learning At the same time it develops team work among the students as they are required to work in teams for such project-based learning Within a short period of time these audio-visual aids gained much popularity and have shown their dominance 2.1.6 Kinds of Audio-Visual Aids According to Nupur [7; p.3], there are four kinds of audio-visual aids They are films, television, video and CDs Films represent an effective instructional device to cater to the students’ attention and create interest and motivation among them towards effective learning Educational films may be prepared on any content material or any aspect of knowledge, and behavior Television is a versatile medium of transmitting education through different programs It is an exciting means of communication Useful instructional programs are being telecasted regularly for the student community on television A teacher should utilize the TV programs and make them the basis for discussions on relevant occasions Video is a viable aid towards effective learning and teaching Teaching with the help of video is called video-aided instruction In video-aided instruction, learners’ comprehension is generally tested through a questionnaire and video is clearly an instructional medium that generates a much greater amount of interest and enjoyment than the more traditional printed material Nowadays, educational video-cassettes are easily available in the market Educational CDs can be prepared on any aspect of the subject-matter and curriculum 2.1.7 The Advantages of Using Audio Visual Aids According to Nupur [7; p.5], there are so many advantages of using audio visual aids, such as: * Best motivators: They are the best motivators Students work with more interest and zeal They are more attentive * Fundamental to verbal instructions: They help to reduce verbalism which is a major weakness of the schools They convey the same meaning as words mean They give clear concepts and thus help to bring accuracy in learning * Clear images: Clear images are formed when we see, hear, touch, taste and smell as our experiences are direct, concrete and more or less permanent Learning through the senses becomes the most natural and consequently the easiest * Vicarious Experience: Everyone agrees to the fact that the firsthand experience is the best type of educative experience but such an experience cannot always be provided to the pupils so in some situations certain substitutes have to be provided For this we find a large number of inaccessible objects and phenomenon In all such cases audio-visual aids provide us the best substitutes * Variety: Audio-Visual aids provide variety and provide different tools in the hands of the teacher * Freedom: The use of audio-visual aids provides various occasions for the pupil to move about, talk, laugh and comment upon Under such an atmosphere the students work because they want to work and not because the teacher wants them to work 2.2 Research context 2.2.1 Setting and participants This study was conducted in 16 weeks from October 2018 to January 2019 in class 10B5 at Nong Cong high school in rural area of Thanh Hoa province Forty 10th graders involved in the study They mainly came from the countryside In general, they had learnt English for over years However, their proficiency is not satisfactory enough, and their learning style is quite passive In addition, they hardly acquired any effective skills in speaking due to their incompetent pronunciation, especially in real context as a presenter In their opinion, learning English means getting grammar and structures with common lexical resources As a result, they were almost beginners in speaking as a high school student 2.2.2 The textbook The reading materials used in the study consisted of selected texts from new English Textbook 10 (learner-centered and communicative approach with themebased teaching) published by Education Publishing House and Pearson In the textbook, there are 10 units with diverse topics related to themes: Our lives, Our society, Our environment, Our future sections were included in one unit namely: Getting started, Language, Skills, Communication and Culture, Looking back and Project in which there are some Looking back and Project lessons are not simple enough that did not require a lot tutoring from the teacher However, some of the Project required a lot of attention and time to be fulfilled It is hoped that English teachers will have a better insight look in tutoring students to integrate their knowledge into conducting the Project requirements Therefore, I found that it matched with the objectives of the learning program and students’ levels of competence In the narrow scope of this study, I only focused on using some audiovisuals to help students improve the students’ pronunciation (mainly focus on English consonants) 2.2.3 The reality of teaching and learning English pronunciation at Nong Cong high school As mentioned above, speaking skill (presenting skill) in Project lesson in new Tieng Anh 10 is the last part if the eighth lesson that make up of one unit in the textbook In order to fulfill their project required in the Textbook, the teacher is obliged to provide students with guidance how to do, what to with their Project in which targeted Grammar and structure of overall lesson is indispensible The students in our school, however, have been facing numerous challenges in speaking lesson because of their poor source of phonetics knowledge They are not confident and competent enough to pronounce long sentence or present their ideas in front of the whole class Some get tired of speaking out, others speak English with much hesitation In addition, most of them have difficulty using the obtained phonetics knowledge to produce their utterances Moreover, Project- based learning is unfamiliar to students from lower secondary schools They are not experienced enough to work in group and make their lesson outcome confidently The differences between the number of Vietnamese ending consonants (only consonants appear at the end of words) and English ending consonants (endless list of final consonants and final consonant clusters in English) make it hard for the students to remember and pronounce correctly In addition to this, some problems of the teacher related to pronunciation practice should be stated namely lack of knowledge about Pronunciation; lack of motivation to teach Pronunciation; inappropriate techniques of teaching Pronunciation This has caused pronunciation teaching and learning at my high school to be ignorant 2.3 Stages of the study Based on my observation, my school has completely enough facilities There are 25 classes from 10th grades to 12th grades Each class consists of 40 students Besides, there are a headmaster room, a language laboratory (in progress), a science laboratory, a computer laboratory, a library, a counseling room, a health room, and a hall I conducted study in this school for about three months with the frequency of once a week where five steps were followed: Step Identify the problem In identifying the problems, I had conducted a survey (through questionnaire), pre-test, and post-test in which two instruments were used: (1) Questionnaire: The list of questions were delivered in order to know the students’ attitudes to pronunciation, teaching method used by the teacher, and the students’ behavior during teaching-learning process (2) Tests: The pre-test was given in order to know the students’ pronunciation ability Step Planning the study General plan will be made before implementing the study I prepared everything related to the study as follows: - Making lesson plan and designs the steps in doing the study - Preparing teaching aids (slide shows, text-book, etc) - Preparing pretest and post-tests (to know whether students’ pronunciation ability improves or not) Step Implementing the study In implementing the study, I carried out the ready-made plan by using cartoon films in teaching and learning process in order to improve students’ pronunciation ability All the videos in this step were only used in the website “www.youtube.com” In the first meeting, I explained about the basic concept of vowels and diphthongs using lecturing technique combined with listen and imitate technique The videos called “Vowels & Diphthongs - English Listening & Pronunciation Practice (Part 1&2)” were used for the first meeting I showed many parts of the videos as a model to pronounce certain words, then the students pronounced the word altogether After that, the students tried to pronounce the words individually In the second meeting I used the videos “Introduction to Articulatory Phonetics (Consonants)” to teach the students basic knowledge about consonant In this video, students would focus on how linguists describe consonant sounds, in particular in American English Finally, the last meeting was mainly about the labiodental sounds/f, v/, the interdental sound / ð /, and the alveolar sound /s, z/ The names of the videos used in this meeting were “Labiodental sounds Judith”, “"th" [θ] [ð] consonant sounds- English Pronunciation Lesson”, and “English: How to Pronounce S and Z consonants: American Accent” Picture 1: Students from class 10B5 at a pronunciation lesson Step Observing the study In the two meetings, the condition of the classroom was perfectly controlled The students didn’t make unnecessary noise during the action of the research After the first meeting, there was a progress in the classroom situation Haft of the students confidently pronounce the words that they have learnt in front of the class The others still struggled with the vowel and the diphthongs However, in the second meeting, most of the students were able to pronounce correctly the consonants although this was the first time they had a chance to learn the consonants clearly They seemed to be interested in watching videos to enhance their pronunciation When the students finished learning about consonants, I gave them the wordlist in the pretest as a small test to check their improvement Step Reflecting the study The author evaluated the teaching activity that had been carried out in order to find out the strengths and weaknesses of the teaching activity that had been carried out The weaknesses are refined in the next lesson, so that finally the effectiveness of using videos to improve students’ pronunciation ability is determined Picture 2: Student of class 10B5 giving her presentation on Vietnamese culture 2.4 Data collection 2.4.1 Instruments To gather data related to students’ improvement on English Pronunciation, the author made use of several instruments, namely pretest, posttest, questionnaire and interview Questionnaire Questionnaire is a valuable technique to gather students’ perception toward the study It will help the teacher identify the problems of the students when they pronounce English final consonants and find out students ‘opinion about new 10 methods to improve their pronunciation Previous researches have proved that questionnaire helps researchers get information from a lot of people easily without costing too much time and money It can also supply respondents not have to be under much pressure for immediate response The respondent’s privacy is kept; therefore, they can provide reliable answer The test was given to the students after four times treatment The test has the same format as pretest Both the pre and posttest are equal in term of level of difficulty The posttest was also conducted 10 minutes The same tool of pretest evaluation was used to mark student’s posttest The results of posttest were in comparison with that of pretest so as to reveal the impact of adapting audio-visual method for improving English Pronunciation Pre-test The participants were required to pretest before the experimental teaching The pretest was designed to access students’ English pronunciation students had to complete the test in 10 minutes There was no guidance or help given during the test The test consisted one parts which is a range of most commonly mispronounced words by non-native English language learners in Vietnam It was aimed to find out whether the students already know how to pronounce some words in English correctly or not In the first part, the wordlist contained fourteen words which ended with six final consonant sounds that are foreign to Vietnamese speakers (/s/, /z/, /l/, /ð/, /f/, /v/) and for the second part, the students will read some random sentences Students should aware of being evaluated on pronunciation and therefore slowly enunciate each syllable Posttest There are two parts of the posttest In the first part, the teacher asked students to read 14 commonly mispronounced words by Vietnamese English language learners Then, they will be asked to read out some sentences The students’ tests were assessed by basing on the checklist The maximum score a student can achieve is 100 The teacher rated each student’s reading of the wordlist and reading sentences and assigned numerical values to represent the level of accuracy with which they produce each sound 11 PART 3: CONCLUSION 3.1 The main findings The study was carried out with a view to exploring the effectiveness of using audiovisuals to improve the students’ pronunciation The result was collected from the questionnaires and the differences of pretest and posttest results 3.1.1 Preliminary inquiry (questionnaires) Before delivering the pretest, I distributed Questionnaires to the students to prove the general assumptions about the English teaching learning process Question Table 2: Questionnaires Totally Agree agree Not sure Disa gree Totally disagre e Percentage Good English pronunciation is promoted through regular opportunities for you to understand native speaker clearly and they understand you more Your teacher only teaches LKS (a handbook containing materials and student worksheets) by explaining the materials and doing exercise on the handbook Your teacher teaches pronunciation by dictating and drilling I often have problem in pronouncing a final consonant and put right stress in the right syllable\word Lack of time to practice pronunciation is the good reason for bad pronunciation Wrong methods of self-study and wrong teaching methods of teachers can lead to incorrect pronunciation 7.You often have a habit of pronouncing the sounds of English like the sounds of Vietnamese 8.When you see the words is not familiar 55% 33.3% 8.3% 1.7% 1.7% 96.7% 3.3% 0% 0% 0% 95% 3.3% 1.7% 0% 0% 88.3% 3.3% 3.3% 3.3% 1.7% 46.7% 31.7% 3.3% 10% 8.3% 33.3% 21.7% 13.3 % 15% 16.7% 80% 5% 11.7% 3.3% 1.7% 3.3% 8.3% 8.3% 3.3% 75% 12 and you try to look it up in the dictionary, you can read and pronounce the word correctly by looking at the symbols Based on the analyses of the Questionnaires result, most of the students agree that Pronunciation is an important skill and students from all ages can enhance their English pronunciation According to the details result, I listed three main problems of my students in learning English pronunciation as follows: Firstly, 80% Students had high interest to study English and English pronunciation but they had lack intrinsic motivation, so they gave up to find other sources to practice pronunciation Secondly, 91.6 %students had problem in putting right stress in the right syllable/word and they were neglecting to pronounce a final consonant at all Finally, the teacher rarely used various methods and videos in teaching 3.1.2 The result of Pre-test The forty students were given the pre-test (Appendix 2) to examine their English ability before the experiment The results of the pre-test from the table below showed that the scores of two chosen students’ groups were a bit different However, the fact revealed from these figures was that most of the students’ performance in both two groups was below average even poor The students were all tested on the same day, one day before the interventions began The results of the initial assessment are shown in Table Level (insufficient) No % 26 65 Level Level (sufficient) (proficient) No % No % 10 22.5 10 Table 3: Initial Student scores Level (excellent) No % 0 The data showed that most students’ pronunciation levels were rather low The percentage of each final consonant was pronounced in the wordlist and the sentence by 40 students was unsatisfactory This percentage is a summary of the score of each final sound when I evaluated the recordings as seen in Appendix Base on the recordings, when reading from the sentences with less time focus on formulating the specific sounds, mistake made more frequently Level (insufficient) No % 10 25 Level (sufficient) No % 18 45 Level (proficient) No % 20 Level (excellent) No % 10 13 Table 4: Final Student scores It is undoubtedly that the data illustrated above have shown that the videos are appropriate media to improve students’ pronunciation ability The improvement of students’ pronunciation ability in this study involves certain focuses that are closely related to the theories in Part about the goals of teaching pronunciation using videos 3.2 Discussion of the main findings 3.2.1 Student’s perception After students watched videos they often imitated the models even after the class was over Since they were accustomed to listening to dialogues spoken by natives, they could easily remember how to pronounce the consonants correctly That was the proof that videos could motivate students to produce correct pronunciation Videos also add students’ interest to pronunciation It is proved by students’ answers in questionnaires They were stated that they were interested to learn pronunciation after watching videos Videos that are able to create fun and enjoyable atmosphere gave a huge contribution to the change of class situation from dull and passive to cheerful and active The students could easily express their feelings during the lesson They were able to give criticism to the teacher or simply reminded the teacher to pray and fix little mistakes done by the teacher Besides, they were able to give right position of each consonant Videos are able to stimulate students to action In this case, the students were stimulated and to produce English sounds as much as possible They could make it although it was something new for the students since they were accustomed to produce Vietnamese sounds Videos are audiovisual media that have a lot of benefits to pronunciation practice Compared to other media, videos provide something that not easily provide by other media They provide enjoyment and a good learning model at once That is why the students look happy and relax during the lesson Based on the explanation above, it can be concluded that the hypothesis of this study is accepted Videos are effective media to improve the students’ pronunciation ability The use of videos in teaching pronunciation encourages the students to learn pronunciation in an easy and enjoyable way 3.2.2 The students’ performance Based on the data discussed above, it is a satisfactory conclusion that videos are considered the appropriate media to achieve that intelligible pronunciation When they were implemented in the teaching learning process, it 14 helped the teacher to give modeling of correct pronunciation It was easier for the teacher to show how to pronounce some words by using videos It was also very useful to make students familiar with English pronunciation When certain parts of videos were continuously repeated, the students had enough chance to recognize certain words I enclosed here with a video made by one group of 10B class as their pronunciation assignment during my treatment (Unit 3- Music- Period 25Project- New English 10- ) Audiovisual methods also encourage the students to be active As stated by Kemp [3; p.3] when such audiovisual materials as slides, filmstrips, overhead transparencies, and film are carefully prepared they give some important benefits; one of them is add interest to subject It means that students take turns as active speakers and active listeners as well so that their pronunciation ability is improved In this study, the students were actively participated in many activities in the classroom Moreover, the students were challenged to read the words as close as possible to the real models They were so motivated to imitate the pronunciation of native English speaker in the videos The group had an opportunity to record their voices Then, they were supposed to compare their record and the videos so that the students could correct their mistakes in pronouncing the final consonants Videos really affected students understanding about pronunciation Before videos were used, the students had some difficulties in following six final consonant After they watched videos they were so good in following English six final consonant The students’ pronunciation difficulties in mastering vowels, diphthongs, consonants were decreased Automatically, the students’ pronunciation score was improved 3.3 Limitations and suggestions for further study 3.3.1 Limitation The study has achieved its aims; however, there are still a few drawbacks that should be considered for future study Firstly, because of time and some other factors, the data collected could only be carried out among small groups of students not all the 10th grade students of one school, so the findings could not be generalized to the students of the whole school Secondly, the time for exploring online videos was only in four lessons, which might be not enough to investigate all students’ reflections And the tests might not fully reflect the students’ performances in quite short procedures Therefore, the author hoped that more studies would be conducted to measure the effectiveness of this method as well as help improve students’ English pronunciation 3.3.2 Suggestions for further study 15 Firstly, pronunciation is considered an important language element that should be taught as early as possible because it provides students with a basic ability to help them listening to English utterances Therefore, it is better for the teacher to teach this part first before the others Among pronunciation teaching approach, cartoon films are supposed to be effective because it provides a good pronunciation model to the students However, in order to make full use of videos, teachers should adjust videos presented with the material given and the level of the students It can also be used for other purposes such as practicing particular sounds in the class Secondly, high schools dealing with English teaching-learning in their programs should provide the appropriate facilities that support the teaching learning process in order to improve the educational quality, such as an appropriate language laboratory, audio visual room, internet, library et cetera In addition to this, high schools should encourage English teachers to use different techniques to teach English especially pronunciation in order to improve quality of teaching learning process Thirdly, this study examines the improvement of pronunciation ability using videos as the media The result of the study is expected to be able to encourage other researchers to conduct research dealing with the cartoon films in the other subjects, such as speaking, writing, reading, or listening Otherwise, they can also study the improvement of pronunciation ability using other media Signature of Principle Thanh Hoa, May 2th, 2019 Hereby, I certify that this study is the result of my own experience and has not been submitted by any others Writer Trần Thị Khánh Toàn 16 REFERENCE Bertil Malmberg 1963 Phonetics Michigan: Dover Publications Celce-Murcia, M., Brinton, D., & Goodwin, J (1996) Teaching Pronunciation: A Reference for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other languages Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Kemp, Jarrold E 1963 Planning and Producing Audiovisual Materials California: Chandler Publishing Company Kenworthy, Joanne 1987 Teaching English Pronunciation Essex: Addison Wesley Longman Ltd Kristina, Diah and ZitaRarasteja 2006 Pronunciation Surakarta: SebelasMaret Univeristy Press Lado, Robert 1964 Language Teaching: A Scientific Approach New York: McGraw Hill, Inc Nupur (2014) What are the Main Advantages of Audiovisual Aids? Retrieved on 16/8/2015.http://www.preservearticles.com2012032829111/what-are-themain- advantages-of-audiovisual-aids.html Peter and Ehrlich, Susan (1992) Teaching American English Pronunciation Oxford: Oxford University Press Vietnam MOET (2015) Tiếng Anh 10: Student book Hanoi: Education Publishing House and Pearson 17 APPENDIX 1: QUESTIONNAIRE Survey Questionnaire for Students This questionnaire is designed to collect information for the study on “Using videos to improve 10th graders’ English Pronunciation” Your participation in completing the following items is highly appreciated You can be certain that this is for the study purpose only and that you will not be identified in any discussion of the data Please put a tick in the appropriate box to show how much you agree with the following statements: Statement Totall Agree Not Disag Totall y sure ree y agree disagr ee Good English Pronunciation is promoted □ □ □ □ □ through regular opportunities for you to understand native speaker clearly Your teacher only teaches LKS (a □ □ □ □ □ handbook containing materials and student worksheets) by explaining the materials and doing exercise on the handbook Your teacher teaches pronunciation by □ □ □ □ □ dictating and drilling I often have problem in pronouncing a □ □ □ □ □ final consonant and put right stress in the right syllable\word Lack of time to practice pronunciation is □ □ □ □ □ the good reason for bad pronunciation Wrong methods of self-study and wrong □ □ □ □ □ teaching methods of teachers can lead to incorrect pronunciation You often have a habit of pronouncing □ □ □ □ □ the sounds of English like the sounds of Vietnamese When you see the words is not familiar □ □ □ □ □ and you try to look it up in the dictionary, 18 you can read and pronounce the word correctly by looking at the symbols APPENDIX 2: PRE-TEST Part 1: Read out loud the words below Small Pool Has Have Famous Life Love School His Is House With If Of Part 2: Read out loud the sentences below Nam lives in a small house for whole life in the countryside with his mother but Nam’s sister likes to live in a luxury house with her famous friends She would love to become a famous woman because she has a lot of talents If the small car has to be repaired, Nam will have to walk to school with his friends He doesn’t have to go down the pool with his cousins for a swim If Nam could choose his life, he would become a famous man and live with parents in a small villa near the beach of South Asia John is one of the best students in my school where a lot of famous students in the world like to study If Life let you down, just keep moving forward -THE END- 19 APPENDIX 3: POST-TEST Part 1: Read out loud the words below Small Pool Has Have Famous Life Love School His Is House With If Of Part 2: Read out loud the sentences below Tommy doesn’t like to go to school with his brothers because she is afraid of the cold weather outside her house She will love to become a famous woman if she has many talents If the small car has to be repaired, Nam will have to walk to school with friends He would like to go down the small pool with his cousins for a swim The best results I had in my life; the most enjoyable times, have all come from asking the simple question” What is the worst that could happen?” Scott is the best student in my famous small school where a lot of famous students in the world like to study If Life can remove someone you never dreamed of losing, it can replace them with someone you never dreamt of having When Life gives you lemon, just make lemonade with sugar THE END! 20 21 ... have about using videos to help them improve 1. 3 Scope of the study This study limited itself to focus on improving the 10 th graders? ?? pronunciation at class 10 B5 of Nong Cong high school Forty... teacher related to pronunciation practice should be stated namely lack of knowledge about Pronunciation; lack of motivation to teach Pronunciation; inappropriate techniques of teaching Pronunciation. .. for the study on ? ?Using videos to improve 10 th graders? ?? English Pronunciation? ?? Your participation in completing the following items is highly appreciated You can be certain that this is for the

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  • PART 1: INTRODUCTION

    • 1.1. Rationale for the study

      • This study limited itself to focus on improving the 10th graders’ pronunciation at class 10B5 of Nong Cong 1 high school. Forty students involved participation focusing on the effectiveness of using audio visual (videos) to develop high school students’ English pronunciation by improving six final consonants (/s/, /z/, /l/, /ð/, /f/, /v/). The pronunciation standard used is American standard.

      • The pre-tests were necessary to assess pronunciation competence the students possessed in single utterances as well as in full presentation before the intervention of the strategy and used as a baseline score. The post-tests were used to determine the effectiveness of the strategy used by the students during the experiment process by comparing the pre-test scores to the posttest scores taken at the end of the study to conclude the hypothesis.

      • PART 2: DEVELOPMENT

      • 1.1. Literature Review

      • 2.1.1 Definition of pronunciation

      • Pronunciation is one of the important aspects in English, especially in oral communication. Every sound, stress pattern, and intonation may convey meaning. The non-native speakers of English who speak English have to be very careful in pronouncing some utterances or he may create misunderstanding. Therefore, having an intelligible pronunciation is necessary rather than having a native-like pronunciation.

      • Lado [7: p.70] has stated that pronunciation is the use of a sound system in speaking and listening. Here, pronunciation is merely treated as the act that happens in speaking and listening.

      • Sharing the ideas, Kristina, Diah, et al. [6: p.1] defined that pronunciation is the act or manner of pronouncing words; utterance of speech. In other words, it can also be said that it is a way of speaking a word, especially a way that is accepted or generally understood. In the senses, pronunciation entails the production and reception of sounds of speech and the achievement of the meaning. This second definition gives a briefer pronunciation’s definition. It contains some important keys in pronunciation: act, speaking, production and reception of sound. According to Oxford Advanced Learner’s English Dictionary, pronunciation is a way in which a language or a particular word or sound is spoken. This definition has affirmed that pronunciation is a way of producing something and the product of this act is language or word or sound.

      • 2.1.2. Definition of Consonant

      • According to Bertil Malmberg [1; p.32], consonants are sounds characterized by a constricting or a complete closing of the air passages. Every consonant may be defined according to its place of articulation and manner of articulation.

      • Regard to Manner of Articulation, Peter and Susan, [8; p.18] refers Manner of articulation to the way in which the obstruction of the air-stream, which characterizes all consonants, is achieved at the different places of articulation in the mouth. He grouped consonants as Stops, Fricatives, Nasals, Laterals, Trills: r-sound

      • 2.1.3 English Phonetic Symbols

      • Given the complexity of sound-spelling correspondences in English, it would be difficult to use the Roman alphabet to symbolize English sounds. Some problems would arise when English spelling system is used to represent sound. English Pronunciation has distinctive sound classes. It is divided into two basic groups: segmental and supra-segmental. In the segmental group there are vowels, diphthongs and consonants. In supra-segmental group there are stress and intonation.

      • Table 1. English Phonetic Symbols

      • 2.1.4. The objectives of teaching Pronunciation

      • Teaching pronunciation in a high school is very essential. Teacher should give certain attention in teaching pronunciation and decide the area of sounds that become the basic need for students.

      • Native-like pronunciation is difficult for most young learners to achieve in a foreign language. The achievement of it requires not only skilled teaching but also a high level of internal motivation of the student. Most young learners are satisfied with reasonably intelligible speech in the second language and this is an acceptable goal for the English Foreign Language teacher. The teacher should give assistance during the regular speaking lesson to students who are having difficulty with particular sounds. The particular sounds that students will find it difficult will differ for different language backgrounds.

      • Celce- Murcia, et al. [2; p.8] stated that the pronunciation should enable learners to surpass the threshold level so that their pronunciation will not detract from their ability to communicate

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