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598 © 2012 ACADEMY PUBLISHER JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE TEACHING AND RESEARCH [4] Clark, H. (1996). Using language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [5] Kakegawa, T. (2008). Informal application of contrastive learner corpus analysis to the teaching of Japanese sentence final particles. In Princeton University (ed.), Proceedings of the 15th Princeton Japanese Pedagogy Forum, 130–142. [6] König, E. and P. Siemund, (2007). Speech act distinctions in grammar. In T. Shopen (ed.), Language typology and syntactic description I: clause structure. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 276-324. [7] Kuno, S. (1973). The structure of the Japanese language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. [8] Kuroda, S.-Y. (1972). The categorical and the thetic judgment: Evidence from Japanese syntax. Foundations of Language 9, 153–185. [9] Makino, S. and M. Tsutsui. (1989). A dictionary of basic Japanese grammar. Tokyo: The Japan Times. [10] Sawyer, M. (1992). The development of pragmatics in Japanese as a second language: The sentence-final particle ne. In G. Kasper (ed.), Pragmatics of Japanese as native and target language. Honolulu: Second Language Teaching and Curriculum Center at the University of Hawai‟I at Manoa, 83-125. [11] Vance, T. (2008). The sounds of Japanese. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Masanori Deguchi received a Ph.D. in Linguistics from Indiana University, Bloomington. His main areas of expertise include syntax and semantics of Japanese. He is currently Assistant Professor of Japanese and Linguistics at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington. Representative publications include “The Role of Information Structure in Multiple Quantification Sentences” in Syntax and Beyond (Bloomington, Indiana: IULC Publications, 2005), and “Semantic Integration of Mimetics in Japanese” with N. Tsujimura in Papers from the 38th Annual Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society (Bloomington, Indiana: AuthorHouse, 2007). Current research interests include applications of theoretical linguistics in language pedagogy. Dr. Deguchi has been affiliated with the Linguistic Society of America and the Association of Teachers of Japanese. He has served as a reviewer for professional journals, such as Linguistic Review and the Journal of Japanese Linguistics.
ISSN 1798-4769 Journal of Language Teaching and Research, Vol. 3, No. 4, pp. 599-607, July 2012 © 2012 ACADEMY PUBLISHER Manufactured in Finland. doi:10.4304/jltr.3.4.599-607 English Pronunciation Teaching: Four Case Studies from Finland © 2012 ACADEMY PUBLISHER Elina Tergujeff University of Jyväskylä, Finland Email: elina.tergujeff@jyu.fi Abstract—The present study looks at how English pronunciation teaching practices are like in Finnish schools from the primary to upper secondary level; in particular, which methods are used and which items are emphasised. The study was carried out as focussed observations (Hopkins 2008, p. 89), as classroom observations were considered the best way to achieve the aim of this study. Four EFL teachers were each observed for 6–9 lessons within a period of one week. A pre-prepared observation form was used as a tool, and then developed into a categorisation of the teaching methods used by the observed teachers. As for the results, the teachers offered pronunciation teaching very different from each other, but in general the pronunciation teaching was found to be pragmatic and teacher-led, and traditional teaching methods were used. At the segmental level, a strong emphasis was placed on phonemes that have typically been found to be difficult for L1 Finnish-speaking learners (sibilants and affricates). Despite the emphasis on suprasegmentals in pronunciation teaching literature, explicit teaching of suprasegmental features of speech was neglected by the observed teachers. Index Terms—pronunciation teaching, EFL, classroom observations I. INTRODUCTION Since the late 1980s, when interest in pronunciation teaching as a research topic was on the rise, the focus of pronunciation teaching has shifted from practising individual sounds to concentrating equally on suprasegmental features (e.g. intonation, rhythm, stress) – at least in (English) pronunciation teaching literature (e.g. Seidlhofer 2001; Celce-Murcia et al. 2010, p. 11; Lane 2010, p. 8). Is this the case in the classrooms as well? This paper addresses the issue in the context of Finland, where English and many other foreign languages are studied extensively and language skills are highly valued. In general, a great deal is invested in language studies in Finnish schools, and according to 2009 statistics 40.1% of the year‟s upper secondary school graduates had studied three different languages in addition to their mother tongue, and 11.0% had studied four. English is the most widely studied foreign language in Finland. Nearly all children study it as their first foreign language: 99.6% of all upper secondary school graduates in 2009 had begun their English studies in the lower classes of basic education 1 . (Kumpulainen 2010, pp. 88–89.) Besides education, English has a grown status in Finnish working life and people‟s leisure activities (see Leppänen et al. 2011). The pronunciation skills of advanced Finnish learners of English (university students of English) have been recently studied by Lintunen (2004). Lintunen‟s study, which was restricted to segmentals, reveals that even advanced Finnish learners of English make systematic errors (or, deviations from the standard) in their pronunciation. This result led Lintunen (2004, p. 215) to suggest that pronunciation is not given enough attention in school teaching. However, this critique aimed at teachers is only based on the learners‟ pronunciation skills, not on any empirical work on EFL teaching, teacher surveys or the like. Thus, Lintunen‟s study raises questions regarding how English pronunciation teaching is carried out in Finnish schools if the learning results are found fault with. This paper, part of my ongoing Ph.D. project, aims to shed light on this question and to fill the research gap in English pronunciation teaching in Finland. A special interest is taken in both teaching methods and the contents of teaching. The following research questions were set for the present study: (1) Which methods are used in teaching English pronunciation in the context of Finnish schools? (2) Which aspects are emphasised in English pronunciation teaching in the context of Finnish schools? To answer these questions, classroom observations in Finnish schools were arranged and the study described in Chapter III was conducted. II. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND English pronunciation teaching has undergone a change in focus from what is called a narrow approach – concentrating on segmentals – to a broader one that emphasises suprasegmentals and regards pronunciation as an integral part of oral language use (e.g. Morley 1991). This expanded concept of pronunciation operates top-down, and 1 The compulsory basic education for 7- to16-year-olds in Finland lasts nine years. For more information about the Finnish educational system, see e.g. Kumpulainen (2010, p. 222).
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Cognitive Styles and Performance on
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