Hiết kế bài tập bổ trợ dạy phụ âm tắc xát dựa trên giáo trình english pronunciation in use của mark hancock cho sinh viên năm thứ nhất chuyên anh tại trường cđsp lạng sơn

=***= PHẠM THANH MAI DESIGNING SUPPLEMENTARY EXERCISES IN TEACHING AFFRICATIVE SOUNDS THROUGH THE BOOK “ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION IN USE” BY MARK HANCOCK TO THE FIRST-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR

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PHẠM THANH MAI

DESIGNING SUPPLEMENTARY EXERCISES

IN TEACHING AFFRICATIVE SOUNDS

THROUGH THE BOOK “ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION IN USE”

BY MARK HANCOCK TO THE FIRST-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT LANG SON TEACHERS’ TRAINING COLLEGE

THIẾT KẾ BÀI TẬP BỔ TRỢ DẠY PHỤ ÂM TẮC XÁT DỰA TRÊN GIÁO TRÌNH

“ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION IN USE” CỦA MARK HANCOCK CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM

THỨ NHẤT CHUYÊN ANH TẠI TRƯỜNG CĐSP LẠNG SƠN

(M.A MINOR THESIS)

Field: English Methodology Code: 60 14 10

Supervisor: Dr Dương Thị Nụ

Hanoi, 2010

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements ……… ii

Abstract ……… iii

Table of contents ……… iv

List of Abbreviation ……… vii

List of figures, charts and tables ……… viii

Part A INTRODUCTION ……… 1

1 Rationale ……… 1

2 Aims of the study ……… 2

3 Research questions ……… 3

4 Scope of the study ……… 3

5 Methods of the study ……… 3

6 Design of the study ……… 4

Part B DEVELOPMENT ……… 5

Chapter I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ……… 5

1.1 Teaching pronunciation ……….……… 5

1.1.1 Importance of teaching pronunciation in EFL teaching ……… 5

1.1.1 Problems in teaching pronunciation ……… 6

1.2 Affricative sounds ……… 7

1.2.1 Definition ……… 7

1.2.2 Description of affricative sounds ……… 7

1.2.3 Learners’ problems with affricates ……… 9

1.2.3.1 Distribution/ Absence of sounds ……… 9

1.2.3.2 Spelling pronunciation ……… 10

1.2.3.3 Syllable types ……… 10

1.3 Materials Evaluation ……… 11

1.3.1 What is Materials Evaluation ……… 12

1.3.2 Criteria for Materials Evaluation ……… 12

1.3.2.1 Criteria by Brian Tomlinson ……… 12

1.3.2.2 Criteria by Hutchinson & Walters ……… ……… 12

1.3.3 Types of Evaluation ……… 13

1.4 Materials adaptation ……… 14

1.4.1 Reasons for adaptation ……… … 15

1.4.2 Objectives for adaptation ……… ……… 15

1.4.3 Techniques for adaptation ……… 16

Chapter II: THE STUDY ……… 17

2.1 Subjects ……… 17

2.2 Context ……… 17

2.2.1 The current situation of English teaching and learning at LSTC ………… 17

2.2.2 Teachers ……… 18

2.2.2.1 Description ……… 18

2.2.2.2 Teacher analysis ……… 19

2.2.3 Learners ……… 21

2.2.3.1 Description ……… 21

2.2.3.2 Learner analysis ……… 21

2.3 Summary ……… 29

Chapter III: SUPPLEMENTARY EXERCISES ……… 30

3.1 Brief evaluation of current coursebook ……… ……….…… 30

3.1.1 Objectives of the material ……… 30

3.1.2 Organization and design ……… 31

3.1.3 Activities and exercises ……… 32

3.1.4 Methodology ……… 33

3.1.5 Summary ……… 34

3.2 Proposed supplementary exercises ……… 34

3.3 Suggestions for teachers and answer key ……… 38

3.4 Summary ……… 38

Part C CONCLUSION ……… 39

1 Conclusion ……… 39

2 Limitations of the study ……… 40

3 Recommendation for further research ……… 40

REFERENCES ……… 41 APPENDICES ……… I Appendix 1 Suggestions for teachers and answers for exercises ……… II Appendix 2 Questionnaires ……… VII

Appendix 3 Unit 12 in “English pronunciation in Use” by Mark Hancock ……… XI

LIST OF ABBREVIATION

EFL: English Foreign Language

ICT : Information Communication Technology LSTC: Lang Son Teachers’ training College

M.A Master of Arts

OHP Overhead Projector

PPP Presentation, Practice, Production

RP Received Pronunciation

VNU: Viet Nam National University

ULIS: University of Language & International Studies

LIST OF FIGURES, CHARTS AND TABLES

Figures:

Figure 1: The position of the tongue in the production of /tʃ/ and /dʒ/

Figure 2,3: Section of stop phase of /tʃ, dʒ/

Charts:

Chart 1: Frequency students dealt with pronunciation at high school

Chart 2: Students’ exposure of spoken English in class

Chart 3: Students’ views on the importance of pronunciation

Chart 4: Students’ purposes of pronunciation

Chart 5: Frequency of students’ pronunciation practice

Chart 6: Methods of students’ pronunciation practice

Chart 7: The ways students do exercises

Chart 8: Students’ ability in reading phonemic transcription

Chart 9: Students’ ability in writing phonemic transcription

Chart 10: The sounds students find the most difficult/ the easiest to pronounce

Tables:

Table 1: Possible final clusters with affricative sounds

Table 2: Students’ difficulties in speaking English

Table 3: Students’ evaluation to the current coursebook

Table 4 : Student’s choices of correct sounds

Despite the importance of pronunciation and teaching pronunciation to EFL students, this aspect is less taken into consideration and takes much of teachers‘ ignorance in the EFL classes - an idea shared by Kelly (1996) who dubs pronunciation the ―Cinderella‖ area of foreign language teaching This fact affects students' learning and they take little concern for pronunciation Consequently, many students have poor knowledge of this aspect They often make mistakes in articulating English sounds and they find it difficult to capture correct pronunciation

The above- mentioned matters are really true to the English teaching and learning situation in Lang Son teachers‘ training college (LSTC) Many English major students have trouble with pronunciation, especially with the English sounds As a result, there are various problems arising to the students Firstly, because of the differences between sound systems of English and Vietnamese, some English sounds do not exist in Vietnamese and vice versa and thus many students do not know how to correctly pronounce some certain sounds such as /θ/,

/ð/, /tʃ/, /dʒ/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/ … and some other vowels Secondly, ―each sound of English is

represented by more than one written letter or by sequences of letters‖ and ―any letter of English represents more than one sound, or it may not represent any sound at all‖ (Paul,

1991:5) for example /tʃ/ in chip, future, watch ; /dʒ/ in jam, general, age, fridge or /g/ in

giggle, /ʒ/ in gigolo, /dʒ/ in giant …, the confusion among some sounds /dʒ/, /z/, /ʒ/ or / ʃ/,

/s/ frequently happens to these students who can scarcely be able to clearly distinguish these sounds from others

It's believed that this problematic issue results from teachers‘ ignorance and the fact that they wonder what and how to teach The teachers entirely depend on the course book and there is almost no creation or supplementary exercises for students‘ practice Besides, the teachers sometimes find it really difficult to apply the exercises in order to help students with pronunciation practice These crucial factors restrict students to improve their knowledge of pronunciation

To solve the problem, some researchers have designed pronunciation syllabuses for their own colleges In LSTC, the book ―Pronunciation in Use‖ written by Mark Hancock is used as course book However, there are only 45 periods of the whole course for this subject

so it is impossible to cover all the features of pronunciation From the fact that the students‘

“inaccurate of a phoneme can lead to misunderstanding‖ (G Kelly, 2006: 11) and that sound

is considered as the core of language, the system of English sounds is chosen as prior part presented to students But the system of English sound exposes problems to students as stated above Therefore, the researcher decides to choose a particular pair of English sounds - affricates - which challenge students when they are dealing with the system of English sounds in order to make an attempt to design the supplementary exercises for these consonants with the hope that it can help improve students‘ pronunciation, bring about the teachers‘ orientation and concerns over the pronunciation lessons as well as make their lessons more effective and interesting Furthermore, it can be a model for teachers to design exercises for teaching other sounds

2 Aims of the study

From the fact of teaching and learning pronunciation in EFL classes, there apparently exist limitations for both teachers and learners when dealing with this aspect With the hope of bringing about a small contribution to the matter of teaching and learning pronunciation in her own situation of researcher‘s, the study aims to:

- Address a particular pair of English sounds: The affricates

- Make some contrastive analysis of English and Vietnamese consonant sounds

- Find out the difficulties students meet when pronouncing affricative sounds /tʃ/ and /dʒ/

- Evaluate the course book ― English Pronunciation in Use‖ in terms of a single section

―Letters and sounds‖

- Propose a certain number of exercises on affricate sounds for the first - year English major students at LSTC

3 Research questions

To target the aims of the study, the following research questions are addressed:

(1) What difficulties do students have in dealing with affricative sounds?

(2) How suitable is the system of English sound in the course book ―English Pronunciation in Use‖ for English major students at LSTC?

(3) What are supplementary exercises for affricative sounds?

4 Scope of the study

Obviously, pronunciation covers different features: segmentals (individual sounds) and suprasegmentals ( intonation and stress) We must bear in mind that the sounds are considered

as the preliminary enquiry in teaching and learning pronunciation and they are also concerned

in teaching other aspect like vocabulary or teaching speaking skill However, the researcher does not have ambition to include the whole English sound system because it is a really time- consuming and complex matter Otherwise, the researcher would like to take only affricates - two complex consonant sounds - which cause difficulties for students to do a different job from the previous researchers': design the supplementary exercises with the hope that it could

be not only an improvement in reality of teaching and learning pronunciation but also the sample to design exercises for teaching other sounds in the situation of LSTC and of teachers' who are concerned with the same situation

5 Methods of the study

The researcher, in this study, applies both quantitative and qualitative methods to analyze the data which are collected by means of questionnaire to both teachers and students

in LSTC and the interviews to the teachers only in order to explore the aims of the study

Besides, an important method to establish the theoretical background of the study is reviewing the related document relating to teaching pronunciation especially teaching the English sounds, the understanding of affricates as well as the exercises on English sounds to help EFL learners‘ practice is used Additionally, method of document analysis is also employed to fulfill the study

6 Design of the study

The study comprises three main parts, together with appendices:

Part A is treated as the Introduction of the study addressing rationale, aims of the

study, the research questions, scope, method as well as design of the study

Part B is considered as the main content of the study It consists of three chapters

Chapter I reviews theoretical background relating to the importance and problems of

teaching and learning pronunciation Besides, all about affricatives sounds is also mentioned such as the description of affricatives and learners‘ problems with these sounds The third section in this chapter refers to Material Evaluation Material adaptation is clearly displayed in section 4

Chapter II named The study plays a significant role of the study as it provides findings

for the next chapter This chapters describes the context, instruments for data collection and analyses of the results

Chapter III targets the goal of the study by making an evaluation of Section A Letters

and sounds in the coursebook and designing supplementary exercises of affricative sounds

Part C makes a conclusion and limitations of the study

be a mistake if there is no mention of various issues relating to teaching pronunciation to foreign language learners

1.1.1 Importance of teaching pronunciation in EFL teaching

Among the different subjects in English language teaching, pronunciation is

considered as an important component since it is ―a primary medium for communication of

information about ourselves as individual and as representatives of different groups‖

(Pennington, 1996:2) This idea is also shared by Stevick (1978, quoted in Pennington,

1996:2): “ pronunciation is the primary medium through which we bring our use of language

to the attention of other people‖

It is a common view that correct pronunciation is necessary for a speaker to communicate A learner who consistently mispronounces a range of phonemes can be extremely difficult for a speaker from another language community to understand (Kelly, 2006:11) The consequence in which a learners of foreign language is not understood when they articulate something make his process of learning meaningless Thus, according to Kelly

(2006), it can be ―very frustrating for the learner who may have a good command of grammar

and lexis but have difficulty in understanding and being understood by a native speaker.‖

Apparently, the effects of pronunciation on the successful learning output are so significant that teaching pronunciation is deservedly put in high position in teaching language Hence, for many recent years, teaching pronunciation has been taken into account due to the changes in the purpose of foreign language learning in general and English in particular

Learners take English courses for successful communication in their work and lives so they want to achieve native- like pronunciation Especially, the learners who plan to become teachers of English will want to approximate a native accent (Kenworthy, 1987) As a result, several researches carried out by Haycraft (1971), Kenworthy (1987), Brown (1991), Pennington (1996), Kelly (2000), … have appreciated the role of teaching pronunciation in EFL teaching because of different reasons However, the author of this thesis highly agrees with Kelly - an expert at teaching pronunciation - who ascertains the importance of teaching

pronunciation as follows: ―A consideration of learners‟ pronunciation errors and of how these

can inhibit successful communication is a useful basis on which to assess why it is important

to deal with pronunciation in the classroom‖ (Kelly, 2000:11)

1.1.2 Problems in teaching pronunciation

In spite of the importance of pronunciation and teaching pronunciation to EFL teaching, pronunciation is not paid attention by most of teachers, it is not thought to be equated to grammar and vocabulary and it takes teachers and students‘ ignorance

It is the fact that there are many problems arising in pronunciation teaching depending

on different teaching situations However, two key problems with pronunciation teaching seem to be true to all situations Firstly, it tends to be neglected Secondly, when it is not neglected, it tends to be reactive to a particular problem that has a risen in the classroom rather than being strategically planned (Kelly, 2000: 13)

To paraphrase the two key problems mentioned above, Kelly (2000: 13) has come into

a paradox: ―The fact that pronunciation tends to suffer from neglect may not be due to

teachers lacking interest in the subject but rather to a feeling of doubt as to how to teach it Many experienced teachers would admit to a lack of knowledge of the theory of pronunciation and they may therefore feel the need to improve their practical skills in pronunciation teaching.‖ This author also points out an absurdity that while pronunciation is a subject

bringing about the enthusiasm and benefit as it helps learners with better pronunciation, they

spend little concern learning this aspect and ―their concern with grammar and vocabulary

tends to take precedence.‖ He concludes this paradox with a statement: ―So, paradoxically, even though both teachers and learners are keen on the subject, it is often neglected‖

(Kelly, 2000: 13)

To summarize, the fact that the teachers wonder what and how to teach pronunciation

to their students is a noticeable problem because it is a determining factor towards the pronunciation learning output Therefore, good ideas for classroom activities such as suggested exercises, activities, tasks, methods or approaches of teaching… are considered as valuable resources for teachers to apply in their pronunciation teaching from which they can create the interesting and effective lessons of pronunciation

1.2 Affricative sounds

Although, English vowels exposure difficulties to Vietnamese learners, the researcher

has reasons to mention English consonants since, according to O‘Conner‘s, (1980: 24) ―There

are two good reasons for beginning with consonants rather than vowels First, consonants contribute more to making English understood than vowels do Second, consonants are generally made by a definite interference of the vocal organs with the air stream, and so are easy to describe and understand‖

Among 24 consonant sounds in English, there are only 2 complex ones- affricates- including /tʃ/ as in chug /tʃʌg/ and /dʒ/ as in jug /dʒʌg/ These affricates are post- alveolar sounds in which /tʃ/ is unvoiced and fortis; /dʒ/ is voiced and lenis

In order to make a clear description of these sounds, it is necessary to give the definition of Affricates

1.2.1 Definition

In this study, the author really appreciates Cruttenden‘s definition He defines: ―The

term „affricate‟ denotes a concept which is primarily of phonetic importance Any plosive whose release stage is performed in such a way that considerable friction occurs approximately at the point where the plosive stop is made, may be called

„ affricative‟ ‖(Cruttenden, 2001: 171) To reach this definition, only 2 English sounds /tʃ/

and /dʒ/ are satisfactory

1.2.2 Description of Affricative sounds

In the description of affricative sounds, the author is willing to refer to three basic characteristics:

Place of articulation (where in the mouth the airstream is obstructed)

To produce affricates, the soft palate is raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the obstacle to the airstream is formed by a closure made between the tip, blade, and the rims of the tongue and the upper alveolar ridge and side teeth Figure 1 illustrates the place of articulation of affricates

Fig 1: The position of the tongue in the production of /t ʃ/ and /dʒ/

Manner of articulation (the way in which the airstream is obstructed)

As Cruttendence‘s description (2001: 176), in order to articulate /tʃ/ and /dʒ/, the front

of the tongue is raised towards the hard palate in readiness for the fricative release The closure is released slowly, the air escaping in a diffuse manner over the whole of the central surface of the tongue with friction occurring between the blade of the tongue and the alveolar

Fig 2 Fig 3

Fig 2,3: Section of stop phase of /t ʃ/, /dʒ/

Degrees of voicing (whether there is vibration of the vocal cords)

Generally, voiceless sounds are made without the vibration of vocal cords whereas voice sounds are the one produced with the vibration of vocal cords In the case of affricative sounds, during both stop and fricative stages, the vocal folds are wide apart for /tʃ/, but may be vibrating for all or part of /dʒ/ according to the situation in the utterance Thus, /tʃ/ is unvoiced and /dʒ/ is voiced

1.2.3 Learners’ problems with affricates

1.2.3.1 Distribution/ Absence of sounds

As stated above, affricates / tʃ / & / dʒ / are two complex sounds in English They are complex in the way that they are sounds, in the progress of articulating, starting as stop consonants and ending as fricatives

However, Vietnamese consonant system, according to Đoàn Thiện Thuật (2003;153), comprises three main categories of sounds: stops, nasal (sonants) and fricatives This is an indication that the Vietnamese consonantal inventory does not contain the same consonants as its English counterpart Particularly, the afficates do not exist in Vietnamese languages

Naturally, the manner of articulation of stops and fricatives is quite differ from that of affricatives which Vietnamese speakers find it uneasy and unfamiliar to pronounce Instead, they tend to make these sounds similar to the ones of their native language (such as they pronounce / tʃ / as /t/ in trưa & / c / in chua

Kelly (2000:58) supposes: ―Sometimes the difficulties may be due to the absence of a

phoneme in L1‖ He also takes an example: ― Italians, for example, does not have / ʒ/, and so,

understandably, Italians may have difficulties with this phoneme in English‖ This example

entails the Vietnamese speakers‘ difficulties in articulating affricative sounds are due to the absence of these sounds in Vietnamese consonantal inventory The causes are well explained

by Avery and Ehrlich as following: ― Difficulties may arise when a learner encounters sounds

in English that are not part of the sound inventory of the learner‘s native language‖ and ― the

pronunciation of sounds depends on the proper use of the musculature in the mouth Thus adult learners may be unable to produce new sounds because they have never exercised their mouth in particular way required to pronounce certain English sounds‖ (Avery & Ehrlich,

1997: xv)

Hence, the effective way to help learners to overcome this may be to help them practice as much as possible

Beside some sounds represented by a single letter as /p/, /b/, /m/, /n/, /v/, many sounds can be represented by more than one letter or combination of letters Among these sounds, /tʃ/

& /dʒ/ can be good examples for this: / tʃ / can appear in check, temperature, question ….& /dʒ/ is shown in dangerous, jam, bridge …

In summary, the lack of sound-spelling correspondence in English makes it ―not

always easy for learners of whatever L1 to see how a written English word should be pronounced, or how a word they have only heard should be written‖ (Kelly 2000:122-3) That

is why the teachers should help learners get to grip with a different way of thinking about the relationship between written and spoken language

1.2.3.3 Syllable types

Lê Văn Lý (1948:37, quoted in Đoàn Thiện Thuật, 2003:85) comes into conclusion that a Vietnamese syllable usually has a maximum of three phonemes: C(consonant)V(vowel)C in which the vowel is always present, but there can be absence of initial or final consonant or both of them

In contrast, the syllable types such as CCVC, CCVCC, CCCVCC… are very popular

in English This is an indication that ―consonant clusters are a common feature of English,

they will come up very often in class‖, but ― Speakers of other L1s will also bring habits across into English, or find particular clusters difficult‖ (Kelly, 2000:58).Thus, the matters of

clusters should be taken into consideration in teaching English pronunciation to non-native speakers

However, when dealing with this, it is unavoidable to address / tʃ / & / dʒ /- two affricates -which are often included in consonant clusters, especially, final clusters and these clusters are usually considered as the difficult ones The following table illustrates the possible final clusters in English which contain affricates

ntʃ wrench ltʃ belch rtʃ arch ndʒ strange ldʒ bulge rdʒ barge

Table 1: Possible final clusters with affricative sounds

It‘s common view that speakers of different languages may employ different strategies

in dealing with consonant clusters which they find difficult to pronounce What about

Vietnamese learners? According to Avery & Ehrlich (1997:59), ―in pronouncing English

words with initial or final consonant clusters, Cantonese and Vietnamese speakers tend to delete one of the consonants of the cluster rather than insert a vowel‖ to make the word

conform to the pattern of the native languages of the learners By this way, our learners get used to pronouncing the word French as / fren/ instead of /frentʃ/ and also other words

Therefore, to solve this problematic area, an ESL teacher ―should focus on cluster

simplifications that are inappropriate to English‖ because ―Unlike native speakers, learners of English may simplify consonant clusters inappropriately, leading to misunderstanding or incomprehensibility‖( Avery & Ehrlich, 1997:60)

1.3 Materials Evaluation

To choose one amongst a great deal of books as a coursebook for a particular situation

in teaching and learning is quite a difficult job because there always exist differences in different contexts Therefore, in the light of Brown‘s view, an evaluation of materials is necessary to judge the appropriateness to the target students as ―there is no such a thing as a perfect textbook‖ (Brown, 1995: 166)

1.3.1 What is Materials Evaluation?

In the framework of this study, Tomlinson‘s definition takes precedence due to its

clearness and intelligibility He defines: ―Materials evaluation is a procedure that involves

measuring the value (or potential value) of a set of learning materials It involves making judgements about the effect of the materials on the people using them‖ (Tomlinson, 2003: 14)

1.3.2 Criteria for Materials Evaluation

When taking an evaluation, the evaluator must follow any particular criteria, basing on the items or the purposes he/she wants to focus on Nonetheless, the checklists of the criteria for evaluation are not similarly introduced by different scholars This section exposes two inventories of criteria introduced by B Tomlinson and Hutchinson & Walters

1.3.2.1 Criteria by Brian Tomlinson

It‘s worthy including in this part the criteria for materials evaluation which tries to measure some or all of the following:

- the appeal of the materials to the learners;

- the credibility of the materials to the learners, teachers and administrators;

- the validity of the materials (i.e is what the teach worth teaching?);

- the reliability of the materials (i.e would they have the same effect with different groups

of target learners?);

- the ability of the materials to interest the learners and teachers;

- the ability of the materials to motivate the learners;

- the values of the materials in terms of short-term learning (important, for example, for performance on tests and examinations);

- the values of the materials in terms of long-term learning ( of both language and of communication skills);

- the learners‘ perception of the value of the materials;

- the teachers‘ perception of the value of the materials;

- the assistance given to the teachers in terms of preparation, delivery and assessment;

- the flexibility of the materials (e.g., the extent to which it is easy for a teacher to adapt the materials to suit a particular context);

- the contribution made by the materials to teacher development;

- the match with administrative requirements (e.g., standardization across classes, coverage

of a syllabus, preparation for an examination)

(B Tomlinson, 2003:14)

It is the fact that, in different context, the evaluations are not the same as ―the needs,

objectives, backgrounds and preferred styles of the participants will differ from context to context‖ To carry out an evaluation, the criteria are obligatory basis on which the evaluators

depend to come to end

1 3.2.2 Criteria by Hutchinson & Waters

In comparison with Tomlinson‘s checklist, Hutchinson & Waters introduce fewer criteria one of which, although a bit different, seem to be more comprehensive and each criterion can cover one or more than one criterion in the Tomlinson‘s

By this way, Hutchinson & Waters (1993) suggest the criteria for materials evaluation as: audience, the aims, the content, the methodology, and some other criteria such as price or availability

In conclusion, applying which criteria for evaluating materials is much dependent on the evaluator‘s purpose This study, under the purpose of adapting coursebook by designing supplementary exercise, would employ some of criteria suggested by Tomlinson to make material evaluation

1.3.3 Types of Evaluation

While Tomlinson (2003) reveals three types of Materials evaluation as pre-use evaluation, whilst-use evaluation and post-use evaluation which seem to be equivalent to preliminary, formative and summative evaluation respectively, Millan & Schumacher (1993)

provide two main types of evaluation named formative and summative These types differ

from each other in terms of purpose, audience, major characteristics, measures, frequency of data collection, sample size, design constraints

Lynch (2003: 10) introduces the distinction in evaluation between formative and summative as following:

Formative evaluation occurs while the programme is being implemented and developed The

goal is recommend changes for improving it, and, towards this end, it focuses on programme processes Typically the outcome of a formative evaluation is numerous small- scale recommendations for change

Summative evaluation occurs at the end of a programme‘s natural term or cycle The goal is to

make an ultimate judgement about the programme‘s worth, whether it has succeeded in meeting its objectives or not Typically the outcome of a summative evaluation is a formal report to be used in large-scale decisions such as whether to continue funding the programme

or not

Because ―in fact, most evaluations represent a combination of formative and

summative‖ and the motivation for evaluation is both ―to decide whether or not our current practice (programme) is doing what it should‖; and ―to bring about innovation or changes in those practices‖, the author tends to make the evaluation in terms of the combination of these

two types

1.4 Materials adaptation

In order to provide teaching and learning processes with better results, pedagogical innovations must be implemented and adapted according to local condition, the strengths of the individual teachers and students, the objectives, the learners‘ need …Thus, in order to

bring about good classes, the classroom teachers ―will still have to adapt the materials either

consciously or subconsciously‖ even when she ―selects the book, knows every student in the class well and is using materials designed specifically for the context they are in‖ (Islam &

Mares, quoted in Tomlinson, 2003:86) That is why classroom materials need to be adapted to reflect needs within particular teaching context, current understanding of second language acquisition and good teaching practices (Tomlinson, 2003:100)

Pedagogically, adaptation is a process of matching and its purpose is to maximize the appropriateness of teaching materials in context, by changing some of the internal characteristics of a coursebook or a set of materials to better suit our particular situation

1.4.1 Reasons for adaptation

Although there are several reasons for adapting materials in order to make them as accessible and useful to learners as possible, these reasons have varied and changed as the field has developed and views on language acquisition and teaching practice have become better informed by research and experience

McDonough and Shaw (1993) make a list of reasons for adapting unsystematic approach to grammar presentation, and it seems to be quite a bit of overlap with Cunningsworth‘s reasons (1995) However, the adaptation is appropriate when materials are not ideal in:

 Methods (e.g., an exercise may be too mechanical, lacking in meaning, too complicated)

 Language content (e.g., there may be too much emphasis on grammar your students learn quickly or not enough emphasis on what they find difficult)

 Subject matter (e.g., topic may not be interesting to students or they may be outdated

or not authentic enough)

 Balance of skills (e.g., there may be too much emphasis on skills in the written language or skills in the spoken language, or there may not be enough on integrating skills)

 Progression and grading (order of language items may need to be changed to fit an outside syllabus or the staging may need to be made steeper or more shallow)

 Cultural content (cultural references may need to be omitted or changed)

 Image (a coursebook may project an unfriendly image through poor layout, low quality visuals, etc.)

( Islam & Mares, quoted in Tomlinson, 2003:88) From all above reasons, it can be confirmed that materials adaptation plays an integral and necessary role in any teaching processes in which materials are not always ideal in all items used for every context

1.4.2 Objectives for adaptation

According to McDonough & Shaw (1995, quoted in Tomlinson, 2003:89), a teacher,

by adapting classroom materials, may hope to achieve the following objectives in order to attain greater appropriacy from materials:

Modernize

Apparently, adapting classroom materials need to have clear objectives since these

objectives ―will help guide the choice of adaptation techniques as well as help decide the

appropriate content or language choice” (Tomlinson, 2003:89)

1.4.3 Techniques for adaptation

Adapting materials is carried out as soon as a gap between publish teaching materials and the needs and objectives of classroom is recognized In order to adapt materials for a particular situation in an effective way, the teacher needs to employ certain techniques that she finds suitable amongst the different ones Tomlinson (2003: 91) quotes a list of popular techniques, offered by McDonough & Shaw (1993) and Cunningsworth (1995), which includes: Adding; extending and expanding

Deleting; subtracting and abridging

In summary, adaptation is a crucial job that the researcher needs to employ to break the mismatch between the materials and the learners‘ needs and the classroom ‗s objectives alike

All about theoretical background of materials adaptation is a really precious resources for the researcher to apply as basis to reach the goal of the study

CHAPTER II: THE STUDY

2.1 Subjects

This study was carried out with the participation of 88 first- years English major students at LSTC There average age was 19 ranging from 18 to 20 Approximately 82% (72 students) of these students were minorities coming far from the central city They all stated that they studied English for their future work as teachers of English

With regard to teacher population, 7 teachers of English at Department of Foreign Languages also involved in this study by taking part in the researcher‘s interview relating to reality of teaching pronunciation and the current coursebook at LSTC

More information about the subjects will be clearly analysed in the next parts

2.2 Context

It is the fact that, EFL teaching in general and pronunciation teaching in particular is not always the same in different contexts due to differences of local conditions, teachers, students, syllabuses, aims, requirements… The information hereafter is about the certain

context related to teaching and learning reality in LSTC

2.2.1 The current situation of English teaching and learning at LSTC

In comparison with other 7 departments at LSTC, the Department of Foreign languages was latest opened So far, it has experienced 13 years of training and supplying teachers of English for most of primary and junior high schools in Lang Son province, especially for the schools far from the central city

Right from the early stage, the teaching staff included only 7 teachers, most of whom (6 teachers) were trained in in-service training courses Time goes by, the Department has improved both its quantity and quality More teachers are employed and there have been significant changes in various aspects of teaching English as foreign language in terms of the views of the learners, the teachers, the teaching methods… The teachers also apply inductive methods in the light of communicative approach to increase the classroom motivation Teachers do not dominate all activity of the lessons any more Students become more active,

most of them are not passive recipients of information Nonetheless, the expected output is taken into consideration since students are not often successful in spoken communication

This results from various causes The shortage of teaching materials and the reference sources bring about the limitations in teaching job Therefore, the teachers usually have to prepare their own teaching materials and sometimes it is not interesting enough to the students Furthermore, the lack of the training courses or seminars on English and English teaching methods makes it difficult for the teachers to share the ideas or learn from the others The teaching and leaning facilities for environment of foreign languages are not suitably taken care of There is no available room with OHP Once the teacher wants to apply ICT in teaching to make the lessons more interesting and effective, she has to ask the administrators before and it is admitted only when she has a laptop and the equipment is not occupied This

is an indication that there are not free chances for the teachers to show their efforts as well as

to equip themselves with necessary skills in the teaching and for the students to absorb language in the good ways

2.2.2 Teachers

2.2.2.1 Description

Department of Foreign Language at LSTC has duty of teaching two languages: English and Chinese with the participation of 19 teachers in which there are 15 teachers of English aged from 24 to 46 With the enthusiasm and eagerness in improving knowledge of language and teaching competence, 4 teachers have finished courses of M.A in Vietnam, two others are studying for M.A degree in Australia and one teacher is taking the same course at ULIS- VNU, Hanoi Two teachers were trained in in-service training courses and they now have P.G certificates The rest are young and have less than 3 years of teaching experience These teachers are trying their best to earn their M.A degrees in the next few years

At work, the teaching staff is a close knit community Teachers take much interest in their job and the classroom observations are usually held to share the ideas and learn from each other

However, teachers are always complaining about the lack of reliable reference books

or supplementary materials that they can apply in the situation of EFL teaching at LSTC

Hence the teachers here show their desire for these sources very much and they are always encouraged to adapt teaching materials for their own

2.2.2.2 Teacher analysis

Teacher analysis was carried out over the informal interviews with 8 teachers of English at LSTC Among them, only three have dealt with the current coursebook since the

coursebook ―English Pronunciation in Use‖ by Mark Hancock has been applied in teaching

pronunciation to major students for just two years The interviews focused on:

- teachers‘ views towards the importance of teaching pronunciation to students, especially to major students at LSTC

- Teachers‘ attitude to and their difficulties in teaching pronunciation

- The teachers‘ evaluation of the current coursebook

- Teachers‘ expectation of supplementary exercises applied in teaching pronunciation

be ranked the third to grammar and vocabulary but they have no explanation for Kenworthy‘s

ideas: ―Learners who plan to become teachers of English will want to approximate a native

accent‖ (Kenworthy, 1987: 3) Through the teachers‘ answers for the importance of

pronunciation and teaching pronunciation, it is concluded that pronunciation is an aspect that

is not always highly evaluated by all teachers

Talking about the attitude to the job of teaching pronunciation, 4 teachers who have

never done this job said that they did not want to be appointed to teach pronunciation and they gave three reasons Firstly, they did not know how to teach this aspect Secondly, their grounding in theoretical knowledge of pronunciation is not good enough for them to be confident in teaching this subject Thirdly, they do not really want to spend time, energy, money improving and practicing the knowledge of pronunciation as it takes a very small proportion of the whole course 50% (4) of the interviewees who have experienced pronunciation teaching said that they do not want to continue to teach pronunciation although they might have better lessons in the next time Understandably, it was difficult for them to be successful as well as to have interesting pronunciation lessons These four teachers were also the ones who talked about the difficulties they had in their job It was unsurprised that all of them (4/4) considered the lack of necessary and adaptable supplementary materials as the main problem They almost had no reference sources to access to good ideas for classroom In addition to the coursebook, they sometimes download exercises from the websites:

http://www.englisch-hilfen.de/en/complex_tests/simple_past1/index.php and

http://wwwSoundofenglish, but, in their opinion, the exercises were not interesting and suitable enough to students in their own context And the work of collecting, choosing or designing is really complicated for them

With regard to teachers‘ evaluation of the coursebook, only three interviewees who have dealt with the coursebook had brief evaluation as following: Generally, the current coursebook is more interesting than the former one ―Ship or Sheep‖ by Ann Paker, 1997, CUP

in terms of content, design, structure of lessons in clearly separated parts However, it is quite

difficult for the teachers to follow the suggestion of the book ― It is better if you balance the

work that you do from the three sections: first, do a unit from Section A, then a unit from Section B, then a unit from Section C, then a unit from Section A, and so on.‖ ( Mark Hancock,

2003: 5) since this subject takes only 45 periods (each lasts 45 minutes) of the whole course so

only Part A Letters and sounds and some of Part B Syllable, words and sentences are

addressed Another thing is that the system of vowels and that of consonants are introduced alternatively so that it is a bit difficult for the teachers to present the sounds systematically i.e first the vowels and then the consonants as they were used to Besides, the book is written to

non- native learners of English all over the world so it creates difficulties for learners at LSTC to catch the knowledge from it because most of them are minorities Furthermore, the book is also written for the purpose of self- study, all exercises have keys at the end of the book It sometimes makes the students passive and teachers have doubt about their students‘ answers to exercises

That is why all teachers, especially those who were dealing with the coursebook showed much desire for a particular syllabus of pronunciation and supplementary exercises for their pronunciation teaching

2.2.3 Learners

2.2.3.1 Description

English major students at LSTC are trained to become teachers of English at primary and junior schools in Lang Son province They all come from different parts in Lang Son province 80 percent of them were minorities, aged from 18 to 23 They have learnt English for at least 3 years at their high schools but many of them were not good at English before they come to LSTC All these students fell the university entrance examinations Some of them come from remote areas and they are not proficient in standard Vietnamese language

At present, all students states that they need English for their future work as teachers of English so they hope that they can get, from their teachers, not only the good knowledge of English but also the various interesting methods of teaching English To these students, learning English is really important as it will always be used in their future job However, to some students, what and how they got just from the beginning of the course was quite different from their secondary school and they must spend a long time getting used to it

In general, students try to learn with purposes of gaining a certificate in order to get the job of teaching English in the future because there seem to be no other choices or chances for them in this place

2.2.3.2 Learner analysis

Two questionnaires were delivered to 88 first - year English major students who had just finished 45 periods of pronunciation to discover all information about their pronunciation learning During the time students fulfilled the questionnaires, the researcher was available to

be ready to explain what students were unclear about the questions Therefore, hardly were there doubts about the answers

Questionnaire 1 includes 12 questions Questions 1-7 concerned to students‘ comments on

pronunciation as well as their pronunciation learning The purposes of exploring students‘ ideas about teaching methods and current material are shown from question 8 to question 12

Question 1 is intended to conduct a check on the frequency that students had dealt with

pronunciation at their high schools

Chart 1: Frequency students dealt with pronunciation at high school

The frequency that students learned pronunciation at high schools is one of determinant affecting their background knowledge of pronunciation before taking a course at LSTC Unfortunately, no students (nobody always and usually) had many chances to deal with this aspect The fact that 19.32%(17) students sometimes studied pronunciation, more than half of students (55.68%) rarely dealt with it, especially, 25%(22) had never learnt it resulted

in their pronunciation mistakes and poor knowledge of English pronunciation And correcting their well-established is not a simple activity Therefore, pronunciation must be represented right from the beginning of the course and the teachers need to have strategies to motivate students in lessons

Question 2 aimed to identify the chances students expressed their spoken English to their

teachers and friends By this way, how students pronounced the English words was easily identified From the researcher‘s own experience as a teacher of English at LSTC, students almost had no chances to express their spoken English except in classroom However, as illustrated as in Chart 2, students expose very little spoken English (42%: sometimes, 28.5%:

rarely) these students might have answers only when they were required by the teachers, together with 2.3% (2) who never spoke in class One of the reasons for this may be due to their bad pronunciation so question 3 was targeted

Chart 2: Students‟ exposure of spoken English in class

Question 3 was designed to find out how much pronunciation influenced on students speaking

Table 2: Students‟ difficulties in speaking English

From the statistic in Table 2, it is easy to see that, in addition to vocabulary (75%),

incorrect pronunciation takes quite a large proportion (64.8%) of students‘ difficulties in

speaking English In fact, all three criteria: lack of vocabulary, poor grammar knowledge,

incorrect pronunciation are causes of the lack of confidence However, to students at LSTC,

they had not much exposure of spoken English because many of them found that they owned bad pronunciation Apparently, incorrect makes students worry if they can be understood by teachers or friends and scarcely do they express themselves Therefore, EFL settings at LSTC should have suitable room and strategies for pronunciation teaching in order to equip students

with adequate communication competence in the role of teachers of English

Question 4 addressed levels of importance students find about pronunciation to their course

Chart 3: Students‟ views on the importance of pronunciation

Although, pronunciation was less taken into account than grammar and vocabulary, students had appreciated its importance While only 17% (15) of students denied the role of pronunciation, 83% ( 73) confirmed that this aspect was important Among them, 3.4% (3) found pronunciation very important, 26.2% (23)supposed it was quite important This is understandable due to the fact that even when the non-native speakers‘ vocabulary and grammar are excellent, if their pronunciation falls below a certain threshold level, they are unable to communicate efficiently and effectively Furthermore, these students are trained to become teachers of English so the knowledge of pronunciation is really necessary to them

Question 5 discovered students‘ purpose of learning pronunciation

4 teaching English in the future

5 other(s)

Unsurprisingly, two immediate purposes students at LSTC were conscious of are passing examination and teaching English at the future It is obvious that when taking a course, everyone fully hopes to pass any exams so 90.9% chose this item 100% (88/88) learnt pronunciation for teaching English indicates that they all realize its importance to their future job 59.1% students had the purpose of communicating well shows that in Lang Son, there are not many chances for students use their spoken English While only 6.8% (6) dealt with listening with the entertainment such as listening to music, singing songs …, 86.4% (76) hoped pronunciation can help them acquire a near- native pronunciation To meet these purposes of students, it is a really heavy workload for the teachers since many of them do not have useful strategies or techniques for teaching EFL pronunciation and students have poor knowledge of pronunciation

Question 6 and 7 explored students‘ self- improvement of pronunciation

always usually sometimes rarely never

Chart 5: Frequency of students‟ pronunciation practice

39.8

37.5

25

0 20.5

Chart 6: Methods of students‟ pronunciation practice

1 listen to the recording/ radio

2 ask teachers/ friends for help

3 do pronunciation exercises

4 record your voice

5 others