MISTAKES STUDENTS MAKEIN POSITIVE COMMUNICATIONPresented by Paul Rafferty

PHONEMICS

• Phonemics is a branch of linguistic analysis involving the study of phonemes.

• Phonemes refers to the smallest linguistic unit of speech that can be used to make one word different from another word.

• The sounds represented by “c” and “b” are different phonemes, as in the words “cat” and “bat.”

MISTAKES IN PHONEMIC DIFFERENCES

• Phonemic differences are not clearly defined (eg, short "i" and long /i/; voiced and unvoiced consonants /p/ and /b/, /t/ and /d/).

• Third person and plural "s" or "es" is not produced, nor are "-ed" regular endings.

• Intonation patterns are flat and dull.

• Word stress is ignored and therefore whole utterances sound robotic and monotonous.

• Continuous and simple aspects are very often confused. This gives rise to "I swimming three times a week" or "They are not here, they eat their lunch now, teacher".

MISTAKES WITH VERBS & NOUNS

• Verb tenses are omitted, with a tendency to speak in the infinitive (eg, "I go next weekend").

• Auxiliary verbs, prepositions and pronouns are very often omitted altogether.

• Verb and noun forms are often confused (eg, "I breakfast Haddid").

• Complex sentences are rarely attempted.

• Features such as pausing and hesitation (well, erm, yeah, you know, etc) are lacking or Arabic equivalents are used, sounding strange to an English ear.

MISTAKES IN STUDENT COMMUNICATION

MISTAKES IN SPELLING

• Homophones (Words that sound alike but with different meanings and spellings), confusables, misrepresentation of vowel sounds,

• misrepresentation of consonant sounds, misapplication of spelling rules, silent letters, double letters and mispronunciation.

•  aes ayes eyes   

•  bald balled bawled

•  cellar seller

• dense dents  

• ere err eyre air aire are ayr ayre heir    

BASIC SPELLING RULES

• No English word ends in ’v’ except spiv. Use ve instead.• • No English word ends in ’j’. Use ge or dge instead.• • No English word ends in ‘i’. Use y instead. Exceptions:

macaroni, spaghetti, vermicelli (Italian) and taxi (short for taxicab)• • The word endings ‘dge’, ‘tch’, may only be used after a

short vowel e.g. badge, hedge, lodge, fetch, Dutch, catch. Exceptions to this rule are: much, such, rich, which.

SPELLING CONTINUED

• We double ‘l’, ‘f’, ‘s’ and ‘z’, after a single vowel at the end of a short word; e.g. call, tell, toss, miss, stiff, stuff, fizz, jazz.Exceptions to this spelling rule: us, bus, gas, if, of, this, yes, plus, nil, pal.• Two-syllable words that end with s.• Many words that end with s have the stress on the first

syllable, e.g, crisis, bonus, crocus, circus, litmus and fungus .... These follow the rule - only use one s at the end of the word.

MISTAKES

I received jour letter – incorrect spellingWe know well this city – incorrect word order

Always I am happy here – incorrect word order

UNDERSTANDING WRITING MISTAKES

• ESL students who wish to write well need help in understanding and avoiding mistakes in their writing. There are 4 main types of mistake in written language: spelling, punctuation, grammar and usage.

PUNCTUATION

• Punctuation mistakes: ESL students need to learn certain aspects of the English punctuation system, such as the way to punctuate direct speech.

•  English spelling is irregular and even many native-speaker adults have difficulties with it. 

• Would you like your students to write a great paper for one of your classes? If so, proper punctuation is a must.

• Your students have to really want to learn new vocabulary if they’re going to succeed.

• The next time your students have to write an essay, take a moment to look over their sentences and structure.

spelling punctuation

usagegrammar

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