Luận văn thạc sĩ VNU ULIS strategies to correct common errors in pronouncing english final consonant clusters made by second year english majored students at phuong dong university

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ---oo0oo--- NGUYỄN THỊ HẢI STRATEGIES TO CORRECT COMMON ERRORS IN PRONOUNCING ENGLISH FINAL CONSONANT CLUSTERS MADE BY SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH-MAJORED STUD

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

-oo0oo -

NGUYỄN THỊ HẢI

STRATEGIES TO CORRECT COMMON ERRORS IN PRONOUNCING ENGLISH FINAL CONSONANT CLUSTERS MADE BY SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH-MAJORED STUDENTS

AT PHUONG DONG UNIVERSITY

(NHỮNG CHIẾN LƯỢC SỬA CÁC LỖI THƯỜNG GẶP KHI PHÁT

ÂM NHÓM PHỤ ÂM CUỐI TRONG TIẾNG ANH CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ HAI CHUYÊN TIẾNG ANH TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC

PHƯƠNG ĐÔNG)

M.A Minor Programme Thesis

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology

Code: 60 14 10

Hanoi – 2011

-oo0oo -

NGUYỄN THỊ HẢI

STRATEGIES TO CORRECT COMMON ERRORS IN PRONOUNCING ENGLISH FINAL CONSONANT CLUSTERS MADE BY SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH-MAJORED STUDENTS

AT PHUONG DONG UNIVERSITY

(NHỮNG CHIẾN LƯỢC SỬA CÁC LỖI THƯỜNG GẶP KHI PHÁT

ÂM NHÓM PHỤ ÂM CUỐI TRONG TIẾNG ANH CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ HAI CHUYÊN TIẾNG ANH TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC

PHƯƠNG ĐÔNG)

M.A Minor Programme Thesis

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology

Code: 60 14 10 Supervisor: Nguyễn Hoàng Lan, M A

Hanoi - 2011

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CANDIDATE’S STATEMENT i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

LIST OF TABLES, CHARTS vii

PART 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale of the study 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Scope of the study 2

4 Method of the study 3

5 Thesis Design 3

PART 2: DEVELOPMENT 5

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

1.1 English pronunciation 5

1.1.1 Standard English Pronunciation 5

1.1.2 Aspects of English pronunciation 5

1.1.2.1 Consonant sounds 6

1.1.2.2 English final consonants and consonant clusters 7

1.1.2.3 A comparison between English and Vietnamese final consonants.9 1.2 Errors 12

1.2.1 Errors vs Mistakes 12

1.2.2 Pronunciation errors 13

1.3 Error correction 14

1.3.1 Definition and types of error correction 14

1.3.2 Approaches to error correction 16

1.4 Techniques to deal with final clusters 16

CHAPTER 2: AN OVERVIEW OF TEACHING AND LEARNING PRONUNCIATION AT PDU 21

2.1 The syllabus 21

2.2 The learners 22

2.3 The teachers 22

2.4 The teaching and learning conditions 22

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 24

3.1 Research questions 24

3.2 Subjects of the study 24

3.3 Data collection procedure 24

3.4 Data analysis procedure 25

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 26

4.1 Findings from recordings and discussions 26

4.1.1 Overview of the errors with final clusters of 2nd year English-majored students at PDU 26

4.1.2 Details of the errors with final clusters of 2nd year English-majored students at PDU 27

4.1.2.1 Reduction 27

4.1.2.2 Substitution 30

4.2 Findings from observation and discussions 31

4.3 Comparison of the two findings 33

4.4 Strategies to correct final clusters errors 33

PART 3: CONCLUSION 38

1 Summary of major findings 38

2 Limitations and suggestions for further study 38

REFERENCES 40 APPENDIX 1: Checklist for recording I APPENDIX 2: Findings from recordings II APPENDIX 3: Checklist for observation XIX APPENDIX 4: Findings from observation XXVI

LIST OF TABLES

Table 2: Component of consonant clusters pp 8-9 Table 3: Reduction errors found in the data from recordings pp 27-28 Table 4: Substitution errors found in the data from recordings p 30 Table 5: Errors from students’ reading out loud the 230 errors from recordings p 31 Table 6: Details of errors from observation p 32

LIST OF CHARTS

Chart 2: Comparison of two results from recordings and observation p 33

PART 1: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

English has become an important demand for schooling and job opportunities in the past few years; however, many Vietnamese speakers do not have intelligible English pronunciation so as to be easily understood in direct communication with foreigners

Learners with serious pronunciation errors will certainly fail in communication Therefore,

it is very essential to research learners‟ pronunciation errors, and then to seek out suitable strategies to solve the problems

Among many pronunciation errors that learners of English as a second language are likely

to make (i.e intonation, stress, ending sounds, etc.), errors with final consonant clusters can be considered serious because “learners‟ inability to produce final consonant clusters can lead to incomprehensibility” (Avery & Erhlich, 1992, p.55) In the same line, Celce-Murcia, Brinton & Goodwin (1996) supported that inaccurate pronunciation of consonant clusters can make English language learners‟ speech difficult for native speakers to understand, particularly in cases where the learners use epenthesis to break up clusters or omit a consonant in a cluster (as cited in Arnold, 2009)

Serious as it might be, problems with final clusters can be considered as one typical pronunciation error of Vietnamese learners According to an earlier research by the Australian Government publication Asian Language Motes (1978; as cited in Pham, 2009),

“initial clusters do not cause many problems, but final clusters are found extremely hard for Vietnamese students” Also in an article about common challenges faced by Vietnamese learners, Deshayes (2005, p.6) firmly stated that “English consonant clusters give Vietnamese learners problems not only because they do not have these consonant combinations in their own language, but also because they produce a variety of syllable types”

Although final clusters errors are very common to Vietnamese learners, it seems that teachers do not pay much attention to them Firstly, it is perhaps because the final sounds are not pronounced as clearly as other sounds in an utterance so they are less noticed by both learners and teachers In addition, few researches have been carried out on these particular final clusters errors The latest and most noticeable research on this issue was done by Pham (2009); however, it did not analyze deeply students‟ final clusters errors as well as did not suggest particular strategies for correcting them

Being an English teacher at Phuong Dong University (PDU), I realize that many of my students encounter difficulty in pronouncing English final clusters though they are able to produce single consonants accurately For the above reasons, I would like to conduct this

research entitled “Strategies to correct errors in pronouncing English final clusters

made by second- year English-majored students at PDU”

The research hopes to find answers to the following questions:

 What are the English final cluster errors that second-year English-majored students at PDU often make?

 What are some strategies to correct those errors?

2 Aims of the study

The main aim of the study is to analyze final clusters errors in pronunciation of the year students in English Department, PDU, and then to suggest strategies to help teachers

second-deal with students‟ final clusters problems

3 Scope of the study

There are many pronunciation errors that Vietnamese students are likely to make

However, within the limit of a minor thesis, this study focuses on analyzing the students‟

final clusters errors and proposing the strategies for correcting them

This study was implemented for a group of 30 English-major second-year students at Phuong Dong University who are working with the course book “Let‟s talk 2” by Leo Jones (2002)

4 Method of the study

30 English-majored second-year students from class 509701A2 were chosen to participate

in this study Recording and observation were two methods used to collect data The data analysis procedure included two steps In the first stage, all the speeches that the students presented in their mid-term oral test were recorded and used for take-home analysis Next, all the errors made by students were counted in terms of types, sounds frequency and seriousness in order to find out a list of common pronunciation errors students make with final clusters At the same time, tapes recorded from students were sent to a group of three English teachers to help analyze and find errors and error frequency After that, the data were converted into tables and charts In the second stage, the results from recording analysis were used to design a checklist for observation process when each student was asked to read the words individually The results collected from observation were then compared with the results from recording analysis to prepare for the next stage where suitable solutions to students‟ pronunciation errors with final clusters were suggested

5 Thesis Design

This thesis consists of three parts, namely Introduction, Development and Conclusion

Part 1, the Introduction, presents the rationale, the aims, the scope and the method of the study

Part 2 is the development with four chapters Chapter 1 (Literature review) introduces some key concepts necessary for understanding this research including Standard English Pronunciation, English final consonants & consonant clusters, Vietnamese final consonants, Errors vs mistakes, Pronunciation errors and Error correction Also, it reviews some previous studies related to the topic Chapter 2 (Setting) gives an overview of

English pronunciation teaching and learning context at PDU Chapter 3 (Methodology) demonstrates a clear and detailed plan to collect adequate and reliable data for analysis including the selection of subjects, research instruments, procedures of data collection as well as procedures of data analysis Chapter 4 (Results and Discussions) mainly deals with the findings from the recordings and observation Some discussions about these findings can also be found in this chapter

Part 3, the Conclusion, discusses the major findings and limitations of the research as well

as provides suggestions for further study

PART 2: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

In this chapter, the author provides readers with the relevant literature of the study by introducing some key concepts necessary for understanding this research, as well as the review of previous studies related to the topic Some crucial concepts chosen to be clarified in this part include Standard English Pronunciation, English final consonants & consonant clusters, Vietnamese final consonants, Errors vs mistakes, Pronunciation errors and Error correction

1.1 English pronunciation 1.1.1 Standard English Pronunciation

First of all, it is essential to define Standard English Pronunciation Standard English is defined as “a particular dialect of English, being the only non-localized dialect of global currency without significant variation, universally accepted as the appropriate educational target in teaching English; which may be spoken with an unrestricted choice of accent”

(Strevens, 1983, p.88, as cited in McKay, 2002, p.51) Therefore, Standard English pronunciation can be any dialect of English that is widely used and accepted in the world

It is common knowledge that there are two major dialects of English for international broadcasts and in social and business settings: Received Pronunciation (RP) in the United Kingdom and General American (GA) English in the United States Vietnamese people tend to follow RP English in which the /r/ sound is not pronounced at the end of words, so RP English will be used as the criteria for analyzing students‟ pronunciation in this research

1.1.2 Aspects of English pronunciation

Pronunciation is a complicated concept that involves many aspects Generally, it can be broken into the following components: vowels, consonants, word stress, rhythm, intonation,

the English sound system is studied under two main headings: segmental and suprasegmental

According to Seferoglu (2005, p.304, as cited in Abuseileek, 2007, p.4), “Segmental aspects of the sound system includes individual vowels and consonants, and the suprasegmental aspect comprises words, phrases, and sentence stress, pitch contour or intonation, and rhythm”

1.1.2.1 Consonant sounds

According to Peter Roach (2000, p.19), consonants are “sounds in which there is obstruction

to the flow of air as it passes from the larynx to the lips” Specifically, consonant sounds are the sounds in the production of which two articulators come close together so that air stream is obstructed and can not get out freely

Consonants can be described in terms of the manner of articulation, the place of articulation and voicing Kelly (2000) and Roach (2000) categorized the 24 consonants into 6 groups:

Lateral + l

Table 1: Table of consonant sounds

A stop cuts off airflow through either the mouth or the nose so there are oral and nasal stops

Oral stops are often called plosives: /b, p, d, t, g, k/ Nasal stops are usually called nasals: /m,

n, ŋ/ English fricatives include /f, v, θ, ð, s, z, ʃ , ʒ , h/ English approximants include /j, w, r/, and lateral /l/ Affricates can be seen as a sequence of a stop and a fricative which have the same or similar places of articulation, and there are only two affricative sounds in English /tʃ ,

dʒ /

1.1.2.2 English final consonants and consonant clusters

Any consonant except h, r, w and j may be a final consonant Final consonant sounds in English are listed as below:

/p/ - ship, tip /s/ - miss, chess /b/ - curb, rib /z/ - his, was /t/ - eat, sit /ʃ / - wash, crash /d/ - ride, side /ʒ / - garage, beige /k/ - back, cook /tʃ / - church, catch /g/ - bag, pig /dʒ / - large, age /θ/ - teeth, earth /m/ - team, room /ð/ - breath, clothe /n/ - than, man /f/ - beef, chief /ŋ/ - thing, sing /v/ - cave, give /l/ - smile, feel

When there are two or more consonants at the end of the word (called final cluster), the terms

“pre-final” and “post-final” consonants are used

Post-final includes: /s, z, t, d, θ/

 Two consonant clusters:

o Pre-final followed by a final consonant

o Consonant plus post-final

E.g.: think, important, help, health, cats, etc

 Three consonant clusters:

o Pre-final plus final plus post-final (e.g helped, twelfth, banks, etc.)

o Final plus post-final plus post-final (e.g text, fifths, lapsed, etc.)

 Four consonant clusters:

o Most are pre-final plus final plus post-final plus post-final

e.g prompts, twelfths

o Occasionally, there is one final and three post-final consonants

e.g sixths, texts

The table below presents the consonant clusters, extracted from Pham (2009):

Table 2: Component of consonant clusters

1.1.2.3 A comparison between English and Vietnamese final consonants

English consonants are different from Vietnamese ones because “there are only six consonants and two semi-vowels which can stand in word-final position” in Vietnamese (Nguyen, 2007, p.4) Details about Vietnamese final consonants are adopted from Doan (1999, as cited in Nguyen, 2007, pp.4-7) as follows:

iii) /ŋ/: there are three allophones of this phoneme:

[ŋ͡ m]: bilabialized, proceded by rounded vowels /u, o, ɔ /

súng [ʃ uŋ͡ m]

không [xoŋ͡ m]

[ɲ ]ː corresponding to letters „nh‟, proceded by front vowels /i, e, ɛ /

bệnh [beɲ ] tình [tiɲ ] nhanh [ɲ ɑ ɲ ] [ŋ]ː elsewhere

vi) /k/ː this sound is produced where the letter “c”, “ch” is shown at the final position

of a syllable and it is agreed by many linguistics that this phoneme has 3 allophones which appear in a complementary distribution

[k͡ p]ː this ending sound is bilabialized if the consonant is preceded by rounded vowels /u, ɒ , ɔ /

1.2 Errors 1.2.1 Errors vs Mistakes

Making mistakes or errors is a natural process of learning In language learning, making errors

is an inevitable part that can not be avoided People can not learn language without first systematically committing errors (Dulay, Burt and Krashen, 1982, as cited in Pham, 2009)

Many researchers have made a clear distinction between errors and mistakes, such as Brown (2007), Ellis (1997), Corder (1981) or such A mistake refers to a performance error related to

a random guess or a slip of the tongue, reflecting a failure to use a known system correctly;

however, an error, a noticeable deviation from the known grammar of a speaker/writer, reflects the competence of the learner (Brown, 2007, pp.257-258) In another research, in the same line, Ellis (1997) states that errors reflect gaps in a learner‟s knowledge; they occur because the learner does not know what the correct one is Nevertheless, mistakes reflect occasional lapses in performance; they occur because in particular instance, the learner is unable to perform what she or he knows

In short, a mistake made by a learner when writing or speaking is caused by lack of attention, fatigue, carelessness, etc and can be self-corrected, while errors result from the learner‟s incomplete knowledge Therefore, a speaker or writer can go on saying or writing the wrong thing without knowing that he is doing it, and he can not correct by himself

1.2.2 Pronunciation errors

According to Nguyen (2007), errors in pronunciation are defined as the incompetence in language and incorrect pronunciation that may affect intelligibility in communication Jenkins (2006, p.36) defines pronunciation errors as “variants of pronunciation which prevent one communicator from understanding the propositional content of the other‟s utterances” (as cited in Nguyen, 2007) The definition given by Jenkins seems more precise when English is considered as a means of international communication

1.2.3 Final consonant clusters errors

Results of some studies of errors with consonant sounds can be classified into 6 types:

1 Cluster reduction This is the “deletion of one or more consonants from a target cluster

so that only a single consonant occurs at syllable margins” (Grunwell, 1987, p 217, as cited in Treiman, 1989)

2 Cluster simplification The error occurs when one/some elements of a cluster being is/

are produced in a different manner from the target phoneme (Grunwell, 1987, as cited

in Treiman, 1989)

e.g green – pronounced as [gwin]; bread – pronounced as [bwed]

3 Epenthesis This is the insertion of some vowel (normally a schwa) between cluster elements (Dyson & Paden, 1983, as cited in Treiman, 1989)

e.g drive /draiv/ pronounced as [dəraiv]

4 Coalescence It occurs when the yielded pronunciation contains a new consonant

composed of features from the original consonants

e.g Swim - pronounced as [fim] It was explained that because the [+fricative] feature of /s/ cooccurs with the [+labial] feature of /w/, resulting in a labial fricative, [f] (Dyson &

Paden, 1983, as cited in Treiman, 1989)

5 Omitting nasal and liquid sounds In consonant clusters consisting of pre-final + final

consonants with nasals (/n/, /m/) or liquids (/r/, /l/) as the first element, (/m, n, l, r/ + final consonant), nasals and liquids sounds are often omitted (Treiman, Zukowski, &

Richmond-Welty, 1995)

e.g went  wet belt  bet

6 Phonetically possible spelling In representing the first consonant of a cluster, spellers

tend to spell words in an inaccurate but phonetically plausible ways (Treiman & Bourassa, 2000)

e.g trap  chap It was explained that because “ch” closely resembles the sound of the

initial blend “tr” Treiman (1985) explains that this “ch” spelling reflects the release of /t/

in the context

(Treiman, 1985, as cited in Pham, 2009)

Pham (2009) finds out that the major problem with cluster ending is reduction of sounds

Deshayes (2005) and Avery & Ehrlich (1992) also agree that the omission of one or two of the consonants is common to Vietnamese learners of English

Although the problems encountered by learners with final consonant clusters are predictable, the researcher carried out the study in order to find out the errors that Vietnamese learners at PDU actually make with final clusters and then suggest some strategies to correct them

1.3 Error correction

As mentioned above, errors are unavoidable but essential in the process of language learning because no errors in a lesson means no real learning has taken place However, discovering these errors in students‟ speaking alone seems to be of no value if they are not treated reasonably That is the reason why teachers should understand about error correction and the principles in correcting students‟ speaking errors in general and pronunciation errors in particular

1.3.1 Definition and types of error correction

Julian Edge (1989, p.20) defines correction as “a way of reminding students of the forms of Standard English It should not be a kind of criticism or punishment” According to Nguyen et

al (2003), correction is known as a series of pedagogical techniques to get students to refine what they want to say (as cited in Nguyen, 2009, p.26)

Basing on the person who gives correction, Edge (1989) classifies error correction into three types: self- correction, peer- correction and teacher- correction In self-correction, teacher does not correct the errors for the students Instead, he elicits correction from students who are forced to think, to discover their errors, to choose an alternative word and to attempt to say it again For this reason, Edge strongly asserts that “the best form of correction is self-correction” (1989, p 24) When the students do not know how to correct his errors, teachers can invite other students to help out In this case, it is called Peer-correction It can keep the whole class more involved in correction process However, peer-correction can have problems

if the two or a group of students are not in the habit of correcting each other The third type of correction is called teacher- correction If neither self-correction nor peer- correction works,

teachers can give more help by providing a correct way of expressing what the students want

to mean

Basing on the moment of correction, Richards (1998) suggests two types of error-correction:

delayed correction and immediate correction In delayed correction, the correction is delayed

to the end of the activity The teacher monitors closely as learners discuss a topic in groups, making a note of the most important errors When the discussion finishes, these are discussed with the whole class This kind of correction is suggested for use in production stage In contrast with delayed correction, immediate correction is done immediately when an error is made This type of correction is recommended when students are involved in the practice stage where accurate use of language is strongly insisted from students The decision whether

to correct immediately or not depends on various factors such as aims, class dynamics, learner attitude and expectations, motivation, level, and the teacher's evaluation of whether a mistake

or an error has been made

In short, there are many types of error corrections and each type has its own advantages and disadvantages Therefore, teachers should carefully consider in advance which type of correction to use in different contexts to suit their students best

1.3.2 Approaches to error correction Since there are many types of errors, the approaches to error correction vary Doff (1988, as

cited in Hadinata, 2006) identifies three approaches to error correction practiced by teachers

The first approach is that teachers correct their students immediately when they make mistakes This approach focuses more on errors of students than on what they do correctly

This approach hampers developing fluency in English, for committing mistakes is an integral part of any learning activity The second approach asserts that teachers should not correct students all the time but sometimes, depending on teaching phases Specifically, if students are practising one particular language point, teachers insist that they say it correctly; but if they‟re doing a freer activity, teachers should not correct too much The last approach stresses

avoiding error correction or correcting as little as possible in order to help students express themselves in English without worrying too much about making mistakes

1.4 Techniques to deal with final clusters

According to Tench (1981, p.66), “problems concerning consonant clusters are usually simply

a problem of articulation” In other words, although a learner might produce the elements of a cluster satisfactorily, the combination of the elements in close sequence (clusters) may prove

to be problematical This author suggests some techniques for dealing with consonant clusters, including demonstration, association and/or explanation Demonstration is usually sufficient, but the teacher must resort to association and/or explanation if it does not work The following are some examples using the techniques „demonstration + explanation‟ to practice clusters

For final sequences of stops such as /-pt, -kt, -bd/ (a sequence of unreleased stop + released stop): retaining the closure of the first stop while effecting the closure of the second For instance, for /-pt/, the lips must remain sealed while the tongue blade rises for the alveolar closure of /t/; for /-kt/, the back of the tongue must remain raised against the soft palate while the blade effects alveolar closure of /t/ For a sequence of fricatives such as /-θs/, hold the tongue in the /θ/ position and prolong the /θ/ and then, suddenly and sharply, draw the tongue

in and upwards

Deshayes highlights an approach “to identify the areas of mouth in which the sounds are moving” to final clusters errors, and asserts that “Helping students realize the transitions that need to occur in their mouths will help them make the necessary adjustments” (Deshayes,

2005, p.6) She also recommends some other specific techniques such as reading aloud a list of words with consonant clusters, breaking down consonant clusters, adding and changing sounds gradually, for instance, “six”, “sixth”, “sixths”

Another approach to final clusters is “to simplify final consonant clusters in connected

speech” (Avery & Ehrlich, 1992, p.104) For instance, “This sweater was hand-made”, „hand‟

is pronounced as „han‟ without a final /d/ Simplifying the final consonant clusters through the

deletion of one or more of the consonants are very common in the speech of native speakers but do not occur randomly For example, the final /d/ of „hand‟ is much less frequently deleted

if the following word begins with a vowel sound as in the phrases „hand out‟ Unlike native speakers, learners of English may simplify clusters inappropriately, leading to misunderstanding Therefore, it is the task of the pronunciation teacher to introduce the simplification strategies to students Two particular activities proposed by these two authors are practising using two words for difficult consonant clusters, and practising consonant clusters through the addition of grammatical endings

Celce-Murcia, Brinton & Goodwin (1996) agrees that English native speakers also employ simplification strategies to make consonant clusters easier to pronounce Two simplification strategies they use are cluster reduction (omitting one of the consonants) and resyllabification (breaking up a final consonant cluster when it is followed by a word beginning with a vowel sound) For the first strategy, it is usually a middle consonant that is dropped in final clusters

of three or four consonants This strategy is often used to simplify clusters created by the

addition of grammatical endings, as in the simplification of asked /æskt/ to /æst/ or facts /fækts/ to /fæks/ It is regularly employed when pronouncing fractions such as sixths (reduction of /siksθs/ to /siks/ or fifths (reduction of /fifθs/ to /fifs/) It should be noted for

students that third person singular present tense and plural endings provide important grammatical signals and are never left off in order to simplify a cluster For the second strategy, the final consonant of the cluster is moved over to the next syllable For example, in the phrase “She moved it.”, a native speaker will usually pronounce as /ʃ i.muːv.dɪ t/ These authors also recommend that “having students gradually build up clusters allows them to gain mastery over final clusters of three or four consonants” (Celce-Murcia, Brinton & Goodwin,

/k/  /ks/  /ksθ/  /ksθs/

sick  six  sixth  sixths

Pham (2009) outlines strategies to overcome ending sounds errors using Communicative Teaching She stresses three important techniques (information gap, role-play, and tasks) usually used in communicative activities in order to get students to interact with each other, and from then improve their competence In addition, she lists some sample activities and tasks for practicing ending sounds, including brainstorming, chain stories, exaggeration, and sound picture

An example of using Communicative Teaching to deal with final clusters errors is provided by Deshayes (2005, p 6) For a less controlled communicative activity, teachers can provide students with a calendar of the current month and have them ask each other questions such as,

“What will you do on the thirty-first?” For an information gap activity, teachers can use or adapt the calendar below: one student has a blank calendar and must interview her partner to recreate the other‟s schedule

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 Hair salon

Dad‟s birthday

Movie night

6 Picnic at the park

Lunch meeting work

20

21 Visit aunt Andrea

According to the research conducted by Arnold (2009), pronunciation training yields more target-like pronunciation of final three-segment consonant clusters More specifically, the instructional method that incorporated native English speaker modeling, choral repetition and self-correction using the subjects‟ audio taped recordings of them reading the target words in word lists, sentences and passages results in a decreased use of the following consonant cluster simplification strategies - articulatory feature change, consonant cluster reduction and substitution - when pronouncing words containing final three-segment consonant clusters

Kelly (2000, p.58) also gives some specific techniques to teach final clusters: (1) isolating the clustered sounds The word or utterance can be written on the board, in phonemic script, and students are asked to repeat the sounds slowly; (2) drilling; (3) tying the sounds in with familiar words which include the cluster and which can then be included in activities and drills

To sum up, there are a variety of techniques suggested for dealing with final clusters What is important is that teachers need to be aware of their students‟ errors with final clusters and then adapt the activities or use the techniques in order to fit their students‟ level as well as the aim

of the lesson

CHAPTER 2: AN OVERVIEW OF TEACHING AND LEARNING PRONUNCIATION

45 minutes The first semester focuses on English vowels while the second one on English consonants The final tests which are carried out by administrators at the end of each semester are not included in 15 weeks‟ study

„Ship or Sheep? An intermediate pronunciation course‟ by Ann Baker (1977) is used as the textbook It is written in a simple and succinct style with clear illustrations and a variety of activities Most units begin with an illustration and notes on how to produce the sound to be practiced, then minimal pairs, recognition test, word list, dialogue, stress/ intonation, and finally conversation/group work However, it has some shortcomings Like many other books

of English pronunciation, it is written by the foreign author and for the learners of English all over the world in general, it is not written exclusively for Vietnamese or the learners of Phuong Dong University All the sounds are presented equally; it does not concentrate on the sounds which the first-year students of Phuong Dong find difficult Moreover, there are several repeated exercises, and some units have too many exercises which the students do not have enough time to practise in class Consequently, the pronunciation activities in the textbook would be adapted to suit students‟ needs and the course‟s objectives

2.2 The learners

The learners are first-year students at English department, Phuong Dong University They have a range of ages from 18 to 20 years old As young adults, they are very flexible, dynamic, and able to imitate the native-like accent in a relatively quick way All students have studied English for at least three years at high school, which has both positive and negative influence

on their study in college First, if their already- formed pronunciation is not good, it is rather difficult to correct them Second, the students‟ pronunciation is considered to be poor, in comparison with the four skills: reading, writing, speaking, listening or grammar The main reason is that little time was spent on learning pronunciation at high school What‟s more, all kinds of tests and exams taken at schools were in written form, so the schoolteachers paid less attention to teaching pronunciation than to teaching grammatical structures, reading and writing skills

2.3 The teachers

There are over 20 teachers at the English department, Phuong Dong University They are all young (25-40 years old), enthusiastic, and helpful However, all of them have just graduated

from colleges in Vietnam, and many are not experienced in teaching pronunciation As a result, they may encounter difficulties in dealing with students‟ errors in pronunciation as well

as carrying out pronunciation activities in classroom

2.4 The teaching and learning conditions

The English department offers good and modern facilities for learning and teaching language such as a language laboratory, cassette recorders, computers and projectors Besides, the number of students in each class is not so big, ranging from 25 to 30 students These conditions are very ideal for students to learn and practise pronunciation However, the lack of native teachers results in little chance for students to practice their pronunciation with native speakers

In brief, all the above-mentioned components of the course have their effects on the pronunciation, especially the pronunciation errors, of the participants of the research The following chapters will describe the methodology to find out the errors, the way to analyse the data, find out the findings and propose strategies to correct the common errors in pronouncing English final clusters made by second year English majored students at PDU

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY

3.1 Research questions

The research was carried out in the first semester of the school year 2010-2011 to find answers

to the following questions:

 What are the English final cluster errors that second-year English-majored students at PDU often make?

 What are some strategies to correct those errors?

3.2 Subjects of the study

Participants in the research are 30 second year students from class 509701A2, which was chosen randomly from the 4 second - year classes, K509, English Department, PDU All of them had completed the two Pronunciation courses offered to first-year students in English department, PDU Hence, they had got not only basic ideas of pronunciation rules but also certain awareness of their own pronunciation problems which might have been corrected by teachers

At the time of the research, these English majored subjects, aged from 19 to 21 years old, are working with the textbook “Let‟s talk 2” by Leo Jones (2002) for speaking skill The total time allowed for speaking skill for the third term at university of PDU English majors is 45 class hours The mid-term oral test occurs in week 8 or week 9 in each class with the same speaking topics for K509

3.3 Data collection procedure

The data collection was divided into two steps as follows:

Stage 1: Recording

The data collection was administered through an oral test This is the mid-term oral test that students had to participate to get the mid-term marks which make up 40% of the total score in the semester During the test, each of the students was requested to present a talk about a particular topic in about three to five minutes All what they presented was recorded with the aid of an mp3 recorder which was placed on the table in the test room to get the best audio quality, and then used for take-home analysis to find out all their errors with final clusters

Stage 2: Observation

All the mispronounced words with final clusters collected from the recordings were then used for the participants to read out loud The aim of the stage is to check the hypothesis whether or not the students have the same problems in the test and in their real speeches From this, it is expected to suggest relevant and suitable strategies to correct the errors Therefore, the speaker himself/ herself would read out loud the errors that he/ she made, paying attention to the final clusters when pronouncing the words When they read, the researcher took note of any mispronounced final clusters into a checklist (For a checklist for observation, see Appendix 3)

3.4 Data analysis procedure

The data analysis procedure included two phases:

Phase 1: All information collected from the subjects during the oral test was used for analysis

All the errors made by students were counted in terms of types, sounds frequency and seriousness The researcher then classified those types of errors and presented them in form of charts and tables Tape(s) recorded from the oral test were given to a group of three English

teachers including two Vietnamese and one English for pronunciation evaluation The evaluators, informed in advance of the purpose of the evaluation, were also given a checklist

so that the results would be more precise and suitable for the purpose of the researcher (For a checklist for recordings, see Appendix 1) After getting the result, they gave a written feedback to the researcher and participated in a discussion to work out the final result Then, data were processed by using the descriptive statistics, working out the common kinds of mistakes

Phase 2: The results from recording analysis were used to design a checklist for observation

process The results collected from observation were then compared with the results from recording analysis so as to suggest suitable solutions to students‟ pronunciation errors with final clusters

CHAPTER 4: FINDNGS AND DICUSSIONS

This chapter presents findings from two sources, namely recording and observation Basing

on findings from recordings, the researcher elaborates common errors with final clusters that the second-year English-majored students at PDU actually make Also, suitable strategies to overcome those errors are suggested on the basis of the comparison between the two findings from recording and observation

4.1 Findings from recordings and discussions

The data from recording analysis helped reveal (1) the final clusters errors that the second year students in English Department, PDU often make and (2) which errors are the most common ones in their pronunciation It should be noted that the most common one was chosen owing to the number of subjects that made the errors and the number of times they appear when students presented the talk

4.1.1 Overview of the errors with final clusters of 2 nd year English-majored students at PDU

From analyzing the data collected from recordings, 230 pronunciation errors related to final clusters was found, including 200 reduction errors and 30 substitution errors Below is the chart that shows the percentage of the two types of errors:

87%

13%

Reduction Substitution

Chart 1: Types of errors

As can be seen from the chart, reduction error (repeated 200 times) is more common than substitution (repeated 30 times) In other words, reduction is the major problem that the second year students at PDU face

Basing on the number of students who commit the errors, we can conclude that reduction error

is the most common one Of all the subjects, 100% made errors with consonant reduction (30 students) and 60% (18 students) had substitution error

Interestingly, no insertion error was found in the data although this error still appeared in some previous researches (Pham, 2009; Treiman, 1989)

4.1.2 Details of the errors with final clusters of 2 nd year English –majored students at PDU

4.1.2.1 Reduction

As mentioned in the previous part, reduction is the most common error that the 2nd year students at PDU make Below is the table which demonstrates the details of reduction error of students found in the data from recordings

Consonant clusters Sound(s) omitted

No of subjects with errors

Repetition times

Pre-final + Final + (Post-final)

/ndʒ /, /ndʒ d/

/dʒ / or /dʒ d/

Table 3: Reduction errors found in the data from recordings

From the Table 3, it can be seen that the errors with final clusters /nt(s), nd(z), st/ are very common to the subjects The times these final clusters appeared in the subjects‟ talk are also

noted for correcting In addition, some of the sounds such as /θ, dʒ / at the end of words are really hard for Vietnamese learners to pronounce, so subjects tend to delete them Details of the two types of final clusters are as followed

Considering the first case (Pre-final + Final + (Post-final)), there were two tendencies to which the final clusters are mispronounced basing on the pre-final consonants:

 Deleting the pre-final

 Deleting the final or post-final sounds Firstly, when the liquid sound /l/ stands as the pre-final, it tends to be omitted This type of error was found in 33% of the subjects (10 students)

e.g child /tʃ aild/  /tʃ aid/

help /help/  /hep/

film /film/  /fim/

world /wɜːld/  /wɜ ːd/

old /əuld/  /əud/

The consonant following /l/ is also deleted (accounting for 53%)

e.g difficult /difikəlt/  /difikəl/

health /helθ/  /hel/

else /els/  /el/

self /self/  /sel/

Secondly, when /n/, /m/, /ŋ/ - nasal sounds – stand as pre-final, the students tend to delete all

or keep the first and the last sound in a cluster while deleting the middle ones The phenomenon was found in 100% of the subjects

e.g went /went/  /wen/

environment /invairənmənt/  /invairənmən/

friends /frendz/  /fren/

think /θɪ ŋk/  /θɪ ŋ/

find /faɪ nd/  /faɪ n/

Thirdly, when the pre-final sound is a fricative /s/, the students tend to delete the final sounds

26 students commit this error (87%)

e.g fast /fa:st/  /fa:s/

first /fɜːst/  /fɜ ːs/

ask /aːsk/  /aːs/

last /laːst/  /laːs/

past /paːst/  /paːs/

Considering the second case {Final + post-final(s)}, it is noted that the final consonant is hardly deleted while the second element of two-element clusters and third of three-element clusters are often omitted Many students just pronounced the first consonants of the long clusters and delete all the consonants that go after them

e.g next /nekst/  /nek/ (/s/ & /t/ were deleted)

in fact a negative transference that inhibits the pronunciation of ending sounds in general and final clusters in particular in the target language

4.1.2.2 Substitution

Of the two common final clusters errors that the subjects committed, the substitution error

comes second The following table incorporates the data on students‟ substitution errors found from recordings

substituted with errors

Table 4: Substitution errors found in the data from recordings

As has been shown in Table 4, the subjects tend to replace the English sound by the Vietnamese one or confuse between similar sounds The English sound replaced by Vietnamese one is /θ/, for example, health /helθ/  θ pronounced as „th‟ in Vietnamese It can

be explained that this sound is strange to Vietnamese speakers Because of the influence of mother tongue, the students simply substitute them with Vietnamese similar sound

Regarding sound confusion, the most frequent errors are /s/ and /z/ (repeated 21 times) For instance, loves /lʌ vz/  /lʌ vs/; kids /kidz/  /kids/ The mispronunciation of /z/ to /s/ sounds

to be due to the fact that the students often push the air through the mouth too hard

Also in reference to the confusion of sounds, the mispronunciation of /dʒ / to /z/ may be due to the carelessness and laziness of the students The students who made this kind of mistakes usually do not try to find out how the tongue act in each case, instead they make all these sounds similar which results in their mispronunciation as found in this study The mispronunciation of /θ/ to /t/ may be because of the difficulty the students had when articulating the sound /θ/ at the end of word

4.2 Findings from observation and discussions

The data collected from taking note of each student‟s reading out loud their final cluster errors found from recordings are shown in the following table:

Types of errors Times

Table 5: Errors from reading out loud the 230 errors from recordings

The data from observation shows that the subjects still made mistakes when they read single words The most common error that the subjects made is reduction error, and it should be noted that there appears insertion error

Details of errors from observation are as follows:

- /lps/

- The middle sound of a three-consonant cluster is deleted

- /l/ is omitted

Substitution /lθ, ʃ t, ndʒ , dz/ θ = t, ʃ = s, dʒ =z, z=s

Table 6: Details of errors from observation

As can be seen from Table 6, the subjects mainly made errors with long clusters and clusters with difficult sound The reason is perhaps that students had little time to practise them in the Pronunciation course mentioned above Also, teacher might not have raised enough awareness

of their students about these clusters in particular and clusters in general

4.3 Comparison of the two findings

The chart below is created to compare the results from recordings with those from observation

0 50 100 150 200 250

Insertion Substitution Reduction

(I: Errors from recordings; II: errors from observation) Chart 2: Comparison of two results from recordings and observation

The Chart 2 indicates that making errors considerately reduces when the students read word by word rather than made a real speech, which means that some errors can be corrected by students, some should be corrected with the help of teacher It also reveals that reduction is the most common error that the second year students at PDU commit Interestingly, there occurs some minor insertion error in observation that is not present in recordings