Pronunciation

Matt Altstiel
5/2/07
TESL 3001

Pronunciation

Pronunciation can mean success or failure in conveying a message. Unfortunately, many foreigners and immigrants carry the burden of heavy accents which prevent communication or change the meaning of their sentences. Therefore, CLUES attached specific focus onto teaching pronunciation, which a specific sound every week. Similar to the methods they advocate for teaching grammar, (explicitly) each individual sound has its own accompanying worksheets, minimal pair lists and speaking drills. The <> approach does not carry much weight within this program.

Teaching pronunciation has always been one of my strengths considering that the majority of the students retained proper pronunciation for sounds long after the individual lesson. Brown mentions <> as one of the most important factors / barriers. Therefore, some sounds are much more difficult for Latinos to produce, than other ethno-linguistic backgrounds, and vice versa. Certain sounds such as the <> sound do not exist in Spanish and these unique sounds provided singular challenges. Luckily, the students were aware of the sound and their inability to produce it only pushed them to further motivation. At the beginning of each sound I would show through minimal pairs how confusing the sounds hindered meaning and could cause embarrassment. This was consistent with Brown’s principal <>. The clarity of speech became a priority as they saw how it shaped their self-image and language ego.

The most difficult of these sounds was the aforementioned <> sound. Students were inclined to make a b sound instead. To show the difference, I used techniques to clearly illustrate the mouth and lip position. I had students hold their finger up to the lip to see how it vibrated with the V sound and how it did not with the B sound. I had them watch as my front teeth touched my bottom lip when making the V sound, and how my lips moved apart with B sound. Watching me say tongue twisters with the two different sounds from a side position, students could mimic by mouth position. Another thing that helped was making the content distinction that occurred between <> and <>, which caused them to laugh, but it stuck. After 20 minutes of solid practice, students didn’t make the same mistake and were way ahead of students in other sections.