PART 1: INTRODUCTION

1. Rationale

In the past few years, as the Vietnamese have come into contact with people from other

countries, especially since Vietnam entered the World Trade Organization (WTO) and became

one of twenty destinations of the world, there is a growing awareness of the importance of and

need for communicative English. The emphasis in language teaching has changed to give

spoken English the same status as written English, and the communicative language teaching

is considered as a predominant approach in which teachers pay more attention to speaking and

listening skills and need to perceive that these skills require not only vocabulary and ideas but

also a reasonable pronunciation. Unfortunately, the outcome of communicative learning is not

very satisfactory. Though they have learnt English at school and university, many students,

especially non-English majors, often complain that it is really hard to communicate in English

since they do not catch what the speakers are saying, and they are not confident to speak

English. One of the reasons is their unintelligible pronunciation.

Pronunciation plays an important role in second language teaching and learning. Without

it, learners have many difficulties in getting their speech understood and understanding

others’. Misunderstanding, communication breakdown or failure may occur due to

mispronunciation.

As a teacher of English at the University of Transport and Communications (UTC) for

two years, the researcher has witnessed the great efforts made by her colleagues as well as

students to improve the quality of teaching and learning English. As the teaching goals, all

four language skills are equally focused in the teaching program which lasts three terms.

Students are required to have good English for their next coming major studies, and for their

further future. Whereas, it is undeniable that, among four skills, students get worse score at

listening and speaking. In such the context, pronunciation teaching should be taken in

appropriate consideration so that the teaching goals can be met.

However, up to now there has not been any research on teaching English pronunciation

at UTC yet. Thus, the case study of teaching pronunciation to first-year students at UTC is of

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special importance. It describes pronunciation teaching in the context, specifying the

shortcomings and then making suggestions to improve the teaching of pronunciation.

2. Aims of the study

The aim of the study was to investigate how the teachers at UTC teach pronunciation to

first-year students, with the goal of making suggestions for the teachers to improve the

teaching of pronunciation.

3. Research questions

Focusing on a case with a target on non-English-major students at UTC, this research

examined the teaching of pronunciation. To achieve this, three research questions were

proposed:

(1) What are the teachers’ beliefs in teaching pronunciation?

(2) What elements of pronunciations are taught?

(3) How do the teachers deal with teaching pronunciation?

4. Scope of the Study

This study plays the role as a case study. The researcher intends to describe the current

situation of pronunciation teaching in the context of first-year students at UTC. It provides

rich information about the teachers’ beliefs in the issue, pronunciation elements to be taught in

the curriculum, the ways the teachers use to treat pronunciation teaching.

5. Method of the Study

A qualitative and quantitative methodology was selected for this case study. This

involves the following methods:

(1) Survey questionnaire

(2) Interviews and discussions

(3) Classroom observations

(4) Curricula analysis

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The collected data come from 19 teachers of English at UTC, 57 classroom observations

and the existing syllabus. Then the analysis is carried out in the light of finding out the

answers to the research questions.

6. Organization of the study

The study includes three parts:

- Part 1, INTRODUCTION, introduces the rationale for the research, the aims of the

study, the scope, the methods and the organization of the study.

- Part 2, DEVELOPMENT, consists of three chapters as follows:

- Chapter 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

- Chapter 2: METHODOLOGY

- Chapter 3: ANALYSIS, FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

- Part 3, CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS, summarizes some major findings,

provides recommendations for teaching pronunciation, limitations of the study, and

suggestions for further research.

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PART 2: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1. Pronunciation and communicative teaching

Pronunciation is not an optional extra for the language learner, any more than grammar,

vocabulary or any other aspect of language (Tench, 1981). ‘Pronunciation’ is defined as ‘A

way of speaking a word, especially a way that is accepted or generally understood.’ (American

Heritage Dictionary, 1992). A reasonable pronunciation is important when a learner’s general

aim is to talk intelligibly to others in another language. Making yourself understood when you

say something, besides grammar, lexis, function, and discourse, it has to be pronounced

reasonably well. It is necessary for a teacher to give due attention to pronunciation along with

everything else.

Students can be expected to do well in the pronunciation of English if the pronunciation

class is taken out of isolation and becomes an 'integral part of the oral communication' class

(Morley,1991). The goal of pronunciation should be changed from the attainment of 'perfect'

pronunciation (A very elusive term at the best of times.), to the more realistic goals of

developing functional intelligibility, communicability, increased self-confidence, the

development of speech monitoring abilities and speech modification strategies for use beyond

the classroom (Morley, 1991). The overall aim of these goals is for the learner to develop

spoken English that is easy to understand, serves the learner's individual needs, and allows a

positive image of himself as a speaker of a foreign language. The learner needs to develop

awareness and monitoring skills that will allow learning opportunities outside the classroom

environment.

The communicative approach to pronunciation teaching requires teaching methods and

objectives that include ‘whole-person learner involvement'’(Morley,1991). Morley states there

are three important dimensions the teacher should catered for in any pronunciation program;

the learner's intellectual involvement, affective involvement, and physical involvement. The

learner's involvement in the learning process has been noted as one of the best techniques for

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developing learner strategies, that is, the measures used by the learner to develop his language

learning (Morley, 1991). It is the teacher's responsibility to develop the learning process so the

learner has the greatest chance to develop the learning strategies that are unique to each

individual learner. The teacher also has a special role to play in the communicative learning

program, a role that Morley describes as one of ‘speech coach or pronunciation coach’. Rather

than just correcting the learner’s mistakes, the ‘speech coach’ ‘supplies information, gives

models from time to time, offers cues, suggestions and constructive feedback about

performance, sets high standards, provides a wide variety of practice opportunities, and overall

supports and encourages the learner’ (Morley,1991). It can be seen the teacher's role is not

only to ‘teach’ but to facilitate learning by monitoring and modifying English at two levels,

speech production and speech performance.

1.2. History and scope of teaching English pronunciation

The role of pronunciation in the different schools of language teaching has varied widely

from having virtually no role in the grammar-translation method to being the main focus in the

audio-lingual method where emphasis is on the traditional notions of pronunciation, minimal

pairs, drills and short conversations. (Castillo, 1990) During the late 1960s and the 1970s

questions were asked about the role of pronunciation in the ESL/EFL curriculum, whether the

focus of the programs and the instructional methods were effective or not. Pronunciation

programs until then were ‘viewed as meaningless non-communicative drill-and-exercise

gambits’ (Morley,1991). In many language programs the teaching of pronunciation was

pushed aside, as many studies concluded ‘that little relationship exists between teaching

pronunciation in the classroom and attained proficiency in pronunciation; the strongest factors

found to affect pronunciation (i.e. native language and motivation) seem to have little to do

with classroom activities’ (Suter, 1976, Purcell and Suter, 1980). Pronunciation has been

regarded as ‘the Cinderella of language teaching’ (Kelly, 1969; Dalton, 1997).

The above view that ‘little relationship exists between teaching pronunciation in the

classroom and attained proficiency in pronunciation’ was supported by research done by Suter

(1976) and Suter and Purcell (1980) on twenty variables believed to have an influence on

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pronunciation. They concluded that pronunciation practice in class had little affect on the

learner's pronunciation skills and, moreover ‘that the attainment of accurate pronunciation in a

second language is a matter substantially beyond the control of educators’. They qualified

their findings by stating that variables of formal training and the quality of the training in

pronunciation could affect the results, as would the area of pronunciation that had been

emphasized, that is segmentals (individual sounds of a language) or suprasegmentals. ( The

‘musical patterns’ of English, melody, pitch patterns, rhythm, and timing patterns (Gilbert,

1987) Pennington (1989) questioned the validity of Suter and Purcell’s findings as the factors

of formal pronunciation training and the quality of the teaching, if not taken into account,

could affect any research results. He stated that there was ‘no firm basis for asserting

categorically that pronunciation is not teachable or that it is not worth spending time on...’. It

is quite clear from the research mentioned above that the role of pronunciation training in the

learner's language development is widely debated, with researchers such as Suter, Purcell, and

Madden (1983) all thinking that pronunciation training is relatively ineffective, and in

opposition researchers such as Pennington believing that teachers, with formal training in

pronunciation and teaching suprasegmentals in a communicative language program, can make

a difference. Between these opposing views, Stern (1992) says ‘there is no convincing

empirical evidence which could help us sort out the various positions on the merits of

pronunciation training’.

There has been a move from teacher-centered to learner-centered classrooms, and

concurrently, a shift from specific linguistic competencies to broader communicative

competencies as goals for teachers and students. Morley states the need for the integration of

pronunciation with oral communication, a change of emphasis from segmentals to

suprasegmentals, more emphasis on individual learner needs, meaningful task-based practices,

development of new teacher strategies for the teaching, and introducing peer correction and

group interaction. (Castillo,1991) Research has shown that teaching phonemes isn't enough for

intelligibility in communication (Cohen,1977). With the emphasis on meaningful

communication and Morley’s (1991) premise, that ‘intelligible pronunciation is an essential

component of communication competence’ teachers should include pronunciation in their

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courses and expect students to do well in them. Without adequate pronunciation skills the

learner’s ability to communicate is severely limited. Morley believes that not attending to a

student’s pronunciation needs, ‘is an abrogation of professional responsibility (1991)’. Other

research gives support to Morley’s belief in the need for ‘professional responsibility’ when the

results show that ‘a threshold level of pronunciation in English such that if a given non-native

speaker’s pronunciation falls below this level, he or she will not be able to communicate orally

no matter how good his or her control of English grammar and vocabulary might be’ (Celce-

Murcia, 1987). Gilbert (1984) believes the skills of listening comprehension and pronunciation

are interdependent: ‘If they cannot hear English well, they are cut off from the language...If

they cannot be understood easily, they are cut off from conversation with native speakers.’

Nooteboom (1983) also has suggested that speech production is affected by speech perception;

the hearer has become an important factor in communication discourse. This illustrates the

need to integrate pronunciation with communicative activities; to give the student situations to

develop their pronunciation by listening and speaking. The current research and the current

trend reversal in the thinking of pronunciation shows there is a consensus that a learner’s

pronunciation in a foreign language needs to be taught in conjunction with communicative

practices for the learner to be able to communicate effectively with native speakers.

1.3. Approaches to teaching pronunciation

According to Celce-Murcia’s review (1996), the field of modern language teaching has

developed two general approaches to the teaching of pronunciation: Intuitive-imitative

Approach and Analytic-linguistic Approach.

1.3.1. Intuitive-imitative Approach

Intuitive-imitative Approach depends on the learner’s ability to listen to and imitate the

rhythms and sounds of the target language without the intervention of any explicit

information; it also presupposes the availability of good models to listen to, a possibility that

has been enhanced by the availability first of phonograph records, then of tape recorders and

language labs in the mid-twentieth century, and more recently of audio- and video-cassettes

and compact discs.

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Jones and Evans (1995) suggest teachers should take this approach at the beginning of

teaching pronunciation: ‘Firstly it constitutes a more holistic approach in which, from the

outset, different elements of pronunciation are seen as integrated. Secondly, it gives students a

chance to experience pronunciation on intuitive and communicative levels before moving on

to a more analytical exploration of specific elements of phonology. Finally, work in voice

quality can help students to improve their image when they speak English, and thus increase

their confidence’

1.3.2. Analytic-linguistic Approach

Analytic-linguistic Approach utilizes information and tools such as a phonetic alphabet,

articulatory descriptions, chart of the vocal apparatus, contrastive information, and other aids

to supplement listening, imitation, and production. It explicitly informs the learner of and

focuses attention on such segmentals as the sounds and rhythms of the target language. This

approach was developed to complement rather than to replace the intuitive-imitative approach.

Two common approaches to teaching pronunciation mentioned by Tench (1984),

Pennington (1989), Jones and Evans (1995), Dalton and Seidlhofer (1994) are Approaches of

Bottom-up and Top-down.

1.3.3. Approach of Bottom-up

Approach of Bottom-up has close relationship with accuracy which should be focused

from the very beginning of a course. Teachers teach learners with the smallest and most

concrete unit elements in pronunciation. The teacher goes from individual consonants and

vowels to more abstract segments such as intonation and thought group.

1.3.4. Approach of Top-down

Approach of Top-down gets the idea of contextualized sounds in connected speech. The

teacher goes from the biggest elements to the smallest ones of pronunciation: from intonation

or thought group, or contextualized sounds to individual sounds.

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1.3.5. Approach of integrating pronunciation

Hewings (2004) suggests an Approach of integrating pronunciation for some classes

where pronunciation is given a lower priority than other components of language such as

grammar and vocabulary. The teacher gives pronunciation a more central role in teaching by

integrating it with other areas of language work, for example, connecting vocabulary and

pronunciation, or the links between grammar and pronunciation.

The approaches to pronunciation teaching above have been used worldwide in language

teaching. However, it depends on the certain situation, the formal curricula and the teacher

that decide which approach is of priority.

1.4. Techniques to teach pronunciation

The Communicative Approaches, which are currently dominant in language teaching,

hold that since the primary purpose of language is communication, using language to

communicate should be central in all classroom language instruction. This focus on language

as communication brings renewed urgency to the teaching of pronunciation, since there is a

threshold level of pronunciation for non-native speaker of English; if they fall below this

threshold level, they will have oral communication problems no matter how excellent and

extensive their control of English grammar and vocabulary might be (Celce-Murcia, Brinton,

Goodwin, 1996).

To teach pronunciation as part of Communication Approach, Celce-Murcia, Brinton and

Goodwin list ten techniques have been traditionally used and are still being used:

1.4.1. Listen and imitate: A technique used in the Direct Method in which students

listen to a teacher-provided model and repeat or imitate it. This technique has been enhanced

by the use of tape recorders, language labs, and video recorders.

1.4.2. Phonetic training: Use of articulatory descriptions, articulatory diagrams, and a

phonetic alphabet (a technique from the Reform Movement, which may involve doing

phonetic transcription as well as reading phonetically transcribed text).

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1.4.3. Minimal pair drills: A technique introduced during the Audiolingual era to help

students distinguish between similar and problematic sounds in the target language through

listening discrimination and spoken practice. Minimal pair drills typically begin with word-

level drills and then move on to sentence-level drills.

1.4.4. Contextualized minimal pairs: In this technique, the teacher establishes the

setting and presents key vocabulary; students are then trained to respond to a sentence stem

with the appropriate meaningful response.

1.4.5. Visual aids: Enhancement of the teacher’s description of how sounds are

produced by audiovisual aids such as sound-color charts, Fidel wall charts, rods, pictures,

mirrors, props, etc. These devices are also used to cue production of the target sounds.

1.4.6. Tongue twisters: A technique from speech correction strategies for native

speakers (e.g., “She sells seashells by the seashore.”)

1.4.7. Developmental approximation drills: A technique suggested by first-language

acquisition studies in which second language speakers are taught to retrace the steps that many

English-speaking children follow as they acquire certain sounds in their first language. As

children learning English often acquire /w/ before /r/ or /j/ before /l/, adults who have

difficulty producing /l/ or /r/ can be encouraged to begin by pronouncing words with initial /w/

or /j/, and then shift to /r/ or /l/, respectively:

/w/ → /r/ /j/ → /l/

wed red yet let

wag rag young lung

1.4.8. Practice of vowel shifts and stress shifts related by affixation: A technique

based on rules of generative phonology (Chomsky and Halle 1968) used with intermediate or

advanced learners. The teacher points out the rule-based nature of vowel and stress shifts in

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etymologically related words to raise awareness; sentences and short texts that contain both

members of a pair may be provided as oral practice material:

Vowel shift: mime /ai/ mimic /i/

Sentence context: Street mimes often mimic the gestures of passersby.

Stress shift: PHOtograph phoTOgraphy

Sentence context: I can tell from these photographs that you are very good at

photography.

1.4.9. Reading aloud/recitation: Passages or scripts for learners to practice and then

read aloud, focusing on stress, timing, and intonation. This technique may or may not involve

memorization of the text, and it usually occurs with genres that are intended to be spoken,

such as speeches, poems, plays, and dialogues.

1.4.10. Recordings of learners’ production: Audio- and video-tapes of rehearsed and

spontaneous speeches, free conversations, and role plays. Subsequent playback offers

opportunities for feedback from teachers and peers as well as for teacher, peer, and self-

evaluation.

Except the last two techniques listed above, we can see that the emphasis in

pronunciation instruction has been largely on getting the sound right at the word level –

dealing with words in isolation or with words in very controlled and contrived sentence-level

environments. The last two techniques allow learners to practice at the discourse level.

However, the practice material is often fully scripted and sometimes highly contrived.

1.5. Elements of teaching pronunciation

According to Kelly (2000), teaching pronunciation concludes: vowels, consonants,

word and sentence stress, intonation, other aspects of connected speed and spelling. Whereas,

Colin Mortimer (1985) argues that elements of teaching pronunciation are weak forms,

clusters, linking-up, contractions and stress time. Linda Grant (1993) provides a more

comprehensive and authentic elements of teaching. She organized the teaching elements from

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sounds to syllables and words, to sentences and finally to discoursal segments. Elements of

pronunciation to teach are as follows:

1.5.1. Sound and Spelling Patterns

Sounds and spelling patterns are confusing aspects of English pronunciation. Sound and

spelling correspondences in English are irregular because English has borrowed lots of words

from other languages, from ancient Latin and Greek to Eskimo and Farsi. Homographs and

homophones are two typical examples of unequivalence of sound and spelling. Referring to

sound and spelling patterns, an effective pronunciation teaching must also consider individual

sounds (vowels and consonants), phonetic transcription, syllable and ending sounds.

1.5.2. Word Stress

Word stress must be highly focused on at the beginning of any pronunciation course to

help learners to have understandable pronunciation. In every words two ore more syllables,

one of them is stressed and stronger, louder and longer than the other(s). This stressed syllable

is very important because speakers of English rely on patterns of stress to identify the words

and phrases they hear (Linda Grant, 1993). The more frequently the speaker misused stress,

the more effort the listeners have to make to understand what she/he is saying.

1.5.3. Rhythm

‘Rhythm is characterized by the alternation of strong and weak syllables’ (Kenworthy,

1992:30). Rhythm is a product of word stress and the way in which important items are fore-

grounded through their occurrence on a strong beat, and unimportant items are back-grounded

by their occurrence on a weak beat.

1.5.4. Sentence focus and Intonation

In spoken English, there are various ways in which a speaker gives the listener

information about the relative importance of different parts of the massage. One of these ways

is to put stress on the words that carry the most information. This usually called the main

sentence stress (Kenworthy, 1992:32). Sentence focus and intonation refer to the intention and

feelings of the speaker. When she/he speaks, she/he gives more emphasis on the most

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important words. The teaching of sentence focus and intonation will be more successful if the

teacher selects a context which forces learners to grapple with this notion of ‘importance’.

1.5.5. Thought group

Words organized into short meaningful phrases by the speaker are called thought group.

It is a suprasegmental factor of pronunciation, and it seems to be unteachable. However, if

teachers simplify this abstract concept by explaining in a friendly way and providing authentic

exercises, it will become teachable. Teaching thought group is a crucial element in teaching

pronunciation. If a speaker does not divide the stream of speech into appropriate thought

groups, the language may be challenging to understand, no matter how clearly each word is

pronounced. So a really useful way to help students with their pronunciation is to help them

become aware of thought group – a term from the excellent phonology book for learners

‘speaking clearly’ (Rogerson and Gilbert 1984). To define the ‘thought group’, Rogerson and

Gilbert state ‘When we speak, we need to divide speech into small chunks to help the listener

understand the messages. These chunks or thought groups are groups of words which go

together to express an idea or thought. In English, we pause and low pitch to mark the end of

thought groups.’

1.6. The teacher’s roles in teaching pronunciation

The usefulness of teaching pronunciation is a widely debated subject in the language

teaching world. Some of the current research suggest that teachers can make little or no

difference in improving their students pronunciation (Suter 1976, Purcell and Suter, 1980). In

other words, the attainment of accurate pronunciation in a second language is a matter of

substantially beyond the control of educators. However, there is research that indicates that the

teacher can make a noticeable difference if certain criteria, such as the teaching of

suprasegmentals and the linking of pronunciation with listening practice, are fulfilled.

Pennington (1989) believes ‘teachers with formal training in pronunciation and teaching

supragmentals can make a difference’. No matter how formal their training is, teachers play a

key role in teaching and learning pronunciation. Some roles of a typical teacher of teaching

pronunciation are mentioned (by Kenworthy 1996) as follows:

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1.6.1. Helping learners hear

Helping learners perceive sounds is part of teacher’s role. Learners often have a strong

tendency to hear the sounds of English in terms of the sounds of their native language. Each

language has its own categories of sounds. Teachers need to check that their learners are

hearing sounds according to the appropriate categories and help them to develop new

categories if necessary.

1.6.2. Helping learners make sounds

It is obvious that some sounds of English do not occur in learners’ mother tongues.

Sometimes learners will be able to imitate the new sound, but if they cannot then the teacher

needs to be able to give some hints which may help them to make the new sounds.

1.6.3. Providing feedback

Both the above tasks require the teacher to tell learners how they are doing. Often

learners themselves cannot tell if they have got it right; the teacher must provide them with

information about their performance. In other cases, learners may overdo something – they

may make inaccurate assumptions about the way English is pronounced, perhaps because of

the way it is written. This leads to another task for the teacher:

1.6.4. Pointing out what’s going on

Learners need to know what to pay attention to and what to work on. Because while

learners are speaking with the most part unconsciously controlled, they may miss something

important. For example, they may not realized that when a particular word is stressed or said

in a different way this can affect the message that is sent to the listener. Teachers need to make

learners aware of the potential of sounds – the resources available to them for sending spoken

messages.

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1.6.5. Establishing priorities

Learners need the help of the teacher in establishing a plan of action, in deciding what to

concentrate on and when to leave well enough alone. Learners themselves can be aware of

some of the features of their pronunciation that are ‘different’, but they will not be able to tell

if this is important or not. They may notice that something about their pronunciation is not like

the way English people do it and may automatically try to change this, but their efforts are

misplaced because that feature is a refinement, or acceptable to the English ear.

1.6.6. Devising activities

Learning pronunciation is so complicated that the teacher must consider what types of

exercises and activities will be helpful. Which activities will provide the most opportunities

for practice, experimentation, exploration? In designing activities for learning, teachers must

also keep in mind that certain activities suit the learning styles and approaches of some

learners better than others.

1.6.7. Assessing progress

This is a kind of feedback or comment on their dealing with pronunciation work.

Learners find it difficult to access their own progress so it will be meaningful if the teacher

provide this kind of information. This is especially difficult in the activity of making sounds,

but information about progress is often a crucial factor in maintaining motivation.

1.7. Pronunciation goal

In teaching pronunciation, teachers keeps in mind these questions of what goals should

be set for individual learners or groups of learners; How ‘good’ should the learner’s

pronunciation aim to be?

Some time ago, the goal should always be native-like pronunciation, and it was achieved

by relatively few learners. It is thought to be an inappropriate goal for most learners. The great

majority of learners will have a very practical purpose for learning English and will derive no

particular benefit from acquiring a native-like pronunciation.

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While native-like pronunciation may be a goal for particular learners, a far more

reasonable goal is comfortable intelligibility (Kenworthy 1987, Morley 1994, Celce-Murcia et

al 1996). It means that the speech is understood by a listener at a given time in a given

situation. It is the same as ‘understandability’.

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CHAPTER 2 : METHODOLOGY

2.1. The context of the study

At the University of Transport and Communications, students are majored in science,

technology and engineering. English is not considered a major. It is expected to be a tool for

students to read documents of their own field (Formula of teaching goals, the Ministry of

Education and Training). Like many other subjects, English is taught in a formal setting,

namely a classroom. The teaching of English is divided into two stages. During the first stage,

students study General English which focuses on four language skills. After the stage, students

get the level of Pre-intermediate English. During the second stage, students learn their ESP.

The first stage lasts two academic terms. The second stage lasts only one academic term.

Every academic year, there are 2300 new comers who study English as a compulsory

subject. (Statistics from the Training Chamber, UTC, 2007). They have already learned

English at school, however, there is no classification of levels at this very beginning time. The

students are gathered into groups of majors. If a group is larger than 50 students, it will be

divided into two small groups for English class-times. On average, there are 40 students in a

classroom of English. Therefore, it can be called a large class.

All materials using for teaching and learning are self-edited textbooks called ‘New

English’ series (Student’s Books), and cassettes for General English, a language lab for all

groups to share. The textbooks were quoted from ‘Headway’, ‘New Headway’ by John & Liz

Soars, ‘Lifeline’ by Tom Hutchinson, and ‘Power Base’ by David Evans. In this series of

books, four basic language skills are equally developed. Other aspects of language are also

integrated into teaching such as grammar, everyday English, vocabulary and pronunciation.

The study focuses on teaching pronunciation to first-year students (at the stage of

General English). It is worthy to note that the University gives a special priority to students of

Road and Bridge English. The textbooks and other materials for such students are different

from the rest of students at the university. In the study, those groups are not mentioned. The

researcher only investigated on the teaching to the majority of students.

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2.2. Rationale of using case-study as the research method

A case study is defined as a study of a ‘bounded system’ emphasizing the unity and

wholeness of that system, but confiding the attention to those aspects that are relevant to the

research problem at the time (Johnson 1992). A case is a unit of analysis, for example, in

education research, a case is probably a learner, a teacher, a class, or a school that exists in its

natural occurring environment. A case study is used to describe the case in its context, to

understand the complexity and dynamic nature of a particular entity. Data collection

techniques for a case study are not complicated to implement. They can be entirely naturalistic

observation, elicitation, interviewing, verbal reports or collection of written materials.

The reason why the researcher chooses ‘case study’ as the research method is its

characteristics can meet the aims of her study. The study is conducted to describe the situation

of teaching pronunciation in the scope-limited context of first-year students at the University

of Transport and Communications. It functions as a rich-information report on the issue to all

the teachers of English at the University and to those who take interest in. With the

information reported, implications are then made with the hope that the situation of teaching

pronunciation will be improved.

2.3. Participants

The participants were 19 teachers who fulfilled the questionnaire for teachers and do the

interview. They are from different parts of Vietnam, but all living in Hanoi. They are from 25

to 52 years old; 18 females and only one male. The length of years of teaching English varies

from 2 years to 21 years (63% more than ten years). 15 of them are M.A. in ELT or

linguistics, the rest are attending a postgraduate course.

The students who were involved in the lessons played a role as sub-participants. Those

sub-participants’ feedback partly reflected the teaching. The researcher used their feedback in

classroom as supplementary data to make the finding more reliable.

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2.4. Data collection instruments

To get the findings to research questions, these means of data collection were

administered:

2.4.1. Class observations

Thanks to the movement of class observation during the academic year of 2007-2008,

which was founded for teachers of English to learn from experience and then had action-

reviews, The researcher observed totally 57 different classrooms occupied by all the teachers

of the English Section. From the observations, the researcher learnt how English was taught

and learnt. The researcher particularly focused on the way teachers treated teaching

pronunciation.

2.4.2. Curricula and Materials analysis

To support the findings, the researcher examined the formal curricula and teaching

materials in the consideration of teaching pronunciation. All the analyzed documents were two

course books of New English (Elementary and Pre-Intermediate), cassettes/CDs and VCDs

used along with the books, classrooms and facilities, and previous written reports by the

teachers of UTC.

2.4.3. Questionnaire

The questionnaire was designed with 10 questions to get information about the teachers’

beliefs and practice in teaching pronunciation. Collected demographic data included gender,

age, years of teaching English, and professional qualifications.

2.4.4. Interview

After the questionnaire was fulfilled by all the teachers, an interview to six of them

began. These six teachers were chosen based on the variance in terms of age and point of view

on the teaching of pronunciation. The researcher interviewed them separately when she met

them at the teacher’s halls at breaking time. In addition, formal and informal discussions and

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free talks with all the teachers and the administration staff to collect data for this study were

also carried out.

2.5. Data collection procedure

The study was conducted during the academic year 2007-2008 (from September 2007 to

June 2008). The data was collected in following steps:

First of all, the researcher had an overview of the syllabus of Elementary and Pre-

Intermediate English course-books. She examined the elements of pronunciations to teach.

Then she did 57 classroom observations and kept records of the teachers’ and students’

classroom activities. After each classroom observation, she transcribed and discovered the

patterns of the teachers when they did the language teaching and especially teaching

pronunciation.

Next, she conducted a questionnaire based on the literature on teaching pronunciation,

her observation of the context during two years of working at UTC and the discussion with

other teachers at the university. The questionnaire was delivered to all the 19 teachers of

English. She clearly explained the purpose of doing research before they fulfilled the

questions. The participants were also encouraged to raise questions if there was something in

the questionnaire they did not understand. They were instructed to take as much time as they

needed to complete it.

After that, she did the interview to six of them separately to get further information that

she could not have during the observations or in the questionnaire. The participants in the

interview varied in ages and years of experience so they could represent the whole teaching

staff. The interview helped support the findings.

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CHAPTER 3: ANALYSIS, FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

3.1. Data analysis

To answer the three research questions, data from the observations, the questionnaire, the

interview, the syllabus analysis were classified into six different categories as follows:

- Teachers’ beliefs and knowledge in pronunciation teaching;

- Formal curricula;

- Teaching goal and assessment;

- Approaches and techniques;

- Teacher’s roles

- Teaching and learning materials.

The data were collected and coded in pages of transcripts, tables, field notes, descriptive

statistics and interpretations. This coding, sorting and grouping of data by categories allowed a

balanced description of the teaching pronunciation to the first-years students at UTC.

3.2. Findings and discussions

In this part, the collected data will be presented to answer the research questions that the

researcher has proposed.

3.2.1. Teachers’ beliefs and knowledge in teaching pronunciation

In the questionnaire, five questions were designed to explore the teachers’ beliefs in

teaching pronunciation. The teachers were asked to check (√) the alternative that showed their

attitude. The responses were summarized in the table below.

Question 1: How important is pronunciation in your teaching of English A1 & A2?Response Very important Quite important Not very important Unimportant

Number of participants

6 7 6 0

Percentage 32 % 36 % 32 % 0 %

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Question 2: How much do you like teaching pronunciation?Response Like Don’t mind Don’t like

Number of participants

9 9 1

Percentage 47 % 47 % 6 %

Question 3: How good are you at teaching pronunciation? Response Good at Ok Not good at

Number of participants

6 13 0

Percentage 32 % 68 % 0 %

Table 1: Teachers’ beliefs in teaching pronunciation

Mentioning the importance of pronunciation in the teachers’ English teaching, most of

them argued that it is very important or quite important (32 % very important and 36 % quite

important). 32 % of the teachers believed that it is not very important. In the interviews, the

teachers who argued that pronunciation is important to their students explained the benefits of

having a reasonable pronunciation: ‘A reasonable pronunciation make learners more confident

in their communicative skills.’ (Thu Huong, aged 46), ‘Pronunciation is necessary for

speaking and listening which are two of four language skills that we should treat equally.’

(Kim Thanh, aged 26). The others who thought that pronunciation is not very important said

‘there are a lot of things we have to deal with while teaching. Pronunciation is only a minor

area in language teaching. Moreover, the students are non-English-major ones, it would be too

demanding if they were asked to be good at all four skills. There is no test for speaking.

Listening makes up only 20% of total mark in the exams.’ (Thuy Quynh, aged 43). The

teachers gave pronunciation different scales of importance, however, no one ignored the role

of pronunciation in their language teaching.

Fifteen of the teachers have professional qualifications as M.A. in linguistics or English

teaching methodology. The rest of them are attending a postgraduate course at the same time

of teaching. They were well-trained phonetics and phonology as well as teaching

pronunciation beside other areas of linguistics and language teaching during their courses of

22

postgraduate. Therefore, it was no surprising that they responded they are OK (68%) or even

good (32 %) at teaching pronunciation.

The teachers were confident to teach pronunciation. 47 % of them liked, other 47 %

didn’t mind teaching pronunciation. They found it funny and relaxing when there were some

pronunciation exercises or tasks in the course books. The whole students were attentive to join

this kind of activities. Only one teacher (6%) did not like it.

Five of six teachers who were interviewed believed that their students could be improved

by inside class activities. They were sure that if they gave this area more priority in the

teaching objectives, their students would make progress and then acquire a reasonable

pronunciation. These teachers made their students perceive the importance of pronunciation in

their learning, so their students worked harder at home in this field. The students practiced

outside classroom on their own.

Through the questionnaire and the interviews, it was discussed that the teachers of

English at UTC had strong beliefs that pronunciation is important and they could improve

their students’ pronunciation with inside class activities. They were skillful, and they had

strong confidence in dealing with the teaching of this area. In short, their beliefs and

knowledge in teaching of pronunciation would promise a good prospect for the students’

pronunciation.

3.2.2. Formal curricula description

The formal curricula are ‘New English’ series which consist of New English Elementary

called English A1 and New English Pre-Intermediate called English A2. The New English

series are edited and developed from different series of the same level like the Headway

(mainly based), the New Headway, the Lifeline, and the Power Base. The reason why the

teachers did not use one of those originally published books was the limitation of the time.

Headway Elementary provides approximately 140 hours’ work, Headway Pre-Intermediate

120 hours’ work (Headway series, Teacher’s Books, John & Liz Soars). Whereas the time of

work for New English Elementary as well as New English Pre-Intermediate is around 56

hours each (75 periods of class time; a period is equal to 45 minutes). To make a comparison,

23

the hours of work for New English series are less than half of the required time that the

original authors John and Liz Soars recommended. The editors of the books of New English

had to cut lessons and activities short to fit in with the constrictions imposed by their

timetable. There were not any workbooks edited for students or teacher’s books for the

teachers. However, the teachers could use Headway teacher’s books for reference, and they

could give their students homework sheets.

The curricula can be described in a summary of claims as follows:

Level of learners - Beginners or false beginners: before learning English Elementary;

- Those who have finished English Elementary

Age of learners - 19 and older

Learners’ culture

and L1

Vietnamese and Lao (a minor number of students are from Laos to

study overseas)

Reason for learning English as a compulsory subject; for general, practical or cultural

purposes

Language model British English, but illustrates other varieties as well

Target performance Learners are required to pass the examination after every academic

term of learning. Three language skills (reading, writing, listening)

are tested in the exam.

Claims and

assumptions

It offers valuable practice for the exam.

Students learn what they use and forget what they do not use

Table 2: Claims of the formal curricula

24

Analyzing the curricula, the researcher focused on pronunciation which is treated in

order to help answer the second research question that what elements of pronunciation are

taught.

25

Course Book: New English Elementary

Breakdown of exercises in which pronunciation is treated

Total number of exercises in which pronunciation is treated in some way: 50

- Number of exercises with pronunciation instructions appear: 9 (18 %)

- Number of exercises in which teachers may treat elements of pronunciation regarding

lexis/structures presented (no exercises in student’s book): 18 (36 %)

- Number of exercises with optional exercises (students’ decision): 23 (46 %)

Breakdown of exercises according to type

Number of exercises (including oral drills by teacher): 50

Exercises focusing on perception: 24 (48 %)

Exercises focusing on production: 26 (52 %)

- Look & say/ listen & repeat / read aloud: 26

- Listen and tick the sentence you hear: 2

- Group/match words according to homophones: 1

- Read and listen: 8

- Listen and check: 8

- Listen and fill in gaps with missing words: 5

26

Breakdown of exercises according to the pronunciation elements they treat

- Sound and spelling patterns: 2

- Word stress: 2

- Intonation/Sentence focus: 3

- Rhythm: 2

- Thought group: 10

- Mixed elements: 31 (it depends on students’ /teacher’s decision)

Breakdown of exercises according to medium of presentation

- Presented/modeled by teacher: 11 (22%)

- Presented/modeled by taped material: 39 (78%)

Table 3: Pronunciation teaching treatment in New English Elementary

In the book of New English Elementary, there appear 50 exercises that pronunciation is

treated in some way. The number of exercises with instructions in teaching pronunciation is 9

(18%). The number of exercises in which teachers may treat elements of pronunciation

regarding lexis/structures presented (no exercises in student’s book) is 18 (36%). The rest of

exercises (23 exercises, 46%) are optional (students’ decision). The breakdown of exercises

according to type indicates that among 50 exercises (including oral drills by teacher), there is a

balance between perception and production; that is, 26 exercises (52 %) of them focused on

production, and the rest of them focused on perception. All the elements of pronunciation are

treated directly or indirectly. However, there is a cut-out in the number of types of exercises

compared with the original course books of Headway series. Though the concept of ‘thought

group’ is not mentioned in Student’s Book of New English Elementary, the teacher can use

taped reading texts to help the students perceive and practice it. It is interesting to note that

27

78% of the exercises are taped material, so the students can learn much from native speakers

or standard pronunciation. The teacher is expected to work as a guide and coach in the

students’ perception and production of speech.

Course Book: New English Pre-Intermediate

Breakdown of exercises in which pronunciation is treated

Total number of exercises in which pronunciation is treated in some way: 32

- Number of exercises with pronunciation instructions appear: 1 (3 %)

- Number of exercises in which teachers may treat elements of pronunciation regarding

lexis/structures presented (no exercises in student’s book): 7 (22%)

- Number of exercises with optional exercises (students’ decision): 24 (75 %)

Breakdown of exercises according to type

Number of exercises (including oral drills by teacher): 32

Exercises focusing on perception: 16 (50 %)

Exercises focusing on production: 16 (50 %)

- Look & say/ listen & repeat / read aloud: 16

- Write words of homophones: 1

- Read and listen: 4

- Listen and check: 8

- Listen and fill in gaps with missing words: 3

Breakdown of exercises according to the pronunciation elements they treat

- Sound and spelling patterns: 1

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- Mixed elements: 31 (all pronunciation elements are presented in ‘rapid speech’, the

teacher decides whether to teach or not)

Breakdown of exercises according to medium of presentation

- Presented/modeled by teacher: 1 (3 %)

- Presented/modeled by taped material: 31 (97%)

Table 4: Pronunciation teaching treatment in New English Pre-Intermediate

In the book of New English Pre-Intermediate, 32 exercises in which pronunciation is

treated in some way. The amount of exercises in this area is smaller than that in New English

Elementary. Pronunciation elements to teach do not appear obviously with instructions. It

depends on a certain goal of teaching and learning that the teacher or the students decide how

to work with this area. The students should play a more decisive role in their learning because

they are in a higher level. They practice pronunciation with taped material mostly on their

own. The teacher is expected to give them the guidance to gain their goal of learning

pronunciation.

The course books encouraged the teachers to exploit to teach both segmental and

suprasegmental elements of pronunciation even though the instructions were not visible. The

questionnaire and the observations showed that the teachers paid more attention to segmentals

like sounds and word stress. The elements of suprasegmental were sometimes presented in

their teaching, but it took little time. The students did not have a chance to do the production

and get the teacher’s correction for the elements of intonation, rhythm and thought group. For

instance, when a student made a question with the tone like a statement, the teacher did not

give any correction because she satisfied with the student’s correct grammar and sounds. The

students’ practice of pronunciation was administered in the scale of words separately.

In summary, the series of New English were quite communicative. The curricula

encouraged the teachers to teach pronunciation. All elements of pronunciation (segmental and

29

suprasegmental) appeared in different types of exercises. However, the amount of direct

instructed exercises of pronunciation is small (10 in total 82 exercises in both books). The

teachers spent more time teaching and monitoring segmentals than suprasegmentals.

3.2.3. Teaching pronunciation’s goal and assessment

During the academic year of 2007-2008, the teachers had some seminars to discuss the

curricula of English Elementary and English Pre-Intermediate and they made some changes in

the syllabus. But there was no change for the framework of assessment. Speaking was not

applied in the examinations.

Finishing the course book of English Elementary, the students were required to take a 45

minute paper test called English A1 test. The tasks in the test was described in the table below.

Tasks Instructions Mark/score

(Total 10 points)

Task 1 Read the passage and circle the correct answers 2 points

Task 2 Put the words in the correct order 2 points

Task 3 Each sentence has a mistake. Find and correct it. 2 points

Task 4 Fill in the blank with a suitable word from the box. 2 points

Task 5 Listen: - Part A: Listen and circle the correct answers.

- Part B: Listen and decide the statements are

True or False

2 points

(Part A: 1 point, Part B: 1

point)

Table 5: Structure of test A1

The structure of the test showed that there was no direct assessment for the students’

pronunciation. There was an argument that the testing of listening included the area of

pronunciation. To some extent, that was correct. For example, in a test, the students had to

distinguish the words ‘ten badges’ and ‘ten bags’ to circle the correct answer.

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After the course of English Inter-mediate, the students took a 60 minute test called

English A2 test. There were four tasks as follows:

Tasks Instructions Mark/score

(Total 10 points)

Task 1 Choose the best answer by circling A, B, C or D 4 points

Task 2 Sentence building 2 points

Task 3 Read the passage and circle the correct answers 2 points

Task 4 Listen: - Part A: Listen and decide the statements are

True or False

- Part B: Listen and fill in the gaps with

missing words

2 points

(Part A: 1 point, Part B: 1

point)

Table 6: Structure of test A2

In the test of English A2, pronunciation was tested in terms of lexis. To complete the part

B of listening task, in addition to their perceived vocabulary, the students should have an

intelligible pronunciation to catch the missing words.

The form of the tests was informed to all the teachers and students at the very beginning

of each course. The teachers would complete their mission if more than 60% of their students

passed the examinations for the first time. Those students who got mark 5 and over would pass

the examination, the failed ones would retake it for the second time.

Though the teaching objectives were set in all fields of language, the teachers and

students were oriented to the final tests during the class times. The teaching goal of

pronunciation was not clearly reflected in the tests.

There was no common identified goal of teaching pronunciation in the teaching program

as well as among the teachers themselves. Individual teachers set the teaching goal of

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pronunciation and did the assessment. The questions in the questionnaire indicated the

teachers’ view on pronunciation teaching goal and their subjective assessment.

Question 4: What is the goal of teaching pronunciation? Response Native-like

pronunciationReasonable

pronunciation(Intelligibility)

It depends on personal learner’s

goal.

Number of participants

3 16 0

Percentage 16 % 84 % 0 %

Question 5: Is the time you spend enough to meet your students’ need?Response Yes No Don’t know

Number of participants

5 13 1

Percentage 26 % 68 % 6 %

Question 6: How good is your students’ pronunciation? Response Perfect OK Not very bad Bad

Number of participants

0 2 7 10

Percentage 0 % 11 % 36 % 53 %

Question 7: Do you assess your students’ pronunciation?Response Yes No

Number of participants

10 9

Percentage 53 % 47 %

Question 8: If Yes, how do you assess?Response Speaking

activities/testsReading aloud texts Paper tests (No assessment)

Number of participants

5 4 1 (9)

Percentage 26 % 21 % 5 % (47%)

Table 7: Views on pronunciation goal and assessment

The goal of pronunciation teaching in the teachers’ opinion was mostly that of

‘intelligibility’. The concept of ‘intelligibility’ was explained to be a reasonable and

understandable pronunciation. They argued that their students were going to work in an

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English as a second language working environment, so their English pronunciation was not

necessary to be native-like. Some of the students were going to study overseas, that would be

fantastic if their pronunciation was native-like, but there was no obstacles when their

pronunciation is comfortably intelligible. Nevertheless, the teaching and learning goal of

pronunciation could not be gained. 68 % of the teachers reckoned that their teaching time did

not meet their students’ need in pronunciation. Ten of the teachers did the assessment through

speaking activities, reading aloud texts and paper tests. Speaking activities were enclosed in

the formal curricula, therefore, the teachers could assess their students’ pronunciation. After

the tasks of reading comprehension, some teachers asked their students to read aloud the texts

and made some correction of pronunciation. One teacher delivered paper tests with

pronunciation exercises such as putting the stress for words, finding the different

pronunciation of the same spellings. Nine others did not assess their students’ pronunciation,

yet their experience of working with their students in class could help them identify how good

their students’ pronunciation was. Only 11 % of them thought that their students’

pronunciation was OK, 53 % commended that their students’ pronunciation was bad.

In brief, the pronunciation teaching goal was set by teachers themselves to be that of

intelligibility. But whether the teaching goal was targeted or not was indefinite. It was based

on their own opinion, not the fact. The teachers did not share the same framework of

assessment. Some of the teachers did not assess it at all. The students were not tested or given

scores in this area. Speaking was not applied in the final examinations. The paper tests for all

the students from different groups did not test pronunciation.

3.2.4. Approaches and Techniques of teaching pronunciation

While communicative curricula were used in the courses of General English,

communicative approaches were encouraged to apply. By observing and interviewing, I was

informed how they practiced teaching this area. To teach pronunciation, the teachers applied

different approaches and techniques in accordance with different stages of students’ learning.

In New English Elementary, the teachers preferred the Approach of Bottom-up. They

began with the smallest elements in pronunciation, from vowels and consonants to word stress

33

and then intonation. The Analytic-linguistic Approach were also used when they introduced a

phonetic alphabet, phonetic symbols, word stress and sentence stress. They gave an overview

description about the characteristics of the sounds, stress and intonation of English language in

order to supplement listening, imitation and production.

In New English Pre-intermediate, the treatment was different when the students’ English

got higher. It depended on individual students’ ability to listen and imitate the sounds and

rhythms of English. The teachers did not have much intervention while the students were

working with tape recorders and language labs. That was called Intuitive-imitative Approach

they used. The Approach of Top-down was used in this level. In the post-listening, some

teachers went from the bigger elements of pronunciation like intonation or contextualized

sounds to individual sounds.

During the courses of English, the teachers integrated pronunciation in different ways

and to different extents: pronunciation of new vocabulary items which were presented through

other work each day, dealing with pronunciation in an incidental manner, and pronunciation

with grammar. Three of the teachers had their students read after her the word list before

starting with a new lesson. Ten teachers only dealt with pronunciation when it came up to be

problematic. Those teachers made the correction of pronunciation in the scale of lexis when

the students made the errors when they produced their speech. All of the teachers integrated

pronunciation into grammar teaching, for example, teaching the pronunciation of ‘-ed’ or ‘-s’

endings, strong forms and weak forms of auxiliaries.

As I observed, the teachers used four techniques to teach pronunciation, that is, Listen

and imitate, Phonetic training, Minimal pair drills, Visual aids, and Reading aloud. However,

the techniques of Listen and Imitate and Reading aloud were of the most priority by all the

teachers. Those two techniques were used every day of delivering lessons. The technique of

Phonetic training was used at the very beginning of the elementary course, but the teachers

did not make sure their students were well trained. Minimal pair drills were just integrated

twice in the teaching when the listening exercises of ‘tick the sentence you hear’ appeared in

34

the student’s books. The visual aids used by all the teachers were nothing but the board, chalk

and themselves. There were no sound-color charts or pictures to cue the students’ production.

Even though the teachers used various approaches and techniques to teach pronunciation,

their teaching in this area carried no planned strategies. They taught pronunciation when it

appeared to be a problem or it appeared in exercises in the student’s books. They did not

measured their effort in teaching pronunciation by recording learners’ production or giving

scores to their students in speaking or pronunciation. There was evidence that the field of

pronunciation was not the central focus in their teaching, and pronunciation practice was cut

down compared to the original course books of the same level, so they did not teach it

frequently (12 teachers sometimes taught it, 7 teachers usually taught it). The time they spent

on the teaching was not enough to meet their students’ need. The students’ practice and

production of pronunciation inside classroom were not controlled effectively.

3.2.5. Teachers’ roles in teaching pronunciation

The teachers were confident in ‘helping learners hear’ and ‘helping learners make

sounds’. However, some of the teachers were reluctant to ‘provide feedback’. The interviewed

teachers had uncertainty about their role in correcting and monitoring students’ speech. One

teacher mentioned that there was a lack of time for such the activity. She taught pronunciation

with the hope that her students had knowledge in this field and then had personal practice and

self-monitored production. An other teacher argued that it was ‘a big thing’ to change the way

her students speak. The students were deeply influenced by the system of sounds they had

made for years at school (secondary school or high school). According to her, such an intense

focus on an area was not wanted by the students, and doing so caused embarrassment or

discomfort for them because most of the students were too shy to make speech in English. By

doing the correction, she was interrupting the flow of speech and this would inhibit them. All

the teachers agreed that the area of pronunciation was not tested in the final examination, so

they did not need to develop the correcting or monitoring. Most of the teachers did not play

some other roles in teaching pronunciation such as ‘pointing out what’s going on’, ‘devising

activities’, and ‘assessing progress’.

35

These views suggest a change for assessment framework. Pronunciation needs a proper

position in the entire assessment. There is also a need for professional development which

highlights the necessity and importance of monitoring of students’ pronunciation by teachers.

The teacher plays the role as a ‘speech coach’ (Morley 1994). Such training would help

teachers by providing them with skills in, and knowledge about, the process, allowing them to

explain confidently to their students why and how they are going to monitor them. In addition,

students should learn to monitor their own speech for intelligibility inside and outside

classroom and self-correct.

3.2.6. Teaching and learning materials

All the materials used for teaching were the student’s books of New English Elementary

and New English Pre-Intermediate, enclosed CDs/cassettes and video CDs. The students’

learning materials were just the student’s books. Only a minority number of them owned the

enclosed audio materials to work at home on their own. The teachers did not use additional

materials for teaching though they knew some suitable materials and resources for the

teaching of pronunciation were available. There were so many things to teach and train for the

examination within the limited time, therefore, they did not need extra materials for this

teaching. ‘There’s no time to apply more pronunciation activities or games that are out of

central teaching objectives’ (Hang, aged 40). The teachers developed a wealth of resources for

other teaching areas such as grammar and vocabulary. They felt that an equally diverse range

of materials for pronunciation was not necessary for them. This would seem to reflect a

general attitude or approach which puts pronunciation outside the central focus of teaching

and learning.

36

PART 3: CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

1. Summary of major findings

This case study is on teaching pronunciation to the first year students at UTC. The author

examined the aspects of the teachers’ beliefs and knowledge, formal curricula, teaching goal

and assessment, teacher’s roles, teacher’s approaches and techniques, teaching and learning

materials. All the examined aspects were analyzed in order to answer three research questions.

The findings in the previous chapter indicates that all the questions have been satisfactorily

answered.

The teachers’ beliefs and knowledge: The teachers of English at UTC had strong

beliefs that pronunciation was important in their language teaching and they could improve

their students’ pronunciation with activities inside classroom. They were professionally

trained in English teaching methodology, therefore, they were confident to treat this teaching.

Their knowledge and confidence could bring their students an intelligible pronunciation.

Elements of pronunciation to teach: All elements of pronunciation appeared in

different types of exercises and activities. The segmental elements (sounds and word stress)

were taught at the beginning of the elementary course, and then they were integrated into the

teaching of other areas during the courses. The suprasegmental elements (intonation, rhythm,

thought group) were not frequently taught. Most of the teachers ignored the teaching of

suprasegmental elements. Some of them exploited the course books and taped materials to

teach intonation and rhythm. However, their students’ production of suprasegmentals was not

controlled and monitored.

The teachers’ treatment in teaching pronunciation: There was no policy for

pronunciation goal and assessment for the courses of General English. The pronunciation

teaching goal was set by teachers themselves to be that of intelligibility. Nevertheless, whether

the teaching goal was targeted or not was indefinite. Most of the teachers believed that their

time of teaching pronunciation did not meet their students’ need. Their students’ pronunciation

was assessed to be ‘bad’ or ‘not very good’. The assessment was done by their experience in

37

teaching oral skills. Some of the teachers did not assess it. The teachers did not share the same

framework of pronunciation assessment. The teachers used various approaches to teach

pronunciation, that is, approaches of bottom-up and top-down, intuitive-imitate approach,

analytic-linguistic approach, and approach of integrating. The techniques mainly used in their

teaching pronunciation were ‘listen and imitate’ and ‘reading aloud’. They did not have

strategies for teaching pronunciation in advance. They taught pronunciation when it appeared

to be a problem or it appeared in exercises in the student’s books. They were reluctant to

correct or monitor their students’ speech. The teachers did not act as well as a ‘speech coach’

by giving feedback or assessing progress. The field of pronunciation was not the central focus

in their teaching. They were all in a rush to the students’ final examination in which

pronunciation took an unimportant part. The materials for learning and teaching pronunciation

were student’s books, audio cassettes or CDs, video CDs to work in the language lab. The

teachers took no care of extra materials to develop teaching pronunciation even though they

were aware of available resources.

2. Implications of the Study for teaching pronunciation

On the basis of the issues arose from the research, the following implications are

proposed with the hope to promote teaching pronunciation to first-year students at UTC:

2.1. Giving pronunciation increased prominence within formal curricula

This involves:

- Using the curriculum to drive change: From the interviews and observations, the

teachers had enough training to teach pronunciation, but they did not give them a central focus

because the cut-out of this area in the curricula. Therefore, this study recommends that

pronunciation be highlighted and given increased prominence within formal curricula. If this

is done, then it is likely that several of the other shortcomings would also be addressed.

- Developing a policy: It is apparent that pronunciation in particular and oral skills in

general are not tested and assessed in the final examinations. In such the situation,

38

development of a policy of teaching pronunciation is recommended. In the policy, the goal and

assessment for teaching pronunciation should be detailed with requirements.

- Integrating pronunciation: A clearly described syllabus which integrates

pronunciation with the other skills, topics and activities within a course would provide clear

direction on what to teach. The integration includes the teaching of all elements of

pronunciation, both segmentals and suprasegmentals.

- Setting learner’s goals: It is recommended that curricula include detailed guidance for

teachers on what goals they should be setting, and on the goals they can help their students set

for themselves. It is important that these learner goals cover a range of levels of achievement

from goals that can be set for beginners’ pronunciation for English A1, and intelligible speech

for English A2. The advantage of setting goals with pronunciation at beginner level is that

student motivation and concern for pronunciation would be encouraged from the early stages

of their English learning, and continue right through to advanced level.

- Devising assessment frameworks: Once the learner’s goals are set, the development of

assessment frameworks is necessary. Such frameworks need to be integrated into the formal

curricula. The teachers need to be given instruction on how to use these tools, and have

opportunities to moderate their assessments with their colleagues.

2.2. Redefining the teacher’s roles

Though the teachers have professional qualifications of English teaching methodology,

there is a need for more training which develops an understanding of the role as a speech

coach who monitors learner speech and provides students with ways to self-monitor, to assist

learners to recognize their own accomplishments.

2.3. Developing teachers’ skills in integrating pronunciation

Teacher training in pronunciation is needed. This training needs to focus on ways to plan

for comprehensive and integrated instruction; ways to teach pronunciation ‘through’ other

areas; and ways to integrate pronunciation in a planned manner. Pronunciation needs to be

regarded as an integral part of the course and needs to be addressed regularly and consistently.

39

2.4. Encouraging the students to practice and self-monitor their pronunciation outside

the classroom

The teacher should organize English clubs and encourage their students to join. In such

the created environment of spoken English, pronunciation is best learnt. With the teacher’s

help, students can have peer correction and group interaction, and then their oral skills are

improved. An approach of task-based would be very useful to teach pronunciation since the

time for inside classroom activities is limited. The teacher should give students assignments in

the area of pronunciation. Students are recommended to work with extra designed materials

that the teacher provided. The materials are probably in type of paper or audio.

2.5. Adjusting the achievement tests

It is reasonable that ‘the examination’s requirements and contents are goals that every

learner reaches’ (Nguyễn Huy Kỷ, 2006: 264). The structure of the tests A1 and A2 were not

communicative enough. It is recommended that the structure of the paper tests should be

changed to have a small part of pronunciation testing which makes up 10 % of total score.

Pronunciation tasks can be designed in paper base, for example, choosing the words with

different pronunciation, driving arrows for the utterances (recommended by Nguyễn Huy Kỷ,

2006: 268).

3. Limitations of the study

Although the study has fulfilled all its proposed needs. It is a rich information report on

the teaching of pronunciation to the first year students at the University of Transport and

Communications, it has got a number of shortcomings.

Firstly, the participants of the study were just the teachers, not any learners. The learners

played the role of sub-participants when the researcher did the observations. Therefore, the

researcher did not measure the results and feedback of the teachers’ teaching pronunciation.

Secondly, it appears that a number of suggestions mentioned above for the

improvements of teaching pronunciation are likely to be subjective and incomplete because of

the limitation of the writer’s practical experience.

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And lastly, within the scope of the current study, there was no detailed description of the

recommended formal curricula or re-structured paper tests.

4. Suggestions for further research

For the drawbacks mentioned in the previous part, the issue is left open to debate. I

would like to have the co-operation from teachers of English at UTC make their implications

to overcome the shortcomings in the teaching of pronunciation. An action research would be

meaningful to solve the shortcomings in the teaching. The students themselves have difficulty

learning this area, so research on the students’ pronunciation issues is not out of the

suggestions. There is also a need for syllabus analysis to find out to what extent the syllabus

meets the teaching goals. Designing achievement tests in which pronunciation has a more

central focus is also suggested.

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