Appendix H Pronunciation Teaching Materials designed for Volunteer ESL Tutors and Their Adult Students by Linda M. Sims ə PLAN FOR THE INTRODUCTORY WORKSHOP ..................................................................... 2 VIDEO SCRIPTS .................................................................................................................. 11 VOWELS ............................................................................................................................ 30 CONSONANTS ................................................................................................................... 75 SYLLABLE STRESS ............................................................................................................ 121 SENTENCE STRESS AND RHYTHM ................................................................................... 149 FOCUS STRESS ................................................................................................................. 170 INTONATION ................................................................................................................... 199 COMPENSATION STRATEGIES ......................................................................................... 215 OUTLINE: RECONVENE, REVIEW, SHARE ........................................................................ 230 1 Linda M. Sims 2018 Plan for the Introductory Workshop The purpose of the Introductory Workshop is to familiarize tutors with foundational pronunciation concepts and to explain how the rest of the professional development will unfold. Estimated Time: About 90 minutes Format: Face-to-Face (could be adapted to video) Materials: Have all printed program materials on hand for tutors to refer to if necessary Welcome and Overview (5 minutes) Description: Welcome ESL volunteers/tutors. Explain that the purpose of the workshop is to familiarize everyone with some basics of pronunciation and pronunciation teaching. After the workshop, tutors will have access to a series of six 5-minute videos that they can watch at their leisure. Each video explains more about a specific topic, for which there are materials and activities that they can use with their students. Display list of topics that will be covered in the Introductory Workshop: 1) Why Pronunciation Matters, 2) Feeling Unprepared, 3) The Goal is Intelligibility, 4) Overview of Key Pronunciation Concepts, 5) “High Value” Sounds, 6) Correcting Pronunciation Errors, 7) Compensation Strategies, 8) Communicative Practice, 9) Online Resources, and 10) What Happens Next. Point out that all discussion about pronunciation assumes that we are talking about North American English (NAE) – the type spoken by “broadcasters” in the U.S. Acknowledge that there are other types of English, but NAE will be the focus. Why Pronunciation Instruction Matters (8 minutes) Description: Share the following quotes from student interviews: “I thinK the most important thing now is pronunciation because most of our level student can understand grammar and we Know what people are saying, 2 Linda M. Sims 2018 but sometimes if I speaK out, some people - especially native speaKers - can't understand me. I thinK most of the tutors [at ESL] are good at understanding international students, so they can guess what I am saying. They are so patient and nice and they don't correct me, and so I am happy and I thinK "oh my English is much better now!" But then when I talK outside of ESL class, I realize 'Oh no, I am not good! They do not understand me!' I feel sad about this and am embarrassed to conversate with people.” –Student from South Korea “Sometimes when I'm talKing to someone they "freeze" and I Know they don't understand me, and it maKes me very nervous and uncomfortable and I feel I am getting smaller and smaller and my voice is going away. And then I very hesitate to speaK to native speaKers because I don't want to feel shocKed like this.” -Student from Japan Briefly discuss how the student quotes indicate how pronunciation issues truly impact students’ lives. Share that in interviews with local students, all students reported having difficulties with common everyday activities because of their pronunciation issues. Students expressed that they want to develop more confidence and avoid embarrassment while speaking out in public. These are similar sentiments to those reported in pronunciation research. Students report embarrassment, sadness, and frustration. Pronunciation teaching is important work! Feeling Unprepared (2-3 minutes) Description: Share that in interviews with tutors, almost everyone expressed feeling unprepared to help students with pronunciation. Assure tutors that they are not alone in their bewilderment. Research shows that even trained ESL teachers express trepidation when they have to teach pronunciation. Explain the Pronunciation Teaching Paradox, a phrase coined by a pronunciation researcher, Isabelle Darcy. “Everyone knows it’s important but no one feels confident teaching it.” This workshop and all the follow-up materials are designed to help everyone feel more confident about teaching pronunciation! 3 Linda M. Sims 2018 The Goal Is Intelligibility (2-3 minutes) Description: Say: It’s important to emphasize that the goal of this pronunciation teaching curriculum to help students be intelligible. That means that others can understand them when they speak, not that they no longer have an accent, not that they say everything perfectly. Keep this in mind as you go through the materials and activities with your students. For example, you may think it’s really important that students pronounce the end of cats [catssssss] differently than the end of dogs [dogzzzzz]. But these materials are basically saying, “There are bigger fish to fry. You can use either ssss or zzzz. People will still understand you.” Yes, there is a right way to say it. And yes, you are welcome to help students notice those differences and practice making the right way their habit—but keep in mind that the materials are designed to focus on overall intelligibility, not perfection. A (Very) Brief Overview of Key Pronunciation Concepts (20-25 minutes) Description: Explain that this part of the workshop will cover some key vocabulary that everyone needs to be on the same page about so they can make the best use of the materials and the videos. Explain that there are six 5-7-minute videos that tutors will have access to after the workshop. These videos explain some pronunciation concepts in more detail, with specific examples. [Note: This thesis contains complete scripts for each video. The actual videos will be produced at a later date.] IMPORTANT VOCABULARY: Go over the following terms with brief examples. Vowels, Consonants – display the alphabet with vowels and consonants visually contrasted. Long vowels and short vowels: Provide examples (long a in Kate vs short a in cat; long e in meet vs short e in met). Ask tutors to think back to their elementary school days (or their children’). Did they learn about vowels sounds using the terminology long vs short? Explain that we will use the terms long and short in this program, even though those aren’t ideal terms. But more about that in the Vowel Video. Syllable – Syllables can be thought of as the sound building blocks of words. A word is made up of one or more syllables. A syllable is a segment of speech that includes a vowel sound. Some words have 1 syllable, like [clap the syllable] school, hat, strength. Some have 2 syllables [clap] water, table, 4 Linda M. Sims 2018 teacher. 3 syllables [clap] finishing, apartment, octopus. 4 syllables [clap] machinery, necessary, unimportant. Display the word unintelligibility. Ask: How many syllables in the word? (8) Stress – Stress means emphasis. Sometimes words are stressed. For example, if someone says, “You need to come home NOW!”, the word now is stressed. If they say, “You need to come HOME now!”, the word home is stressed. We also stress syllables within a word. In the word, RABbit, the first syllable is stressed. In the word aMAzing, the second syllable is stressed. Some of you may have used the word “accent” instead of “stress” when you were in school. I did. My teacher would say, “Mark the accented syllable.” But we’re using the term stress because in the world of ESL teaching, accent has a totally different meaning. Intonation – Intonation is the “musical” part of speech. We don’t speak like this: [spoken in a very flat way] Really? Your daughter’s getting married? What great news! No. We say…[repeat with expected intonation]. The pitch of our voice goes up and down. English has a melody. “Are you coming over?” My voice went up at the end. That’s called rising intonation. “Not today.” My voice went down at the end. That’s called falling intonation. Rhythm – English also has rhythm. Rhythm is the timing of how we say words in sentence. We don’t say, [spoken with all syllables getting even rhythm] Really? Your daughter’s getting married? What great news! No. We say…[repeat with expected rhythm]. English has rhythm – and it’s a different type of rhythm than some other languages have. That makes it tricky for many students. You’ll hear more about rhythm in one of the short videos. IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT INDIVIDUAL SOUNDS Say: I used to think that if someone could say all the sounds of a word correctly, they would be easily understood. But research and personal experience tell us that at least as important as individual sounds—and possibly even more important —are the other things we just talked