An investigation into errors of pronouncing some english consonants and final sounds made by first year students at thuongmai university

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
During the completion of this paper, I have appreciated precious support from
many people. First and foremost, I would like to express sincere gratitude towards
my beloved supervisor, M.A Nguyen Thi Thuy Chung for her devoted instruction
during the last year. Despite her business, she was always willing to give me advice
on the thesis. She guided me ways to conduct this study and correct each mistake of
forms and contents in my work. Without her assistance, it would have been so
difficult for me to accomplish the paper.
Secondly, I want to show my deep thankfulness to the lecturers who helped me
to carry out an interview for this paper. I highly appreciate their invaluable
suggestions to my work.
I also desire to say thanks to teachers in charge of guiding students to do
research and evaluating the progress of their works. Owing to their lessons and
comments, I knew how to carry out a study and what to improve in my paper.
Furthermore, I would love to thank students from K53N of English Faculty at
Thuongmai University, who have cooperated and given results of questionnaires to
finish my study.
Last but not least, my special gratefulness is to my much –loved family. At all
times, they stood by my side and encouraged me to overcome difficulties in
conducting this thesis. Thanks to their material and spiritual support, I had more
time and motivation to get over the challenge.

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ABSTRACT

English has become the most used popular international language in Vietnam
in recent years. Despite being spoken by the millions of people, lots of Vietnamese
people including students still make mistakes in pronunciation, which makes them
embarrassing when speaking. This paper, therefore, focuses on some common

mistakes in consonant pronunciation made by first- year students of English faculty
at Thuongmai University. The paper covers a number of reasons for the mistakes
and some tentative suggestions to address those problems are then discussed. These
errors include wrong consonant pronunciation, final consonant sounds, omission of
consonant cluster and omission of final consonants. Moreover, it is argued that the
mistakes can be explained in terms of inadequate knowledge of the articulation of
the sounds and, more importantly, the interference of the mother tongue. To end this
study, some of key suggestions for pronunciation improvement includes careful
instruction in how to pronounce the sounds and more emphasis on drills and
practice.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT.......................................................................................i
ABSTRACT.............................................................................................................ii
TABLE OF CONTENTS.......................................................................................iii
LIST OF TABLES, CHARTS, PICTURES AND ABBREVIATIONS................v
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 subjects.............................................................................................4
1.5 Scope of the study.............................................................................................4
1.6 Research methodology.....................................................................................4
1.6.1. Observation.....................................................................................................4
1.6.2. Recording Test...............................................................................................5
1.6.3. Questionnaire................................................................................................5
1.7 Organization of the study................................................................................6

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW..............................................................7
2.1. The definition of pronunciation, consonants, and final consonants..............7
2.1.1. Pronunciation.................................................................................................7
2.1.2. English consonants.........................................................................................7
2.1.3. Final consonants............................................................................................8
2.2. Vietnamese consonants and English consonants............................................9
2.2.1. English consonants.........................................................................................9
2.2.2. Vietnamese consonants.................................................................................12
2.3. English final consonants and Vietnamese final consonants.........................14
2.3.1. Vietnamese final consonants........................................................................14
2.3.2. English final consonants..............................................................................15
2.3.3. Contrastive analysis of some English consonants and Vietnamese
consonants..............................................................................................................15
2.4. Interference of mother tongue on pronouncing English consonants..........16
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CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH FINDINGS..............................................................18
3.1. Error of pronouncing some English consonants and final sounds made by
first- year students at Thuong Mai University....................................................19
3.1.1. Consonants confusion..................................................................................20
3.1.2. Omission of consonant cluster.....................................................................21
3.1.3. Omission of final consonants.......................................................................22
3.2. Evaluation of the English Faculty’s lecturers on pronouncing some English
consonants and final consonants of the first- year students...............................23
3.3. Reasons for errors of pronouncing some English consonants and final
consonants..............................................................................................................24
3.3.1. Lack of practices and drills...........................................................................24
3.3.2. Failure in distinguishing the differences among English consonants........25
3.3.3. Lack of correction from teachers.................................................................25

3.3.4. Difference between Vietnamese sound system and English ones................25
3.3.5. The influence of mother tongue in English pronunciation.........................26
CHAPTER 4: RECOMMENDATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS........................28
4.1. Recommendations for students......................................................................28
4.2. Recommendations for teachers of English Faculty......................................31
CONCLUSION......................................................................................................34
1. Summary of the study.......................................................................................34
2. Limitations of the study....................................................................................34
3. Recommendation for further study..................................................................35
REFERENCES
APPENDIX

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LIST OF TABLES, CHARTS, PICTURES AND ABBREVIATIONS
TABLES
Table 2.1
Table 2.2
Table 2.3
Table 2 .4
Table 2.5
Table 2. 6
Table 2.7
Table 3.8
CHARTS
Chart 3.1
Chart 3.2
Chart 3.3
Chart 3.4

Chart 3.5
Chart 3.6
PICTURES
Picture 4.1
Picture 4.2
Picture 4.3
Picture 4.4

English consonants
Voicing contrast in English fricatives
Voicing contrast in English stops
Vietnamese initial sounds
8 ending Vietnamese consonants
Vietnamese ending consonants
English final consonants
Pronunciation errors of some English consonant cluster
Students’ interest towards learning English
Student’s perception to importance of learning English
Students’ consonant mispronunciation
Students’ consonant confusion
No. of students omits final consonants
Reasons for errors of consonant pronunciation
International Phonetic Alphabet
Listen to the consonant sounds
Example words
ELSA Speak with artificial intelligence (Source: Edu2)

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CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY
1.1 Rationale
English is the most commonly used language among foreign language
speakers in the world. In other words, everyone needs to learn the language in order
to get in touch on an international level. In Vietnam, English language is considered
as a mean of communication which is widely used for studying or doing research,
and for those who are working in various fields such as education, economics,
science, and so forth.
Despite well awareness of its importance and emphasis on the acquisition and
use of English, little do people pay attention to some common pronunciation
mistakes that are made as the consequence of the mother tongue interference or the
lack of basic knowledge of articulation of the sounds. According to recent research
and from my own experience, it is figured out that most students usually have
difficulty pronouncing a certain number of consonants. Moreover, because of the
difference of Vietnamese sounds and English ones, a large number of students make
mistakes of the final consonants seriously. Coping with these problems, therefore,
students need to obtain the basic knowledge background of consonants
pronunciation.
For all the mentioned reasons, I decided to investigate the subject “An
investigation into errors of pronouncing some English consonants and final sounds
made by first- year students at Thuongmai University”
1.2 Previous studies
Many studies have been conducted to find out the problems in the
pronunciation of English language which were made by students.
All over the world, linguists and researchers have demonstrated that the errors
made by the speakers of English language are something systematic rather than
random. According to Moosa (1972) and Homedan (1984), Arab students who
speak English face with problems in the pronunciation of sounds which are not
familiar with such as /v/, /p/, /ŋ/. Therefore, they concluded that substitution of
sounds was the main problem of the speakers of English language. In other words,

they substitute the sounds that they do not have in their native language, with other
sounds which are close to them in the place of articulation. For instance they replace
/p/ with /b/, /θ/ with /s/ etc.
Similarly, several studies conducted by Vietnamese researchers showed that
Vietnamese learners encounter lots of difficulties in learning English pronunciation
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and also common errors of mispronunciation. Dung (2014) pointed out that
Vietnamese speakers have a wider number of problems with the voiced versus the
voiceless stops in word final position, /b/, /p/, /d/, /g/ vs. /p/, /t/, /k/ and final
fricative consonants /f/, /v/, /θ/, /ð/, /s/, /z/. Omission of a fricative at the end of
words usually occurs when speaking English as fricatives do not occur in word-final
position in their mother tongue. Because of this, Avery and Ehrlich, emphasized”
Vietnamese students tend to omit one or more consonants from a difficult cluster”
(1992, p. 155).
In addition to the past works, Duong Thi Nu ( 2009, pp 41-50) has studied
pronunciation problems and the influence of the mother tongue. She highlighted
that the common pronunciation mistakes of Vietnamese learners are confusion in
terms of consonant sounds. So many sounds such as /s/ and /ʃ/, /z/ and / ʒ/, /dʒ/
and / ʒ/, /tʃ/ and Vietnamese /ć/ are confused e.g. (she/ sea), (measure / pleasure),
(change /tʃeindʒ/ is pronounced //tʃeinʒ/). For the /tʃ/ and Vietnamese /ć/, the
English /ʧ/ in chair is incorrectly pronounced like Vietnamese /ć/ in Vietnamese
che.
The mispronunciation of the above sounds is the result of the over practice of
the first language, a process of fossilization. According to (Yule; O’Connor, 1975)
reported that the main problem of English pronunciation is to build a new set of
sounds corresponding to the sounds of English, and to break down the arrangement
of sounds which the habits and the systems of the mother tongue have strongly built
up. It means that it is too difficult to change such habits which learners has

obtained since their childhood or at least it needs very long years to be changed and
after also very long time and regular practice, and all that is linked to a certain age
of the learner, especially students. So the points mentioned above altogether share
the concept that the learners confuse such sounds and replace each of them with
other sounds that are said to be the nearest ones to them (O’Connor, 2003).
Another the result of the study being indicated by Nu was the effect of sound
system on learning pronunciation. She showed that the main problem in teaching
and learning English pronunciation result from the differences in the sound system
of English and the system of Vietnamese, so a Vietnamese student is not
accustomed to pronounce for instance θ -sound and ð-sound, because they do not
found in his native language. This means that the organs of speech of the learner are

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not trained to produce such sound systems because they are unfamiliar to students.
Particularly, the differences between two languages are the differences of manner of
articulation, place of articulation, and voicing in Vietnamese and English.
Additionally, learners with different linguistic backgrounds would of course face
different difficulties in order to produce English sounds, because of the differences
between the two languages (English and Vietnamese).These differences between the
sound systems are regarded as a barrier against competence in the pronunciation of
English, because the new sounds still remain strange for their organs of speech.
However, this problem is expected to be solved after a long time of regular practice
and hard work.
Therefore, most of the Vietnamese students face such problem because in
Vietnamese, the sound system is not too complex and the learner can speak without
any confusion, but in English he may pronounce /ʃ/ for /s/ for example /shame/,
/same/. Also in English the /r/ is distinctly pronounced only before a vowel e.g.
the /r/ after a vowel is not pronounced. In Vietnamese, however, the /r/-sound is

similarly pronounced in all positions. So students have lots of problems with
different sounds and are difficult to distinguish those consonants ones.
Consequently, the mentioned studies above pointed out the common problems
exist in the consonant pronunciation of most among English learners. However,
those studies were done outside Thuongmai University in general and students of
the English Faculty in particular. Therefore, that is why the research is intended to
fill a certain gap and seek such problems at Thuongmai University based on
conducted studies.
1.3 Aims of the study
The present study aims at investigating the most common pronunciation errors
made by first- year students at Thuongmai University. The research focuses on
analyzing factors that affect to these errors. And as final step, this study suggests
solutions to help to promote learning process of pronunciation in undergraduate
students.
Therefore, it was to answer the two following questions:
What common errors of pronouncing English consonants are made by firstyear students of English faculty at Thuongmai University?
What is the reason of making those errors?
1.4 Research subjects
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Within the limitation of time and reference materials, the research only
emphasizes the pronunciation errors and final sounds in terms of consonants made
by first- year students at Thuongmai University.
1.5 Scope of the study
Because this study focuses on errors of consonant pronunciation that are made
by first- year students of English faculty, it is conducted on 100 students of K53N
who are chosen randomly. In addition, the researcher will interact with seven
teachers of English faculty who are teaching English phonetics and phonology at
Thuongmai University. They also have the ability to answer all problems related to

first- year students’ pronunciation.
1.6 Research methodology
In this research, the data has been collected from 50 first year students of the
English Faculty. The sample of the study contained 45 female students and 5 male
ones who were chosen randomly from the Faculty of English. Besides, 7 teachers
responded to the questionnaire on the exact sounds which students mispronounce
and the reasons for pronunciation problems.
Data was collected through using of three main research instruments,
observation, recording test and questionnaire respectively. These will be discussed
in details below:
1.6.1. Observation
In order to obtain some information of errors, the researcher started to observe
the students inside some English classes that were taught English phonetics and
phonology. While the students were discussing in English, the researcher was taking
down some particular sounds that students could not pronounce correctly, or which
they tried to replace with others sounds close to them. To verify the pronunciation
among students, some teachers were asked to fill a questionnaire regarding the
pronunciation of their students.

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1.6.2. Recording Test
Recording test regarded as an essential tool of collecting their data by many of
the researchers in the previous studies, helped the researcher investigate problems
with English pronunciation among English Faculty’s students.
The sample of this study was 30 students at the English of Faculty. The
researcher prepared three exercises of pronunciation including consonant sounds,
words and sentences written on a paper. Each of the students read the whole sounds,
words and sentences aloud while the researcher was recording their pronunciations.

After each of 30 students recorded their sounds, the researcher listen carefully
samples and repeated this process a lot of times playing the tape at home. Both
incorrect and correct pronunciation was written down and analyzed descriptively.
In general, for the recording test, all sounds recorded from students were
written on papers, and the number of correct and incorrect pronunciation was
counted beside each student. Consequently, the recording test assisted a lot the notes
and the information, which was also drawn from observation.
1.6.3. Questionnaire
The third tool used in this study was a structured questionnaire, which was
used in collaboration with some of students and English teachers at the English
faculty.
A number of 37 copies of the questionnaire were printed and answered by 30
students and 7 Faculty’s teachers within two weeks.
Using open- ended and follow- up questionnaires served three main purposes:
- To assess common pronunciation errors made by students.
- To find out factors that affect to students’ English pronunciation.
- To suggest ways assisting in student’s pronunciation improvement.
The questionnaire used in this study had at least four sections:
- The first section is made of questions about the background of the
respondents.
- The second one comprises two questions in which the researcher enquires
about the respondents’ attitude towards the English language. It is really necessary
for this study as it can explain the students’ pronunciation performance.
- The third section consists of five questions all related to pronunciation,
particularly consonant sounds. These questions give the details about the students’
difficulties in the pronunciations of English sounds, which are pivotal since the
purpose of the study is to investigate the pronunciation errors made by first- year
students.
The fourth and the last section consist of two questions about solution to their
problems.

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Moreover, based on the main targets of this study, the questionnaire was
designed to ask the teachers to give their opinions about influence of mother tongue
on pronunciation and the reasons that made such pronunciation errors by students.
Lastly, the respondents were asked to express their point of view about the
recommending solutions for such errors. All that helped a lot to obtain very accurate
results and findings to make sure of validity and reliability of the questionnaire.
Afterwards, the results and the findings of the questionnaire were analyzed
descriptively. The results and the information of both questionnaire and the
recordings will be reviewed in further details in the third chapter of the study.
1.7 Organization of the study
The study consists of four chapters which will cover errors of consonants
pronunciation and reasons for those errors of first- year students at Thuongmai
University. Here is an overview of the content of each presented chapter:
Chapter I: This chapter introduces the rationale and significance of study,
aims, research subjects, the scope and the organization of the study.
Chapter II: This chapter reviews the definition of pronunciation, consonants,
final sounds, Vietnamese consonants and final consonants, English consonants and
final consonants, and interference of mother tongue on pronouncing English
consonants.
Chapter III: Research finding, this part describes the current situation of
pronouncing consonants of the English faculty students, pronunciation errors made
by them, evaluation of teachers and reasons result from poor pronunciation.
Chapter IV: This is an overview of the previous chapter, suggests some
solutions for both teachers and learners, and suggestions for further studies.

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1. The definition of pronunciation, consonants, and final consonants

2.1.1. Pronunciation
One of definitions of pronunciation was supposed Cook (1996) and cited in
Pourhosein Gilakjani( 2016), pronunciation is defined as the production of English
sounds. Moreover, pronunciation is the production of a sound system which does
not interfere with communication either from the speakers’ or the listeners’
6


viewpoint (Paulston & Burder, 1976). As Richard and Schmidt (2002) defined,
pronunciation is the method of producing certain sounds.
According to Wikipedia, pronunciation is the way in which a word or
a language is spoken. It is referred to generally agreed-upon sequences of sounds
used in speaking a given word or language in a specific dialect ("correct
pronunciation"), or simply the way a particular individual speaks a word or
language. Besides, a word can be spoken in different ways and depending on lots of
factors such as the duration of the cultural exposure of their childhood, the location
of their current residence, speech or voice disorders, their ethnic group, their social
class, or their education.
Therefore, pronunciation is the act or manner of pronouncing words; utterance
of speech, a way of speaking a word, especially a way that is accepted or generally
understood, and a graphic representation of the way a word spoken, using phonetic
symbols.
2.1.2. English consonants
As Wikipedia showed, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with
complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Notably, a consonant is a letter of the
alphabet which represents a basic speech sound produced by obstructing the breath
in the vocal tract. For example:
T is pronounced using the tongue (front part)
K is pronounced using the tongue (back part)
B is pronounced with the lips

H is pronounced in the throat
F is pronounced by forcing air through a narrow gap
M is pronounced using the nasal passage
The English consonants can be judged from the three main characteristics
which enable each individual describe the concrete consonants and distinguish them
from each other.
-

The voicing: The first way in which consonants can be different from each

other is in terms of voicing. The English consonants can be “voiced or voiceless.”

7


(Rogers, 2000, p.47). For instance, The sounds /t/ and /k/ are voiceless and the
sounds / d/ and /g/ are voiced in English.
- Manner of Articulation: The manner of articulation is the way in which
speech sounds are produced by the speech organs such as oral stops, fricatives,
affricates, nasal stops, a lateral and approximants (Fromkin, Rodman, Collins &
Blair, 1988, p.58). The two English fricatives /ʃ/, /ʒ/ and the two affricates /tʃ/, /dʒ/
are examples demonstrating this point.
- The place: where the block of air occurs (lips, teeth, alveolar, ridge, palate
and so on).
2.1.3. Final consonants
To ESL (English as a Second Language) learners, “ending sounds” are familiar
as it refers to those ultimate sounds in a word. More particularly, it refers to the
consonant sound(s) as the word can end with one or more consonant sounds
(consonant clusters). Thus “ending sounds” in English pronunciation can be defined
as those consonant sounds which appear at the very end of words.

Additionally, English has a “limited number of permitted combinations of
consonants in initial and final clusters.” (Avery and Ehlich, 1995, p.54) Some of the
following consonant clusters are taken from Avery and Ehlich (1995, p.55) such
as /-ʃl/, /-lʃ/, /-rʃ/, /-ltʃt/, /-rtʃt/, and /-ndʃd/.
Consonant Clusters Consist of /ʃ/: shrink, shrine, shroud, crucial, essential,
Welsh, mention, nation, etc
Consonant Clusters Consist of /ʒ/: garaged, sabotaged, vision, division.
Consonant Clusters Consist of /tʃ/: belched, hitched, watched, arched.
Consonant Clusters Consist of /dʒ/: bulged, changed, exchanged.
2.2. Vietnamese consonants and English consonants
2.2.1. English consonants
There are 24 consonants in English. They are classified according to 3 aspects:
 Place

of

articulation:

The place

of

articulation

bilabial (both

lips), alveolar (tongue against the gum ridge), and velar (tongue against soft
palate).
 Manner of articulation: Manners include stops, fricatives, and nasals.

8


 The voicing: voiced or voiceless
Those consonants are classified based on the following table:
Place of articulation
Dent
PalatoBilabial
Labiodental
Alveolar
Palatal Velar Glottal
articulation
al
alveolar
Plosive
p b
t d
k g
∫ ʒ
Fricative
f v
θ ð
s z
h
tʃ, dʒ
Affricate
Nasal
m
n
ŋ

Lateral
l
Approximant
w
r
j
Manner of

Table 2.1: English consonants (Source: English Phonetics and Phonology- Peter
Roach)
Place of articulation
Here are the details of place of articulation based on the definitions from
Oxford Advanced Leaner’s Dictionary.
Bilabials are consonants that are produced by using the two lips and include
/p, b, m, w/.
Labiodentals are consonants that are produced by “placing the top teeth
against the bottom lip”. Two labiodental sounds are /f, v/.
Dentals are consonants that are articulated by placing the tongue between the
teeth and include /θ, ð/.
Alveolars are consonants that are produced “with the tongue touching the part
of the mouth behind the upper front teeth” and include 7 alveolar sounds in English
/t, d, s, z, n, l, r/.
Palato-alveolars are consonants that “are produced by the contact of the front
part of the tongue with the hard palate just behind the alveolar “ridge” according to
the definition of palate- alveolar on the website . English
palato- alveolars include 4 consonants /ʃ, ʒ, tʃ, dʒ/.
Palatal/j/ is a consonant produced by “raising the tongue body against the
hard palate”.
Velar are consonants made by “placing the back part of the tongue near or
against the back part of the mouth -the soft palate” /k, g, ŋ /.

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Glottal is a consonant articulated with the glottis. It is /h/.
Manner of Articulation
Plosive consonants are consonants made by “completely stopping the flow of
air coming out of the mouth and then suddenly releasing it” (OALD). Six plosive
consonants in English are /p, b, t, d, k, g/.
Fricative consonants are consonants articulated by forcing air through a
“narrow space in the mouth with the lips, teeth or tongue in a particular position”
(OALD). English fricatives include 9 consonants /f, v, θ, ð, s, z, ∫, ʒ, h/.
Affricates are consonants made up of a plosive followed immediately by a
fricative (OALD). Two affricate consonants are / tʃ, dʒ /.
Nasal are consonants produced by “allowing the air to escape freely through
the nose” (OALD). There are 3 nasal sounds. They are /m, n, ŋ/
Lateral are consonants “produced by placing a part of the tongue against the
palate so that air flows around on both sides of the tongue” (OALD). There is only
one lateral sound in English. That is /l/.
Approximant are consonants made by bringing the parts of the mouth which
produce speech close together but not actually touching (OALD). There are 3
approximant consonants /w, j, r/.

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Voicing
In English, consonant phonemes are classified as either voiced or voiceless
even though it is not the primary distinctive feature between them. Still, the
classification is used as a stand-in for phonological processes, such as vowel
lengthening that occurs before voiced consonants but not before unvoiced

consonants or vowel quality changes (the sound of the vowel) in some dialects of
English that occur before unvoiced but not voiced consonants. Such processes allow
English speakers to continue to perceive difference between voiced and voiceless
consonants when the devoicing of the former would otherwise make them sound
identical to the latter. In other words, voicing plays a vital role in distinguish
consonant sounds.
Voiceless consonants include /p, t, k, f, θ, s, ∫, h, tʃ/.
Voiced consonants: /b, d, g, v, ð, z, ʒ, dʒ, m, n, ᶇ, l, w, r, j/.
English has four pairs of fricative phonemes that can be divided into a table
by place of articulation and voicing. The voiced fricatives can readily be felt to have
voicing throughout the duration of the phone especially when they occur between
vowels.
Here is an example of the voicing in English fricatives:
Articulation
Pronouncing with the lower lips against the teeth
Pronouncing with the tongue against the teeth
Pronouncing with the tongue near the gums
Pronouncing with the tongue bunched up

Voiceless
/f/ fan
/θ/ thin
/s/ sip
/ʃ/ Confucian

Voiced
/v/ van
/ð/ then
/z/ zip
/ʒ/ confusion

Table 2.2: Voicing contrast in English fricatives (Source: Wikipedia)
Additionally, English voiceless stops are generally aspirated at the beginning of a
stressed syllable, and in the same context, their voiced counterparts are voiced only
partway through. In more narrow phonetic transcription, the voiced symbols are
maybe used only to represent the presence of articulatory voicing, and aspiration is
represented with a superscript h. This is illustrated in the following table:
Articulation
Pronouncing with the lips closed

Unvoiced
/p/ pin
11

Voiced
/b/ bin


Pronouncing with the tongue near the gums
Pronouncing with the tongue bunched up
Pronouncing with the back of the tongue
against the palate

/t/ ten
/tʃ/ chin

/d/ den
/dʒ/ gin

/k/ coat

/g/ goat

Table 2.3: Voicing contrast in English stops (Source: Wikipedia)
2.2.2. Vietnamese consonants
While English has 24 consonants, Vietnamese has 22 initial consonants and 8
final consonants. They are also classified according to place of articulation, manner
of articulation and voicing.
Place of articulation

Manner of articulation

Labial Alveolar

Aspirated

Retroflex

Palatal

Velar

Glottal

ʈ

c

k

ʔ

ɲ

ŋ

t’
voi
cele

Stop

un-aspirated

ss
Voi

B

d

Nasal

M

n

Voiceless

F

s

ş

x

Voiced

V

z

ʐ

ɣ

ced

Fricati
ve

t

Lateral

l

Table 2.4: Vietnamese initial sounds (Source: Le Quang Thiem, p.100)
Place of articulation

Labial: Vietnamese has 5 labial consonants. They are /b, m, f, v/.
Alveolar: There are 7 alveolar consonants in Vietnamese. They are
/t’, t, d, n, s, z, l/.
Retroflex: Retroflex consonants includes 3 sounds /ʈ, ş, ʐ/.
Palatal: There are 2 palatal sounds in Vietnamese. They are /c, ɲ/
Velar: Vietnamese velar consonants consist of 4 sounds. They are /k, ŋ, x, ɣ/
Glottal: There are 2 glottal consonants in Vietnamese. They are /ʔ, h/
Manner of articulation

12

h


Vietnamese consonants are divided into two kinds in term of manner of
articulation.
Stop consonants include 12 sounds. They are /b, t’, t, d, ʈ, c, k, ʔ, m, n, ɲ, ŋ/
Fricative consonants include 10 sounds. They are /f, v, s, ş, ʐ, z, ɣ, h, l/
The stops
There are also different kinds of stop consonants in Vietnamese
Aspirated stop consonant includes /t’/.
Voiceless stop consonants include /t, ʈ, c, k, ʔ/.
Voiced stop consonants include /b, d, ɲ,ŋ/.
Nasal stop consonants include /m, n/.
The fricative
Voiceless fricative consonants include /f, s, ş, x, h/.
Voiced fricative consonants include /v, z, ʐ, ɣ/.
Lateral fricative consonant includes /l/.
Based on mentioned analysis of the consonants in English and Vietnamese,
there are some distinctive similarities and differences between them:

- Both consonant systems have fricatives /s/. /z/, /ʃ/ and /ʒ/
- Unlike English, Vietnamese consonant system does not include any
affricates.
- Vietnamese consonants are found in the initial or final positions of a word,
but the final consonants are never heard while English consonants are pronounced
in three positions: initial, medial and final.

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2.3. English final consonants and Vietnamese final consonants
2.3.1. Vietnamese final consonants
In Vietnamese, there are only six consonants and two semi- consonants which
can be pronounced in the final position. It is indicated in the following table:
Manner of articulation
Noise consonant
Nasal
Sonan
semi
t
-consonant

Place of articulation
Labial
Alveolar
Velar
p
t
k
m

n
ŋ
u̯
i̭̯

Table 2.5: 8 ending Vietnamese consonants( Source: Le Quang Thiem, p.101)
- 6 consonants: p, t, k, m, n, ŋ. For example : /n/ chan, /k/ ngoc, /t/ buot.
- 2 semi- consonants : u̯, i̭̯ ( which have both feature of not only vowels but
also consonants).
For instance: / u̯/ mau, / i̭/̯ mai
According to Thiem, p. 106, the following table also has writings which are
equivalent to Vietnamese ending sounds.
Numbe
r
1

Sounds

Letters

-p

p
t
ch
c
m
n
nh
ng

o
u
y

2

-t

3
4
5
6
7

-k
-m
-n
-ɲ
-ŋ

7

u̯

8

i̭̯

Examples
Tạo, úp, nép

Át, nét, mặt
Sách, cách, dịch
Lắc, cốc, móc
Nam, ám, chạm
Nhàn, tan, hán
Xinh, tranh, bệnh
Trông, đứng, đang
Tao, vào, bao
Đau, ngủ, thiu
Lấy, tay, này

Table 2.6. Vietnamese ending consonants

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2.3.2. English final consonants
Based on the features of English consonants system, when there are two or
more consonants standing at the end of the word, the term “final consonant”, “ prefinal” and “post-final” consonants are used.
Here is the table of English final consonants:
/p/: map, nap.
/b/: rib
/t/: cat, right
/d/: did, bad
/k/: like, Mike
/g/: big, pig
/f/: laugh, life

/v/: live, leave
/θ/: tooth, breath

/ ð /: breathe
/ʒ/: beige
/ʃ/: cash
/d ʒ/: change, huge
/t ʃ/: watch

/m/: Mom, room
/n/: noon
/ᶇ/: sing, spring
/l/: school, cool

Table 2.7. English final consonants
Additionally, English final consonants include pre-final (/m/. /n/, /η/, /l/, /s/)
and post- final (/s/, /z/, /t/, /d/, /θ/)
For example:
Pre-final plus final plus post-final (e.g. helped, banks, bonds, twelfth)
Final plus post-final plus post final: s, z, t, d, θ (e.g. fifths, next)
2.3.3. Contrastive analysis of some English consonants and Vietnamese
consonants
It is indicated that there are some differences between two English consonants
and Vietnamese consonants.
Firstly, there are more detailed and categorizing criteria for manner of
articulation in Vietnamese than in English. For example, manner of articulation
is divided into two manner of articulation for stop and fricative, and then stop
and fricative are divided into nasal stop and oral stop. Moreover, in Vietnamese,
there is oral stop/t’/, oral voiceless stop/ / ţ , t, c, k /, oral voiced stop/b, d/, nasal
stop / m, n , ɲ, n / in the manner of articulation for stop. Meanwhile, English
plosive consonants combine between oral stop and / p, b, t, d, k, g, m, n/ and
affricate/ tʃ, dʒ/.
Secondly, in the manner of articulation for fricative, English consonants are

different from Vietnamese consonants such as / θ, ð, ʃ, ʒ, dʒ, tʃ, s, z/. Furthermore,
there are some English consonants that have no in Vietnamese such as/w, r, j/ .
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Finally, Vietnamese does not have consonants clusters like in English. For
example, in English, the groups/spl/ and /ts/ are consonant clusters in the word
splits. (Wikipedia, p.1)
2.4. Interference of mother tongue on pronouncing English consonants
Through a contrastive view into Vietnamese and English consonants, it is
illustrated that English learners are having difficulties in pronunciation.
Firstly, English also has a lot of sounds that cannot be found in Vietnamese
such as /ð/, /θ/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/, / tʃ/, /dʒ/ or pronounced differently /z/, /s/. Consequently,
learners have difficulty in exercising their mouth in the particular way required to
pronounce the English sounds correctly. Moreover, Vietnamese learners tend to
substitute the Vietnamese sound for the English. For example, students tend to
substitute the Vietnamese sound /b/ for the English /p/ or / θ/ for /d/.
Secondly, in conversational situations, the /s/ sound may present two types of
problem. The first problem is that in the spelling of some words, the /s/ sound is
omitted. For example, the word “ bikes” often pronounced as /baik /. The second
problem that many speakers encounter is the redundancy of the /s/ sound. In fact,
the /s/ and /z/ sounds do not occur at the final position in Vietnamese words, but for
English words, they do. Consequently, when speaking, Vietnamese learners of
English are over aware of these sounds and the over-awareness leads them to make
pronunciation mistakes. Vietnamese often add the /s/ sound in both adjectives and
non- count nouns. For example, instead of saying “very good”, many speakers
say very “goods”.
Sometimes, Vietnamese speakers tend to omit both /t/ and /d/ sound in the
final sounds of words. As, Nguyen (2007) stated, "clusters ending with voiceless /s/
and /t/ cause quite lot of problems for informants" (p. 23). Some other final

consonant clusters such as /kt/ as in walked, / t/ as in washed, / d/ as in judged,
and /ld/ as in filled are very difficult for Vietnamese learners to pronounce.
Thirdly, Vietnamese learners often have problems with sound confusion
between /s/ and /z/. They replace /s/ for /z/, so that a word such as “advise” is

16


pronounced as “advice”. As a result, this leads to misunderstanding in
communication among learners and between Vietnamese and foreigners.
Fourthly, English also has many consonants clusters at the beginning and at
the end of the words while Vietnamese sound system does not. Vietnamese students
often left one or two sounds in the consonant clusters. For example, instead of
pronouncing world /wə:rld/, Vietnamese students pronounce /wə:rl/ without the
sound /d/ at the end.
According to Nguyen (2007), "two-consonant cluster that contain /l/ in /lz/,
/lt/, /ld/, or /lf/ are observed to be really difficult for all speakers since the sound
itself never appears in the first language" (p. 22). For instance, myself may be
pronounced as /maisel/. Therefore, these common mistakes can be very difficult for
Vietnamese learners, especially students to overcome.
In conclusion, through a contrastive view into English and Vietnamese
consonants, it highlights a very important point concerning the influence of the
native language. It is if learners hear the second language though a ‘filter’, the filter
being the sound system of the native language” (Avery and Ehrlich, 1995, p.xv). In
other words, the learners’ errors such as consonants omission, mispronunciation
may be the predictable and potential difficulties that the student subjects face
because of the influences of Vietnamese.

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH FINDINGS
The data were collected from the questionnaires, interviews and recording test

during lessons and discussion, which were analyzed to answer the research

17


questions, from which the findings are presented in accordance with the discussion
of the relating studies in the field.

Very much
A lot
So so
Not like

Very important
Important

Chart 3.1: Students’ interest towards

Chart 3.2: Student’s perception to

learning English
importance of learning English
As can be seen in the pie chart 1, only 8% of the students are really fond of
learning English; 11% of the students like to learn it while the percentage of
students who concerns about learning English constitutes 62%. Referring to the
chart 2, it can be seen that majority of first- year students is aware of the importance
of English in our daily basis. Particularly, over 70% students know how important
English is towards their life and future job while some think that learning English is
not too significant.
Similarly, when being asked to evaluate the importance of English

pronunciation, most students strongly agree that correct pronunciation is absolutely
crucial in communication (68%). The rest of students argue that pronunciation is not
as important as other skills.
In fact, first-year students who have got the basic knowledge of pronunciation
admit the difficulty of pronunciation over the past semester. One haft of students
(over 50%) often have trouble with pronunciation, especially consonants whilst
some students are able to pronounce correctly and confident with their ability.
As a result, the larger number of first-year students encounter great difficulties
in pronouncing sounds, especially consonants for several reasons which are
demonstrated the following.

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3.1. Error of pronouncing some English consonants and final sounds
made by first- year students at Thuong Mai University
According to the analyzed results, it is indicated that majority of the students
have difficulty with a wider number of the English consonants. Particularly, the
sixth question of the questionnaire asked the students to point out which English
consonants that they encounter.

Mispronouncing consonant sounds
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%

p

b

t

d

s

z

f

v

m

n

ŋ

h

θ

ð

k

g

∫

ʒ

tʃ dʒ

l

r

w

j

Chart 3.3. Students’ consonant mispronunciation
Table 3.1 illustrates that the students often make mistakes of 19 English
consonants. The bilabial plosives /p/ and /b/ were mispronounced around 6.2% and
4.3%, respectively. The alveolar plosives /t/ and /d/ are 19% and 19.5% while the
velar nasal /ŋ/ is only 7.5%. the labio-dental fricatives /f/ and /v/ are 7.8% and
9.5%. Notably, the dental fricatives /ð/ and /θ/ constitute up 40.1% and 42.3%, also
the post-alveolar affricates /tʃ/ and /dʒ/ make up and 17.3 appropriately 39% and
42%. The post-alveolar fricatives /ʃ/ and /ʒ/ are 45.2% and 49.2%, / while the
alveolar fricatives /s/ and /z/ are 26.4% and 29.3%.
Hence, based on both the survey and teachers’ answer, it is indicated that the
larger number of students have trouble with 8 out of 24 English consonants, which
are /tʃ/,/dʒ/,/ʃ/,/ʒ/, /θ/, /ð/, /z/, and /s/ sounds as these sounds are not pronounced in
Vietnamese language.
3.1.1. Consonants confusion

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According to the survey of the five English consonants //tʃ/,/dʒ/,/ʃ/,/ʒ/ and /z/,
it is interesting to find out that several learners mispronounced these sounds and
produced/ s/, /z/, /z/, Vietnamese/ć/, /z/ instead, respectively.

The percentage of students makes sound confusion
35%
30%
25%
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%

/ʃ/-/s/

/ʒ/ - /z/

/ dʒ/-/z/ or /s/ /ʧ/- Vietnamese/ć/.

/s/- /z/

Chart 3.4.Students’ consonant confusion
As seen from the chart, over 30% students fail to pronounce /ʒ/ as a fricative
sound. Instead they pronounce it as /z/. The confusion of the sounds /ʧ/Vietnamese/ć/ constitutes approximately 22.2%. Similarly, /dʒ/-/z/ or /s/ sounds
being confused make up around 16%. Notably, the wider number of students who

confuse /ʃ/-/s/, /s/-/z/ is 33% and 38%, respectively.
Therefore, many Vietnamese learners and users of English make mistakes in
pronouncing the above mentioned consonants are due to failure in distinguish
among sounds and how to place their articulation incorrectly.
3.1.2. Omission of consonant cluster
To identify the omission of consonant cluster among first- year students when
they speak English, each one was asked to pronounce ten consonants sounds aloud,
while his or her voice was recorded. Afterwards, the errors were analyzed
statistically as in the following table:

20