Tips for Teaching Pronunciation: A Practical Approach (with Audio CD) [Paperback]

Linda Lane (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0138136297 | ISBN-13: 978-0138136291 | Publication Date: March 20, 2010 | Edition: 1

Tips for Teaching Pronunciation shows English language teachers how to teach the North American sound system. This practical reference book provides practical tips, clear explanations, diagrams, and sample classroom activities. Each chapter covers one of the five main areas of pronunciation -- vowels, consonants, stress, rhythm, and intonation. The companion audio CD in the text provides listening material for select activities. Features: *What the teacher should know sections set the scene with pedagogical research. *Concrete tips provide practical classroom suggestions for teaching vowels, consonants, stress, rhythm, and intonation * Sections on Specific Features in each chapter cover common pronunciation problems that teachers find challenging *Sample activities for Specific Feature exemplify how to implement the tips *Practical suggestions show how to integrate pronunciation with other skill areas *Clear diagrams demonstrate how to articulate vowels and consonants * Extensive descriptions help teachers prepare forpronunciation problems common to specific languages groups *Photocopiable diagnostic test and handouts can be used in class with minimal preparation *Audio CD provides listening material for select activities The Tips for Teaching series covers topics of practical classroom-centered interest for English language teachers. Written in clearly comprehensible terms, each book offers soundly conceived practical approaches to classroom instruction that are firmly grounded in current pedagogical research. See also: Tips for Teaching with CALL: Practical Approaches to Computer-Assisted Language Learning Tips for Teaching Series Series Editor: H. Douglas Brown Purpose and Audience Tips for Teaching (hereafter TFT) is a series of professional reference books for ESOL teachers and teachers in training on a variety of topics of practical classroom-centered interest. TFT targets teaching in the contexts of ESL in English-speaking countries as well as teachers of EFL in non English-speaking countries. The audience within these contexts is teachers of English in secondary schools, colleges, and adults at varying levels of proficiency. Each book in the series is a practical manual intended to provide the user with clearly conceived methodological ideas, approaches, tasks, activities, and/or techniques to better accomplish their pedagogical goals. General Methodological Characteristics Each TFT book offers background in the underlying pedagogical principles of language learning and teaching in clearly comprehensible terms. This background is meant to provide a brief and concise understanding of theory. These are followed by soundly conceived practical approaches to classroom instruction, from authors who have successfully used the approaches described in the book. TFT methodology is based on communicative and/or task-based language teaching foundations. Student-centered, interactive classroom activities receive primary focus, but not at the expense of appropriate teacher-centered approaches or tasks for individual in-class or homework activity. Market Teachers using TFT books may be novice teachers seeking practical guidelines for approaching instruction in a specified area, or experienced teachers in need of refreshing new ideas. TFT books seek to meet current needs of ESOL teachers, filling a gap in current available publications, or providing better information than other publications. TFT proposals must have a broad enough defined audience for the publication to be financially feasible for Pearson/Longman. Format All the TFT books have numerous practical approaches, activities, tasks, and/or techniques that appeal to their intended audience. They are not simply a listing of 101 techniques, but rather, offer practical classroom ideas with background foundations, commentary, and guidelines for teaching Books in the TFT series may have different formats depending on the subject matter and approach of an author, but each book in the series should use similar formats/design so readers will be familiar with the approach once they've seen one book in the series. A reader won't want to be disappointed if a book in the series does not have the (ie.) examples or background information that another book has. The books will be visually attractive with an ample number of charts, diagrams, illustrations, and drawings. Enough white space on pages provides an uncluttered look that invites further reading. Prose is limited to a few paragraphs at a time, and is interspersed with figures, tables, bulleted lists, and other visual breaks. Chapter organization varies, but the following guidelines generally apply: 1. Each chapter begins with a chapter overview, usually a list of chapter objectives, bulleted summary points, or questions that will be answered. 2. Exercises or other forms of practical applications are offered at the end of each chapter. 3. Photocopy-ready pages of handouts or other pages to support activities may be included. 4. End-of-chapter summary, conclusion, or final comment. Front matter also varies, but the following are commonly included: 1. Author's preface indicating the purpose and audience of the book. 2. Series Editor's preface indicating the place of this book in the series and comments on the importance of the subject matter of the book. 3. Table of contents including subheadings within chapters. Back-matter may include the following: 1. Bibliography of related references. 2. Annotated bibliography of a few selected references that might be of special help to users. 3. Subject index. 4. Glossary, if appropriate. 5. Appendices of photocopy-ready pages for tasks and activities

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Tips for Teaching Pronunciation shows English language teachers how to teach the North American sound system.  This practical reference book provides practical tips, clear explanations, diagrams, and sample classroom activities.   Each chapter covers one of the five main areas of pronunciation -- vowels, consonants, stress, rhythm, and intonation. The companion audio CD in the text provides listening material for select activities.

 

Features:

• What the teacher should know sections set the scene with pedagogical research.
• Concrete tips provide practical classroom suggestions for teaching vowels, consonants, stress, rhythm, and intonation.
• Sections on Specific Features in each chapter cover common pronunciation problems that teachers find challenging.
• Sample activities for Specific Feature exemplify how to implement the tips.
• Practical suggestions show how to integrate pronunciation with other skill areas.
• Clear diagrams demonstrate how to articulate vowels and consonants.
• Extensive descriptions help teachers prepare for pronunciation problems common to specific languages groups.
• Photocopiable diagnostic test and handouts can be used in class with minimal preparation.
• Audio CD provides listening material for select activities.

The Tips for Teaching series covers topics of practical classroom-centered interest for English language teachers. Written in clearly comprehensible terms, each book offers soundly conceived practical approaches to classroom instruction that are firmly grounded in current pedagogical research.

 

See also: Tips for Teaching with CALL: Practical Approaches to Computer-Assisted Language Learning

About the Author

Dr. H. Douglas Brown, Series Editor - Professor Emeritus of the MA-TESOL program at San Francisco State University. A past president of TESOL and recipient of the James E. Alatis Award for Distinguished Service, he has authored many books and articles and is a frequent presenter at world conferences. Before coming to SFSU, Dr. Brown was Professor and Director of the Division of ESL at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana, and previous to that, a faculty member at the University of Michigan, where he also served as Acting Director of the English Language Institute for three years. Dr. Brown was the 1980-81 President of International TESOL. In 2001, he was the recipient of TESOL's James E. Alatis Award for Distinguished Service. In 2005, he was honored to receive the Distinguished Service Award from SFSU's Office of International Programs. His numerous professional publications include: Principles of Language Learning and Teaching (5th ed.); Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy (3rd ed.); Language Assessment: Principles and Classroom Practices (2nd ed.); and Readings on Second Language Acquisition (co-edited with Susan Gonzo). He has co-authored several ESL textbooks: Strategies for Success, Challenges, the ESL basal series Vistas, and Voyages (international). From 1970-1978, Dr. Brown served as Editor of the journal Language Learning. Linda Laneis a senior faculty member in the American Language Program of Columbia University. In addition to the Focus on Pronunciation series, she is also the author of Tips for Teaching Pronunciation, Pearson Longman, 2010. She served as director of the Columbia University Humanities Media Center for 10 years and coordinated Columbia's TESOL Certificate Program for another 10 years, teaching classes in Applied Phonetics and Pronunciation Teaching and Introduction to Second Language Acquisition. She received her Ed.D. in Applied Linguistics from Teachers College, Columbia University, her M.A. in Linguistics from Yale University, and her B.S. in Mathematics from the University of Washington, Seattle.

Product Details

• Paperback: 296 pages
• Publisher: Pearson ESL; 1 edition (March 20, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0138136297
• ISBN-13: 978-0138136291
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.9 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,014,525 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Super-practical!, January 10, 2012

By 

Zegpoddle (Phoenix, AZ USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Tips for Teaching Pronunciation: A Practical Approach (with Audio CD) (Paperback)

Most books on pronunciation fall into two camps: textbooks with lots of activities and exercises aimed at nonnative speakers, or teacher resource books that tend to be highly theoretical and descriptive but don't offer much in the way of useful activities for the classroom. Thankfully, this book really breaks the mold. I borrowed a copy from another teacher, intending to copy just a few pages, but when I found myself mentally tagging virtually every page in the book, I realized that I would need to buy the whole book for myself. Never again will I scratch my head wondering how to teach any feature of NAE pronunciation in a clear and engaging way. This book is FULL of lesson ideas that are spelled out step-by-step, complete with worksheets and many, many examples. The explanations for teachers are the clearest I've ever come across. If I were allowed to have only three books to use in planning fun, interactive pronunciation classes, they would be Mark Hancock's Pronunciation Games (Cambridge Copy Collection), Martin Hewings' Pronunciation Practice Activities Book and Audio CD Pack: A Resource Book for Teaching English Pronunciation (Cambridge Handbooks for Language Teachers), and Linda Lane's Tips for Teaching Pronunciation: A Practical Approach (with Audio CD). The latter covers all of the features a teacher really needs to understand (specific phonemes, suprasegmentals, the works) while also converting all of that information/description into ***ready-to-be-deployed classroom activities***. That's where most teacher resource books in this particular specialty fail miserably. In fact, this teacher reference contains even more imaginative classroom activities than Lane's own textbook series Focus on Pronunciation 1 (with 2 Student Audio CDs) (2nd Edition). Usually it's the reverse: the textbooks contain all the fun activity ideas while the teacher reference books are too distant and "deep" to be of much practical day-to-day use. As a working teacher in constant need of ideas for what to do in the classroom, I know which kind of book is more valuable to me. Let the grad students and academics have all the other books about pronunciation teaching. I'll take this one--it's worth a dozen of those.