Luận văn a contrastive analysis of professional titles in legal systems in english and vietnamese

"VIETNAM NATIONAL IRTVERSETY, HA NOE UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: FACULTY OF POST-GRADTATE STUDIES, NGUYEN THI VAN ANH COMMON MISTAKES MADE BY 10-GRADE STUDENTS A

"VIETNAM NATIONAL IRTVERSETY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYÊN THỊ VÂN ANH

COMMON MISTAKES MADE BY 10-GRADE STUDENTS AT ME LINIL MGI SCIIOOL IN PRODUCING ENGLISIE VOWEL AND

CONSONANT SOUNDS

(Những lỗi phổ biến của học sinh khối 10 rlờng THPT Aé Linh trong

việc phát âm các nguyên âm và các phụ âm Tiếng Anh)

M.A MLNOR THESIS

Major: English Teaching Methodology

Cede : 601410

HANOL 9/2011

"VIETNAM NATIONAL IRTVERSETY, HA NOE UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES:

FACULTY OF POST-GRADTATE STUDIES,

NGUYEN THI VAN ANH

COMMON MISTAKES MADE BY 10-GRADE STUDENTS AT ME LINH HIGH SCHOOL IN PRODUCING ENGLISH YOWEL AND

CONSONANT SOUNDS

(Những lỗi phổ biến của học sinh khối I0 trléng THPT Mé Linh trong

việc phát âm các nguyên âm và các phụ âm Tiếng Anh)

M.A, MINOR THESIS

MAJOR: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY

SUPERVISOR: KIM VAN TAT, M.A

HANOE 9/2011

1.2.1 Consonanls " 1.22 Vowels 12 1.3 The importance of teaching and leaming pronunciation 12 1.4 Review of previous research 13

CHAPTER 2: FHE STUDY

2.1 Contexi of the study àà cà nh hhueheeeeeeoeeoeeeoT

2.1.1 Teaching staff and teaching methods lS

2.1.2 Students and their background "¬ sec eee 15

2,5 Data collection procedures sees cescssseessseiressmeseetieaneesstnatersanenenned

2.6 Data analysis Process « cesceessesssesseessseiisssssseervniieanietssevessanneetenseeld

CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

3.1 Classroom observation and discussion .ssssnienenetneneniemeninedl

3.2 Findings and discussion from the questionnaire 2⁄4

3.3.1 Findings about the students’ attitudes towards pronunciation

3.2.2 Kindings about the common problems with English sounds and the main

3.2.3.2 Teachers’ methods in teaching prortnciatiori - 28 3.2.3.3 Sludonl° cxpoculơn lơm thơ teaehsrs

CHAPTER 4: SOME SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS FOR 10" GRADE STLDENTS AT

ve Sk

4.2 Solutions for English sounds practice .csccsesreesssn eee el

4.2.4.1 Pronuneiation maze

42.42 Bingo PART Ti: CONCLUSION

Figure 1 Diagram of Vowels

Figure 2: Consonants in the English language

Table 1: Promuwiation matters mentioned in Tieng Anh 10

Table 2: students’ attitude toward pronunciation

Tahie3: students’ opinion on the level af difficulties of English vowels

Tabled: siudents' opinion on the level of difficulties of English consonants

Tables: Causes af students’ mistakes in producing English sounds

Tahle 6: Students’ opinions about their self- correction

Table 7: Teaching English pronunciation methods

Table 8: Students’ expectation from their teachers’ methods in teaching pronunciation

PART ONE: INTRODUCTION

1, Rationale of the study

In the proeess of integration and globalization, English is rapidly becoming an indispensable instrument in community communication Its being used world-wide as the main language in business, trading, commmmication, etc ‘Therefore, more and more people learn English as forcign language and wish lo bz able to masicr it as native speakers, However, leamers cannot suecess in studying English without mastering English pronunciation because pronunciation is one of the most imporlanl components of a language Il is really very important for learners to have communication of the target language as correct possible right from the start

‘There have been a great deal of notable works about pronunciation and pronunciation teaching since the dawn of language tcaching such as orgs wrilton hy, Ginnson (1962), Kenwerthy (1987), Avery &Ehrlich (1992), Jerkins (2000) However, few studies have been done on common mistakes in pronouncing English sounds alone, The most popular one is the study by Avery

&Ahrlich (1992) in which the probisms of selected language group are discussed, In their work they have confirmed that “Vietnamese speakers do not experience too much difficulty with the English vowels” In tcalily, Vicinar

leamers often mnisprononnce the sound / / and fe! Moreover, their explanations about the problems which Vietnamese leamers have with English

consonants are not really appropriate

ILis said hat Victhamese lcamers have nol so many difficultics when producing English sounds because English and Vietnamese have the same Latin alphabets However, there is a big

difference in the phonetics alphabets between the two languages and the ways lo pronounce them Thus, the most common cause is the default misunderstanding of the way these sounds are produced and the effect of some sounds of the mother tongue,

In Vicnamn, English is ths core forcign language that is tingli as a eornpulsory subject ab all school levels The nccd to acquire this so popular language proves to be constant with soeiceconomic changes in Vietnam in recent years, However, it is undeniable that many Vietnamese suudents receiving the Tinglish teaching from their teachers al schools cat pronounce English words comectly This is one of the first language influences on the second language acquisition in the way that some features of pronouncing words in English do not exist

in Victramesc

In fact, Vietnamese learners of English have many difliculties in pronouncing English For high school students, especially students at Me Linh high school are not the exception even

11

though they have leant English since the early age Another reason is that no research has been carried on this field at Me Linh high school in Henoi, ‘This leads the researcher to the thought of making a research on “Common mistakes made by tenth grade students at Me Linh high school

in producing Engtish vowel and consonant sounds” wilh the purpose of finding out the causes of mispronunciations, It is hoped that this study will contribute to the goal of enihancing students’ perforinances in the leaching and learning foreign language

2, Aims of the study

‘The study aims at finding out common mistakes made by tenth grade students at Me Linh

high school in pronouncing ngtish words and the causes of these problems The results will provide an overview of learners’ pronunciation at Me Linh high school and give suggestions for teachers to improve the situation ‘The findings of this research will hopefully help Me Linh high school studenis lo raise their awarcness of fearing correc pronunciation so as lo produce English vowel and consonant sound properly

3 Research questions

1 What are the common mistakes in pronouncing English vowels and consonants made by 10"

grade students at Me Link high school?

2 What are the causes of thase mistakes?

3 What are solutions to the problem?

4 Scope of the study

The study Limited itsclf te the investigation of common mistakes in English pronunciation

of the 10 grade students at Me Linh high school in Hanoi The researcher of the thesis pays alleution lo find out students’ common mnistakes in the lessons Language focus with the sub- section Prominciation of Tieng Ant 10- textbook, Solutions arz also provided to help improve teaching and learning English pronunciation in general, teaching and learning English pronunciation for the 10" grade studomts at Mo Linh high school in particular

5 Research method

A combination of different data collection methods was used including class observations and questionnaires for students Details of the methodology applied in the study are discussed in Chapter 2 of Part two

6 Organization of the study

The study composes of three parts:

Part one, Jviroduction, includes the rationale, aims, research question, scop2, method and organization of the study,

Part two, Development, can of four chaplars Chaplor one, Literature Review, prost

the theoretical background relevant to the research The first section presents the basic concepts

of phonetics, phonology articulatory phonetics ‘The second section shows the main differences between English and Victnamese sounds The next section presents the imporlanec of teaching pronunciation The last section summarizes the review of previous research related to vowel and consonant pronunciation Chapler wo, the Stedy, describes the context of the study, the participants, and thơ mmothoil Chapter thrcc is thơ findings and discussion from classroom observations and questionnane, The last chapter is some suggested solutions for 10 grade students at Me Linh high school to produce iinglish sounds correctly

Part three, Conclus‘on, summarizes the findings and gives limitations and suggestions for farther research,

Besides, the classroom observation Iramscripls, survey questionnaire and snggesied solutions for the teachers and students are included in the Appendices

PART TWO: DEVELOPMENT Chapter : LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter is devoted to thc prescntation of the theoretical issucs related to the study The

13,

first section provides some basic linguistic and phonstic concepts to bring a comunon view of the matter studied inchiding phonetics, phonology, English consonants and vowels, The second section describes the differences between linglish and Vietnamese ‘The next section presents the importance of pronunciation teaching and leaning The final section discusses the review of some previous research related to English consonant and vowel sounds,

1.1 Phonetics and phonology

‘This section starts with a distinction between two related terms (often loosely) used to refer

to linguistic disciplines studying the linguistic sign which Ferdinand de Saussure in Course of General Linguistics called the acoustic image: phonetics and phonology

Phonetics deals with how speech sounds are actually produced, transmitted and received in actual spoken language, while phonology deals with especially with the ways those sounds arc organized into the individual languages, hence dealing with abstractions on a virtual basis

“Phonelics first of all divides, or segments,

concrete ullerances into individual speech soumts TL is therefore cxelusively concemed with parole or perfarmance Phouclics can be divided info three distinct phases: (1) articualtory phonetics, (2) acoustic phonetics and (3) auditory phonetics” (Skandera& Burleigh, 2005:3)

Articulatory phonetics deals with the way in which speech sounds are produced, Sound are usually classified according to the position of lips and the tongue, how far open the mouth is, whether or nol the vocal cords arc vibrating and so on

Acoustic phonetics deals with the transmission of speech sounds through the air, When a speech sound is produced it causes minor air disturbances (sound waves) Various instruments

are used [o measure the characlzristies of these sound waves

Auditary phonetics deals with how speech sounds are perceived by the listener,

From the practical phonetic standpoint, it is convenient to distinguish two types of speech sound, simply because the majotity of sounds may be described and classified most appropriately aooording to one of the two techniques

1 The types of sounds which is most easily described in terms of articulation, since we can generally feel the contacts and movements involved Such sounds may be produced with or without vocal cards vibration (voice) and very often have a noise component in the acoustic

sore; these sounds fall gencrally into the traditional category of consonants

2, ‘The type of sound, depending largely on very light variations of tongue position, which

s, since there nol corals or sfriclures

Burleigh, 2005:5)

Phonology is primarily concerned with how we inferprel and syslemalixe sounds, Ik deals with the system and patton of the sounds which exists within particular languages The study of phonology of English looks at the vowels, consonants and superasemental features of the language Within the disciptines of phonology, when wa talk about vowels and consonants we are retiarring to the different sounds we make when speaking, and not the vowel and consonants letters we refer to when talking about spelling

1.1.1 English vowels:

Vowels are defined as “sounds in which there is continual vibration of the vocal cords and the air stream is allowed to escape from the mouth in an obstructed warmer, without any interruption” (Celce-Murcia M, Briton D, Goodwin, J 1996)

Near close rey si

Close mid 9\e——¥IO

Mid 3

|@pen mid ce—3\o—a 9 E

Vowels at right & left of bullets are rounded & unrounded,

/I/ - The short RP /I/ is pronounced with a part of the tongue nearer to centre than to front raised

just above the half close position; the lips are loosely spread; the tongue is lax, with the side rims

making a light contact with the upper molars

/e/ - For the short RP /e/, the front of the tongue is raised between the half-open and half-close position; the lips are loosely spread and are slightly wider apart than for /I/; the tongue may have more tension than the case for /I, the side rims making a light contact with the upper molars

/e/- The mouth is slightly more open than/e/, the front of the tongue is

raised between the half-open positions, with the side rims making a very slight contact with the back upper molars; the lips are neutrally open, This

is a short vowel

/A/ ~ The short RP /a/ is articulated with a considerable separation of the

jaws and with the lips neutrally open: the centre of the tongue is raised just

above the fully open position, 0 contact being made between tre tongue anc the upper molar

/a:/- This normally long vowel iy articuleted with a considerable separation

of the jews and the lips neutrally ove; a part of the vougue vetween the

centre and 2ack is ‘n the fel’y open position, no contacz being mace between

the rims of che tongue and the upper molars

/ nf - This shart vowel is articulated with wide open jaws ard Tight, open lip-roundinz; the back of tze congue is in the fully open position, no contact being nade vetween the tungie end the upper molars

“This relatively long RP vowel is articulated with medium lip-rounding; the back of the tongue is raised between the half-open and half-close positions, no contact being made between

the tongue and the upper molars

/ uf ~ The short vowel / u/ is pronounced with a part of the tongue nearer to centre than to

back raised just above the half-close position; it has, therefore, a symmetrical back relationship wilh the front vowel 4:4; the tongue is laxly held, no firm contact being made between the tongue and the upper molars

fa: / - RP long i! is a back close vowel, but the tongue raising is relaxed from the closet position and is somewhat advanced from true back; ils relationship with /u/ is similar lo that between fi and /V/, the articulation of Ax being compared with that of / u/ , though no firm contact is made between the tongue and the upper molars

? 8!⁄ — RP / at/ is articulated wilh the contre of the longue taised behween half-elose and half-open, no firm contact being made hetween the tongue and the upper molars; the lips are naulrally spread

1.1.2 English consonants

“Consonants are formed by interrupting, restrieting or diverting the airflow in a variety of ways” (Kelly G, 2003:24)

There are Ihree ways of describing the consonant sounds: the manner of articulation, the place of articulation, the force of the articulation

Place of articulation Front | + bak

Figura 2: Consonants in the English language

« Bilabial Plosives: ip, b/

The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the primary obstacle to the air- stream is provided by the closure of the lips Lamg air is compressed belsind Uhis closure, during which stage the vocal cords are held wide apart for ‘p’, but may vibrate for all or part of the compression stage for /b/ according to its situation in the utterance Then the closure is released suddenly for the air to escape with a Kind of explosion

+ Alveolar Plosives: /t, di

The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shul off, the primary obstacls to the air- stream is formed by a closure made between the tip and rims of the tongue and the upper alveolar ridge and side teeth Lung air is compressed behind this closure, during which stage the vocal

cords are wide apart for /t/, but may vibrate for all or part of the compression stage for /d/ according to its situation in the utterance ‘I'he air escapes with noise upon the sudden separation

of the alveotar closnre

+ Labio-dental Fricatives {f, w/

The sofl palate being raised and the nasal resonator shul off, the inner surface of the lower tip makes a tighl contaet with the edge of the uppor lecth, so thal the escaping air produeas fiction

For /f!, the friction is voiceless, whereas there may be some vocal cord vibration accompanying

‘yi, according to its situation

+ Denial Fricatives: 15, 6/

(Examples words: thumb, thus, either, father, breath, breathe)

The soft palals boing raised and the nasal resonalor shut off, the tip and rims of the tongue make

a light contact with the edge and inner surface of the upper incisors and a firmer contact with the upper side teeth, so that the air escaping between the forward surface of the tongne and the incisors causcs friction For / 9 / the fiction is voiecless, whercas for / 3 there may be some vocal cord vibration

« Alveolar Fricatives: a

(Examples words: sip, zip, facing, rise, tice)

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The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shnt off, the tip and blade of the tongue make

a light contact with the upper alveolar ridge, and the side rims of the tongue a close contact with the upper side teeth ‘The air-stream escapes through the narrow groove in the centre of the longue and causes friction between the tongue and the alveolar idge In oticr words, in the articulation of these sounds the air escapes through a narrow passage along the centre of the tongue, and the sound produces is comparalively intense

+ Palato-alveolar Fricatives: / f) J/

(Exampte words: ship, Russia, measure, Irish, garage)

The fricatives are so called patato-alveolar, which can be taken to msan that their place of articulation is partly palatal, partly alveolar The tongue is in contact with an area slightly further back than that for /s/, /2/ If you make /s’ then / ff /, you should be able to feel your tongue move backwards The air escapes through a passage along the centre of the tongue, as in /s/ and /2/, bul the passage is a litile wider Most speakers of RP have rounded lips for / f fad / 34, and this is an important difference between these consonants and /s/ and /z/ In addition, the escape of air is diffuse (compared with that of /s, 7), the friction occurring between a more extensive area

of the tongue and the roof of the mouth In the case of / ff, the friction is voiceless, whereas for

#3,/ there may be some vocal cord vibration according to its situation, All the tticatives described

so far can be found in initial, medial and final positions In the case of / 3, however, the distribution is much more limited Very few Bnglish words begin with / 3/ (most of them have come into the language comparatively recently from French) and not many end with this consonant, Only medially, in words such as “measure”, “usually” is it found at all commonly

1.2 The main differences between English and Vietnamese sounds

1.2.1 Consonants

Kirst, English has 24 consonants but there are only 21 in Vietnamese Some phonemes exist in English bul nol in Vietnamese and viec versa, Far inslancc, ucoording lo Đoàn Thiện Thuật, following English sounds are absent in Vietnamese dialect

think — they Asa English — yet sh — Xị pupil teacher

Second, in Viemamese, a letter is often presented by the same phoneme Whereas in English, some phonemes seam to be presented by identical letters but different in promunciation For example,

Fourth, different fromm English with many scquences of consonants including the initial

such as “street” /stri:t/ / or “throat” / /@rout/ / and the final such as “ sixth” / /siks0// or

“slapped” /stepl’ /, Vietnamese does nal have sequences of consonants at all Although some orthographic combinations of letters in Vietnamese lock like consonant clusters such as th Ch,

ng, ngh, tr, ph in fact they present only simple consonants phonologically such 4

ng(p (ph ete, This feature causes both perceptive and productive problems, especially final consonant clusters cause the greatest difficulties for Vietnamese students

1.2.2 Vowels

Theze arc three out of scven short English vowels that are absent in Vietnamese ! @ /,/a/ and/ 3: /, Victnamese docs not have vowel contiasts (minimal pairs) which mcans there is no discrimination between the short andlong E.g 4: / and /1 /, This is really a matter to Vietnamese students because thsy canmot pronounce some words correctly without looking at its

pronunciation transcription in the dictionary

1.3 The importance wf teaching and learning pranunciatian

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“A leamer who constantly mispronounces a range of phonemes can be extremely difficult for a speaker from another language community to understand A consideration of learners’ pronunciation errors and of how these can inhibit successful communication is a useful basis on which to assess why if is important to deal with pronunciation in the class”, Kelly (2000: 11)

While saying why it is important to teach pronunciation, Ilewings (200410) “Difficulties with pronunciation might mean that students fail to gct their message across, even when the correet words are being used, or they might fail to understand what is said to them.”

Sound is the core of thc language so that is the reason why when teaching a language the

first thing the teacher shorld do is to let the learners have chances to explore the sounds of that language Morcaver, communicative approach

considered as the major language loaching in the twenty first contury as whal the learners really need afler graduating is that they can communicate successtully in their work and their life That is the reason why pronunciation teaching has been paid more and more attention by all the teachers,

Pronunciation is as important as any other aspects of language like syntax and

vocabulary Speech is much more than pronunciation of course, bul speech is impossible without it, Correct pronunciation, in fact, is considered to be a prerequisite to develop the speaking skill ‘That is why teaching pronunciation should occupy an important place in the sturty of any language

Nowadays, communicative approach is considered as the major language teaching in this twenty first century English is being used world-wide as the main language ‘Iherefore, teachers

of English have paid more and me

designed in textbook for high school students in each lesson for each grade

Ifention in teaching pronunciation Pronunciation is also

1.4 Review of previous research

There have been a number of studics about Vietnamese leamers’ difficultics or problems in any aspects of English pronunciation, Important findings were drawn and become a valuable basis for this research

Avery &Ehrlich (1992) are the two people mentiomng problems Vietnamese leamers may face when studying English: “As the sound systems of English and Vietwamnese differ greally,

Vietnamese speakers can have quite severe pronunciation problems In their work, the most common problem for the Vietnamese leamers have is the problem with the word final

, / 0/, đồi

consonants including voiceless stop consonants/p’, /t/, /k/, fricative consonants

Besides, they also presenled Vietnamese lewners’ problems in pronouncing vowels such as fits Af Joy! wei a!/ ariel ysl! BI,

In the article “Common pronunciation problems of Fietamese learners of English” Tam (2005) pointed out the two main problems in pronunciation of Viemamese leamers, that is, sound omission and sound confusion Relating to English final consonant pronunciation, she stated that Vietnamese speakers omitted ending sound most frequently A reason for sound omitting is a negalive Iransference of their LI due to the habit of “swallowing” the ending sound in the nother

tongue,

The article “feaching English to speakers of Viemamese, Refugee Education Guide: General Iyformation” that highlighis problems Vielnamese speakers are likely to have in leaming English and supgests ways of helping, Vietnamese stadents of English over difficulties caused by these differences Or “9 Lissential English Promaciations in the Vietnamese Context”

by Tran Thi Lan found that Frgkish sounds not found in Vietnamese, for example, the

or Vietnamese /th/ though this may not influence

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Chapter 2: THE STUDY

The literature review has described the basic theory of phonetic matters regarding the study

‘They are the background supporting this part of the research ‘Chis chapter presents the methodology, context of the study, datz collection procedures and the subjects of the sluly The results getting trom the data analyses and the discussion of those results are provided,

2.1, Context of the study

2.1.1 Teaching staff and teaching methods

The teaching staff at Me Linh high school consists of 10 teachers of English at the age from

26 to 33 They graduated fiom College of Foraign Languages- Vietnam National University, Lanoi: ‘Thai Nguyen University, Vinh Phne ‘Teachers ‘Iraining College and have been teaching English for at leasl 5 years Most of them have to teach in Targe elasses with sbout 45 students each Each teacher has to teach more than 3 classes of this kind It means that they must be responsible for the leamning results of more than 120 sludenls In addition, teaching materials are not always available, so many teachers have to buy textbooks and use them as their main material, Although the teachers are always aware of the new trend in teaching methods and aware of the importance of the communicalive approach when Icaching English to their studsnts

in general and pronunciation in particular, classes are usually conducted in the form of lectures: Most of the time the teachers are the main speakers working through the text

2.1.2 Students and their background

Me Tinh high school is located in Me Linh, a nuzat district of Hanoi Tis one of tho six schools in Me Linh and the second oldest one in this district, At tenth grade, there are 455 students, ‘They have been leaming English for at least four or five years at secondary schools, Mest of the sludents come fiom poor Ganilics but they are very hardworking and have an acceptable level of English knowledge However, they cannot communicate with each other effectively and cannot pronounce some sounds correctly In order to communicate well in a forcign temguage, they know that the First thing they should da is to pronounce corrcolly the wards and know how to use them accurately, However, some students said that they couldn’t read the transcription in dictionary, and only know the words which teachers had taught them how to pronounes, others said thal they imilated the sounds in the casscllc lapes but it was very difficult for them to pronounce the words they heard, others said that they offen found it hard to communicate with native speakers, etc Soma students know that their speaking is not accurate, bul they do nol know what arrors they have made or how te corredt thơm Gonerally thơ targpL students’ English tluency is still at a low level because the purpose of students leaming is to pass the gensral education examination,

2.1.3 The teaching materials and facilities

‘The teaching material for this study is the feosthook: 7ieng Anú: 10 Itis the basio cuuricultn for

general students with 16 units of different themes which cover two semesters Lach unit consists

of 5 scctions: reading, speaking, listening and language focus and cach section is supposed lo be taught in 45 minutes The classes have 3 periods a week, There is a test after every 3 units and two final tests al the end of each semester Teaching pronunciation is the first part of the Language focus, the second one is Grammar Because the time is limited for this section (only 45

minntes for 2 parts: pronunciation and Grammar), so the pronunciation is often practiced in 7 or

10 minutes that is not cnough The details of Pronunciation sul-scction in Tieng Anh 70 arc shown in the table below

Unit S Unit 6 Unit7 /eLf -/ai/- /91/

Units Tats? = Fac?

Unit? /iaf- fe a/- ƒ ta/

Unit 10 7b/-/pé Uniti 7đ7- TỨ Unit 12 fs/-/at Unit 13

Unit 14 Unit 15 Unit 16

Table 1: Pronunciation matters mentioned in Vieng Anh 10

From the table, we can come to a conclusion that in Tieng Anh 10, pronunciation matters

are complicated, including diphthongs, minimal pairs of both vowels and consonants,

Teaching facilities also play an insportanl part in leaching English and may affect the teaching positively or negatively, All teachars can use cassette recorders in their class when necessary but the recorders are too ald and offen out of order ‘There are some modem devices

2.2 Research questions

The research focuses on znalyzing the pronunciation problems of tenth grade students af

Me Linh high schoo! to find out their common mistakes in producing English sounds, The study raised the following questions

1 What are common mistakes in pronouncing English vowels and consonants made hy 1 grade students at Me Linh high school?

2 What are the causes of those mistakes?

3 What are sohitions ta the problem?

2.3 The subjects

The subjects of the study consist of 100 ten grade studenls from ten classes al Me Linh high school They are chosen at random basing on thei ordinal umber in the attendance register

‘They are from 15 to 16 years old All of them have leamed English sinoe 6" grade (about 12

yours old) The loaning aid is only a cassolfe player Most of thom can do written English asks

quite well, but they speak English with a lot of mispronounced words

2A, Data collection lastruments

To get the findings for research questions, these means of data collzction were admunistered:

2.4.1 Class observations

Classroom observations are apptied in arder to find onl common mistakes in producing English consonant and vowel sounds among students at grade ten The observations were carried out before the time the questionnaires were conducted in three Language Focus periods of three different classes taught by three different teachers at grade 10 Hopefully, the results from the classtoom observations will contribute much to finding out the solutions to the problems

2.4.2 Questionnaire

The questionnaire was designed with 11questions to get information about the students’ attitude, their difficulties in producing Linglish sounds and the causes of those difficulties as well

as the teachers’ methods to help students to produce English corrcetly

2.5 Data collection procedures

As mentioned in the above section, lo collscl information and data, wo instruments: the observation and questionnaire were used All the participants were informed of the purpose of the study and willing to help the researcher to fulfil the task

‘The stady was condueted in two steps as follows

cher look notas immediately in her notshook These noles were then transcribed and analyzed to evaluate pronunciation teaching and leaming in the classroom

‘Then, the result of the observation would bs compared with the result of the questionnaire

Sccondly, the questionnaires were administcred to 100 students of grade 10 at the ond of the second- semester of the school year, the questionnaire consists of LIquestions Five first questions are aimed at finding oul the aitiludes of studenls towards the pronunciation lessons

The next throe questions are aimed at finding oul the levels of difficulties in producing vowels

and consonants and the causes of difficulties, The three last questions are aimed at finding out the solutions to produce English sounds correctly in teaching and leaming pronunciation ‘The researcher clearly explained the purpose of doing research before the participants answered the questions, They were also cneouraged lv 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

2.6 Data analysis process

Duta, collected from Iwo different sources were calogorized into (a) the tenth grade students’ attitudes towards pronunciation at Mc Linh high school, (b) the difficultics in producing English vowel and consonant sounds and the causes of mistakes (¢) the suggestions made by the researcher for both isachers and students in learning and teaching pronunciation comrectly, The data were categorized this way is easy for the researcher to find the answers for the research questions, ‘Ihe quantitative data were prasented in the form of tables while qualitative data from the class obscrvation was presented by quoling relevant responses fram the respondents,

2.7, Summary

This chapter presented the context of the study at Me Linh high school, the research questions, the research methodology and instruments of dala collection The researcher used two different instruments: class observation and questionnaires with the purpose of achieving reliable and valid data In the next chapter, chapter 3, the author will present the data analysis

discussion, The last chapicr is the implications for tzaching and learning English pronunciation in Tieng Anh 10

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Chapter 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

In this chapter, the results are in tun elaborated and discussed in two sections ‘rhe first part is, the findings from classroom obscrvations, The sccond part presents the data from the questionnaires by means of tables,

3.1 Classroom observation and discussion

During the academic year 2010- 2011, the researcher observed 3 grade 10 teachers in class 10A1, 10A4, 108, at Me Linh high school when they taught Language focus which has the sub- section: Pronunciation During the process of observations, the researcher focused on some aspects such as: teaching and learning materials used in class, students’ activities and their

mistakes in producing sounds, and teachers’ approaches and techniques used in teaching promuciation

In clasy 1041

‘The lesson that the researcher was allowed to observe was Language Focus period of unit

3 in Tieng Anh 10 which focuses om minimal pair /e /-/ e /, After settling down the students (there were 40 students in this class), the teacher asked them to look at the two columns of words

fe /-/a/, then listened to the cassette player Students had a chance to get all the sounds from the cassulle twice, and thon they had fa repeal after the teacher Then problems appoared that students sitting at the back of the room could not hear the cassette clearly, as a consequence, some read words in the way they thought right, some tried to imitate the sounds the teacher had just pronounced The most significanl mistakes were Uhal students could not produce the sounds /

z fin words man, sad, bad, sand, some pronounced / @ / like /e/ and some prononneed it like /a/ After one minute practicing reading the words, the teacher asked four students to read aloud individually and checked immediately, The teacher found that all four students make mistakes with the sound / v/, so she let the whole class listen again that sound and then required the whole class to repeat after the cassette twice It took 7 minutes for those activities The next 3 minutes were spent on practicing sentences, The teacher read all 6 sentences and students listened After that, she called 6 students in tum read aloud 6 sentences in the textbook and checked, All six students made mislakes in producing the sound / ø/ in the words; fat (sentence 2), handbag (sentence 2}, apples (sentence 3), pans (sentence 4), cat (sentence 5), bad (sentence

From the observation, we can see that pronunciation teaching and learning in class 10A1 still followed the traditional path of imitating and drilling which causes boredom for students, Even though there was li

ing activity at the bogiming, it did nol help much because the roar was too large for the students sitting, at the back, AAll of the students make mistakes in producing

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the sound /e/ in words and sentences The lesson was far from satisfaction for both teacher and

students

In class 1044

The teacher taught this scction as warm up activitics that makes students Icam both

vocabulary and pronunciation of unit 12 with two sounds: /s/ - /z/ Students were eager to learn

because she gave them some picture and asked them to find the words for those pictures and pronounce those words, Shs checked immudiaicly, Then, the lsachor introduced these lwo sounds /s! - /2/, It seemed that they are easy sounds that students can pronounce them coutectly after listening to the teacher’s instruction and imitating her pronunciation When asked, students were able lo read the isolated wards and sentences concetly Aer 7 iinules students could distinguish these sounds without any difficulty They seemed to be very happy When checked, § oul of 6 students read sentences correcily The researcher saw thal this minimal pair was not difficult for students to pronounce

dn class 10A8

The rescarcher had a chance lo observe a Language Focus period in class 10A8 (A remarkable characteristic in this class is that there were 47 students) when they had been tanght umil 15 which deals wilh /0/ - // The sleps carried out, by the teacher were nol very different fiom which the teacher teaching class 10A1 chose to introduce the sounds and then give time for students to practice The different points were the challenges that the teacher had to deal with

during the lesson, Tho omerging problem was thal most studonts had difficulty in producing these sounds because they were not in Victnamese sound systeza and they offen confused with the sound /th/ in Vietnamese The teacher Iet students listen to her introduction of the two sounds twice, and then the leacher read aloud and asked sludents Lo repeal, Tlowsver, wher students read aloud, most of them could not produce these sounds correctly The teacher had to read aloud the words which have the sounds/9/ - /ð/ again slowly and clearly and asked students fo read in chorus iwice She let studenls | minute practice individually However, students’ praclicing was still unsatisfactory When three students were asked to read aloud this minimal pair, they pronounce two sounds similarly, therefore, all three students made mistakes in producing this minimal pair The teacher checked immediately for only these students Then she moved to the

part practice the sentences, First the teacher read all the five sentences, then she had 2 minutes for students to practice reading them individually, next she called in turn 5 students to read aloud the five sentences llowever, all five students make mistakes in these sounds Lach of Eve sludents was checked and made conection, Those activitics look ncarly 30 minutes thal is why the teacher asked students to practice more at home, and moved to Granimar section, After the lessom, the researcher had informal talk with the (eacher She said that she herself was not satisfied with the result of her students’ practice, however, if she had continued checking and correcting students’ mistakes, there would have been no time for grammatical points which were

In conclusion, the present situation of teaching and learning pronunciation at Me Linh high school is not positive as

expocted The researcher found that teaching and learning materials and equipment, limited teaching and leaming time, unvaried teaching techniques and few chances for students to practice in class bring about trouble in teaching and leaming pronunciation,

43.2 Findings and discussion [rom ihe questionnaire

According to the structure of the questionnaires, the findings and discussion in this part is divided into three main parts The first part is sludents” altitude towards pronunciation in Tieng Anh 10, The second part presents the common problems with pronunciation that students usually face, ‘The last part give more details about the correction made by their teachers and students- themselves in producing English sounds

3.2.1 Findings about the students’ attitudes towards pronunciation

lable 2: students’ attitude taward pronunciation

The data reveals that most of the students are highly aware of the vital role of proper pronunciation of Unglish All of the students started to learn Linglish atgrade 6 at their secondary schools as English is a compulsory subject from this grade to higher ones 73 participated students have a modest aim to attain intelligible pronunciation of English (a reasonable and

understandable promunciation) and the rest was the number of students desired to have near native like and near- native like pronunciation When students were asked about the importance

of pronunciation, most of them (85 students) agreed that it was very important to leam English

‘his proves that only by mastering a good pronunciation can the students speak Linglish aveuralely and Gucntly and make olhers understand, Similarly, 83 students thoughl thal English promunciation was difficult or even very difficult, while only 2 students thought that it was not difficult at all Those mumbers reveal the ficl thal producing English pronunciation correctly is necessary in comnmunicating, Ht is needed for the students to achieve the goal of intelligible

prommnciation

3.2.2 Findings about the common problems with English sounds and the main causes

3.2.2.1, Findings about the common problems with English sounds

As the answer for the question 4, 83 oul of 100 siudents at the grade 10 thought that English pronunciation was difficult and even very difficult, The textbook was designed with 12 units involving the minimal vowel and consonant pairs ‘'o find out the common mistakes in producing Frglish sounds of 10 grade students, the rescarcher taised questions 6 and 7 which asked students to rank the pairs according to their Jevels of difficulty

most difficult vowel pair

Table3; studerus’ opinion on the level of difficulties of English vowels

With the minimal vowel pairs in question 6, the pair /e/ - //ze/ was chosen for the most difficult pair by 68 students, while only 5, 3 or 2 students chose for the pair/l! -fi/,/ uf /- fx / and /e/-/3:/ for the most difficult one respectively, 12 students pot number one for the pair /a/ {+ fuel, Thorelore, it is clear that most of the students considerad the pair fof - (fax! is difficult for them to distinguish and to practice

Consonant pairs ‘Number of students chose the

most difficult consonant pair

35

G./3//-/ƒ1// Asia - English 38

Tabled: students’ opinion on the level of difficulties of English consonants

Similarly, with the minitnal pairs on Tieng 4nk 70, the pair / 6 -/ 8) variked the first place

as it was the mnost difficull chosen by 42 students 38 sludents chose the pair / 3 / - / ƒ 7 The resL

5 minittuil consonant pairs were chosen by 1 20 students To conclude, the pairs /@/-/ 8/ and ¿ 3/

-/ Jé were the most difficult pairs for Me Linh tenth grade students

3.2.2.2, The causes of consonant and vewel mistakes

It is important to find out the causes of consonant and vowel mistakes Therefore, question

8 was designed to mention all aspects of the problem, for example: the sound sysiem, students? practice or the feedback

3 | 1 think that English sounds and Viemamese are the same 3 7

4 | 1 donot practice the sounds taught outside class 95 5

5 | nobody corrects my pronunciation 4 96

6 | Ido not dare to ask my teachers or friends for help 8 92

Tables: Causes of students’ mistakes in producing English sounds

According to the data provided, 86 students recognize the cause of their difficulty in promuncialion lies in the fact (hat there are some Fngtish sounds thai đo nơi exist in Vielnarnese Only 7 of them think they haven’t been familiarized with the sound in English And 3 students agree that English sound s and Vietnamese are the same his is understandable because they have quite sufficient input of English inside and outside classroom as mentioned above In

contrasl, 95 students agree that they do nol praclice the sounds taught outside class There[ore,

the students” practice plays an important role in producing English sounds courectly, the main cause of having problems with some sounds was the lack of practicing Only 4 students say that nobody corrects their pronunciation because the others are often received the help from their leachers and fiends, Most of the studenls (92 students) agree that they dare to ask their eachers and ftiends for help when they have problems It is clear that students are aware of their problems ard confident to ask for the help and eager to achieve better prorumciation

3.2.3 The solutions to the problem

4.2.3.1 Students’ self correctian

‘When asked about what they should do to produce Tinglish sounds correctly, 100 students agreed that they should practice as much as possible, It is understandable because practice is perfect In addition, most of the stndents agreed with the ways such as asking teachers and friends for help, practicing when possible, and learning Pronunciation on Intemnet, In contrast, students did not agree with recording for self-correcting and attending English extra pronunciation courses because these two ways are time-consuming and expensive as well ‘Ihe

following figures were presented in the lable below

1 | tecard for self- correcting

3.2.3.2 Teachers’ methods in teaching pronunciation

Question 10 mentioned students’ opinions about the ways their teachers taught

pronunciation The dala was collected in the following table

Table 7: Teaching English pronunciation methods

It can be seen that all the teachers use such way as listening and imitating, minimal pair drilling, and reading aloud Tt proves that these are popular ways to teach pronunciation, Students learned to produce sounds by listening to the tape or the teacher’s voice and imitating by reading

in chorus ar individually ‘The minimal pairs were designed in the textbook in each unit,

‘Vherefore, minimal pair drills were chosen by all students 57 students agreed that their teacher

used tongue twister to teach pronunciation Sindenls practiced by teading the senlences in the

textbook However, 96, 97, even 98 students say “no” with listening activities, visual aids, and playing games

3.2.3.3, Students’ expectation from their teachers’ mcthods in teaching pronunciation

Question [1 is shont students’ expectation rom their te

chors’ methods thal help to

improve their pronunciation

studenis agree students disagree

Listen and imitate 100 0

Minimal pair drills 100 0

Tabie 8: Satdents' expectation from their teachers’ methods in teaching prommeiation

It can be seen that the methods of listening and repeating, minimal pair duilling and reading aloud were applied in teaching pronunciation and all students agreed that they were good and common methods The teachers can use them when teaching pronunciation as they do not require any teaching faeilitics, Students only listen to teachcr’s pronunciation and practice 83 students expected to be taught pronunciation with visual aids such as pictures and VCD which help them