Experiences in teaching pronunciation for primary students

INDEX
Contents
Page
 1 - INTRODUCTION
1
1.1. REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC
1
1.2. THE PURPOSE OF THE RESEARCH 
2
1.3. RESEARCH TASKS
2
1.4. RESEARCH TIME AND LOCATION
2
 2 - CONTENTS 
2
2.1 . RATIONALE
2
2.2. THE PRESENT SITUATION OF THE PROBLEM 
4
2.2.1. About students
4
2.2.2 . About the teacher 
4
2.2.3. About the teaching facilities
5
2.2.4. The quality survey and students’ classification 
5
2.3. THE SOLUSION
5
2.3.1. Sounds 
6
2.3.2. Stress and Rhythm 
9
2.3.3. Intonation 
13
2.3.4. Five basic steps to teach pronunciation
16
2.4. THE EFFICIENCY OF THE RESEARCH 
17
 3 - THE CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
17
3.1. CONCLUSION
17
3.2. RECOMMENDATIONS
18
 REFERENCES 
19
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1. REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC
English plays an important role in our lives. It is not only the language in the field of international communication but also the language of the science, information technology, socio-cultural, tourism and commercial, etc.
In Vietnam, English is considered as a compulsory subject at school, especially Primary School. With the trend of international integration, Vietnam is increasingly able to be fully available in all areas. To meet the growing demand as well as communication needs of society, the Ministry of Education and Training has put English into the programme at Primary School. 
Learning English is to form and develop students' knowledge and basic skills in English, through English, students gain knowledge and their love for the Vietnamese. Learning English not only contributes for the development of personality and learning style but also provides students with basic knowledge and helps students understand initially the knowledge about the people and culture of English speaking countries .
At Primary School, English is a subject which has its own characteristics. Therefore teachers are as an artist , he or she needs be creative and cheerful in order to involve students in learning English excitingly. As a teacher of English at Primary School, I am always awarded of researching the specific methods in teaching English, especially in teaching pronunciation in order to make the students believe that they can speak English fluently and naturally. Students will not be motivated to speak in English unless they are presented with words in context. Creating a positive classroom ethos where students feel empowered to work in a collaborative way is an important role of the teacher. We must understand the inter-relationship between speaking, listening, reading and writing and plan for speaking opportunities in the classroom in the same way that we plan for teaching pronunciation. 
Pronunciation is the basic foundation when learning English, it is very important with beginner learners as it allows them to feel more comfortable when speaking; teachers must be aware, however, that the more sounds differ between the mother tongue and the second language, the higher the affective filter. A student feeling too self-conscious will not be as willing to take the risks that are necessary when learning a new language.
Some teachers might argue that pronunciation is not important at all for very few of the tests require students to show their speaking ability. Others, however, find that they do not know how to teach pronunciation, even if they want to teach it. That is because of these conventional notions about pronunciation that the teaching of it has, for too long, been neglected in many ESL/EFL curriculums all over the world.
According to our teaching experience, a great number of our students have many difficulties in pronunciation. When speaking English, with very little or poorly trained pronunciation skill, they have problems either making themselves understand or understanding others.
After exploring and accumulating the experiences from colleagues, I have some experiences in teaching pronunciation and achieved quite effective results. The students are more interested in learning English and more confident in speaking in front of the class. This improves that my methods are right. With the passion and the love for teaching English, I have studied and developed the research: "Experiences in teaching pronunciation for primary students " 
1.2. THE PURPOSE OF THE RESEARCH.
- The research applies the methods of teaching pronunciation to involve students in learning pronunciation well.
- Creating the language circumstance to communicate in English and promote students to actively participate in communicative activities; offering some solutions and methods for teaching pronunciation.
- Exchanging and sharing some experiences in teaching pronunciation for primary student.
1.3. RESEARCH TASKS
- Systematizing some theoretical issues about the procedures and activities in teaching pronunciation in English Primary program according to the communicative approach.
- Exploring the present situation of teaching pronunciation at Primary School and suggesting some techniques in teaching pronunciation to develop speaking skill for elementary students, helping them be more confident to communicate in English.
1.4. RESEARCH TIME AND LOCATION
Research Time : School Year 2017-2018.
Research Location: Hoang Trinh Primary School 
Research Object: " Applying the methods of teaching pronunciation for primary students " 
The respondents of the research: With this research I focused on the primary student, especially the students of class 3.
2. CONTENT
2.1 . RATIONALE
A significance of research, developed over many years, is available to inform educators about effective approaches to teaching children how to read. However, research on applying the methods of teaching pronunciation for primary students is in its infancy. This reflects the fact that many teachers in the Vietnam are faced with the challenge of teaching children to listen and speak in English while the students have a heritage language that is not English and they are not proficient in English yet. Making this a more critical issue, several researches suggest that teachers are not receiving adequate professional development in effective strategies to teach pronunciation for students. As part of the effort to learn more about teaching pronunciation for primary students, educational researchers and teachers in Vietnam have looked at instructional practices in Primary School. In order to be successful in using of the information presented in this research, many teachers might want to consider the following set of questions together in preparation for making decisions about teaching pronunciation for primary students. 
Pronunciation is an umbrella term that encompasses the interrelated areas of sounds, phonetic symbols, stress, intonation and rhythm. Good pronunciation comes from a lot of technical knowledge on the part of the teacher about placement of the mouth, etc. Most teachers in Vietnam unfortunately, do not have this knowledge and therefore tend to pass it off as being unimportant but in fact, as you progress in your fluency, pronunciation becomes more and more important. Language learning needs a lot of practice and both mechanical and meaningful practice lead to improved pronunciation. Only practising that pronunciation will become automatic and drill-like activities are not always considered interesting.  Nevertheless perception practice is a good way to help learners distinguish certainly sounds.
	Pronunciation involves far more than individual sounds. Word stress, sentence stress, intonation, and word linking all influence the sound of spoken English, not to mention the way we often slur words and phrases together in casual speech. 'What are you going to do?' becomes 'Whaddaya gonna do?' English pronunciation involves to many complexities for learners to strive for a complete elimination of accent, but improving pronunciation will boost self esteem, facilitate communication, and possibly lead to a better job or a least more respect in the workplace. Effective communication is of greatest importance, so choosing first to work on problems that significantly hinder communication and let the rest go. Remember that your students also need tobe learnt strategies for dealing with misunderstanding, since native pronunciation is for most an unrealistic goal.
Pronunciation is an interesting area because when learning in a classroom context, pronunciation isn’t usually a major factor that influences comprehension. The value of teaching pronunciation cannot be underestimated. Besides the difficulty of changing a `bad habit´, early pronunciation instruction helps students understand how to form sounds that are not found in their mother tongue, contributes to decoding ability and lowers the affective filter. Some researchers suggest that pronunciation does not need to be taught and will `take care of itself´ over time. Others suggest that teaching pronunciation is necessary.
In order to avoid some of the pitfalls associated with poor pronunciation it is important to hear as much of the target language (TL) as possible. This exposure to the TL can be from the teacher, from films or media clips, songs or audio clips, guest speakers ... 
This research will present specific tools and techniques to help students overcome problems with English pronunciation. The selection of problems is based on both the frequency and seriousness of errors which many Vietnamese students may produce. Methods are resolved or resolving the various problems, such as missing final consonants, misplaced stress in sentences, and misused intonation patterns, will be discussed in the three areas of pronunciation: sounds, stress & rhythm, and intonation. Activities related to the correction of these errors are designed to meet students' different learning styles, namely auditory, visual, tactile, and kinesthetic learning. In this way, the goal of the “learner-centered” classroom is hoped to be pragmatically achieved.
2.2. THE PRESENT SITUATION OF THE PROBLEM 
Analysis of my school’s performance in teaching and learning pronunciation in recent years showed that our average score in pronunciation had been consistently below that of like other schools in urban areas. It was a situation that was of concern and motivated a thorough examination of the school’s approach to the teaching of pronunciation. 
Our school is a public primary school in a rural area in Thanh Hoa province. It is a small school with about 415 students, ranging from 6 to 10 years old. There are three or four classes in each grade, meaning that collaboration among teachers is extremely important to ensure consistency in learning programs. In the school year 2009 - 2010, Ministry of Education and Training applied pronunciation as the framework in the program of teaching English for primary students . After teaching English book from grade 3 to grade 5, I found that most of the students can not pronounce the new words correctly. They only focused on grammar and vocabulary and did not like to learn pronunciation during the lesson. 
2.2.1. About students
In fact, in the process of learning a foreign language, students often focus on learning grammar mainly because the test requires the application of grammar, the tests often have a few exercises with pronunciation. In English class they have little chance to practice pronouncing. Over time they lose their ability to communicate in English. In addition, the limitation of students’ speaking skill that has some reasons:
+ The old habit of learning English does not motivate students to communicate in English.
+ Being lack of knowledge of English to communicate everyday .
+ Having a few opportunities to speak and practise English in the classroom with their ​​teacher and classmates.
2.2.2 . About the teacher 
Many teachers in the Vietnam are faced with the challenge of teaching students to pronounce correctly, when the students have a heritage language that is not English and they are not yet proficient in English
Normally when teaching a foreign language, teachers often focus on teaching vocabulary, grammar or structure. However, grammar is not the final result of the teaching and learning process. It is only a tool to help learner to communicate more effectively. But in fact, there are some differences between spoken English and written English. Written English requires the accuracy statement of the structure, whereas spoken English needs the flexibility and the intimacy in communication .
From those factors, there are some problems in teaching pronunciation for primary student at school. However, in a number of causes, teachers and students can progressively overcome the difficulties. Therefore, in the teaching process teachers must use some suitable techniques to teach students how to lean pronunciation effectively. He or she should have creative and flexible approaches in using the methods of teaching pronunciation.
2.2.3. About the teaching facilities
My school has facilities of teaching and learning to meet the needs of specific subjects such as: projectors, the modern teaching equipment such as Television, CD player, etc. So the application of teaching pronunciation is quite effectively.
2.2.4. The quality survey and students’ classification
	Based on the present situation of students in class 3 the level of all students is acquired after a few weeks of the new school year with the methods of teaching pronunciation. I had a test on students in class 3A, 3B, 3C to survey and classify the students. The following servey showed the result: 
Class
The numbers
of students
Excellent
(A)
Good
(B)
Fair
(C)
Poor
(D)
Fail
(F)
3A
31
0
7=22,6%
9=29%
11=35,5%
4=12,9%
3B
30
0
5=16,7%
8=26,6%
12=40%
5=16,7%
3C
28
0
4=14,3%
9=32,1%
11=39,3%
4=14,3%
Total
89
0
16=18%
26=29,2%
34=38,2%
13=14,6%
According to the survey result, I have classified the students and immediately applied the methods and experiences which I accumulated over the years to improve the teaching and learning quality. 
2.3. THE SOLUSION
At the present situation in English classes at my school, pronouncing wrong still exists in all grades from 3 to 5, especially in grade 3. To improve this situation, I would like to present some techniques for teaching pronunciation and elicit the stages of teaching pronunciation for primary student which I have researched and applied quite successfully at my school.
This research will attempt to address the common and serious pronunciation errors that Vietnamese students produce. Activities related to the correction of these errors are designed to meet students' different learning styles, namely auditory, visual, tactile, and kinesthetic learning. As for the research's title, the "learner-centered" classroom, we take the term from a broader perspective, meaning that it is a class where students can feel, experience, and monitor their own learning of pronunciation. The research will cover the three areas of pronunciation: sounds, stress & rhythm, and intonation with the expectation that it will provide the audience with comprehensive insight into ways of teaching pronunciation. The presentation is by no means comprehensive; rather it is an opportunity for sharing what we know about new perspectives in pronunciation instruction. 
2.3.1. Sounds
Teaching sounds involves several steps: first, identify your students' problem areas; second, find a meaningful context for the problem sounds, and then develop communicative or relevant tasks that incorporate the sound; third, develop at least three or four exercises so that students can keep practicing target sounds in new contexts. ( Celce-Murcia, 1987 ). For the sounds part, we intend to offer teachers some remedial teaching techniques for sounds which they can apply in regular English classes to help students overcome problematic sounds.
        Vowel length and final consonants are commonly found difficult for most Vietnamese students to master in English classes. What teachers confront is that no effective technique has been found to help students to pronounce some problematic vowel contrast such as / i / and / I / correctly in sentences, in dialogues or even in reading passages. Traditionally, teachers will model the sounds and then students repeat them or teachers show a facial diagram which allocates various sounds positions in the mouth to enhance correct pronunciation. In order to provide teachers with more effective and interesting teaching techniques, the first part of this paper will present some new teaching tools and activities to solve the problems mentioned above.
In the second part of sounds, we will address the problem of dropping final consonants while students are speaking. In Vietnamese, there is no CVC structure ( consonant + vowel + consonant); consonants would never appear at the end of the word. This is quite different from English. Influenced by Vietnamese, students omit final consonants while speaking and this result leads misunderstanding with each other in meaning. For example: They pronounce these words in the same way: white, wine, wife, why, etc. The activities adopted tend to alert students to final consonants and regulate their English language habits in putting final consonants on in speech.
* Vowel Length 
- Rubber bands. Students like to have the chance to experience how sounds can be produced through operating a rubber band. For example, using a rubber band in / i / sound, students have to pull both sides of the rubber band to the end to feel the strength and tense of / i /. On the other hand, while practicing / I /, students just have to pull both sides of rubber bands slightly apart, as shown below.                      / i /                                                  / I /
(Adopted from Gilbert, 1993, Clear Speech, 2nd. ed., p. 54)
By doing this, students can clearly distinguish the length of the two vowels and experience the real difference between both sounds. Other vowel sounds can also be demonstrated by rubber bands in the same way.
For example: 
 My brother is thirteen.
My mother is thirty – three yearsold.
(Tieng Anh 3 - Unit 11: This is my family – Lesson 3 - Page 10)
        Students may hear two different vowel lengths of “thirteen” and “thirty”. The "ee" vowel sound of “thirteen” is pronounced a little bit longer than the 
''y'' of “thirty.” . Using rubber bands can help students to build up their listening comprehension ability and clarify the slightly different vowel length.
One important aspect that teachers have to inform students about vowels is that if the vowel sound follows a voiced consonant then the vowel sound will be pronounced a little bit longer than when followed by a voiceless consonant
        If the final sound is voiced, the vowel before it is long. Pull the rubber band at both sides to the end. If the final sound is unvoiced, then the vowel before it is short. Pull the rubber band slightly toward both sides.
For example:                 rise                                                     rice
 (Gilbert, 1993, p.45)
Practice the rubber band with different words within the same vowel but followed by voice and voiceless consonants, such as:
        	back bet cap plants cart sink ice bucks
        	bag bed cab plans card sing eyes bugs
        (Dauer, 1993)
         Then, do some minimal pairs to practice these similar word sounds in sentences to reinforce the pronunciation. One student is speaking the sentence and the other is operating the rubber band according to what he/she heard from the partner. 
For example:
       	 a. Please take this back. Please take this bag.
        	b. Has he used this bet? Has he used this bed?
        	c. I need a cap. I need a cab.
        	d. Where are your plants? Where are your plans?
        	e. Give him a cart. Give him a card.
        	f. She is going to sink. She is going to sing.