Dealing with pronunciation and intonation in a communicative context

8/20/2019 Dealing with pronunciation and intonation in a communicative context

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N ATIONAL AND K APODISTRIAN U NIVERSITY OF ATHENS

SCHOOL OF PHILOSOPHY

F ACULTY OF E NGLISH STUDIES

ELT Methods and Practices (6 th Semester)

PEER TEACHING SESSION: DEALING WITH PRONUNCIATION AND

INTONATION IN A COMMUNICATIVE CONTEXT

Professor: Dr. Kia KaravasTutor: Dr. Mary Drossou

Peer Teachers:Efthymia Frangou (220335)

Alexander-Michael Hadjilyra (99362) Amir Izadi (98385)

Peer Teaching Session: Wednesday, 16 March 2005Project’s Paper Submission: Tuesday, 05 April 2005


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1.1 Introduction - Main Principles

English has undoubtedly been an international language for nearly three

centuries. In a world of linguistic diversity, where over 6.800 languages arespoken, only a few manage to escape their national borders and become“world languages”. Although Chinese has always had the largest number ofnative speakers, and whilst Arabic, German, Japanese, Russian, Iberian andIndian languages were confined to their linguistic habitats and their coloniesand/or protectorates (if any), English and French were battling for thesupremacy of the so-called “global language”, basing their case upon theircolonial, commercial, diplomatic and technological advances. As you shouldhave already speculated, English was the victor of this battle, with the result ofbeing spoken or understood by five times the number of its actual nativespeakers1.

English, being so widespread and so extensively utilised in our everyday lives,has come to be not merely a lingua franca amongst and between people usingdifferent languages (thus assuming the role of Greek in the Hellenistic era, orthat of Greek and Latin during the Byzantine times and the Mediaeval period),but also a powerful source of influence2. A reasonable question might be “WhyEnglish?” The answer to this question would be that, due to historical, geo-political, socio-cultural and economic reasons, the Anglo-American civilisation

has actually contributed a great deal to the world culture. Precisely becausethe Anglo-American civilisation not only has the financial and thetechnological merits, but also the socio-political power to disseminate itsaccomplishments, the rest of the world has become a passive recipient of thosecultural items (songs, films, serials, advertisements, devices etc) and, sincethey contain words, people want to learn what they mean.

English has a history of assimilating and of being established: It emerged afterthe Anglo-Saxon invasion (449 AD), overcoming the Celtic influences(displacing Welsh) and the ecclesiastical language (Latin), and surviving theNorse raids and invasions (787-1042), even the Norman Conquest (1066-1215) 3.English, however, goes far beyond the practical influence its cultural items

1. English has approximately 400 million native speakers (while Chinese is spoken by 900 millionpeople). Interestingly enough, however, English is used as a second/foreign language, or isrecognised by more than 2 billion people (http://newcanadianteachers.oise.utoronto.ca/facts.php).2. Many bureaus, commissions etc. try to limit the influence of English in their national languages(Anglicisation), by translating the English terms into their languages. However, the one body thatstands out from its peers, is the French Academy (Académie Française), that not only translatesforeign terms into French, but also imposes the use of the terms it coins (le bon usage) , often

controversially regulating the French language by imposing fines for the use of the English words.More information may be found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_policy_in_France. Aninteresting example is presented at http://forums.yellowworld.org/archive/index.php/t-8303.html.3. The dates have been taken from http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/.

http://newcanadianteachers.oise.utoronto.ca/facts.phphttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_policy_in_Francehttp://forums.yellowworld.org/archive/index.php/t-8303.htmlhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/http://forums.yellowworld.org/archive/index.php/t-8303.htmlhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_policy_in_Francehttp://newcanadianteachers.oise.utoronto.ca/facts.php


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Dealing with Pronunciation and Intonation in a Communicative Context

ELT Methods and Practices, 6th Semester

have: precisely because most technological advancements occur, at any rate,in the Anglophone countries, English becomes the medium through whichthose devices or advancements are named. Not only that but, due to the

communication and exchange of thoughts and ideas by people from differentcultures all around the globe, and the quest for a lingua franca, English benefitsagain.

Finally, computers and the Internet have inadvertently had their share ofpromoting the English language: since computers were actually devised in theUnited States, and since most domains and servers are located in Anglophonecountries, or even because of intelligibility and popularity issues, English is thelanguage used the most over the Internet (80 % of the websites are inEnglish4). During the famous pre-judicial hearings for Microsoft’s trial on

monopoly and anti-competitive conduct, Scott McNealy (Sun’s Chairman andCEO) sardonically testified to the Senate Judicial Committee in March 1998,laughing: “The only thing I’d rather own more than Windows is the Englishlanguage, because I could charge you with two hundred and forty-nine dollarsfor the right to speak it. Then, I could charge everyone to use it and chargemore when I added new letters like ‘N’ and ‘T’”5.

A reasonable question might be “What does all that have to do withpronunciation and intonation?” Once again, the answer is opaque and implicit.

English pronunciation is known for being notoriously disproportionate to itsspelling. Although English pronunciation is not really unattainable, the factthat it is incompatible to its written counterpart makes it knotty for non-native speakers to achieve it. Precisely because we are dealing with a foreignlanguage (to either some or all the speakers), we have some issues that liebeyond the scope of meaning and comprehension: Pronunciation andintonation are really a question of power and self-confidence, and a means or amedium of establishing relationships.

Based on our long experience as learners of English, we are all undoubtedly

aware that, perhaps, the one thing that has continuously held us back fromactually conversing or even chatting in English is our lack of confidence aboutour pronunciation. Some learners of English may be very good at writing inEnglish, but - when the time of speaking comes - they immediately switch totheir mother tongue (especially in English classes). While there is little doubtabout the teachers’ appreciation of the importance of pronunciation, there iseven less doubt about the learners’ own demand for effective pronunciationteaching, something almost all learners deem as a priority for guided learning.On the one hand, good pronunciation gives an essential confidence to the

4. Percentage taken from http://home.utm.utoronto.ca/~nakagawa/Full%20Text%20Essay.doc.5. Information taken from http://www.windowsitpro.com/Article/ArticleID/17679/17679.html.

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learners, allowing them to confidently interact with native speakers - a veryessential ingredient for all aspects of linguistic development. On the otherhand, poor pronunciation can mask otherwise good language skills,

condemning the learners to less than their deserved social, academic andlabour advancements (Pennington, 1996).

Whether we have the case of two (or more) people, from different countries,for whom English is not their first language (e.g. A Dane and a Greek), or thecase of a native speaker and a non-native speaker (e.g. An Irish and a Cypriot),we come to realise that, underlying communication, there is a wider issue: theissue of power, confidence and poise expressed via linguistic means. A personwho is able to handle English (or any other language used in communication)well is actually implicitly instilling respect to the other interlocutors, being

more confident about his or her language abilities, thus being less prone tomistakes or misconceptions, both of which hinder communication and reduceour confidence.

Sometimes, poor pronunciation is enough to ruin other well-developed skills,thus degrading learners of English to, even, an unjust extent, in that it doesnot correctly correspond to their linguistic reality6. Conversely, excellentpronunciation sometimes makes up for the lack of other skills, such as poorvocabulary. This happens in that way because, like the personal encounter we

have with another human being, the first thing we see about them is their faceor (in the case of language) their pronunciation: If we see an ugly person (or aperson who has poor pronunciation) we are most likely to be negativelypositioned towards them, while if we see a beautiful person (or a person withexcellent pronunciation) we will, in all probability, be attracted to them.

However, we should always keep in mind that it is elusive and, perhaps,offensive to expect students to speak English with a native pronunciation, orto impose on them a specific pronunciation, for three main reasons:

For better or worse, good pronunciation is much more than saying a series ofsounds together: there is also the involvement of the “facial set” of a particularlanguage. By “facial set”, we mean the arrangement of the facial muscles, asdeveloped primarily for the articulation of the mother tongue of an individualby the time they reach adulthood (that is, they attain physical maturity). Inorder to adapt those muscles to approximate that of English, not only genuineeffort on behalf of the learner is required, but also awareness of what thelearner must do in order to achieve this, both of which are considered verydifficult tasks. We could argue that “pronouncing a foreign language is, first

6. This also happens frequently with spelling: Sometimes, when we read a paper with a large numberof spelling mistakes, we are instinctively negatively predisposed, to a point that, although it maycontain useful and interesting ideas, it is eventually given a low grade or a negative opinion.

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and foremost, to demonstrate an ability to switch to a different persona, one inwhich the learner takes the facial set of that language”(www.onestopenglish.com).

Another, perhaps, equally important factor that impedes our esperance of thelearners using a native or native-like pronunciation is the problem emanatingfrom any efforts of selecting the standardised variety of a particular accent or,if you will, pronunciation norm. Prototypically, native English is divided intoAmerican and British English, with slightly different flavour in Australia,Canada, Ireland, Malta, New Zealand, Scotland, South Africa and Wales. Whosepronunciation are we to teach? Which of those accents and pronunciations isbest for teaching and learning? These questions have yet to be definitivelyanswered. Yet, even if we - in our own wisdom or foolishness - decide “I will

adopt xxx English pronunciation”, be that xxx one of the above regionalvarieties, we are confronted with an apparently insurmountable task:

When selecting, for example, American, Australian, British or Canadianpronunciation, we will only realise that various regional or local dialecticaldifferences exist, even within those national flavours. Often, the diversity isenormous (UK) or less significant (USA). However, in seeking the standard, wewill must recognise that the so-called standardised RP for British English andthe so-called standardized GenAm for American English are neither the most

representative, nor the most widely spoken accents: For example, RP is spokenby something between 3 - 5 % of England, only in a particular region (TheThames estuary), only by particular individuals (belonging to the higher socio-economic strata of England) and is fostered by the BBC and some “public” (i.e.private) schools in Britain. On the other hand, GenAm is representative of themiddle class, and it also tied to a particular geographical region, the Centralsection of the continental United States. Any speaker of lower or highereconomic strata or any speaker that comes from the Northern, Eastern,Southern and Western perimeter (Coastal or Border States) will exhibit arecognisably regional accent (Pennington, 1996).

The third and emerging factor that stands in our way is even more complex,sometimes even diffusing our very own definition of “native accent”.Traditionally, we defined native varieties of English as being spoken as an L1 bypeople from Australia, Canada, the Republic of Ireland (Éire), Malta, NewZealand, the United Kingdom and the United States. Any other variety was notnative, and any other culture was not English7. However, with the extensivecolonisation and the perdurable institutionalisation of English in somecountries, either by choice or by imposition, new varieties of English have

7. However, even within those cultures, the English civilisation is not always predominant (e.g. Ireland,Malta, Scotland and Wales) or it is transmuted.

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developed in some African and Asian countries8 during the 20th century. Theyare called NVE (New Varieties of English) or, more quaintly, New Englishes.

English is widely used as an official language and as the language of education,

but also as a means of wider communication by people who are nativespeakers of some other language. Via this process, what for many years wasemployed for external (non-intimate) purposes is now either partly or inparallel used for internal (intimate) purposes, as well. Those “localised ornativised varieties of English … differ from OVE (Old Varieties of English) andfrom each other in terms of lexis, semantics, syntax, phonology andpragmatics”… “English has to function in what may be called ‘un-English’contexts, covering a very wide territory, and is used in a variety of domains -social, cultural, educational, media-related, administrative and literary”

(Pennington, 1996).

Having all the above in mind, and aiming at equipping the students with notonly the skills of reading and writing in English, but also with the skills ofspeaking and listening to English, in a way that it allows them to productivelyand genuinely interact with other speakers of the language, native or not, wemust attempt to imbue them with the technical and pragmatic know-how ofhow to speak, in a manner that does neither hinders communication, norbreaks it down.

8. These countries include Hong Kong, India, Malaysia, Nigeria, the Philippines and Singapore.

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1.2 Pronunciation and Intonation in Language Teaching

The issue of pronunciation and intonation in Foreign Language Teaching has

not always been focused upon equally by all Methods and Approachesemployed for that purpose. Garnering information from the web, we havecompiled the following table, illustrating the various approaches on the issueof pronunciation and intonation in Foreign Language Didactics:

Approach/MethodHistorical

periodViews on pronunciation and intonation

Grammar−Translation Method 1840 − 1940

Little or no focus is given on pronunciation.

Intonation is not really an issue for

discussion.

Cognitive Approach 1940 − 1950

Because of the absence of explicit rules, acognitive approach to pronunciation and

intonation is really not possible. Fluency Vs

Accuracy, either the former or the latter.

Audiolingual Method 1950 − 1970

Native−like and perfect pronunciation is

expected from the learners, with the aid of

minimal pairs. Intonation is also important.

Natural Approach 1960 − 1970There is focus on pronunciation and, to a

lesser extend, intonation.

Silent Way 1960 − 1970Students are encouraged to correct theirpronunciation errors, aided by the teacher’s

gesticulations. Pronunciation and intonation

are important.

Total Physical Response (TPR) 1960 − 1970Students are expected to speak using near−

native pronunciation and intonation.

Suggestopaedia 1960 − 1980

Pronunciation improves and becomes

accurate in due time. Sometimes,

exaggerated rhythm and intonation are used

to fit in with the music.

Direct Method 1970− 1980 Accuracy in pronunciation and intonation is

expected from the students.

Communicative Approach 1980 − present

The terminus is no longer for students to

attain a native or native−like pronunciation,

but to be able to function in an intelligible

way that serves communication. Intonation

is taught indirectly, as part of the broader

context.

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1.3 Basic Points to keep in mind - Organisation

Precisely because English is used as a common ground by people whose native

languages are dissimilar, each linguistic context has to be dealt withseparately. Teaching pronunciation and intonation must focus on other issueswhen taught in France, Germany, Spain, Greece or the Slavic countries. In ourparadigm, we are to focus on the Greek context, by splitting our efforts in adual way: we will both attempt to teach pronunciation and intonation in ageneral, comprehensive way - aiming at a well-understood outcome - , but weshall also concentrate upon the known difficulties Greek speakers present inarticulating English, namely alveo-palatal fricatives ( ʃ and ʒ), alveo-palatalaffricates (t ʃ and dʒ), and aspirated consonants, all of which are absent instandardised modern Greek. In teaching pronunciation and intonation ingeneral, we should focus on the variety of vocalic occurrences and, viaminimal pairs/sets, we are to examine how they are usually produced, since amethod that can adequately account for virtually every occurrence of vowelsis really arduous and, perhaps, pointless.

To begin with, we must keep in mind that nothing can actually be learnt unlessthe recipients are motivated: we should try to make learning fun or, if that isnot possible, an interesting activity. By dividing the class into groups of 3-5persons, we in fact guarantee that they will not get bored being in pairs or by

themselves, and that they will actually be encouraged to exchange theirthoughts and communicate their ideas on pronunciation in English. Even ifthey use their mother tongue to converse between them, they will inevitablyhave to produce the English sounds. There is another theory that advocatesthat its best for students to physically be within a group: that is, even if anactivity or task is not for a group, but it is to be carried out individually, thephysical arrangement of the class in groups will predispose the students with aco-operative or, even, competitive spirit.

However, the class will not be solely a consortium of groups: the whole classwill be exposed to authentic or authentic-like acoustic or audiovisual material,with the emphasis being placed upon the problematic areas of articulation forGreek native speakers. After having repeatedly listened to the sounds underinvestigation, the students will, in all probability, be familiarised with them,since they will have to actually produce them, not necessarily in a native-likeway, but in a way that does not hinder communication and does not presentan obstacle in conversation (Pennington, 1996). The actual focus is not onproducing native-like pronunciation, but on the sounds that, if producedincorrectly, might create an intercourse problem, or even risk communicationbreakdown (e.g. bitch Vs beach).

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The more we are exposed to the authentic9 or authentic-like10 material, thebetter our pronunciation will become. The absence of some sounds in standardModern Greek does not automatically mean that Greek speakers are physically

incapable of producing them

11

, simply that they must guide their articulatoryorgans towards producing those specific sounds. However, we should alwayshave in mind that some of the students, for various reasons, may not actuallyproduce (or want to produce) the sounds in a native way. This could be, to anextend, acceptable, but some focus should be given to, e.g. the aspiratedsounds [kh, ph, th], since, if produced in an un-aspirated way, they may beperceived by some or all (native or non-native) speakers as g, b, d, thusthreatening the conversational viability.

To help clarify any doubts about pronunciation, we will also work with

minimal pairs and sets, thus exposing the possible pronunciations of a set ofphonemes and aiding the students from a cognitive point of view. Becausemany dictionaries use IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) symbols, or apronunciation key, we will also distribute a handout that, through examples,will explain those symbols. However, since we are dealing with a non-epistemological audience, we must have no requirements for the students toactually learn those symbols: the handout will be there for their ownreference. With the perplexed and, sometimes, inexplicable phonetic symbolsinvolved, we must not rely solely on the handout: we are to distribute or

provide access to multimedia materials that will readily be used to produce theestablished pronunciation(s) for any unknown word, or known word withunknown or uncertain spelling/pronunciation. This actually helps students tobe vigilant about improving their pronunciational skills.

Another important thing to keep in mind is that, when learning a newlanguage, we are initially learning words in context (although, a few years ago,words were actually learnt in isolation), but instinctively try, for better orworse, to keep their pronunciation intact, as if they were in isolation. However,when we are in an intermediate or advanced level, we actually synthesise

9. By authentic material , we mean any material that is extracted from actual real-life situations, e.g. anews bulletin, a train announcement, or a conversation. What distinguishes authentic materials fromnon-authentic materials is that the former are not created with language teaching/learning in mind,while the latter are put into practice having language teaching/learning in mind. Precisely becausenon-authentic materials are pre-defined and pre-determined, they give away their stilted andunnatural colouration.10. When dealing with elementary and early intermediate stages, it would perhaps be more useful toactually use authentic-like materials , that is materials that have been extracted from authenticsituations, but have been subtractively processed, thus retaining the situation and context, but arestripped off difficult words or have a slower delivery rate.

11. It is mistakenly believed that the Japanese are, by anatomy, incapable of producing the sound land produce an r instead, even when borrowing foreign words (milk => miruku). However, it seemsthat it is behaviour that is to be blamed, not anatomy, since - in the absence of the sound in theirlanguage, they cannot actually distinguish between l and r.

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language in a way that words are no longer left in isolation, but arephonetically affected or altered by the neighbouring words. We must alsoexpose students to material that actually deals with how the adjacent lexical

items affect the pronunciation of some words [e.g. the case of the linking r inUK English (Maddonar of the Rocks), the t ʃ sound in US English (Would you likesomething?), or the contrast between the f/v sounds in of the topic (v sound)and off the topic (f sound)].

Often, and this needs extra care, both on behalf of the teacher, but also onbehalf of the learner, there is a radical difference between what people think they say and what people are actually saying (http://metz.une.edu.au). Themain source for this discrepancy in phonetic reality is primarily theorthography, but the nature of phonetics is also to blame. Take for example

the word “awfully”: both in British and American English it is phoneticallyrealised in two syllables, although it is written in a way that we should actuallyexpect three syllables. Other examples are also available (e.g. Britishpronunciation for “opera”, “police”, “support” etc). Both teachers and learnersmust be vigilant about these occurrences and guide their teaching/learningtowards clarifying those cases.

Intonation, perhaps the most hairy part of the whole process, can only belearnt via exposure to authentic material or, at any rate, audible material. We

must never have the illusion that the students can actually learn intonationusing only materials in black and white. A parallel to that would be trying toteach the notes of a gamut or a score, or even the tempo only based on thesolfège. The most intricate and, at the same time, intriguing thing aboutintonation is that it varies dramatically depending on the context, thesituation, the relationship between the interlocutors etc. Placing our effortswithin a context also plays an important role, especially in terms ofunderstanding why we intone a word or a set of words in a particular manner.

Another point that needs to be understood, in order to grasp the “extra”

difficulty English presents, in terms of intonation, is the fact that English isconsidered a stressed language, while many other languages (including Greekand Romance languages) are considered syllabic. While in Englishpronunciation and intonation focuses on specific stressed words, quicklygliding over the other, non-stressed words, in other languages each syllablereceives equal or nearly-equal importance (http://esl.about.com). In English,stressed words are usually content words (nouns, principal verbs, adjectivesand adverbs), while non-stressed words are usually function words(determiners, auxiliary verbs, prepositions, conjunctions and pronouns).

However, there are times where invert the rules, stressing function words anddepriving stress of content words, particularly when we want to placeemphasis on a particular semantic and/or pragmatic aspect of our utterance.

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If we are, for example, acquainted with a boy named Peter, whom we know tobe a very nice person, and we are then informed by someone that “Peterrobbed a bank”, we will inevitably ask in wonder “Peter?”. But if the same

Peter is known to be disabled, we will say “Peter?” in a somehow playfulmanner, knowing that he cannot actually move on his own, far less rob a bank.Similarly, if we are playing hide and seek with the very same Peter (providedof course that he is not physically challenged), we will say something like“Peter?” by extensively prolonging both vowels, thus actually inviting him toappear. And of course, a very different “Peter!” will be rendered if we arePeter’s father and we shout at him in anger! Intonation is inextricably linkedwith context, extra-linguistic information etc.

In any case and at any rate, we must come out of the closet, lifting thepsychological and social barriers that make it difficult for us to practiseEnglish effectively, and be no longer surprised by the suggestion to practise English speaking. The question is not whether to teach pronunciation, but how to teach it. Students must come to their senses and escape their wishfulthinking that pronunciation is a stagnant topic, like History, which can belearnt merely by listening to the teacher, while intonation is something thatshould not really concern them (http://metz.une.edu.au). Both teachers andstudents must actually produce English, work upon our pronunciation -

through trial and error, exposure to authentic material etc - and, after havingachieved all that, feel more confident about our pronunciation, which inretrospect will actually help us boost up our language abilities, thus actuallyleading us towards employing English correctly and more often (which, by theway, can be pronounced both as ɒftən and as ɒf ən!).

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2. Handout on teaching pronunciation and intonation:

Useful Terminology:

Homograph: When two or more words are alike to the eye (spelt thesame), but different to the ear (e.g. an ob ject BUT I object). Also,beyond the scope of pronunciation, a homonym: [e.g. a bow of a boat and abow of an arrow, the bank (of a river) and the bank (financialinstitution)].

Homophone: When two or more words are alike to the ear(pronounced the same), but different to the eye (e.g. here and hear,where and were).

Intonation: The manner of utterance, especially the high or low,

stressed or unstressed pitch in our voice. Unlike in Greek, intonationis very important in English.

IPA: The International Phonetic Alphabet, designed to represent allsounds of all human languages with one unique symbol. Establishedin 1886, in Paris, it is used as a basis by many English dictionaries.Latest revision: 1996.

Minimal pair/set:

A pair/set of words, of the same language, thatdiffer by a single phoneme (sound) in the same position, thusproducing a different meaning (e.g. bother, father, pother, rather).

Pronunciation: The actual realisation of a lexical item in oraldiscourse. Particular pronunciations create particular accents.

Spelling: The orthographic representation of a lexical item. Certainwords are spelt (spelled) differently by Americans and differently bythe British (e.g. jewellery Vs jewelry, enquire Vs inquire colour Vscolor, synthesise Vs synthesize, grey Vs gray, defence Vs defense).

Background Information:

English pronunciation: notoriously disproportionate to itsspelling. Difficult to attain and make out just by looking at words.

We all have the experience of being insecure or embarrassedabout our pronunciation. We must establish confidence to the students (through practice).

Poor pronunciation ruins other well-developed skills, whileexcellent pronunciation makes up for lack of other skills.

Handling English pronunciation well invests us with self-confidence,and instils respect to the other interlocutors.

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Different linguistic backgrounds face different pronunciationalproblems. Focus upon the Greek context and the known difficulties:

♦

Aspirated consonants: k

(court/king/queen), p

(palace)and t

(tyrant). Non-aspirated kʰ, pʰ, tʰ may be perceived as g, b, d by

other speakers of English (native or not), thushindering intercourse and risking communicationbreakdown.

♦ Alveo-palatal fricatives [ ʃ as in ship and ʒ as in measure]♦ Alveo-palatal affricates [(t ʃ as in chamber and dʒ as inmanger)]

Their substitution by s/z or the (non-existent inEnglish) ts/tz results in an annoying and unpleasantform of English (cf. how some foreigners speak Greek).

ALL OF THESE SOUNDS ARE ABSENT IN STANDARD MODERN GREEK

In previous years, teachers aimed at a native-like pronunciation.Modern approaches on Language teaching/learning show us thatperfect pronunciation should not be our main goal. We aim at an intelligible and comprehensible pronunciation. Native-

like pronunciation is always desirable, of course.

Nothing can actually be learnt unless the students are motivatedand understand the big “ hy we teach pronunciation”. When dealingwith pronunciation and intonation, we are not after meaning as such. Exposure to authentic or authentic-like material, group work,

audiovisual and multimedia material. Sensitisation to thecommunicative impact pronunciation and intonation have.

Because of the fact that English is so widely spread, there exist

words that may be pronounced in more than one ways (e.g. often,communicative, pronunciation, potato etc). Even if we adopt only one pronunciation in our teaching, we inform

students of this diversity.

Last, but not least: intonation CANNOT be possibly taught in blackand white. Inextricably linked with context, feelings, situations etc. We provide students with background information and explain its

importance.

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Structuralist Vs Communicative/Functional Approach:

STRUCTURALIST APPROACH COMMUNICATIVE APPROACH

Pronunciation, like everything else,is taught outside context, inisolation.

Pronunciation, like other parts of thelanguage, is taught within a given orcreated context.

Heavy use of non-authentic material,mainly visual (not so much acoustic)and use of unnatural dialogues.

Careful use of authentic orauthentic-like materials, visual andacoustic, multimedia/ audiovisualmaterials.

Individual work, lack of motivationand impetus for learning. Minimal

interaction between students.

Pair/Group work, motivational andfun. Interaction and communication

are of paramount importance.Exposure to a single pronunciation(British in Europe). The children areexpected to perform like nativespeakers.

Exposure to multiple pronunciations,letting the children to develop theirown. No native-like requirements.

No attention given to thecommunicative values of intonation.

We emphasise on the communicativevalue of intonation.

Being aware of that fact that pronunciation was dropped out because of

the way it was taught to students, resulting in a stilted form of language,we try to make it more interesting. In no case do we employ only onemethod; rather we combine practices from both approaches.

Precisely because most dictionaries use the IPA12 symbols to express thephonetic values of the words (or rather, an IPA subset applicable to theEnglish language), we should also equip advanced students and teacherswith such a handout, aiming at facilitating them towards improving theirpronunciation. However, intermediate and advanced students could also

benefit from a pronunciation key.

12. As mentioned above, IPA stands for International Phonetic Alphabet.

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ELEMENTARY LEVEL ACTIVITIES

1.

► Please match the words that have the same sound.

1. ant a. hear2. be b. hi3. cell c. plane4. here d. our5. high e. sun6. hour f. aunt7. sale g. sell

8. plain h. sea9. see i. bee10. son j. sail

ANSWERS: 1 - f, 2 - I, 3 - g, 4 - a, 5 - b, 6 - d, 7 - j, 8 - c, 9 - h, 10 - e

Teacher’s Notes

This exercise is most fitting for young learners. It aims at making the students aware of the homophonic phenomenon, enabling them tounderstand that a certain sequence of sounds may be spelt in various ways.By working in pairs, the students will see the words in question and decideupon which words sound the same (even if they are spelt in a different way).

2Α. ► Listen to the story and select the word you listen to fill in thegaps. Remember that some words are unknown!

► Ακούστε την ιστορία και διαλέξτε τη λέξη που ακούτε για να

γεμίσετε τα κενά. Να θυμάστε πως μερικές λέξεις είναι άγνωστες!

DEsert deSERT OB ject OB ject obJECT PREsent

PREsent preSENT REcord reCORD use (s) use (z)

The children were lost in thedesert

. They found a strange roundobject

, with whichthey played for a while. After two hours, some men came on camels and took the

children to present them to the Sultan. The Sultan was very kind and offered thema deliciousdesert

with chocolate cream and strawberries. One of the children tookoff his pocket the little strange object and gave it to the Sultan as a present , but

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asked for a sword in return, although he didn’t know its use. The Sultan didn’tobject

and the guards showed the child how touse

the sword. After the childrenleft, the Sultan tried to find out what the object did, and it turned out to be a magicrecord

that couldrecord

voices, unlike the ones we have atpresent

.

2Β. ► Now, listen to the sentences and say what the missing word you think is.

► Τώρα, ακούστε τις προτάσεις και πείτε ποια νομίζετε πως είναι η λέξη που λείπει.

Remember: (N) = Noun, (V) = Verb. Good luck!

DEsert (N) deSERT (N) OB ject (N) obJECT (V) PREsent (N)preSENT (V) REcord (N) reCORD (V) use (s) (N) use (z) (V)

a. It’s too hot today. It’s like we are in the desert. b. My little sister does not know the use of hands free.c. Mary lives in London at present.d. Yesterday, we all saw a strange object in the sky.e.

I always have desert after lunch.f. I asked my mother to give me her brush, and she didn’t object.g. She gave me a present for my birthday.h. My mother bought a VCR to record her favourite movies.i. My grandfather bought me a record yesterday. j. Mary didn’t know how to use a mobile phone.

Teacher’s Notes

This exercise may be used for all ages. We use bilingual instructions in order to facilitate the students towards achieving our tripleaim: To enable students to understand that a single orthographic word maybe pronounced in more than one manner (homographs) and ( beyond the scopeof pronunciation and phonetics ), that such lexemes may both be nouns andverbs, and that they may have a related meaning (use) or an entirely different one (object). It is an individual task: In the first case, the students will be sensitised by listening to the short story and selecting the appropriate words.In the second case, the students, having had the previous acoustic experience,will provide the appropriate words by themselves.

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3A. ► Select the words you listen to fill in the blanks (a word is usedtwice):

cheap choke jeep joke see

she ship show sip so

Mary wanted to so us that see can tell a funny choke, and started telling usa story about a sip and a jeep. Honestly, I didn’t understand anything: notonly it wasn’t a choke, but it was also show meaningless. But, she seemedhappy telling the joke with the ship and the cheap.

3B. ► I. Select the words you listen to fill in the blanks (ELEMENTARY)► II. Select the words you listen to fill in the blanks and then

select the correct word that should be placed there (PRE-INTERMEDIATE)

I

II

choke jeep sip see so

choke cheap jeep joke seeshe ship show sip so

- It was a funny choke. [JOKE]- See was very beautiful on her wedding gown. [SHE]- Mary wanted to so us her new ring. [SHOW]- Last summer, we took the ship to Zante. [SHIP]

-

You must buy this dress, it’s very jeep. [CHEAP]

Teacher’s Notes

This exercise may be used for all ages. It is quite straightforward, asking students to discern between audibly distinct soundswithin words, even if they may be (and probably are) unaware of their meaning. It is an individual task: In the first case, the students will be sensitised by listening to the short story and selecting the appropriate words.The second part is divided in two sub-parts: Elementary students will carry on exactly the same thing they did in the first part, while Pre-Intermediate

students, having had the previous acoustic experience, will first select thewords they listened, and then the correct words, in terms of meaning.

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INTERMEDIATE LEVEL ACTIVITIES

1. The following is a transcription of an actual conversationbetween two non-native students practising their English. Listen toit carefully, the first time selecting words from below to fill in thegaps with what you heard, and the second time filling them in withthe words you guess they should have used.

blew deer four four lock

luke read suck think thinks

this ware won wood yell

Chris: Hello Mike. What’s the matter?Mike: Hey Chris. Oh deer. I’m going out with Maria tonight and I havenothing to ware. [DEAR/WEAR]Chris: What about your blew trousers? They lock nice. [BLUE/LOOK]Mike: That old think? They make me luke like a suck of potatoes.

[THING/LOOK/SACK]Chris: Yell, why don’t you borrow something mine? [WELL]Mike: Could I, really?Chris: Yes, wood you like to? [WOULD]Mike: Of course I’d like to. Especially the read pants you have. [RED]Chris: I can bring them four you tomorrow. [FOR]Mike: But still, I don’t feel comfortable borrowing your thinks. [THINGS]Chris: Don’t mention it, what are friends four? I’ll borrow something yours won of this days if it makes you feel any better. [FOR/ONE/THESE]

Teacher’s Notes

This exercise has a dual aim: On the one hand, we ask students to match pronunciation with spelling (regardless of meaning), and on the other hand, we ask them to match pronunciation and spelling with meaning. The dialogue is to be read in the form of a Role-Play: The firsttime, we assess the students’ alertness of pronunciation patterns, while the second time we evaluate their vocabulary, in terms of pronunciation. The students are supposed to work on their own.

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2. You will be given an envelope, containing one of the wordsbelow. Team up in groups of three, open the envelope, read the word

it contains, and try to guess as many words as you can that soundexactly the same, but have a different initial sound. You have 3minutes. Good Luck!

boat, fool, make, dear, sock

ANSWERS:

BOAT, COAT, COTE, DOTE, GOAT, MOAT, MOTE, NOTE, OAT, ROTE, TOTE, VOTE, WROTE COOL, FUEL, JEWEL, MEWL, MULE, POOL, RULE, TOOL, YULE NOT KEWL13

BAKE, CAKE, FAKE, HAKE, JAKE, LAKE, RAKE, SAKE, SHAKE, TAKE, WAKE BEER, BIER, CERE, CHEER, DEER, FEAR, FERE, GEAR, HEAR, HERE, JEER, LEAR, LEER, MERE, NEAR, PEER, PIER, REAR, SEAR, SEER, SERE, SHEAR, SHEER, SPEER, TEAR, TIER, VEER, WEIR, YEAR COCK, DOCK, FLOCK, HOCK, JOCK, KNOCK, LOCH, LOCK, MOCK, NOCK, POCK, ROCK, SHOCK, YAK

Teacher’s Notes

: This exercise aims at combining fun, heuristics and linguistic knowledge: The class will be divided groups of three, and each

group will be given an envelope containing a piece of paper with a wordwritten on it. Based on their lexical knowledge and the spelling of thewords, the students will hopefully come up with as many words as possible(provided, of course, that they are meaningful), that may also have adifferent spelling (e.g. KNIGHT, MIGHT, RITE etc). It is interesting that in English, to a far greater extent than Greek, minimal pairs and sets arequite numerous, precisely because we are dealing with a consonant-based language.

13. *kewl , which is NOT a proper lexical item, is often used in online chatting, instant messaging andonline gaming over the Internet in the place of the proper lexical item cool.

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ADVANCED LEVEL ACTIVITIES

1. How would you say the word “Peter” in the following situations?

a. You have a friend named Peter, who is a very nice boy.Someone tells you that “Peter robbed a bank”. (Peter?)

b. Peter, however, is disabled, and cannot move on his own.(Peter?)

c. You are playing hide and seek with Peter (provided thathe is not physically challenged) and you try to find him. (Peter?)

d. You are Peter’s father and you shout at him with anger(Peter!)

Teacher’s Notes

This exercise aims at making the students aware of the intonation patterns in the English Language. We have limited the number ofexamples in four, but any speaker of the language may indeed come up with many others. It is truly amazing how a single word (in our case, a propername) may be rendered in four, or even more, different ways, conveying adifferent meaning. The students will read listen to the various contextualdescriptions we provide and - in pairs - will try to exemplify their reactions orally.

2. How would you utter “I want to go” in the following situations?

a. You are discussing with a friend about going to the theatre. Yourfriend asks you if you actually want to go there, respondingpositively. (Yes, I want to go).b. Having stated your wish, your friend seems to be unwilling to

attend the performance, but you are eager to do so. (But I want togo).c. You are asked by a third party “Who is the one interested ingoing to the theatre?” (I want to go).d. Even though your friend doesn’t want to go, you still need a liftto go there {and your friend has a vehicle}. (I want to go, please).e. After talking it over, your friend is still determined not to go.However, you too are adamant and getting aggravated (I want to go).

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Teacher’s Notes

This exercise aims at making students aware of the intonation patterns existent as internal sentence mechanisms in the EnglishLanguage, to a greater extent than the previous exercise. By providing the

desirable context, we can virtually provoke any number of linguistic responses,all of which are different in terms of intonation. Exactly because we have anentire sentence, not just a single word, we can clearly see the patterns, andhow the stress falls and rises. The students will read and listen to the variouscontextual descriptions we provide and - in pairs - will try to exemplify theirreactions orally.

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3. Peer Teaching Evaluation We all believe that the Peer Teaching was a valuable experience, because it

gave us a first insight of professional teaching in English, especially for 20+students. Although Amir has had some limited experience of teaching Englishto young children, for Alexander and Efthymia that was the first time theyactually taught in class! All three of us worked closely together to prepare thetheoretical part of our session and, after discussing it, we decided thatEfthymia would take the elementary level activities, Amir would beresponsible for the intermediate level exercises and Alexander would be incharge of the advanced level tasks. After compiling and finalising the handout,we practised its delivery the day before the presentation, assigning roles toeach of us.

DIVISION OF LABOUR

We tried to work both jointly and separately. Alexander looked forinformation both from books and websites, Amir looked for information fromwebsites only, while Efthymia looked for information only from books. As agroup, we met with Mrs. Kamperi on 24/02 (09:00 - 10:00), then with Dr.Drossou on 01/03 (13:00 - 14:00) and both with Mrs Kamperi and Dr. Drossouon 07/03 (13:00-14:00). Between those sessions and after the last one, we

arranged other meetings where, as a group, we closely co-operated with eachother to compile the material and exchange ideas on the exercises. Alexandertyped and word-processed the material, while Amir photocopied the handouts.

THE PLAN - WHAT WENT ACCORDINGLY TO IT

To begin with, Efthymia would start the process by distributing the 45 xeroxedhandouts we prepared for the class. We actually photocopied 50 classhandouts, four of which we kept for our records and one of which we gave toDr. Karavas. Along with those 50 class handouts, we photocopied 5 teachers’

handouts: we kept one for our records, gave one to Dr. Karavas and used theother three during the session (each peer teacher used one).

Immediately after we assumed from the previous peer teaching session onvocabulary, Amir wrote on the board “Fluency Vs Accuracy”, an importantpoint which he developed later on. Alexander, on the other hand, wrote“Pronunciation Vs Spelling”, another important point which he, too,developed later.

Alexander was to introduce the peer teachers, Efthymia was to say a few

things about the organisation and the layout of the handout (two parts,theoretical and practical), and then Alexander would handle points 1, 4 and 8(in the order they appear in the handout), Amir would develop points 5, 6 and

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7, and Efthymia would say a few things on points 2 and 3. Later on, Alexanderwould mention the two predominant approaches in language teaching/learning (namely: Structuralist and Communicative/Functional) and remind

the audience of the reasons that resulted in abolishing the teaching ofpronunciation in the past, and Efthymia would say that in the handout wedecided to include an updated IPA chart and a pronunciation key.

From that point on, each peer teacher would start by explaining the exercisesfor the level he or she undertook. Efthymia was responsible for the Elementarylevel exercises, Amir compiled the Intermediate level exercises and Alexanderwas in charge of the Advanced level exercises.

Efthymia explained the elementary level exercises to our colleagues, providing

them with some of the examples.When Amir carried on to the Intermediate level, all three peer teachers role-played the dialogues [the first time Amir (Mike) and Efthymia (Chris) and thesecond time Alexander (Mike) and Efthymia (Chris)]. Following, Amir went onby introducing the PETER exercise, setting the context and asking the studentsto provide him with answers.

After Amir finished, Alexander took over, with the aid of Efthymia. Alexandergave the instructions for the exercise and Efthymia distributed the 20

envelopes we prepared. The envelopes were decorated with two ladybirdstickers each. During the time the envelopes were being distributed, Alexandershowed the class the picture of a ladybird (ladybug), asked the students if theyknew how it is called in English and then told them a little joke: “How do youcall a male ladybird?” The joke was said to “break the ice”.

After the envelopes were distributed and a few clarifications were given,Alexander waited for 3-5 minutes. After the passing of time, Alexanderreceived many answers from the class, which he wrote on the board. When the

exercise was completed, Alexander moved on to the second exercise, onintonation. He verbally set the context and sometimes paraphrased it, andreceived a number of responses.

After we finished, and because time was pressuring us, Alexander told thestudents that we were thankful for them being there and referred to thebibliography mentioned in the handout, informing the students that all citedbooks could be found at the Library of the Department.

ADDENDA AND CORRIGENDA

In the post-session meeting, it was decided that the ENVELOPES exercise wasnot very difficult and, therefore, would have to fall under the Intermediate

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level exercises. In exchange, the PETER exercise would be part of the Advancedlevel exercises. It was also decided that in Exercise 2B (Elementary level), thestudents will actually say the words themselves, instead of simply hearing

them and writing them down.WHAT WENT WRONG / ACCORDING TO THE PLAN

In the actual presentation of the peer teaching, most of what we had plannedbeforehand was carried out as planned. However, we did have some problemsworking as a group (in terms of turn-taking) and, at some point, Amir lost hiswords… Things like that happen and, sometime in the future, they will bepleasant memories to go back to and laugh at ourselves :-) Perhaps this isbecause we paid more attention in preparing the handout than we did in

rehearsing its presentation. Another thing we had not anticipated was thetime limit: because there were two peer teaching sessions in one academicsession, and because the 5-minute break we had became a 20-minute break, wewere a bit short of time.

WHAT WE WOULD HAVE DONE DIFFERENTLY

If we had the chance to do it one more time, one better time, we would try tobe more linked together, physically be closer between us and to the students(in terms of emotional and spatial proximity), while some of us would have

been more prepared for the session. In the ENVELOPES exercise, we woulddistribute the envelopes only AFTER the instructions were given.

RESPONSE FROM THE AUDIENCE / FEELINGS DURING THE SESSION

In general, we - initially, at least - felt somehow tensed and insecure. However,as the session progressed, we started gaining more confidence. The responsewe received from the audience, at least for Alexander and Amir, was adequateto satisfactory. In the PETER exercise, Amir tried to involve the audience andreceived some answers; more people could have participated. Alexander’s

ENVELOPE activity was the exercise that activated many of our fellowstudents, and the response there was above average. In the final exercise forthe advanced level, Alexander confesses that he received more answers thanhe actually expected.

EVALUATION FROM OUR PEERS (QUESTIONNAIRES)

The feedback we received from our colleagues was valuable, although out ofthe approximately 50 persons in the class, we received only 25 questionnaires.This is due to two reasons: on the one hand, because it was the first day of peer

teaching sessions, some of the students forgot to photocopy the questionnairefrom the Information Booklet, or they did not bring enough xeroxed

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questionnaires, thus consuming them for the first peer teaching session. Onthe other hand, unlike the previous session, where Mrs. Kamperi distributedsome xeroxed questionnaires for evaluating the Peer Teaching session on

Vocabulary, unfortunately, we were not patronised in the same way.At any rate, Dr. Karavas and we agreed that we would collect thequestionnaires, process them, and hand them over to her at our post-teachingsession on Friday, 18th of March 2005. We did process them and, afterextracting percentages and summarising the comments of our fellow students,we present the results here:

On Question 1, concerning whether our session was successful in transmittingnew knowledge on the subject of pronunciation:

40 % graded the session with grade 3,48 % graded the session with grade 4 and12 % graded the session with grade 5.

On Question 2, regarding whether or not the teaching aim was well served:40 % responded Yes about the way the lesson was organised,60 % responded To a certain extent about the way the lesson was organised,68 % responded Yes about the choice of the teaching material,32 % responded To a certain extent about the choice of the teaching material,32 % responded Yes about the way the material was used in class and68 % responded To a certain extent about the way the material was used inclass.

On Question 3, regarding the handout used for our session:60 % responded Yes about it being well-organised,40 % responded To a certain extent about it being well-organised,84 % responded Yes about it containing useful material,16 % responded To a certain extent about it containing useful material,40 % responded Yes about it being adequately used during the teaching

process and60 % responded To a certain extent about it being adequately used during theteaching process.

On Question 6, regarding our communication skills as teachers, we receivedthe following grades:Alexander: 16 % voted 3 (medium), 48 % voted 4 (good) and 36 % voted 5(excellent).Amir: 12 % voted 2 (fair), 56 % voted 3 (medium) and 32 % voted 4 (good).Efthymia: 44 % voted 3 (medium), 52 % voted 4 (good) and 4 % voted 5(excellent).

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On Question 4, regarding the strong points of the lesson, we received thefollowing answers: the handout, the bibliography, the activities (especially theenvelope game), the opportunities for listening, the participation of the

audience, our organisation, the material we used, the vivid presentation andthe communicative ability of some peer teachers, the information onintonation, while a certain individual wrote “Alexander!!!”.

On Question 5, regarding the weak points of the lesson, we received thefollowing answers: it was lengthy and a bit boring, it wasn’t organised, somepeer teachers had a lack of language, the handout was complicated, there wasa lot of theory and speaking, there were many activities, there was not muchtheory, some of the exercises were not explained, there was not equalparticipation, the activities were not helpful, some peer teachers were reading

the handout, there was lack of imagination on behalf of some peer teachers,language production was not promoted, a student was discontent by theroman enumeration we had on the handout, while a certain individual thoughtthat Alexander was taking over.

From Question 7, which asked students to briefly state what they gained fromthe lesson, we only received two or three answers. Although we did not jotthem down, we distinctly remember that a (most likely female, judging fromthe handwriting) student gained the confidence that s/he can do better As to

that, we believe that there is always room for improvement and, since at someparts of our session, we were not entirely giving out our full potential, weshould keep this remark in mind, and try to minimise our lapses and omissionsin the future.

Finally, on Question 8, where the students could make comments about thesession, we got the following responses: it was not too well organised, weshould have fewer activities, we should have louder voices, it was a goodeffort, we should equally divide time and not present all activities, we couldhave developed the theory more, while one of the students commented: Less

stress/Heads up That was indeed true. Some, if not all of us, were a bitstressed and, therefore, kept our heads in a lowered position.

Our overall impression is that most of the students judged us fairly. However,three of them were not being entirely honest, or entirely consistent, since twoof them graded all three peer teachers with the same grade, while one studentcommented (for the negative points) that there was much theory, but then onthe remarks, s/he suggested that there should have been more theory!

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INDIVIDUAL COMMENTS

We consider prudent to also include some individual comments from the peerteachers about the session.

Alexander: I believe that it was a valuable experience, since it was the first time I actually taught in class. I feel that I gave my full potential there, trying as much as I could to explain my points in plain words and get the students involved. I even tried to make a joke with the question on how we should address a male lady bird, but it seems that some of the students did not appreciate the joke, while some of them got it too late!

The contact with the audience was quite satisfactory I may say, but I

do believe that my fellow peer teachers could have tried to explain things in a better way. What I should have done to improve my presentation was to be even closer to the students (in terms of spatial proximity).

As for our audience, I must confess that they were much better than what I actually expected! With the exception of one of them that thought that I was taking over and graded me with a lower grade than my two fellow peer teachers, I must say that our audience judged me fairly and

justly. I would also like to say a big THANK YOU to the student who wrote that I was the strong point of the session!

Amir: As far as I am concerned, during the theory part of our peer teaching, many things went wrong: I was too nervous and the important part was that I didn’t expect to be nervous at all. Some student claimed that I wasn’t prepared enough, but I strongly deny that remark, because I practiced the whole ‘lecture’ plenty of times. I thought that having the experience of teaching (to young learners) would be effective and crucial as far as anxiety and agony is concerned.

In my opinion, the reason for my bad presentation is that I underestimated the whole process. Things normalized and went almost according to the plan during the practical session, with the students helping with their participation (with the exception of a small percentage). I should less underestimate the whole process and I should try to be more comfortable. I should be closer to the students (both literally and

metaphorically) and I should ask more for the students’ participation. I

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would also doubt less if my classmates would cooperate and I shouldn’t be so negative in believing the opposite.

It was a very valuable experience, because it showed my

vulnerability. It showed that I am not always comfortable (as I thought I was) while speaking in front of the crowd. Hopefully, this experience will be a reason for more successful tasks in the future. Finally, about my evaluation, to be honest I was surprised! Maybe, it was because I was better in the activities part and always the last impression stays in mind. I would evaluate myself with “2”, while I had an average of around “3”.

Efthymia: In our peer teaching session, we all three worked together to

prepare the theory part of our peer teaching. I believe that the thing that went wrong in our peer teaching session was that we paid too much attention on creating the whole handout than presenting it. We didn’t rehearse our presentation a lot, before we actually performed it in the classroom.

Apart from that, we were supposed, when presenting our work in front of our fellow students, to “interact” with each other: we didn’t do that, but I don’t find it so tragic. Thankfully, we made our presentation quite satisfyingly, although Amir was so stressed to a point that he lost his words(it happens). Personally, I believe that we should have been practising our

presentation more before entering the classroom, in order to be more organized and perhaps Amir wouldn’t have lost his words.

My classmates were exactly as I expected it: most of them were silent, watching us as if we were aliens, or we were talking in Chinese and others were playing tic- tac- toe on the desk or talking to the person next to them.

The only time they seemed to participate was when Alexander did an exercise with several envelopes, when the only thing they had to do was to find simple minimal pairs.

The thing is, I realized that I am going to be a teacher, so I should feel more confident and relaxed while I’m teaching, in order to help my students understand, although, I felt a little stressed at the beginning. Also, there was some negative energy that held me back, but then I thought that I shouldn’t care, I’m just doing my job.

It was a very valuable experience, because I had the opportunity to teach for the first time in front of 50 students, and I was motivated to

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search on pronunciation and intonation and create activities for the learners to help them. I believe I was born to teach, particularly children not adults. I also became more experienced on pronunciation and I saw that it is very

important for young learners to know how to pronounce carefully. I did it quite good I think, and the only thing I heard and thought it

as true was that I should motivate the students to participate more in the classroom. But I couldn’t do that because my peers were passive recipients, they looked at me liker they didn’t understand what I was saying and then I asked if they wanted me to explain anything, again they were staring at me. So what?

We, collectively, would like to thank Dr. Drossou and Mrs. Kamperi for carefully guiding us through the Peer Teaching process, Dr. Karavas for providing us with valuable feedback and our colleagues, for bearing with us, as well as for supporting us!

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4. Selected sources - Bibliography

A variety of books and Internet websites is available to anyone interested inthe topic of pronunciation and intonation, ranging from rudimentarypronunciation theory and simple exercises to in-depth analysis and elaborateactivities. For the compilation of the material in hand, the following bookswere used:

Bowen, J. Donald (1978), Patterns of ENGLISH Pronunciation (Newbury House Publishers, Inc. / Rowley, Massachusetts).

Brazil, David (1997), The communicative value of intonation in English (Cambridge University Press).

Bronstein, Arthur J. (1960), The Pronunciation of AMERICAN ENGLISH

(Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc. New York).Cruttenden, Alan (ed.) (2001), Gimson’s Pronunciation of English

(Arnold, London).Crystal, David (1999), The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English

Language (Cambridge University Press).Graddol, David (2000), The Future of English? (The English

Company/The British Council).Haycraft, Brita (1975), The Teaching of Pronunciation: a classroom

guide (Longman).

Hooke, Robert and Rowell, Judith (1982), A Handbook of EnglishPronunciation (Edward Arnold, London)MacCarthy, Peter (1972), Talking of Speaking: Papers in Applied

Phonetics (Oxford University Press).Pennington, Martha C. (1996), Phonology in English Language

Teaching: An International Approach (Longman).Poole, Stuart C. (1999), An Introduction to Linguistics (Palgrave).Roach, Peter (2003), English Phonetics and Phonology: A practical

course (Cambridge University Press).

Thompson, Lionel (1978), Learning to Pronounce English (EvansBrothers Limited).Yule, George (1996), The study of language (Cambridge University

Press).

Furthermore, we used information from the following websites, regardinginformation about the teaching methods and approaches on pronunciationand intonation, as well as other information:

⇒ http://www.britishcouncil.org/english/pdf/future.pdf

⇒

http://coe.sdsu.edu/people/jmora/ALMMethods.htm ⇒ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_policy_in_France

Efthymia Frangou, Alexander-Michael Hadjilyra, Amir Izadi © 2005 XXX

http://coe.sdsu.edu/people/jmora/ALMMethods.htmhttp://coe.sdsu.edu/people/jmora/ALMMethods.htm


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⇒ http://esl.about.com/cs/pronunciation/ht/ht_prononce.htm ⇒ http://esl.about.com/library/weekly/aa110997.htm ⇒ http://forums.yellowworld.org/archive/index.php/t-8303.html

⇒

http://home.utm.utoronto.ca/~nakagawa/Full%20Text%20Essay.doc⇒ http://iteslj.org/Articles/Otlowski-Pronunciation.html ⇒ http://metz.une.edu.au/~hfraser/docs/HFLanguageMatters.pdf ⇒ http://newcanadianteachers.oise.utoronto.ca/facts.php ⇒ http://w3.gazi.edu.tr/web/gboran/eltmethodstogether.doc ⇒ http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/⇒ http://www.melta.org.my/ET/1989/main2.html ⇒ http://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/

Audio.htm ⇒ http://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/pronunciation.htm

⇒ http://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/silentway.htm

⇒ http://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/suggesta.htm

⇒ http://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/totalphysical.htm

⇒

http://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/whatgrammar.htm ⇒ http://www.windowsitpro.com/Article/ArticleID/17679/17679.html

In order to find IPA charts, homographs’ and homophones’ lists, we googledthe corresponding keywords. The homophones’ list we used may be found atwww.abcteach.com/abclists/homophones.htm. The list of homographs weused is available at www.opundo.com/homographs.htm. For IPA charts, pleasenotice that the latest revision of took place in 1996, not in 1993. The IPA chart

we used comes from http://web.uvic.ca/ling/resources/ipa/charts/IPAChart96.pdf . The pronunciation key we used comes from The CambridgeInternational Dictionary of English (2001), Cambridge University Press. For theminimal sets and pairs of Exercise 2 for the Intermediate Level, we used theCD-ROM version of the Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary and Thesaurus (Version 2.5, 2000).

This paper was typed under Microsoft® Word 2002 Service Pack 3, usingGentium, MgChanceryBeauty, MgOptima UC Pol, SK AdamPolUni_W ,SKMilitaryBlack, Sylfaen and Tahoma. It was converted into a PDFDocument using Adobe® Acrobat® Professional 7.0
http://esl.about.com/cs/pronunciation/ht/ht_prononce.htmhttp://esl.about.com/library/weekly/aa110997.htmhttp://home.utm.utoronto.ca/~nakagawa/Full%20Text%20Essay.%0Bdochttp://iteslj.org/Articles/Otlowski-Pronunciation.htmlhttp://metz.une.edu.au/~hfraser/docs/HFLanguageMatters.pdfhttp://newcanadianteachers.oise.utoronto.ca/facts.phphttp://w3.gazi.edu.tr/web/gboran/eltmethodstogether.dochttp://www.melta.org.my/ET/1989/main2.htmlhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0BAudio.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0BAudio.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0Bpronunciation.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0Bpronunciation.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0Bsuggesta.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0Bsuggesta.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/totalphysical.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/totalphysical.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/whatgrammar.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/whatgrammar.htmhttp://www.windowsitpro.com/Article/ArticleID/17679/17679.%0Bhtmlhttp://www.abcteach.com/abclists/homophones.htmhttp://www.opundo.com/homographs.htmhttp://web.uvic.ca/ling/resources/ipa/charts/IPAChart96.pdfhttp://web.uvic.ca/ling/resources/ipa/charts/IPAChart96.pdfhttp://web.uvic.ca/ling/resources/ipa/charts/IPAChart96.pdfhttp://web.uvic.ca/ling/resources/ipa/charts/IPAChart96.pdfhttp://www.opundo.com/homographs.htmhttp://www.abcteach.com/abclists/homophones.htmhttp://www.windowsitpro.com/Article/ArticleID/17679/17679.%0Bhtmlhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/whatgrammar.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/whatgrammar.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/totalphysical.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/totalphysical.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0Bsuggesta.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0Bsuggesta.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0Bpronunciation.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0Bpronunciation.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0BAudio.htmhttp://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/%0BAudio.htmhttp://www.melta.org.my/ET/1989/main2.htmlhttp://w3.gazi.edu.tr/web/gboran/eltmethodstogether.dochttp://newcanadianteachers.oise.utoronto.ca/facts.phphttp://metz.une.edu.au/~hfraser/docs/HFLanguageMatters.pdfhttp://iteslj.org/Articles/Otlowski-Pronunciation.htmlhttp://home.utm.utoronto.ca/~nakagawa/Full%20Text%20Essay.%0Bdochttp://esl.about.com/library/weekly/aa110997.htmhttp://esl.about.com/cs/pronunciation/ht/ht_prononce.htm

Dealing with pronunciation and intonation in a communicative context

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