Effective English Learning

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EFFECTIVE ENGLISH LEARNING

Unit 8: Pronunciation

Anyone who speaks another language will know it can be difficult

to produce certain sounds that we do not use in our first
language. Many international students are nervous about
speaking and believe their pronunciation of the sounds of English
is an obstacle to effective communication. However, in the case of
spoken English, there are two important things to bear in mind:
You do not need native-like pronunciation of English sounds
in order to be comfortably understood
Other aspects of pronunciation are actually more important
for your listeners than the sounds you make
We will be looking at both those points in this unit.
I need a pronunciation teacher
ELTC gets a lot of enquiries from students who believe they need
individual coaching in English pronunciation. We also get many
requests from School teaching staff at the University of Edinburgh
to do something about particular students pronunciation.

Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

Effective English Learning

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Lets explore first the assumption that pronunciation is something

that can be changed by teaching. Can it?
Task 8.1
Imagine you are attending an English academic writing class. Would you expect the
teacher to correct your pronunciation when you ask a question about a grammar point?
To compare your opinion with ours, click here for Feedback

The evidence from research into second language learning is that

the long-term effect of teachers' corrections is very limited.
In the short term, a student who has just been corrected will
probably be able to imitate the teachers pronunciation of a word
immediately afterwards. However, the chances are that the next
time the student needs to use the word, they will produce it
incorrectly, as they had done before.
Task 8.2
Why do you think it is that (adult) language learners tend to revert to their usual
pronunciation of a problematic word, even after they have been corrected by a teacher
and have successfully copied the teachers pronunciation?
For Feedback, click here

Research also shows that there are other factors, over which the
language teacher has no control, that exert a great influence on a
learners pronunciation:

Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

Effective English Learning

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The factors which turn out to be important for accurate pronunciation are those which
teachers have the least influence on. Native language, the most important factor, results
from historical accident. Similarly, the learner's ability to imitate foreign sounds is
beyond the control of the instructor... Similarly, length of residence in a country where
the second language is spoken natively is largely beyond the instructor's control.
Finally... the learner's concern for pronunciation accuracy is often the result of personal
motivations and attitudes established well before the student enters the classroom.
(adapted from Purcell and Suter, 1980, in Pica 1994: 72)

Task 8.3
Which of these four sentences is the best summary of the views of Purcell and Suter?
a)
b)
c)
d)

Teachers can do relatively little to improve a learner's pronunciation

Some teachers can teach a learner to sound like a native speaker
No learner can sound like a native speaker
For the learner to sound native-like, the teacher must be a native

To check your decision, click here

Intelligibility
There is good news and bad news about pronunciation. The bad
news first: with very few exceptions, adult speakers of a second
language will not achieve a native-like accent.
The good news: you dont need to sound like a native speaker.
What you should aim for, according to Joanne Kenworthy, is 'to be
comfortably intelligible' (Kenworthy 1987: 3).
The use of the word comfortable is important; it refers to the
comfort of the listeners, rather than the speaker. Comfortable
intelligibility 'implies that second language learners should not
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Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

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only make themselves understood to their listeners, but should

not irritate. This is not just a matter of pronunciation, but of
general speaking habits' (Parkinson 1993: 56).
Task 8.4
Are there any features of English speech (of native or non-native speakers) that you find
irritating or unpleasant?
Are you aware of anything in the way you speak English that seems to cause (a)
comprehension problems or (b) irritation, for people listening to you?
For Feedback, click here

Task 8.5
Read the extract below. Try to imagine what it sounded like as it was said. The speaker,
Kim, was an international student in an English class at Edinburgh, responding to a
question from another student.
If she asked you for advice about improving her speaking, what would you tell her?

Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

Effective English Learning

Kim:

ELTC self-study materials

from different childhood + or different education + uh + + woman don't + woman can't

avoid + can't avoid um being being femi + uh feminist + being female + fema-- + more
fema-- + more feminine (deep breath) more um + more feminist + feminist feminist +
more feminist + like more calm and more um + not positive not aggressive and + there +
when the uh + when the women face a certain technology + in my my my + in my case is
same + when I uh when I face the technology I have + I don't have confidence + this is
usual situation

To compare your comments with ours, click here

In the last few years, a new expression has come into use among
language teachers: international intelligibility.
Task 8.6
What do you the term international intelligibility means?
Watch Robin Walkers video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qoh07EovCsE
Then write your definition of international intelligibility
and compare it with the Feedback here

The central role of stress in spoken English

Two types of stress are crucial in being understood: correct
syllable within a word, and appropriate stress of words in a
sentence.
Syllable stress in words
The key to making yourself comfortably intelligible to other
people in English is to make sure you put the main stress on the
correct syllable of word.
Although we have a wide variety of accents in the British Isles, but
- with one or two regional exceptions - everyone uses the same
pattern of word stress. So British listeners are quite used to
understanding the different sounds - especially vowels - produced
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by native and non-native speakers of English. But if a speaker

changes the word stress, their listeners can have great problems
in understanding what was said.
Knowing how a word is stressed is essential when you use it
yourself for the first time. Even if your pronunciation of the
sounds is accurate, you will often be misunderstood if you place
the stress on the wrong syllable.
Task 8.7
Here are four words from the two previous paragraphs. Underline the part of the word
that should be stressed:
SYLLABLE

ACCURATE

MISUNDERSTOOD

VARIETY

Check your answers here

Word stress in a sentence

In English it is possible to put the main stress on (more or less) any
word in a sentence. Where the speaker places the main stress
reflects the meaning they intend the listeners to understand.
For example:
1. This is your Italian book

(= not hers)

2. This is your Italian book

(= not your French one)

3. This is your Italian book

(= not that one)

4. This is your Italian book

(= why did you say it wasnt?)

Try this website, Word stress in sentences

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpPCBWsVUp0&feature=related

Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

Effective English Learning

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RESOURCES
Dictionaries
Use a dictionary to check the stress pattern of new and important
words that you come across in your reading. If you are not sure
how word stress is marked in your dictionary, check the User's
Guide (usually at the front). If you are not familiar with the
phonemic symbols used to show pronunciation, your dictionary
will provide a guide explaining which sound each symbol
represents, with words illustrating each sound.
Task 8.8
There are 26 letters in the English alphabet. How many English sounds are there?
Check your answer by going to
http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/activities/phonemic-chart

Websites
There is a wealth of material on pronunciation on the Internet. At
the moment, googling for "English pronunciation" produces over
8 million hits.
A good place to start, if you are interested in British English
pronunciation, is the BBC Learning English website, which offers a
series of short video tutorials
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdRmGvmeY1U
Two sites that our students have recommended:
How to improve your pronunciation
http://esl.about.com/cs/pronunciation/ht/ht_prononce.htm
Improving your pronunciation
http://www.english-at-home.com/pronunciation/improving-your-pronunciation/

Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

Effective English Learning

ELTC self-study materials

For a demonstration of word stress:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX1rrFh4OZw
BBC video on the sounds of English
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/pr
on/sounds/
ADVICE FROM OTHER STUDENTS
Here is the view of an international student at Edinburgh who
made a conscious effort to improve his speaking ability in English.
I try to involve myself in situations where I have to speak and discuss with people in kitchens, social events, visits to friends and so forth. Or I record myself and try
to improve my pronunciation by repeating again and again the words that are
difficult for me to pronounce. I also request friends to help me by pointing out my
weak points in speaking.

Task 8.9
How many techniques does that student use?
Check your answer with the Feedback here

Task 8.10
The advice below was chosen as the Best Answer to the question How can improve
my English pronunciation?
Which parts of it do you think are the most useful for you, in your situation?
Are there any parts of it that you would not be able to adopt?
1. Listen to spoken English as often as possible.
Listen to how English speakers (on TV, the Net, in person) pronounce specific words and
phrases, and "model" your pronunciation on what you hear.
2. Learn the phonemic alphabet.
Use the English phonemic alphabet page, which you find at the beginning of good
dictionaries, as a guide to pronouncing new words.

Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

Effective English Learning

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3. Don't forget to learn the word stress of a new word.

Every English word has its own normal stress pattern. For example, the word "believe" has
two syllables (be and lieve), but only the second syllable is stressed. Your dictionary should
show the syllable stress by an apostrophe (') before the syllable to be stressed: believe.
4. Work out which sounds cause you most problems in English.
Depending what your first language is, you are likely to have problems with certain sounds.
For example, most French speakers have difficulties with "th"; speakers of Mandarin have
difficulties with "r" or "l", and the zh in usually, and Arabic speakers with "p" and "b".
5. Practise the sounds you find difficult.
A useful exercise is a "minimal pair" exercise. For example, if you have difficulty
distinguishing between "p" and "b", try practising pairs of words which are the same except
for the sound "p" and "b": For example, "pair" and "bear"; "pond" and "bond"; "pie" and "buy"
etc.
6. Be aware of intonation and sentence stress.
Not all words in a sentence have equal stress, and generally only the "information" words
(nouns and verbs) are stressed.
'Where's the pen I gave you?
'Where's the red pen I 'gave you?
Where's the pen I gave you yesterday?
The unstressed words (such as "the", "I", "you" and "and") don't carry as much "weight" as
the stressed words. They become much smaller in length, and are almost abbreviated. For
example, "and" becomes "un".
Changing stress
Sentence stress isn't "fixed" like word stress. In fact, you can stress words that are
normally unstressed in order to highlight different meanings.
For example:
I bought the book = not the DVD
I bought the book = not Arthur
I bought the book = I didnt borrow it
Intonation
There are a couple of easy-to-remember rules about intonation. Usually our voices go up at
the end of the sentence to show a question, and down at the end to show a statement.
Intonation is also important in "tag questions":

Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

Effective English Learning

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You know him, don't you?

(With rising intonation on "don't you?" to show it's a question)
You know him, don't you.
(With falling intonation on "don't you" to show it's a statement that
you expect the other person to agree with.)
7. Learn to recognise spelling patterns.
For example, "-tion" on the end of a word is pronounced "-shun", while "-sion" can be
pronounced "-zhun". There are often many ways to pronounce a particular spelling pattern,
but it certainly helps to know what the variations are. For example, the pattern "ough" can
be pronounced "uff" as in "enough" and "tough", or "or" as in "ought" and "bought" or "oh" as
in "although" and "dough".
8. Don't rush.
If you speak too quickly, you risk skipping over some sounds, failing to pronounce them
completely, or mixing them up. If you speak too slowly, you might end up sounding unnatural.
But it's better to speak slowly and clearly than too quickly.
Source:
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081128034212AAQNJI0

Thats the end of this unit on pronunciation and also of these Effective English Learning
materials. A key element in improving your English, from this point on, will be practice
not just reading about ways of enhancing your English, but actually trying them out and
seeing if they suit you.
The English proverb Practice makes perfect is over-optimistic. But what we can say
with certainty is that practice combined with feedback represents the most effective
route to better command of a language.
I hope that these materials have given you some insights into the ways in which other
international students have made progress. If you devise your own informal techniques
for learning English, I would be delighted to hear about them at A.J.Lynch@ed.ac.uk
Prof. Tony Lynch, English Language Teaching Centre

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Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

Effective English Learning

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Pronunciation
Feedback: study notes and answers
Task 8.1
As a teacher of English, I would only correct a students pronunciation in a
writing class (or any other class than speaking) when I did not understand
what they had said. For me, a pronunciation error is only serious when it
obstructs comprehension. To return to the page you were on, click here

Task 8.2
The basic reason is that when we are saying something in a foreign
language, our mental focus is on the meaning of what we want to say. Our
attention (processing capacity) is directed solely on that message, and not
on the form of what we want to say.
This means it is natural to forget what a teacher has said perhaps, days
or weeks before about the pronunciation of a particular word that we
need to use in what we want to say, when our mind is on the message.
Other things have greater priority at the time of speaking.
That is why, for example, it makes good sense to rehearse a presentation
several times before giving it, so that we are familiar with what we want to
say, and therefore have time (= spare processing capacity) to focus on the
pronunciation of particular key words when we are actually doing the
presentation. To return, click here
Task 8.3
Sentence (a) is the best summary. Purcell and Suter's view is that, although
some exceptionally talented individuals may be predisposed to achieve a
native-like accent, this is not due to teaching, but to a number of prior
variables over which the teacher has no control: (1) the native language, (2)
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Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

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ability to imitate, (3) length of stay in the second language culture, and (4)
concern for pronunciation accuracy. To return, click here
Task 8.4
These are open questions, but some sources of irritation I have heard
British people mention are: repetitive intonation; lack of clear stress
patterns; excessive hesitancy; excessive self-correction; mumbling;
speaking too loud. To return, click here
Task 8.5
The features that irritated Kim's listeners most were her hesitation and selfrepetition. She seemed to be driven by an excessive desire to choose the
precise word, rather than to get her message across. That can tax listeners'
patience. To return, click here
Task 8.6
I would define it as: the extent to which a person can be easily understood
when speaking English to listeners from different language backgrounds.
Robin Walker, who you have just watched on video, is a leading authority
on pronunciation teaching. Among other things, he has written about the
Lingua Franca Core, which is the set of key elements of English
pronunciation that an adult learner needs to master in order to be
understood in situations where English is the language being used as a
lingua franca (as the common language for international communication).
If you are interested in knowing what these core elements are, click here.
Task 8.7
The correct main stresses in those words are:
SYLLable
ACCurate
misunderSTOOD
vaRIety
To return, click here
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Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012

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Task 8.8
The BBC English phonemic chart shows 46 distinct sounds (phonemes) - 19
vowels and diphthongs, and 27 consonants. To return, click here
Task 8.9
This student seems to be a very active learner. He mentions three ways of
improving: social practice in speaking with other people; individual
pronunciation practice with an audio recorder; and getting feedback on his
performance. To return, click here
Task 8.10 is an open question

References in this Unit

Kenworthy J. 1987. Teaching English Pronunciation. Harlow: Longman.
Parkinson B. 1993. 'Teaching Phonology'. ACELT distance learning course materials.
Institute for Applied Language Studies, University of Edinburgh.
Pica T. 1994. 'Questions from the language classroom: research perspectives'. TESOL
Quarterly 28/1: 49-79.
Purcell E. and Suter R. 1980. 'Predictors of pronunciation accuracy: a re-examination'.
Language Learning 30/2: 271-87.

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Effective English Learning

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The Lingua Franca Core (for teachers of English) by Robin Walker

The Lingua Franca Core comprises seven areas in which it is essential to eliminate error
in our students pronunciation:

Vowel quantity: vowel quality varies widely from one native speaker accent to another.
However, the length differences between the vowels of English feature in all accents, and
the long English vowels are very long in comparison with average vowel lengths in other
languages. Because of this, the distinction between long and short vowels is more
important than exact vowel quality, and should be clear in speech.

Consonant conflations: when a consonant of English does not occur in their mother
tongue, learners may replace the missing sound with something similar. The
substitution of one consonant for another can cause serious confusion for both native and
non-native listeners - for example, when a Korean speaker of English replaces /f/ with /p/
and produces paint for faint, or copy for coffee.

Phonetic approximations: another strategy is to use a sound from your mother tongue
that is close to the required English sound. However, some approximations lead to
unintelligibility, as with/B/, the fricative sound the Spanish use for the b in cabin, or /F/,
the sound they use for the g in again or a girl.

Consonant cluster simplification: learners tend to use two radically different strategies
to deal with consonant clusters. Of the two, deleting one of the consonants to simplify a
cluster can affect intelligibility considerably, whilst the addition of a vowel seems to
cause fewer problems. Turkish speakers of English, for example, will often insert a vowel
before or after an s, so stone will sound like istone or sitone. Although this may sound
foreign to a native speaker, it is much less damaging to intelligibility than eliminating one
of the two consonants, leaving tone or sone, for example.

Prominence and weak forms: on the continuum between stress-timed and syllabletimed languages, English tends towards the stress-timing end. Learners often find native
speakers harder to understand than non-natives. Pronunciation teaching should focus on
helping them achieving adequate prominence: with correct prominence, a learners
English is intelligible, even if they do not produce weak vowel used by native speakers.

Tone groups: failing to use tone groups to divide the stream of speech into manageable,
meaningful chunks has a serious effect on intelligibility. On the one hand, it may lead to
breaks in speech in unexpected places, reducing intelligibility; on the other, it reduces
planning time for the speaker, which will inevitably lead to new errors of all types.

Nuclear/contrastive stress but not tone: one almost unique characteristic of English is
the way in which it varies the most prominent stress in a tone group to create meaning.
Thus, the utterance They rented a FLAT does not carry the same meaning as They
RENTED a flat. Many other languages use grammar changes to alter meaning, so
learners often fail to pick up the significance of the tonic stress in English. Putting the
main stress on the wrong word in a spoken sentence will direct the listeners attention to
the wrong place, leading to confusion.

Source: Robin Walker

http://www3.telus.net/linguisticsissues/internationalintelligibility.html
To return to the main study unit, click here
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Tony Lynch and Kenneth Anderson, English Language Teaching Centre, University of Edinburgh 2012