Teaching English pronunciation to secondary school students with ...

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Apr 20, 2012 ... Department of English Language and Literature. Teaching English pronunciation to secondary school students with focus on. “th” consonants.
MASARYK UNIVERSITY BRNO FACULTY OF EDUCATION Department of English Language and Literature

Teaching English pronunciation to secondary school students with focus on “th” consonants. Diploma Thesis

Brno 2012

Supervisor: Mgr. Irena Headlandová Kalischová, Ph.D.

Written by: Bc. Eva Macháčková

Hereby I state that I have worked on this diploma thesis on my own and that all the sources of information I have used are listed in the bibliography. ………...…………...................... Bc. Eva Macháčková

Brno 20th April 2012

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Acknowledgement

I am deeply indebted to Mgr. Irena Headlandová Kalischová, Ph.D., my supervisor, for her extraordinary help, valuable advice and outstanding support. I would also like to thank my students without them this thesis would not be at all possible. 2

Abstract The final thesis is concerned with teaching pronunciation of voiced and voiceless TH consonants /ð/ and /θ/. The objectives of the work are to focus on teaching secondary school students to produce these sounds correctly. The thesis deals with a question whether it is possible to achieve faultless pronunciation of the TH consonants. The theoretical part enlists features of pronunciation, the importance of teaching pronunciation and the most problematic sounds for Czech learners. The factors influencing pronunciation and problematic TH consonants are overviewed in the part too. The practical part concentrates on the original teaching of TH consonants. Activities and methods used for correction of /ð/ and /θ/ are summarized in this part. The practical part is based on three recordings of secondary school students. The recordings are subsequently analysed and compared so as to answer the initial question whether the students are able to improve their pronunciation of the TH consonants. Anotace Diplomová práce se zabývá výukou výslovnosti znělých a neznělých anglických souhlásek /ð/ a /θ/. Cílem diplomové práce je zaměření se na výuku výslovnosti těchto problematický souhlásek u středoškolských studentů. Práce se dále zabývá otázkou, zdali je možné u nich dosáhnout bezchybné výslovnosti. Teoretická část je věnována základním rysům výslovnosti, důležitosti výuky výslovnosti a aspektům anglické výslovnosti, které způsobují problémy českým mluvčím. Tato část se také shrnuje faktory, které ovlivňují výslovnost, a vlastnosti znělých a neznělých anglických souhlásek /ð/ a /ð/. Praktická část se zaměřuje na samostatnou výuku výslovnosti. Aktivity a metody, které jsou zaměřeny na korekci znělých a neznělých anglických souhlásek /ð/ a /θ/, jsou shrnuty v této části. Praktická část je založena na třech nahrávkách středoškolských studentů, které jsou následně analyzovány a srovnány. Na základě analýzy a srovnání nahrávek je v závěru zhodnoceno, jestli došlo ke zlepšení výslovnosti.

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Key words: Pronunciation, voiced and voiceless consonants, problematic sounds in pronunciation, pronunciation of /θ, ð/, International Phonetic Chart. Klíčová slova: Výslovnost, znělé a neznělé souhlásky, problematické zvuky ve výslovnosti, výslovnost /θ, ð/, Mezinárodní fonetická abeceda.

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Content 1 Introduction ..............................................................................................................................7 2 Theoretical Part ........................................................................................................................9 2.1 Features of Pronunciation ...............................................................................................9 2.1.1 The most problematic sounds for Czech learners..............................................11 2.2 Why to teach pronunciation ........................................................................................14 2.2.1 Intelligibility ................................................................................................................16 2.2.2 Model .........................................................................................................................17 2.3 Teaching and learning pronunciation ........................................................................17 2.3.1 Pronunciation teaching ..........................................................................................18 2.3.2 Teacher’s role ...........................................................................................................20 2.3.3 Student’s role ............................................................................................................21 2.4 Factors influencing pronunciation learning ...............................................................22 2.4.1 Age factor.................................................................................................................22 2.4.2 The role of the mother tongue ..............................................................................24 2.4.3 Motivation .................................................................................................................25 2.4.3 Learner’s attitude and sense of identity ..............................................................26 2.5 Consonants ......................................................................................................................27 2.5.1 Production of voiced and unvoiced consonants “th” .....................................30 2.6 Summary of the theoretical part..................................................................................31 3 Practical Part ..........................................................................................................................33 3.1 Introduction to the Practical Part ................................................................................33 3.2 Activities focused on pronunciation of “th” sounds .................................................35 3.2.1 Introducing TH fricative consonants .....................................................................35 3.2.2 Minimal pairs .............................................................................................................38 3.2.3 Tongue twisters .........................................................................................................41 3.2.4 Oral reading..............................................................................................................43 3.3 Introduction of the students..........................................................................................45 3.4 Recordings .......................................................................................................................47 3.4.1 Assessing recordings ................................................................................................48 4.4.2 First recording ...........................................................................................................48 3.4.3 Second recording....................................................................................................51

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3.4.3 Third recording..........................................................................................................55 3.4.5 Summary of the recordings ....................................................................................60 4 Conclusion ..............................................................................................................................62 5 References..............................................................................................................................64 6 Appendix.................................................................................................................................67 6.1 Appendix 1: reading text...............................................................................................67 6.2 Appendix 2: TH fricative consonatns ...........................................................................68 6.3 Appendix 3: table of consonatnts ...............................................................................69

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1 Introduction  Despite the existence of thousands of languages all around the world millions of people speak English as their mother tongue. Moreover, there are millions of others who use English either as their second language or an international language when communicating with people all around the world. As members of the European Union and due to the possibility of travelling and studying abroad the necessity to communicate in English became a crucial part of our lives. Pronunciation as an inseparable aspect of the language has a great influence on our successful communication but it is still overlooked by a large number of teachers, who rather pay attention to teaching lexis and grammar as they feel more certain about them. In my teaching practice at a secondary school I face to unintelligible pronunciation of some students. Intelligible pronunciation is essential during a listening process, clear and correct pronunciation makes a conversation more comfortable for both the speaker and the listener and even helps to avoid misunderstanding. Therefore, I decided to focus this thesis on pronunciation teaching of the voiced and voiceless “th” consonants /ð, θ/ since I regard them as the most problematic aspects of pronunciation for Czech learners of English. The final thesis is not only aimed at pronunciation teaching process but also at helping my students to be clearly and easily understood by others. The work is divided into two parts, theoretical and practical. The theoretical part is based on theoretical background that is relevant to the pronunciation teaching and learning process and serves as a basis for the practical part. It deals with the issue of pronunciation in everyday communication,

outlines

why

pronunciation

should

be

taught

and

concentrates on the most problematic sounds for Czech learners of English. Moreover, the part is focused on teachers’ and students’ roles and aspects that influence a speaker’s intelligibility. Lastly, the theoretical part deals with the production of voiced and voiceless consonants /ð, θ/ since these two 7

consonants are representatives of the most difficult sounds in English for Czech speakers. The practical part of the final thesis deals with a hypothesis, whether Czech students of English have problems with pronunciation of TH consonants, and assumptions, if secondary school students are able to improve their pronunciation of /ð/ and /θ/, and whether they can achieve faultless pronunciation of the sounds. Moreover, the part contains three recordings of my students which will be analyzed and the findings of the research will be presented in this part. First, the findings from the first recording will be demonstrated and the initial hypothesis will be answered. Second, the part will focus on reducing the number of mistakes made during speaking and enhancing students’ awareness when pronouncing the voiced and voiceless consonants /ð, θ/ by providing the students with pronunciation activities and opportunities to work on their pronunciation. Third, all three recordings will be compared together in order to find out whether the number of mistakes was reduced or not and which of the two consonants was the most problematic for the students. Finally, the last part of the practical part will comprise a conclusion, in which the findings, outcomes and answers to the two assumptions will be presented.

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2 Theoretical Part   In this part of the final thesis the relevant theoretical background will be viewed. We will study how and mainly why pronunciation should not be neglected and should become an inseparable part of a teaching process, and what the roles and aims of the teacher and students are. We will outline the importance of learner’s intelligibility and its affect on understanding during the process of communication, then a model of pronunciation will be discussed and also the limitations of speakers e.g. learners’ first language and culture, the age of learners and their attitude towards the language; speakers’ learning experience, motivation and so on will be outlined. Lastly, we will deal with the production of the most problematic consonants for Czech Speakers of English.

2.1 Features of Pronunciation  Since

the

thesis

is

concerned

with

pronunciation

teaching,

pronunciation as such must be defined first. Pronunciation is a way how sounds are articulated by speakers marking their social class, education and so forth. According to Dalton and Seidlhoffer there are two ways how pronunciation as a production of significant sounds can be characterized: First, sound is significant because it is used as part of a code of a particular language. So we can talk about the distinctive sounds of English, French, Thai, and other languages. In this sense we can talk about pronunciation as the production and repetition of sounds of speech. Second, sound is significant because it is used to achieve meaning in context of use. Here the code combines with other factors to make communication possible. In this sense we can talk about pronunciation with reference to acts of speaking (1994: 3).

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When studying pronunciation we deal with a theoretical context of phonetics and phonology. Catford describes phonetics as the study of the physiological, aerodynamic, and acoustic characteristics of speech-sounds. Whereas phonology studies how sounds are organized into systems and utilized in languages (1992: 187). If we want to study the functions of language and the pronunciation itself we have to break down the constituent units. There are two main features of pronunciation- the segmental and suprasegmental features. This thesis will deal with the segmental features only. Segmental features are sets of distinctive sounds of particular language and the suprasemental features are related to intonation; stress and change of sounds in connected speech (Kelly 2002). Catford states that phonemes are the minimal sequential contrastive unites of the phonology of language (1992: 198). The contrastive function of phonemes is that there are the bits of sounds that differentiate one word from the other e.g. pin is differentiated from bin by the distinctive initial consonants /p/ and /b/. The sequential function means that the phonological form of a word consists of a sequence of phonemes, and that every phoneme consists of a set of (simultaneous) distinctive features (1992: 201). The minimal function of phonemes means that phonemes are the smallest units which cannot be further divided (Roach 1992). Phonemes can be divided into two main categories, vowels, which are subdivided into monophthongs and diphthongs, and consonants, which are subdivided into voiced and unvoiced. The following table presents English phonemes.

Figure 1: English Phonemic Chart

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2.1.1 The most problematic sounds for Czech learners Pronunciation

problems

may

occur

when

non-native

speakers

communicate because speakers are used to sounds that exist in their mother tongue but may not exist in the target language. There are a lot of sounds that do exist or are similar in English and Czech, however, there are sounds that are very different or do not exist in Czech. There are several factors that influence the pronunciation of Czech learners of English. First, Czech learners use sounds that are in Czech language but may not exist in English. Second, when reading or speaking Czech students apply the rule of first syllable prominence which is not presented in English. Lastly, Czech learners do not distinguish between the written and spoken form as in Czech the written and spoken forms resemble and this goes hand in hand with pronouncing the silent letters e.g. the word salmon is usually pronounced as /sælmən/ instead of /sæmən/ by Czech learners. Based on the finding of Cambridge university press1, I will outline the most likely problematic pronunciation errors for Czech speakers. English has more vowel sounds than Czech; there are only five vowels, which are short and long, in Czech in comparison with twenty in English and there can also be confusion between other vowels. The following table demonstrates the most problematic vowel sounds for Czech learners of English. The first column presents the vowels that are frequently mispronounced and the second column provides information about which vowels are used instead. /æ/ as in the word cat

Since the vowel /æ/ does not exist in Czech, it is often pronounced as /e/ as in the word men. Although the short vowel exists in Czech, it is often confused with /æ/ as in the word man or /ɑ:/ as in the word heart.

/ʌ/ as in the word bus

1

These findings are presented in an online article related to pronunciation teaching.

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The short vowel does occur in Czech

/ɪ/ as in the word ship

but it is frequently mixed with long vowel /i:/ as in the word sheep. Although the short vowel is used in

/ʊ/ as in the word bull

Czech it is often pronounced as long vowel /u:/ as in the word boot. The vowel does not exist in Czech

/ɜ:/ as in the word bird

and it is frequently mispronounced by inexperienced Czech learners as / ʌ / as in the word cup or /ɑ:/ as in the word heart. /ə/ as in the word camera

Schwa is not presented in Czech and it is usually pronounced as the spelling of the word. It is commonly pronounced as /e/ as

/eɪ/ as in the word tail

in the word pen. The common error made by Czech

/ əʊ/ as in the word phone

learners is that they do not distinguish between written and spoken form and therefore it is pronounced as /ɒ/ as in the word clock. Figure 2: The most problematic vowels (Cambridge university press) Yet a closer look will be paid to consonants. There are consonant sounds in English that neither exist nor have equivalent form in Czech and therefore confusion between consonants may occur. The following table demonstrates the most problematic consonant sounds for Czech learners of English. The first column provides the consonants that are frequently mispronounced and the second column presents information about which consonants are used instead.

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/w/ as in the word water

Inexperienced

learners

usually

replaced it with /v/ as in the word van, because the letter w is pronounced as /v/ in Czech. /θ/ as in the word thin

There is no sound similar to this consonant in Czech, and therefore it is often pronounced as /t/ or /s/ because

of

a

close

place

of

articulation. /ð/ as in the word mother

There is no representation of the consonant in Czech and therefore it is pronounced as /d/ or /z/ because of a close place of articulation.

/ŋ/ as in the word think

Although the consonant does exist in Czech,

Czech

learners

usually

replace it with /nk/ or /ng/. The common error made by Czech

/dʒ / as in the word jar

learners is that they do not distinguish between written and spoken form and therefore it is usually confused with /j/ or / tʃ/. It is usually pronounced fully no

/kɑ:r / as in the word car

matter where it occurs in a word, because there is no weak form of r in Czech. /z/ as in the word maze

In

Czech

language

a

rule

of

assimilation of end consonants is applied, which means that a voiced consonant becomes a voiceless when it occurs in a final position, therefore the voiced consonant is pronounced as voiceless /s/ if it is in a final position 13

/g/ as in the word frog

Czech

learners

assimilation therefore

of the

use

a

final

consonants;

voiced

rule

of

consonant

becomes voiceless /k/ in a final position. /b/ as in the word cab

In

Czech

language

a

rule

of

assimilation of final consonants is used therefore, the voiced consonant is changed into voiceless /p/ in a final position. /v/ as in the word brave

In Czech learners apply a rule of assimilation

of

end

consonants;

therefore The voiced consonant is transformed into voiceless /f/ in a final position. Figure 3: The most problematic consonants (Cambridge university press) The tables outlined the typical mistakes that are made by the Czech speakers. All the aspect set in the tables should be considered when teaching and learning pronunciation because being aware of the sound system of the target language helps speakers in communication with other speakers.

2.2 Why to teach pronunciation   Teaching pronunciation has undergone a long evolution. At the beginning of the twenties century everything was subordinated to teaching grammar and lexis and pronunciation was totally overlooked. Many things have changed since that time but on the other hand there are still some teachers who do not pay enough attention to pronunciation. According to Scrivener this is partly because teachers themselves may feel more

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uncertain about it than about grammar and lexis, worried that they don’t have enough technical knowledge to help students appropriately (2005: 284). It is widely recognized that acquiring good pronunciation is very important because bad pronunciation habits are not easily corrected. Kelly states that a learner who consistently mispronounces a range of phonemes can be extremely difficult for a speaker from another language community to understand. This can be very frustrating for the learner who may have a good command of grammar and lexis but have difficulty in understanding and being understood by a native speaker (2002: 11). In my opinion pronunciation is still neglected at schools. When teaching pronunciation it is difficult to create a lesson that would be only focused on pronunciation practice because pronunciation is taken as an additional practise in all course books. Another problem can be caused by the fact that emphasis is frequently given on individual sounds or distinguishing sounds from each other. According to Gilbert there are two main reasons why pronunciation is neglected in classes. First, teachers do not have enough time in their lessons, which would be dedicated to pronunciation, and if there is time attention is usually given to drills which lead to discouraged students and teachers who both want to avoid learning and teaching pronunciation. Second, psychological factor plays a relevant role in learning pronunciation because students are not as sure about their pronunciation as they are about their knowledge of grammar and lexis. Gilbert claims that the most basic elements of speaking are deeply personal and our sense of community is bound up in the speech rhythms of our first language (2008: 1). These psychological barriers are usually unconscious but they prevent speakers from improving the intelligibility (ibid.). To be able to overcome the fears of speaking, teachers should set at the outset that the aim of pronunciation improvement is not to achieve a perfect imitation of a native accent, but simply to get the learner to pronounce accurately enough to be easily and comfortably comprehensible to other speakers (Ur 1984: 52).

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2.2.1 Intelligibility Since pronunciation is a complex and important part of learning and teaching process teachers need to set goals and aims they want to achieve with their students. As perfect accents are difficult if not impossible to achieve in foreign language (Ur 1984: 52) the goal of teachers need to be, to make their students be easily understandable when communicating with other people. When speaking about intelligibility there is no clear definition of it, but in general we can say that intelligibility means that a hearer can understand a speaker at a set time and situation without major difficulties, in other words, the more words a listener is able to indentify accurately when said by a particular speaker, the more intelligible the speaker is (Kenworthy 1990: 13). Therefore the pronunciation of the speaker does not have to be without errors if a listener is able to understand the utterance. Dalton and Seidlhofer point out that intelligibility is by no means guaranteed by linguistic similarity and phonetic accuracy, but it is often overridden by cultural and economic factors (1994: 11). Consequently, despite the language factors there are other points that can influence the intelligibility such as whether the topic is familiar to both a speaker and a listener or whether the utterance of a speaker is expected by a listener (AMEP research centre2). As far as intelligibility is concerned, Kenworthy also points out that other factors can affect a speaker’s utterance e.g. if a learner’s speech is full of self-corrections, hesitations, and grammatical restructurings, then listeners will tend to find what he or she says difficult to follow (1990: 14). AMEP research centre views this matter a little bit differently as they state that aspects influencing intelligibility are complex issues ranging from prosody, intonation, word stress, rhythm, syllable structure, segments, and voice quality to phrasing and sense group. The authors further outline that language teaching used to emphasize learning individual sounds rather than focusing on all aspects influencing intelligibility, and point out that recent studies claim that overall prosody, comprising stress, rhythm and intonation, 2

An online journal published by the Macquarie University of Sydney.

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may have greater prominence on intelligibility regardless a learner’s mother tongue.

2.2.2 Model Although there are around 4,000 languages spoken in the world, English slowly become a lingua franca for business and political negotiations of non-native speakers. Therefore when teaching pronunciation we need to think not only about the varieties of English in Great Britain, the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand but also about the countries where English is not the first language. The Model of pronunciation used in course books is the Received Pronunciation accent but the truth is that not even 3% of British population can speak naturally with the RP accent (Kelly 2002). To start with, teachers need to think whether they want their students to speak with an RP accent or whether they want them to be able to pronounce accurately enough to be understood and be able to communicate efficiently. Although teachers use one model of accents which will always be marked with their mother tongue and modified in favour of their students, they should also be aware of other varieties of English and introduce the varieties to their students with them. As there is no general statement about which model of accents should be taught teachers must allow their students to choose their own target model so long as it is widely comprehensible (Kelly 2002: 15).

 2.3 Teaching and learning pronunciation  This chapter is dedicated to the aspects that are connected with teaching and learning pronunciation. Firstly, the emphasis is put on the roles of the teacher and students during the teaching-learning process. Secondly, the factors that affect pronunciation learning will be outlined. To begin with, approaches to teaching will be viewed.

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2.3.1 Pronunciation teaching When talking about teaching methods and approaches attention must be drawn to the most influential ones throughout the twentieth century. Through grammar-translation method and reading based approach for which the pronunciation was irrelevant, direct method, focused on imitation of a model in other words drill, to the arrival of notional-functional approach focused on communicative purposes of the target language, which pushed mechanical drills to the margins (Celce-Murcia, Brinton and Goodwin). When learning pronunciation we use different strategies in order to achieve comprehensible pronunciation. According to Dalton and Seidlhofer there are two approaches aimed at pronunciation teaching- the bottom-up approach and top-down approach. Bottom-up approach means that learners start with learning how to pronounce individual phonemes and then they work their way to intonation (Dalton and Seidlhofer). Generally speaking, when teaching the segments of pronunciation the suprasegmental features will take care of themselves (Dalton and Seidlhofer 1994: 70). Anderson and Lynch claim that we perceive speech by building up an interpretation in a series of separate stages, beginning by the lowest units and gradually working up to the larger units such as the utterance, from which we then derive our interpretation of the speaker’s meaning (qtd. in Jenkins 2000: 80). Based on the findings mentioned above, this approach is very similar to a structural approach used for teaching grammar and lexis. As far as the top-down approach is concerned, at the beginning the attention is paid to patterns of intonation and then if required individual sounds are taken into focal point (Dalton and Seidlhofer). In other words, once the prosodic features of pronunciation are in place, the necessary segmental discriminations will follow of their own accord (Dalton and Seidlhofer 1994: 70). According to Pinker, top-down process, which largely corresponds with communicative aspects of language teaching, uses knowledge and expectancies to guess, predict, or fill in the perceived event or message (qtd. in Jenkins 2000: 80). Celce-Murcia, Brinton and Goodwin offer another elaboration of two general approaches concerning pronunciation teaching e.g. intuitive-imitative 18

approach and analytic-linguistic approach. Intuitive-imitative approach conveys the learner’s ability to listen and imitate the rhythms and sounds of the target language without the intervention of any explicit information (1996: 2). Analytic-linguistic approach, on the other hand, utilizes information and tools such as phonetic alphabet, articulatory descriptions, chart of vocal apparatus, contrastive information, and other aids to supplement listening, imitation, and production.

It explicitly informs the learner of and focuses

attention on the sounds and rhythms of the target language (1996: 2). Obviously, the approaches presented above can be combined in any way, but it is vital to set which approach or a combination of approaches is the most suitable for our language purposes. When teaching pronunciation teachers need to bear in minds that pronunciation in comparison with the other aspects of learning will be always marked with personal attitudes towards the target language, learner’s abilities and so on; therefore there can never be a one-to-one relationship between what is taught and what is learnt (Dalton and Seidlhofer 1994: 72). Because of above mentioned facts, we should pay certain attention to teachability–learnability (ibid.) presenting aspects of pronunciation that are teachable e.g. individual sounds and segments, and others such as intonation that are bound to certain circumstances and therefore extremely problematic to teach. Roach states that the complexity of the total set of sequential and prosodic components of intonation and of paralinguistic features makes it a very difficult to teach. ... The attitudinal use of intonation is something that is best acquired through talking with and listening to English speakers (1992: 168-169). Dalton and Seidlhofer point out that intonation as a part of pronunciation teaching-learning is problematic, individual sound segments are on the other hand fairly easy to be taught but not so important for communication. However, stress was identified as an area with maximum overlap of communicative importance and teachability, therefore is the most convenient focal point for any course in pronunciation (1994: 73).

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2.3.2 Teacher’s role Teachers as models of pronunciation carry a huge responsibility in their classrooms, they influence their learners either in a positive or negative way and their main goal is to create a friendly and supportive atmosphere. On the other hand, their practical proficiency is not sufficient since if the teacher can only exemplify pronunciation by his or her own speech performance, the learners are left to work out what is significant for themselves. Learners of a second language will not readily discern crucial phonological distinctions (Dalton and Seidlhofer 1994: 67). On one hand, there are so called gifted learners that are able to pick up the pronunciation of the target language only by being exposed to it, but on the contrary many students, if not majority, need as explicit explanations as possible to be able to acquire and imitate difficult sounds when speaking. Generally speaking they need a teacher who would draw their attention to how sounds should be pronounced and guide them in order to achieve intelligible pronunciation. Kenworthy offers several ways of teachers’ roles in pronunciation learning process: • Helping learners hear ƒ The role of teachers is to help their students to perceive sounds that are often misperceive because of the false similarity in learners’ mother tongue. Teachers need to check whether their learners are hearing sounds according to the appropriate categories and help them to develop new categories if necessary (Kenworthy 1990: 1). • Helping learners make sounds ƒ In this situation teachers have to explain and guide their students how to imitate and pronounce new sounds that do not exist in their mother tongue. • Providing feedback ƒ Teachers need to give their students accurate and constructive feedback about how they are doing, since they are not able to judge whether their pronunciation is comprehensible or not. Not 20

providing students with feedback could mean that students make wrong assumptions about pronunciation. • Pointing out what’s going on ƒ As speaking is unconsciously controlled, students can miss important features of conversation, and therefore teachers should always highlight the key features. • Establishing priorities ƒ Learners themselves are aware that their pronunciation is in some ways different in comparison with native speakers, but what they are unaware of is whether it is relevant or not. Here teachers guide them which features they should focus on and which not. • Devising activities ƒ When choosing the most suitable activities that offer the best opportunities for practise teachers need to also take into consideration students learning styles as the effectors of their progress. • Assessing progress ƒ Assessing progress is not an easy task for any teacher but providing students with information about their progress is essential for further motivation. In conclusion, during the pronunciation teaching teachers not only serve as guides, who help their students to form necessary categories, establish priorities but also they need to provide their students with appropriate exercises and relevant feedback.

2.3.3 Student’s role The primarily learners’ roles are not only to pay attention to what they are doing in the classes or to be active participants of the learning process but also they need to be able to observe their progress. In other words, what all learners need to do is respond (Kenworthy 1990: 2) to the teacher otherwise no progress or slight improvement will become evident. Therefore, 21

there is no doubt that ultimately success in pronunciation will depend on how much effort the learner puts into it and whether the student is willing to take responsibility for his or her own learning (Kenworthy 1990: 2). Learners’ willingness to be responsible for their own learning and to take action goes hand in hand with factors influencing learners’ pronunciation learning. These factors will be tackled in the following subchapter.

2.4 Factors influencing pronunciation learning  During pronunciation lessons teachers need to pay attention to factors that can have influence on a learning process of their students. It is usually the native language that is taken into consideration and others are overlooked. In this chapter the most important factors that have an impact on pronunciation of non-native speakers will be overviewed.

2.4.1 Age factor It is believed that prepubescent children learning second language with adequate exposure to the target language can attain near native-like pronunciation. Kenworthy supports this assumption by claiming that if a person doesn’t begin to learn a second language until adulthood, they will never have a native-like accent even though other aspects of their language such as syntax or vocabulary may be indistinguishable from those of native speakers (1990: 4). Penfield, Roberts and Lenneberg agree with this by stating that there is a period (occurring around puberty) after which brain lateralization, or the assigning of certain functions to the different hemispheres of the brain, is completed (qtd. in Celce-Murcia, Brinton and Goodwin 1996: 15). Based on the findings we can say that it is important to start teaching pronunciation at the very beginning of second language learning since children can attain near native-like pronunciation with ease. The ease with which children acquire pronunciation can be explained by the critical period, which is 22

biologically determined period of life during which maximal conditions for language acquisition exist (Celce-Murcia, Brinton and Goodwin 1996: 15). Scovel and Krashen claim that it is nearly impossible for learners, who start learning foreign language after this critical period, to achieve natural pronunciation since the brain losses its plasticity (qtd. in Celce-Murcia, Brinton and Goodwin). This means that during the critical period a second language is acquired naturally and more easily since the brain is more flexible. The fact that the critical period lasts till puberty explains why adolescents and adults find pronunciation learning so problematic and need explanations how to produce different sounds in order to be able to pronounce them. Kenwothty outlines several researches concerning age related limits. In the first survey Oyama concludes that the younger the person learning a target language is the more native-like he/she will sound. In other words, it is very unlikely for adult learners to attain comprehensible pronunciation (qtd. in Kenworthy). In the second study aimed at the age factor, researchers found out that if people start before the age of 11 their accent is rare, when they begin learning between 11 and 15 their accent is uncommon, but if they start after they are 15 their accent is virtually universal (qtd. in Kenworthy 1990: 5). However, the third research, carried by Snow and Hoefnagel-Höhle, concluded that older British English speakers learning Dutch in Holland were better than younger speakers in the initial part of the research since they quickly mastered syntactic and morphological structures of the target language, but by 4 or 5 months the difference vanished and after a year the younger learners began to excel (qtd. in Kenworthy). The finding suggested by Hoefnagel-Höhle can be supported by Florez’s findings. She claims that adults find pronunciation more difficult that children do and that they will probably not achieve native-like pronunciation. Yet experiences with language learning and the ability to self monitor, which come with the age, can offset these limitations to some degree (1998: 2). In conclusion, attaining native-like pronunciation seems to be the only aspect of English language that can cause problems to adolescent and adult learners but the limitations can be compensated to some degree. 23

2.4.2 The role of the mother tongue It is widely recognized that the role of the mother tongue influences acquisition of the foreign language. Unlike children learning second language, adult learners have already accustomed their speech in terms of the sound system of their mother tongue. This means that learners’ native language shares some of the sound characteristics with the target language, which means that learners will probably have problems with pronunciation of those phonemes that are similar to those occurring in their mother tongue. Kenworthy states that these characteristics are often obvious enough to make a person’s origins identifiable by untrained as well as trained people (1990: 4). Florez adds that interference or negative transfer from the first language is likely to cause errors in aspiration, intonation, and rhythm in the target language (1998: 3), which is true for Czech learners of English since their tendency to transfer the rule of first syllable prominence into English which violates their intelligibility. Celce-Murcia and Goodwin support the premises by claiming that the second language filters through the learner’s first language facilitating acquisition when the target pronunciation features are similar and interfering with acquisition when the features are dissimilar or non-existent (qtd. in Sharkey 2003: 11-12). Gilbert outlines several problems caused by the influence of the mother tongue. First, the inability to sound out letters, which occurs at the beginning stage of learning a new language, makes the learners impossible to pronounce sounds correctly. Another problem experienced by learners is wrong production of final consonants. In many languages sounding final consonants are restricted and therefore, non-native speakers can have intelligibility problems. Lastly, it is so called choppy speech, which is separating words with silence. As it was already mentioned above, teachers need to be aware of the phonology of their learners’ mother tongue in order to help their students to attain comprehensible pronunciation.

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2.4.3 Motivation Motivation appears to be a very influential factor as some of the nonnative speakers are more concerned about their pronunciation than others. Their desire to attain good pronunciation, usually influenced by their sense of responsibility, helps them to achieve comprehensible pronunciation. Celce-Murcia and Goodwin agree with the statement by saying that if the learner’s motivation to improve is strong and if the investment of time and effort is genuine, there will be perceived improvement (qtd. in Sharkey 2003: 16). As far as motivation is concerned, Brod (qtd. in Sharkey 2003) outlines several motivational factors that make learners work on their pronunciation: •

Learners want to improve themselves



Learners want to become a part of the target language community



Learners need their speech to be intelligible to their children’s teachers



Learners want to improve their employment prospective



Learners want to improve their everyday communication skills Lukmani and Shuman (qtd. in Sharkey 2003), on the other hand,

categorized learners’ motivation for intelligibility into integrative and instrumental motivation. Integrative motivation is defined as a desire to identify or become a member of the target language community. Whereas, instrumental motivation is described as a matter of immediate desire, since the speakers are only orientated towards attaining intelligible pronunciation for their specific purposes. Therefore, integrative motivation seems to be more powerful and long lasting in comparison with instrumental motivation, since its main goal is not the interest in the target language society. Overall, motivation as a very important influential factor cannot be generalized since every learner has different views, but indentifying learners’ motivations helps teachers to create a supportive classroom atmosphere and develop learners’ motivations.

25

2.4.3 Learner’s attitude and sense of identity In language teaching process teachers cannot influence learners’ age, motivation, nor they can have control over their attitude or sense of identity. At the beginning of the chapter a crucial question needs to be dealt withwhether a learner’s sense of identity and his/her attitude towards the target language

can

increase

or

obstruct

acquisition

of

comprehensible

pronunciation. Bolitho (qtd. in Sharkey) claims that although it is difficult for learners to find suitable balance between his/her mother tongue and the target language, since they have a kind of emotional and intellectual relationship with both languages, finding the suitable balance contributes to attaining comprehensible pronunciation. His theory is supported by Marques, who suggests that learners need to seek acculturation by which they adopt the new culture while maintaining the identity of the old one (qtd. in Sharkey 2003: 14). In other words, if learners stick to socializing primarily within their community and stay attached to their native culture their ability to acquire intelligible pronunciation is very limited. According to Florez, learners who unconsciously or consciously apply ethnicity markers into the target language will never achieve native-like pronunciation since their speech will become resistant to changes which help speakers to be intelligible. Kenwothy comes to the same conclusion. She points out the existence of a group affirmation factor of native speakers, suggesting that personal commitment to a community, and a willingness to be identified with the members of that community, can be revealed through the way a person chooses to speak (1990: 8). The group affirmation factor can be transferred onto non-native speakers too, since their positive feelings towards the target language contribute to a development of comprehensible pronunciation. The ideas are supported by Schuman with his rejection transfer (qtd. in Sharkey). His analysis reveals that if learners have a negative attitude towards the target language, their community views the target language negatively or they are homesick they unconsciously create barriers that prevent them to acquire comprehensible pronunciation. Although these findings are aimed at immigrants, refugees or job seekers in English 26

speaking countries, they can be applied on Czech learners of English too, mainly students of secondary schools. Since if learners do not like the target language for any reason, they subconsciously build up negative attitudes towards the language, as they are describe by Schuman, which subsequently prevent them not only to achieve comprehensible pronunciation but also to learn the language itself. The chapter outlined several factors which may or a combination of them may affect speaker’s intelligibility and therefore, it is important to bear these factors in mind when setting realistic goals and plans for the learners. Laroy (qtd. in AMEP 2002: 4) discusses that pronunciation teaching cannot be divorced from the people who are speaking, but should involve the whole person.

2.5 Consonants   Since the thesis is aimed at pronunciation teaching and primarily at teaching “th” consonants, the general features of consonants will be presented first. Consonants are sounds that are produced with closed or nearly closed articulations and are formed by interrupting, restricting or diverting the airflow in variety of ways (Kelly 2002: 47). Kelly puts forward three ways how to classify consonants: •

The manner of articulation



The place of articulation



The force of articulation When talking about the manner of articulation they way how to produce

sounds in the vocal tract is referred to. The vocal tract can either be obstructed and the air is unable to go through the throat or another possibility can be when a closing movement of the lips, tongue or throat take place and

27

it is possible to hear the sound caused by the air that is passing through (Kelly). According to the manner of articulation consonants can be divided into six categories: • Plosives ƒ Plosives are produced when a complete stricture is created somewhere in the vocal tract and the soft palate is raised at the same moment. After forming the closure and having compressed the air behind it the sound released making the sound of plosion e.g. /k/, /g/ (Roach). • Fricatives ƒ When fricatives are created the air that goes through a small passage in the vocal tract produces a hissing sound e.g. /s/, /f/ (Roach). • Affricatives ƒ Affricatives begin as plosive consonants but they finish as fricative e.g. /tʃ/ (Roach). • Nasals ƒ When nasals are formed air passes through the lowered soft palate and nose since the lips make a closure e.g. /m/, /n/ (Roach). • Lateral ƒ The tip of the tongue causes a partial closure against the alveolar ridge and therefore the air passes along the sides of the tongue e.g. /l/ (Roach). • Approximants ƒ During the production of the consonant the articulators do not approach enough to create a complete consonant e.g. /w/, /r/ (Roach). As far as the place of articulation is concerned, various organs of speech must be taken into consideration: 28

• Bilabial ƒ The lips are almost or totally pressed together e.g. /p/, /m/ (Kelly). • Labiodentals ƒ The lower lip is in contact with the upper teeth /f/, /v/ (Kelly). • Dental ƒ The tongue touches the teeth e.g. /ð/, /θ/ (Kelly). • Alveolar ƒ The tip of the tongue touches the alveolar ridge e.g. /t/, /s/ (Kelly). • Palate-alveolar ƒ The tip of the tongue is pressed behind the alveolar ridge e.g. /tʃ/ (Kelly). • Palatal ƒ The tongue is in the middle raised against the palate e.g. /j/ (Kelly). • Velar ƒ The back of the tongue is raised against the soft palate e.g. /k/ (Kelly). • Glottal ƒ A gap between the vocal folds is used to produce audible friction e.g. /h/ (Kelly). The force of articulation is focused on a difference between voiced (lenis) and voiceless (forties) consonants. The following table provides a summary of the English consonants, marking their manner of articulation, place of articulation and force of articulation.

29

Figure 4: English Consonats

2.5.1 Production of voiced and unvoiced consonants “th” The following chapter focuses on fricative “th” sounds. The fricative consonants /ð/ and /θ/ are dental sounds produced when the tip of the tongue is placed between the upper and lower teeth; the soft palate is raised all the time. In other words, the sounds are made by putting the tongue between the teeth so that the blade is extended just forward of the teeth and the tongue is the active articulator (Pennington 1996: 40). The consonant /ð/ is voiced interdental fricative and the symbol of the fricative the Germanic letter eth /ð/, whereas /θ/ is voiceless interdental fricative and its symbol is the Greek letter theta /θ/ (Pennington 1996: 50). The following figure shows how the sounds are produced.

Figure 5: Fricative “th” 30

The interdental fricative consonants are very frequently mispronounced by Czech students. The problem is caused by the fact that there are no dental fricatives in Czech language and therefore inexperienced students pronounce them as other fricatives which have a very close place of articulation e.g. voiced /ð/ is often pronounced as /d/, /z/ or /dz/ and voiceless /θ/ usually becomes /t/, /s/ or /f/. Another important aspect of these sounds is that the consonants belong to a group of phonemes which can change the meaning of a word when mispronounced e.g. when the word think is not pronounced as /θɪŋk/ but as /sɪŋk/ students’ intelligibility is disrupted completely. Since the consonants do not exist in Czech language and their mispronunciation may influence learners’ intelligibility teachers need to focus on the explanation how to produce them. Kelly suggests teachers to ask students to put the front of your tongue against the back of your teeth. Let the air pass through as you breathe out. Don’t use your voice. Hold the sound and, add your voice (2002: 55). Another technique that may help learners to pronounce the sounds is to put a finger against the lips and try to make the finger touch the tip of the tongue and then breathe out (Kelly). These two suggested ways of practice may help learners to acquire correct pronunciation of the consonants.

2.6 Summary of the theoretical part   The theoretical part provides a theoretical background and a rationale connected with the topic of the final thesis. The first part focuses on the features of pronunciation and why pronunciation should not be neglected. Attention is also paid to the most problematic sounds for Czech speakers and the theoretical part embraces various opinions about factors that have influence on learners’ pronunciation. It may be concluded that both teachers and learners need to set realistic goals and their primary focus should be placed on intelligibility rather than desire to achieve perfect and faultless pronunciation. 31

All the pieces of information serve as a basis for the practical part.

32

3 Practical Part  

3.1 Introduction to the Practical Part  The aim of the practical part of the final thesis is to apply theoretical knowledge concerning pronunciation and mainly pronunciation of “th” sounds. Since I teach at a secondary school I work with students from different age groups, ranging from 14 to 21, with different abilities, learning styles and pronunciation levels. During my teaching practice I have encountered both students with excellent pronunciation and students whose pronunciation was terrible and made their speech unintelligible. Maybe, this is caused by the fact that teachers usually focus on making their students to study grammar and lexis, practise situational dialogues and get them to become good at listening and reading comprehension. Yet they do not try to teach pronunciation may be because of their fear of dealing with the pronunciation features, they are not sure about, and an idea that grammar and vocabulary are more important elements and pronunciation teaching would impede them in their lessons. Another reason for not incorporating pronunciation into lessons can be teachers’ thought that students will pick it up naturally, but the fact that some students are able to acquire reasonable pronunciation without over pronunciation teaching should not blind us to the benefits of a focus on pronunciation in our lessons (Harmer 2007: 248). It may be concluded that teachers need to teach pronunciation because it not only influences students’ awareness

of

sounds

and

other

pronunciation

features,

but

also

pronunciation has a positive influence on students’ speaking comprehension and intelligibility. Kenworthy claims that pronunciation learning is not an easy but very difficult and complex task. She compares the process of pronunciation learning with practice tennis is learnt, one component of tennis is learning how to serve. Serving can be divided into: (1) how to hold the racket; (2) 33

tossing up the ball; (3) striking the ball; (4) placing the ball; (5)varying the speed and direction of the ball, and so on (1990: 27). In other words, teachers must start with the basic features of pronunciation in order to be able to move to the stress, intonation and so on. The hypothesis for the practical part is that students have difficulties with pronunciation of “th” sounds as they are no similar sounds in their native language system. In the thesis I would like to answer questions, whether adolescent students can improve their production of TH sounds and whether perfect pronunciation can be achieved. In the first part I decided to do a survey on this issue in order to support my assumption. The research is based on a small-scale classroom study. First, I chose a group of 11 students who were in the third year of their studies at a secondary school. Next, I found a suitable text and adjusted it so as to meet my criteria of “th” sound position occurrence. All positions initial, middle and final are presented in the text (see appendix 1). Third, the students were asked to read the text while being recorded. Finally, I attempted to analyze the recordings. During the analysis the attention was paid to the initial, middle and final positions of the “th” consonants and the way the students pronounced them. I wanted to find out whether they are read correctly or substituted with other consonants. The second part of the research concentrates on two sets of activities concerning the subject of the thesis. The activities were designed to practise the pronunciation of the chosen consonants. After completion of the activities students were recorded again and the first and the second recording were compared together so as to establish whether students improved their pronunciation. The next part of the research deals with other two sets of activities which help to eliminate mispronunciation of “th” consonants. The final stage of the research was to record the students and subsequently evaluate all three recordings together. I attempted to compare the recordings so as to chase up whether adolescent students are able to improve or even achieve perfect pronunciation of “th” sounds.

34

As I tried to base the thesis on my own experience, I described only those activities that were really used in my lessons. The conclusion of the practical part refers to the survey outcomes and the initial assumptions.

3.2 Activities focused on pronunciation of “th” sounds  This chapter of the practical part will deal with activities that were used for teaching pronunciation of “th” consonants. The most important part of teaching-learning process is to highlight how phonemes are pronounced since people tend to hear the sounds of a new language in terms of the sounds their mother tongue (Kenworthy 1990: 45). Doff (qtd. in Dalton and Seidlhofer 1994: 130) outlines steps that are necessary to follow when new sounds are introduced to students: • Say the sound alone. • Say the sound in a word. • Contrast it with other sounds. • Write the word on a board. • Explain how to make the sound. • Get students to repeat the sound in chorus. • Get individual students to repeat the sound. Kenworthy adds that when introducing new sounds students need to hear them together with familiar sounds occurring in their mother tongue.

3.2.1 Introducing TH fricative consonants As I have already mentioned in the theoretical part of the thesis “th” sounds /ð/ and mainly /θ/ are the most problematic English sounds for Czech learners of English, therefore a great attention must be paid to the way they are produced. Aims : to focus students’ attention to the production of “th” consonants 35

: to increase students’ awareness about the way they are pronounced : to provide students with opportunity to practise the production of the sounds Aids : a mirror, a picture of speech tract (see appendix 2) Timing : 30 minutes Procedure Step 1 Teacher prepares a picture of speech tract when the “th” fricatives are pronounced. Students bring mirrors and chewing gums. Teaching activities used in this lesson plan are inspire by Kenworthy’s teaching tips described in her book “Teaching English Pronunciation” and by Kelly’s learner’s-friendly explanations outlined in his book “How to Teach Pronunciation”. Step 2 The teacher introduces the topic to students by showing the picture. He/she explains where the tongue is placed during the production of the sounds and demonstrates it. Step 3 First, the teacher asks students to prepare mirrors and chewing gums. Second, he/she invites students to put the tip of the tongue between the upper and lower front teeth and to either gently bite the tip of the tongue or to put the index finger against the lips so that it touches the tip of the tongue. Third, students are asked to breathe out and make a hissing sound resulting in production of voiceless /θ/, as in the word think. For production of the voiced sound /ð/, as in then, students are invited to breathe out and produce a buzzing noise. When producing the sounds students are constantly looking into the mirrors in order to see what is happening with the tongue and teeth. Another possibility how to introduce the production of the sounds is with a use of a chewing gum. 36

First, students are given a small piece of a chewing gum, after a short period of chewing it they are told to stick it against the back of the upper front teeth. Second, they are asked to touch the chewing gum with the tip of the tongue, breathe out and produce a hissing or buzzing noise. Step 4 After the introductory stage of producing the isolated hissing and buzzing sounds students are encouraged to pronounce words containing “th” consonants. /ð/: The-Then-There-Therefore-That-This /θ/: Thank-Than-Thick-Thief-Think-Thin Comments This teaching method focuses students’ attention to the production of “th” consonant sounds. The main goals of this activity are to provide learners with an opportunity to practise the sounds in isolation, help them to fix the pronunciation and gain a control over the production. Moreover, students are given an opportunity to practise pronunciation of the problematic sounds. Since the activities are playful and entertaining students were actively involved from the very beginning and moreover, these activities help them to breakdown the initial fear of pronunciation. The only problem some students had was occasional substitution of /ð/ and /θ/ with /s/, /z/, /t/ or /d/. In this case I followed the tip with the chewing gum suggested by Kenworthy I told my students to position the gum on the roof of the mouth immediately behind the upper front teeth; for s/, /z/, /t/ and /d/ the must touch the gum; for “th” they must avoid it (1990: 75). I found her idea with a chewing gum extremely helpful as it offers an aid suitable for acquiring the postures needed for pronunciation of /ð/ and /θ/. After the introductory lesson the students felt more relaxed and familiar with the form and production of the sounds.

37

3.2.2 Minimal pairs A minimal pair is a pair of words which differ in lexical meaning base on a difference in one of the sounds (Pennington 1996: 24). In general, the objective of minimal pairs is to make a contrastive environment where a pair of words differs by one phoneme e.g. thin and sin, the words differ by the initial consonant /θ/, as in the word thin, and /s/, as in the word sin. Aims : to raise students’ awareness of “th” sounds production : To provide students with opportunities to practise the sounds Aids : handouts with minimal pairs and sentences, CD recordings Voiceless /θ/ minimal pairs and sentences handouts3 /s/

/θ/

mouse

mouth

What a sweet little mouse/mouth!

sum

thumb

Is this sum/thumb OK?

sick

thick

It’s very sick/thick.

sink

think

He is sinking/thinking.

pass

path

there is a mountain pass/path.

/f/

/θ/

first

thirst

He has got a first/thirst.

fin

thin

A fin/thin soup, please.

half

hearth

I’d like a half/hearth.

/t/

/θ/

tree

three

It’s a big tree/three.

tanks

thanks

The President sends his tanks/thanks.

sheet

sheath

The knife was hidden in a sheet/sheath.

Baker, Ann. Ship or Sheep? An internation Pronuciation Course. London: Collins, 1981. p. 162165. 3

38

Voiceless /ð/ minimal pairs and sentences handouts 4 /d/

/ð/

Dan

than

Smith is bigger Dan/than Jones.

day

they

Day/They arrived.

dare

there

Jim dares/there’s his friend.

doze

those

Doze/Those after lunch.

Ida

either

I don’t know her sister Ida/either.

/z/

/ð/

close

clothes

The shop sign said “Closing/Clothing”.

breeze

breathe

Breeze/Breathe means air moving.

boos

booth

The boos/booth echoed loudly.

size

scythe

That’s a large size/scythe.

Timing : 30 minutes per lesson plan (2 lessons together) Procedure Step 1 Teacher prepares two handouts focused on the practice of minima pairs. The first handout will deal with the difference between /θ/ and /s/, /θ/ and /f/ and /θ/ and /t/. The second handout will concentrate on /ð/ and /d/ and on /ð/ and /z/. The lesson plans are based on Barker’s book “Ship or Sheep? An international Pronunciation Course”. Step 2 Teacher introduces the topic of the lesson with revision of “th” consonants pronunciation by producing the hissing and buzzing noises.

Baker, Ann. Ship or Sheep? An internation Pronuciation Course. London: Collins, 1981. p. 165167. 4

39

Step 3 First, students are provided with the handouts with minimal pairs focused on discrimination of two sounds, and are asked to read the pairs for themselves. Second, the teacher plays the CD with the recordings of the pairs. Third, students are asked to repeat the words in chorus. Fourth, they practise the pairs in groups and the teacher monitors them and helps if necessary. Step 4 Students are given second handout with simple sentences containing the words that were already practised. First, they are played the recording with the sentences and then they are asked to practise the sentences by themselves. Second, each student reads one sentence and the rest of the class guesses which word was pronounced, whether a word containing a “th” sound or the non-problematic sounds with a close place of articulation. Comments These teaching sequences are examples of drill pronunciation activities. They are used to raise learners’ awareness of pronunciation and discrimination of /θ/ and /ð/ and the consonants with a near place of articulation. During the second stage students revised the problematic consonants /θ/ and /ð/ in order to establish accurate pronunciation and focus on them. The third stage served for realizing the difference between /θ/, /ð/ and consonants with a near place of articulation. The students did not have any major problems during any stage; although the last step was more complex they did not face up any difficulties and were able to distinguish the words correctly. The goals of these activities are to provide students with as much practice as possible in order to help them improve their pronunciation and show them how intelligibility is important during communication because mispronunciation of “th” sounds can lead into misunderstanding between a speaker and a listener.

40

3.2.3 Tongue twisters Tongue twisters are phrases or sentences that are difficult to pronounce because of the similar sounds occurrence. Aims : to provide students with enjoyable activities aimed at pronunciation practice : to provide students with opportunities to practise the “th” sounds Aids : tongue twisters handout, mp3 recordings of the tongue twisters, headphones Tongue twisters handout:5 • The thirty-three thieves thought that they thrilled the throne throughout Thursday. • There those thousand thinkers were thinking how did the other three thieves go through? Through three cheese trees three free fleas flew. While these fleas flew, freezy breeze blew. Freezy breeze made these three trees freeze. Freezy trees made these trees' cheese freeze. That's what made these three free fleas sneeze. • Thirty-three thirsty, thundering thoroughbreds thumped Mr. Thurber on Thursday. • Three short sword sheaths. • I thought, I thought of thinking of thanking you. • Tom threw Tim three thumbtacks. • Then this mother soothed and bathed the other although the other didn’t want to be together. • Not these things here but those things there. • Ruth and Luther’s moose’s loosest tooth is uncouth. • I can think of six thin things, but I can think of six thick things too.

Tongue twisters: tongue twister with “TH”. Downloaded from this webpage http://www.heathermeloche.com/AP%20Tongue%20Twisters.htm

5

41

• Room Three Hundred Thirty-Three on the third floor rents for thirty-three dollars and thirty-three cents every third Thursday. • Three free throws. Three free throws. Three free throws.

Timing : 20 minutes Procedure Step 1 The teacher prepares the tongue twisters handout and the mp3 recordings of the sentences, which were downloaded from a webpage. Step 2 Students are given the handouts, mp3 recordings and headphones. First, they are asked to listen to the recordings and try to read the sentences by themselves. Teacher monitors and helps if necessary. Step 3 First, students practise saying the tongue twisters in pairs. Second, they are asked to memorize them and then say them correctly aloud in front of the whole class. Comments Tongue twisters concentrate on accurate production and help students to improve their pronunciation skills. The second step gave students an opportunity to hear the sentences over and over so that they could fix the correct pronunciation of “th” consonants. As far as the third step is concerned, students had to focus on faultless pronunciation. Since the texts do not only contain “th” consonants but also consonants with a near place of articulation and therefore the meaning of them would be changed completely. The objective of the tongue twisters is to help the students to realize how important accurate pronunciation is through enjoyable activities.

42

3.2.4 Oral reading In order not only to practise “th” sounds in isolation two reading texts containing both “th” consonants and other sounds were chosen as the last practice. Aims : to sustain correct pronunciation of “th” consonants : to provide students with pronunciation prastice Aids : two reading texts and a vocabulary list of the “th” sounds Vocabulary list and a text focused on a voiceless consonant /θ/6 Vocabulary list: think, thievery, thefts, three, thought, things, thieves, worth, thousands, tenth, thoughtful, thwart If you think you're safe from thievery, think again. Most thefts occur within three miles of the victim's home. People often venture into the streets without giving their valuables a second thought. They leave things out in the open, where thieves can easily spot them. Items worth thousands of dollars can be stolen in a tenth of a second. So be thoughtful. Only you can thwart this terrible crime. Watch your things carefully. Thieves do.

Vocabulary list and a text focused on a voiced consonant /ð/ 7 Vocabulary list: father, weatherman, whether, neither, the, other, they, there, then, rather, than, weather, mother, with Even though my father is a weatherman, he can't predict with absolute certainty whether it will rain or not. Neither can the other people who work with him. They say

The voiceless TH sounds. ESL: English study and Learning Materials! Downloaded from http://www.eslgold.com/pronunciation/voiceless_sound_th.html 6

The voiced TH sounds. ESL: English study and Learning Materials! Downloaded from http://www.eslgold.com/pronunciation/voiced_sound_th.html 7

43

there's only a thirty per cent chance of rain, and the next thing you know, it's pouring. They predict snow, and there's nothing for another five days. Then, there's a blizzard. So rather than trust my father's weather forecasts, I use a more reasonable approach. I ask my mother.

Timing : 20 minutes per lesson plan Procedure Step 1 Teacher prepares a reading text together with a vocabulary list; the words in the list are taken from the text. The text was downloaded from the internet focused on studying materials. Step 2 First, teacher writes the vocabulary on the board, then reads the vocabulary from the list and students repeat them in chorus. Second, students are divided into pairs and are given the whole text. In the pairs they work on the pronunciation of the whole text, the teacher monitors and helps if necessary. Step 3 Each student reads the text and the teacher gives him/her a feedback. Comments This activity is rather complex and therefore I decided to use it as the last activity before the third recording. The reading text gave students the opportunity to work on their pronunciation as a whole because the texts do not only contain the target “th” sounds but also other consonants with a near place of articulation and therefore mispronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ would make them unintelligible. At this stage it is extremely important to provide students with an appropriate and constructive feedback. Since as stated in the theoretical part, students are not able to assess their pronunciation. The inability to assess their pronunciation can lead to wrong assumptions about 44

their pronunciation. These wrong assumptions can make their speech unintelligible for a listener. The main aims of the activity are to revise pronunciation of the target “th” consonants and get used to their production. In conclusion, the activities were chosen because of the practice in hearing and saying the “th” consonants, moreover, they pointed out that the words containing “th” consonants are pronounced in two ways and the spelling of “th” does not overlap with pronunciation. During the activities I followed the steps, which are needed when introducing new sounds, proposed by Kenworthy and Doff. First, the introductory lesson was only about how to produce the sounds and what is happening with our vocal tract during the production. The objectives of the lesson were to explain the basic features of pronunciation and create a friendly and supportive atmosphere in the class. Second, the minimal pair practice activities were focused on demonstrating the contrast between the target consonants /θ/ and /ð/ and other consonants with a neat place of articulation. These activities helped students

to

realize

how

different

the

sounds

are

and

therefore,

comprehensible pronunciation is needed. Third, tongue twisters were selected because they present the difference between the /θ/ and /ð/ consonants and other sounds; and moreover, they represent activities that are funny and enjoyable for students. Finally, the usage of the reading texts moved students beyond repetition and drills as they had to think about the text properly, practise how to say each word and was encouraged to work on their intelligibility.

3.3 Introduction of the students   The goal of the chapter is to analyze students’ pronunciation of “th” sounds. I decided to work with a group of 11 students who attend private secondary grammar school in Brno. There are two girls and nine boys in the group. The students were in the third year of their studies during my survey. 45

English language is the main foreign language taught at the school and students have four compulsory general English lessons and two compulsory conversational lessons in the third and fourth year. Students studying at the school are divided into two groups according to their level of English. The group I worked with is an advanced group and their level of English ranged from lower-intermediate to upper-intermediate. Course books that are used at the school are New English Files by Oxford University Press. The researched group used New English File intermediate during their third year. The course book includes activities focused on extending knowledge of grammar and vocabularies, practising speaking,

reading,

writing,

listening

and

pronunciation

skills,

but

pronunciation activities used in the textbook tend to have a same pattern and therefore students try to avoid them. Apart from the textbooks various supplementary materials are used during lessons e.g. grammar, speaking and vocabulary photocopiable exercises. Students are also exposed to different listening activities ranging from songs, films to different listening tests, but to tell the truth no specially designed pronunciation exercises are included and students are not forced to work on their pronunciation intelligibility. On the basis of above mentioned fact I decided to incorporate pronunciation activities into my lessons. The pronunciation exercises do not only pay attention to pronunciation of “th” sounds but also attention is paid to other pronunciation features, but pronunciation activities concerning “th” sounds will be presented as they correspond with the topic of my thesis. To be able to find out whether students are able to make improvements in their pronunciation or even attain prefect pronunciation, I decided to record my students’ speech. The students were recorded three times so as to pinpoint if activities dealing with “th” consonants can help them to be more intelligible. The following table provides information about the students’ level of English. Their level of English was detected by annual tests that students must sit for at the beginning and end of each school year.

46

Student

Sex

Level of English

Student 1 JP

Male

Lower-intermediate

Student 2 PH

Male

Intermediate

Student 3 DK

Female

Lower-intermediate

Student 4 JS

Male

Intermediate

Student 5 MS

Male

Intermediate

Student 6 ZT

Male

Lower-intermediate

Student 7 ID

Male

Upper-intermediate

Student 8 JH

Male

Upper intermediate

Student 9 IM

Female

Intermediate

Student 10 MK

Male

Lower-intermediate

Student 11 OZ

Male

Upper-intermediate

Figure 6: Level of English The results of the table show that the group consists of students with mixed abilities and the average level of English is intermediate, but no general statements about their pronunciation cannot be based on the finding from the chart.

3.4 Recordings  The following chapter will outline a description of the process of my research. The research was conducted during the school year 2010-2011. In this chapter research questions and methods will be presented. The questions that I decided to deal with are: • Are secondary school students able to improve their pronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants? • Can secondary school students achieve faultless pronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants? At the first stage of the research I recorded 11 students who were in their third year of studies at the secondary school. I prepared a short text 47

containing 12 “th” consonants. Each student was given 10 minutes for preparation so that they could get familiar with the text. After the period of 10 minutes I asked the students to come individually into the class. I wanted them to come individually because I did not think that they would have been fully concentrated on the text and moreover, they would have been distracted by the other students. While the students were reading the text I was recording them. At the end of November the students were recorded again. They were provided with exactly the same text and the conditions remained the same as they were during the first recording. In January 2011 they were recorded for the last time. The text, conditions and the process of recording remained completely the same as they were during the previous two recordings. During the period between first and second recording, and the period between second and third recording the students were exposed to various pronunciation activities. The activities that were devoted to the practice of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants were introduced in the chapter 3.2.

3.4.1 Assessing recordings Assessing the recordings is a crucial part of the thesis, but it is not an easy task to be done as Celce-Murcia, Brinton and Goodwin state in the existing literature on teaching pronunciation, little attention is paid to issues of testing and evaluation (1996: 341). I decided that the assessment of “th” sounds will be focused on whether the sounds are pronounced correctly and if not which consonants are used instead of them, the correctly pronounced consonants will be ticked in the charts and if the consonants are pronounced incorrectly a consonant used instead of them will be noted down.

4.4.2 First recording At this very stage of the research I wanted to find out whether my hypothesis, that Czech students of English have problems with “th” 48

consonants as there are no similar sounds in their mother tongue, is right or not. Second, I wanted to ascertain if the students substitute the “th” sounds with other consonants with a near place of articulation. Lastly, the first recording functioned as an indicator of the initial conditions of the students’ pronunciation of “th” consonants. The results of each student are transformed into tables and the overall findings are presented in a graph demonstrating percentage rate of correct production. Student 1 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /d/

that

/θ/

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/

Student 2 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/s/

Student 3 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /t/

that

/θ/

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/t/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/ tʃ/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/

Student 4 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1



/d/ /d/

that

/θ/

there

other

than

this

/d/

/d/

/dz/ /t/

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/z/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/

Student 5 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /t/

that

/θ/

there

other

than

/t/

/d/

/dz/ /t/

49

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing



/s/

/f/

/t/

/t/

Student 6 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1



/d/ /d/

that

/θ/

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/d/

/d/

/t/

/d/

/t/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/

Figure 7: The First recording

Taking the results of the first recording as a whole my initial hypothesis was proven right. In nearly all cases students substituted “th” consonants with consonants of a near place of articulation and in one case the student 3 pronounced the word without as /wɪ tʃ aʊt/. In conclusion, there were five students missing during the first recording, but the outcomes seem to be clear and support my initial assumption. Students have real problems with the “th” consonants and voiced consonants no matter where they occur are usually pronounced as /t/ or /d/. As far as the voiceless consonants are concerned, they are frequently replaced with /s/ or /f/.

50

3.4.3 Second recording During the period between the first and second recording the students got familiar with “th” consonant production and were exposed to several activities that were devoted to pronunciation practise of “th” sounds. First, they were explained how “th” consonants are produced. Then they were provided with opportunities to practise their production. The aims of the activity were to raise students’ awareness about the ways the consonants are produced and to focus their attention to their production. Second, students were working with minimal pair practice activities. These activities helped them with discrimination of “th” sounds from other consonants with a near place of articulation. The objectives of these exercises were to assist students with realization of the differences in pronunciation of “th” consonants and other consonants, to raise their awareness of “th” sounds production and to provide them with opportunities to practise the sounds. Moreover, both activities demonstrated how intelligibility is important during communication process. In November the students were recorded again. At this stage I wanted to find out whether they still had problems with pronunciation of “th” consonants or whether their pronunciation improved and if yes which “th” sounds were pronounced correctly, whether those that occur in the initial, middle or final position. The results of the first and the second recording of each student were transformed into tables. The tables offer an opportunity to compare how the pronunciation of individual “th” sounds changed. The overall findings are presented in a graph demonstrating the percentage rate of correct answers. Student 1 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /d/

2

/d/

/d/ /dz/ /d/

that

/θ/

There

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/



/d/

/t/

/z/

/t/



/t/

/f/

51

Student 2 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

The

that

There

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/s/

2



/d/

/d/

/d/



/d/

/d/

/t/

/t/





/s/

Student 3 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /t/

2

/dz/ /d/ /d/

that

/θ/

There

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/t/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/ tʃ/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/





/d/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/f/



/t/

Student 4 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1



2



that

/θ/

There

other

than

this

/d/ /d/

/d/

/d/

/dz/ /t/

/d/ /d/

/dz/





/d/

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/z/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/

/s/

/s/

/f/





Student 5 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /t/

2

/dz/ /d/ /d/

that

/θ/

There

other

than

/t/

/d/

/dz/



this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/dz/ /t/



/s/

/f/

/t/

/t/

/d/

/t/

/s/



/t/

/f/

/d/

Student 7 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

There

Other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2





/d/





/d/

/d/

/t/



/s/



/f/

52

Student 8 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

There

Other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2













/d/



/s/

/s/

/s/



Student 9 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

The

that

There

Other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2

/d/





/d/

/d/

/dz/ /d/

/t/

/s/

/f/





Student 10 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

The

that

There

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2

/t/

/t/

/t/

/dz/

/d/

/t/

/d/

/t/

/s/



/t/

/f/

100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50%

Wrong

40%

Correct

30% 20% 10% 0%

Figure 8: Second recording

In this part students’ pronunciation based on the comparison of the two recordings will be analyzed. 53

Student 1: Taking the results from the table we can say that his pronunciation was not improved. There are only two “th” consonants that were pronounced correctly. The words pronounced correctly were other and something, both with a middle position of a “th” consonant. Student 2: Based on the results from the table his pronunciation improved only by a third. He improved the pronunciation of “th” sounds in the words other, they, something and thought. Student 3: When considering the results we may say that she slightly improved her pronunciation; she did not have difficulties with pronunciation of the voiced sound in the middle position in the word other and she also pronounced thought and something without any problems. Student 4: Taking the results from the two recordings it is clear that his pronunciation has improved. He no longer has problems with correct pronunciation in the words they, other, than, thought and nothing. Student 5: The results of the second recording show that he has more or less the same problems as the student 3. Students 7-10: Since the students were absent during the first recording their results from the second recording will be overview as initial conditions. In conclusion, the analysis of the first and second recording, in terms of improvement of “th” sounds pronunciation, demonstrates that pronunciation of the voiced “th” consonant is easier for the students than pronunciation of voiceless. The students were able to improve their pronunciation of the consonant mainly in the middle and final position, but on the other hand pronunciation of the word this was not improved at all. As far as the voiceless “th” sounds is concerned, pronunciation was slightly improved as well, mainly in the initial position.

54

In general, although the majority of the students improved their pronunciation they still substitute some “th” voiced sounds with /d/ or /t/ and the voiceless are pronounced with /s/ rather than /θ/.

3.4.3 Third recording The period between the second and third recording was filled up with activities aimed at correction of “th” consonants. The first set of activities was devoted to tongue twisters. The objectives of using the tongue twisters were to provide the students with funny and enjoyable drilling exercises in order to practise pronunciation of the target sounds. The second set was aimed at oral reading text. During these activities the students were exposed to two reading texts containing not only “th” consonants but also consonants with a near place of articulation. The main focus was paid to sustaining correct pronunciation and to demonstrate how unintelligible pronunciation can change the meaning of the texts. In January 2011 the students underwent the last recording. The findings of the third recording are stated in tables that were created for each student and the final finding are noted in a graph demonstrating the percentage of correct answers. Student 1 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /d/

2

/d/

3



that

/θ/

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/

/d/ /dz/ /d/



/d/

/t/

/z/

/t/



/t/

/f/

/d/ /d/





/d/



/s/

/f/

/t/

/f/

/d/

55

Student 2 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/s/

/s/

2



/d/

/d/

/d/



/d/

/d/

/t/

/t/





/s/

3

/d/

/dz/ /dz/ /dz/





/d/

/t/

/t/

/t/





Student 3 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /t/

2 3

that

/θ/

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/t/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/ tʃ/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/

/dz/ /d/ /d/





/d/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/f/



/t/

/d/

/d/



/d/

/d/

/t/

/t/

/t/

/t/

/f/

/d/ √

Student 4 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1



2 3

that

/θ/

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/d/ /d/

/d/

/d/

/dz/ /t/

/z/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/



/d/ /d/

/dz/





/d/

/s/

/s/

/f/







/d/ /d/







/dz/ /t/

/t/

/f/



/f/

Student 5 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1

/d/

/d/ /t/

2 3

that

/θ/

there

other

than

/t/

/d/

/dz/ /d/ /d/

/dz/

/dz/ √

/d/

/t/

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/dz/ /t/



/s/

/f/

/t/

/t/



/d/

/d/

/t/

/s/



/t/

/f/





/d/

/t/

/t/

/f/

/t/

/t/

56

this

Student 6 /ð/ Recording

they

the

1



2 3

that

/θ/

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

/d/ /d/

/d/

/d/

/t/

/d/

/t/

/s/

/s/

/t/

/f/

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

/d/

/d/ √

/d/





/d/

/t/

/s/

/f/

/t/

/f/

-

Student 7 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2





/d/





/d/

/d/

/t/



/s/



/f/

3

/d/



/dz/ √





/d/

/t/

/s/



/t/



Student 8 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2













/d/



/s/

/s/

/s/



3













/d/

/t/

/s/

/f/





Student 9 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2

/d/





/d/

/d/

/dz/ /d/

/t/

/s/

/f/





3













/d/

/z/







/f/

Student 10 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2

/t/

/t/

/t/

/dz/

/d/

/t/

/d/

/t/

/s/



/t/

/f/

3

/d/

/d/ /t/





/dz/ /d/

/t/

/s/

/f/



/f/

57

Student 11 /ð/

/θ/

Recording

they

the

that

there

other

than

this

without

with

something

thought

nothing

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

2

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

3













/dz/ /t/

/s/

/f/





Figure 9: Third recording

In this part the results of the students will be analyzed. Student 1: Based on the results of all recordings his pronunciation was improved only by a third. He mainly improved the production of voiced “th” consonants but on the other hand pronunciation of the voiceless “th” sounds did not improved at all. Student 2: His pronunciation was slightly improved in both “th” form sounds with occasional slips to producing /t/ instead of /θ/.

58

Student 3: As far as the production of voiced consonant is concerned, some of the words were pronounced correctly, but she still has big problems with pronunciation of /θ/, she kept pronouncing it as /t/. Student 4: Taking the results from the table we can say that he improved pronunciation of voiced consonant, but the production of voiceless /θ/ still causes problems to him. Student 5: Although he was quite successful with correction of the voiced consonant as he pronounced a third of the words correctly, he failed with correction of /θ/ completely, since he kept pronouncing it as /t/. Student 6: As the student was absent during the second recording only the first and third results will be compared. He improved pronunciation of voiced “th” consonant by a third, but on the other hand he was not able to do so in the case of the voiceless consonant, /θ/ was frequently substituted with /t/ or /f/. Student 7: As far as the voiced consonants are concerned, he improved the production in a half of the words. As far as the voiceless consonant is concerned, it was corrected in the middle position. Student 8: His pronunciation of “th” voiced consonant was nearly faultless from the very beginning and since he worked on his pronunciation of the voiceless sounds as well he corrected a majority of them. Student 9: Based on the findings from the table she was able to correct nearly every voiceless and a majority of voiced “th” consonants. Student 10: The production of voiceless consonant was not improved and the pronunciation of voiced one was only slightly improved.

59

Student 11: Although the student was absent during the first and second recording, he worked on the activities and therefore his results are presented too. The production of the voiced and voiceless consonant is nearly faultless. In conclusion, the students were able to improve their pronunciation of voiced “th” consonants and the highest improvement was noted in the middle position of the word other, since every student pronounced it properly, on the other hand they were not able to pronounce the word this correctly and they stuck to substituting it with /d/ or /dz/, moreover, they had certain problems with the words with and without too, as they kept pronouncing it as /s/ or /t/. As far as the voiceless “th” consonant /θ/ is concerned, the results show that not a major progress was done since the students stuck to production of /t/ or /s/ instead of /θ/.

3.4.5 Summary of the recordings In this part findings of the research will be presented and the initial questions will be answered: • Are secondary school students able to improve their pronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants? • Can secondary school students achieve faultless pronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants? The analysis and assessment of the three recordings demonstrate that a major progress in pronunciation of the voiced “th” can be seen. All students were able to attain faultless pronunciation of it in its middle position of the word other. In September nobody was able to pronounce it correctly but in January everybody did pronounce it faultlessly, but production of the word this was not improved at all since in the final stage nobody pronounce it as /ð/. The overall result of /ð/ production is 50% of correct answers; in case of mispronunciation the students had a tendency to pronounce /ð/ as /d/, /t/ or /dz/. On the other hand not a major improvement can be seen in production 60

of /θ/. It was extremely difficult for the students to pronounce the sound correctly, mainly in the initial position. The production of the sound improved in only about 30%. In case of mispronunciation the students inclined to pronounce /θ/ as /f/ or /t/. It may be concluded that the second research question cannot be proved right at all since nobody was able to attain faultless pronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants. As far as the first question is concerned, it was neither proved wrong nor was right since the results of the analysis of the recordings clearly state that there is a certain amount of progress in production of “th” consonants. The findings of the slight improvement of “th” consonants production can be explained on the basis of the factors influencing pronunciation learning. These factors are outlined in the theoretical part of the final thesis. In my opinion the dominance of the mother-tongue and the age of the secondary school students are very limiting during the pronunciation learning process no matter how much the students were motivated. Based on the findings, we can say that it is very difficult for secondary school students to improve pronunciation of “th” consonants and mainly of /θ/, but on the other hand the students admitted that the consistent and continual work on the sounds helped them with pronunciation intelligibility and listening comprehension.

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4 Conclusion   The goal of the final thesis was concentrated on correction of “th” consonants pronunciation that contributes to intelligibility of non-native students of English. In the theoretical part features of pronunciation and the most problematic sounds for Czech learners of English are outlined. In this part I also inquire about the reasons for teaching pronunciation and how intelligibility of learners is important in everyday communication. Furthermore, since pronunciation teaching is still being neglected and for some reason pushed to the margins of the language teaching teachers’ and students’ roles are presented in the theoretical part too. Moreover, the part presents factors that influence pronunciation acquisition. Lastly, attention is paid to production of “th” consonants and characteristic features of them are outlined. In the practical part I aimed to present my research. The research is focused on pronunciation of “th” consonants by secondary school students. The initial hypothesis (whether Czech students of English have problems with pronunciation of TH consonants), and two questions (Are secondary school students able to improve their pronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants? and Can secondary school students achieve faultless pronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants?) are answered in this part. To prove the hypothesis and the questions correct I asked my students to undergo three recordings. The first recording proved the initial hypothesis right since the students were not able to pronounce “th” consonants correctly. On the basis of the finding form the first recording I framed various pronunciation activities aimed at “th” consonants practise. During the pronunciation activities the students were introduced to the production of “th” consonants and exposed to pronunciation practise of them. Then the students were recorded again and I could compare the first and second recording together. At this stage of the research I focused on how “th” 62

consonants are pronounced and if they are mispronounced which consonants are used instead. After the second recording the students worked on other pronunciation practice activities and then they were recorded for the last time. Subsequently, I compared all three recordings together in order to answer my questions. On the basis of the results from the analysis of the recordings my assumption whether it is possible for secondary school students to achieve faultless pronunciation was proved wrong, but on the other hand the first assumption whether secondary school students are able to improve their pronunciation of /θ/ and /ð/ consonants was neither proved wrong nor right, since the students’ pronunciation of /ð/ was more or less successfully corrected (in 50%), but in case of /θ/ the students’ results in production of /θ/ were nearly the same they were at the beginning of the research. Nevertheless, the findings from the research demonstrate that factors influencing pronunciation acquisition such as age of the students or the mother tongue do play an important role in pronunciation learning process. On the other hand, systematic and continual work on pronunciation can help learners to become more intelligible. In conclusion, assessing the students’ pronunciation turned to be the most difficult and demanding part of the research since I found it very difficult to set which sounds can be still considered as correct and which cannot.

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5 References  1. Dalton, Christiane and Barbara Seidlhofer. Pronunciation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. 2. Catford, John, Cunnison. A Practical Introduction to Phonetics. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. 3. Roach, Peter. English Phonetics and Phonology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. 4. Roach, Peter. Introducing Phonetics. London: Penguin English, 1992. 5. Jenkins, Jenifer. The Phonology of English as an International Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. 6. Kelly, Gerald. How to Teach Pronunciation. Harlow: Longman, 2002. 7. Stern, Hans, Heinrich. Issues and Options in Language Teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. 8. Harmer, Jeremy. The Practice of English Language Teaching. Harlow: Longman, 2007. 9. Ur, Penny. A Course in Language Teaching: Practice and Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984. 10. Scrivener, Jim. Learning Teaching: The Essential Guide to English language Teaching. Oxford: Macmillan, 2005. 11. Gilbert, Judy, B. Teaching Pronunciation: Using the Prosody Pyramid. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. 12. Kenworthy, Joanne. Teaching English Pronunciation. Harlow: Longman, 1990. 13. Underhill, Adrian. Sounds and Foundations: Learning and Teaching Pronunciation. Oxford: Macmillan, 2005. 14. Celce-Murcia, Marianne, Brinton and Goodwin. Teaching Pronunciation: A Reference for teachers of English to speakers of other Languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 15. Pennington, Martha, C. Phonology in English Language Teaching. Harlow: Longman, 1996. 64

16. Baker, Ann. Ship or Sheep? An internation Pronuciation Course. London: Collins, 1981. Internet Sources 1.“What is Pronunciation”. AMPE Research Centre, 2009. 30 June 2011. . 2.“Setting Goals for Teaching Pronunciation”. AMPE Research Centre, 2009. 30 June 2011. .

3.Sharkey, Rosemary. “Facilitating Communicative Competence for Adult Non-native English Speakers”. Minnesota: Hamline University, 2003. 30 June 2011. . 4.Florez, MaryAnn, Cunningham. “Improving Adult ESL Learners’ Pronunciation Skills”. ERIC Digest, 1998. 30 June 2011. . 5.“Fricatives TH”. Wikimedia Commons, 15 November 2011. 20 December 2011. . 6.“Czech Speakers Likely Pronunciation Errors”. ESL and applied linguistics. Cambridge University Press, 2010. 30 June 2011. . 7.“Pronunciation Practice: TH Sounds”. Vita Education Services. 30 June 2011. . 8.“The Hunter’s Boldness”. Nyad Business, 2010. 30 June 2011. . 9.“Phonetic Chart”. Enjoy English!, 2009-2011. 30 June 2011. . 10. “Table of Consonants”. Google. 30 June 2011. . 11. “Tongue twister with “TH”. Tongue twisters. 20 December 2010 . 65

12. “The voiceless TH sounds”. ESL: English study and Learning Materials! 15 February 2010. 20 December 2010. . 13. “The voiced TH sounds”. ESL: English study and Learning Materials! 15 February 2010. 20 December 2010. .

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6 Appendix  

6.1 Appendix 1: reading text 

The Hunter's Boldness When they reached the place, the hunter pointed out a small spot without trees in the middle of the forest, with a steep rise at one end. The pilot thought that there was not enough room to land there, but the hunter said that the other pilot had done so the year before, so down went the plane. When it came to the rise, it turned right over onto its back. As the hunter climbed out, he smiled happily and said, “Yes, that is exactly how the other pilot managed it last time.”

Adjusted text: The Hunter's Boldness When they reached the place, the hunter pointed out a small spot without trees in the middle of the forest, with something steep rising at one end. The pilot thought that there was not enough room to land there, but the hunter said that the other pilot had done so the year before, so down went the plane. When it came to the rise, it turned right over onto its back. As the hunter climbed out, he smiled happily and said, “Nothing is better than this.”

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6.2 Appendix 2: TH fricative consonatns  

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6.3 Appendix 3: table of consonatnts  

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