What makes pronunciation teaching work? Testing for the effect of two variables: socially constructed metalanguage and critical listening

Couper, Graeme

doi:10.1080/09658416.2011.570347

Cited by 72 publications

(56 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…aLVEs & MaGRO, 2011;CEBRIaN & CaRLET 2014;COuPER, 2011;RaMÍREz VERDuGO, 2006;RaTO, 2013;saITO, 2015;sILVEIRa, 2004;WREMBEL, 2005). as brought up by silveira and alves (2009), the instructor can have the facilitating role in helping learners to notice details of L2 speech which otherwise may be left unnoticed.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Brazilian Efl Learners’ Awareness About L2 Phones: Is Mall Pronounced as ‘Mal’?

Souza

2017

Trab. linguist. apl.

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The aim of this paper was to examine the extent of non-verbalizable knowledge L1 Brazilian Portuguese (BP) learners of English possess about the segmental inventory of the L2. The study had two aims: i) to determine to what extent L1 BP EFL learners are aware of contrastive and non-contrastive L2 segments, ii) to determine which type of segments present the lowest level of awareness. To the date, little research has been carried out about the non-verbalizable aspect of L2 phonological awareness, most studies having relied on participants' verbalization of the acquired knowledge (e.g., KENNEDY & TROFIMOVICH, 2010;WREMBEL, 2011). Whereas language learners are frequently taught grammar explicitly, pronunciation of the L2 is rarely addressed in the foreign language classroom. Moreover, phonology is in nature less susceptible to conscious processing than other aspects of L2 learning, making the noticing, and especially the explicit explanation, of phonological aspects difficult. Nevertheless, high L2 phonological awareness is beneficial for L2 pronunciation (KIVIsTö-DE sOuza, 2015), making its examination a priority in the foreign language classroom context. The participants of the study were 71 advanced EFL learners and 18 native speakers of american English. Participants performed a perception test which presented English segments spoken by native and non-native speakers. The ability to identify pronunciation deviations in the non-native speaker trials was taken as a measure for phonological awareness. The results showed that the L1 BP participants manifested a significantly lower sensitivity to English segmental phonology than the native English speakers (F[1, 87] = 40.56, p <.001, η 2 =.31). Pronunciation deviations involving consonants were identified to the greatest extent (52%), whereas the trials involving short-lag VOTs were identified the poorest (33%). The results reveal a need for explicit pronunciation instruction and the employment of consciousnessraising activities in the Brazilian EFL classroom. Keywords: Phonological awareness; L2 speech learning; Pronunciation instruction. RESUMO

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Brazilian Efl Learners’ Awareness About L2 Phones: Is Mall Pronounced as ‘Mal’?

Souza

2017

Trab. linguist. apl.

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“…After a 12‐week course, while both groups improved in terms of production of individual sentences, only the suprasegmental group showed progress in extemporaneous speaking. An example of research targeting language awareness in pronunciation comes from Couper (), who showed that pairing intensive listening practice with an approach allowing the instructor and the learners to develop a mutually agreed–upon set of metalinguistic descriptors for discussing pronunciation resulted in the best performance, compared to other approaches, in both perception and production. Both these lines of research have demonstrated that attention to pronunciation through explicit instruction is beneficial (as shown by Derwing et al, ), especially when learners are made aware of how L2 pronunciation works, for example, through metalanguage (as suggested by Couper, ).…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learner Pronunciation, Awareness, and Instruction in French as a Second Language

Kennedy¹,

Blanchet

Trofimovich³

2014

Foreign Language Annals

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This study examined the speech of 30 adult learners of French as a second language (L2) in a 15‐week listening/speaking course, investigating the relationship between learners' pronunciation development and their pronunciation awareness, measured through learners' conceptions of learning. The course targeted segmental and suprasegmental aspects, including connected speech processes (enchaînement, liaison), intonation, and fluency. Learners wrote weekly journals eliciting measures of pronunciation awareness and completed read‐aloud and picture description tasks at the course's beginning and end. Speech was analyzed through seven measures, including fluency and segmental and suprasegmental accuracy. Results showed significant improvements in learners' segmental production, enchaînement, and some aspects of intonation and fluency. Several variables were associated with pronunciation awareness measures. Results are discussed in light of L2 pronunciation development and instruction‐awareness links.

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“…This is especially justified as previous research indicates that consciousness-raising activities, such as explicit teaching, for instance, are extremely beneficial for L2 speech development (e.g. ALVES; MAGRO, 2011;CEBRIAN;CARLET 2014;COUPER, 2011;RATO, 2013;SAITO;WU, 2014).…”

Section: Stress Placement Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Stress Placement and Unstressd Vowel Production in English Neutral Suffixes by Brazilian Learners

Bueno

Silveira

Gonçalves

et al. 2017

matraga

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This paper examined the production of unstressed vowels by Brazilian Portuguese (BP) learners of English. More specifically, the aim was to examine the acoustic characteristics of the interlanguage unstressed vowels and to determine whether the language learners' stress assignment in cognate words was targetlike or not. The participants were 20 L1 BP learners of English and two native English speakers who provided the baseline data. Participants read lists of sentences including polysyllabic cognate words with the neutral suffixes "-able" and "-al" (e.g. 'respectable', 'radical'). Participants' productions were acoustically and auditorily analysed and the F1, F2 and duration values measured. The results showed that the L1 BP participants produced a reduced vowel /ə/ with similar acoustic characteristics to the L1 English speakers, differentiating it from /ʌ/ in terms of vowel quality and duration. Despite being able to distinguish between the unstressed and the stressed central vowels, the correct assignment of stress in polysyllabic cognates was challenging for the L1 BP informants. A possible explanation for the non-target-like stress assignment is negative transfer from the L1, in which one of the target suffixes, "-al" (e.g. 'tropical'), attracts stress, contrary to the L2.

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What makes pronunciation teaching work? Testing for the effect of two variables: socially constructed metalanguage and critical listening

Cited by 72 publications

References 22 publications

Brazilian Efl Learners’ Awareness About L2 Phones: Is Mall Pronounced as ‘Mal’?

Brazilian Efl Learners’ Awareness About L2 Phones: Is Mall Pronounced as ‘Mal’?

Learner Pronunciation, Awareness, and Instruction in French as a Second Language

Stress Placement and Unstressd Vowel Production in English Neutral Suffixes by Brazilian Learners

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