08/19/2014 $2

Helpful Tips to

teach

pronunciation

The importance

of IPA when teaching

pronunciation

Teaching

Pronunciation

Challenges in the

Caribbean Vowels &

Consonants

ACTIVITIES

This magazine is intended for English teachers who like to go the extra mile in their classes! It is full with pronunciation tips, activities, information and more that will definitively help you in the arduous but exciting work of teaching pronunciation. Learn from the experts, explore new ideas, learn about the latest teaching tools in the market and have fun while designing your classes.

[ i ]

You have to feel

tension in your lips,

tongue and jaw

when you pronounce

it. Your mouth

seems to be smiling

when you say it

properly.

[ ɪ ] This is a short quick sound. Your lips should barely move.

1. /ɪ/ &/i/ English Level: Intermediate Materials: Worksheets with minimal-pairs ( /ɪ/ and /i/) and a PPP. Procedures: • Ss work in two different teams • Instructor provide each group with a list of minimal

pairs (the images are in the ppp) • Instructor plays a power point presentation with images

of minimal pairs words • Ss of each group will choose a word (from the images in

the ppp and in the words in the sheet of paper) and create a sentence for the other group to recognize which word they said whether with /ɪ/ or /i/.

• One of the ss of each group will have to write on the board the word they hear and the phonetic symbol.

• Instructor checks the answers and provides feedback. • The team that gets most of the correct answers will win

a prize.

/ɪ/ /i/

Ship Sheep

Chip Cheap

Hill Heel

Live Leave

Ill Eel

/ɪ/ /i/

Sit Seat

Hit Heat

Fit Feet

It Eat

Bin Bean

Vowels activity#2 [ɪ ] and [i]

Worksheet

[ ʃ ] It sounds like when you ask someone to be quiet. Ssshhh!

Keep the airstream steady, Do not let the tongue touch your

teeth and upper ridge.

[ tʃ ] The tongue must be firmly pressed against the gum ridge and behind the upper front teeth. It is an explosive, non-vibrating sound.

/ʒ/

Asia Beige

Invasion Collision

Television Pleasure Treasure Leisure Garage Azure

/ʃ/

Ship Rush

Fashion She

Shooting Ocean Sugar Wish Shy

Show

Consonants Activity #2 [ ʃ ] and [ tʃ ]

Pronunciation is a very important part when teaching a second language and one of the most difficult one as well. And what does it make it that difficult? Simple! The differences among languages regarding to sounds. In English, for example, we have 17 vowels in and it does not mean it will be the same in other languages. The pronunciation of a same letter may vary depending on the language. In Spanish we pronounce words the same way we read it, but in English, pronunciation totally changes from the way a word is written and the way it is pronounced. Let’s take as an example de sound of the i letter: in Spanish, when we read a word with this letter, it will always sound the same, but in English there are 2 different ways to pronounce it, /i/ and /I/ and you will not necessarily find the i letter within the word, which makes it more difficult. The International Phonetic Alphabet was designed to make easier the learning of different sounds. It is important that learners of English as second language are able to recognize the differences between sounds in order to produce a good pronunciation. Teaching IPA has great advantages for students; if they learn IPA symbols they would be able to go to a dictionary and make sure about the pronunciation of words by reading the phonetic transcription, they would be able to differentiate between similar sounds, and something very important is that it would raise metacognition on them since they would be aware of the pronunciation of sounds within words. However, as teachers we have to remember that there are many types of learners and multiple intelligences and what works for one will not necessarily work for the rest. With IPA teachers can work on more than one type of learning at the same time, students can learn IPA by seeing, listening, and moving. How? Seeing symbols and sound-producing diagrams, listening to sounds, producing sounds while playing, and checking their mouth movement in front of a mirror. There are several fun activities to use for teaching IPA (you will see some throughout this magazine). The tongue and lips movement awareness make the difference between a standard English pronunciation and an incomprehensible one. It is not easy to achieve a native English pronunciation but not impossible. The International Phonetic Alphabet is a great tool for teachers to teach pronunciation and a great tool for students to learn it, all teachers should take advantage of its existence and use it in their classes. By Rukmini Monestel

As the bridge that connects the two Americas, Costa Rica has received influence from many different countries. Unfortunately, this not only provides richness and variety to our culture, but it is something that needs to be considered by pronunciation teachers. A professional educator must know the background, singularities, and struggles of the population to be taught. Therefore, come out with different methods and strategies to attend the needs of the students. The Caribbean zone of Costa Rica has a singularity that every teacher working in this country should consider. Imagine that you have enrolled to become a teacher with the Ministry of Public Education in Costa Rica. Then, they send you to Limón. You might think that it would be easy due to the fact that many people there speak Mekatelyu, which is a creole language from the zone. However, in that matter is where the difficulty lies. In every country of the world where English is spoken, there are differences in regards to pronunciation and intonation. The same happens with Mekatelyu. The habitants from Limón which speaks this language are descendants from the slaves brought to build the train’s lines. They use it to communicate with family members and friends. But they speak Spanish at school and with people who do not know this creole language. According to Herzfeld, (2002) the Mekatelyu speaking population is below 100,000 habitants. Nevertheless, when it comes to speaking English, as it is taught in our schools, the pronunciation differs. Here is where metacognition plays an important role in order to avoid mixing the two languages, which are similar, but not the same. We cannot omit this detail in our small country. There are a couple of aspects that teachers need to pay special attention to. The first one is the pronunciation of /s/ plus a consonant. In this case the consonant is omitted by them. For example /ɑːsk/ would be pronounced as /ɑːsk/. Another common difference is that they tend to include a non-existent sound in a word. For instance they pronounce /snIek/ instead of /sneIk/. Other phenomenon like avoiding the pronunciation of /ð/, the initial /h/, and the final /t/ and /d/ sounds usually happen too. But those are not the only ones. In conclusion, every region might present difficulties in regards to pronunciation features. The ability to teach pronunciation effectively will depend on each teacher’s will to investigate and adapt his techniques to improve his work. Do not forget to raise the student’s awareness about their weaknesses of English pronunciation, but at the same time remark those differences that identify them as a rich and unique culture. This way the students will learn the correct pronunciation of English without losing the important features of Mekatelyu that characterize them.

By Kenneth Araya

Costa Rican Teaching Pronunciation Challenges in the Caribbean

Kenneth Araya Vásquez

Rukmini Monestel

“Educationists should build the

capacities of the spirit of inquiry,

creativity, entrepreneurial and moral

leadership among students and become

their role model.”