Classroom Language Pronunciation

Trainer Notes

Classroom English Teacher Training

Workshop Pronunciation - Notes

1 Pronunciation Trainer Notes

Learning Outcomes
By the end of this session participants will:
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Be more confident in their ability to teach pronunciation. Identify some pronunciation problems their learners have. Use appropriate techniques and activities to help learners develop their pronunciation.

Key Learning Points

Contractions, schwa, weak and strong sounds, phonemic chart Stress, rhythm, intonation, pitch (See Definitions for trainer) This session will look at some language and practical activities for teaching aspects of the pronunciation of individual sounds and connected speech. It is not a theoretical session, but tries to help participants focus on particular problems their learners have and on activities teachers can be confident to use in the classroom.

Plan Summary
1 Outcomes 2 Warmer 3 Lead-in 4 Useful language 5 Activities for individual sounds 6 Intonation 7 In the classroom 8 Phrasebook Pronunciation game rhyming pairs Identifying problems and solutions Phrases for teaching pronunciation Practice of classroom activities for individual sounds 5 10 25 20 30

Practice of classroom activity to practice intonation Evaluation of some pronunciation activities Selecting useful words and expressions from the workshop

20 30 10 20

9 Reflection & action plan Reflect on what they learned from the workshop. Decide on action points to try out in class

This session uses some of the material developed for Training Videos Teaching Speaking DVD. You may want to use the DVD and study materials to supplement this session. You will need a set of flashcards of different types of food for each group of 4 for stage 6. You can copy flashcards of foods from www.britishcouncil.org/kids-flashcards.html

Classroom English Teacher Training

Workshop Pronunciation - Notes

Procedure
1 Outcomes
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Explain learning outcomes for session to participants

2 Warmer
(optional)
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10

Participants play a game of rhyming tennis. Play in pairs. The first person says a one syllable word. Their partner has to reply with a word that rhymes with the first word. The second person then begins with a new one syllable word and the first person must think of a rhyming word. When a player cant find a rhyme, his opponent wins a point. For example: A: boat B: coat B: seat A: meet A: road B: (cant think of one) A wins a point.

Allow them to play for 5 or 6 minutes.

3 Lead-in
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Look at the Lead-in worksheet. Ask the participants to think about their students. Which English sounds do they find most difficult? For each sound, write a word they find difficult to say. Elicit one or two examples of difficult words and elicit the problem sound - it is a good idea to think of some examples yourself, just in case participants find this difficult. Then ask participants to work in pairs or a three and give them a few minutes to write down some more example words and sounds. Elicit answers from the group and write them on the board - you will need them later on in the session. Now look at the second question on the worksheet. Think about how you teach the pronunciation of English sounds to your students. Write down at least three ways that you encourage students to make or practise the sounds you identified above. Ask participants to work in the same groups and to suggest activities that they use to help with these pronunciation problems. Monitor the discussion. When most groups have finished thinking of activities, ask each group to explain its best activity.

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Classroom English Teacher Training

Workshop Pronunciation - Notes

Demonstrate to the participants these 4 ways of practising pronunciation:

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Say a word and ask the learners to repeat it breakfast Mime sounds with your mouth and ask the learners to watch and copy, saying the sounds. /t/ Say two similar sounds one after the other to practice the difference. /t/ /d/ Use fingers to show a contraction (he and is = hes).

Look at the pronunciation problems of their own learners the participants suggested. Discuss which techniques could be used to work on which problem. Ask the participants to practise these in pairs.

4 Useful language
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20

Ask participants to work with a partner and decide on some useful phrases for teaching pronunciation. Discuss as a class. Look at the useful language worksheet. Ask them to work through the pronunciation of the words and phrases, especially the underlined parts. Drill the phrases and words as a whole group. Point out to the participants that in 2. syllables and in 6. listen, the sound is a Schwa. Check that everyone understands the phrases, especially stress, syllables, consonant, vowel, schwa, rhythm (check with the definitions in these notes).

5 Activities for individual sounds

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30

Ask participants to look at the activities for individual sounds worksheet. In pairs they are going to prepare some words and sounds to practise these activities with other pairs. When they are ready, join pairs together (two and two), and the pairs practice teaching each other their activities. Remind them to use some of the phrases from the last stage. Monitor this and assist with any problems. With the whole group, discuss comments and questions.

Classroom English Teacher Training

Workshop Pronunciation - Notes

6 Intonation
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Say that so far you have been looking at the pronunciation of individual sounds in words. Say that another part of pronunciation is the pronunciation of phrases and sentences. You are going to demonstrate an activity to practice an aspect of this the way the voice goes up and down when we speak English. One of the best ways to show students the difference between rising and falling intonation is through lists. Use flashcards of food to elicit a list of food you are going to buy in a market: Im going to market to buy some oranges, some bananas, a pineapple and some apples. Each student adds to the list practising the rising intonation for each thing on the list until the last thing, when the intonation falls. Exaggerate the rises on everything except the last thing, where you can exaggerate the fall. Play the game Im going to market with the participants. They imagine one thing they will buy. This is a memory game, which gets more difficult as the number of things on the list grows. I First student: Im going to market to buy some eggs. I Second student: Im going to market to buy some eggs and some biscuits I Third student: Im going to market to buy some eggs, some biscuits and a cake. Divide the group into fours and give each group a set of flashcards. Each group puts the flashcards face down in the middle. The first participant takes a card and says Im going to market to buy some (food on first flashcard). The next participant takes another card and says, Im going to market to buy some (food on first flashcard) and (food on second flashcard). The next participant takes another card and adds to the list, and so on. Monitor the participants and give feedback where necessary.

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7 In the classroom
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30

Divide Ps into pairs. Ask them to look at the worksheet In the Classroom. Ask Participants to discuss which aspect of pronunciation each activity practises. As they are working write the following discussion question on the board:
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Do any of these activities help with the problems identified earlier? Could any of them be adapted for your context? Do your course books have any of these activities?

Lead whole class feedback on the worksheet task.

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Suggested answers: 1 similar sounds - minimal pairs 2 the way the voice goes up and down - intonation 3 word stress 4 rhythm / connected speech / weak forms / sound

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Then ask small groups to discuss the question on the board. Ask for whole group feedback. Teachers are often uncertain about teaching pronunciation. Encourage the participants to try some of the activities they have practised today.

Classroom English Teacher Training

Workshop Pronunciation - Notes

8 Phrasebook
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Give participants time to write any useful expressions they have learned during the session in the phrasebook worksheet, and any notes they want to make. Encourage them to discuss this in pairs, if they want.

9 Reflection & Action Plan

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Ask participants for quick reactions to the questions, What was the most useful thing about todays sessions? Then make sure that they have the Reflection and action plan worksheet. Ask them to discuss this in pairs, if they want, and complete them individually. Go around as participants do this and discuss their plans with them. When they have finished, say that you will be looking forward to talking to them at the next session about how their plans. Ask if they have any final comments or questions.

Classroom English Teacher Training

Workshop Pronunciation - Notes

PRONUNCATION DEFINITIONS FOR TRAINER

INDIVIDUAL SOUNDS
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Contractions refer to words that are shortened when spoken, (eg. it is = its; I will = Ill). The schwa is an unstressed vowel sound which occurs in many words of two syllables or more and in connected speech. It is the most common vowel sound in English. For example, the word 'banana' has a main stress on the second syllable and the other two syllables are schwa sounds. Learners often have great difficulty reproducing this sound. Weak and strong sounds. Weak sounds are syllable sounds that become unstressed in connected speech and are often then pronounced as a schwa. For example, in the sentence What do you want to do this evening? the first 'do' is a weak sound and the second is a strong (stressed) sound.

STRESS AND INTONATION

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Stress is about which sounds we emphasise in words and sentences. For example in the word banana the stress is on the second syllable, in the word orange the stress is on the first syllable. In sentences, we usually stress the most important, content words. Rhythm is about how we use a combination of stressed and unstressed words in sentences. Sentences have strong beats (the stressed words) and weak beats (the unstressed words). Intonation is the way the pitch of a speakers voice goes up or down as they speak. We use intonation to help get our message across. Pitch movement is the way the quality of the voice changes as a speaker communicates. English often uses changes in pitch to communicate meaning, especially attitude.

Classroom English Teacher Training

Workshop Pronunciation - Notes

3 Lead-in Possible answers

Think about your students. Which English sounds do they find most difficult to make? For each sound, write a word you know they find difficult to say. Write the sounds and an example word in the box. Work in pairs. Words with difficult sounds for my students

Trainer what are the difficult sounds for speakers of English in your country? Are there particular sounds you want to focus the participants on during this session? Now think about how you teach the pronunciation of English sounds to your students. Write down at least three ways that you encourage students to make or practise the sounds you identified above. e.g.: 1 Say a word and ask the students to repeat it. 2 Mime sounds with your mouth and ask the learners to watch and copy, saying the sounds. 3 Say two similar sounds one after the other to practice the difference. 4 Use fingers to show a contraction (he and is = hes). 5 Pronunciation games. 6 Let students listen first (to the teacher or the cassette) and then reinforce with the written form. 7 Practise the vowels and consonants and then practise them in words and sentences