Assignment

Topic: The importance of teaching pronunciation and give suggestions for

teaching it.

Subject: Phonetics and Phonology.

Submitted to: Sir Rao Kashif Jaleel

Submitted by: Muhammad Abdullah Bokhari

Program: M.A. English (Evening) 1st Semester

National University of Modern Languages,

(Regional Campus, Egerton road, Lahore.)

Abstract:

Communication is the most important component of any human society. In this

aspect, they adapted English language as the local language of the world. So, to
communicate properly we need correct pronunciation, because pronunciation affects
very much on the understanding of the meanings of the words. If the sound of word
is differing it may lead the listener to some other meanings, and if this happens,
it is very much obvious that its not a proper communication. This is, in fact,
confusion. To avoid such kind of problems we need to let know every speaker,
correct pronunciation and I don't think we need to try to turn people into
sounding like native speakers, but at least we do need to get them to be capable
of being understood by a variety of listeners and this goal can not be achieved
since you must provide students the best teachers.
Introduction:

Now a day, all regions of world coming closer to each other and world is
globalizing. Naturally, all the masses and people are getting more familiar and
more near to each other. This way, they collectively effect each other in all
aspects of life. Specially, it is the language, which is effected more. And, as it
is said that English is local language of the world. So, it has immense number of
people around the globe to speak it up. Every one of them has its own way to deal
with it but it's quite sure that Language is not that kind of abstract art which
can be dealt in one's own way like any abstract painting. "Language is humankind's
distinctive feature. Whether we think of rationality or sociability, we are
thinking of language.

It is language that makes us different from other species." And especially when
one talk about speaking of English or learning to speak English, he must replace
the saying: "Seeing is believing" with "Hearing is believing" because speech is
therefore the basic form of language. This leads to the conclusion that speech
should be emphasized accurately. As it is confirmed that "without some degree of
accuracy, speaker could end up producing unrecognizable or incomprehensible
language.
I don't think we need to try to turn people into sounding like native speakers,
but we do need to get them to be capable of being understood by a variety of
listeners, which involves a degree of approximation to the core sounds." So, it is
quite important to teach the right pronunciation of English to the learners, so
that they may communicate exactly what and how they want to communicate.

Importance of teaching English:

It is very much necessity to teach correct pronunciation because it is the

communication, by which we form our society and get near to the people, and
communication is the tool which is the basic content to perform every job in the
social sphere. And it is very much clear that communication is nothing but the
correct pronunciation. "Pronunciation involves far more than individual sounds.
Word stress, sentence stress, intonation, and word linking all influence the sound
of spoken English, not to mention the way we often slur words and phrases together
in casual speech. 'What are you going to do?' becomes 'Whaddaya gonna do?'
English pronunciation involves too many complexities for learners to strive for a
complete elimination of accent, but improving pronunciation will boost self
esteem, facilitate communication, and possibly lead to a better job or a least
more respect in the workplace. Effective communication is of greatest importance",
so we should choose first to work on problems that significantly hinder
communication and let the rest go initially. We should remember that students also
need to learn strategies for dealing with misunderstandings, since native
pronunciation is for most an unrealistic goal.
"A student's first language often interferes with English pronunciation. For
example, /p/ is aspirated in English but not in Spanish, so when a Spanish speaker
pronounces 'pig' without a puff of air on the /p/, English may hear 'big' instead.
Sometimes the students will be able to identify specific problem sounds and
sometimes they won't."
It is often, difficult for a student to reach the exact pronunciation by spellings
because English phonemes are not much in that order in which the spellings are in
practice. So only a teacher can move away student from spellings to phonemic
script to learn correct pronunciation. Teaching pronunciation is also needed
because learning the phonemic script involves not just getting to know the symbols
but also making sure you can say the right sound for each one, lots of help by a
teacher is needed very much.

Major problems of Pakistani learners in speech and pronunciation:

Being Pakistani English learners we often face various problems in speech and
pronunciation. As we do not have very much education in our country and English
teachers are not so well trained all over the country so they just let know the
student what the English is?? But very much of them are not well aware of correct
speech and pronunciation so it is very much obvious that Pakistani English
learners linger behind in this field.

Moreover, various languages of Pakistan, influence English learning process.

Usually languages in Pakistan have strong phonemes like /p/, /t/, /d/ and so on,
approximately all sounds are vigorous than that of English sounds. Pakistani
students also do not have very much sense of stressed sounds as major Pakistani
languages are un-stressed languages.

Pakistani students also make difficulties by following every word's spelling. And
one more thing affects Pakistani students and that is American influence on
Pakistani media and they actually confuse British and American accent of English.
Suggestions:

Let the students be familiar with the articulators and the functions of
them.

Help students practicing sounds more and more and give them more variety of
pronunciation practice.

Help students writing the correct transcriptions of the words.

Let the students be familiar with the dictionaries and they should know how
to use it.

Show them the difference between spellings and sounds.

Help students to improve listening comprehension.

Tell the students to be slow and be careful in learning sounds.

Give the reference of the sounds of the student's own native language
wherever it is possible.

References:

http://www.usingenglish.com/forum/pronunciation-phonetics/38675-importance-
pronunciation.html

http://www.wowessays.com/dbase/af1/arm299.shtml

http://writing.colostate.edu/guides/teaching/esl/pronunciation.cfm

http://www.usingenglish.com/articles/why-does-my-teacher-make-me-learn-phonemic-
script.html