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Developing Pronunciation
Most pronunciation work with young learners will be integrated
into their speaking and listening practice. Children are natural
mimics and are usually not embarrassed about sounding strange, so
teachers can exploit this by getting them to copy voices on cassettes
or CDs, videos, in songs and the teachers themselves. With English
sounds which aren't used in their first language, you can exaggerate
the mouth shape and make the whole process into a game, to encourage
them and have fun!
Make sure you cover all aspects of pronunciation, such as intonation,
linking words and sounds, sentence and word stress, as well as the
pronunciation of specific sounds.
Classroom Ideas
Here are some ideas for how to do this:
- get children to repeat dialogues from course book videos or
audio recordings as preparation for acting them out.
- singing or chanting together; nursery rhymes for young children,
and songs for all children. You could ask the children to bring
in pop songs that they like, especially ones which use fairly
simple language. You can also make up raps, getting the children
to beat time on their desks (but do warn teachers in neighbouring
classrooms first!).
- do tongue twisters to focus on certain sounds and rhythm -
beat time on the desk as your students repeat the sentence, trying
to keep in time with you. It's an excellent way of getting them
to follow English stress patterns and to practise joining sounds.
- if your students have trouble distinguishing between two sounds
(such as 'l' and 'r'), divide them into two teams standing in
lines in the middle of the classroom. One team is, for example,
'l' and the other is 'r'. You call out a word which begins with
or contains one of these sounds; the team who hears 'their' sound
must touch the wall nearest them before someone in the other team
catches them.
- use reading aloud to do quick remedial work and to work on
intonation, sentence stress and linking sounds. (See Reading
with Young Learners). Use recordings of the texts if they're
available, so students listen to a sentence, then read it out.
- when reading aloud, you can exaggerate intonation styles (extreme
monotone, overemphasised stressed words, staccato) and get your
students to copy you. This is fun but you can also ask them what's
wrong with that way of speaking, and so make them aware of features
of English pronunciation. Then make sure they read aloud in an
'English' way.
- build up to producing difficult sounds by getting students
to say the sound alone, then in a word, and finally in phrases
or sentences. You can do this individually and in chorus. The
same process can be followed for short phrases your students find
difficult, exaggerating weak and strong syllables.
- while you are monitoring their speaking activities, note down
any words, phrases or sound combinations they are having problems
with. Do some extra work on these in feedback or in another lesson.
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