№ 3 (106) 2015
97
teach it or what we teach; perhaps the vital question to consider is why we teach pronunciation. Speaking
a foreign language is always had work. Another special effort is required on the part of the non-native
speaker to accommodate his/her speech organs to the articulation of English sounds. In order to acquire a
better British accent the learner should control:
- the activity of the lips
- the activity of the tongue
- the activity of the throat and jaw [4,6].
We speak using lips, tongue, teeth, hard and soft palates and alveolar ridge. All of them are vital in
having beautiful and intelligent speech.
One of the main ways to improve pronunciation is through drilling. In its most basic form, drilling
simply involves the teacher saying a word or structure, and getting the class to repeat it. At its simplest,
drilling means listening to a model, provided by the teacher, or a tape or another student, and repeating
what is heard. This is a repetition drill, a technique that is still used by many teachers when introducing
new language items to their students. The teacher says (models) the word or phrase and the students repeat
it [3, 15].
Recording and replaying are also essential in improving and teaching pronunciation. Students may
think they are using correct pronunciation when in fact they are saying something quite different. By using
a device to record what students are actually saying, teacher will get empirical data to play back for each
person. This method helps to compare a recording of a native speaker and student’s in order to identify
an error. In this way, students will have a more objective understanding of their true pronunciation and be
able to take steps to correct it.
Rhymes. To avoid boring students with continuous practicing and drills, use rhymes with a regular
beat and the same vowel sound. This will lead students to master the target sound unconsciously. Ask stu-
dents to snap their fingers, clap, or tap on the desks to keep the beat and read aloud the rhyme:
Pretty birds don’t fly away
Stay with me all the day
You can sing while I play
So, pretty birds don’t fly away [5, 28].
Tongue twisters are probably more popular for practicing and improving pronunciation. Not only are
they a challenge to your students’ pronunciation abilities, they add an element of fun to the classroom that
can help your students relax and therefore free them to be more daring in their attempts at English. Here
some tongue twisters:
1. Near an ear, a nearer ear, a nearly eerie ear.
2. Frivolous fat Fannie fried fresh fish furiously.
3. I feel I need a deep sleep.
4. The cook took a good look at the cookery book.
5. The hall is on the fourth floor.
Games are also valuable in teaching correct pronunciation. For example, ‘Silent Sounds’ you mouth
a sound silently and the children guess the sound from the shape of your mouth. Use the game to contrast
sounds that are often confused such as / I/ and /e/ - found in words like ‘sit’ and ‘set’.
In order to prevent mistakes in reading the combinations of vowels. We should always bear in minds
the following:
1. Individuality of a person.
2. Psychological test to articulate his or her speech organs to the articulation of the English combi-
nations of vowels. English stress and rhythm are particularly difficult for Kazakh/Russian speakers. Even
advanced students often have difficulty in mastering English sentence stress and speech rhythm, which are
necessary to master if they want to achieve a good level of language fluency in English.
3. To prevent interference by using exercises, rhymes, games, etc.
It is widely recognized that acquiring good pronunciation is very significant because bad pronunci-
ation habits are not easily corrected. Kelly Gerald states that a learner who consistently mispronounces a
range of phonemes can be extremely difficult for a speaker from another language community to under-
stand. This can be very frustrating for the learner who may have a good command of grammar and lexis
but have difficulty in understanding and being understood by a native speaker [6,11].
Finally, pronunciation of combinations of vowels can be a tricky area for both students and teachers,
but it is also vital one as a pronunciation of consonants in the necessity of being understood in the real
world. Therefore learning the English vowel sounds is a crucial part of achieving good pronunciation and
intelligibility.
|