Teaching English pronunciation: past and present (PART 2) [Archives:2005/906/Education]
Dr. Kalyani Samantray
Reader in Phonetics
English Language Teaching Institute
Bhubaneswar
Orissa, India
With the developments in cognitive psychology, which tried to unravel the mental processes in language learning, language was viewed as a rule-governed creative activity rather than a mechanical habit formation. The cognitive approach which then substantially influenced language teaching drew from theory development in the transformational generative grammar proposed mainly by Chomsky (1959, 1965). The development in the cognitivist school stemmed the structuralist tide which was very much in favor of pronunciation teaching. The cognitive school proposed that learning native-like pronunciation was unrealistic, and could not be achieved. The tide turned to emphasize the teaching of grammar and vocabulary which proved to be more attainable objectives for non-native learners.
The Silent Way, as discussed in Gattegno (1972, 1976), is the next prominent landmark in pronunciation teaching with focus on accuracy. Individual sounds, assimilation processes when sounds combine, stress and intonation are all emphasized in the teaching methodology so that the learner can sharpen her internal mechanism for accurate pronunciation.
In this method, sound-color charts, Fidel charts, word charts and color rods are used by the teachers in place of the phonetic alphabet and explicit linguistic information. The teacher's talk in teaching is kept to the minimum, and the input is given mainly through elaborate gestures in how to use the various tools in approximating an accurate pronunciation. Once the input has been given, the teacher recedes to the background allowing learners to practice pronunciation in stages using the charts and rods. Many language educators (Stevik: 1980, and Blair: 1991) appreciate the discovery procedure of the Silent Way which allows learner's internal resources to come into play in getting a feel for the actual stress, intonation and rhythmical patterns of the target language.
Like the Silent Way another learner-centered approach to teaching pronunciation is Community Language Learning (Rogers: 1951, Curran: 1976). The role of the teacher in this approach is that of a 'counselor'. A tape recorder is the essential tool around which learners sit in a circle. The 'counselor' produces an utterance for a learner in slow motion and in chunks. The learner repeats the chunks and then the whole utterance till she gets the appropriate pronunciation. The pronunciation is then recorded. Every learner gets the chance for pronunciation practice and recording of their pronunciation.
The recorded utterances are played back with a word-for-word translation provided by the counselor. The input by the counselor can be switched on or off at will by any learner. The focus of the learners remain on how the utterances were made and not on what was said. Here, the learners have the option to choose the language chunks they would like to practice without any intervention from the teacher's side. The level of attainment is also controlled by the learners' independent choice. Though the methodology is similar to the Direct Method, i.e., intuitive and imitative, the content and extent of practice is learner centered.
The Communicative Approach in language teaching came into practice in the early 1980s, and is still prevalent in most ESL classrooms. Its basic principle is grounded on the primary purpose for which language is used, i.e., communication. As the main bearing of this approach is to teach language to learners to carry on communication effectively, there has been a renewed urgency in teaching pronunciation to achieve that objective.
Research in the level of achievement in pronunciation (Hinofotis & Baily: 1980) shows that nonnative speakers of English should be able to achieve a 'threshold level' pronunciation. They can communicate and produce the desired effect through speaking if their pronunciation is at the 'threshold level'. If their accomplishment falls below this level, there arises problems in oral communication no matter how refined and broad their grasp is over English grammar and vocabulary.
Morely (1987) suggests that four types of English language speakers are now there for whom oral communication needs to be at a high level of intelligibility, and who therefore require appropriate acquisition of English pronunciation. These four types are the following:
1. nonnative faculty members and teaching assistants in academic institutions in English speaking countries
2. nonnative technical personnel, business people and professionals in their work situations in English speaking countries
3. nonnative diplomats who need to use English as their working lingua franca
4. nonnative refugees wishing to emigrate to English speaking countries.
Apart from the list above, there is a spurt in English speaking activities globally. People who are obliged to use English efficiently in other situations than the ones already mentioned are the following:
1. nonnative teachers of English in their own countries who are expected to be role models for their learners
2. nonnative technical personnel, people in business, and professionals who deal either with native English speakers and/or nonnative English speaking people from various countries in relation to their work or profession.
All the above categories require appropriate and adequate training in oral communication skills.
The classroom objectives in ESL currently is not to aspire for a native-like competence in oral communication, which has already been proved to be unachievable with a majority of learners. Such a goal is unrealistic except for a few highly motivated and adroit learners. A more realistic goal is to assist learners to move beyond the 'threshold level'. If they remain below the 'threshold level', they would not only have to consciously labor with the various aspects of pronunciation but would also have to cope with other immediate communication requirements. Teaching of pronunciation should now focus upon the process of internalizing the required patterns in English utterance stress and intonation. When the internalization is accomplished, conscious plodding to achieve an acceptable and intelligible pronunciation will cease, and the mental faculties will allow learners to concentrate their attention on expression of meaning through English. In other words, their attention will no longer be unduly sensitive to 'not' producing clumsy pronunciation, but will remain free to negotiate the meaning-building maneuver in oral communication.
Pedagogical issues
Accepting that discernible pronunciation is the primary requirement for nonnative speakers of English, the next issue to deal with is pedagogical. Teachers of nonnative learners require pragmatic teaching mechanisms and tools to develop oral competency in their learners. In Communicative Language Teaching (CLT), no accepted common methodology has yet been projected for the teaching community, though quite some practical suggestions for teaching English pronunciation communicatively appear in Celce-Murcia (1983), Cecle-Murcia et al (1996), and Pica (1984) among a few others.
Being holistic in approach, CLT has allowed its practitioners in teaching pronunciation a wide range and variety of choices in methodology drawing from the more traditional 'listen and imitate', 'phonetic training', 'conceptualized minimal pairs', 'approximation drills', 'vowel shift and stress shift practice' and 'reading aloud', to a more modern practice in 'utterance stress', 'intonation in context', 'voice quality management,' role play', 'discussions in groups', 'presentation techniques' and so on.
Inherent to the traditional approaches to teaching is the emphasis on practicing sounds in isolation and sounds in words at the initial stage of learning English pronunciation. The words are then placed in unnatural sentences manipulated to focus learner attention on the sound/s under study. Though a discourse based approach is used in reading aloud the sentences under discussion, attention continues to be on sound production. The materials used for pronunciation practice under any of the traditional approaches tend to be teacher driven and prepared by teachers.
With theory development in CLT (Brumfit & Johnson: 1979; Widdowson: 1978), the pronunciation teaching pedagogy underwent a sea change. Techniques and materials used to teach pronunciation at the segmental level were discarded in toto in favor of discourse based approaches. The practical considerations for communication oriented pronunciation teaching drove methodologists and teachers in search of more effective tools in terms of suitable materials and teaching pedagogy.
McNerny and Mendelsohn (1992), and Gilbert (1993) share the opinion through their research that pronunciation courses which focus on teaching suprasegmentals at the discourse level lead learners quickly to a higher level of comprehensibility. Such courses prove less frustrating for learners than courses emphasizing learning sounds, as the latter is less achievable. In learning the suprasegmentals, greater change can be attained in pronunciation in a short duration of instruction and practice.
Current research thus deals with the acquisition of the discourse features in pronunciation: English stress and unstress and the resulting rhythm, intonation patterns with variable pitch contours, voice quality settings along with phonemic contrasts and assimilation. There is no longer a tussle between a 'top-down' and a 'bottom-up' approach. The move is towards a combinatory approach using those features which occur in contexts carrying a heavy functional load. Those features could be phonemic and/or suprasegmental but those must be the ones which have a bearing on the communicational needs of the learners. Thus the attention is now on teaching the functional aspects of pronunciation used to carry on effective communication. If the functional impact is under-valued, learners can encounter two problems: first, in listening to understand natural English, and next, in their own oral communication.
At present, any syllabus prepared to teach pronunciation needs to have a holistic approach which would integrate the choice of teaching-learning principles with learner requirements, and would use materials and methodology to suit learners' linguistic ability, and their short and long term requirements in verbal communication.
References
Asher, J.J. (1977), Learning another language through actions: The complete teachers' guide-book. Los Gatos, CA: Sky Oaks Productions.
Bowen, J.D. (1972), Contextualizing pronunciation practice in the ESOL classroom. TESOL Quarterly, 6(1), 83-94
Bowen, J.D. (1975b), Patterns of English pronunciation: Student-centered activities for pronunciation work. Burnt Mill, Harlow: Longman.
Brumfit. C.J., & Johnson, K. (Eds.) (1979). The communicative approach to language teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Celce-Murcia, M. (1983). Teaching pronunciation communicatively. MEXTESOL Journal, 7(1), 10-25.
Chomsky. N. (1959). Syntactic Structures
Chomsky. N. (1965). Aspects of the theory of syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Gattegno, C. (1972). The common sense of teaching foreign languages in schools: The Silent Way. New York: Educational Solutions.
Howatt, A.P.R. (1984), A history of English language teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Kelly, L.G. (1969), 25 centuries of language teaching. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
Krashen, S.D., & Terrell, T.D. (1983), The Natural Appraoch. Hayward, CA: Alemany Press.
McNerney, M., & Mendelsohn, D. (1992). Suprasegmentals in the pronunciation class: Setting priorities. In P. Avery & S. Ehrlich (Eds.), Teaching American English Pronunciation (pp. 185-196). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Morley, J. (Ed.), (1987), Current perspectives on pronunciation. Alexandria, VA: TESOL.
Neisser, U. (1967), Cognitive psychology. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.
Pica, T. (1984). Pronunciation activities with an accent on communication. English Teaching Forum, 22(3), 2-6.
Scovel, T. (1969), Foreign accent: Language acquisition and cerebral dominance. Language Learning, 19,245-254.
Widdowson, H. (1978). Teaching language as communication. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
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