Spring Journal 2013 - English Teachers Association of Switzerland

ack of the mouth (for example,/p – b – t – d – ʧ – ʤ – k – g/).By examining a variety of accents, withcontributions from many of the attendees,John demonstrated how difficult listeningcomprehension can be, given the rangeof accents which our students may beexpected to understand. Suggestedtechniques to help deal with the spokenword included ‘humming’ dialogue, asurprisingly effective way to circumventpronunciation difficulties. Jazz chants werealso used as a way to help students. Thewhole audience was roundly entertained,especially by the interactive exercises whichdemonstrated how to convey intonation,mood, and word and sentence stress.Fun apart, John addresses a seriousproblem for learners of English. He suggeststhat listening exercises should not be simplerepetitions of a recording, with pauses forcomprehension checks, but ratherinterspersed with exercises and activitiesaimed at improving comprehension, throughimproving the ability to understand theactual pronunciation.In summing up, John added that videorecordings, rather than audio-only, are apowerful tool in overcoming pronunciationdifficulties, because they can include all ofthe signs and signals that body languageand facial expression convey.Overall, this session provided valuableinsights and suggestions into how Englishlearners deal with listening pronunciationdifficulties, and how we as teachers canhelp in that process. Thanks go to Johnfor the ideas, energy, and fun, but most ofall for the food for thought!Susan Codringtoncoax your students into learning them – youmight agree that English phonologysometimes needs to be demystified.Adrian began his workshop with a passionatespeech in defence of pronunciation, “theCinderella of the language systems”,arguing that pronunciation infuses alllanguage and even cognitive skills, as wetend to pronounce words to ourselves notonly when reading or listening but also whenformulating our thoughts or memorizinginformation. And yet, pronunciation is oftenreduced to five-minute activities at theend of a unit, outshone by her two “uglysisters”, Grammar and Vocabulary.In order to bring pronunciation back to allclassroom work, we can:1) provide our students with the phonemicchart as a ‘roadmap’ which shows inwhat part of the mouth each sound isproduced (in the front or in the back, atthe top or at the bottom)2) teach pronunciation as a physicalactivity (rather than cognitively), payingattention to four “muscle buttons”:tongue put forward or back, lipsspreading or rounded, jaw and tonguegoing up or down, voice turned “on”or “off”.(See more detailed explanations inAdrian Underhill’s article atwww.britishcouncil.org/a_new_approach_to_pronunciation.docor on his blog:http://adrianpronchart.wordpress.com/)A quick-paced tour of the chart followed.We moved from “top left” vowels to“top right” (/i: - ɪ – ʊ – u:/), “centre”and “bottom” vowels, then pronounceddiphthongs and finally covered consonantsin the same order, from the front to theTo learn about Adrian Underhill’s originalpronunciation teaching technique, you canwatch the official one-hour video of one ofhis seminars at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5RekixAMoM. However, here area few interesting tips that he shared:1) The teacher mimes a sound andenhances it with a gesture andsometimes a situation to imagine(“You’ve got an orange in your mouthso you can’t close it!”). Students firstprepare the position for the sound totake place, then pronounce itresponding to the teacher’s gesture.Only then does the teacher pronouncethe sound themself!2) In the same way, sometimes it’s usefulto ask students not to pronounce butjust to mime a sound.3) Students can compare sounds usinggestures, e.g. pressing a finger againsttheir lips to see if they are pushedforward.4) Individual differences in pronunciationcan be celebrated: “Listen to allthese /ɜ:/”!All this helps to raise students’ awarenessof how and where sounds are actually made.Instead of imitating and drilling sounds, theycan now experiment with them. They literallyknow what they are doing when theypronounce a sound – and this is when thewhole chart stops being yet another thing tolearn and becomes a clear and useful tool.Thank you, Adrian, for a wonderful andhighly inspiring workshop!Anel Aubert© Macmillan EnglishB1A practical approach tointegrating pronunciationinto all language workPresenter: Adrian UnderhillAdrian Underhill, the renowned author ofSound Foundations: Learning and TeachingPronunciation (Macmillan Education, 2005),devoted his workshop to “demystifyingphonology”. If you’ve ever used IPA(International Phonetic Alphabet) rune-likesymbols in a classroom – let alone tried toETAS Journal 30/2 Spring 2013 31