Teachers tend to ignore pronunciation - so-called 'non-native' teachers who doubt their own pronunciation and so-called 'native' teachers who are just too sure.
Indeed, pronunciation is "the Cinderella of language teaching": Dalton - Some Techniques for Teaching Pronunciation (TESL/TEFL)
But good pronunciation is the most important thing in learning a language - otherwise nobody's going to understand you: Why Pronunciation Teaching Should Be the Number One Priority
Here's a good discussion to start off: Studying pronunciation is a waste of time. - Page 2 - EnglishClub ESL Forums And another: Why do some people have great pronunciation? Why do others struggle?<br/><br/>Are some people just born with it? While the rest are forever doomed to struggle with bad pronunciation? — Lingtuitive
How though are we going to work on our pronunciation?
For all types of teacher, there are some excellent resources online - which provide good solid models to give the students - who can use most of the same links for themselves.
- A list of very specific activities: Learn English Pronunciation Elocution Intonation - Learn English
- A focus on the sounds of English: HOME | sounds-of-english
- A good look at all the phonemes: Introduction to Teaching Pronunciation Workshop - Adrian Underhill (COMPLETE) - YouTube With more from the master: Adrian’s Pron Chart Blog | Practical discovery of English pronunciation
- A look at the most important phoneme: Jay Doubleyou: a curvaceous young phoneme called schwa...
- An excellent guide from BBC Learning English, both old: BBC Learning English | Pronunciation Tips and new: BBC Learning English - Learn English pronunciation
- Several guides to listening - to songs: Jay Doubleyou: listening to song lyrics will help your pronunciation and Jay Doubleyou: singing songs to learn english and Jay Doubleyou: using songs in the esl/esol/tefl classroom
- A focus on the importance of getting and using 'connected speech': Jay Doubleyou: connected speech and Jay Doubleyou: 'four ears' or 'four years'?
- Perhaps the most effective method: Jay Doubleyou: shadowing
- And another couple more directions: Jay Doubleyou: chunking and Jay Doubleyou: sound scripting and Jay Doubleyou: voice recognition apps to help learn english pronunciation
Finally, we need to feel confident in teaching and learning - and using the language: Jay Doubleyou: pronunciation: empowering educators to feel confident and prepared to teach pronunciation
To finish, though, here are some funny crazy things: it doesn't help that none of it makes any sense: Jay Doubleyou: english pronunciation is crazy or that it's all rather a babble: Jay Doubleyou: what english sounds like
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