Assessing the contribution of instructional technology in the teaching of pronunciation

Abstract

This investigation discusses the implementation of computerbased teaching of Spanish pronunciation, especially intonation, in the classroom. It examines the potential and the actual use of a technologically-based system, and the results of such a system in the improvement of students' pronunciation in one semester of instruction. The effects of instructional technology were studied through recordings of students made at the beginning and end of a semester. Their recordings were evaluated by native speakers of Spanish in two ways. First, native speakers evaluated the overall pronunciation of each recording according to a scale from 0-8, using 8 as the equivalent of native speaker pronunciation. Then, the native speakers were asked to give their intuitive evaluation of the language musicality of the same recordings. In this second task, native speakers were asked to decide if the recordings of second language learners sounded: (0) not like singing, (1) a little like singing, (2) much like singing, and (3) so much singing that it was annoying.Quantitative analysis of the overall results is still undetermined, despite possible improvement in nearly 40-50% of participating students. More promising and revealing, however, is the qualitative analysis of the data, and the experiment itself, all of which reveal significant information in favor of the present technology.

Visual feedback and second language segmental production: The generalizability of pronunciation gains

“…Intelligibility is broadly defined as the extent to which an utterance is actually understood by the listener (Derwing & Munro, 2005). For L2 learners, many researchers have shown a link between pronunciation and intelligibility, with non-targetlike pronunciation leading to decreased intelligibility Derwing, Munro, & Wiebe, 1998;Munro & Derwing, 1995Derwing & Munro, 2009;Levis 2005;Levis & Grant, 2003;Derwing & Munro, 2009;Simões, 1996;Sturm, 2013). While intelligibility is an indicator of how much is understood, comprehensibility can be seen as degree of ease or difficulty with which an utterance can be understood (Derwing, Munro & Wiebe, 1998).…”

“…Although second language pronunciation clearly has ramifications for intelligibility, comprehensibility, and accentedness, relatively little attention has been given to the teaching of pronunciation (Arteaga, 2000;Derwing & Munro, 2005;Elliott, 1995Elliott, , 1997Isaacs, 2009;Lord, 2005;Saalfeld, 2011;Saito, 2011Saito, , 2013Simões, 1996), particularly in comparison with grammatical and syntactic features. Pennington and Richards (1986), for example, explain how pronunciation has been set aside as mere "linguistic competence" rather than "communicative competence" in more recent methods of instruction (p. 207).…”

Phonetics and Technology in the Classroom: A Practical Approach to Using Speech Analysis Software in Second-language Pronunciation Instruction

“…While there has been some variability in the results, taken as a whole, such research provides strong evidence that phonetic instruction can in fact assist learners in improving their L2 pronunciation. Providing support for the claim that phonetic training does improve learner pronunciation in the L2, a number of studies have attempted to isolate the effect of training and evaluate learners' performance pre-and post-training (Archibald 1998;Arteaga 2000;Elliot 1995;González-Bueno 1997;McCandess and Winitz 1986;Simões 1996;Zampini 1996). This research has examined pronunciation of a wide variety of phonetic features of a learner's L2, including vowel quality, rhotics and trills, voice onset time, liquids, etc., and has found varying, yet measurable improvement for many segments.…”