Seameo regional language centre
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- 2.4.3. Vocabulary
| 2.4.2. Pronunciation
The three books seem to cover almost all aspects of phonology, for example the articulation of individual sounds, weak forms and strong forms, word stress, sentence stress, rhythm and intonation. However, like in the case of grammar, the books also seem to teach phonology non-communicatively. This is because they tend to teach and practice sounds, stress patterns and intonation as discrete points rather than in connected speech. Consider these exercises in which the two sounds short /i/ and long /i:/are practiced. Listen and repeat 49 /i/ /i:/ Hit Kick Heat Repeat Bit Click Beat Read Little Interest Meat Eaten Practice these sentences 1. Is he coming to the cinema? 2. We’ll miss the beginning of the film. 3. Is it an interesting film, Jim? 4. The beans and the meat were quite cheap. 5. He’s going to leave here for the Green Mountains. 6. Would you like to have meat, peas and cheese? (English 10: 19) What we can see is the two sounds are taught and practiced almost mechanically via repetition drilling. There are no communicative tasks for students to practice them in connected, natural discourse. Unfortunately, this kind of practice is the only kind available for phonology study in all units in the books given consideration. 2.4.3. Vocabulary In the present books, vocabulary is taught and practiced via both materials for language skills development and in its own right in the Language focus section. Thus, vocabulary is both taught in meaningful contexts and further consolidated in form- focused exercises. In the Reading section, vocabulary is taught through activities such as matching definitions with words, gap-fill, finding antonyms and synonyms, and translation. In the Language focus section, vocabulary is practiced most frequently via gap-fill and word formation exercises. Among the different aspects of vocabulary 50 teaching, emphasis seems to be placed on denotational meaning rather than connotational meaning, and word building rather than collocations. The books also seem to give due attention to teaching vocabulary strategies via activities which focus on developing skills in dealing with unknown words and using dictionaries. Unfortunately, however, as mentioned in 2.3.1, many of these activities are not properly designed; thus they are unlikely to achieve their purposes. For example, as spelled out in the book map, the following exercise aims to teach students how to use a dictionary for independent vocabulary learning. Yet, it only instructs students to find the meaning of the new vocabulary items in the dictionary. Presumably, dictionary skills involve more than just opening a dictionary and looking up for a word. Students need to be taught at least what aspects (i.e. spelling, pronunciation, meaning, use, collocation and so on) to look for and how, so that they can develop their own vocabulary independently of the teacher. Task 1: Find what the following words mean in the text. Use a dictionary when necessary. 1. grand: ……………………… 2. agrarian: …………………….. 3. banner: ……………................ 4. pray: ………………………… 5. sugared apples: …………….. 6. excitement: ………………….. (English 11: 92) |