(Luận văn thạc sĩ) a contrastive analysis of professional titles in legal systems in english and vietnamese

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Vietnam national university, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYỄN THI ̣ v©n anh

Common mistakes made by 10-grade students at me
linh high school in producing English vowel and
consonant sounds
(Những lỗi phổ biến của học sinh khối 10 tr-ờng THPT Mê Linh trong
việc phát âm các nguyên âm và các phụ âm Tiếng Anh)
M.A. MINOR THESIS

Major: English Teaching Methodology
Code : 60 14 10

HANOI, 9/2011


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Vietnam national university, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

Ngun THỊ v©n anh

Common mistakes made by 10-grade students at me
linh high school in producing English vowel and

consonant sounds

(Nh÷ng lỗi phổ biến của học sinh khối 10 tr-ờng THPT Mê Linh trong
việc phát âm các nguyên âm và các phơ ©m TiÕng Anh)

M.A. MINOR THESIS

Major: English Teaching Methodology
Code : 60 14 10
Supervisor: KIM văn tất, M.A

HANOI, 9/2011


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TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION……………………………………………………………………………i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS …………………………………………………….………….ii
ABSTRACT………………………………………………………………………………..iii
TABLE OF CONTENTS…………………………………………………………………..iv
LIST OF TABLES…………………………………………………………………...........vii
PART I: INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………1
1. Rationale of the study……………………………………………………………….1
2. The aims of the study……………………………………...…………………..........2
3. Research questions…………………………………………………………….........2
4. The scope of the study…………………………………………………….………..3
5. Research method……………………………………………………………………3
6. Organization of the study…………………………………………………………...3

PART II: DEVELOPMENT ………………………………………………….………….4

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW ……………………………………..…………4
1.1.

Phonetics and phonology ……………………………………………….………4

1.1.1. English vowels……………………………………………………………...5
1.1.2. English consonants…………………………………………………….........8
1.2. The main differences between English and Vietnamese sounds ……...………….11
1.2.1. Consonants ………………………………………………………………..11
1.2.2. Vowels …………………………………………………………….............12
1.3. The importance of teaching and learning pronunciation …………………………12
1.4. Review of previous research ………………………………………………..........13
CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY…………………………………………………………….15
2.1. Context of the study. ………………………………………………………..........15


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2.1.1. Teaching staff and teaching methods ……………………………………..15
2.1.2. Students and their background …………………………………………….15
2.1.3. The teaching materials and facilities……………………………………….16
2.2. Research questions ……………………………………...…………………..........17
2.3. The subjects ………………………………………...……………….....................18
2.4. Data collection instruments ………………………………………………………18
2.4.1. Class observations …………………………………….…………………..18
2.4.2. Questionnaire ……………………………………………………………...18
2.5. Data collection procedures…………………………………………………..........18
2.6. Data analysis process ……………………………………………………………..19
2.7. Summary……………………………………………………………………………20
CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION ……………………………………….21
3.1. Classroom observation and discussion …………...................................................21

3.2. Findings and discussion from the questionnaire …………………………………24
3.2.1. Findings about the students’ attitudes towards pronunciation………………..24
3.2.2. Findings about the common problems with English sounds and the main
causes………………………………………………………………………………………25
3.2.2.1. Findings about the common problems with English sounds…………25
3.2.2.2. The causes of consonant and vowel mistakes………………..............26
3.2.3. The solutions to the problems………………………………………………...27
3.2.3.1. Students’ self correction……………………………………………...27
3.2.3.2. Teachers’ methods in teaching pronunciation………………………..28
3.2.3.3. Students’ expectation from their teachers’ methods in teaching
pronunciation …………………………………………………………………………….29
CHAPTER 4: SOME SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS FOR 10TH GRADE STUDENTS AT
ME

LINH

HIGH

SCHOOL

TO

PRODUCE

ENGLISH

SOUNDS

CORRECTLY……………………………………………………………………………31
4.1. Using visual aids………………………………………………………………31

4.2. Solutions for English sounds practice ……..…………………………………31


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4.2.1. Drilling (Listen and repeat)…………………………………………….32
4.2.2. Tongue twisters………………………………………………………...32
4.2.3. Do the listening exercises:……………………………………………...33
4.2.4. Playing games: …………………………………………………………34
4.2.4.1. Pronunciation maze…………………………………………….34
4.2.4.2. Bingo…………………………………………………………...35
PART III: CONCLUSION ……………………………………………...………………38
1. Conclusions ……………..…………….……………………………………………38
2. Limitations and suggestions for further study ……………………….………..........38

REFERENCES ………………………………………………………...…………...........40
APPENDICES………………………………………………………………………...........I

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES


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Figure 1:

Diagram of Vowels

Figure 2: Consonants in the English language
Table 1: Pronunciation matters mentioned in Tieng Anh 10
Table 2: students’ attitude toward pronunciation
Table3: students’ opinion on the level of difficulties of English vowels
Table4: students’ opinion on the level of difficulties of English consonants

Table5: Causes of students’ mistakes in producing English sounds
Table 6: Students’ opinions about their self- correction
Table 7: Teaching English pronunciation methods
Table 8: Students’ expectation from their teachers’ methods in teaching pronunciation

PART ONE: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale of the study


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In the process of integration and globalization, English is rapidly becoming an
indispensable instrument in community communication. It is being used world-wide as the main
language in business, trading, communication, etc. Therefore, more and more people learn
English as foreign language and wish to be able to master it as native speakers. However,
learners cannot success in studying English without mastering English pronunciation because
pronunciation is one of the most important components of a language. It is really very important
for learners to have communication of the target language as correct possible right from the start.
There have been a great deal of notable works about pronunciation and pronunciation teaching
since the dawn of language teaching such as ones written by, Gimson (1962), Kenworthy (1987),
Avery &Ehrlich (1992), Jerkins (2000). However, few studies have been done on common
mistakes in pronouncing English sounds alone. The most popular one is the study by Avery
&Ahrlich (1992) in which the problems of selected language group are discussed. In their work
they have confirmed that ―Vietnamese speakers do not experience too much difficulty with the
English vowels‖. In reality, Vietnamese learners often mispronounce the sound / æ / and /e/.
Moreover, their explanations about the problems which Vietnamese learners have with English
consonants are not really appropriate.
It is said that Vietnamese learners have not so many difficulties when producing English
sounds because English and Vietnamese have the same Latin alphabets. However, there is a big
difference in the phonetics alphabets between the two languages and the ways to pronounce
them. Thus, the most common cause is the default misunderstanding of the way these sounds are

produced and the effect of some sounds of the mother tongue.
In Vietnam, English is the core foreign language that is taught as a compulsory subject at
all school levels. The need to acquire this so popular language proves to be constant with
socioeconomic changes in Vietnam in recent years. However, it is undeniable that many
Vietnamese students receiving the English teaching from their teachers at schools can’t
pronounce English words correctly. This is one of the first language influences on the second
language acquisition in the way that some features of pronouncing words in English do not exist
in Vietnamese.
In fact, Vietnamese learners of English have many difficulties in pronouncing English. For
high school students, especially students at Me Linh high school are not the exception even


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though they have learnt English since the early age. Another reason is that no research has been
carried on this field at Me Linh high school in Hanoi. This leads the researcher to the thought of
making a research on ―Common mistakes made by tenth grade students at Me Linh high school
in producing English vowel and consonant sounds‖ with the purpose of finding out the causes of
mispronunciations. It is hoped that this study will contribute to the goal of enhancing students’
performances in the teaching and learning foreign language.
2. Aims of the study
The study aims at finding out common mistakes made by tenth grade students at Me Linh
high school in pronouncing English words and the causes of these problems. The results will
provide an overview of learners’ pronunciation at Me Linh high school and give suggestions for
teachers to improve the situation. The findings of this research will hopefully help Me Linh high
school students to raise their awareness of learning correct pronunciation so as to produce
English vowel and consonant sound properly.
3. Research questions
1. What are the common mistakes in pronouncing English vowels and consonants made by 10th
grade students at Me Linh high school?
2. What are the causes of those mistakes?

3. What are solutions to the problem?
4. Scope of the study
The study limited itself to the investigation of common mistakes in English pronunciation
of the 10th grade students at Me Linh high school in Hanoi. The researcher of the thesis pays
attention to find out students’ common mistakes in the lessons Language focus with the subsection Pronunciation of Tieng Anh 10- textbook. Solutions are also provided to help improve
teaching and learning English pronunciation in general, teaching and learning English
pronunciation for the 10th grade students at Me Linh high school in particular.
5. Research method


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A combination of different data collection methods was used including class observations
and questionnaires for students. Details of the methodology applied in the study are discussed in
Chapter 2 of Part two.
6. Organization of the study
The study composes of three parts:
Part one, Introduction, includes the rationale, aims, research question, scope, method and
organization of the study.
Part two, Development, consists of four chapters. Chapter one, Literature Review, presents
the theoretical background relevant to the research. The first section presents the basic concepts
of phonetics, phonology articulatory phonetics. The second section shows the main differences
between English and Vietnamese sounds. The next section presents the importance of teaching
pronunciation. The last section summarizes the review of previous research related to vowel and
consonant pronunciation. Chapter two, the Study, describes the context of the study, the
participants, and the method. Chapter three is the findings and discussion from classroom
observations and questionnaire. The last chapter is some suggested solutions for 10 grade
students at Me Linh high school to produce English sounds correctly.
Part three, Conclusion, summarizes the findings and gives limitations and suggestions for
further research.
Besides, the classroom observation transcripts, survey questionnaire and suggested

solutions for the teachers and students are included in the Appendices.

PART TWO: DEVELOPMENT
Chapter 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter is devoted to the presentation of the theoretical issues related to the study. The


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first section provides some basic linguistic and phonetic concepts to bring a common view of the
matter studied including phonetics, phonology, English consonants and vowels. The second
section describes the differences between English and Vietnamese. The next section presents the
importance of pronunciation teaching and learning. The final section discusses the review of
some previous research related to English consonant and vowel sounds.
1.1. Phonetics and phonology
This section starts with a distinction between two related terms (often loosely) used to refer
to linguistic disciplines studying the linguistic sign which Ferdinand de Saussure in Course of
General Linguistics called the acoustic image: phonetics and phonology.
Phonetics deals with how speech sounds are actually produced, transmitted and received in
actual spoken language, while phonology deals with especially with the ways those sounds are
organized into the individual languages, hence dealing with abstractions on a virtual basis.
―Phonetics first of all divides, or segments, concrete utterances into individual speech
sounds. It is therefore exclusively concerned with parole or performance. Phonetics can be
divided into three distinct phases: (1) articualtory phonetics, (2) acoustic phonetics and (3)
auditory phonetics‖ (Skandera& Burleigh, 2005:3)
Articulatory phonetics deals with the way in which speech sounds are produced. Sound are
usually classified according to the position of lips and the tongue, how far open the mouth is,
whether or not the vocal cords are vibrating and so on.
Acoustic phonetics deals with the transmission of speech sounds through the air. When a
speech sound is produced it causes minor air disturbances (sound waves). Various instruments
are used to measure the characteristics of these sound waves.

Auditory phonetics deals with how speech sounds are perceived by the listener,
From the practical phonetic standpoint, it is convenient to distinguish two types of speech
sound, simply because the majority of sounds may be described and classified most appropriately
according to one of the two techniques


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1. The types of sounds which is most easily described in terms of articulation, since we can
generally feel the contacts and movements involved. Such sounds may be produced with or
without vocal cords vibration (voice) and very often have a noise component in the acoustic
sense; these sounds fall generally into the traditional category of consonants
2. The type of sound, depending largely on very light variations of tongue position, which
is most easily described in terms of auditory relationships, since there not contacts or strictures
which we can feel with any precision. Such sounds are generally voiced, having no noise
component; these sounds fall generally into the traditional category of vowels and will be known
as vowels
"Phonology deals with the speakers’ knowledge of the sound system of a language. It is
therefore exclusively concerned with langue or competence [...] Phonology can be divided into
two branches: (1) segmental phonology and (2) suprasegmental phonology" (Skandera &
Burleigh, 2005:5)
Phonology is primarily concerned with how we interpret and systematize sounds. It deals
with the system and pattern of the sounds which exists within particular languages. The study of
phonology of English looks at the vowels, consonants and superasemental features of the
language. Within the disciplines of phonology, when we talk about vowels and consonants we
are referring to the different sounds we make when speaking, and not the vowel and consonants
letters we refer to when talking about spelling.
1.1.1. English vowels
Vowels are defined as ―sounds in which there is continual vibration of the vocal cords and the air
stream is allowed to escape from the mouth in an obstructed manner, without any interruption‖
(Celce-Murcia. M, Briton. D, Goodwin. J. 1996)

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Figure 1:

Diagram of Vowels

Vowel sounds can be described in the following details according to the RP vowel phonemes
/i:/: the front of the tongue is raised to a height slightly below and behind the close front position;
the lips are spread; the tongue is tense, with the side rims making a firm contact with the upper
molars. This is a long vowel
/I/ - The short RP /I/ is pronounced with a part of the tongue nearer to centre than to front raised
just above the half close position; the lips are loosely spread; the tongue is lax, with the side rims
making a light contact with the upper molars.
/e/ - For the short RP /e/, the front of the tongue is raised between the half-open and half-close
position; the lips are loosely spread and are slightly wider apart than for /I/; the tongue may have
more tension than the case for /I/, the side rims making a light contact with the upper molars
/æ/- The mouth is slightly more open than/e/, the front of the tongue is
raised between the half-open positions, with the side rims making a very
slight contact with the back upper molars; the lips are neutrally open. This
is a short vowel.
/ʌ/ - The short RP /ʌ/ is articulated with a considerable separation of the


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jaws and with the lips neutrally open; the centre of the tongue is raised just
above the fully open position, no contact being made between the tongue and
the upper molar.
/a:/- This normally long vowel is articulated with a considerable separation

of the jaws and the lips neutrally open; a part of the tongue between the
centre and back is in the fully open position, no contact being made between
the rims of the tongue and the upper molars.
/ ɒ/ - This short vowel is articulated with wide open jaws and light, open
lip-rounding; the back of the tongue is in the fully open position, no contact
being made between the tongue and the upper molars.
/ ɔ:/ This relatively long RP vowel is articulated with medium lip-rounding; the back of the
tongue is raised between the half-open and half-close positions, no contact being made between
the tongue and the upper molars.
/ ʊ/ - The short vowel / ʊ/ is pronounced with a part of the tongue nearer to centre than to
back raised just above the half-close position; it has, therefore, a symmetrical back relationship
with the front vowel /i:/; the tongue is laxly held, no firm contact being made between the tongue
and the upper molars
/u: / - RP long /u:/ is a back close vowel, but the tongue raising is relaxed from the closet
position and is somewhat advanced from true back; its relationship with /u/ is similar to that
between /i:/ and /I/, the articulation of /u:/ being compared with that of / ʊ/ , though no firm
contact is made between the tongue and the upper molars
/ ɜ:/ - RP / ɜ:/ is articulated with the centre of the tongue raised between half-close and
half-open, no firm contact being made between the tongue and the upper molars; the lips are
neutrally spread.
1.1.2. English consonants


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―Consonants are formed by interrupting, restricting or diverting the airflow in a variety of ways‖
(Kelly. G, 2003:24)
There are three ways of describing the consonant sounds: the manner of articulation, the place of
articulation, the force of the articulation
Place of articulation

Manner of articulation

Plosive

p

b

t

f v
m

θ ð

s

z

ʃ

glottal

velar
g

h

ʒ

n

Lateral

Figure 2:

k
tʃ dʒ

Fricative

Approximant

palatal

d

Affricate

Nasal

alveolar

Post-

Alveolar

dental

dental

back

labio-

Bilabial

Front

η

l
(w)

r

j

w

Consonants in the English language

• Bilabial Plosives: /p, b/
The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the primary obstacle to the airstream is provided by the closure of the lips. Lung air is compressed behind this closure, during
which stage the vocal cords are held wide apart for /p/, but may vibrate for all or part of the
compression stage for /b/ according to its situation in the utterance. Then the closure is released
suddenly for the air to escape with a kind of explosion.
• Alveolar Plosives: /t, d/
The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the primary obstacle to the airstream is formed by a closure made between the tip and rims of the tongue and the upper alveolar
ridge and side teeth. Lung air is compressed behind this closure, during which stage the vocal

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cords are wide apart for /t/, but may vibrate for all or part of the compression stage for /d/
according to its situation in the utterance. The air escapes with noise upon the sudden separation
of the alveolar closure.
• Velar Plosives: /k, g/
The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the primary obstacle to the airstream is formed by a closure made between the back of the tongue and the soft palate. Lung air
is compressed behind this closure, during which stage the vocal cords are wide apart for /k/, but
may vibrate for all or part of the compression stage for /g/ according to its situation in the
utterance. The air passage escapes with noise upon the sudden separation of the velar closure. All
six plosives can occur at the beginning of a word (initial position), between other sounds (medial
position) and at the end of a word (final position).
• Labio-dental Fricatives: /f, v/
The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the inner surface of the lower lip
makes a light contact with the edge of the upper teeth, so that the escaping air produces friction.
For /f/, the friction is voiceless, whereas there may be some vocal cord vibration accompanying
/v/, according to its situation.
• Dental Fricatives: /ð, θ/
(Examples words: thumb, thus, either, father, breath, breathe)
The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the tip and rims of the tongue make
a light contact with the edge and inner surface of the upper incisors and a firmer contact with the
upper side teeth, so that the air escaping between the forward surface of the tongue and the
incisors causes friction. For / θ / the friction is voiceless, whereas for / ð/ there may be some
vocal cord vibration.
• Alveolar Fricatives: /s, z/
(Examples words: sip, zip, facing, rise, rice)


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The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the tip and blade of the tongue make
a light contact with the upper alveolar ridge, and the side rims of the tongue a close contact with
the upper side teeth. The air-stream escapes through the narrow groove in the centre of the
tongue and causes friction between the tongue and the alveolar ridge. In other words, in the
articulation of these sounds the air escapes through a narrow passage along the centre of the
tongue, and the sound produces is comparatively intense.
• Palato-alveolar Fricatives: / ʃ; ʒ /
(Example words: ship, Russia, measure, Irish, garage)
The fricatives are so called palato-alveolar, which can be taken to mean that their place of
articulation is partly palatal, partly alveolar. The tongue is in contact with an area slightly further
back than that for /s/, /z/. If you make /s/ then / ʃ /, you should be able to feel your tongue move
backwards. The air escapes through a passage along the centre of the tongue, as in /s/ and /z/,
but the passage is a little wider. Most speakers of RP have rounded lips for / ʃ / and / ʒ /, and
this is an important difference between these consonants and /s/ and /z/. In addition, the escape of
air is diffuse (compared with that of /s, z/), the friction occurring between a more extensive area
of the tongue and the roof of the mouth. In the case of / ʃ /, the friction is voiceless, whereas for
/ ʒ / there may be some vocal cord vibration according to its situation. All the fricatives described
so far can be found in initial, medial and final positions. In the case of / ʒ/, however, the
distribution is much more limited. Very few English words begin with / ʒ/ (most of them have
come into the language comparatively recently from French) and not many end with this
consonant. Only medially, in words such as ―measure‖, ―usually‖ is it found at all commonly.
1.2. The main differences between English and Vietnamese sounds
1.2.1. Consonants
First, English has 24 consonants but there are only 21 in Vietnamese. Some phonemes exist in
English but not in Vietnamese and vice versa. For instance, according to Đoàn Thiện ThuËt,
following English sounds are absent in Vietnamese dialect
/ θ/
think

/ ð/

they

/ ʒ/
Asia

/ʃ/
English

/j/
yet

/p/(initial)
pupil

/t/ (initial)
teacher


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Second, in Vietnamese, a letter is often presented by the same phoneme. Whereas in English,
some phonemes seem to be presented by identical letters but different in pronunciation. For
example,
/k/ -

kite /kait/
-

/f/ / s/

knife /naïf//
forget /fə'get/
of / əv/
- sea /si:/

-

Season /'si:zn/

Third, Vietnamese in general is spoken with a staccato delivery. Syllables and words are not
linked together as in English but are clearly separated from each other.
For example,
Không có gì-

Not at all
/No

te tall/

Fourth, different from English with many sequences of consonants including the initial
such as ―street‖ /stri:t/
―stepped‖ /stept/

/ or ―throat‖ / /θrout/

/ and the final such as ― sixth‖ / /siksθ/

/ or

/, Vietnamese does not have sequences of consonants at all. Although some

orthographic combinations of letters in Vietnamese look like consonant clusters such as th. Ch,
ng, ngh, tr, ph in fact they present only simple consonants phonologically such as ng / ŋ /, ph /f
/,etc. This feature causes both perceptive and productive problems; especially final consonant
clusters cause the greatest difficulties for Vietnamese students.
1.2.2. Vowels
There are three out of seven short English vowels that are absent in Vietnamese / æ /, /ʌ/ and /
ɜ: /. Vietnamese does not have vowel contrasts (minimal pairs) which means there is no
discrimination between the short and long. E.g /i: / and /I /. This is really a matter to Vietnamese
students because they cannot pronounce some words correctly without looking at its
pronunciation transcription in the dictionary.

1.3. The importance of teaching and learning pronunciation


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―A learner who constantly mispronounces a range of phonemes can be extremely difficult
for a speaker from another language community to understand. A consideration of learners’
pronunciation errors and of how these can inhibit successful communication is a useful basis on
which to assess why it is important to deal with pronunciation in the class‖. Kelly (2000:11).
While saying why it is important to teach pronunciation, Hewings (2004:10) ―Difficulties
with pronunciation might mean that students fail to get their message across, even when the
correct words are being used, or they might fail to understand what is said to them.‖
Sound is the core of the language so that is the reason why when teaching a language the
first thing the teacher should do is to let the learners have chances to explore the sounds of that
language. Moreover, communicative approach is considered as the major language teaching in
the twenty first century as what the learners really need after graduating is that they can
communicate successfully in their work and their life. That is the reason why pronunciation
teaching has been paid more and more attention by all the teachers.
Pronunciation is as important as any other aspects of language like syntax and

vocabulary. Speech is much more than pronunciation of course, but speech is impossible
without it. Correct pronunciation, in fact, is considered to be a prerequisite to develop the
speaking skill. That is why teaching pronunciation should occupy an important place in the
study of any language.
Nowadays, communicative approach is considered as the major language teaching in this
twenty first century. English is being used world-wide as the main language. Therefore, teachers
of English have paid more and more attention in teaching pronunciation. Pronunciation is also
designed in textbook for high school students in each lesson for each grade.
1.4 Review of previous research
There have been a number of studies about Vietnamese learners’ difficulties or problems in
any aspects of English pronunciation. Important findings were drawn and become a valuable
basis for this research.
Avery &Ehrlich (1992) are the two people mentioning problems Vietnamese learners may face
when studying English: ―As the sound systems of English and Vietnamese differ greatly,


22
Vietnamese speakers can have quite severe pronunciation problems. In their work, the most
common problem for the Vietnamese learners have is the problem with the word final
consonants including voiceless stop consonants/p/, /t/, /k/, fricative consonants /f/, /v/, / θ/, /ð/....
Besides, they also presented Vietnamese learners’ problems in pronouncing vowels such as
/iy/vs /i/ /ey/ vs/ ɜ:/ or /e/ vs // æ/.
In the article “Common pronunciation problems of Vietnamese learners of English” Tam
(2005) pointed out the two main problems in pronunciation of Vietnamese learners, that is, sound
omission and sound confusion. Relating to English final consonant pronunciation, she stated that
Vietnamese speakers omitted ending sound most frequently. A reason for sound omitting is a
negative transference of their L1 due to the habit of ―swallowing‖ the ending sound in the mother
tongue.
The article ―Teaching English to speakers of Vietnamese. Refugee Education Guide:
General Information‖ that highlights problems Vietnamese speakers are likely to have in

learning English and suggests ways of helping Vietnamese students of English over difficulties
caused by these differences. Or ―9 Essential English Pronunciations in the Vietnamese Context”
by Tran Thi Lan found that English sounds not found in Vietnamese, for example, the
interdentals / ð/,/ θ/ can be mixed up /f/ or Vietnamese /th/ though this may not influence
comprehensibility.
The above studies are all about problems of Vietnamese learners in pronouncing English in
general; in addition, this research was carried out to find out common mistakes made by 10 grade
students at Me Linh high school in producing English vowel and consonant sounds in
specifically.


23

Chapter 2: THE STUDY
The literature review has described the basic theory of phonetic matters regarding the study.
They are the background supporting this part of the research. This chapter presents the
methodology, context of the study, data collection procedures and the subjects of the study. The
results getting from the data analyses and the discussion of those results are provided.
2.1. Context of the study
2.1.1. Teaching staff and teaching methods


24
The teaching staff at Me Linh high school consists of 10 teachers of English at the age from
26 to 33. They graduated from College of Foreign Languages- Vietnam National University,
Hanoi; Thai Nguyen University; Vinh Phuc Teachers Training College and have been teaching
English for at least 5 years. Most of them have to teach in large classes with about 45 students
each. Each teacher has to teach more than 3 classes of this kind. It means that they must be
responsible for the learning results of more than 120 students. In addition, teaching materials are
not always available; so many teachers have to buy textbooks and use them as their main

material. Although the teachers are always aware of the new trend in teaching methods and
aware of the importance of the communicative approach when teaching English to their students
in general and pronunciation in particular, classes are usually conducted in the form of lectures:
Most of the time the teachers are the main speakers working through the text.
2.1.2. Students and their background
Me Linh high school is located in Me Linh, a rural district of Hanoi. It is one of the six
schools in Me Linh and the second oldest one in this district. At tenth grade, there are 455
students. They have been learning English for at least four or five years at secondary schools.
Most of the students come from poor families but they are very hardworking and have an
acceptable level of English knowledge. However, they cannot communicate with each other
effectively and cannot pronounce some sounds correctly. In order to communicate well in a
foreign language, they know that the first thing they should do is to pronounce correctly the
words and know how to use them accurately. However, some students said that they couldn’t
read the transcription in dictionary, and only know the words which teachers had taught them
how to pronounce, others said that they imitated the sounds in the cassette tapes but it was very
difficult for them to pronounce the words they heard, others said that they often found it hard to
communicate with native speakers, etc. Some students know that their speaking is not accurate,
but they do not know what errors they have made or how to correct them. Generally the target
students’ English fluency is still at a low level because the purpose of students learning is to pass
the general education examination.
2.1.3. The teaching materials and facilities


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The teaching material for this study is the textbook Tieng Anh 10. It is the basic curriculum for
general students with 16 units of different themes which cover two semesters. Each unit consists
of 5 sections: reading, speaking, listening and language focus and each section is supposed to be
taught in 45 minutes. The classes have 3 periods a week. There is a test after every 3 units and
two final tests at the end of each semester. Teaching pronunciation is the first part of the

Language focus, the second one is Grammar. Because the time is limited for this section (only 45
minutes for 2 parts: pronunciation and Grammar), so the pronunciation is often practiced in 7 or
10 minutes that is not enough. The details of Pronunciation sub-section in Tieng Anh 10 are
shown in the table below.

Units

Pronunciation matter

Unit 1

/ I / - / i: /

Unit 2

/ ʌ / - / a: /

Unit 3

/e/ - /æ/

Unit 4

/ ɒ / - / ɔ: /

Unit 5

/ ʊ / - / u: /

Unit 6

/ə/ - / ɜ: /

Unit 7

/ eI / - / ai / - / ɔI /

Unit 8

/ aʊ / - / əʊ /

Unit 9

/ iə / - / e ə / - / ʊə /

Unit 10

/b/- /p/

Unit 11

/ d/- /t/

Unit 12

/s/- /z/

Unit 13

/f/- /v/

Unit 14

/ g/ - / k /

Unit 15

/θ/- /ð/

Unit 16

/ʒ/- /ʃ/


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Table 1: Pronunciation matters mentioned in Tieng Anh 10
From the table, we can come to a conclusion that in Tieng Anh 10, pronunciation matters
are complicated, including diphthongs, minimal pairs of both vowels and consonants.
Teaching facilities also play an important part in teaching English and may affect the
teaching positively or negatively. All teachers can use cassette recorders in their class when
necessary but the recorders are too old and often out of order. There are some modern devices
such as overhead projector and projector, but seldom can teachers and students use them because
it is inconvenient for them to fetch it to the classroom. It is obvious that teaching facilities at Me
Linh High School are poorly supplied. This certainly has negative effects on English teaching
and learning.
2.2. Research questions
The research focuses on analyzing the pronunciation problems of tenth grade students at
Me Linh high school to find out their common mistakes in producing English sounds. The study
raised the following questions.

1. What are common mistakes in pronouncing English vowels and consonants made by 10 th
grade students at Me Linh high school?
2. What are the causes of those mistakes?
3. What are solutions to the problem?
2.3. The subjects
The subjects of the study consist of 100 ten grade students from ten classes at Me Linh high
school. They are chosen at random basing on their ordinal number in the attendance register.
They are from 15 to 16 years old. All of them have learned English since 6th grade (about 12
years old). The learning aid is only a cassette player. Most of them can do written English tasks
quite well, but they speak English with a lot of mispronounced words.
2.4. Data collection instruments


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To get the findings for research questions, these means of data collection were administered:
2.4.1. Class observations
Classroom observations are applied in order to find out common mistakes in producing
English consonant and vowel sounds among students at grade ten. The observations were carried
out before the time the questionnaires were conducted in three Language Focus periods of three
different classes taught by three different teachers at grade 10. Hopefully, the results from the
classroom observations will contribute much to finding out the solutions to the problems.
2.4.2. Questionnaire
The questionnaire was designed with 11questions to get information about the students’
attitude, their difficulties in producing English sounds and the causes of those difficulties as well
as the teachers’ methods to help students to produce English correctly.
2.5. Data collection procedures
As mentioned in the above section, to collect information and data, two instruments: the
observation and questionnaire were used. All the participants were informed of the purpose of the
study and willing to help the researcher to fulfill the task.
The study was conducted in two steps as follows:

Firstly, the class observation was done when the subjects learning English pronunciation
lessons naturally without awareness of being observed in the classroom. The researcher attended
teaching periods of other colleagues and observed the students of her own class. During the
observation, the researcher took notes immediately in her notebook. These notes were then
transcribed and analyzed to evaluate pronunciation teaching and learning in the classroom.
Then, the result of the observation would be compared with the result of the questionnaire.
Secondly, the questionnaires were administered to 100 students of grade 10 at the end of
the second- semester of the school year. The questionnaire consists of 11questions. Five first
questions are aimed at finding out the attitudes of students towards the pronunciation lessons.
The next three questions are aimed at finding out the levels of difficulties in producing vowels


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and consonants and the causes of difficulties. The three last questions are aimed at finding out
the solutions to produce English sounds correctly in teaching and learning pronunciation. The
researcher clearly explained the purpose of doing research before the participants answered the
questions. They were also encouraged to raise questions if there was something in the
questionnaire they did not understand. They were instructed to take as much time as they needed
to complete it.
2.6. Data analysis process
Data collected from two different sources were categorized into (a) the tenth grade
students' attitudes towards pronunciation at Me Linh high school, (b) the difficulties in
producing English vowel and consonant sounds and the causes of mistakes (c) the suggestions
made by the researcher for both teachers and students in learning and teaching pronunciation
correctly. The data were categorized this way is easy for the researcher to find the answers for the
research questions. The quantitative data were presented in the form of tables while qualitative
data from the class observation was presented by quoting relevant responses from the
respondents.
2.7. Summary
This chapter presented the context of the study at Me Linh high school, the research

questions, the research methodology and instruments of data collection. The researcher used two
different instruments: class observation and questionnaires with the purpose of achieving
reliable and valid data. In the next chapter, chapter 3, the author will present the data analysis,
discussion. The last chapter is the implications for teaching and learning English pronunciation in
Tieng Anh 10.