Problems and solutions to improve the 10 TH graders pronuciation at nong cong no 1 secondary school

TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART 1: INTRODUCTION …………………………..
1.1.Rationale for the study ……………………………………
1.2.Purposes of the study and Research Questions …………
1.3. Scope of the study …………………………………………

Page 2
Page 2
Page 2
Page 3

1.4Methods of the study ………………………………………
PART 2: DEVELOPMENT ……………………………………
2.1. Literature Review …………………………………………
2.2.1. Definition of pronunciation ……………………………
2.1.2. Ways to overcome pronunciation errors ……………..
2.2. Methodology…………………………………………….
2.2.1.Participants and the research context………………….

Page 3
Page 4
Page 4
Page 4
Page 10
Page 11
Page 11

2.2.2.Textbook and Reading materials

Page 11

2.2.3.The reality of teaching and learning Pronunciation at Nong Cong 1
Page 11
Upper secondary school
2.2.4. Research methodology

………………………………….

Page 12

2.3. FINDINGS AND IMPLICATIONS
2.3.1.Data analysis and discussion

……………………………

Page 12

2.3.2. Major finding and discussion

…………………………

Page 13

PART 3: CONCLUSION
3.1 Summary of the main findings
3.2 Suggestions for further study

………………..
………………….

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PART 1. INTRODUCTION
1. 1.Rationale for the study
Obviously, pronunciation is one of the most important skills in English
language teaching . Incorrect pronunciation leads to misunderstandings,
however, at the upper-secondary schools in Vietnam, pronunciation has so far
been paid less attention to compared to vocabulary, grammar and language
skills. Moreover, in English textbooks for 10 th graders, there are a few exercises
for pronunciation practice. As we know, all English exams at school are always
in the written form so most teachers as well as students have little motivation to
teach and to learn pronunciation.
In teaching English I recognize that students make many pronunciation
errors such as word and sentence stress, intonation, length of vowel sounds,
ending sounds and linking sounds. There are a lot of differences in learning
English between people in city and the countryside, as students in city have
better skills than in countryside. The results of examination in two recent years
show that students in the cities have better marks than in the countryside. The
gap in knowledge and skills of English between students in those two areas is
very big. Therefore, the necessity to fill this gap is a challenging but worth doing
for teachers of English. One of the aspects that needs to be fulfilled is
pronunciation. To improve students' pronunciation , I carry out this study to find
out suggested solutions to overcome problems in pronunciation. Thus, with the
ambition to improve our own students’ pronunciation, that is, to improve our
students’ English skills, decided to carry out the study entitled “ Problems and
sollutions to improve the 10 th graders’s pronunciation at Nong Cong no.1 Upper
secondary school”

1.2. Purpose of the study
The aim of the study is mainly figure out common mistakes in
pronouncing English vowels and consonants by 10th graders at Nong Cong no.1
upper secondary school in order to give some suggested solutions to improve
teaching and learning pronunciation at Nong Cong no.1 upper secondary school
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1.3. Scope of study
The research focuses on English pronunciation mistakes made by 10 th
graders at Nong Cong

no.1 upper secondary school and gives suggested

solutions . Moreover, within the scope of this study, we do not have an ambition
to cover all students' problems with English pronunciation. Only pronunciation
mistakes with some typical vowels and consonants made by the students are
investigated.
In order to obtain the exact response to the aims, two research questions
are raised:
1. What types of common pronunciation mistakes made by 10th graders
students?
2.What should students do to overcome the pronunciation mistakes?
1.4. Methodology
There are 80 10th graders from classes 10A6, 10A10 at Nong Cong no.1
upper secondary school in Thanh Hoa province. They are the same age but they
are in different levels. The students are from rural areas such as Tế Nông, Tế
Thắng, Thăng Long communes.They were asked to answer the questionaires.
The teacher calls them to read the sounds in each lesson with their teacher’s
observation . The observer listens and finds out the common pronunciation

mistakes in vowels and consonants.

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PART 2. DEVELOPMENT
2.1 . literature review
2.1.1. Definition of pronunciation
Pronunciation is the way in which a word is spoken" or "the way in which
a word is usually pronounced . Pronunciation is a basic skill in speaking. If the
word is pronounced wrong, the listener can't understand. In addidition, sound is
the core of the language so the teacher should teach pronunciation correctly.
Nowadays communicative approach is popularly applied, it means that learners
must communicate successfully with each other. That is the reason why
pronunciation teaching has been paid attention to by all the teachers as well as
the students.
As we know there are 44 sounds in English. They are included two
groups: there are 20 vowel sounds including 12 pure vowels, 8 dipthongs and 24
consonants sounds.
Characteristics of pure vowel sounds are presented as follows:
Pure vowel

Characteristics

Sounds
/ i: /

The front of the tongue is slightly behind and below the
close front position. The "close" position is where the
tongue is closest to the roof of the mouth. Lips are spread.

The tongue is tense, and the sides of the tongue touch the
upper molars.
For example some words are read as / i:/: sea, seat, , see,

/ɪ/

free, cede, secret, receive, Vietnamese, chief, machine.
The part of the tongue slightly nearer the centre is raised to
just above the half-close position. The lips are spread
loosely, and the tongue is more relaxed. The sides of the
tongue may just touch the upper molars.
As in these words: village, ear, beer , pier , here, bit,

/ e/

become, women.
The front of the tongue is between the hlf-open and half4


close positions. Lips are closely spread. The tongue is
tenser than for / ɪ /, and the sides of the tongue may touch
the upper molars.
/ æ/

For example: bed, bread, breath, chair, care, pleasant
The front of the tongue is raised to just below the half-open
position. Lips are neutrally open.

/ ɑː /

For example: dam, map, have, plait, antique.
The tongue, between the centre and the back, is fully open
position. Lips are neutrally open.

/ ɔː /

As in these words: bar, sharp, half, calm, star, smart.
The back of the tongue is raised to between the half-open
and half-close positions. Lips are loosely rounded.
For example: all, call, fault, laugh, law, awful, wall, water,

/ɒ/

born, cross, oar, four, door.
The back of the tongue is in the fully open position. Lips
are lightly rounded.
Example: dot, often, long, knowledge, want, cough,

/ʊ/

Astralia.
The part of the tongue just behind the centre is raised, just
above the half-close position. The lips are rounded, but
loosely so. The tongue is relatively relaxed.
For example: could, should, full, put, woman, wolf, foot,

/ uː /

cook, good.
The back of the tongue is raised just below the close

position. Lips are rounded. The tongue id tense.
As in these words: screw, fruit, juice, rule, do, who, cool,

/ʌ/

food, cukoo.
The centre of the tongue is raised to just above the fully
open position. Lips are neutrally open.
For example: come, some, young, cousin, but, cup, blood,

/ ɜː /

rug, must, unhappy, umbrella, lungs.
The centre of the tongue is between the half-close and half5


open positions. Lips are relaxed, and neutrally spread.
As in these words: serve, girl, first, worm, fur, hurt, earth,
learn.
The centre of the tongue is between the half-close and half-

/ə/

open positions. Lips are relaxed, and neutrally spread.
For example: sperate, about, paper, silent, banana.
Table 1: Characteristics of pure vowel sounds
Characteristics of English diphthongs are presented as follows: A
diphthong is defined by Jones as "a sound made by gliding from one vowel to
another....represented phonetically by sequence of two letters"
Diphthongs

/ eɪ /

Characteristics
Diphthong / eɪ / starts " from slightly below the halfclose front position and moves in the direction of RP /

Diphthong / ɔɪ /

ɪ /" .
The first element of / ɔɪ / in RP is pronounced very
close to cardinal [ɔ ] and the second, after
configuration

/ əʊ /

changes,

is

close

towards

the

pronunciation of [ɪ
The realisation of diphthong / əʊ / starts with the
articulators positioned for "typical RP [ɜː] position",
while afterwards the tongue moves "slightly up and

/ aʊ /

back to RP [ʊ].
The diphthong / aʊ / starts "further back than / aɪ/ and

/ ɪə /

changes towards RP / ʊ /"
This is one of the centering diphthongs (/ ɪə /, / eə/, /
ʊə/). Diphthong / ɪə /, starts with the tongue

/ eə /

positioned for / ɪ /.
Diphthong / eə / "starts at cardinal /e / or below and

/ ʊə /

moves to more central but equally open position"
The glide / ʊə / has "coalesced with / ɔː / for most RP
speakers" and "[a] monophthongal pronunciation
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is ...found regularly before / r / in, e.g. alluring,
furious, having the quality of the diphthong's
beginning point"
Consonant sounds
Consonan

Characteristics

t sounds
/p/

Bilabial sounds: total closure is made using both lips. The soft
palate is raised. / p / is unvoiced and fortis. / b / is voiced and

/b/

lenis. / b / is devoiced at the end of the word.
For example: pig/ big, cap/ cab, happen, cabbage

/t/
/d/

Alveolar sounds: closure is made by the tongue blade against
the alveolar ridge. The soft palate is raised. / t / is unvoiced and
fortis. / d / is voiced and lenis. / d / is devoiced at the end of a
word.

/k/

For example: to/ do, hat/ bad, hotter, harder
Velar sounds: closure is made by the back of the tongue against
the soft palate. / k / is invoiced and fortis. / g / is voiced and
lenis. / g / is devoiced at the end of a word.
Example: cat/ get, pick/ pig, packet, forget

/g/
/f/

/v/

Labio- dental sounds: the lower lip makes light contact with the
upper teeth. The soft palate is raised. / f / is unvoiced and
fortis. / v / is voiced and lenis. / v / is devoiced at the end of a
word.

/s/

For example: fan/ van, cafe, cover, hoof, hooves
Alveolar sounds: The tongue blade makes light contact with the
alveolar ridge. The soft palate is raised. / s / is unvoiced and

/z/

fortis. / z / is voiced and lenis. / z / is devoiced at the end of a
word.
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/θ/

For example: sad/ zoo, this, that, these, icy, lazy.
Dental sounds. The tongue tip makes light contact with the back
of the top, front teeth. Or, tongue tip may produce between
upper and lower teeth. The soft palate is raised. / θ / is unvoiced
and fortis. / ð / is voiced and lenis. / ð / is devoiced at the end of

/ð/
/ʧ/

/ʤ/

a word.
For example: thank, the, bath, bathe, mathematics, father.
Palato-alveolar sounds. The tongue tip, blade and rims close
against the alveolar ridge and side teeth. The front of the tongue
is raised, and when the air is released, there is audible friction.
The soft palate is also raised. / ʧ / is unvoiced and fortis. / ʤ / is
voiced and lenis. / ʤ / is devoiced at the end of a word.

/ʃ/

For example: church, judge, nature, larger
Palato-alveolar sounds. The tongue blade makes light contact
with the alveolar ridge, and the front of the tongue is raised. The
soft palate is also raised.

/ʒ/

/ ʃ / is unvoiced and fortis. / ʒ / is voiced and lenis.
/ ʒ / is devoiced at the end of a word.
Note: / ʒ / does not occur as an initial sound in English, and is
rare as a final sound.

/h/

For example: she, fish, nation, measure
A glottal sound. Air passes from the lungs through the open
glottis, causing audible friction. Tongue and lip position is that
of the following voel sound. The soft palate is raised. / h / is

unvoiced.
Note: / h / does not occur as a final sound.

/m/

For example: hello, behind
A bilabial sound. Total closure is made by both lips. If followed
by / f / or / v /, the closure may be labio-dental. The soft palate
is lowered, and air passes out through the nasal cavity. / m / is
voiced, but may be devoiced, after /s/ like in smart.
8


/l/

For example: more, room, camera
A lateral sound. A partial closure is made by the blade of the
tongue against the alveolar ridge. Air is able to flow around the
sides of the tongue. The soft palate is raised. / l / is voiced.

/n/

For example: life, pool, small.
An alveolar sound. The tongue blade closes against the alveolar
ridge, and the rims of the tongue against the side teeth. If
lollowed by / f / or/ v / the closure may be labio-dental, or
bilabial if followed by / p / or / b /. The soft palate is lowered,
and passes out through the nasal cavity. / n / is voiced, but may
be devoiced after / s / like in snow

/ŋ/

For example: no, on, infant, know.
A velar sound. The back of the tongue closes against the soft
palate. The closure is further forward if it follows on from a
front vowel (compare sing and bang). The soft palate is lowered,
and air passes out through the nasal cavity. / ŋ / is voiced. / ŋ /
does not occure as an initial sound.

/r/

Foe example: sing, sink, singing. Sinking
A post- alveolar sounds, as the tongue tip is held just behind
(not touching) the alveolar ridge. Back rims of tongue touch
upper molars. The soft palate is raised. / r / is voiced.

/j/

For example: red, hurry, party, car
A palatal semi-vowel. The tongue is in the position of a close
from vowel (similar to / ɪ /). The soft palate is raised. The sound
glides quickly to the following vowel. / j / is voiced. / j / does
not occure as a final sound.
For example: yes, young, usual, few, education, suit

/w/

A labio-velar semi-vowel. The tongue is in the position of a
close back vowel (similar to / ʊ /). The soft palate is raised. The
soft palate is raised. The sound glides quickly to the following

vowel. / w / is voiced. / w / does not occure as a final sound.
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2.1.2. Ways to overcome pronunciation errors
There are many ways to help students overcome pronunciation mistakes
because of its importance. Learners need to be taught pronunciation, as all other
aspects of language, in a communicative method. Though communicative
methods for teaching vocabulary, grammar and pragmatics have been around for
decades, there has been little development of a communicative method for
pronunciation teaching. We consider here some aspects of what is involved in a
communicative approach to pronunciation. One thing learners need is teachers
with confidence to assure them that the communicative methods do fulfill their
needs.

2.2. METHODOLOGY
2.2.1.Participants and the research context
The participants were 82 students of 10 A6,10 A10 class from every corner of
Nong Cong district, by this I mean they are both from town and rural areas.
Almost of them are females and they are 16 years old. Most these students
are generally at elementary level. They learned English for at least five
years at high school but this subject was not carefully taken into its
consideration. In their opinion, learning English means learning grammar and
structures with common lexical sources. Therefore, they find learning
English pronunciation difficult. Some students can easily adapt to the new
ways of learning, but most of them face challenges
2.2.2.Textbook and Reading materials
The vocabulary materials used in the study consisted of selected texts from
English Textbook 10 published by Education Publishing House. In the textbook,
there are 16 units with diverse topics related to 6 themes: You and me,

Education.Community, Nature, Recreation, People and places. 5 sections were
included in one unit namely: Reading, Speaking, Listening, Writing, Language
focus ( where pronunciation is taught).. It is hoped that English teachers will
have a better insight into using images and become confident to integrate these
effective tools into their learning vocabulary classroom practice.
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2.2.3. The reality of teaching and learning pronunciation at Nong Cong no.1
Upper secondary school
Nong Cong no.1 upper secondary school is a school located in the
countryside, the students have very few opportunities to speak English.
Students' level of English is lower than other areas. After finishing high school,
if they enter university or go to work, English is very essential to get a good
job. Therefore, it is essential to help students pronounce correctly, which helps
students have opportunity as students in other areas
In communication, correct pronunciation is very important because if you
mispronounce a sound, it leads to misunderstand. If the pronunciation is
different from other people, it is difficult to recognize and understand each other.
To get success in communicating with other, you must have good pronunciation.
So good pronunciation is very important for students who learn foreign
language. This will decide the success or failure of students' communication in
the target language. Like other aspects of language pronunciation is very
important. Correct pronunciation is very necessary to develop our skills,
especially speaking skill. Beside this, pronunciation also has other connections
to other fields like listening, writing, spelling ...If you are good at pronunciation,
you will be able to speak English well.
The sound systems of English and Vietnamese differ greatly, so
Vietnamese learners can have some pronunciation problems. Vietnamese is a
tone language, that is, pitch changes distinguish word meaning. Most words in

Vietnamese consist of only one syllable, there are fewer consonants than in
English and there is no consonant cluster. Thus, they often meet some main
problems when producing English
2. 2.4 Research methodology
Through questionaires and classroom observation survey to find out the
student's pronunciation mistakes. The study is based on the combination of
qualitative and quantitative approaches . Quantitative researchers are concerned
in their research with an attempt to count, measure the events and perform the
statistical analysis of a body of numerical data. This method can achieve high
levels of reliability of gathered data due to controlled observations, laboratory
experiments, mass surveys, or other form of research manipulations.

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2.3. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
2.3.1. Mistakes analysis
2.3.1.1. / æ/ sound mistake analysis
The results from the survey questionnaire, there are up to 62 students in
the number of 82 students participating in researcher's survey agree that, / æ/
sound is the most difficult sound to them. / æ / sound is often mispronounced
into monothong / e/ or / ɑː /. This leads to some difficulties for speakers and
listeners when they talk to each other in English. I would like to discuss why my
students turn / æ / sound into / e/ or / ɑː / when they pronounce the sound.
/ æ / sound is mispronounced into / e/ or / ɑː / sound because of the wrong
manner the students do or inexact place they put their articulators to produce the
sound. on the other hand, when pronouncing / æ / sound, my students do not
open their lips neutrally, they keep their lips loosely spread that may become the
first favourable condition for them to pronounce / e/ not / æ / sound. Moreover,
the different positions of their toungue also make them produce different sounds.

The students pronounce / æ / sound, they do not raise the front of their tongue to
just below the half-open position, they put either the front of their tongue
between the half-open and half-close position or the tongue between the centre
and the back in the fully open position. As a result, they produce either / e/ or /
ɑː / sound. When pronouncing / æ / sound, the tongue must be relaxed, not be
tense as in producing / e/ sound. Thus, the student's misplaced articulators
directly results in the wrong manner of their articulation that will continue to be
used to analyze the sounds mistakes made by 10 th grade .
2.3.1.2. Mistakes concerned with consonant sounds
Base on the analysis results from questionaires, most of students
mispronounce consonants / z / for / ð / and they often omit final sounds /p/,
/k/, /t/. The results show that students always make pronunciation mistakes
between / ð / and / z/ (85.55% students). They read /z/ for / ð /, especially class
10A10 28/30 students made this mistake. 72.22% students read / s / for /ʃ/, 60%
/ z / for / ʤ /, 47.77%/ t / for / ʧ /, 42.22% / ʃ / for / ʧ /and 50% /s / for / ʧ /.They
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omit most of final consonants such as 85.55% for / p / sound, 80% for / k /
sound and 82.22% for / t / sound.
2.3.2. Major finding :The causes lead to common mistake
2.3.2.1. Time limit on teaching and learning pronunciation
From questionaires we know that in 10 th textbook there is little time to
teach and learn to pronunciation. Pronunciation is a part of languague focus
period. It is about 10 minutes in the languague focus lesson, so that both
teachers and students are not aware of the importance of pronunciation. They
just concentrate on the skills and grammar, it means that many students often
mispronounce.
2.3.2.2. Lack of awareness of the importance of pronunciation
Obviously from questionaires, our students have inappropriate thoughts of

pronunciation. pronunciation is an important part that can support other skills'
improvement. Pronunciation plays a very important role both learning a
language and using that language. Although many students have good selfcomments on pronunciation, they are still unconfident when speaking in
English. My students should understand that good pronunciation is one of the
first thing to learn English well. If they pronounce wrong, the hearers may not
understand what they say. It is essential to practice pronunciation everyday.
2.3.2.3. Teacher's neglection of pronunciation
From my classroom observation, I know that all the materials used for
teaching and learning are in the textbook: " English 10", published by
Vietnamese education publisher. The teachers used a cassette to teach listening
in only 1/6 teaching sessions. In the pronunciation lesson, teachers only played
the tapes which contain the words for students to listen. They did not focus on
checking pronunciation of students. The teachers did not use any additional
materials for the teaching pronunciation. Almost techers complained that there
are so many things to teach and train for the test and exam while the teaching
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time is limited. Beside this, the students did not use dictionary to check
pronunciation at home, it leads to mispronounce.
2.3.2.4. Lack of knowledge of pronunciation rules
The students forget or do not master the place and manner of articulation
when they pronounce the sound. Thus, they tend to mistake one sound to another
sound. From my questionaires, the findings point out most of 10 th students
cannot distinguish what consonants are voiced and voiceless. So most of them
have wrong transcriptions of many simple words such as: bad /bʌd/, rise /raɪs/,
hot /hɔː t/...
2.3.2.5. Mother toungue interference
Because they are from Nong cong province so that they did not pronounce
the consonants in the final positions, which can cause a lot of misunderstanding.

As we know, the students did a lot of word- ending omission, they did not
pronounce word-ending sound such as three word-final fortis stops
consonants /p/, /k/, /t/ and three dental consonant stop /f/, /v/, /ð/. Most of
students at Nong cong no.1 upper secondary school also made mistakes when
they pronounce two consonants /ð/ and / θ /. They often pronounce /t/ for / θ /
and /d/ for /ð/.
2.3.3. Suggested solutions
There are a lot of suggested ways for students to find out the phonetics course
books to practice pronunciation. From my teaching experiences, what we
attempt to present here are some suggested solutions that we find effective in our
own experiences in teaching how to pronounce well.
2.3.3.1. Suggested solutions for each student/ individuals
2.3.3.1. 1. Students should do pronunciation exercises
In textbook 10, there is a few exercises on pronunciation, so after learning
basic sounds of English, students can self- practice by doing the phonetics
exercises regularly. They will help students to read and review the sounds they

14


are taught by the teachers. When doing the phonetics exercises students know
the differences between the pair of sound and pronouce correctly.
2.3.3.1. 2. Talking, listening to native speakers and try to imitate their
voice.
This way is very useful for students to apply because students can
communicative with native speakers. That helps them to improve their
pronunciation.It will help you see the differences between the sounds of English
and your native language and you can imitate the pronunciation and other
qualities of speech easier.When you listen to native speakers

for example

talking to them, watching TV, watching a movie, listening to an audio book,
listening to the song... you should pay attention to the sounds they pronounce
and try to imitate them again and again.

Part 3. CONCLUSION
3.1. Summary of the finding
As we know, with the aims stated in the first introduce chapter, I did my
research with some issue concerning English pronunciation teaching and
learning. Throughout the study, our goal has been to take closer look at the most
common mistakes by tenth graders' at Nong Cong

no.1 upper secondary

school , the study has achieved its aim, which is to awareness of vowels and
consonants mistakes and provide some ways to help students overcome
difficulties in learning pronunciation.
Firstly, the findings show that some common pronunciation mistakes that
10 th graders' students often make vowels sounds and consonants ones. From the
questionaires and classroom observations, I found out that my students cannot
distinguish clearly the differences between long vowels and short ones, so they
always make mistakes with some English couples like / e / vs. / æ /, / ɪ / vs. / ɪ: /,
/ ʊ / vs. / uː /. They also make mistakes with the consonant sounds such as / ð /
and / z /, / ʤ / sound vs / z/, /ʃ/ and /s/.
15


Secondly, there are many causes of these mistakes. The causes are time limit
on teaching and learning pronunciation, lack of awareness of the importance of

pronunciation, teacher's neglect of pronunciation, lack of knowledge of
pronunciation rules and the influence of mother tongue.
Another significant part of the study is that some suggested solutions to
teach and learn English pronunciation better. The suggested solutions for
individuals and groups or classes teach and practice pronunciation effectively.
For individuals, each student can practice at home as well as anywhere they
want. For groups and classes some games and activities are used to teach and
practice easier. It provides some noticeable points when using games and
activities in teaching and practicing pronunciation and sample activities that
could be helped students to be aware of and correct their mistakes with the
vowel and consonant sounds.
3.2. Suggestions for futher study
The researcher would like to give some suggestions related to this study
for English teachers and students. The researcher hopes that these suggested
solutions will be useful, especially for teachers, institutions, students, and other
researchers.
For teachers
Pronunciation is very important for the students as a basic ability to help
them listening to English utterances. Pronunciation is considered important
subject that should be taught as early as possible. So, it is better for the teacher
to teach this subject first before the others. There are some ways to teach
pronunciation effectively so that teachers can use them to reach achivements.
For students
Throughout the common pronunciation mistakes that found out in the
research, each student must reliaze own mistakes to practice pronunciations
better and better. Students can apply some suggested solution to practice their
pronunciation.
16

Signature of Principle

Thanh Hoá June 26th 2020
Hereby, I certify that this study is the
result of my own experience and has
not been submitted by any others.
Writen by

LÊ HƯƠNG GIANG

REFERENCES
1. Baker, Ann and Goldstein, Sharon.(1990). Pronunciation Pairs. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press
2. Bowen, T., and Marks. J. (1992). The Pronunciation Book: student-Centred
Activities for Pronunciation Work. Harlow: Longman
3. Hancock, M. (1995). Pronuncation Games. Cambridge University Press
4. Dalton, David F. 1997. Some Techniques for Teaching Pronunciation: The
Internet TESL Journal, Vol. III, No. 1
5. Hopkins, David. (1993). A Teacher’s Guide to Classroom Research. Great
Britain: St Edmundsbury Press Ltd
6. Hornby, A.S.1995.

Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current

English.Oxford Oxford University Press
7. Kelly, G. (2000). How to teach Pronunciation. Harlow: Pearson
8. Roach, P. (1983). English Phonetics and Phonology, Cambrigde, Cambridge
University Press.
9. Roach, P. ( 2001) Phonetics : Chapter 2 and 2. Oxford University Press.
17

10. Spencer, A. (1996) Phonology. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.

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APPENDIX 1: QUESTIONAIRES
This survey questionaire is designed for the research into " " SOME
PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS FOR BETTER PRONUNCIATION FOR
GRADE 10TH STUDENTS " . Your cooperation in answering the following
question is appreciated. Thank for your assistance
1. Do you like to learn pronunciation?
A. Yes

B. No

2. In your opinion: " which of the following parts is the most important?"
A. Grammar

B. Vocabulary

C. pronunciation

D. developing skills

3. In your opinion, pronouncing well means:
A. Pronouncing clearly
B. Pronouncing as exactly/ correctly as native speakers of English.
4. Do you think pronunciation is very important in learning English?

A. Yes

B. No

5. Do you learn English pronunciation as a separate lesson at your school?
A. Yes

B. No

6. In your opinion, pronunciation is:
A. Difficult

B. Easy

C. Interesting

D. Boring

7. What consonants are voiced and voiceless. Put "x" next to the voiced
consonants and "0" next to the voiceless consonants
s
z
t
d

ʒ
ʤ
j
p

b
f
v
h

Θ
Ð
ʃ
ʧ

w
l
r
k

8. Put a tick next to the vowel(s) you find difficult to pronounce

E
ɒ

æ
ə

ɪ
iː
1

ɜː
ɑː

g
m
n
ŋ


ʌ

ʊ

uː

ɔː

9. Put a tick next to consonant(s) you find difficult to pronounce
s
z
t
d

ʒ
ʤ
j
p

b
f
v
h

Θ
Ð
ʃ
ʧ

w
l
r
k

g
m
n
ŋ

10. Put a tick next to the pair(s) of sounds you find difficult to distinguish
e- æ
ɪ- iː
s-z
ɒ- ʌ
ə- ɜː
s- ʃ
ɑː- ɔː
ʊ- uː
m-n
11. How often do you practice pronunciation?
A. sometimes

B. always

g-w
z- ð
ʤ-z

C. never

12.How do you often practice pronunciation?
A. Reading loudly the sounds in textbook
B. Recording pronunciation and listen to it
C. Talking with foreigners and try to imitate their pronunciation
D. Other ways:...................................................................
13. Write the transcription of these words
Number
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12

Word
Hit
Bad
Put

Jellyfish
They
Shop
Church
Clear
Where
How
phone
Note

transcription

2

ʧ -s
ʧ-ʃ
ʧ -t


APPENDIX 2: CLASSROOM OBSERVATION SHEET
Name of observer: ………………………
Name of teacher observed:.....................................................
Date and time of observation:
Length of observation:
Grade level: 10th grade
Objective of observation: To find out the common pronunciation mistakes made
by 10th graders.
Name of lesson: Unit..../
Stage time

Procedures
Teacher' activity

technique
Students' activity
3


s

4