Playing an instrument can help improve language competences Exploring on the effects of musical education on language learning

Andreychuk, Margarita

Dhesi, Cristina

Moreno, Mario

Acquisition and development of the English language

Group 81

2

INDEX

Index ....................................................................................... Page 2

Introduction ............................................................................. Page 3

Theoretical background .......................................................... Pages 4 – 5

Description of the context ....................................................... Pages 5 – 8

A systematic analysis of the language .................................... Pages 8 – 16

Conclusion ............................................................................... Pages 16- 17

References ................................................................................ Page 18

Appendix .................................................................................. Pages 19 - 28

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INTRODUCTION

Language and music have long been regarded as unique human abilities. Even

though, animal species can communicate and, some of them also sing, their skills are

very limited when compared to that of humans. The linguistic and musical capabilities

are some of the most remarkable characteristics of our species. Language Acquisition,

together with Neuroscience and other areas of Applied Linguistics investigate the

relations of these disciplines and how they affect human behaviour.

Scientists have long speculated about the effects of music instruction on

Language Acquisition. While it seems clear that the brain is favoured by the

development of music activity, such as learning how to play an instrument, or even

listening to music, it is uncertain how this affects language acquisition. Nevertheless,

the most common assertion is that the influence proves beneficial.

For our project, we were interested in observing if musical education could have

positive influence in the oral component of Second Language Students. We

contemplated the possible enhancement of sound reception and production in those who

had engaged in musical instruction. With this hypothesis in mind, we gathered two

groups, one with musical education and another one without. We decided to put our

subjects through a series of tests that would later help us analyse our findings. These

tests included a grammar test, a test for the reception and production of unknown

sounds and another test for the production of familiar sounds. The first with the

intention of controlling that our subjects had similar level of dexterity in their Second

Language (L2), thus eliminating possible variables. The second and the third tests were

the focus of our project. We examined our collection of data, analysed the results, and

compared the performances of the two groups.

Our main goal was to carry out the project and present the results in an academic

form in order to have a better understanding of how language acquisition research

works. We also hoped that our intuitions met with the findings of the investigation.

Nevertheless, we were fully aware of the scope of our research before beginning our

project. While our research was of a preliminary nature, it is important to expand the

existing literature on the field.

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THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

The role of music in Language Acquisition has always been an intriguing theme.

Firstly, because of the relevance of songs as a source for word learning by learning their

lyrics and singing them and secondly, because of the aural acquisition that music seems

to facilitate to those people who pay real attention to each of the musical resources on

them. According to D. Schön et al. (2008), „„the presence of pitch contours may

enhance phonological discrimination, since syllable change is often accompanied by a

change in pitch, if we look at it from a perceptual point of view. In addition, the

consistent mapping of musical and linguistic structure may optimize the operation of

learning mechanisms‟‟. At the acoustic level, we clearly appreciate that music and

speech use pitch, timing and timbre notions as to convey information. But at a cognitive

level, music and speech processing coincide in certain requirements such as memory

and attention skills. Being this the case, musicians show an advantage in processing

pitch, timing and timbre of music compared with non-musicians. These cognitive skills

are also crucial for speech processing; then, we can assume that long-term training with

musical pitch patterns can promote the processing of pitch patterns of foreign languages

too.

If we focus on the relationship between music and neuroscience, we can see that

there are many researches made in the line of observing the link among music and

cognitive functions. First of all, it has been demonstrated that the brain structure of

musicians differs quite a lot from non-musicians‟. One of the most relevant studies in

relation to this area was that of Gaser and Schlaug (2003), where they compared brain

structures of professional musicians with non-musicians. The important discovery was

that gray matter volume differenced in motor, auditory and visual-spatial brain regions,

what gave way to the assumption of musicians having more and better cognitive and

sensorial capacities than non-musicians – though there are always exceptions,

obviously-. Once analyzed several brain regions in both subject groups‟ brains and

having already seen those actually existing differences, it is more possible to say that

they are due to the long-term acquisition and repetitive rehearsal of musical skills rather

than innate principles or cognitive functions.

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But for the aim of our project, it is quite interesting what a recent article by

researchers from Northwestern University showed up. Some of the results that they

obtained were that musicians are more successful than non-musicians in learning to

incorporate sound patterns for a new language into words. Thus, as we slightly

suggested before, people who are musically trained manifest stronger neural activation

to pitch changes in speech, having a better vocabulary and reading ability than people

who did not did musical training.

However, an important aspect of this existent aural capacity has been seen by

many doctors as very linked to language capacity also by their learning strategies. If we

look at O‟Malley and Chamot‟s typology of learning strategies (1987), we will see that

most of the strategies that are given could be also applicable to those carried out by

music learners (metacognitive and cognitive strategies, not social in this case). But

certainly there are several steps that are more general to everyone in the process of

learning. Some of them are listening carefully to how a word/note should sound;

starting with a small part of a sentence/piece of music; trying it once and again until it

is as close to perfect as possible; keep on doing the following sections the same way;

and finally, going over it from beginning to end to make sure you remember it well.

Following this general learning structure, Conversational Solfege by John M.

Feierabend is a general music program that enables students become independent

musical thinkers with the help of a rich variety of folk and classical music, but always

with the dynamic of these previously mentioned learning steps. Thus, in Dr. John

Feierabend‟s words (1995:9), „„One should learn with his/her ears before learning with

his/her eyes‟‟. That means that auditory capacities are fundamental when learning a

language since sounds are the first attempt that we have to get in touch with the

communicative world, due to the fact that when we born, we do not know to read yet,

but sounds can be getting familiar to us earlier than any other thing.

DESCRIPTION OF THE CONTEXT

In other to test our hypothesis we focused on the evidence collected from three

different tests. We will now describe the subjects we selected and the tests we chose.

Also we will mention how we reduced the variables in our experiment in order to try to

carry the tests on equal conditions for all the subjects.

6

We made use of a cross-sectional study. As previously mentioned the focus of

our project was to test two different groups of people: one who had received and were

currently practicing musical education, and one group who had not been instructed in

musical education. We selected a total of ten subjects and divided them in groups of

five people each. Group 1 (G1), as we shall hereafter mention, was the group without

musical education, and Group 2 (G2) was the one with musical education. The subjects

shared a number of common characteristics1: they were of similar age, ranging from 21

to 23 (in exception of one, of 25); nine of them had Spanish as their L1; and almost all

of them had been studying English for over 10 years (except one of them, who studied

English just for 4 years). Perhaps the most important differences to take into account

were: the different numbers of languages they spoke; their engagement in

conversational English; as well as other external factors. For these possible variables

we carried out a questionnaire asking them about these factors.

The data collection obtained was the result of three different tests labelled

within the two different forms of collecting data: questionnaires to elicit our subjects‟

proficiency in English, and oral production of samples in the target languages. Thus,

the three tests that we applied are the following:

- Grammar proficiency test: to control that our subjects had a similar knowledge of

one of the tested languages (English). This will be useful when co-relating the next

tests applied.

- Reception and production of unfamiliar sounds: to test the subject‟s ability.

- Reproduction of familiar sounds: to check whether they are generally good at

pronunciation in every language, or if it is specially in an already known language.

The first test was aimed at controlling that our subjects had a similar knowledge

of one of the tested languages (English). By reassuring a similar competence between

the two groups we eliminated some important variables, which was the main goal of this

test.

For the oral experiments we tried to make the interviews as spontaneous as

possible. The subjects were recorded separately so that they would be completely

unprepared as to what they were going to hear. We tried to create a good atmosphere in 1 To learn more about the subjects individually see „List of subjects‟ in appendix.

7

the recorded room so that the subjects could feel relaxed. Making them feel nervous

would have had consequences in our outcome. In general, we focused on making the

recordings feel as natural as possible as to achieve reliable results.

The first of the two oral tests was the reception and production of unfamiliar

sounds. This test consisted in making the participants repeat sentences in two languages

unknown to them, namely Russian and Estonian. One of the members of our team, a

native speaker of both these languages, would sit side by side with our subjects making

them repeat first isolated words, a few times, and then say them within a context: a short

sentence of five words - first in Estonian and later in Russian. These sentences had been

carefully chosen by our team in order to include sounds that could result particularly

challenging for our subjects. We did not look for a perfect reproduction but rather for

the general capacity of subjects to receive and produce unknown sounds.

These two languages differ greatly from what the average subject normally is

acquainted with. Russian derives from the group of Slavic languages and thus has

sounds that might be unusual for most of our subjects. Moreover, Estonian comes from

a different family of languages: Uralic. Both Russian and Estonian have phonological

systems different from that of English, which makes the task of transcribing more

difficult. In order to avoid confusion, we decided to adopt the symbols used in English,

with the exception of the phonemes: /ɤ/ (mid back unrounded vowel; e.g. in the word

õudsalt in Estonian), /Ø/ (mid, rounded and front; as in the Estonian word öösel), /y/

(high, rounded, front; as in the word üle in Estonian), and /ɨ/ (close central unrounded

vowel as in Russian word бык).

The last of our three tests consisted in making our subjects reproduce four

English sentences. We selected sentences that could help us identify the subjects‟ skills

at the time of utterance. Given that 7 out of 10 of our subjects scored C2 level in the

grammar test, we knew that they were going to be familiar with all English sounds. In

order to create a more difficult scenario we chose sentences that could raise problems.

For the purpose of clarity, we will number the sentences in order to refer to them as: S1,

S2, S3, and S4. There were two English tongue twisters: Peter Piper picked a peck of

pickled peppers (S2) and Santa’s short suit Shrunk (S3) and, placed in 1st and 4

th

position, the sentences: Where were you born (S1) and Where were you burnt (S4).

8

Subjects were given only one opportunity to pronounce the sentences, right after

reading it, to assure their pronunciation was natural and not forced.

Given that tongue twisters can result difficult even to native speakers, this test

allowed us to observe the subjects real ability to produce problematic sentences. Also,

we were able to contrast these results with those obtained from the first test. S1 and S4

challenged them to distinguish between born /bɔːrn/ and burnt /bɜːrnt/, but that is

something that we will develop later on our analysis. We will compare the general

performance of the two groups.

A SYSTEMATIC ANALYSIS OF THE LANGUAGE

As we explained before, the starting point of our tests was based on an English

grammar proficiency test with which we could state our presupposition on our subjects‟

English level, which was about a C2. The results that we obtained from these

examinations were that despite 7 of our 10 subjects got a C2 on their tests, the 3

remaining people got a C1. From these 3 last, 2 of them belong to the non-musician

group. In addition to that, we also observed that the C2 level of proficiency in non-

musicians was lower in comparison to musicians‟ level, since this last group got higher

marks than non-musicians. Then, these results gave us a clear base with the objective of

base our following results with those subjects‟ proficiency level. We present the results

in the figures below: figure 1.1 corresponds to G1, 1.2 to G2.

The second tests introduced us into the oral part of our experiment, so we started

with the reproduction of Estonian language, making them repeat the underlined words

in the following sentences:

10

10,5

11

11,5

12

12,5

13

13,5

Proficiency Test out of 15

Fig. 1.1> G1

101

102

103

104

105 0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

Proficiency Test out of 15

Fig 1.2 > G2

201

202

203

204

205

9

1a. Mulle õudsalt meeldib Pärnu südaööelu. (I love the nightlife of Pärnu)

[mulle ɤutsalt ´me:ldip pærnu ´syda,ø:elu]

1b. Öösel mina kõnnin üle silla tasapisi. (I quietly cross the bridge at night)

[ø:sel mina ´kɤnnin yle silla ´tasapisi]

After being acquainted with the words, we made them pronounce the whole

sentence in two parts: the first three words and then the rest.

We proceeded then with Russian language, following the same method: separated

words, then short clauses.

2a. Бык сразу вздрогнул и убежал. (The bull immediately started and run

away)

[bɨk ´srazu ´vzdrognul ɪ ubi´ʒal]

2b. Я уезжаю в Санкт-Петербург. (I am going to Saint Petersburg)

[ja uje´ʒaju v sank piter´burk]

Our recordings were made in the way that one of the members of our team had

chosen and previously interviewed our subjects. The rest of us, who had to measure

their ability in their production, did not know who did play an instrument or had to do

anything with music in general. Thus, we avoided the prejudice we might have had in

relation to our hypothesis.

Analysing the recordings, we found some general problems in both groups: the

one that did not play a musical instrument (G1), and the one that did (G2). The first

problem was quite expected by our team. Many people failed to understand and to

reproduce Estonian vowels ö, ä and õ, as well as the Russian ы. However, the some

subjects that had problems with the sound /æ/ (ä) got it at the second time, which could

be explained by its similarity to the English /æ/ in bag. While only 2 members of G1

were able to finally identify the sound, none of G2 had any particular problem with it.

Those unable to get the sound replaced it for the first sound of the diphthong /ai/ as in

buy, and thus they were able to reproduce the whole word. As for the rest of the sounds,

they seemed to be more problematic for our subjects.

10

The most difficult came to be the Estonian /ɤ/ and the Russian /ɨ/ in the word

such as õudsalt and бык, respectively. The general tendency was to substitute it for /i/

and /e/, sounds usual and thus easier for them. The results obtained seemed to point out

that G2 performed much better: sound /ɤ/ was captured by 4 subjects from G2 and none

from G1, while /ɨ/ was identified by everybody from G1 and only 2 from G1.

We should say that from the set of problems that Estonian language offered the

most important came to be the number of vowels that occur in a sequence within

compound words. This is quite typical in this language - also in Finnish -, and we can

find it in the word südaööelu, a compound consisting of three words: süda, öö and elu.

The result is a combination of vowels hard to pronounce: -aööe-. In addition, we saw

that people had problems with long vowels within these sequences; the tendency was to

shorten them, as in the case of the long /ø:/ in the word südaööelu. Others inserted

another vowel, creating diphthongs such as /øe/ or /øi/. But from all the subjects only 3

could finally make do with these vowels; one form G1 and 2 from G2.

Concerning Russian language, it should be pointed out that the most problematic

feature seemed to be the consonant clusters; namely, in the words вздрогнул and сразу.

However, the difficulty of these consonant clusters was caused by different reasons. The

first one, /vzdr/, coordinated too many consonants, which was quite unusual for our

subject, remembering them being rather a challenge for them. The sounds on their own

were not complicated, and are found in Spanish language. The solution we observed

was that some subjects tended to insert a vocal between the first two consonants:

/viz´drognul/, for example.This insertion of a vocal made it easier to reproduce this

consonant blend. Thus, asked to pronounce this word within a sentence, only one

subject from G1 succeeded in doing it correctly. However, there is a variable we should

take into account: this subject´s mother tongue was Polish, a Slavic language, and which

has similar to Russian sounds. That is why this particular subject had no major problems

in reproduction of the words and sentences in Russian.

The case of the second cluster was a bit different; it resulted from the

combination of voiceless alveolar fricative /s/ and alveolar trill /r/. People were

generally trying to voice the /s/, getting /zr/ as a result, which obviously would be a

more sensitive way to pronounce these two letters together, but, which is not the case in

Russian in this particular context. Moreover, the vast majority of our subjects from

11

both groups (3 from each) inserted /t/ into this cluster, [strazu], as a link to make the

way from voiceless to voiced consonants more gradual, while trying to reproduce the

word within a context.

A curious thing manifest in the outcome of both groups was that they failed to

perceive some start or end consonants within a phrase: [´_e:ldi_] instead of [me:ldip]. It

is important to point out, that the case of dropping out consonants was found only in 1

subject from G1, against 3 from G2 (especially in the word [´vzdrognul]). This data

could weaken our hypothesis. Nonetheless, we could explain it by the thing we

observed while recording our subjects: generally, G2 took their time in starting

reproducing the sounds they were asked to. The fact that they omitted some sounds

might have been due to their fear to pronounce them in a wrong way, and they preferred

to leave them unpronounced instead. Furthermore, 4 out of 5 from G2 could not get the

final /l/ for past tense masculine, as in [ubi´zal].

Following our analysis of data, we observed insertion of the unstressed neutral

vowel schwa (ə), which is not present in Russian or Estonian, in both groups. Some

subjects tried to substitute the final vowels for schwa, as, for example, at the end of the

word öösel, while the original pronunciation would expect ther an /e/. The use of schwa

helped them while pronouncing the consonant cluster /sr/, the one we have mentioned

before. Thus, introducing schwa eased them putting these two sounds together.

Generally speaking, schwa was introduces in many cases where the original sound was

not understood by the listener. The only 2 subjects that did not make use of schwa

proceeded from G2.

Another striking phenomenon we observed was the aspiration of the consonants

/p/ and /t/ as in the following examples: [pʰarnu] and [sytʰa´ø:elu]. This phenomenon

can be explained by aspirated voiceless stop consonants that are met in native English

speech, as for example, in the words pen or ten. An occasional aspiration of a

consonant was found in 3 subjects from G2, being rather a mistake made only one.

However, 2 members of G1 showed to be really influences by this pattern, producing

aspirations regularly.

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Concerning both the aspiration of consonants and insertion of schwa it could be

claimed that the fact that our subjects were English speakers made them apply their

knowledge of English phonology in order to make it possible the pronunciation of the

sounds they did not know.

On the other hand, as 90 per cent of the tested people were Spanish native

speakers, it was curious that a subject of G1 tended to replace /b/ in бык [bɨk] by /v/ in

vino. This phenomenon must be linked to the general confusion over the use of “v” and

“b”, which are both pronounces as /v/ or /b/, depending on the context. On the other

hand, 2 subjects from G1 dropped out the last consonants of the word Cанкт [sank],

supposedly associating it with the Spanish word san. The influence of the word´s

similarity to the same proper name in their mother tongue made some subjects try to

insert an –s into this word: [piters´burk], since, as we believe, it is found in Spanish

(San Petersburgo). To be exact, 2 subjects from G1 made this mistake. Thus, we could

see how the L1 transferred to the L2´s perception; L1 influenced the way people

perceived and reproduced the sound we were dealing with.

To conclude this part of analysis we could note the fact that G1 was less capable

of remembering a whole phrase, while G2 showed more facility and productivity. Some

G1 subjects mixed the sound form different words and they did not perceive the error.

Moreover, it appears that G2 was more independent from the sound they already knew

from the languages they speak; that is to say, they were more natural in their

reproduction of the input. It was seen in that they made less use of schwa and the case

of aspired consonants was far rarer in their reproductions.

The figures below contrast the performances we obtained. We evaluated the

subjects over 10 points with a general perspective. Figure 2.1 corresponds to G1, figure

2.2 to G2.

13

Fig 2.1 > G1

Fig 2.2 > G2

Finally, our third and last test was based in challenging our subjects to produce

some tongue twisters in order to prove their pronunciation in an already known

language.

S1 and S4 were mostly about being able to distinguish the sounds /ɔː/ and /ɜː/

since the last words of the sentences were born /bɔːrn/ and burnt /bɜːrnt/, respectively.

Most of our subjects in G1, for example, were unable to reproduce the difference

between the sound /ɔ:/ in S1 and the sound /ɜː/ in S4. Even if this does not point out the

inability of subjects in G1 to produce the sound /ɜː/ it does seem to suggest that under a

challenging context G2 was able to perform better. Also it seems important to highlight

that where some subjects of G1 failed to produce the final /t/ in the word burnt of S4,

every subject in G2 produced it. On the one hand, this again may be due to the

similarity in form to S1. If the subject does not do a complete reading of the sentence,

he or she might simply repeat what he or she said in S1. On the other hand, this factor

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

Estonian out of 10 Russian out of 10

101

102

103

104

105

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Estonian out of 10 Russian out of 10

201

202

203

204

205

14

might point to another factor unrelated to sound performance, which may well be the

general ability of subjects to focus in a particular task. Although this distances from the

main goal of our investigation we shall later comment on this as an external factor that

might influence the subjects‟ performance.

Another pattern we observed was the different realisations of the word where in

initial position. The full form of where is transcribed as /weər/, but the vowels are often

reduced in conversation, plus next to the weak form of were, /wər/, the subject might be

driven to realise the two in a similar manner.

S2 is a very popular tongue twister. The general difficulties are the

mispronunciation of diphthongs for vowels. Some of this confusion is due to the fact

that the letter “i” is found both as a short vowel /i/ and as a diphthong /aɪ/. This

difficulty is increased by the fact that every word begins with the bilabial plosive /p/

which usually drives the speaker to utter short vowel instead of a diphthong.

In S2 some problems emerge in the pronunciation of Piper /paɪpər/. Contrary to

what we thought, this particular word was performed better by G1 than by G2. Subjects

201 and 204 (of G2) failed to produce the diphthong and instead realised it as a short

vowel /i/ resulting in /pipər/. The past tense verb form picked /pɪkt/ was heavily

mispronounced by subjects 101 and 105 (G1) whereas it did not raise particular

problems among subjects of G2. Also subject 101 mispronounced pickled /pikəld/ as

/pikitən/. The short vowel /i/ of the word pickle /pikəl/ was only mistakenly realised as a

diphthong by subject 104. And finally the word peppers /‟pepərz/ was accurately

produced by 3 members of each group. Subjects who mispronounced this last word

realised the open short vowel /e/ as /i/ a common problem that arises when reading this

tongue twister.

The tongue twister in S3 presents the problem of realising the sound /s/ followed

by the sound /ʃ/ in a four word sequence. What it does is that it confuses the speaker as

to what sound,/s/ or /ʃ/, should follow. Other problems are found, as usual, in the

realisation of vowels.

G1 confused more sounds than G2. The word short was correctly pronounced by

both groups in each occasion, except for subject 101 and 201. Subject 101 did a very

weak realisation of the sound /ʃ/ whereas 201 realised it as /s/. It is worth noting that

15

subject 201 realised every word of S2 closer to /s/. Also, the word suit was realised as /

ʃu:t/ instead of /su:t/ by subject 104. The final sound /t/ is met by /ʃ/, thus creating

further difficulty. Subject 103, for instance, assimilated this sound and produced it

closer to a /d/ thus resulting in a form closer to /ʃu:d/. Subjects were particularly

troubled by the final word, shrunk, since it is arguably the most difficult to utter,

particularly after uttering the previous sequence. The vowel /ʌ/ was mistakenly realised

by some subjects of G1. 101 failed to produce the vowel and 104‟s pronunciation was

rather weak. The rest of the subjects seemed to achieve a quite acceptable

pronunciation.

Now let us revise our previous analysis and compare the performance of the two

groups. The tables below show the number of correct words uttered by each subject in

each sentence2. Figure 1 presents the results of subjects in G1 and Figure2 those of G2.

It seems important to clarity that S1, S3, and S4 are evaluated over 4, whereas S2 is

evaluated over 8, corresponding to the number of words in each sentence.

Fig.3.1>G1

Fig.3.2>G2

A quick glance of these numbers seem to point out that G2 performed better than

G1. However, the number of factors that should be taken into account to give an

2 We should note once again that we qualified the subject‟s pronunciation ourselves and therefore, the

results should be taken as nothing more than an orientation for the reader.

0

2

4

6

8

S1 out of 4 S2 out of 8 S3 out of 4 S4 out of 4

101

102

103

104

105

0

2

4

6

8

10

S1 out of 4 S2 out of 8 S3 out of 4 S4 out of 4

201

202

203

204

205

16

approximate conclusion of this type of study exceeds the scope of our research. We

must, then, restrict our project to the data we collected and the variables we took into

account.

One important factor, not reflected by the numbers in the figures above, was that

G2 usually took longer to reproduce the sentences. This is interesting since it seems to

point out that those that took longer to utter the sentences generally performed better.

Whether musical education has anything to do with this is uncertain and unrelated to

our project. However, it seems to suggest that subjects who had received musical

education were less anxious which could help in their performance. On the other hand,

G1 usually reproduced the sentences faster and hesitations during their performances

were more common. This could suggest the opposite, that is, that G1 subjects were

more anxious during their performance. Then again, anxiety is an extremely

complicated variable and it seems impossible to measure it.

Individual and group results may be misleading. The results obtained by subject

101 suggest some particular problems at the task of pronunciation. This corresponds

well with its grammar test which scored lower than most subjects. Therefore it might

point to a personal rather than a group factor. This would, again, reduce the reliability of

the numbers indicated by figure 1 and figure 2 above.

CONCLUSION

All the test being realized, we would like now to conclude our research. After

realization of all the three parts of our tests, the results we have got are quite interesting

and challenging for further and more profound research. Even though the difference

between the data collected within the subjects with musical education and the ones

without was not so striking, if we analyze the figures in the tables, we will see that it

(the difference?) is there. When we were selecting people for our project, we were

absolutely aware of the variables and also similarities our subjects would have. First, all

of them were our classmates, which supposed they would possibly have a similar level

of English. This would imply that the grammar test and the test of English sounds had to

be scrutinized in order to obtain any possible clue for our hypothesis. On the other

hand, there were people who spoke languages similar to Russian and Estonian.

Obviously, they could obtain better results in the test of unknown sounds as compared

to others. All these details taken into account, we intended to be impartial observers of

17

the outcome. Finally, when we analyzed all the data, we got enough evidence – in all

three tests - to believe our hypothesis was proved.

In addition, we would like to point out that generally, both groups took their

time in reproducing the words and phrases, although people that got better results in this

test, were mainly slower in starting the repetition. They asked to repeat the word or the

phrase twice before they took the risk of pronouncing it, thus achieving a more accurate

result. An important note was taken on the fact that G1 was less capable of

remembering a whole phrase, while G2 showed more facility. Moreover, in the test of

unknown sounds, it appears that G2 was more independent from the sounds they

already knew; that is to say, they were more natural in their reproduction of the input. It

was seen in that they made less use of schwa and the case of aspired consonants was far

rarer in their reproductions.

To conclude, we should say that, on the contrary to the grammar test, which

consisted in choosing an appropriate answer, and which was easy to correct, the

transcription and the evaluation of the data collected on the basis of recording and was

much more complicated, taking into account that none of us is a specialist in phonetics.

On the other hand, the overall results might have been rather different if the scope of

our investigation was not so limited.

18

REFERENCES

Chamot, A.U. & O'Malley, J.M. (1987). A cognitive academic language learning

approach: A bridge to the mainstream. TESOL Quarterly.

Feierabend, J. M. (1995). First steps in music for nursery and preschool series. GIA

Publications.

Gaser, C.; Schlaug, G. (2003). Brain structures differ between musicians and non-

musicians. The Journal of Neuroscience (23(27):9240–924). Available online at

<< http://www.jneurosci.org/content/23/27/9240.full.pdf+html>>

Schön, D.; Boyer, M.; Moreno, S.; Besson, M.; Peretz, I.; Kolinsky, R. (2008). Songs as

an aid for language acquisition. Cognition 106 (975–983). Available online

at <<http://www.incm.cnrs-mrs.fr/publication/schoncognition_08.pdf>>

19

APPENDIX

List of subjects

Do not play an instrument Grammar test result ESTONIAN RUSSIAN

101 11/15 C1 6/10 5/10

102 13/15 C2 8/10 6/10

103 11/15 C1 5/10 4/10

104 13/15 C2 4/10 4/10

105 12/15 C2 6/10 6/10

Play an instrument Grammar test result ESTONIAN RUSSIAN

201 (violin) 12/15 C2 7/10 6/10

202 (guitar) 15/15 C2 8/10 7/10

203 (clarinet) 11/15 C1 8/10 7/10

204 (guitar) 14/15 C2 8/10 6/10

205 (piano) 15/15 C2 9/10 7/10

Do not play an instrument L1 Studying

English for

Other Ls Lived abroad

101 Sp 15 years / No

102 Polish 4 years Spanish, German Berlin (1 year)

103 Sp 17 years French, German No

104 Sp 15 years French, German No

105 Sp 15 years Japanese No

Play an instrument L1 Studying

English for

Other Ls Lived abroad

201 (violin) Sp 18 years French No

202 (guitar) Sp 14 years No

203 (clarinet) Sp 13 years French, Italian Paris, 1 year

204 (guitar) Sp 13 years No

205 (piano) Sp 12 years French, Finish. No

20

Grammar test (blank)

1- The police are ____ an investigation into the robbery.

a- Carrying out

b- Working out

c- Searching out

d- Making out

2- I think that the problem Henry has raised is a major____ for our society today.

a- Subject

b- Theme

c- Issue

d- Point

3- I am sure I would have regretted it if I ___to take the job.

a- Would have agreed

b- Would agree

c- Did agree

d- Had agreed

4- Soldiers have been sent in to try to restore ____ in the area.

a- Organization

b- Harmony

c- Order

d- Regulation

5- You should read this novel. It‟s been ____ recommended by all the critics.

a- Truly

b- Highly

c- Fully

d- Deeply

6- Nina went to the same school _____I did.

a- Than

b- Like

c- As

d- So

7- Have you been back to the house _____ you grew up?

a- Which

b- Who

c- When

d- Where

8- We may have a picnic tomorrow but it will depend_____ the weather.

a- In

b- Of

c- On

d- Off

9- Alex _____ judo after school every Friday.

a- Goes

b- Makes

c- Plays

21

d- Does

10- How ____ have you and your family lived in this flat?

a- Soon

b- Much

c- Often

d- Long

11- It‟s a great place to live apart from the increasing volume of _____ that passes under my window

every day.

a- Transport

b- Traffic

c- Vehicles

d- Circulation

12- We _____ a lovely three weeks in the south of Spain last year

a- Passed

b- Took

c- Did

d- Spent

13- Fiona is very angry _____ her boss‟s decision to sack several members of staff.

a- Against

b- About

c- For

d- By

14- The teacher asked if _____ to bring our textbooks to class.

a- Had we all remembered

b- All we had remembered

c- We had all remembered

d- Had all we remembered

15- This meat is beautifully ____. What recipe did you use?

a- Gentle

b- Tender

c- Mild

d- Soft

Name: L1:

Gender: other languages:

Studying English for (years): lived abroad: (where/for how long)

Play instrument: yes/no if yes, what instrument:

22

Estonian – Russian transcriptions

Do not play an instrument

101

[´eutsalt] [´parnu] [´suda,jø:elu]

[mulla ´eutsalt ´me:ldip ´parnu ´syda,o:elu]

[´o:sel] [´kinnin] [yle ´silla]

[´e:səl ´mina ´kinnin yle ´silla ´tanapisi]

[sə´rasu] [viz´drognul] [ubə´zal]

[bik ´strazə ´vstrognəl ɪ ubi´ʒal]

[ube´zaju] [san ´piterburk ]

[ja ube´ʒaju v san ´piterburk]

102

[´iutsalt] [´pærnu] [syta´e:ilu]

[mullə ´eutsəlt ´məltip ´pærnu ´syta´e:ilu]

[´ø:sel] [´kinnen] [yle ´silla]

[´ø:sel ´minə ´kɤntin yle ´silla ´tasapisi]

[´srazu] [´vzdrognuəl] [ubi´ʒal]

[bɨk ´srazu ´vzdrognl ɪ ubi´ʒal]

[uji´zaju] [sant pitersburk ]

[ja uji´ʒaju v sank piter´burk]

103

[´iudsalt] [´pʰarnu] [sytʰa´ø:elu]

[mulla ´eutsalt ´me:ldip ´pʰarnu ´syda,ø:elu]

[´ø:səl] [´kʰinnin] [ule ´silla]

[´o:səl ´mina ´ kʰənnin yle ´sigla ´tasapisi]

23

[´srazə] [´vzdrognəl] [ubi´dʒal]

[bik ´strazu ´vʒdagnəl ɪ jubi´ʒal]

[juʒe´ʒaju] [sank piterburk ]

[ja ʒudʒe´ʒaju və sank piter´burk]

104

[´eutsəlt] [´pərnə] [syda´e:əlu]

[mulle ´sytsəlt ´me:ldik ´parnu ´syda,øilu]

[´ø:sel] [´kønnin] [yle ´silla]

[´e:sel ´mina ´kənnin yle ´silla ´tasapisi]

[´zrazu] [´vzdroznəl] [ubi´dʒal]

[bik ´sraznu ´snozno ɪ ubi´ʒəl]

[uje´dʒaju] [san_ piters´burk ]

[ja uje´ʒaʒu v san_ piters´burk]

105

[´eutsalt] [´pærnu] [syta´øilu]

[melle ´eutsalt ´_e:ldi_ ´pærnu ,syda´ø:ilu]

[´ø:sel] [´kʰɤnnin] [ule ´silla]

[´øesel ´mina ´kənnin yle ´silla ´tasapisi]

[´zrazu] [vəzdrognəl] [uvi´zal]

[bɨk ´strazu ´_zdrognəl ɪ ubi´ʒal]

[uje´zaju] [sank peter´burk ]

[ja uje´zaju v sank peter´burk]

24

Play an instrument

201

[´eutsalt] [pærnu] [syda´o:elu]

[mulle ´ɤ:tsalt ´me:ldip ´pærnu ,sytʰa´ø:elu]

[´ø:sel] [´kjɤnnin] [yle ´silla]

[´ø:sel ´mina ´kinnin ule ´silla ´tasapisi]

[´srazu] [vzdrodʒnul] [ubi´zal]

[vɨk ´srazu ´broksnul ɪ ubi´zal]

[uje´zaju] [sank piterburk ]

[ja uje´zaju v sank piter´burk]

202

[´eutsalt] [pærnu] [syda´ø: ilu]

[mulle ´eutsalt ´me:l_ip ´pærnu ,sydə´ø:elu]

[´ø:sel] [´kɤnnin] [yle ´silla]

[´ø:sel ´mina ´kɤnnin yle ´silla ´tasapisi]

[´srazu] [vzdrognə_] [ubi´ʒjal]

[bɨk ´strazu ´_zdrognul ɪ ubi´ʒal]

[uje´ʒjaju] [sank ´piterburk ]

[ja uje´ʒaju v sank ´piter´burk]

203

[´ɤutsəlt] [´pærnu] [syda´ø:elu]

[mulle ´əutsalt ´me:ldip ´pærnu ,syda´ø:elu]

[´ø:sel] [´kɤnnin] [yle ´silla]

[´ø:sel ´mina ´ kʰɤnnin yle ´silla ´tasapisi]

25

[´zrazu] [vzdrognu_] [ubi´zal]

[bɨk ´zdrazu ´_zdrognəl ɪ ubi´zal]

[uje´zaju] [sank piterburk ]

[ja uje´ʒaju və sank piter´burk]

204

[´ɤutsalt] [pærnu] [syda´øe:lu]

[mulle ´eutsalt ´me:ldip ´pærnu ,syda´ø:elu]

[´ø:sel] [´kʰɤnnin] [yle ´silla]

[´ø:sel ´mina ´kɤnnin yle ´silla ´tasapisi]

[´srazu] [´vzdrognul] [ubi´zjal]

[bɨk ´strazu ´vstroknə_ ɪ ubi´ʒjal]

[uje´zaju] [sank piterburk ]

[ja uje´zaju v sank piter´burk]

205

[´ɤutsalt] [pærnu] [syda´ø:elu]

[mulle ´eutsalt ´me:ldip ´pærnu ,syda´ø:elu]

[´ø:sel] [´kɤnnin] [yle ´silla]

[´ø:sel ´mina ´kɤnni_ yle ´silla ´tasapisi]

[´srasu] [vzdrognu_] [ubi´zal]

[bɨk ´strazu ´_zdrognə_ ɪ ubi´ʒal_]

[uje´dʒaju] [sank piterburk ]

[ja uje´ʒaju v sank piter´burk]

26

English transcriptions

Group 1: subjects with no instrumental education

Where were you born?

/weər wɜːr jə bɔːrn/

101 /‟wer wɜːr jə bɔːrn/

102 /we:r wɜːr jə bɔːrn/

103 wər wər jə bɔːrn/

104 /wər wər jə bɔːrn/

105 /wər wər ju bɔːrn/

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers

/ˈpiːtər ˈpaɪpər pɪkt ə pek əv pikəld pepərz/

101 /piːter pipəd „piked ə pek əv pikitən pipərz/

102 /ˈpiːter ˈpaɪpər pɪkt ə pek əv pikəld pepərz/

103 /ˈpiːter paɪpər pɪkt ə pek əv pikəlt piparz/

104 /‟piːtə paɪpər pɪkt ə pek əv paɪkəl pepərz/

105 /‟pi:tə paɪpər paɪkət ə pek əv pikəl pepəs/

Santa's Short Suit Shrunk

/ˈsæn.təz ʃɔːrt suːt ʃrʌŋk/

101 /ˈsantə ʃɔːrt suːt ʃɒrŋk/

102 /ˈsæntə ʃɔːrt suːt ʃrʌŋk/

103 /ˈsæntə ʃɔːrt suːd ʃrʌŋk/

104 /ˈsæntəʔ ʃɔːrʃ ʃu:t ʃrɑŋk/

105 /sæntə ʃɔːrt suːt ʃrʌŋk/

27

Where were you burnt?

/ weər wɜːr jə bɜːrnt /

101 /weər wər jə bɔːrn/

102 /weər wər jə bɜːrnt/

103 /wer wər jə bɔrn- jə bɜrnt/

104 /wer wər jə bɜːrnt/

105 /wer wər jə bɔːrnt/

Group 2: subjects with instrumental education

Where were you born?

/weər wɜːr jə bɔːrn/

201 /wer wər jə bɒn/

202 /wer wər jə bɔːrn/

203 /wer wər jə bɔːrn/

204 /wer wər jə bɔːr/

205 / wer wər jə bɔːrn/

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers

/ˈpiːtər paɪpər pɪkt ə pek əv pikəld pepərz/

201 /piː ter pɪpər pik ə pek əv pikəlappipərz

202 /pi:tə paɪpər pikt ə pek əv pikəld p...pepərz/

203 /pi:tə paɪpər pikt ə pek əv pikəl pi...pepərz/

204 /piter pɪpər pikt ə pek əv pikel pipərz/

205 /piːtər paɪpər pɪkt ə pek əv pikəld pepərz/

28

Santa's Short Suit Shrunk

/sæntəz ʃɔːrt suːt ʃrʌŋk/

201 /sæntəz sɔːrt suːt srʌŋk/

202 /sæntəz ʃɔːrt suːt ʃrʌŋk/

203 /sɑntəz ʃɔːrt sut ʃrʌŋk/

204 /sæntəzʃɔːrt suːt ʃrʌŋk/

205 / sæntəz ʃɔːrt suːt ʃrʌŋk/

Where were you burnt?

/ weər wɜːr jə bɜːrnt /

201 / wer wər jə bɜːrnt

202 /weə wər jə bɜːrnt/

203 /wə...wer wər jə bɜːrnt/

204 /wər wər jə bɜːrnt/

205 /wer wər jə bɜːrnt/