Some experiences in improving students’ pronunciation

INDEX Page PART 1: INTRODUCTION I Reasons for choosing the research………………………………………2 II Aims of the research……………………………………………………3 III Scope, objects and researching methods………………………….… PART 2: CONTENT…………………………………… … ….4 I The factors affect students’ pronunciation………………………….… II Some common mistakes in pronunciation……………………….…….5 III The usefulness of phonetic symbols…………………………….…….6 IV Methods of teaching vocabulary through phonetic transcriptions……6 A Teaching English sounds………………………………………… … Teaching vowels……………………………………………………… Teaching diphthongs…………………………………………………….8 Teaching consonants…………………………………………………….9 B Different activities to motivate students in learning vocabulary… …11 Listen and repeat………………………………………………….……11 Isolation……………………………………………………………… 11 Minimal pairs………………………………………………………….12 Show a vowel diagram………………………………………….…… 12 Sing…………………………………………………………………….12 Tongue twisters…………………………………………………… .13 V Apply the methods in some lessons…………………… ……………13 VI The results……………………………………………………………16 PART CONCLUSION…………………………………… …… 17 PART 1: INTRODUCTION I REASONS FOR CHOOSING THE RESEARCH Despite the existence of thousands of languages all around the world millions of people speak English as their mother tongue Moreover, there are millions of others who use English either as their second language or an international language when communicating with people all around the world With the help of the developing technology, English has been playing an important role in many sectors including medicine, engineering and education Particularly, as a developing country, Viet Nam needs to make use of this world- wide spoken language in order to prove its international power This can merely be based on the efficiency of education Therefore, English is a compulsory subject applied across the whole higher educational system in Vietnam What we learn English for? The answer is - for communication What students learn English for? They learn English for the same reasons as we Our job is to provide them with the basic skills they will need to practice the language and to make sure that they have the basic knowledge and skills that they need for future study In my teaching practice at a secondary school I face to unintelligible pronunciation of some students Intelligible pronunciation is essential during a listening process, clear and correct pronunciation makes a conversation more comfortable for both the speaker and the listener and even helps to avoid misunderstanding Therefore, I decided to focus this thesis on pronunciation teaching The topic is “ Some experiences in improving students’ pronunciation ” II AIMS OF THE RESEARCH - To show some factors affecting students’ pronunciation - To show some mistakes students often have - To show the usefulness of the phonetic symbols - To show how to pronounce English sounds with the phonetic symbols - Give students confidence in learning and correcting their pronunciation III SCOPE, OBJECT AND RESEARCHING METHOD Scope : Researching in the process of teaching English at my school Object: This subject is concerned with ways of using the phonetic transcription effectively in the class Researching method: Reading reference books , discussing with other teachers, applying in teaching, observing and drawing out experiences PART 2: CONTENT I THE FACTORS AFFECT STUDENTS’ PRONUNCIATION: The role of the mother tongue: The mother tongue is the first reason that affects students’ pronunciation Pronunciation problems may occur when non-native speakers communicate because speakers are used to sounds that exist in their mother tongue but may not exist in the target language There are a lot of sounds that exist or are similar in English and Vietnamese, however, there are sounds that are very different or not exist in Vietnamese Students have problems with pronunciation mainly due to the fact that our native tongue may not have a particular sound In the system of phonetic transcriptions, it is not easy for the Vietnamese to pronounce some consonants such as : / δ / , / θ /, /z/ , /s/ / ή / Furthermore, when an English word has many syllables, one of them is always pronounced more strongly This is called word stress, and we say that the syllable is stressed It is the stress and the intonation that make an influence on students’ pronunciation Age factor: It is believed that prepubescent children learning second language with adequate exposure to the target language can attain near native-like pronunciation We can say that it is important to start teaching pronunciation at the very beginning of second language learning since children can attain near native-like pronunciation with ease This means that during the critical period a second language is acquired naturally and more easily since the brain is more flexible Motivation : Motivation appears to be a very influential factor as some of students are more concerned about their pronunciation than others Their desire to attain good pronunciation, usually influenced by their sense of responsibility, helps them to achieve comprehensible pronunciation The factors that make students work on their pronunciation: • Students want to improve themselves • Students want to become a part of the target language community • Students need their speech to be intelligible to their children’s teachers • Students want to improve their employment prospective • Students want to improve their everyday communication skill Learner’s attitude and sense of identity: In language teaching process teachers cannot influence students’ age, motivation, nor they can have control over their attitude or sense of identity if students not like the target language for any reason, they subconsciously build up negative attitudes towards the language, which subsequently prevent them not only to achieve comprehensible pronunciation but also to learn the language itself II SOME COMMON MISTAKES IN PRONUNCIATION: - Most of our students have bad habits in pronouncing English words Especially, such sounds as: / ei ; t∫; ʤ; ʧ; ʒ; θ; ℧ə; æ; ŋ; b; p; f; å:/ - They confuse between the sounds /dʒ/ and /t∫/ or even never pronounce the sound /dʒ/ at the end of the word - Students are used to omitting the sound /s/ It makes the listeners misunderstand what they say - Many a student cannot distinguish the voiced and voiceless sounds This happens even though pronunciation and signs of pronunciation are taught in an ordered and systematic way in each unit in the syllabus of the English language in senior high school level - The final sounds in English are very important to tell what the word means Students, for instance, not pronounce the ending sounds t, θ, k, s, E, z; l, etc - Some students cannot pronounce the sounds/ə℧; a℧ / appropriately III THE USEFULNESS OF PHONETIC SYMBOLS: They help students use dictionaries effectively Students can become independent learners They can find out the pronunciation of words by themselves without asking the teacher Phonetic symbols are arranged in a chart Just as they have a grammar table for grammar and a word store for vocabulary, students need reference material for pronunciation too: the phonetic symbols are simple, keywords that show the sound of each symbol IV METHODS OF TEACHING VOCABULARY THROUGH THE PHONETIC TRANSCRIPTIONS: Because of the factors that affect students’ pronunciation, some common mistakes which students cause as well as the roles of the phonetic transcriptions, I have applied some methods that help students improve their pronunciation effectively in learning vocabulary A TEACHING ENGLISH SOUNDS: At the beginning of the school year, teachers should copy a phonetic symbol board It is better for us to copy the source from school textbooks and give the Vietnamese sound equivalent beside each sound Teaching vowels Method 1: - Drawing the symbols on the board and eliciting whether any of the students know them After drilling the sounds a few times, students will then attempt to write the correct spelling of certain words from the phonemic script For example, after drilling the sounds of /i:/, /ɪ/, /ʊ/, and /u:/ students would then have to write the word under the phonemic script /bi:k/ 2) /bɪn/ (beak) (bin) 3) /bʊk/ 4) /blu:/ (book) (blue) Method 2: The focus is on minimal pairs I systematically go through the chart and focuss on two symbols (normally quite similar) per class I use this minimal pairs website and find four or five words with each sound and write them on the board Before telling students the sound they have to separate the words into two groups For example, I may write the following words on the board randomly see, she, knee, eat, tree fit, ship, lit, chip, bin Students then have to separate the words into the correct group under the sounds of /i:/ and /ɪ/ I will then write the symbols of each sound and they will record them in their notebooks I also give them a phonemic chart so they can write a word under each symbol 2, Teaching diphthongs These aren’t too tricky either A quick way of teaching them is to cut each of the diphthong symbols in two and then a dictation activity where they have to put the symbols together So cut up each of these symbols: /ɪə/, /ʊə/, /eə/, /eɪ/, /ɔɪ/, /aɪ/, /əʊ/, /aʊ/ and then give each pair a set and dictate each symbol We can dictate the sounds in the order above so they notice how the diphthongs end Teaching consonants A lot of the consonants are similar to the alphabet so students can normally figure out which words go with the sounds However, there are a few consonants sounds that need to be taught A good way is to use the following table: p f m b v n t θ ŋ d ð h ʧ s l ʤ z r k ʃ w g ʒ j - Get the students to match these words to the symbols, but only to those which are similar to the alphabet dog Germany cat ghost fry violet snake television moon nose light worm yes ball table house three zoo shoe fishing pen chicken then rabbit They should find it easy and get something like this: p pen f fry m moon b ball v violet n nose t table θ ŋ d dog ð ʧ s snake l light h house ʤ z zoo r rabbit k cat ʃ g ghost ʒ w worm j yes Then we have to teach them the difference between the following sounds The difference is that one is voiced and the other is unvoiced voiceless Voiced ʧ - chicken ʤ- Germany θ – three ð – then ʃ - shoe ʒ - television They normally get the nasally /ŋ/ sound in fishing Once we have our own actions, this is a good order of doing the activity  Show the action and mouth movements to the students (without making the sound)  Get them to copy the action, paying particular attention to their mouths Make sure they have the correct shape  Students listen as we the action and make the sound times  Students copy the action and make the sound  Do some individual drilling  Ask students which two words have the sound and write them up next to the symbol Students copy the words  Repeat for the next symbol  Don’t forget to recap all the sounds and symbols each time (repetition is key) B DIFFERENT ACTIVITIES TO MOTIVAT STUDENTS IN LEARNING VOCABULARY Besides the sound we can teach students accurate pronunciation by giving them information on the pronunciation of difficult words We can possibly give Vietnamese transcription equivalents of the words provided Students can learn, step by step, each of the international phonetic symbols and this will help them practice pronouncing at home by themselves without any problems We can use variety in our pronunciation lessons, our students will be more successful with English pronunciation and gain the confidence that comes with it by these activities: 1: Listen and repeat This will be the first and most common method of teaching sound specific pronunciation in English If we are teaching a long word with multiple syllables, start with the final syllable of the word and have our class repeat it Then add the penultimate syllable and say the two together having our class repeat after us Work backwards in this manner until our students are able to pronounce the entire word correctly Isolation When working on a specific sound, it may help our students to isolate that particular sound from any others Instead of presenting a certain sound as part of a complete word in English, we can simply pronounce the sound itself repeatedly When we do, our students can say it along with us repeatedly, focusing on the small nuances in the correct pronunciation and also engraining the sound pattern into their minds This is especially helpful when we have several students struggling with a specific sound delineation 3.Minimal pairs Minimal pairs are a great way to focus pronunciation on just one sound If you are not familiar with linguistics, a minimal pair is two words that vary in only one sound Show a vowel diagram If we are using phonetic symbols to help you teach vowel pronunciation, a diagram of where each English vowel sound is produced can be eye opening for your students Print copies to distribute in class or show your students where they can find this diagram online When students know which area of the mouth in which they should be making their sounds, they may have an easier time distinguishing between similar sounds because they are produced in different areas of the mouth Sing Surprisingly enough, singing can be a good way for our students to practice their vowel pronunciation Because singing requires a person to maintain vowel sounds over more than just a moment, it can give our students a chance to focus in on the target sound and adjust what sound she is making Tongue twisters 10 Try some tongue twisters This can be a fun way to practise sounds with older children Here are some popular English tongue twisters  She sells sea shells on the sea shore  A proper copper coffee pot  Around the rugged rocks the ragged rascal ran  Red lorry, yellow lorry, red lorry, yellow lorry  A big black bug bit a big black bear  Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers Where's the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked? Notes: However, when we apply these methods we should pay attention to these things:  When students are unsure of pronunciation, ask them to mark the signs of pronunciation above or under the words in their textbooks and then learn them by heart Study the signs of pronunciation given thoroughly  Practice pronunciation frequently to get it fluent Students should listen to the cassette tapes; radio or English TV programs regularly to verify the way to pronounce the words they have already learnt  Whenever meeting a strange word, ask students to learn the sign(s) of its pronunciation by heart as well as its meanings  Give compliments to students by rewarding them with extra encouraging marks Ask them to write down the phonetic symbols on a large sheet of paper and put it in a special place so that they can see it every day  Encourage students to mark directly the signs of pronunciation of the words beside the words as many times as they can in order that when they see them, the way to pronounce comes to them spontaneously  Give students short paragraphs or beautiful sentences to learn by heart in each unit Make sure they are not given the paragraphs that are too long or too difficult V APPLY THE METHOD IN SOME LESSONS: 11 Unit 3- English 6- C Families - teaching vocabulary (10 minutes) Teacher’s activities Students’ activities - write the words on the boards and - look at the board and remember explain the sounds in the words / ƒ / → family, father /۸ / → mother, brother /  / → Stereo, old - read all the distinguish the sounds - distinguish the sounds /۸ / and / /۸ / and /  /  / - tell some words having similar - ask students to give some other sounds words having similar sounds - read words and ask students to - read the words repeat Ex: T: father T: Stereo Unit 7- English 7- B The worker - teaching vocabulary (10 minutes) Teacher’s activities Students’ activities - write the words on the boards - look at the board and remember Mechanic Machine Local golf - ask students look at the words on - guess the sounds and syllables in the board and guess the sounds in each words each words - ask students: - answer: yes/no… 12 Are there any differences between two letters “ch” and “o”? - read the words and ask students to - listen and take notes write the transcriptions - ask students write on the board - write on the board - correct - correct and take notes Mechanic / mә’kænIk/ Machine / mә ‘ʃi:n/ Local / ‘ləʊkl/ Golf / gɔ:lf/ - read and ask students to repeat - listen and repeat VI THE RESULT: Applying these methods in teaching vocabulary at my school, I have found that students have made fat progress in learning English They have been improving not only vocabulary but also pronunciation Many students are getting more excited and more active in the class The lessons are becoming more ebullient and more lively Besides, almost students remember the words after the lessons especially, they are able to look up new words in the dictionaries and pronounce the words themselves correctly Moreover they find it easier to make stress as well as where the stress is The total is that from 80% to 92% students learn new words by themselves at home and remember words quickly in the class PART 3: CONCLUSION Teaching is like an art and the teachers play an important role in training students Therefore, the teachers are always creative to explore 13 effective methods so that their students can achieve the knowledge effectively and feel self-confident when communicating With my preparation, I would like to present some effective methods and my experience in using the phonetic transcriptions This subject given out with the hope that all of us will find out the most suitable ways to organize and carry out our task-teaching in the classes With limited time and my limited preparation I really want all of you share your opinions, constructive comments and experience in using the phonetic transcriptions to make my subject more perfectively and our English classes in generally more creatively, effectively and successfully Vice headmaster’s signature Written by Nguyễn Thị thúy Hằng 14 ... misunderstanding Therefore, I decided to focus this thesis on pronunciation teaching The topic is “ Some experiences in improving students’ pronunciation ” II AIMS OF THE RESEARCH - To show some factors... of using the phonetic transcription effectively in the class Researching method: Reading reference books , discussing with other teachers, applying in teaching, observing and drawing out experiences. .. study In my teaching practice at a secondary school I face to unintelligible pronunciation of some students Intelligible pronunciation is essential during a listening process, clear and correct pronunciation