A study on common pronunciation mistakes faced by students of english faculty at thuongmai university

THUONGMAI UNIVERSITY ENGLISH FACULTY ---GRADUATION PAPER A STUDY ON COMMON PRONUNCIATION MISTAKES FACED BY STUDENTS OF ENGLISH FACULTY AT THUONGMAI UNIVERSITY... LIST OF TABLES AND FIG

THUONGMAI UNIVERSITY ENGLISH FACULTY

-GRADUATION PAPER

A STUDY ON COMMON PRONUNCIATION MISTAKES FACED

BY STUDENTS OF ENGLISH FACULTY AT THUONGMAI

UNIVERSITY.

HANOI - 2020

In the integration period with the current trend of globalization, foreignlanguages, especially English, plays an extremely important role, a powerfulsupport for the construction of a global shared house More importantly, thanks toforeign languages, each of us has the opportunity to integrate into the world, learnfrom the experience and quintessence of human civilization, thereby developing ourown strengths

Today in Vietnam, many universities and colleges have conductedprofessional content teaching in English as well as the standard of foreign languageoutput (popularly English) for graduates and the University Thuongmai University

is no exception

In fact, most Vietnamese students in general and Thuongmai University'sstudents in particular, have a good training in grammar and vocabulary But manystudents are still not confident enough to communicate in English due to the fear ofbeing wrong There are many reasons for this, the first is due to students' incorrectpronunciation, and they do not understand the pronunciation rules This not onlymakes students not confident enough to speak, but also affects other skills Thisleads to inefficient English learning Results of a survey of 50 students with unequallanguage skills, coming from many regions across the country showed that allstudents have pronunciation errors

In this graduation thesis, I focus on highlighting common pronunciationerrors, related to tail pronunciation, phonics, pronunciation of difficult sounds, wordstress, stress and intonation of sentences At the same time, analyzing andunderstanding the objective and subjective causes leading to false pronunciation.From that, offering some solutions to solve this problem, I hope that in the nearfuture, the pronunciation of Thuongmai University's students will be improved

In order to complete this Graduation Paper, I have received a large amount ofassistance, guidance and encouragement from my teachers and friends

Firstly, I don’t know how to express my thanks to my beloved supervisor, Ms

Le Thi Tuyet Nga who has supported me a lot to fulfill this study, her greatguidance, precious comments and continuous encouragement from the beginningand through the study process Without her help, I could not finish my graduationpaper

Secondly, I particularly express my thankfulness to 50 students of EnglishFaculty in Thuongmai University for cooperation and enthusiastic help in recordingand answering questions

Thirdly, I owe all the lecturers of English Faculty at Thuongmai University agreat deal, because they have taught me a lot throughout the valuable lessons on theamphitheater

Lastly, sending my gratitude to my family and friends always supported andencouraged me to complete this paper as well as possible

I am glad all of those who supported for my graduation paper And I have avery great honors to receive any comments from readers

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS v

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES vi

CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY 1

1.1 Rationale 1

1.2 Previous studies 1

1.3 Aims of the study 3

1.4 Research subject 3

1.5 Scope of the study 3

1.6 Research methodology 3

1.6.1 Data collection instruments 3

1.6.2 Data collection procedures 4

1.6.3 Data analysis procedures 4

1.7 Organization of the study 4

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 6

2.1 English pronunciation 6

2.1.1 Definition of pronunciation 6

2.1.2 The importance of pronunciation 6

2.1.3 Aspects of pronunciation 7

2.2 Pronunciation mistakes 16

2.2.1 Definition of pronunciation mistakes 16

2.2.2 Common pronunciation mistakes made by Vietnamese learners 16

2.3 Solutions for improving pronunciation skill 18

2.3.1 Practicing Difficult Phonemes and Syllables 18

2.3.2 Studying English pronunciation 19

2.3.3 Mimicking English Sounds 20

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH FINDINGS 21

3.2 Subjects 21

3.3 Design of questionnaire 21

3.3.1 Design of survey questionnaire 21

3.3.2 Aim of the survey questionnaire 21

3.4 Research findings 22

3.4.1 Data analysis 22

3.4.2 Summary 31

CHAPTER 4: RECOMMENDATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS 32

4.1 Suggestions for improving pronunciation skill and further research 32

4.1.1 Suggestions for improving pronunciation skill 32

4.1.2 Further research 33

4.2 Some suggested books for learners to research on pronunciation 33

4.2.1 English pronunciation in use 33

4.2.2 Mastering the American accent 34

4.2.3 Ship or Sheep? 35

4.2.4 American Accent Training 36

CONCLUSION 37

REFERERENCES vii

APPENDIX viii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Figure 2.1: Articulatory phonetics 7

Figure 2.2: Bilabial articulation 9

Figure 2.3: Classification of English consonants (Cawley, 1996) 11

Figure 2.4: Palato-alveolars 13

Figure 2.5: Velar articulation 13

Figure 2.6: Primary cardinal vowels 15

Chart 3.1: The most favorite skill of first year English major students 22

Chart 3.2: The percentages of important factors in speaking 23

Chart 3.3: The importance of pronunciation in English speaking 24

Chart 3.4: Student’s interest in pronunciation 25

Chart 3.5: Sounds that students found harder to pronounce 25

Chart 3.6: Student’s frequency of making pronunciation mistakes 26

Chart 3.7: Students’ common pronunciation mistakes 27

Table 3.1: Percentage of ending sounds faced by students of English Faculty 28

Chart 3.8: Reasons for difficulties when pronouncing ending sounds 29

Chart 3.9: Students’ opinions on pronunciation and speaking skill solutions 30

CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY 1.1 Rationale

In today's society, learning a foreign language has become an essential need ofeveryone Learning a language includes the practice of listening - speaking - readingand writing skills, in which pronunciation is an important part of language learning.This study concerns to mistakes of learners' English pronunciation

Pronunciation is a skill which definitely plays an important part in learning alanguage Poorly pronounced people will not confident enough to be able tocommunicate Learning without using it is not considered learning and does notresult in foreign language learning because the purpose of language learning is tocommunicate Therefore, pronunciation practice should be more focused in theprocess of teaching and learning English from high school to university

These are the reasons why I chose the topic “A study on commonpronunciation mistakes faced by students of English Faculty at ThuongmaiUniversity” for my graduation paper Showing common mistakes, identifying thecauses and proposing some solutions to deal with the pronunciation mistakes, wehope to help students understand deeply about the issues that they have not noticedbefore Thereby improving the status of false pronunciation of the majority ofstudents at the TMU

1.2 Previous studies

According to Elkhair Muhammad Idriss Hassan (English Language

are a lot of people with strong desire to learn and speak English with correctpronunciation In Sudan, there is a large number of interested groups in the subject;among them are the students of English language at Sudan University of Scienceand Technology However, there are many barriers that hinder them to speak withgood English pronunciation

Many studies have demonstrated that the errors made by the speakers of otherlanguages, who speak English, are something systematic rather than random Moosa(1972) and Homeidan (1984) demonstrated that Arab students face problem in the

(Ronald Carter and David Nunan, 2001) (O’Connor, 2003) noted that the errors ofpronunciation that learners of English from different language backgrounds makeare systematic and not accidental So they concluded that the main problem of thespeakers of other languages who speak English, is substitution of sounds i.e theysubstitute the sounds that they don’t have in their native language, with othersounds which are close to them in the place of articulation e.g they replace /p/with /b/, /θ/ with /s/, etc.

Although the same problem exists in the pronunciation of most of theSudanese Students of English (SSEs), all the studies above were done outsideSudan

E.g for speakers of German, Italian, Spanish etc On the other hand, somestudies have been conducted as mentioned above, but on the Arab student’s e.g forthe students of English in Saudi Arabia So that is why this research was intended tofill a certain gap Thus, perhaps mispronunciation of sounds replacements ofproblematic sounds is explored The research is seeking to study such problems ofpronunciation

E.g the mispronunciation of some sounds and the shifting of particular soundswith others and to try to find what are the exact reasons for such errors i.e are theseerrors related to the mother tongue interference, sound system differences betweenthe native and the foreign language, moreover to study the influence of spelling onthe pronunciation, then see to what extent the inconsistency of some English soundseffects on the pronunciation So this study is an attempt to study such problems in aSudanese context because substitution of sounds such as /θ/, /ð/, /p/ is expected inthe pronunciation of many Sudanese students of English, this is because the studentsdon’t have 32 such sounds in their mother tongue language i.e (Sudanese SpokenArabic) The importance of this study comes from the perspective that all theprevious studies, addressed the problem among speakers of European languagessuch as German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese etc and Asian languages

E.g Chinese and Thai There are also some studies on pronunciation errorsamong speakers of Arabic So this study is discussing the same problem, but for thespeakers of Sudanese Spoken Arabic as a form of Arabic in Sudan The study also

aims at helping the Sudanese students of English improve their pronunciation usingthe modern techniques and aids in learning language e.g internet, audio aids such as(CDs, tapes, and TV).

1.3 Aims of the study

Helping students of English Faculty at TMU realize about pronunciationproblems that they faced to

The study is aim to:

 Figure out the general pronunciation mistakes that often met of students atEnglish Faculty of TMU

 Suggesting some solutions to eliminate those mistakes then improvingpronunciation skill

1.4 Research subject

Realizing that students of English Faculty at TMU’s pronunciation skill is notgood enough This is main reason why they often make many mistakes whenpronouncing As a result, their communicating is difficult and limited

Thus, the author chose: “A study on common pronunciation mistakes faced bystudents of English Faculty at Thuongmai University” to be research subject

1.5 Scope of the study

During studying English process, listening, speaking, reading and writing arefour essential skills for learners There are many different documents that require agreat deal of time and effort but time is so limited Therefore, this research cannotcover all English skills It only focus speaking skill as well as the commonpronunciation mistakes that students of English Faculty at TMU often met Theauthor hopes this study will be a useful document for all students to improve theirpronunciation and become more confident when communicating

1.6 Research methodology

1.6.1 Data collection instruments

In order to answer research-related issues as well as to collect survey datafrom the research object (students), a questionnaire was designed

These survey questions focus on analyzing mistakes, figure out solutions for

The questionnaire was carefully designed with reference from previousresearch authors and instructors The questionnaire was sent to 50 students in a class

of the English Faculty

Moreover, in order to find out the mistakes when pronouncing, and analyzethem correctly, the author has conducted the survey through using primary data.After finishing the survey and collecting data, the author proceeded to analyzethe mistakes, classify the questions and find popular mistakes through the dataobtained

1.6.2 Data collection procedures

Stage 1: The researcher created a questionnaire and sent it to the supervisor.From the opinion of the supervisor, the researcher adjusted and completed aquestionnaire concerns to the research

Stage 2: The researcher carried out the survey by sending the questionnaire toeach student in a class of English Department The researcher clearly presented theaim of the survey for those students understand and answer honestly andenthusiastically Thanks to it, the researcher has collected the most accurateanswers

Stage 3: The researcher synthesizes data from the survey and has generalcomments

1.6.3 Data analysis procedures

The study focuses on the difficulties when speaking English of students of theEnglish Department at TMU Through this study the researcher wants to find outthe answers for three questions:

TMU?

1.7 Organization of the study

The study consists of four main chapters:

CHAPTER 1 - “OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY”

This chapter shows the rationale, previous studies ad aims of the study.Besides, it provides the research subjects, scope, methodology and the organization

of the study

CHAPTER 2 - “LITERATURE REVIEW”

This chapter aims to clarify the theory of pronunciation skill and its features CHAPTER 3 - “RESEARCH FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION”

Basing on the data collection from survey questionnaire, the issues will beanalyzed in depth in order to provide realistic information about some commonmistakes of English major’s students

This chapter also offers some suggestions to avoid student’s pronunciationproblems which are mentioned above and solutions in order to help students havegood pronunciation

CHAPTER 4 – “RECOMMENDATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS”

The results from the investigation about some pronunciation problems of

English Faculty students at Thuongmai University will be concluded in this part.

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 English pronunciation

2.1.1 Definition of pronunciation

words Most people speak the dialect of standard English with an accent thatbelongs to the part of the country they come from or live in Learners of BritishEnglish commonly hear RP (received pronunciation), which is an accent often used

on the BBC and other news media and in some course materials for languagelearners, but it is also common to hear a variety of regional accents of English fromacross the world

is spoken This may refer to generally agreed-upon sequences of sounds used inspeaking a given word or language in a specific dialect ("correct pronunciation"), orsimply the way a particular individual speaks a word or language

in a most inclusive sense, the form in which the elementary symbols of language,the segmental phonemes or speech sounds, appear and are arranged in patterns ofpitch, loudness, and duration

2.1.2 The importance of pronunciation

As mentioned above, pronunciation is extremely important in speaking Manypeople ignore pronunciation when speaking English, especially students They takefurther notice of word meanings while pronunciation is considered as the mostessential factor in speaking The others cannot understand if words are pronouncedwrong Therefore, so as to speak English fluently, pronunciation should be paidmore attention to Furthermore, right pronunciation can help with the process ofacquiring new vocabulary Pronouncing words is often a part of memorizing them

in second-language learning, so getting a strong, basic foundation in correctpronunciation early on will equate to more effective learning overall

According to AMP Fact sheets of AMP Research Centre, “Learners with good pronunciation in English are more likely to be understood even if they make errors

in other areas, whereas learners whose pronunciation is difficult to understand will not be understood, even if their grammar is perfect” and “Yet many adult learners find pronunciation one of the most difficult aspects of English to acquire, and need explicit help from the teacher (Morley 1994; Fraser 2000) Surveys of student needs consistently show that our learners feel the need for pronunciation work in class (egg Willing 1989) Thus some sort of pronunciation work in class is essential”

From Higgs Graph of Learner Needs, pronunciation is something that is veryimportant to beginners It allows them to feel more comfortable when speaking.Obliviously, no one can deny the importance of pronunciation It considered as one

of the most significant factors in English speaking

Hence, students should take pronunciation into account in order to have goodspeaking

2.1.3 Aspects of pronunciation

2.1.3.1 Articulatory phonetics

Figure 2.1: Articulatory phonetics

how the sounds of speech are made with the organs of the vocal tract” Ogden(2009:173)

consonants These are voice, place and manner respectively Each of these will now

be discussed separately, although all three areas combine together in the production

of speech

A Voice:

In English we have both voiced and voiceless sounds A sound fits into one ofthese categories according to how the vocal folds behave when a speech sound isproduced

a Voiced: Voiced sounds are sounds that involve vocal fold vibrations when

they are produced Examples of voiced sounds are /b, d, v, m/.

If you place two fingers on either side of the front of your neck, just belowyour jawbone, and produce a sound, you should be able to feel a vibrating sensation.This tells you that a sound is voiced

b Voiceless: Voiceless sounds are sounds that are produced with no vocal

fold vibration Examples of voiceless sounds in English are /s, t, p, f/.

B Place

The vocal tract is made up of different sections, which play a pivotal role inthe production of speech These sections are called articulators and are what makespeech sounds possible They can be divided into two types

The active articulator is the articulator that moves towards another articulator

in the production of a speech sound This articulator moves towards anotherarticulator to form a closure of some type in the vocal tract (i.e openapproximation, close, etc.)

The passive articulator is the articulator that remains stationary in theproduction of a speech sound Often, this is the destination that the active articulatormoves towards (i.e the hard palate)

I will now talk about the different places of articulation in the vocal tract:

a Bilabial: Bilabial sounds involve the upper and lower lips In the production

of a bilabial sound, the lips come into contact with each other to form an effective

constriction In English, /p, b, m/ are bilabial sounds.

Figure 2.2: Bilabial articulation

b Labiodental: Labiodental sounds involve the lower lip (labial) and upperteeth (dental) coming into contact with each other to form an effective constriction

in the vocal tract Examples of labiodental sounds in English are /f, v/ Labiodental

sounds can be divided into two types: Endo Labial and Exo Labial

c Dental: Dental sounds involve the tongue tip (active articulator) makingcontact with the upper teeth to form a constriction Examples of Dental sounds in

English are / θ, ð/ If a sound is produced where the tongue is between the upper

and lower teeth, it is attributed the term ‘interdental’

d Alveolar: First of all, before I explain what an alveolar sound is, it’s useful

to locate the alveolar ridge itself If you place your tongue just behind your teethand move it around, you’ll feel a bony sort of ridge This is known as the alveolarridge Alveolar sounds involve the front portion of the tongue making contact withthe alveolar ridge to form an effective constriction in the vocal tract Examples of

alveolar sounds in English are /t, d, n, l, s/.

e Postalveolar: Postalveolar sounds are made a little further back (‘post’)from the alveolar ridge A postalveolar sound is produced when the blade of thetongue comes into contact with the post-alveolar region of your mouth Examples of

post-alveolar sounds in English are / ʃ, ʒ /.

f Palatal: Palatal sounds are made with the tongue body (the big, fleshy part

of your tongue) The tongue body raises up towards the hard-palate in your mouth(the dome shaped roof of your mouth) to form an effective constriction An example

of a palatal sounds in English is /j/, usually spelt as [y].

g Velar: Velar sounds are made when the back of the tongue (tongue dorsum)raises towards the soft palate, which is located at the back of the roof of the mouth.This soft palate is known as the velum An effective constriction is then formedwhen these two articulators come into contact with each other Examples of velar

sounds in English are /k, g, ŋ /.

C Manner

In simple terms, the manner of articulation refers to the way a sound is made,

as opposed to where it’s made Sounds differ in the way they are produced Whenthe articulators are brought towards each other, the flow of air differs according tothe specific sound type For instance, the airflow can be completely blocked off ormade turbulent

a Stop articulations:

Stop articulations are sounds that involve a complete closure in the vocal tract.The closure is formed when two articulators come together to prevent air escapingbetween them Stop articulations can be categorized according to the kind of airflowinvolved The type of airflow can be oral (plosives) or nasal (nasals) I will now talkabout both plosives and nasals separately

Plosives are sounds that are made with a complete closure in the oral (vocal)tract The velum is raised during a plosive sound, which prevents air from escaping

via the nasal cavity English plosives are the sounds /p, b, t, d, k, g/ Plosives can be

held for quite a long time and are thus also called ‘maintainable stops’

Nasals are similar to plosives in regards to being sounds that are made with acomplete closure in the oral (vocal) tract However, the velum is lowered duringnasal sounds, which allows airflow to escape through the nasal cavity There are 3

nasal sounds that occur in English /m, n, ŋ/

b Fricatives:

Fricative sounds are produced by narrowing the distance between the active andpassive articulators causing them to be in close approximation This causes the airflow

to become turbulent when it passes between the two articulators involved in producing

a fricative sound English fricatives are sounds such as / f, v, θ, ð, s, z, ʃ, ʒ /

c Approximants:

Approximant sounds are created by narrowing the distance between the twoarticulators Although, unlike fricatives, the distance isn’t wide enough to create

turbulent airflow English has 4 approximant sounds which are /w, j, r, l/.

2.1.3.2 Consonant and vowel sounds

A Consonant sounds

a Definition:

According to the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Encyclopedic (1992:192),consonants are “speech sounds made by completely or partly stopping the flow ofair breathed out through the mouth”

the alphabet that represents a speech sound produced by a partial or completeobstruction of the air stream by a constriction of the speech organs”

In English phonetics and phonology (Peter Roach, 2000:10), the termconsonant can be defined as: “sounds in which there is obstruction to the flow of air

as it passes the larynx to the lips” The production of sounds, consonant wasdefined: “Consonant sounds are the sounds, in the production of which onearticulator moves towards another or two articulators come together obstructing theair stream and the air stream can’t get out freely.”

b Classification of consonants:

Figure 2.3: Classification of English consonants (Cawley, 1996).

In order to form consonants, the air-stream through the vocal cords must beobstructed in some way Therefore, consonants are often classified by being given aso-called VPM-label VPM stands for Voicing, Place and Manner:

voiceless

obstructed

c The place of articulation:

in the articulation of consonants It describes the point at which the articulatorsactually touch or are at their closet

consonants are listed in the table below

Bilabials: are the sounds made with the two lips pressed together or coming

together, including: /p/, /b/, /m/, /w/

Labiodentals: are the sounds which are produced with the lower lip touching

the upper front teeth, including: /f/, /v/

Dentals: are the sounds which are produced with the tip or blade of the tongue

touching the upper front teeth, including: /θ/, /ð/

Alveolars: are the sounds which are produced with the tip or blade of the

tongue touching or approaching the alveolar ridge, including: /t/, /d/, /s/, /z/, /n/, /l/

Retroflex: is the sound which is produced with the tip of the tongue curling

back towards the back of the alveolar ridge, including: /r/

Palato-alveolars: are the sounds which are produced with the tongue tip or

blade coming close to the area between the back of the alveolar ridge and the front

of the hard palate, including: /ʃ/, /ʒ/, /tʃ/, /dʒ/

Figure 2.4: Palato-alveolars Palatal: is the sound which is produced with the front of the tongue coming

close to the hard palate, including: /j/

Velars: are the sound which is produced with the back of the tongue touching

the soft palate, including: /k/, /g/, /ŋ/

Figure 2.5: Velar articulation Glottal: are the sound which is produced without the active use of the tongue

and other parts of the mouth, including: /h/

d The manner of articulation

Plosives: are the sounds, which are produced with the air-stream being stopped

in the oral cavity and the soft palate is raised blocking off the nasal cavity Then thetwo articulators come apart quickly and the air escapes through the oral tract E.g

/p/, /b/, /t/, /d/, /k/, /g/

Nasals: they are produced with the airstream being stopped in the oral cavity

but the soft palate is down so that the air can go out through the nose E.g /m/, /n/, / ŋ/

Fricatives: are the sounds in the production of which two articulators come

close together but there is still a small opening between them so the air-stream is

partially obstructed and an audible friction noise is produced E.g /f/, /v/, /θ/, /ð/, /s/, /z/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/, /h/

Affricates: are the sounds, which are produced when a plosive is immediately

followed by a fricative In other words, affricates are a combination of a plosive and

a fricative They begin like a plosive, with a complete closure, but instead of aplosive, they have a very slow release, moving backwards to a place where a

friction can be heard (palate-alveolar) E.g /tʃ/, /dʒ/

Lateral: is the sound which is made when the air-stream is obstructed at a

point along the center of the oral tract, with incomplete closure between one or bothsides of the tongue and the roof of the mouth There is only one lateral in English,

/l/ It occurs in two versions, the so-called “clear l” before vowels, “light”, “long”,

and the “dark l” in other cases, “milk”, “ball”

Approximants: are the sounds in the production of which two articulators

come close together but without the vocal tract being narrowed to such an extent

that a friction noise is produced /w/, /r/, /j/

e State of vocal cords (voicing):

Voiced consonants: are produced when the vocal cords are vibrating E.g /b/, /

 Vowels are the type of sounds that depend mainly on the variations in theposition of the tongue They are normally voiced

b Classification of vowels:

Vowel sounds are classified according to: the position of the tongue in themouth, the openness of the mouth, the shape of the lips, and the length of thevowels

The position of the tongue in the mouth:

 Front vowels are the ones in the production of which the front part of the

tongue is raised the highest such as: [i:], [ i], [e].

 When the central part of the tongue maintains its highest position, the

vowels thus produced are central vowels such as: [ɜː], [ə].

 If the back of the tongue is held the highest, the vowels thus produced are

back vowels such as: [u:], [u]

The openness of the mouth:

 Close vowels: [u:], [u], [i:], and [i]

 Semi-close vowels: [e], [ɜː]

 Semi-open vowels: [e],

 Open vowels: [e], [ʌ], [ɑː]

The shape of the lips:

 Rounded vowels: All the back vowels in English are rounded except [ɑː]

 Unrounded vowels: All the front vowels and central vowels in English areunrounded

The length of vowels:

 Long vowels: The are usually marked with a colon such as: [i:] and [ɑː]

 Short vowels: other vowels are short vowels such as: [e], [e], [e].

2.2 Pronunciation mistakes

2.2.1 Definition of pronunciation mistakes

Learning English is so hard, so that many learners try to make the soundsbeing the same and close to these sounds of native speakers However, students wholearn English as a second language, still make many mistakes when pronouncing

According to Richman’ share “pronunciation problems often do lead to conversation breakdowns" and "There are two key problems in pronunciation teaching Firstly, it tends to be neglected not because of teachers' lack of interest in the subject, but rather to a feeling of doubts as to how to teach it Many experienced teachers would admit to lack of theory of pronunciation and they may therefore feel the need to improve their practical skills in pronunciation teaching Secondly, when it's not neglected, it tends to be reactive to a particular problem that has arisen in the classroom rather than being strategically planned In addition, through my experience as a teacher as well as a teacher trainer who observed several lessons.”

In short, in the course of learning English, students may encounter manycommon mistakes However, learners who learn more about phonetics, they canrecognize and correct these errors

2.2.2 Common pronunciation mistakes made by Vietnamese learners

2.2.2.1 Ending sound errors:

Neglecting the ending sounds is the most common mistake that every Englishlearner encounters Common ending sounds like [s, t, d ] are very common inEnglish and a way to distinguish many words Therefore, when readers forget them,there are many cases that lead to misunderstandings

E.g When listening, other person cannot distinguish “wife”, “wide” or

“white” if speaker doesn’t use ending sound

E.g

Attribute: /ˈætrɪbjuːt/ (NOUN) is a characteristic of something.

/əˈtrɪbjuːt/ (VERB) means “to express that something was created by someone”.

 Address: /ˈædrɛs/ (NOUN) is the name of the place where you live (in the

is this that leads to the boredom of speaking and the regularity without intonation

E.g Focusing (to show what information in the utterance is new and what is

already known)

“I saw a ↘man in the garden” answers "Whom did you see?”.

“I ↘saw a man in the garden” answers “What happened?”

2.2.2.4 Localization of pronunciation:

Because of the same Latin alphabet, there are many similarities betweenEnglish writing and pronunciation This is both a benefit and a disadvantage forEnglish learners

E.g

+/ô/ for /əʊ/ Example: Home, phone

+ /ao/ for /aʊ/ Example: House

+/d/ or /đ/ for /ð/ For example: that, this

+ /th/ for /θ/ example: they

+ /p/, /t/, /k/ are usually pronounced in the Vietnamese language withoutblowing out

2.2.2.5 Concatenation errors:

Concatenation is very important in English, making speech smooth andcreating intonation, but this is not available in Vietnamese Therefore, it is easy tounderstand when 95% of the surveyed students make a non-connecting error