Teaching High-Value Pronunciation Features: Contrastive Stress for Intermediate Learners

Pronunciation features are not equal in how they affect listeners’ ability to understand. Some are low value, while others are high value. This study explores whether contrastive stress is high value. Previous research has shown that identification of contrastive stress is learnable (Pennington & Ellis, 2000), and that explicit teaching about contrastive stress patterns can improve production for advanced learners (Hahn, 2002; Muller Levis & Levis, 2012). To test whether instruction on contrastive stress improved comprehensibility and fluency in spontaneous speech, we developed a 3-week class for intermediate ESL learners, whose pre- and posttest productions were rated by native listeners. Ratings for fluency showed no improvement. Ratings for comprehensibility significantly improved for the experimental group while control participants showed no improvement. Improvement resulted both from better contrastive stress and greater comfort with producing grammatical frames to express the contrasts. The article concludes by discussing the importance of high-value pronunciation features for improved comprehensibility

Intelligibility, Oral Communication, and the Teaching of Pronunciation

A proper understanding of intelligibility is at the heart of effective pronunciation teaching, and with it, successful teaching of speaking and listening. Far from being an optional \u27add-it-on-if-we-have-time\u27 language feature, pronunciation is essential because of its tremendous impact on speech intelligibility. Pronunciation dramatically affects the ability of language learners to make themselves understood and to understand the speech of others. But not all elements of pronunciation are equally important. Some affect intelligibility a great deal, while others do not. With a strong emphasis on classroom practice and how pronunciation teaching can be more effectively approached in different teaching contexts, this book provides an important resource for pronunciation researchers, with a distinctly practical focus. It shows how intelligibility research informs pronunciation teaching within communicative classrooms, enabling language teachers to incorporate intelligibility findings into their teaching. Professionals interested in oral communication, pronunciation, and speech perception will find the book fascinating.https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/engl_books/1010/thumbnail.jp

An Investigation Into Optimal Descent Trajectories for Multipurpose Long Range Space Vehicles Under Advanced Conditions

In this work, we investigate the problem of fuel-optimal control of space vehicle descent trajectories. The main tool we use to establish optimality is Pontryagin’s Maximum Principle. We present a variety of scenarios with increasing complexities, including drag, wind, and moving landing platforms in the context of differing atmospheric and gravitational conditions. Throughout the paper, we use a balance of analytical and numerical techniques. Finally, observations and conclusions drawn from the investigation form the basis for suggestions into additional areas of analysis

Prominence in Singapore and American English: Evidence from reading aloud

English has spread far beyond the boundaries of the traditional L1 varieties (eg British, American, Australian English). Not only is English a leading foreign language throughout the world, it is also a central language for many multilingual communities throughout the world. The speakers of these new Englishes are not yet fully seen as ‘native speakers’ by many speakers from the traditional L1 varieties but cannot be called ‘non‐native speakers’ in any meaningful sense of the word. Kachru (1990) calls these new varieties ‘outer circle’ Englishes, a contrast to the ‘inner circle’ native speaker varieties and the ‘expanding circle’ foreign language speakers of English. The outer circle varieties of English (eg Singapore, Indian, Nigerian English) differ from the inner circle varieties in a number of ways, but few are more noticeable in speech than differences in prosody, that is, in the use of stress, rhythmic structure and intonation. To those familiar only with inner circle varieties, outer circle speakers of English can sound both fluent and choppy, comfortable with English yet incomprehensible, perfectly grammatical yet far too fast. These inner circle judgements grow out of unfamiliarity with the music of outer circle speech. One area of difference between inner and outer circle Englishes is intonation, or the systematic use of voice pitch to communicate phrase‐level meaning

Teaching-oriented research

This paper examines some of the factors that make for a good teaching-oriented paper, in which research and practice are most clearly connected. Such papers have clear research questions, explicit and systematic approaches to teaching and learning for experimental and control groups, improvement measured by pre and posttests, and well-developed teaching implications. Various papers from different journals are used to illustrate the characteristics of successful teaching-oriented papers

Written English into spoken: A functional discourse analysis of American, Indian, and Chinese TA presentations

International teaching assistants (ITAs) often receive specialized training because their spoken English is not easily comprehensible. Lack of comprehensibility may be influenced by grammatical issues (Tyler, 1994), incorrect or inadequate discourse structure (Tyler, 1992; Williams, 1992), or aspects of their pronunciation, such as unclear sentence focus (Hahn, 2004) or intonation (Pickering, 2001; Wennerstrom, 1998). Problems with comprehensibility may be compounded by ITAs having learned English through formal, written models. However, we do not know how ITAs change written text into an oral lecture, nor how their strategies differ from those of native teaching assistants (NTAs) doing the same task. This paper reports results of such a study. We video-recorded three different groups of engineering TAs (American, Chinese, and Indian) presenting information from a textbook passage. Each TA was asked to read the same passage taken from a first-year college physics textbook, and then to teach the content in spoken English. Presentations were transcribed and analyzed using a Systemic Functional Linguistics approach (Halliday, 1994; Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004; Mohan, 2007). Changes made by each group of TAs from the written to the spoken language were compared, and the strategies used by each group to mark their changes from written into spoken language were examined. The results provide a baseline measure of strategies for turning written into spoken texts used by the TAs in our study. Implications for TA training are discussed

Spoken Parentheticals in Instructional Discourse in STEM and Non-STEM Disciplines

Parentheticals, information that is not directly relevant to the topic being addressed, appear in all academic lectures and help listeners distinguish important from less important information. Their use is a critical skill for all teachers. Despite their importance, research on parentheticals in teaching is scarce. This chapter explores the instructional discourse of native English-speaking teaching assistants and international teaching assistants regarding the use of parentheticals, primarily in terms of the intonational and informational patterns they exhibit. Our analysis involved discourse data collected from sixteen classes, eight from chemistry (four taught by native English-speaking TAs and four taught by ITAs) and eight from English (also four taught by TAs and four by ITAs). While our study suggested that parentheticals can be used to connect the teacher and students interpersonally, and to break up the density of the lecture, we uncovered interesting differences between TAs and ITAs

Pronunciation—Research Into Practice and Practice Into Research

The field of second language (L2) pronunciation is attracting researchers with many interests, as well as the teachers who have always been interested in the field. Evidence is growing that pronunciation teaching is successful at promoting greater intelligibility, and that pronunciation learning is not strongly constrained by the age at which learning takes place. The importance of pronunciation in current approaches to language means that L2 pronunciation has a strong teaching-research connection, in which teaching practices are influenced by research, and research agendas are explicitly influenced by practical questions. This growing interest is visible in the field’s dedicated conferences, in growing numbers of scholarly books, and in increasing kinds of other scholarly and pedagogically oriented publications. This article suggests that the interface of research and practice with pronunciation learning is seen in attention to 6 areas: teachers, learners, pronunciation features, teaching and learning contexts, pronunciation materials, and types of pedagogical practices

Social Dynamics in Second Language Accent: Trends in Applied Linguistics

This volume offers a definitive source for understanding social influences in L2 pronunciation, demonstrating the importance of empirical findings from a number of research perspectives, and outlining the directions that future work can take. The aim is to present a coherent argument for the significance of social factors and how they contribute to phonological acquisition.https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/engl_books/1009/thumbnail.jp

The Changing Face of L2 Pronunciation Research and Teaching

This paper discusses changes in the field of L2 pronunciation over the past decade, including research studies, resources, and changes in methodology. To do so, it revisits the history of PSLLT over its 10 years as a conference by considering the inclusion of both research and teaching and the effects of the conference on the field of L2 pronunciation. This paper also describes changes in how L2 pronunciation research is being carried out and the general categories of the papers in the Proceedings of the 10th annual PSLLT conference