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From: Lisa Pierce <ldpierce@emlc.org>
To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-esl@literacy.nifl.gov>
Subject: [NIFL-ESL:8713] RE: teaching of pronunciation & vowel schematic.
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I agree Paul, my experience both as a language teacher and student has
showed the benefit of this.
Thank you to all of you who gave me feedback on the schematic. My
intention is not to use it to teach pronunciation to students but as a
resource to tutors.
Regards,
Lisa
-----Original Message-----
From: Paul Rogers [SMTP:englishtoday2002@yahoo.com]
Sent: Monday, March 03, 2003 8:45 AM
To: Multiple recipients of list
Subject: [NIFL-ESL:8704] teaching of pronunciation
I usually teach beginning Spanish speaking
students, and I put a great deal of emphasis on
pronunciation for at least the first month or so.
My method is very simple:
1. I focus on those sounds which are difficult for
Spanish speakers, such as short i, short u, g, j, v,
th, s followed by a consonant, etc.
2. Using exercises, I conduct occasional "drills"
during my course.
3. Students are "required" to speak in class and to
read out loud.
4. And I do all this as humorously as possible.
As we all know, there is a direct connection
between being able to speak a language and
understanding that language when it is spoken. So, in
my opinion, it is vey important to teach pronunciation
immediately.
I have noticed that students develope more
confidence when they are able to speak fairly well.
And the converse also is true, I think.
It appears to me that students learn English
faster with a good foundation in pronunciation.
Personally, I have studied 6 languages in my life
to one degree or another, and I always learned
pronunciation first.
Paul Rogers
> I just wanted to agree with Charles as regards the
> relative ineffectiveness
> of using mouth schematics to teach pronunciation.
> In fact, I'd argue that
> very much time spent explicitly teaching
> pronunciation is probably wasted.
> A silent period during which students hear a lot of
> English, in my
> experience, produces better pronunciation among
> students. It seems that if
> the brain gets used to the new sounds of English by
> hearing them a lot, the
> mouth then cooperates better.
>
> If a true silent period is not "politically"
> possible, I do believe ESL
> teachers should at least de-emphasize speaking at
> first.
>
> Of course, some rough explicit instruction like "put
> the tongue against the
> teeth and blow" may be useful; but--again--a lot of
> time spent on
> pronunciation is probably counterproductive.
>
> I'm not saying that pronunciation isn't important.
> It's the "thing" that
> keeps English speakers from easily understanding
> foreigners. I just think
> that we should go easy on explicit teaching of
> pronunciation until later.
>
> Richard Russell
> richtiger@cableone.net
>
>
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