psllt/tsll 2018€¦ · session 5 presentations 2:30-3:00 pm . towards a deeper, uh, understanding...

PSLLT/TSLL 2018

Welcome to Iowa State University! We are happy to welcome you to the 10th Annual PSLLT Conference and 16th Annual TSLL Conference.

Welcome!

The Applied Linguistics & Technology (ALT) program at Iowa State University (ISU) is delighted to host the

10th annual Pronunciation in Second Language Learning and Teaching (PSLLT) Conference and the 16th

annual Technology for Second Language Learning (TSLL) Conference.

This year at PSLLT/TSLL, we are happy to announce a great variety in

the types of presentations – research methods workshops, colloquia,

invited speakers’ presentations, and teaching tips, along with the

traditional 20-minute presentations and poster presentations. We

thank all of you who have contributed to making this the biggest

conference yet, as without your efforts and interest this would be

impossible.

We hope you enjoy our beautiful campus, and all it has to offer! We

pride ourselves on its vibrant nature, an abundance of recreational

opportunities, and the rich arts and cultural scene. Additionally, the city

of Ames is a great place to find new things to do with the most

welcoming community.

We wish you a productive conference, and an enjoyable stay in Ames!

John Levis & Erin Todey

Organizing committee:

Ivana Lucic, Alif Silpachai, Sinem Sonsaat, Taylor Anne Barriuso, Idée Edalatishams, Ziwei Zhou, Taichi Yamashita, Yasin Karatay,

Sondoss Elnegahy, Agata Guskaroska

Thursday, September 6th (Pre-conference workshops & reception)

12:00-6:00 PM outside Campanile

Registration

Oak Pioneer

1:00-2:15 PM Workshop 1 Workshop 2

Investigating L2 Fluency, Pekka Lintunen & Pauliina Peltonen

Multidimensional Scaling (MDS) for Analyzing Perception Data, Ryan Lidster

2:15-2:30 PM Campanile

Break

Oak Pioneer


Investigating lexical stress assignment, Mary O'Brien

Running experiments in a web browser using jsPsych, Franziska Kruger & Danielle

Daidone


Break

Oak Pioneer


Research methods in investigating voice

onset time (VOT) in second language pronunciation, Tetsuo Harada

Using surveys in pronunciation research, Jennifer Foote


Reception

Friday, September 7th 8:00 AM- 4:00 PM

outside Campanile

Registration

(8:00-8:45 AM BREAKFAST)

8:45-9:00 AM Campanile

Welcome, John Levis

Campanile 9:00-

10:00 AM Plenary

High variability training in the lab and in the language classroom, Ann Bradlow

Campanile

10:00- 10:30 AM

Break

Campanile Cardinal Gold Oak 2256 MCC

Session 1 Presentations

10:30-11:00 AM

Vowel epenthesis in Korean English learners' pronunciation: at the crossroads of perception, mental lexicon, and cognitive abilities, Hanyong Park, Isabelle Darcy

Effects of perceptual training on vowel perception and production and implications for L2 pronunciation teaching, Juli Cebrian, Angelica Carlet, Núria Gavaldà, Celia Gorba

Pronunciation teaching: Whose domain is it anyways?, Ron Thomson, Jennifer Foote

Asymmetrical Cognitive Load Imposed by Processing Native and Nonnative Speech, Di Liu, Marnie Reed

Relevance of Speech Features in Building and Evaluating Automated Scoring Models, Ziwei Zhou

11:00-11:30 AM

Learner views on the efficiency of perceptual activities: Insights from a classroom-based study, Anastazija Kirkova-Naskova

The effects of task repetition on the use of epistemic stance markers: Corpus-based study, Taichi Yamashita

A Strategy-Based Pronunciation Model for Improving English Linking, Veronica Sardegna

English- and Japanese-dominant children's voice onset time (VOT) in a two-way immersion program, Tetsuo Harada & Asako Hayashi Takakura

“Seeing What People Hear You As”: French Learners Experiencing Intelligibility Through Automatic Speech Recognition, Aurore Mroz

11:30 AM-12:00 PM

Learners' perceptions of a non-standard American English dialect, Mari Sakai

Teaching Segmentals vs. Suprasegmentals: Different Effects of Explicit Instruction on Comprehensibility, Joshua Gordon, Isabelle Darcy

Emergence of L2 perception: Designing and describing a high variability phonetic training study from a complex systems perspective, Shannon Becker

How does a speaker's face and accent affect speech processing?, Noortje de Weers

ASR Dictation Program Accuracy: Have Current Programs Improved?, Shannon McCrocklin, Abdulsamad Humaidan, Idée Edalatishams

12:00-12:30 PM

L2 French vowel production: the relationship with speech perception and phonological memory, Solène Inceoglu

Effects of Self-evaluation on ESL Learners' Oral Performance, Okim Kang, Mark McAndrews

The effect of L2 English orthographic representations on L1 Tera speakers' production and perception, Rebecca Musa

Acquisition of prominence and tone units in English by native Japanese speakers of English: A quasi-longitudinal study, Shigehito Menjo

Golden Speaker: Learner Experience with Computer-assisted Pronunciation Practice, John Levis, Ricardo Gutierrez-Osuna, Evgeny Chukharev-Hudilainen, Sinem Sonsaat, Alif Silpachai, Ivana Lučić

Pioneer

12:30-2:30 PM Lunch (provided) &

Poster Session [see list of Posters below]

Campanile Cardinal Gold Oak 2256 MCC


2:30-3:00 PM

The Effect of Individual Differences on L2 Instrumental and Listener-Perceived Pronunciation, Alyssa Kermad, Okim Kang

Who Follows the Rules? Differential Robustness of Phonological Principles, John Scott

Testing the malleability of teachers’ judgments, Mary O'Brien, Allison Bajt, Pavel Trofimovich, Kym Taylor Reid

Exploring the relationship between perception and production of L2 English vowels, Shinsook Lee, Mi-Hui Cho

Politeness in student-professor interactions: A comparative study on the prosodic features of NS and NNS students, Meichan Huang, Dongmei Cheng

3:00-3:30 PM

Is perception enough? Individual differences in L2 perceptual learning and their relationship to L2 production, Charles Nagle

Effects of perceptual phonetic training on the perception of Korean codas by native Mandarin listeners, Na-Young Ryu, Yoonjung Kang

Bringing the Applied Alive in an online MA TESOL Pronunciation Course, Betsy Parrish, Suzanne McCurdy

Self-evaluations, perception, and production in second semester L2 French learners, Camille Meritan

Prosody and discourse function, Rania Mohammed

3:30-4:00 PM

Native listeners’ evaluations on pleasantness, foreign accent, comprehensibility, and fluency toward accented talkers, Jieun Lee, Dong Jin Kim, Hanyong Park

Perceptual training in a classroom-setting: Phonemic category formation by Japanese EFL learners, Ruri Ueda, Ken-ichi Hashimoto

The Investigation of a Common Modern Spoken Arabic, Romy Ghanem, Khaled Alharbi, Talal Alharbi

The Perception and Production of English Initial sC(C) Clusters by Saudi ESL Learners, Amjad Alhemaid

Prosodic patterns in English Read by Japanese Phonetic Corpus: An Interim Report, Takehiko Makino

4:00-4:30 PM

A System for Analyzing and Evaluating Computer-Assisted Pronunciation Teaching Software, Websites, and Mobile Apps, Lynn Henrichsen

The Formation of Interactional Intelligibility due to Segmental Repair among ELF Dyads, George O'Neal

Setting priorities for Arabic language learners: A survey of pronunciation materials in Arabic textbooks, Ghinwa Alameen

The perception-production interface in the acquisition of palatalized consonants in L2 Russian, Ala Simonchyk

The effect of instruction on receptive prosodic abilities: A meta-analysis, Mark McAndrews

Campanile

4:30-4:45 PM Break Campanile Cardinal Gold

Session 3 Presentations: Invited Speakers

4:45-5:20 PM

Are phonological updates in the L2 mental lexicon perceptually driven?, Isabelle Darcy & Jeffrey Holliday

The Ripples of Rhythm: Implications for Instruction, Wayne Dickerson

Uses and Misues of Speech Rating Data, Murray Munro

5:25-6:00 PM

Investigating the phonological content of learners' lexical representations for new L2 words, Rachel Hayes-Harb, Shannon Barrios

Utopian Goals Revisited, Tracey Derwing

Discourse Intonation: Where are we now?, Lucy Pickering

6:30-9:00 PM

Dinner St. John’s by the Campus 2338 Lincoln Way (Please enter on south side)

Saturday, September 8th 8:00 AM-

12:30 PM

outside CampanileRegistration

(8:00-9:00 BREAKFAST)

Campanile Cardinal 9:00-

11:00 AM Colloquium

Pronunciation Research in Languages Other than English, Charles Nagle, Organizer

Towards a Protocol for a Multilingual Corpus for Pronunciation Researchers, Amanda Huensch & Shelley Staples, Organizers

The role of cross-language phonetic similarity in L2 consonant learning, Anabela dos Santos Rato

Pronunciation in the L2 French classroom: Student and teacher attitudes, Jessica Sturm

Perception of French learners' mistakes, Anne Violin-Wigent and Viviane Ruellot

Perception of Mandarin consonants: Cross-linguistic mapping and the effect of L2 experience, Xinchun Wang

Campanile 11:00-

11:30 AM Break

Campanile Cardinal Gold Oak 3512


11:30- 12:00 PM

Template Model Account of the Intelligibility of Lexical Stress: Exemplification with Arabic-Accented English, Ettien Koffi

Effect of training on the perception and production of intonation: A case of Korean EFL undergraduate students, Jin Soo Choi

L2 Japanese Pronunciation Instruction: Its effects on improving learners' pronunciation, foreign accentedness, comprehensibility, and fluency, Tomoko Okuno

Design and evaluation of a computational system for learner-customized high-variability training on segmental perception in words and sentences, Manman Qian, John Levis, Evgeny Chukharev-Hudilainen

Transforming pronunciation through community outreach: Let me tell you their story, Frédérique Grim

12:00- 12:30 PM

---

The Effect of Discrimination Training on Japanese Listeners' Perception of the English Coda Consonants as in 'rose' and 'roads', Izabelle Grenon, Chris Sheppard, John Archibald

Development of utterance fluency and cognitive fluency and their interrelationship, Jimin Kahng

Informal language contact through technology and its effect on learners’ use of discourse markers in oral communication, Henriette Arndt, Christina Lyrigkou

The role of lexical cues in the adult acquisition of L2 allophonic alternants, Shannon Barrios, Joselyn Rodriguez

12:30- 2:30 PM

Lunch break

Grad Student Meet & Greet

[Location TBA] Campanile Cardinal Gold Oak


2:30-3:00 PM

Towards a deeper, uh, understanding of, um, L2 fluency and its [750 ms silence] correlates, Katie Comeaux, Ron Thomson

The use of the ICF-model in the perceptive and productive assessment and instruction for second language learners, Ilvi Blessenaar, Lizet van Ewijk

Corrective feedback in pronunciation teaching: A Vietnamese perspective, Loc Nguyen, Jonathan Newton

Drama, Plays, and Choirs to Enhance English Production and Pronunciation, Jenelle Cox, Judy James

3:00-3:30 PM

The Timing Patterns of Utterances by Native American Speakers, Cantonese Speakers, and Mandarin Speakers of English, Bingru Chen, Jette G. Hansen Edwards

Exploring technology in the teaching/learning of pronunciation to improve students' perception and production: teaching word and sentence stress to tertiary level students, Nadia Kebboua & Joaquín Romero

Oral corrective feedback timing: The case of an Iranian EFL context, Hooman Saeli

Effects of Japanese EFL Learners’ Acoustic Short-Term Memory on English Word Reproduction Skills, Akiko Kondo

Pioneer

3:30-3:45 PM Break Pioneer

3:45-4:35 PM Teaching Tips Round 1

[see list of Teaching Tips below]

4:40-5:30 PM Teaching Tips Round 2

[see list of Teaching Tips below]

Pioneer

5:30-5:45 PM Closing, John Levis

Teaching Tips Round 1 1. Segmental accuracy: A recommended training sequence for moving learners from accurate perception to accurate (and automatic!) production in the

stream of speech, Monica Richards, Elena Cotos 2. A new way of using the kazoo to teach intonation, Colleen M. Meyers 3. Personalizing peak vowel training in stressed syllables: A sneak peek at Blue Canoe for perception and production, Lara Wallace & Sofía Fernandez 4. Improving speaker comprehensibility: Using sitcoms and engaging activities to develop learners’ perception and production of word stress in English,

Edna Lima, Zoe Zawadzki 5. Developing a task-based pronunciation syllabus, Mari Sakai 6. Smother news or the say mold story? Coaxing the Emma cross the border, Marsha J. Chan 7. Improving Articulatory Gestures with Selfies, Alison McGregor

Teaching Tips Round 2

1. The Power of Prompts: Four Prompt Points, Jenelle Cox 2. Improving intelligibility: Using the three-minute thesis as a prosodic model, Heather Boldt, Margareta Larsson 3. Enhancing Thought Group Pedagogy Through Perception and Production, Mark Tanner 4. Using Tasks to Develop Comprehensibility of Spoken Second Language Spanish, Avizia Long, Lorena Alarcón, Sergio Ruiz-Perez 5. Practicing Pronunciation through Digital Storytelling, Mary Ritter 6. Listening Skills Instruction: Practical Tips for Processing Aural Input, Marnie Reed

Poster Session Participants & Poster Titles

1 Agata Guskaroska The potential of the ASR program for facilitating vowel pronunciation practice for Macedonian learners

2 Agata Guskaroska, Joshua Taylor A Corpus-based analysis of gendered items in pop and country music from the 90s to now

3 Alif Silpachai, Evgeny Chukharev-Hudilainen, John M. Levis, Tatiana A. Klepikova, Gabi Mitchell

The Role of Speaker Identity in High Variability Phonetic Training

4 Ane Icardo Isasa The Effect Of A Semester-Long Phonetics Course in The Production Of L2-Spanish Vowels

5 Anna Jarosz Polish upper secondary school learners wish to improve accuracy: A longitudinal study report

6 Anne Violin-Wigent Longitudinal study of French liaisons and the long-term effects of explicit instruction

7 Annie Bergeron Guatemalan seasonal workers' attitudes towards L2 French: A longitudinal study

8 Atasushi Iino, Ron Thomson Training Japanese EFL learners to perceive English /l/, /r/, and /w/ using a cloud-based, High Variability Pronunciation Training (HVPT) application

9 Benjamin Schmeiser On Spanish Trill Production Improvement for L1 English Learners

10 Edna Lima, Zoe Zawadzki Suprasegmentals + sitcoms = becoming more comprehensible while having fun!

11 Fatemeh Bordbarjavidi, Erik Goodale Learning Pronunciation through Culture

12 Ivana Lučić Influence of Educational and Linguistic Background on Rater Perception of Second Language Oral Performance

13 Jane Lorenzen Tonal Recall: Musical ability and toneme recognition

14 John Archibald Intelligibility and Comprehensibility in Real Time: The Neuro- and Psycholinguistics of the L2 Parser

15 Katherine Yaw, Okim Kang, Janay Crabtree Improving ITAs’ Instructional Confidence Through Structured Contact Activities with U.S. Undergraduate Students

16 Kuo-Chan Sun A cross-linguistic study on lexical tone processing in Mandarin L1 and L2

17 Mara Haslam, Elisabeth Zetterholm The role of consonant clusters in English as a Lingua Franca intelligibility

18 Marcin Wojciech Telidecki Success factors and constraints determining the acquirement of intelligible pronunciation among immigrants in the United States

19 Maria Kouti It's not all Greek to you: Using explicit phonetic instruction in the L2 Modern Greek classroom.

20 Mark Tanner, Alisha Chugg Using Readers Theater to Bridge the Oral Skills Gap From Perception to Production

21 Marta Nowacka L2 pronunciation of first year English Department students: progress testing

22 Matthew Yaksic Variations in the Production of the Neutral r-colored Vowel in L1 Spanish Speakers

23 Mikhail Zaikovskii An Acoustic Phonetic Account of VOT in Russian-Accented English

24 Monica Richards, Elena Cotos When perception of suprasegmental meaning varies across languages, what is a teacher to do?

25 Na-Young Ryu Effects of L1 phonotactic constraints on L2 coda perception: A case study with native English and Mandarin learners of Korean

26 Naoko Kinoshita, Chris Sheppard The measurement of Japanese lexical rhythm as a second language

27 Paige Gibbons, Liping Ma, Ettien Koffi An Acoustic Phonetic Account of the Confusion between [l], [n], and [ɰ] by Some Mandarin Speakers of English

28 Pekka Lintunen, Pauliina Peltonen Short-term gains in L2 speech during an oral skills course: Examining speech rate and fluency

29 Peter Peltekov The Effectiveness of Implicit and Explicit Instruction on L2 German Learners’ Pronunciation

30 Romy Ghanem, Olga Sormaz, Paula Schaefer, Qiuqu Qin

English learners' perception of intonation in different question types

31 Sondoss Elnegahy Non-Native Learner’s Speech Perception of International Teaching Assistants in North American Universities

32 Veronica Sardegna Increasing Pre-Service Teachers' Expert Knowledge, Effectiveness, and Agency

33 Viviane Ruellot French stereotypical accent and pronunciation development of /p/, /t/, and /k/

34 Yoshito Hirozane Different degrees of effects of pauses on English rate perceived by English and Japanese speakers

ABSTRACTS

WORKSHOPS

Usingsurveysinpronunciationresearch

JenniferAnnFoote

Surveyshavebecomeincreasinglycommoninpronunciationresearch,and,thankstomoderntechnology,increasinglyeasytoadministerandcollect.Thisworkshopwilldiscussthebenefitsandchallengesofconductingsurvey-basedresearchinpronunciation.Theworkshopwillbeginwithadiscussionofwhichtypesofresearchquestionsareappropriateforsurveyresearch.Therewillthenbeadiscussionaroundsurveydevelopment,lookingatissuessuchasdealingwithpotentiallyproblematicterminologyandchoosingbetweendifferenttypesofsurveyitems(e.g.,openendedquestions,Likertscales,multiplechoice,etc.).Finally,thepresentationwilllookatanalyzingsurveyresponses,particularlyopen-endedquestions,andissuesaroundsurveydistribution/samplingbias.Thisworkshopwillincludeadiscussionofcurrentpublishedpronunciationresearch,insightsfromthepresenter’sownexperiencesconductingsurvey-basedpronunciationresearch,andideasandquestionsfromattendeeswhohaveconducted,orareconsideringconducting,pronunciation-relatedsurveyresearch.Participantswillhaveachancetoworkondraftingdifferenttypesofsurveyitems,andbewillgivenexampleofdifficultiesthatoccurredwithspecifictypesofsurveyquestionsthathavebeenusedinthepast.

Researchmethodsininvestigatingvoiceonsettime(VOT)insecondlanguagepronunciation

TetsuoHarada

DescriptionVoiceonsettime(VOT)canbeadistinctiveornon-distinctivefeature,dependingonlanguages,andtheinvestigationofVOTshowshowsecondlanguage(L2)learnersdevelopthislanguage-specificfeatureanddeveloptheirfirstlanguage(L1)andL2phonologicalsystems.ThisworkshopwilloverviewthehistoryofVOTstudiesinL2pronunciation,bilingualacquisitionofVOT,andimplicationsforL2phoneticsandphonology.ItwillalsocoverresearchmethodsininvestigatingVOT,includingwaystoprepareforawordlist,datacollection,measurementissues,theuseofPraat,anddataanalysis.Thepresenterwillclarifytheseimportantissuesthroughhands-onactivities.LearningOutcomesParticipantsinthisworkshopwillbeexpectedtolearnthroughlectures,discussions,andhands-onactivitiesseveralimportanttipsondesigningastudyonVOTandanalyzingVOT,including1)howtoselecttargetwords,2)thenumberofwordsandtokensrequired,3)tipsonmeasuringVOT,usingPraat,and4)statisticalanalysisofVOT(e.g.,howtocontrolforspeechrate).AboutthepresenterTetsuoHaradaisaprofessorofAppliedLinguisticsintheGraduateSchoolofEducationatWasedaUniversity,Japan.Hisresearchconcernssecondlanguagephoneticsandphonology,withafocusonphonologicaldevelopmentofEnglishandJapaneseinone-wayandtwo-wayimmersionprograms.

RunningexperimentsinawebbrowserusingjsPsych

FranziskaKruger&DanielleDaidone

Researchinspeechperceptionislargelydonewithcustom-madeprogramssuchasDMDX,Praat,OpenSesame,PsychoPy,E-Prime,andothers.Sincetheseprogramsrequirepre-installationonspecificsystems,frequentupdates,andcorrectcalibration,wehaveexperiencednumerousequipment-relatedcompatibilityissuesthathavebeentaxingforourdatacollections.Inthisworkshopwillweintroduceanopensourcealternative,jsPsych,thatfacilitatesrunningexperimentsthroughawebbrowser.Runningaweb-basedtaskoffersresearchersmorefreedomtotestbothinandoutofthelabwithoutneedingtoinstallorcalibratespecificsoftware.Italsoprovidesaccesstoalargerandmorediversepoolofparticipants,andallowsformoreefficienttestingsessions.Furthermore,usingjsPsychprovidesextremeversatilityinthesetupofthetasksaswellasthedatathatcanbecollected,sinceanythingthatcanbecodedinJavaScriptcanbepartoftheexperiment.Thishands-onworkshopwillbeginwithanintroductiontojsPsychasalibraryofJavaScriptpluginsandthedocumentationthatisavailableonline.Wewillthenworkthroughsamplescriptsforafewcommontasksinspeechperceptionresearch(e.g.AXB,oddity,perceptualassimilation,accentednessratings,intelligibilitytranscriptions,etc.).Scriptswillbechosenbasedonparticipants'interestsasindicatedinapre-workshopsurvey.Participantswilllearnthebasicstructureofascriptandthefunctionsofdifferentpartsofthescript.Wewillpracticealteringascriptsothatthedesiredinstructionsandstimuliarepresented,andtherelevantdataforeachtrialisrecorded(e.g.reactiontimes,accuracy,experimentconditions,etc.).Andfinally,wewilldiscussdifferentwaysinwhichthedatacanbesaved,eitheronthelocalmachineoronawebserver.PriorknowledgeofHTML,JavaScript,andSQLishelpful,butnotrequired,asparticipantswillbeguidedthroughscriptdesignandsetupstepbystep.LearningoutcomesBytheendoftheworkshop,participantswill(1)understandhowtousethejsPsychlibraryasaresourcetool,(2)havesomeunderstandingofhowtointerpretthecodebehindatask,(3)beabletoperformbasicalterationstoasamplescripttocreatetasksrelevanttotheirownresearch,and(4)beawareofdifferentwaystosavethedata.

MultidimensionalScaling(MDS)forAnalyzingPerceptionData

RyanLidsterL2pronunciationteachersandresearchersverycommonlyusethemetaphorofperceptual“space”todiscussdiscriminabilityofL2phones.Easilydiscriminatedphonesareperceptually“distant,”whileL2phonesthataredifficulttodiscriminatesound“closetogether.”Ofkeyconcern,though,isthatsuch“distances”inperceptualspacearewarpedbylanguageexperience,andinparticular,theL1.Understandinghowthatperceptualspaceiswarped—inotherwords,whichL2phonesareperceivedsimilarlytoeachother,whicharen’t,whichacousticcuesarelistenersusingtodiscriminatesounds,whicharelessfaithfullyemployed,andhowthatchangesoverthecourseoflearning—isofkeyconcerntothefieldofL2pronunciation.MultidimensionalScaling(MDS)isarigorousanalyticalmethodforquantifying,visualizing,andgeneratingrichdataonthedistancesbetweenstimuliandtheshapeoflisteners’perceptualspacesusinginputfromavarietyofpossibleperceptiontasks(Clopper,2008).Whilealreadycommoninmanyareasofpsychology,freeclassificationhasonlyrecentlybeenappliedtoL2pronunciation(e.g.Daidone,Kruger,andLidster,2015),butwithverypromisingresults.AcompleteMDSanalysiscanbedoneinSPSS,R,Matlab,oravarietyofothersoftwarepackages,andthekeyconceptsaresimpletolearn.Mostimportantly,theuniqueinformationMDSprovidesonlearners’perceptualspacesgivesthemethodgreatpotentialforgrowthinL2pronunciationresearch;previousworkrevealednotonlyhowlistenersgroupedstimulitogether,butalsowhichacousticcuestheyemployedtomakethosejudgments.Inthisworkshop,IwillexplainMDSasamethod,mostlyfocusingonconceptsratherthanthemathematics,butgoingintoconsiderabledepth.WewilldiscusswhatkindofdataandelicitationmethodsareappropriateforanMDSanalysis,andthenuseanonymizeddatafromrealperceptionexperimentstowalkthroughanMDSanalysisinSPSS(andoneR-basedequivalent),includingallstagesanddecisionsfrominterpretingstressplotsandotherindicesofmodelfit,todecidingonsettingsforconvergence,andfinallycomparingtheresultswithacousticmeasurementsandreportingtheresults.Commonproblemsandsolutionstothemwillbediscussed,withthegoalofleavingthesessionwithapowerfultoolinthetoolboxofresearchmethodstoaskandanswerdetailedquestionsabouthowL2learnersperceivetheinput.Wewillconcludewithyourquestionsanddiscussionofapplicationtocurrentandfutureresearchprograms.LearningoutcomesParticipantsinthissessionwillbecomeableto:

• DecidehowandwhenusingMDScouldprovidekeyinsightintotheirresearchquestions• OrganizeresultsfromanexperimentinawaythatenablesMDSanalysisinSPSS(orR)• ConductanMDSanalysisusingtwodifferentdatasources,includingdecidingonthe

dimensionalityofthedata• Interprettheresultswithrespecttoacousticorphonologicalpropertiesofthestimuli• Relatethoseresultstobehavioraldata

• WriteuptheresultsforapresentationorjournalarticleReferencesClopper,C.G.(2008).Auditoryfreeclassification:Methodsandanalysis.BehaviorResearch

Methods,40,575-581.doi:10.3758/BRM.40.2.575Daidone,D.,Kruger,F.,&Lidster,R.(2015).Perceptualassimilationandfreeclassificationof

GermanvowelsbyAmericanEnglishlisteners.InTheScottishConsortiumforICPhS2015(Ed.),ProceedingsoftheXVIIIInternationalCongressofPhoneticSciences.Glasgow,UK:theUniversityofGlasgow.

InvestigatingL2fluency

PekkaLintunen&PauliinaPeltonen

Secondlanguage(L2)fluencyisamultifacetedconceptthatiscommonlyusedasalearningobjectiveandasacriterionforassessingL2proficiency.Inresearch,fluencyhasbeenapproachedfrommanyperspectives and as a research topic interests both phoneticians and second language acquisitionscholars. Fluency is oftenexaminedasoneaspectof learner language, alongwith complexity andaccuracy(Housen,Kuiken&Vedder,2012).ThemostcommonlyusedframeworkforfluencystudiesisSegalowitz’(2012)classificationoffluencydimensionsintoutterancefluency(measurableaspectsofspokenproductionas indicatorsof fluency),cognitive fluency (efficiencyofunderlyingcognitiveprocessing), andperceived fluency (listeners’ interpretationsof fluencybasedon spoken languagefeatures).WhenL2spokenlanguageisconcerned,Lennon’s(2000)distinctionbetweenhigher-orderand lower-order fluency is particularly relevant, the former referring to fluency as general oralproficiency and the latter involving a more narrow focus on temporal indicators of smooth andeffortlessspeech.The purpose of this workshop is to examine L2 speech fluency more closely and consider themethodological choices available for studyingutterance, cognitive, or perceived fluency in spokenL2. The focus is on utterance fluency and the possibilities for measuring it quantitatively frommonologueL2samples,butwewillalsodiscusshowfluencycanbemeasuredinthecontextsofL2oral communication (dialogue) research and pronunciation research. Based on our experiences ofanalyzingL2speechfromtheperspectiveoffluency,wepresentsomesuggestionsforbestpracticesinL2fluencyanalysis.Wewilldemonstratethestepsneededfromcollectingmaterial toobtainingquantitative andqualitative informationabout fluencybasedon the sample, and look at exampleanalysesofL2speech.

Housen, A., Kuiken, F. and Vedder, I. (eds) (2012)Dimensions of L2 Performance and Proficiency:Complexity,AccuracyandFluencyinSLA.Amsterdam:JohnBenjamins.

Lennon, P. (2000). The lexical element in spoken second language fluency. InH. Riggenbach (ed.)

PerspectivesonFluency(pp.25–42).AnnArbor,MI:TheUniversityofMichiganPress.Segalowitz,N.(2010)CognitiveBasesofSecondLanguageFluency.NewYork:Routledge.

Investigatinglexicalstressassignment

MaryGranthamO’BrienCorrectlyemphasizingsyllablesinwordsandwordsinsentences(i.e.,producingstress)makesbothwordsandsentenceseasiertounderstand(e.g.,Field,2005;Hahn,2004;vanHeuven,2008).DeterminingwhetherL2learnersareabletoaccuratelyproducestresscanbedifficult,though,andthismayhavetodo,amongotherthings,withateacher’s/researcher’soperationalizationofstress,datacollection,andtheanalysisofdata.ThisworkshopwilltakeattendeesthroughaseriesofstepsthatcanbefollowedforboththecollectionandanalysisofL2learnerlexicalandsententialstressdata.Participantsinthishands-onworkshopareaskedtobringalaptopontowhichtheyhavedownloadedPraat(www.praat.org).ReferencesField,J.(2005).Intelligibilityandthelistener:Theroleoflexicalstress.TESOLQuarterly,39(3),

399–423.Hahn,L.(2004).Primarystressandintelligibility:Researchtomotivatetheteachingof

suprasegmentals.TESOLQuarterly,38(2),201–223.vanHeuven,V.J.(2008).Makingsenseofstrangesounds:(Mutual)intelligibilityofrelated

languagevarieties.Areview.InternationalJournalofHumanitiesandArtsComputing,2,39–62.

PRESENTATIONS

SettingprioritiesforArabiclanguagelearners:AsurveyofpronunciationmaterialsinArabictextbooks

GhinwaAlameen

Fromaform-focusedaudio-lingualmethodtoafluency-focusedcommunicativeapproach,secondlanguagepronunciationinstructionhaswitnessedradicalchangesoverthelast70years.Nevertheless,thecoverageofpronunciationinArabictextbookshasnotchangedsubstantially,andcontinuedtohaveamarginalizedunintegratedpositionwithintheArabicasaForeignLanguage(AFL)curricula.Itismostlytreatedinisolationfromotherskillsoftenatthebeginningoftheintroductorycourse.Arabictextbooksseemtopresentthesegmentalaspects(vowelsandconsonants)muchmoreadequatelythanthesuprasegmentals(stress,intonation,connectedspeech,etc.)Asaresult,manyinstructorsarereluctanttoteachpronunciationbecauseoftheshortageofconsistentlanguagematerialsandthelackofformaltrainingofteachers.However,moreandmoreArabiclearnersandteachersfeeltheneedforamoresystematicpronunciationtraining,whichinvolvesnotonlysegmentalbutalsosuprasegmentalaspectsofpronunciationthathavebeenintegratedandrecycledthroughoutthesyllabi.Suchtrainingshouldpromoteintelligibilityandhaveagreaterimpactoncommunicativeeffectiveness(MunroandDerwing,2015).

Inthispresentation,IstartbysurveyingthekeypronunciationaspectsthatshouldbetakenintoaccountwhendesigningArabictextbooks.ThenIexaminesevenAFLtextbooksandtextbookseriesandexploretheaspectsofpronunciationcoveredinadditiontotasktypes,locationinthetextbook,assessmentframeworkandrecyclingofselectedpronunciationaspectsthroughoutthetextbook.Finally,IidentifysomeofthepressingneedsforfutureintegrationofpronunciationmaterialsintheArabiccurricula.Thepresentationconcludeswithrecommendationsformaterialdevelopers,curriculumdesigners,andArabicteachers.

References

Munro,M.J.&Derwing,T.M.(2015).Aprospectusforpronunciationresearchinthe21stcentury.JournalofSecondLanguagePronunciation,1(1),11-42.

ThePerceptionandProductionofEnglishInitialsC(C)ClustersbySaudiESLLearners

AmjadAlhemaid

ThisstudyinvestigatestheperceptionandproductionofEnglishonsetsC(C)clustersbySaudilearnersstudyinginCanada.TheL1swereeitherNajdiArabic(NA)orHijaziArabic(HA).TheNAdialectallowsconsonantclusterswordinitially.TheHAdialectonlypermitssingletononsets.Bothdialectsallowconsonantclustersincodaposition.TheaimwastoexploretheeffectsofL1ontheacquisitionofL2clusters.Twoexperimentswereconductedtoexploreproductionaccuracyandtoexaminewhetherparticipantscouldaccuratelyperceivetheseclusters.Forproduction,participantswereaskedtoperformarepetitiontask.Forperception,pseudo-wordswritingtaskwasemployedtoelicitperception.Theproductionresultsshowthatoutof20,theNAsweremoreaccurate(M=15.63)thantheHAs(M=12.13),showinganinitialadvantageoftransferduetotheirL1.Findingsrevealthataccuracywassignificantlyhigher(p=.001)inthelessmarkedclusters(e.g.,[sl])andlowerinthemoremarkedones(e.g.,[st]),consistentwithEckman(1977),Major(2001),andCardoso(2007).Inperception,theaccuracyrateswereveryhighamongallparticipants(M=95%).Interestingly,theHAs(whoseL1doesnotallowonsetclusters)werenotsignificantlydifferentfromtheNAs(whoseL1does).So,ifthepresenceofL1onsetclustersdoesnotpredictaccurateL2performance,whatdoes?TheRedeploymenttheory(Archibald,2005;Archibald&Yousefi,2018)arguesthatelementsoftheL1grammarcanberedeployedtoassistintheacquisitionofnewL2structures.IarguethattheHAs(eventhoughlackingL1branchingonsets)wereabletoredeploytheirmentalrepresentationofbranchingcodas(orright-edgeappendices)inHA(e.g.,/bint/,/katabt/)toacquiretheleft-edgeappendicesinEnglish.ThisexplainswhythesesubjectsaremoreaccurateinsCclusterperceptionthanthosefromotherL1spreviouslyreportedintheliterature.

Informallanguagecontactthroughtechnologyanditseffectonlearners’useofdiscoursemarkersinoralcommunication

HenrietteArndt&ChristinaLyrigkou

The rapid development and spread of new technologies has opened up awealth of newopportunitiesforsecondlanguagelearnerstoengagewiththeirtarget language:practicessuch as watching online videos, streaming films and music, and engaging with othersthroughsocialmediacontributetowhathasbeenreferredtoasOnlineInformalLanguageLearning(OILL). Previousresearchhasfoundpositivecorrelationsbetweensuchpracticesandsecondlanguageproficiency.1234Itmustbenoted,however,thatthesestudiesmostlyfocusedon learners’grammarand lexicalknowledge,butnotoncommunicative languageskills. Thus, the question remains how such practices affect learners’ oral languageproduction.AfterabriefintroductiontoOILLresearch,thispresentationwillreportonapilotstudythatwas conducted as part of a longitudinal PhD project. The study focused on the use ofdiscoursemarkersinthespokenproductionofsevenadolescentinformallearnersofEnglishinGreece.Eventhoughallparticipantsdemonstratedhighlevelsofgeneraloralproficiency,they markedly differed in terms of the frequency, range and functions of the discoursemarkerstheyused.Furtheranalysisofthepilotdatasuggestedthatthesedifferencesmightbe explained by the types of online activities that comprised each learner’s informallanguage contact: While all participants regularly engaged their receptive language skillsonline,thosewhoshowedfrequentanddiverseuseofdiscoursemarkersstoodoutbecausethey also participated in regular technology mediated oral communication (e.g. throughWhatsApp,Skype,Snapchat).Knowinghowtechnologycontributestothedevelopmentoforal communication has the potential to influence not only the practices of languagelearners and teaching professionals, but also the design of new,multimedia instructionalmaterialsforsecondlanguagelearning.Citations:1.Cole,J.,&Vanderplank,R.(2016).Comparingautonomousandclass-basedlearnersinBrazil:Evidenceforthepresent-dayadvantagesofinformal,out-of-classlearning.System,61,31–42.2.Kuppens,A.H.(2010).Incidentalforeignlanguageacquisitionfrommediaexposure.Learning,MediaandTechnology,35(1),65–85.3.Sockett,G.(2014).TheOnlineInformalLearningofEnglish.London:PalgraveMacMillan.4.Sundqvist,P.(2011).Apossiblepathtoprogress:Out-of-schoolEnglishlanguagelearnersinSweden.InP.Benson&H.Reinders(Eds.),(pp.106–118).Basingstoke:PalgraveMacMillan.

TheroleoflexicalcuesintheadultacquisitionofL2allophonicalternants

ShannonBarrios&JoselynRodriguezWhileadultsecondlanguage(L2)learners’gainknowledgeofL2allophoneswithexperience(Shea&Curtin,2010),itisnotwellunderstoodhowadultlearnersacquireallophonicrelationships.Barriuso&Barrios(2017)investigatedtheroleofphonologicaldistributionalcuesintheacquisitionofanallophonicalternationbetween[b]and[β].However,theauthorsfoundnosupportoftheroleofaphonologicaldistributionalmechanisminadultacquisitionofL2allophonicvariants(seealso,Peperkampetal.,2003;c.f.Noguchi&HudsonKam,2018).Inthepresentstudy,weconsideranotherpotentiallearningmechanism.WeinvestigatewhethernaïvesubjectsareabletoleveragelexicalcuesintheformofvisualreferentstoacquireL2allophones.WeexposednativeEnglishspeakerstooneoftwoartificiallanguageswherenovelwordscontainingtwoacousticallysimilarsounds(i.e.[b]and[β])occurredinanoverlappingdistribution.Thewordswerepairedwithanimagethateitherdidordidnotreinforcethecontrast.FortheDifferentImagegroup,thewords[bati]and[βati]werepairedwith‘apple’and‘penguin’,respectively.FortheSameImagegroup,thewords[bati]and[βati]werebothpairedwith‘penguin’.Participantscompletedthreetaskstodeterminewhethertheexposurephaseimpactedtheirabilitytoperceiveandlexicallyencodethe[b]-[β]contrastintrainedanduntrainedwords.Ifsubjectsuselexicalcuesintheformofsame/differentvisualreferentstoinferthephonologicalstatusof[b]and[β],thenparticipantsintheSameImage,butnottheDifferentImagegroup,shouldhavedifficultydiscriminatingandshouldfailtolexicallyencodethedistinction.Pilotdatafrom29participants(16DiffImage/13SameImage)suggeststhatlexicalcuesmayimpactparticipants’lexicalencoding,butnotperceptualsensitivity,tothe[b]-[β]contrast.Wediscussourfindingsinrelationtoproposedlearningmechanisms.

EmergenceofL2perception:Designinganddescribingahighvariabilityphonetictrainingstudyfromacomplexsystemsperspective

ShannonBecker

PreviousresearchsuggeststhataccurateperceptionisacriticalcomponentinthesuccessfulproductionofL2sounds(Best,1995;Flege,2003),althoughthereisnotpresentlyaconsensusontheorderinwhichtheseprocessestakeplace(Sakai&Moorman,2018).Nevertheless,theinterconnectednessofperceptionandproductionwithinthelargerL2structureisinharmonywithacomplex,adaptivesystems(CAS)theoryoflanguagedevelopment,whichforegroundstheinterdependencyofvariablesandthecentralityofcontext.TakingthisviewofadevelopingL2system,however,raisesquestionsaboutboththetheoreticalunderpinningsofSLAresearchandthemethodologiesemployedtherein.WorkingfromaCASperspective,IdiscusstwowaysofvisualizingdiscreteL2behaviors,anddescribetheprocessofdesigningahighvariabilityphonetictraining(HVPT)studythattakesthistheoreticalorientationintoaccount.Twotheoreticalconceptsaidininvestigatingindividualpartsofthelanguagesystemwithoutlosingsightofthewhole:“stackedlayersofemergence”(Miller&Page,2007)andself-similarityacrossscale.TheapplicationoftheseconceptstothedevelopingL2allowsfortheanalysisoflanguagebehavioratmultiplelevelswhilehonoringthe“synergisticcharacterofnonlinearsystems”(Strogatz,2003,p.182).Discretebehaviorssuchasperceptionarethustreatedaslower-levelemergentbehaviorsnestedwithinoveralllanguageperformance.Toexaminehowthistheoreticalorientationimpactsmethodology,IdiscussthedesignofanonlineHVPTstudytoimproveperceptionofthe/ɑ̃-ɔ̃-ɛ/̃distinctionforL1Englishlearnersinsecond-andfourth-semesterFrench.Datafromboththetestsandtrainingmodulesallowformicrogeneticanalyses(Calais,2008)ofperceptualdevelopmentasithappens,andthisinformationisinterpretedaccordingtodeBotandLarsen-Freeman’s(2011)assertionthat“...insteadofinvestigatingsinglevariables,westudypatternsthatemergefrominteractions”(p.21).

TheuseoftheICF-modelintheperceptiveandproductiveassessmentandinstructionforsecondlanguagelearners

IlviBlessenaar&LizetvanEwijk

IntheNetherlands,Speechandlanguagetherapist(SLT’s)usetheICF-model(WHO,2001)toclassifyandclarifycommunicationproblemspatientsexperienceindailyfunctioning.TheICFor‘InternationalClassificationofFunctioning,DisabilityandHealth’offersaconceptualframeworkwhichallowshealthcareprofessionalstodescribeafunctionalimpairmentandrelateittotheamountofsufferingthiscausesinanindividual‘sparticipationinhis/hersdailylive.Ittakesintoaccountpersonalandcontextualfactorsthatcanpositivelyornegativelyinfluencethisparticipation.Inotherwords,itcanhelptheSLTtonotonlyfocusonwhataclientcannotdo,butalsotakeintoconsiderationwhathe/shewíllbeabletodo(Heerkens,2007;Threats,2008).Thismodelisusedgloballyinabroadarrayofhealthcareprofessions.Yet,itisnotacustomarytool,norprobablyanobviousone,usedbyL2-professionalsovertheworld.Ofcourse,ourgoalisnottoclassifypronunciationproblemsofL2learnersasdisabilitiesorimpairments.Webelievehowever,thatthisframeworkwouldbebeneficialtobeabletoidentifypossibleinfluencingfactorswithinthestagnationorimprovementofthepronunciation(Howe,2008).TheroleofperceptiondifficultiescanbemadeexplicitandcanberelatedtotheabsenceofortheamountofprogressbeingmadeinL2-instruction.InourSLT-curriculumwehaveappliedtheuseofthismodeltoassesstheperceptionandpronunciationproblemsofL2-learnersofDutchandconsequentlytoestablishtheprioritiesininstruction(Howe,2008).InthispresentationwewouldliketoaddresstherelevantaspectsofthismodelinrelationtoL2-practiceinperceptionandproductionandgiveexamplesofhowthisisappliedinourcurriculum.Heerkens,Y.F.&deBeer,J.(2007)InternationalClassificationofFunctioningDisabilityand

Health:GebruikvandeICFindeLogopedie.Logopedie,4,112-119.Howe,T.J.(2008)TheICFContextualFactorsrelatedtospeech-languagepathology

InternationalJournalofSpeech-LanguagePathology;10(1–2):27–37Threats,T.(2008)UseoftheICFforclinicalpracticeinspeech-languagepathology.

InternationalJournalofSpeech-LanguagePathology;10(1–2):50–60WHO(2001)

EffectsofperceptualtrainingonvowelperceptionandproductionandimplicationsforL2pronunciationteaching

JuliCebrian,AngelicaCarlet,NúriaGavaldà,&CeliaGorba

Learnersofasecondorforeignlanguage(L2)inaninstructionalsettingtendtohavelimitedtargetlanguageinputoutsidetheclassroom.Thisfactisproblematicforthedevelopmentofthelearners’abilitytoperceiveandproducetargetlanguagesoundsaccurately.Highvariabilityphonetictraining(usingavarietyofstimulifrommultipletalkers)hasbeenfoundtobeeffectiveinimprovinglearners'L2perceptionandproduction,presentingapromisingalternativeinscenariosoflimitedL2input.ThispaperreportsthefindingsandimplementationofaperceptualtrainingregimeaimedatimprovingnativeCatalan/Spanishspeakers’perceptionandproductionofasetofEnglishvowelcontrasts.Participantswerefirst-yearundergraduatestudentsenrolledinanEnglishStudiesdegreewhoreceivedsix30-minutesessionsofperceptualtrainingoverthecourseofafewweeks.BeforeandaftertrainingstudentsweretestedontheirabilitytodiscriminateandidentifyEnglishvowelspresentedinnon-senseandrealwords.ParticipantsalsoproducedanumberofrealEnglishwordselicitedbymeansofapicture-namingtask.Traineesdifferedinthetypeofperceptualtrainingmethodtheyreceived,eitherthroughidentificationtasksorthroughdiscriminationtasks.Ingeneralperceptualimprovementwasobservedwithalltrainedparticipants,whooutperformedtheparticipantsinanuntrainedcontrolgroup,particularlyintheperceptionofnon-sensewordsaswellasofuntrainedrealwords.Theimpactofperceptualtrainingonproductionwasmorelimited.Althoughbothtypesoftrainingtaskshadapositiveeffect,identificationtasksresultedingreatergains.Studentsoverallfoundtrainingveryuseful,althoughconcernsaboutthelengthofthetrainingandtherepetitivenessofthetaskswereraised.Identificationtaskswerepreferredoverdiscriminationtasks.Allinall,thisstudyprovidesadditionalsupportfortheuseofperceptualtrainingasaneffectivetoolinphoneticsandpronunciationinstruction.

TheTimingPatternsofUtterancesbyNativeAmericanSpeakers,CantoneseSpeakers,andMandarinSpeakersofEnglish

BingruChen&JetteG.HansenEdwards

This study is intended to describe and analyze the effects of polysyllabic shortening, level ofstressonsyllables,andwordorphraseboundaryonthetimingpatternsofspokenutterancesbyChineselearnersofEnglish(CantonesespeakersandMandarinspeakersrespectively)incompar-isonwithnativeAmericanspeakersofEnglish.To investigatetherelativecontributionoftheseeffects,aproductionexperimentwasconducted,adaptingthemethodologicalframeworkofLe-histe (1971). 10 Cantonese speakers, 10Mandarin speakers, and 10 nativeAmerican Englishspeakerswereaskedtoproduce12setsoftokensconsistingofamono-syllabicbaseform,disyl-labic,andtrisyllabicwordsderivedfromthebasebytheadditionofsuffixes,andasetofshortsentenceswithaparticularcombinationofphrasesize,stresspattern,andboundary location.Thedurationofwordsandsegmentswasmeasured,andresultsfromthedataanalysissuggestthat:(1)theamountofpolysyllabicshortening is likelytobeoneofthedifficultiesforChinesespeakersasL2learnersofEnglish;(2)NativeEnglishspeakersproducelongerdurationforsylla-bles inword-finalposition andphrase-finalposition thanChinese ESL speakers. Findings alsohavesomeimplicationsforL2teachingandlearning.Keywords:L1transfer,timingpatterns,polysyllabicshortening

Effectoftrainingontheperceptionandproductionofintonation:AcaseofKoreanEFLundergraduatestudents

JinSooChoi

Whiletherehasbeenconsiderableresearchonsecondlanguage(L2)segmentalperceptionandproductiontraining(e.g.,Derwingetal.,2014;Thomson,2012),muchlessisknownabouttheenhancementofsuprasegmentalfeatures(e.g.,Hardison,2005;Okuno&Hardison,2016).Assuch,thiscurrentstudyexaminedtheinfluenceofauditoryandauditory-visualtrainingonthedevelopmentofsuprasegmentalperceptionandproduction,specifically,threefrequentlyusedintonationpatterns:falling,rising,andfall-rise.Forty-sixKorean-speakinglearnersofEnglishatintermediateproficiencywererandomlyassignedtooneofthreetraininggroups:auditoryinput(n=15),auditoryinputwithcomputer-displayedintonationpattern(n=15),andcontrol(n=16).Usingapretest-posttestdesign,perceptionofintonationpatternswastestedviaamultiplechoicelisteningtestandproductionwastestedusinganoraldiscoursecompletiontask(oralDCT).Participants’responsesoforalDCTwereratedbyonenonnativeandonenativespeakerofEnglish.AMANOVAs,withperceptionandproductionservingasdependentvariables,wasperformedfollowedbypost-hocrepeatedmeasuresANOVAs.Independentvariablesincludedintonation(falling,rising,fall-rise)andgroup(auditory,auditory-visual,control).Findingsforperceptionindicatedthatauditoryoutperformedbothauditory-visualandcontrol,whereasforproduction,onlyauditory-visualdemonstratedhighergains.Forindividualintonationpatterns,bothfallingandrisingshowedsignificantimprovementforperceptionandproductionwithamediumeffect

size(𝜂2>.13),whereasfall-risedidnotdiffersignificantly.TheseresultssuggestthattrainingmaybebeneficialindevelopingbothperceptionandproductionofintonationforL2speakers.Specifically,auditorytrainingwasfoundtobeadvantageousonenhancingperceptionoffallingandrising,whileauditory-visualwashelpfulonproductionoffallingandrising,implicatingthatvisualinputcouldfacilitatewhenproducingintonation.

Towardsadeeper,uh,understandingof,um,L2fluencyandits[750mssilence]correlates

KatieComeaux&RonThomson

Previousresearchindicatesthathesitationphenomenadifferentiallyaffectthewaythatlistenersperceivespokenutterances,dependingontheformandlocationofthosehesitations.Forexample,filledpauses(FoxTree,2001),andpausesthatoccuratclauseboundaries(Brennan&Schober,2001),tendtobelessdeleterioustolistenerjudgmentsofintelligibilityandcomprehensibility,thanarepausesproducedclause-internally(Kang,2010).Beyondtheirimpactoneaseofprocessingforlisteners,hesitationphenomenamayalsoleadtonegativesocialevaluationsofthespeakers,andparticularlyifpausingpatternsareoutsideoflistenerslinguisticorculturallyboundexpectations..Thecurrentstudyaimedtoconfirmandextendthesepreviousfindings,throughcarefulmanipulationofnaturalL2Englishspeechstimuli,controllingfortypeandlocationofpauses.ResultingstimuliwerethenpresentedtonativespeakersofEnglishforevaluation.TheL2speechsamplesusedwereoriginallyproducedby15L1Mandarinand15L1Russiantalkersinthecontextofanextemporaneouspicturedescriptiontask.Eachsamplewasthencarefullymanipulatedtoarriveatseveralmatchedversionsthatwereeitherfreeofhesitationmarkers,includedhesitationmarkersatclauseboundaries(e.g.,um,uhorsilence),orincludedhesitationmarkersplacedwithinclauses.Using9-pointLikert-typescales,twentylistenersratedthespeechsamplesforthespeakers’fluencyandintelligence,duringoneratingsession,andcomprehensibilityandsocio-economicstatusofthespeakersinasecondratingsession.Wepresentresultstohelpdisentanglethecontributionofpausinglocationandtypetolistenerjudgments,anddiscussimplicationsforL2pronunciation/fluencyinstruction.

DramaandPlayProductionstoEnhanceL2ProductionandPronunciation

JenelleCox&JudyJamesThepotentialbenefitsofactinginplayproductionsforL2learnersofEnglishhaveincludedlearningnewvocabulary,buildingconfidenceandmotivation,developingfluency(includinginterjectionsandinterruptions),andassimilatingprosodicfeaturesinacontextualizedmanner(Maley&Duff,1982;Wessels,1987;Richards&Schmidt,2010).Theselanguageskillshavebeenrecognizedasbeingimportantintheacquisitionofasecondlanguage(Dörnyei,2009;Richards&Schmidt,2010;Laufer,1997;).Inaddition,dramaandactingbringtheoutsideworldintotheclassroom,lendingtopositiveeffectsintermsofsocialinteractionandculturalawareness(Wan,1990).

Inessence,havingESLstudentsperforminaplayseemstoallowthestudentstopracticeandproducemanyofthespeechfeaturescoveredintheirESLclassrooms.Students’pronunciationmaybepositivelyinfluencedasthesuprasegmentalsofstress,intonation,pausing,andrhythmmayreceiveextensiveemphasisthroughthemultiplerehearsalsandrepetitionsofspokenlines.Suprasegmentalaspectsofpronunciationleadtothegreatestimprovementinaspeaker’sintelligibility(Derwing&Munro,2009).Thestudents’intelligibilitymayreceiveextraattentionbythedirectoroftheplayinordertomaximizetheaudience’sexperiencewhentheplayisperformed.ThepurposeofthispresentationistosharetheexperienceofaplayproductiondoneinanintensiveEnglishlanguageprogram.Thestudents’reactionstotheirownexperiencewiththeEnglishlanguagethroughtheorganization,rehearsals,andproductionofaplaywillbespotlightedaswellasthespeechproductionbenefitstoL2learnersasperceivedbytheteachersinvolved.

Howdodifferentcombinationsofspeakerfaceandaccentaffectspeechprocessing?

NoortjedeWeersThereiscurrentlydisagreementintheliteratureonhowseeingaperson’sfaceaffectsspeechperception.Whilesomehavearguedthatseeinganimagedepictingadifferentethnicityfromone’sownnegativelyimpactsaccentednessduetosocialbias(e.g.,Rubin,1992;Rubin&Smith,1990; Yi, Phelps, Smiljanic, & Chandrasekaran, 2013), othersmaintain that this effect simplyreflects the cognitive consequences of incongruous face-accent pairings (McGowan, 2015).Withthisdebateas itsspringboard, thisstudy focusesontheeffectsofaccent,speaker face,face-accent congruency, and listeners’ age on processing times, instead of focusing onjudgmentsofaccentedness.Thirty-twonativeEnglishparticipants completeda speededaudio-visual sentenceverificationtask, forwhich they had to classify statements as true or false. The fifty-six sentenceswerepresentedinarandomized,balancedcombinationofCanadianEnglishandJapanese-accentedvoices.Intheaudio-visualcondition,theutteranceswereaccompaniedbyastaticphotographofeitheranAsianfaceoraWhiteface.Fortheaudio-onlycondition,afixationcrossonawhitebackgroundwasused.Analysisindicatedthattheforeign-accentedvoicestooksignificantlylongertoprocessthanthenativevoices,andthattheincongruentface-accentconditiontooksignificantlylongerthantheaudio-only condition. Although these results do suggest an effect of face, its size appears todepend on both the overall processing difficulty of the voice and the listener’s age. Thesefindings contribute to our understanding of the influence of social and cognitive factors onspeechprocessing.ReferencesRubin,D.L.(1992).Nonlanguagefactorsaffectingundergraduates’judgmentsofnonnative

English-speakingteachingassistants.ResearchinHigherEducation,33(4),511-531.Rubin,D.L.,&Smith,K.A.(1990).Effectsofaccent,ethnicity,andlecturetopicon

undergraduates’perceptionsofnonnativeEnglishspeakingteachingassistants.InternationalJournalofInterculturalRelations,14(3),337–353.

Yi,H.G.,Phelps,J.E.,Smiljanic,R.,&Chandrasekaran,B.(2013).Reducedefficiencyofaudiovisualintegrationfornonnativespeech.TheJournaloftheAcousticalSocietyofAmerica,134(5),EL387–EL393.

McGowan,K.B.(2015).Socialexpectationimprovesspeechperceptioninnoise.LanguageandSpeech,58(4),502-521.

TheInvestigationofaCommonModernSpokenArabic

RomyGhanem,KhaledAlharbi,&TalalAlharbiTeachersofArabicasaforeignlanguagehavevoicedseveralconcernsregardingtheacquisitionofspokenArabic.OnethatisfrequentlycitedistheamountandtypeofspokenArabictheyshouldintroducetostudents(Raish,2015).Therearecurrentlyovertwenty-fivespokenArabicvarietieswhicheitherdifferinafewlinguisticfeaturesorarealmostmutuallyunintelligible(Al-Sharkawi,2017).WhileModernStandardArabic(MSA)hasbeenacknowledgedasthestandardvarietythatunitesdifferentdialects,MSAisrarelyusedininformalspokenregisters.VeryfewstudieshaveinvestigatedspecificlinguisticelementsthataredeemedcomprehensibleinArabic-speakingcountries.ThispresentationwillreportonthepilotofamuchlargerstudythatseekstodescribeanddocumenttheuseofmodernspokenArabic.Thepilotstudyincluded12speakersfrom3differentArabcountries:SaudiArabia,Jordan,andEgypt.Theparticipantsengagedinthree“spot-the-difference”activities:onewithaspeakerwhospeaksthesamedialectandtwowithspeakerswhouseadifferentvariety.Thirteenlexicalitemsthatarecharacteristicallydifferentamongthethreedialectswereincludedaslexicalprimesinthethreepictures.Thirtysixspeechfileswereanalyzedbycomparingparticipants’baselineuseofthelexicalfeaturestotheirproductionswhenengagingwithaspeakerofadifferentdialect.Preliminaryresultsshowthatspeakerstendtoaccommodatetheirinterlocutorwhentheirvarietyincludesamarked(dialect-specific)lexicalitem.Mostoften,thelexicalitemthatisconvergedtowardsisonethatiseitherderiveddirectlyfromMSAorismoreeasilyaccessible(e.g.throughmedia).TheimplicationsofthisstudyextendtoseveralareasincludingthesystematicrepresentationofArabicasanInternationalLanguageandcurriculumdesignofArabiclanguageclassrooms.TheendgoalofthislineofresearchisthecreationofanextensivesearchablespokenArabiccorpusthatwouldservebothArabicteachersandresearchers.

TeachingSegmentalsvs.Suprasegmentals:DifferentEffectsofExplicitInstructiononComprehensibility

JoshuaGordon&IsabelleDarcy

Althoughthenumberofpronunciationstudieshasincreasedrecently(Thomson&Derwing,2015),andthereisaclearroleinthedevelopmentofsegmentals/suprasegmentalsintheperceptionandproductionofL2speech(Trofimovichetal.,2015),manyresearchfindingsarenotnecessarilyappliedtoL2classroomsduetolimitationsinteachertraining(Baker&Murphy,2011),ornointerestinpedagogicalinterventionsonthepartofresearchers(Derwing&Munro,2015).Wereporttheresultsofaninterventiontoenhancethecomprehensibilityof3groupsofEFLlearnersatauniversityinCostaRica,forwhichweasked:(1)DoEFLstudentsimproveL2-comprehensibilitybytheendofa10-week-intervention?and(2)Whatexplicitphonetictreatment(basedonsegmentals,suprasegmentals,oracombinationofboth)enhancesthecomprehensibilityofEFLlearnersmorebytheendofa10-weekintervention?Thisisareplicationofourpreviousstudy(Authors,2016)withamorecompletescopeoftrainingondifferentsegmentalsandsuprasegmentals,andalargerlengthoftraining.ThreegroupsofEFLstudentsreceivedpronunciationonsegmentals,suprasegmentals,oracombinationofbothusingexplicitphoneticinstructionandcommunicativetasks(10weeks,30-minsperweek).Spontaneous-speechsamplesfrompretest-posttestwereratedforcomprehensibilityby40L1-Englishraters.Thesuprasegmentalgroupsignificantlyimprovedcomprehensibilityfrompretesttoposttest.Additionally,whereasthesegmentalgroupdidnotimprovecomprehensibility,thethirdgroup(combined)alsoimprovedcomprehensibilityattheendoftheintervention—althoughnotinasignificantway.Theseresults,althoughmodest,replicatetheeffectfoundpreviously(Authors,2016),lendingmorevaliditytoourfindings.Ourresultsalsosuggestthatincorporatingpronunciationlittlebylittleintotheclasscanhelplearnersachievecomprehensiblespeech(Darcy,2018;Derwingetal.,1998;Sicola&Darcy,2014).Theresultsarediscussedintermsofpedagogicalsuggestionsforpronunciationinstruction.

TheEffectofDiscriminationTrainingonJapaneseListeners'PerceptionoftheEnglishCodaConsonantsasin'rose'and'roads'

IzabelleGrenon,ChrisSheppard,JohnArchibaldPhonetictrainingprogramsusuallyfeatureidentificationtasksconsistingofpresentingsecondlanguage(L2)learnerswithoneword,forinstanceright,andaskingthemtoidentifywhichwordtheyheard,‘right’or‘light’.Thistrainingisdesignedtoimproveidentificationaccuracy.However,italsopresupposesthatthelearnersaresomewhatfamiliarwiththeL2grapheme-phonemecorrespondence.Butwhatiftheyarenot?SinceJapaneselistenersdonothearadifferencebetweentheEnglishsounds/z/and/dz/,in‘rose’and‘roads’forexample,alongthemostcriticalacousticdimension,theyassociatetheacousticformswiththeorthographicrepresentationsrandomly.Inordertohelpthemhearadifference,weimplementedadiscriminationtask.Thistaskconsistsofpresentingtwowordsaurallytothetrainees(e.g.,rose–roads),andhavethemdecideifthewordswerethe‘same’or‘different’(withfeedback).Twenty-oneJapanesetraineesreceivedtwo30-minutesessionsofdiscriminationtrainingwiththedistinction‘rose’-‘roads’.

Beforeandafterdiscriminationtraining,wetestedthetrainees'cue-weightingpatternswithanidentificationtaskfeaturing28‘rose’and‘roads’tokenswhichweresystematicallyvariedinthedurationofthevowelandtheclosuredurationofthecodastop.FortynativeNorthAmericanEnglishspeakerscompletedthepre-testforcomparison.Thepre-testresultsindicatedthatourEnglishspeakersreliedonboththedurationofthestopclosureandonthedurationoftheprecedingvoweltoclassifythewords'rose'and'roads',whereasourJapanesetraineesreliedonlyonthedurationofthevowel.Thepost-testresultsrevealedthattheL2traineesimprovedtheircue-weighingpatterntowardsthatofnativespeakers'onbothdimensionsaftertraining.Ourresultssuggestthatdiscriminationtrainingcanbeeffectiveinimprovingidentificationofnovelsegments,andcouldpotentiallybeusefulfortrainingpopulationswhoarenotliterateinthetargetL2.

Transformingpronunciationthroughcommunityoutreach:Letmetellyoutheirstory

FrédériqueGrimFindingcreativewaystoraisestudents’awarenessoftheirpronunciationarealwayssomeofthemajorgoalsandchallengessecondlanguage(L2)teachershave.Experientiallearningmightprovidethoseopportunitieswithamoreauthenticsetting;forinstance,throughtutoring,teaching,assistingteachers,translatingorinterpreting,studentscanbenefitbylearningmoreL2andincreasetheirmotivation(Caldwell,2007;Gascoigne,2001;Grim,2010,2011,2017).Oneparticularopportunitywascreatedatwesternuniversitylanguageprogramis“worldlanguagestorytime”,incollaborationwiththelocalpubliclibrary.Thisparticularactivityhasshownthatstudentsareabletofocusontheirpronunciationanddeveloptheirpresentationalskillsduringthepreparationandperformanceofthestorytimeevent.

ThistalkwillsharewhataFrenchphoneticsthird-yearclassdidtoparticipateinastorytimeprogramandtheimpactithashadonstudents’pronunciationintermsofimprovementandconfidence.Pre-andpost-recordingswereanalyzedtocheckforpronunciationchangeandasurveywasfilledbytheparticipantstogaugeconfidencelevelsintermsofpresentationalskills.

Shortdescription:

ExperientiallearninghasbeenincreasinglyfindingroominL2curriculumbecauseofitspositiveimpactsonL2learners’motivation.Thistalkwillgiveabriefdescriptionofastorytimeprogramintegratedinaphoneticsclass,withananalysisofstudents’pronunciationfrompre-andpost-recordings,andconfidencelevel.

English-andJapanese-dominantchildren’svoiceonsettime(VOT)inatwo-wayimmersion

program

TetsuoHarada&AsakoHayashiTakakuraNosystematicstudieshavebeendoneonpronunciationskillsintwo-wayimmersionprograms,inwhichabalancednumberofstudentsfromeachtargetlanguagegroupareenrolledinaclass,andtheyareexpectedtogetmoreexposedtoL2thaninone-wayimmersionprograms.Thisstudyexaminedhowvoiceonsettime(VOT)ofEnglish-dominantchildrencanbeacousticallycomparedwiththatofJapanese-dominantchildreninaJapanese/Englishtwo-wayimmersionprograminelementaryschoolintheUS.Fiftystudents(25English-dominantand25Japanese-dominantchildren)fromthe2nd,3rd,4th,5th,and6thgradesintheprogramparticipatedinasentencereadingtaskforelicitingeightwordsbeginningwiththreevoicelessstops/p,t,k/inEnglishandJapanese.Baselinedatawerealsocollectedfrom10English-speakingJapanesebilingualsinaone-wayimmersionprogram.TheVOTofinitialstopswasmeasuredtothenearestmillisecondfromthebeginningofthereleasebursttotheonsetofvoicingenergyinF2formants.ResultsshowedthatalthoughtheEnglish-dominantchildren’sJapaneseVOTinthetwo-wayimmersionprogramwaslongerormoreEnglish-likethantheJapanese-dominantgroup’sinthesameprogram,theirVOTwasshorterormoreJapanese-likethanthatofthechildrenintheJapaneseone-wayimmersionprogram.However,itistobenotedthatboththeEnglish-andJapanese-dominantchildrenmadeaphoneticdistinctioninVOTbetweenthetwolanguages.Thefindingssuggestthattwo-wayimmersioninstructionmayhelpchildrenacquiremoretarget-likeL2speechduetosufficientinputfromboththeteacherandpeersthanone-wayimmersioneducation.DiscussionwillcenteronhowtheresultsmatchFlege’s(1995)hypothesisthatbilinguals’phoneticcategorymaybeintermediatebetweentwolanguages.ThisstudywilladdanewperspectivetoexistingVOTstudiesofbilingualsinthetwodifferentinstructionalsettings.

ASystemforAnalyzingandEvaluatingComputer-AssistedPronunciationTeachingSoftware,Websites,andMobileApps

LynnHenrichsen

Thepotentialbenefitsofcomputer-assistedpronunciationteaching(CAPT)havebeenrecognizedbymanyexperts(Neri,Cucchiarini,Strik,&Boves,2002;Chun,2013;Fouz-González,2015).Thesebenefitsincludeaprivate,stress-freelearningenvironment;virtuallyunlimitedinput;practiceatthestudent’sownpace;individualized,instantaneousfeedbackthroughAutomaticSpeechRecognition(ASR);visualacousticdisplays;andvisualarticulatorydisplays.Totakeadvantageofthesesoftwarefeatures,manyCAPTprograms,websites,andmobileappshavebeencreated.Regrettably,however,CAPTsoftwaredoesnotalwaysmeasureuptoitspotential.Forthisreason,“itisnecessarytoanalyze…pronunciationteachingsoftwareprograms…fromacriticalperspectiveusingpedagogicallycoherentandtechnicallyelaboratedcriteria”(Navarro,1999,ascitedinMartins,Levis,&Borges,2016,p.142).Unfortunately,manyL2teachersarenotfamiliarwiththefullrangeofCAPTpossibilitiesandmaynotbeawareofwhatfeaturestolookforinaninstructionalproduct.Thisposterpresentationsharesaremedytothisproblem—acomprehensivesetofcriteriaforanalyzingandevaluatingCAPTsoftware,websites,andmobileapps.Utilizinganeasy-to-usechecklistformat,aswellasLikert-scaleandopen-responseitems,thissystemisdesignedtoguideteachersandlearnersinevaluatingCAPTprograms.UsingvariablesandcriteriarecommendedbypronunciationandCALLexperts(Chun,2013;Derwing&Rossiter,2002;Fouz-González,2015;Martins,Levis,&Borges,2016;Munro&Derwing,2006;Neri,Cucchiarini,Strik,&Boves,2002;Persichitte,2005;Rosell-Aguilar,2017),thistwo-pagetoolprovidesalistingoffeaturesthatpotentialCAPTusersshouldlookforinsoftware.Thecriteriaarearrangedinfivesections—(1)generaldescriptiveinformation,(2)instructionalpurpose(s)andactivities,(3)functionalityandusability,(4)instructionalfactors,and(5)presentation—plusasummarysection.Besidestheposterdisplayofthesystem,thispresentationwillalsoprovideahandoutdepictingthesystem.

Politenessinstudents-professorinteractions:AcomparativestudyontheprosodicfeaturesofNSandNNSstudents

MeichanHuang&DongmeiCheng

Thisstudyintendstoexaminethesimilaritiesanddifferencesinthewayprosodiccuesarerealizedinthestudent-instructorinteractionsinspeechactstosignalpoliteness.Intonationhasbeenusedinspeechactstosignal(im)politeness(Aijmer,2014;Culpepper,2011;Wichmann,2004)andevaluatethecommunicativeeffectiveness(Cheng,2017;Littlemore,2003).Theimportanceofintonationcannotbeunderestimatedincross-culturalcommunication,asaninappropriateintonationpatternmaycausemisunderstanding(Mennen,2007).Sofar,limitednumberofstudieshavecomparedtherealizationofspeechactsusingprosodybyNSandNNSspeakerstorealizepolitenessincommunication.Thisstudyemployedamixed-methoddesign.SixpairsofChineseEnglishasaForeignlanguage(EFL)studentsandNativeEnglishspeaking(NS)studentswereaudio-recordedcompletingthreeroleplaysperformingthreetypesofspeechacts:apologies,requests,andrefusalsinstudent-instructorinteractions.Aprosodicprofileoftheturnscontainingthespeechacts,suchasanindirectrequestorformulaicapologies,willbecreatedusingauditorialandinstrumentalanalysisbasedonBrazil’sdiscourseintonationmodel(1985,1997)usingCSL.Featuressuchas,thelengthofpauses,placementofstress,andintonationpatterns(Aijmer,1996)willbeexamined.Thisprosodicprofilewillalsobeanalyzedalongwithparticipants’retrospectiveverbalprotocols(Cohen&Olshtain,1993;Felix-Brasdefer,2008)onthepronunciationfeaturesspeakerspaidattentiontoduringtherole-playsandgoalstheyintendedtoachieveusingparticularpronunciationfeatures.Theresultswillshedaninsightintosecondlanguagepedagogicalpracticesandmaterialdevelopmentinteachingpolitenessstrategiesinspeechacts.ReferencesAijmer,K.(2014).ConversationalroutinesinEnglish:Conventionandcreativity.Routledge. Brazil,D.(1985).TheCommunicativeValueofIntonationinEnglishBook.Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress. Brazil,D.(1997).TheCommunicativeValueofIntonationinEnglishBook.Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress. Cheng,D.(2017).Communicationisatwo-waystreet:Instructors’perceptionsofstudentapologies.Pragmatics:QuarterlyPublicationoftheInternationalPragmaticsAssociation,27(1),1-32.Cohen,A.D.,&Olshtain,E.(1993).TheproductionofspeechactsbyEFLlearners.TesolQuarterly,27(1),33-56. Culpeper,J.(2011).“It’snotwhatyousaid,it’showyousaidit!”:Prosodyandimpoliteness.LinguisticPolitenessResearchGroups(Eds),DiscursiveApproachestoPoliteness,57-83.Berlin:

DeGruyterMonton. Félix-Brasdefer,J.C.(2008).PolitenessinMexicoandtheUnitedStates:Acontrastivestudyoftherealizationandperceptionofrefusals(Vol.171).JohnBenjaminsPublishing. Littlemore,J.(2003).Thecommunicativeeffectivenessofdifferenttypesofcommunicationstrategy.System,31(3),331-347. Mennen,I.(2007).Phonologicalandphoneticinfluencesinnon-nativeintonation.Trendsinlinguisticstudiesandmonographs,186,53-71. Wichmann,A.(2004).Theintonationofplease-requests:acorpus-basedstudy.Journalofpragmatics,36(9),1521-1549.

L2Frenchvowelproduction:therelationshipwithspeechperceptionandphonologicalmemory

SolèneInceoglu

Somesecondlanguage(L2)learnersaremoresuccessfulthanothersinperceivingandproducingL2contrasts.Variabilityacrossindividualscanbeattributedtoanumberoffactorssuchaslanguageproficiency,ageofL2learning,andtypeofinstruction,amongothers.However,variationinthedegreeofsuccessinL2learningcanalsobefurtherexplainedbydifferencesingeneralcognitiveabilities,includingworkingmemory(WM),phonologicalshort-termmemory(PSTM),andprocessingspeed.Todate,mostSLAstudiesinvestigatingcognitiveindividualdifferenceshavefocusedonthedevelopmentofL2grammar,vocabulary,andfluency,andlittleisknownabouttheireffectsonL2production.ThisstudyexploreshowL2speechproductionofFrenchnasalvowelsisrelatedtoL2speechperceptionandindividualcognitivedifferencesinphonologicalandworkingmemory.Theparticipantswere32Australian-EnglishnativespeakersenrolledinFrenchlanguagecourses.Theycompletedadelayed-repetitiontasktoassesstheirproductionandasetofforce-choiceidentificationtasksinaudiovisual(AV),audio-only(A)andvisual-only(V)modalitiestomeasuretheirperceptionskills.Theythencompletedanon-wordrepetitiontaskassessingtheirPSTM,andalisteningspantestmeasuringtheirWM.Resultsrevealedthataccurateproductionscoreswerehigherwith[ɛ]̃(91%),followedby[ɑ̃](60%),and[ɔ]̃(55%),andthattheperceptionandproductionscoreswerestronglycorrelated(AV:r=.66,A:r=.65,V:r=.68,allwithlargeeffectsizes).Intermsofindividualdifferences,therewasasignificanteffectofPSTMonproductionscores,butnoeffectofworkingmemorycapacity.ThesefindingswillbediscussedintermsoftheroleofcognitiveindividualdifferencesinL2speechproduction(andperception),andinlightsoftherelationshipbetweenspeechperceptionandproduction.

Developmentofutterancefluencyandcognitivefluencyandtheirinterrelationship

JiminKahng

Secondlanguage(L2)utterancefluency(i.e.,temporal,pausing,andrepairfeaturesofutterances;Segalowitz,2010)hasbeenwidelyresearchedduetoitstheoreticalandpedagogicalimportance;however,itsunderlyingcognitiveprocessesresponsibleforfluentutterance(viz.,cognitivefluency)hasbeenunderresearched(cf.,DeJong,Steinel,Florijn,Schoonen,&Hulstijn,2013).

Thislongitudinalstudyattemptstocontributetothefluencyliteraturebyinvestigatingdevelopmentofutterancefluencyandcognitivefluencyandtheirinterrelationship.Thirty-oneChineselearnersofEnglishcompletedabatteryoftasksoncognitivefluencyandutterancefluency,beforeandfivemonthsaftertheirstudyabroadexperienceintheUS.Utterancefluencywasexaminedbymeasuringspeedandpausephenomenaoftheirspontaneousspeech.Cognitivefluencywasanalyzedbymeasuringlinguisticprocessingskillsinvolvedinspeechproduction(e.g.,lexicalretrieval,morphosyntacticencoding,andarticulation).

Thepreliminaryresultsshowthat,afterfivemonthsofstudyabroadexperience,theirutterancefluency(e.g.,articulationrate)andcognitivefluency(e.g.,accuracyandspeedofsentenceconstruction)significantlyimproved.Intermsoftherelationshipbetweenutterancefluencyandcognitivefluency,initiallyarticulationratewascorrelatedwithspeedoflexicalretrieval,andnumberofsilentpauseswascorrelatedwithspeedofsentenceconstructionandthestrengthofinterrelationshipsseemstochangeovertime.

References

DeJong,N.H.,Steinel,M.P.,Florijn,A.,Schoonen,R.,&Hulstijn,J.H.(2013).Linguisticskillsandspeakingfluencyinasecondlanguage.AppliedPsycholinguistics,34,893–916.

Segalowitz,N.(2010).Cognitivebasesofsecondlanguagefluency.NewYork:Routledge.

EffectsofSelf-evaluationonESLLearners’OralPerformance

OkimKang&MarkMcAndrewsSelf-evaluationhasbeenemphasizedininstructionoforalskillsaspartoflearners’takingresponsibilityfortheirownlearning.Itprovidesstudentswiththeopportunitiesandthestrategiestocontinuetheirlearningbeyondtheclassroom(Avery&Ehrlich,1992).However,thereisstillmuchdisagreementonthedegreetowhichlearnerscanidentifyandremediatetheirspeechdifficulties(Celce-Murcia,Brinton,&Goodwin,2010).Inaddition,littleresearchhasempiricallytestedthedirectimpactofsuchself-evaluationonlearners’oralskills.Therefore,thecurrentstudiesinvestigatedtheeffectofESLlearners’self-assessmenttechniquesontheirspokenperformances.Threestudieswereconductedoversixacademicsemesters.Thefirststudyincludedinstructionongeneralguidelinesforself-evaluation,thesecondincludedspecificguidelinesformultipleoralskills,whilethethirdstudyincludedspecificguidelinesforasingleskill.Ninety-fourupper-intermediate/advancedESLstudentsfromlisteningandspeakingintactclassesatanintensiveEnglishprogramprovidedthreesetsoforalpresentations(threepre-instructionandpost-instructionpresentations)ineachsemester.Allpresentationswerevideo-taped.Twotrainedratersevaluatedthespeechsamplesinarandomizedmannerfororalproficiency,presentationskills,comprehensibility,andpronunciationaccuracy.Resultsshowedthatstudentswhoself-evaluatedtheirperformancewithspecificguidelinesoneachsingleskill(e.g.,hesitationmarkers,pauses,/l/sound)improvedtheiroralproficiencyscores,butnootherspeechconstructs.Studentswhoreceivedmoregeneralinstructionaboutself-evaluationwerenotabletoidentifyproblemsintheirperformances,andtheirscoresdidnotimprove.Thisfindingsuggeststhatwithoutspecificassistancefromteachers,studentsmaynotbenefitfromself-evaluation.Thepresentationwilldiscusseffectivepracticeinoralskillspedagogyintermsofhowtostructureanoralskillsclassanddetermineitscontent,alongwithavarietyofspeakingactivitiesthatpromoteself-evaluationstrategydevelopment.

Exploringtechnologyintheteaching/learningofpronunciationtoimprovestudents’perceptionandproduction:teachingwordandsentencestresstotertiarylevel

students

NadiaKebboua&JaoquínRomeroThecurrentstudyexploresstudents’progressinEnglishpronunciationasfarasstressis concerned, this being one of the most difficult areas of English for Spanish andCatalan speakers, by creating onlinematerials to develop their pronunciation skills.Thestudywascarriedoutwithtwogroupsoffirstyearuniversitystudents.Thecontrolgroup received instruction on English stress in a conventional manner, while theexperimental group made use of an online tool for learning pronunciation. Theactivities were divided into four sections: overview, background, perception andproduction. The activities used for both groups were exactly the same, the onlydifferencewasthat,whilethecontrolgrouplistenedtoanativespeakerandrepeatedthewordsafterwards,theexperimentalgroupactuallyrecordedthemselvesusinganintegrated recording tool in the website, listened to the native speaker and thenreflected on the differences between their production and the native speakerproduction. Inordertoanalyseandevaluatetheirprogress,bothgroupstooka leveltest, to test their initial level of English, and a pre-test, in which they recordedthemselvesreadingsomewords,phrases,sentences,ashorttextandthendescribedapicture.Afterfinishingthecourse,theyansweredaqualitativequestionnaire,anddida post test. Their recordings were evaluated in two different methods, acousticanalysis using the Praat speech analysis software and 10 judges’ ratings to evaluatetheir accentedness, intelligibility and fluency. The results show that, while both thecontrolgroupandtheexperimentalgroupshowedimprovementintheirpronunciationofstress,the improvementwasmoreobvious intheexperimentalgroup.Thisseemstoprovideevidenceof theusefulnessof information technologies in the learningofEnglishpronunciationintheclassroom.

TheEffectofIndividualDifferencesonL2InstrumentalandListener-PerceivedPronunciation

AlyssaKermad&OkimKangWiththecomplexityinvolvedinacquiringsecondlanguage(L2)pronunciation,individualdifference(ID)researchcanaccountforvariabilityandexceptionalityinpronunciationoutcomes(e.g.,Dörnyei,2005,2006,2009;Moyer,2014).WhileIDresearchhashadaconsistentlystrongappearanceinsecondlanguageacquisition,itspresenceinL2pronunciationresearchhasbeenempiricallysporadic.However,IDsareevenmorecriticaltopronunciationduetotheunlikelyoddsofacquiringnative-likepronunciationinanL2.Thecurrentstudyaccountsfortheeffectofmotivation,aptitude,anxiety,andlanguagecontactontheinstrumentalproductionandlistenerperceptionofL2pronunciation.TwentyEnglishL2adultlearnerswererecruitedfromanESLcontext.Aspontaneousspeechsamplewaselicitedfromeachparticipant,inadditiontosurveyresponsesformotivation(e.g.,theL2MotivationalSelfSystem),speaking/pronunciationanxiety,andinteractive/non-interactivelanguagecontact.Anoralmimicrytestofnon-wordrepetitionwasadministeredtomeasureaptitudeandtheworkingmemorysystem(Gathercole,2006).Thirtyundergraduatestudentsprovidedtheirimpressionisticjudgmentsofaccentedness,comprehensibility,andintelligibility.Instrumentalspeechanalyseswerecarriedouttoquantitativelymeasuresegmentals,rate,pausing,stress,pitch,andintonation.HierarchicalmultipleregressionanalysesexploredtheeffectsofIDsbasedontheirtheoreticalcontributionstolanguagelearning.IDsaccountedfor50-86%ofthevarianceinsegmentalandsuprasegmentalproduction.Motivationandaptitudewereassociatedwithhigher-proficiencypronunciationperformance,whileanxietyhadadebilitativeeffect.Non-interactivelanguagecontacthadapositiveeffectonL2fluency,whileinteractivelanguagecontactwasassociatedwithmoremonotonousspeechpatterns.IDshaddynamicrelationshipswithlisteners’judgmentsofaccentedness,comprehensibility,andintelligibility,withconsistentpositiveeffectsfromsomemotivationvariablesandaptitude.ImplicationsarediscussedwithrespecttohowteacherscanaddressIDsintheclassroomtoenhancepronunciationacquisitionandhowresearcherscanconsiderIDsinmethodologyanddesign.

Learnerviewsontheefficiencyofperceptualactivities:Insightsfromaclassroom-basedstudy

AnastazijaKirkova-NaskovaMostresearchstudiestestingtheeffectofphoneticinstructionarequantitativeandindicatethepositiveinfluencesuchtraininghasonmodifyinglearners’L2perceptionand production (Macdonald, Yule& Powers, 1994; Bradlow et al., 1997; Derwing,Munro &Wiebe, 1998; Moyer, 1999; Nishi, & Kewley-Port, 2007). Taking learnerperspective into account gives additional qualitative input relevant forunderstandingpronunciationlearning.

Thisstudyinvestigateslearnerviewsontheeffectivenessof5typesofminimalpairactivities as part of a larger classroom-based study which tested the impact of aspecificperceptualtrainingontheperceptionandproductionofEnglishfrontvowels/iː, ɪ,e,æ/byMacedonian learnersofEnglish.Allactivitiesweredesignedtomeetthe following criteria: a) they varied in format and degree of difficulty; b) theycombined traditional minimal pair activities with stimulus tasks employed inlaboratory-based studies; c) learners were exposed to high speaker variabilitystimuli; and d) the teaching context included a large monolingual EFL class. Thetrainingconsistedof12sessionsoverthreeweeks.Thefocuswasgiventopracticingspeech perception activities only; speech production was neither encouraged norpracticed.Qualitativedatawasobtainedposttrainingviainterviews.

Theanalysisshowsthatlearnerscontinuetofavorminimalpairactivitiesdespitethefactthattheyfindthemchallenging.TheyindicatedpreferenceforactivitiessuchasAXB format and sound contrast in one and the sameminimal pair, both activitiesfocusingonspeakervariability.Theyrecognizetheirusefulness in thatexposuretovarious speakers increases their awareness of different native varieties, improvestheir selective attention and increases their sensitivity to vowel quality. Overall,thesefindingssuggestthatperceptualactivitieswithminimalpairsaremostefficientwhentheiraimistofocus learners’attentiontosoundqualitycontrastandnotonthemeaningofindividualwords.

References:

Bradlow,A.R.,Pisoni,D.B.,Akahane-Yamada,R.,&Tohkura,Y. (1997). TrainingJapanese listeners to identify English /r/ and /l/: IV. Someeffectsofperceptuallearningonspeechproduction.JournaloftheAcousticalSocietyofAmerica,101(4),2299-2310.

Derwing, T.M.,Munro,M. J., &Wiebe, G. (1998) Evidence in favour of a broadframeworkforpronunciationinstruction.LanguageLearning,48(3),393-410.

Macdonald, D., Yule, G., & Powers, M. (1994). Attempts to improve English L2pronunciation: The variable effects of different types of instruction. LanguageLearning,44(1),75-100.

Moyer,A. (1999).Ultimateattainment inL2phonology:Thecritical factorsofage,motivation,andinstruction.StudiesinSecondLanguageAcquisition,21,81-108.

Nishi,K.&Kewley-Port,D.(2007).TrainingJapaneselistenerstoperceiveAmericanEnglish vowels: Influence of training sets. Journal of Speech, Language andHearingResearch,50,1496-1509.

ATemplateModelAccountoftheIntelligibilityofLexicalStress:Exemplificationwith

Arabic-AccentedEnglish

EttienKoffiPitchperceptionresearchhasaverylonghistory.SometraceitbacktoPythagoras.YetcontemporaryunderstandingofpitchowesmuchtoFletcherandBékésy(Brownell2017:20,Yost2015:46-53)fortheirseminalinvestigationsanddiscoveriesofthephysiologicalresponsestofrequencyinthebasilarmembrane.Inlinguistics,groundbreakinginsightsintolexicalstressareattributedtoFryforhisdecade-long(1955to1965)speechperceptionandsynthesisexperiments.Hefoundthattheparticipantsinhisstudiesreliedonthreecorrelates:frequency,duration,andintensitytoencodeandperceivelexicalstress.Furthermore,theyperceivedthesecorrelateshierarchically,rankingtheirrobustnessasF0>Duration>Intensity.Thisrankinghasprovencontroversial,butFry’sdiscoverieshavemadeitpossibletomeasureandquantifylexicalstressinstrumentallyratherthanrelyingonimpressionisticdefinitionsofstressedsyllablesashavinghigherpitch,louderintensity,andlongerduration(Fromkinetal.2014:254).WithFry’smethodology,itisnowpossibletoassessandcalculatetheintelligibilityoflexicalstressmathematicallybyappealingtoJustNoticeableDifferencethresholdsinfrequency(1Hz,Lehiste1970:64),intensity(3dB,Moore2007:460),andduration(10ms,Hirsh1959:767).Thesetemplatesalsoaffordpronunciationresearcherstheopportunitytotesttheclaimthatsuprasegmentalsplayasgreatarole,andsometimesagreaterrolethansegmentals,intheintelligibilityofL2-accentedEnglish(Jenkins2000:135,Cutler2015:118).Theaforementionedtemplatesareappliedtospeechsamplesproducedby10ArabicL2speakersofEnglishtoseewhetherornottheirplacementoflexicalstressinterfereswithintelligibility.

EffectsofJapaneseEFLLearners’AcousticShort-TermMemoryonEnglishWordReproductionSkills

AkikoKondo

PeoplehaveoftenintuitivelysensedthelinkbetweenmusicalabilityandL2oralproficiency.Previousstudieshavealsoshownapositiverelationshipbetweenmusicandlanguage.However,onlyafewresearchershaveinvestigatedtherelationshipbetweenmusicalabilityandL2pronunciationskillsthroughempiricalinvestigationsinthefieldofmemory.Therefore,thisstudyfocusesondeterminingtheimpactofacousticshort-termmemoryonL2pronunciationskills.SeventyJapaneseuniversitystudentsparticipatedinthisstudy.Theacousticshort-termmemorycapacityoftheparticipantswasanalyzedandmeasuredinthisstudybyusingtwotests,theTonalMemorySpanTestandRhythmMemorySpanTest,whiletheL2pronunciationskillsweremeasuredusingtheEnglishWordReproductionTest.AfterconductingRaschanalysistoprovidevalidityevidencefortheinstrumentsoriginallydesignedforthisstudy,Pearson’scorrelationanalysisandregressionanalysiswereperformed.Theresultsindicatedthattheacousticshort-termmemorymeasuredbythetestshadsignificantpositiveeffectsonEnglishwordreproductionskillsandthattonalmemorycapacityhadstrongereffectsthanrhythmmemorycapacity.Althoughthisstudyhasseverallimitations,theresultsofthestudyprovidedadetailedandcomprehensiveunderstandingoftheimpactofmusicalabilityontheL2pronunciationskillsofparticipants.ItalsoprovidedsomepedagogicalimplicationsforimprovingL2pronunciationteaching.

ExploringtherelationshipbetweenperceptionandproductionofL2Englishvowels

ShinsookLee&Mi-HuiCho

ThepaperinvestigatedtheinterfacebetweenperceptionandproductionofL2AmericanEnglishvowelsfocusingontheprecedencerelationshipandthecorrelationbetweenperceptionandproduction.Tothatend,34KoreanadultEFLlearnerscompletedvowelidentificationandpronunciationtaskswith12Englishvowelstimuli(/i/beat,/ɪ/bit,/eɪ/bait,/ε/bet,/æ/bat,/ʌ/but,/ɝ/burt,/ɑr/bart,/ɑ/bot,/ɔ/bought,/oʊ/boat,/u/boot).Theparticipantswereaskedtochoosethevoweltheyheardamongthe14alternatives.Theyalsoproduced12Englishwords3timesandtheirproductionswereidentifiedby5nativeEnglishspeakers.Theresultsrevealedthattheparticipantsoverallperceivedthetargetvowelsmoreaccuratelythanproducingthem(75%vs.71%:t(33)=2.204,p<.05),thusshowingtheprecedencerelationshipofperceptionoverproduction.However,theprecedencerelationshipwasnotobservedacrossallthevowels,showingvariationamongvowels.Forinstance,thevowels/i/,/ɪ/,and/ʌ/demonstratedthepredominanceofperceptionoverproductionwhile/ɑr/,/ɑ/,and/oʊ/showedtheoppositepattern.Theresultsalsoindicatedthatnosignificantcorrelationwasfoundbetweenperceptionandproductioneitherbytheparticipantsorbytheindividualvowels.Thisimpliesthattheparticipants’perceptualabilitiesdonotdevelopintandemwiththeirproductionabilities,orviceversa.However,theparticipants’errorpatternsinperceptionandproductionwereverysimilaracrossallthevowels.Forinstance,theparticipantsshowedbidirectionalerrorpatternsbetween/i/and/ɪ/and/ε/and/æ/bothinperceptionandproduction.Theyalsoexhibitedconfusionamong/ʌ/,/ɑ/and/ɔ/inperceptionandtheirproductionsofthesevowelsweremisidentifiedassuchbythenativeEnglishraters.Thefindingsofthestudyarediscussedintermsofacoustic/perceptualcuesandarticulatorygestures,alongwiththeimplicationsfortheSpeechLearningModel.

(1)Meanpercentagecorrectofperceptionandproduction

(2)Meanpercentagecorrectofperceptionandproductionbyindividualvowels

SelectedReferences

Flege,J.E.(1995).Secondlanguagespeechlearning:Theory,findings,andproblems.InWinifredStrange(ed.).SpeechPerceptionandLinguisticExperience:IssuesinCross-LanguageResearch,233-272.Timonium,MD:YorkPress.

deJong,K.,Hao,Y.-C.,&Park,H.(2009).Evidenceforfeaturalunitsintheacquisitionofspeechproductionskills:Linguisticstructureinforeignaccent.JournalofPhonetics,37.4,357-373.

Llisterri,J.(1995).Relationshipsbetweenspeechproductionandspeechperceptioninasecondlanguage.InK.Elenius,andPBranderud(eds.).ProceedingsofXIIIthInternationalCongressofPhoneticScience4,92-99.

Pater,J.(2004).Bridgingthegapbetweenreceptiveandproductivedevelopmentwithminimallyviolableconstraints.InRenéKager,JoePater,andWimZonneveld(eds.).ConstraintsinPhonologicalAcquisition,219-244.Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress.

Sheldon,A.(1985).Therelationshipbetweenproductionandperceptionofthe/r/-/l/contrastinKoreanadultslearningEnglish.AreplytoBorden,Gerber,andMilsark.LanguageLearning,35.1,107-113.

Nativelisteners’evaluationsonpleasantness,foreignaccent,comprehensibility,andfluencytowardaccentedtalkers

JieunLee,DongJinKim,&HanyongPark

Listenersevaluatemanyaspectsofthespeechoftheirinterlocutors.Thedegreeofforeignaccent,comprehensibility,andfluencyaresomeaspectsthatlistenerswouldcontinuouslyassesswhileconversingwithnon-nativespeakers.Thoughtherelationshipsbetweenthesethreedimensionshavebeenwelldocumented,itisnotclearhowpleasantness,listeners’subjectiveevaluationontheirholisticexperiencetowardthespeechsample,relatestootherdimensions.Thus,weinvestigatetherelationshipsbetweenpleasantnessandotherperceptualdimensions,accentedness,comprehensibility,andfluency.Wehypothesizethatlisteners’pleasantnessisafluiddimensionlikeotherperceptualdimensionsandthatlistenerswouldevaluatewithinthisdimensionmorepositivelyforutterancesfrommoreexperiencedsecondlanguage(L2)learners,asinaccentedness,comprehensibility,andfluency.AgroupofnativespeakersofEnglishratedspontaneousspeechsamples,eachabout10-secondslong,fromtwogroupsofadultKoreanlearnersofEnglishdifferingintheirlengthofresidence(LOR)intheUS.Thesesampleswereratedona9-pointscalefortheaforementionedfourdimensions,withtwodimensionstogetherforeachsample.Theinstructionspecifiedhowtorateeachdimension.Forexample,forpleasantness,listenerswereaskedtoratehowpleasantorunpleasanttheirexperienceoflisteningtoeachsentenceis.Preliminaryresultsindicatethatthelisteners’ratingsforthefourdimensionswerecorrelatedwitheachother,withvaryingdegreesofstrength.Forinstance,correlationwasstrongerbetweenpleasantnessandfluency,comparedtopleasantnessandotherdimensions.Inaddition,thegroupwithlongerLORsreceivedmorepositiveratingsthanthatwithshorterLORs,inallassesseddimensions.Ourstudyreconfirmspreviousfindingsthatperceptualdimensionsareconnectedwithoneanother,withvaryingdegreesofassociation.Further,ourresultssuggestthatimprovinglearners’fluencymayenhancelisteners’holisticexperiencewithconversingwithL2learners.

GoldenSpeaker:LearnerExperiencewithComputer-assistedPronunciationPractice

JohnLevis,RicardoGutierrez-Osuna,EvgenyChukharev-Hudilainen,SinemSonsaat,AlifSilpachai,&IvanaLučić

Inapreviousstudy(Gutierrez-Osunaetal.,2018),wereportedquantitativeresultsofaquasi-experimentalstudyinwhichweanalyzedtheeffectofpracticewithaGoldenSpeakerBuilder,aninteractiveonlinetoolthatallowslearnerstopracticepronunciationwiththeirownvoiceproducingnative-accentedspeech.Theoverallresultsshowedsignificantimprovementinfluencybutnosignificantimprovementinlearners’accentednessandcomprehensibility.However,someindividualstudentsshowedimprovementintheiraccentednessandcomprehensibilityaswellastheirfluency.

In this study, we report the qualitative data on the individual learners’ interaction with the system. Fifteen Korean learners of English practicedwith 8 utterances perweekover threeweeks in a lab setting. Learnerspracticedwith threedifferent typesof exercises: say-listen-record, listen and record, and backward build up. Learners’ interaction with the GSB wasrecordedby screen capturing, eye-tracking, and voice recording.Additionally, learnerswereinterviewedfollowingtheirpost-anddelayed-postteststocollectdataabouttheirattitudestowardstheirpracticewiththeGSBandtheirinteractionwithit.

Thefindingsofthestudyshowedthatwhile many learnersstruggled with the voice quality and speed of the Golden Speaker voice, they found imitating the model voice useful for prosody and fluency. They also found some exercises more useful than others, especially the backward build-up, because it gave them greater opportunity to control the speed of the voice and to limit the amount of language they were working with. They also asked for more feedback about what to work on, as the voice itself was not sufficient to help them notice details in the segments.

AsymmetricalCognitiveLoadImposedbyProcessingNativeandNonnativeSpeech

DiLiu&MarnieReedProsodyaffectsinformationprocessingandcomprehension(Escoffier,Sheng&Schirmer,2010;Patel,2010;Zheng&Pierrehumbert,2010).Hahn(2004)foundthatsentencestressusedincorrectlyormisplacedhindersnativeEnglishspeakers’processingandcomprehensionofinformation.MandarinspeakingL2EnglishspeakersfailedtoexploittheEnglishtonalsystem(Pickering,2004;Wennerstrom,1998),producingspeechthatposesprocessingchallengestonativeEnglishspeakers.However,howMandarinspeakingL2Englishspeakers’EnglishprosodyaffectstheprocessingandmemoryoflearnerswithdifferentL1sremainsunknown.ThisstudyinvestigatestheinfluenceofMandarinspeakingL2Englishspeakers’prosodyonnativeandnonnativeEnglishlearners’processingandmemoryinalearningtask.TwolecturesrecordedbyanativeEnglishlecturerandaninternationalteachingassistant(ITA)wereplayedto21universitystudentsusingthepresentationsoftwareSuperlab.Whiletheparticipantswerelisteningtothelectures,theysawpicturesonthescreenandtheywereaskedtoindicateforeachpicturewhetheritisuprightorinverted.Afterlisteningtothelectures,theparticipantswereaskedtocompleteacomprehensionquiz.Participants’reactiontimeandquizscoreswereanalyzedusingANOVA.Theresultsshowthatthereisnosignificantdifferenceamongparticipants’comprehensionquizscores(F(3,17)=0.36,p=0.7829)).Thereisnostatisticallysignificantdifferenceamongthereactiontimeofdifferentgroupsofparticipants(F(3,17)=0.6,p=0.623)).However,participantsaverageprocessingtimeisshorterwhenlisteningtothespeakerwhospeaksthesameL1.TheseresultssuggestaprocessingadvantageforinterlocutorssharingthesameL1eventhoughtheyarecommunicatingintheirL2.Furthermore,L2Englishspeakers’prosodymayaffecttheprocessingofinformation.However,itmaynotnecessarilyinfluencelisteners’comprehension.ThesefindingsareinformativetoresearchonprosodyandITAs.ReferencesEscoffier,N.,Sheng,D.,&Schirmer,A.(2010).Unattendedmusicalbeatsenhancevisual

processing.ActaPsychologica,135(1),12-6.Hahn,L.D.(2004).PrimaryStressandIntelligibility:ResearchtoMotivatetheTeachingof

Suprasegmentals.TESOLQuarterly:AJournalforTeachersofEnglishtoSpeakersofOtherLanguagesandofStandardEnglishasaSecondDialect,38(2),201-223.

Patel,A.D.(2010).Music,language,andthebrain.Oxforduniversitypress.Pickering,L.(2004).TheStructureandFunctionofIntonationalParagraphsinNativeand

NonnativeSpeakerInstructionalDiscourse.EnglishforSpecificPurposes,23(1),19-43.Wennerstrom,A.(1998)Intonationascohesioninacademicdiscourse:AstudyofChinese

speakersofEnglish.StudiesinSecondLanguageAcquisition,20(1),1-25.Zheng,X.&Pierrehumbert,J.B.(2010).TheEffectsofProsodicProminenceandSerialPosition

onDurationPerception.JournaloftheAcousticalSocietyofAmerica,128(2),851-859.

ProsodicpatternsinEnglishReadbyJapanesePhoneticCorpus:InterimReport

TakehikoMakino

EnglishReadbyJapanese(ERJ)PhoneticCorpusisaphoneticallytranscribedcorpuswhichdrawsonasmallportionofERJspeechdatabasecontainingmorethan70,000recordingsofEnglishby200Japanesespeakers(Minematsu,etal.2002).Thepresentauthorcompleteditssegmentalannotationandpresentedthedescriptionofitssegmentalcharacteristicsin2014.Theannotationoftheprosodicaspectswasleftbehindbecauseofthedifficultiesinhandlingtheirinterlanguagenature.Japanesehasamora-timedrhythm,lexicalpitchaccentswhichareinvariablyfalling,andintonationalphrase-finalpitchmovementswhichconvey“intonational”meaning.ThisisaradicallydifferentsystemfromthatofEnglish,wheretherhythmisstress-timed,pitchaccentscanberealizedbydifferenttones,and“intonation”spansthepitchmovementsinawholeintonationalphrase.ThepresentauthorofferedatentativeproposalwhichcouldhandlethedifferentdegreesofmixtureofJapaneseandEnglishsystemsin2015,basedontheIntonationVariationTranscriptionSystem(IVTS)proposedinPostandDelais-Roussarie(2006).Thecoreofthatannotationsystem(whichcouldbecalled“IVTS-ERJ”)isfourtiersoftranscriptionwhichrepresentrhythmicbeats,localpitchmovements,globalpitchchangeand(tentative)phonologicaltonesonpitchaccents.ThepurposeofthispresentationisaninterimreportonthecharacteristicsofinterlanguageprosodyinJapanesespeakers’EnglishbasedontheIVTS-ERJannotationinpartofERJPhoneticCorpus.Someofthefindingsare:(1)morerhythmicbeatsthaninL1EnglishbutfewerofthemthaninL1Japanese;(2)tonesotherthanfallingareused,buttheinventoryisnotaslargeasinL1English;(3)thepitchrangeofthetonestendstobenarrower.

Theeffectofinstructiononreceptiveprosodicabilities:Ameta-analysis

MarkMcAndrewsInthefieldofpronunciationinstruction,outcomesarepredominantlydeterminedbymeasuringlearners’spokenproductions(Thomson&Derwing,2016).However,beingabletoperceivephonologicalfeatures,andtointegratetheinformationtheycarryintohigher-orderlisteningprocesses,isequallyimportantforsecondlanguagespeakers.Theprimarygoalofthisstudywastoestimatetheeffectofinstructiononlearners’receptiveabilitiesforprosodicfeatures.Eighteenprimarystudies,whosetargetfeaturesrangedfromMandarinlexicaltonetoEnglishintonation,wereaggregatedandanalyzed.Overall,instructionwasshowntohaveamedium-to-largeeffectonreceptiveprosodicabilities(d=0.78).Furtheranalyseswereconductedtoidentifyassociationsbetweenstudycharacteristicsandvariabilityinoutcomes.Instructionaltreatmentsthatinvolvedtruebeginnerlearnershadslightlylargereffectsthanthoseinvolvinglearnerswithsomeproficiencyinthetargetlanguage.Studiesthattestedparticipants’abilitiestodiscriminatebetweenstimulitendedtohavesmallereffectsthanthosethattestedparticipants’abilitiestoidentifytargetprosodicfeatures.Thesefindingsarediscussedinrelationtotheso-calledlearningcurve.Finally,itissuggestedthatfutureresearchinthisdomainmakegreateruseofinstrumentsthattesttheabilityoflearnerstouseprosodicfeaturestobuildmeaningduringlistening.

ASRDictationProgramsAccuracy:HaveCurrentProgramsImproved?

ShannonMcCrocklin,AbdulsamadHumaidan,&IdéeEdalatishams

AutomaticSpeechRecognition(ASR)haspotentialtohelplanguagelearnersgetfeedbackontheirpronunciation.Earlyresearchintodictationprograms,however,showedlowratesofrecognitionfornon-nativespeech,andresearchersdidnotconsiderthetranscripttoprovideusablefeedback(Coniam,1999;Derwing,Munro,Carbonaro,2000;Strik,Neri,&Cucchiarini,2008).Recently,attentionhasreturnedtoASRdictationprograms,findingthatASRdictationpracticecanhelpstudentsimprovesegmentalproduction(Liakin,Cardoso,&Liakina,2014)andmayfosterfeelingsofautonomy(McCrocklin,2016),butupdatedresearchisneededtorevisittheaccuracyoftranscriptsprovidedfornon-nativespeechincurrentASRdictationtechnologies.

Therefore,thisstudyinvestigatescurrentaccuracyratesfortwoASRdictationprograms,WindowsSpeechRecognition(WSR)andGoogleVoiceTyping.Participants(10nativeEnglishspeakersand20advancednon-nativespeakers)read60sentences(controlled/readspeech)andrespondedtotwoopen-endedquestions(free/spontaneousspeech).TheirproductionwasaudiorecordedwithAudacityandtranscribedbyWSRandGoogleVoiceTyping.

PairedT-testswereusedtocomparetranscriptaccuracyforeachspeaker,findingGoogleoutperformedWSR,particularlyfornon-nativespeech.Googlebecamemoreaccuratemovingfromcontrolledtofreespeech,WSRmovedintheoppositedirection.T-testswereusedtocomparenon-nativetonativetranscripts,findingthatWSRdidequallywellwithfreespeech,whileGoogledidequallywellwithcontrolledspeech.However,differencesdidemergebetweennon-nativeandnativespeakerswhenexaminingfreespeechinGoogleorcontrolledspeechinWSR,withhigheraccuracyfornativespeakers.ComparingresultstoDerwing,Munro,andCarbonaro(2000)whichfound72%accuracyfornon-nativespeechoncontrolledreading,Googleprovidesincreasesinaccuracyfornon-nativespeakers,rangingfrom88.6%forcontrolledreadingto93.5%forfreespeech.

AcquisitionofprominenceandtoneunitsbynativeJapanesespeakersofEnglish:Aquasi-longitudinalstudy

ShigehitoMenjo

StudiesexploringtheSpeechLearningModel(SLM),proposedbyFlege(1995),havepointedoutthesignificantrolesofageofarrival(AOA)andlengthofresidence(LOR)intheacquisitionofsegmentalsofanL2.StudiesexploringSLMregardingtheacquisitionofprosodicfeaturesofanL2arestillscarce,however.Inlightofthisgap,thisstudyinvestigatedtheacquisitionofprominencesandtoneunitstructurebynativeJapanesespeakersofEnglishinaquasi-longitudinalresearchdesignthatheldAOAconsistent.31nativespeakersofEnglish(NS)andthreegroupsof31JapanesespeakersofEnglishparticipated.ParticipantsreadaloudascriptadaptedfromWennerstrom(1994)thatembedscriticalfunctionsofprominence.ProminentsyllablewordswereidentifiedauditorilyandinstrumentallyusingaKayPentaxComputerizedSpeechLab.Thenumberoftheprominentsyllablewords(PS)andtoneunits(TU)wascountedandcomparedamongthegroups.Resultsofstatisticalanalysesrevealthat,consistentwithpreviousliteratureregardingfluency,theJPgroupstendedtoproduceextraPSincomparisontonativespeakers.AmongtheJPgroupssignificantdifferenceswerealsoobserved.Inaddition,theratioofcompleteTUtothetotalnumberofTUservedasastrongfactortodiscriminatethespeakergroups.TheseresultsindicatedthatidentifyingandproducingPSandTUatadiscourselevelweredifficultforJPs,yetanabilitytoidentifyandproducePSandtheproductionofcompleteTUsignificantlyimprovedthelongerthatJPswerelivingintheU.S.LinguisticfeaturesofL1thatmayhindertheJPs’acquisitionofL2prosody,methodologicalchallenges,andpedagogicalimplicationswillalsobediscussed.

Self-evaluations,perception,andproductioninsecondsemesterL2Frenchlearners

CamilleMeritanHuensch&Thompson(2017)recentlyshowedthatbeginnerlearnersenrolledinforeignlanguagerequirementsconsiderintelligiblepronunciationasanimportantlearninggoal,andasbeingpartoftheirL2idealself.However,thecommunicativelanguagemethodthatpredominatesintheteachingofforeignlanguagerequirementcourseshasalsoledtolearners’lowleveloflinguisticaccuracy,whichRanta&Lyster(2018)arguecanbealleviatedbyre-integratingform-focusedinstructionintothecurriculum.Morespecifically,inthecaseofpronunciation,Derwing(2018)showsthat“explicitinstructioncanbebeneficial[…]tohelp[learners]produce[…]moreintelligibly”.Furthermore,self-evaluationscanbeapromisingcomplementtoexplicitinstructionastheyhavethepotentialtobepracticalforteachers,providinglearner-centered,individualized,formativeassessment,buttheirimpactonintelligibleperceptionandproductionrequiresfurtherinvestigation(Figueras,2018).ThispresentationwilladdressthesecondphaseofanongoingmixedmethodsresearchprojectintendedtoanswerDerwing&Munro’s(2013)callforlongitudinalstudies.Conductedon26L2Frenchlearnersenrolledintheirsecondoffoursemestersofforeignlanguagerequirement,thisstudyaimsatdeterminingifself-evaluationscombinedwithexplicitspelling-to-soundinstructioncanhaveanimpactontheperceptionandproductionofthreephonologicalfeatures,criticalforintelligibilityinFrench.Italsoaimsatdocumentingtheprocessbywhichlearnersdevelopmetaphonologicalawarenessanditsroleinsuccessfulpronunciationlearning.Thisquasi-experimentalstudy(comparison/treatmentgroups)reliedonthemergingofresultsfromaperceptiontest,pre-andpost-productiontestssurroundingintegratedexplicitinstruction,answerstoopen-endedself-evaluationsquestionnaire,andcomparinghighprogressionwithlowprogressionlearnerstodocumenttheemergenceofmetaphonologicalawareness,hypothesizedasacontinuumwhereattentionleadstonoticing,whichleadstoawareness.

Prosodyanddiscoursefunction

RaniaMohammed

Prosodyplaysanimportantcommunicativeroleinspeech.Stressingwords/syllablescanindicateimportance,astartofatopic,oracontrastinformation(Levis,Muller-Levis,&Slater,2012).However,corpusstudieshaveoftenneglectedtheroleofprosodytosignaldiscoursefunction.Specifically,lexicalbundles,frequently-occurringmulti-wordsequences(Biberetal.,1999),havebeenfoundtohavedifferentdiscoursefunctions,suchasdiscourse-organizing,elaboration,stanceandreferentialfunctions(Biber,Conrad,&Cortes;2004).Studiesexaminingspokenlexicalbundleshavenotconsideredthepotentialroleofprosodytosignaldifferentdiscoursefunctions.Thisstudyexaminestheroleofprosodyinsignalingdiscoursefunctioninspokenlexicalbundles.Specifically,itdescribestheprosodicvariationsofthelexicalbundlesasyoucansee,oneofthethings,andoneofthemost,andhowtheseprosodicvariationsarelinkedtodiscoursefunction.TheframeworkofBiber,Conrad,andCortes(2004)wasusedtoidentifylexicalbundleswithtwoprimaryfunctions:discourseorganizersandreferentialexpressions.AnacademiccorpusofuniversitylecturescompiledfromYaleopencourseswasdeveloped.Theresultsshowedthatlexicalbundleshaddifferentprosodicpatternsthatwererelatedtotheirvariousfunctionsinthelectures.Thestudyconcludesthatprosodyisacrucialcontributiontothefunctionsthatlexicalbundlescanhaveinspokenlanguage.Thisindicatesthatprosodyneedstobeconsideredwhenexaminingthefunctionofspokenlexicalbundles.References:Biber,D.,Johansson,S.,Leech,G.,Conrad,S.&Finegan,E.(1999)Longmangrammarofspoken

andwrittenEnglish.Harlow,England:LongmanBiber,D.,Conrad,S.,&Cortes,V.(2004)Ifyoulookat…Lexicalbundlesinuniversityteaching

andtextbooks.AppliedLinguistics,25(3),371-405.Levis,J.,Levis,G.M.,&Slater,T.(2012).WrittenEnglishintospoken:Afunctionaldiscourse

analysisofAmerican,Indian,andChineseTApresentations.InG.Gorsuch(Ed.),WorkingtheoriesforTAandITAdevelopment(pp.529-572).Stillwater,OK:NewForumsPress.

“SeeingWhatPeopleHearYouAs”:FrenchLearnersExperiencingIntelligibilityThroughAutomaticSpeechRecognition

AuroreMroz

ManyK-16practitionersfeelunequippedtoattendtotheirlearners’pronunciation:thereisnotenoughtimeinclass,individualizedfeedbackseemsimpossible,andjudgingwhatcountsasintelligiblespeechishard.However,itiscrucialthatteacherspreparetheirstudentstobeabletobeunderstoodbynativespeakersunaccustomedtodealingwithL2learners(ACTFL,2012).Onepotentiallyuseful,practical,anddemocraticwaytoanswertheseneedsistotakeadvantageofAutomaticSpeechRecognition(ASR)ontheirsmartphones,combinedwithexplicitinstructiononspelling-to-soundpatterns.Contributingtoresearchonmobile-assistedlearning,thestudythatwillbepresentedherefolloweduponrecentASRstudiesbyLiakin,Cardoso,&Liakina(2017)andMcCrocklin(2016),butoperatedashiftinparadigmandmethods(Chapelle,2005).RelyingonanEcologicalapproach(vanLier,2004)andKolb’s(1984)ExperientialLearningmodel,thestudyconsistedinamulti-phase,quasi-experimental,mixedmethodsstudythatlasted16weeks,withcomparisonandtreatmentgroups,andatotalof29participantsenrolledinhighereducation.OnlythequalitativepartofthestudywillbepresentedherewiththeaimtoanalyticallydepicttheprocessbywhichL2FrenchlearnersaimingtoreachAdvancedoralproficiencyperceivedtheirownintelligibilityusingASR.Morespecifically,itwillunveiltheprocessbywhichstudentsexperiencedanddevelopedaninwardawarenessofhowintelligibletheirownlanguagesounds,aswellasanoutwardawarenessoftheirroleandofwhatisatstakeinintelligibleinteractions.Practicalimplicationsaboutaffordancesinresearchonmobile-assistedpronunciationlearning,aswellasforteachingandassessmentpractices,willfinallybedrawninconclusionofthispresentation.

TheeffectofL2EnglishorthographicrepresentationsonL1Teraspeakers’productionandperception

RebeccaMusa

StudiesinL2acquisitionofphonologyandorthographicinputhaveprovidedevidenceaboutL2learners’phonologicaldevelopmentduetoorthographicinput(e.g.Young-Scholten2002andYoung-ScholtenandLanger2015).Also,theeffectsofgrapheme-phonemecorrespondencesleadingtonon-targetlikeproductions(e.g.Rafat2011&2016);andtheeffectsoforthographicrepresentationonpronunciation(e.g.Bassetti2008andBassettiandAtkinson2015).Studieshavealsolookedattheeffectoforthographicexposureleadingtoepenthesistoresolvecomplexclusters(e.g.Young-Scholten,AkitaandCross1999).Inthisregard,astudywasconductedinvolvingL1Tera(bilingualspeakersofTera/HausainNigeria)learnersofL2EnglishinanexperimentalstudywhichlookedatwhetherprovidingL2Englishorthographicinputwouldaffectthelearnersunderlyingrepresentationsandinturntheirproductions.Datawascollectedamong73Teraspeakingsecondaryschoolstudentsinpre-testandpost-testinpicture-naming,dictation,ABXepenthesisandreadingtasks.Qualitativeanalysiswasconductedusinglinearphonologicaloperationsandrulesbasedonsixerrorcategoriesasfollows:vowelepenthesis,consonantclusterreduction,phonesubstitution,metathesis,loan-wordtransfer,andorthographic-basederrors.TheresultsrevealedtransferfromthelearnersL1structureswhichwerelesscomplexthantheL2structuresresultinginepenthesisofvowels[u][o][ɪ]toresolvecomplexconsonatclustersnotpermittedintheirL1,e.g.’bench’/benʧ/→[benʧɪ];ordeletionofsegmentse.g.‘lamps’/læmps/→[læms].Also,therewasincreasedeffectsoforthographicformsduetothecomplexityoftheL2Englishgrapheme-phonemecorrespondencesresultinginwhatBassettiandAtkinson(2015)refertoas‘orthography-induced-epenthesis’e.g.‘knife’/naɪf/→[kinaɪf].Alsometathesisoccured,whichisthereorderingofwordsinordertoresolveclustersthatconstituteL1specificconstraints,e.g.‘desk’/desk/→[deks].

Isperceptionenough?IndividualdifferencesinL2perceptuallearningandtheirrelationshiptoL2production

CharlesNagle

TheSpeechLearningModel(Flege,1995)contendsthatperceptionguidesproductioninsecondlanguage(L2)soundlearning.Ifperceptioninvolvescovertimitationthenthetwodomainsmaybeevenmorecloselyintertwined(Gambi&Pickering,2013).Alternatively,perceptionandproductionmaydissociateintheinitialstagesoflearning(Hanulíková,Dediu,Fang,Bašnaková,&Huettig,2012).Thecurrentstudyexaminedindividualdifferencesinperceptuallearningandtheirrelationshiptoproductionoverayearlongperiod.Twenty-nineL1Englishspeakersenrolledinfirst-andsecond-semesteruniversitySpanishlanguagecoursesparticipated.Ateachofthesevenmonthlysessions,participantscompletedoddityanddelayedrepetitiontaskstoassesstheirperceptionandproductionofL2Spanish

stops.Theodditytaskincludedthreetargetcontrasts,[b-p](Spanish),[p-ph](English),and[b-

ph](control),eachrepresentedbysixsame(e.g.,[pa-pa-pa])andsixdifferenttriplets(e.g.,[pa-ba-pa]).Thelocationoftheodditemwascounterbalancedacrosstrials,andparticipantsindicateditsserialposition,or“none”forsametrials.Onthedelayedrepetitiontask,participantsheardaSpanishverb(e.g.,besas,‘youkiss,’pago,‘Ipay’)andrepeateditafterathreeseconddelay.Bothtasksincludeddistractoritems.A’wascomputedtoestimateparticipants’discriminationabilityforeachodditycontrast.

Mixed-effectsmodelingdemonstratedthatA’washighestfor[b-ph]andlowestfor[b-p],asexpected.Eventhoughsessiondidnotemergeasasignificantgroup-levelpredictorinanymodel,individuallearnersvariedconsiderablyinperceptualtrajectories.Thedelayedrepetitiontaskwasanalyzedbyconsideringlearners’meanVOTandrangeofproductionsforSpanish/b/and/p/.Preliminaryresultsindicatethatsomeindividualswithexcellentdiscriminationabilityfailedtoproducestopsaccurately,buttherewerenocasesofpoordiscriminationandgoodrepetition,suggestingthatperceptualabilitymaybeanecessarybutinsufficientconditionforaccurateL2speechproduction.

Correctivefeedbackinpronunciationteaching:AVietnameseperspective

LocNguyen&JonathanNewtonRecentstudieshavefoundthatmanyESL/EFLteachers’pronunciationteachingepisodesmainlyinvolvederrorcorrectionsthroughlisten-and-repeatactivitiesbutlimitedresearchhasbeendonetoinvestigateifcorrectivefeedbackisbeneficialtostudents’pronunciationlearning.Thestudyreportedinthispaperseekstoextendthisresearchbyexaminingtheteachers’andstudents’perceptionsandattitudestowardscorrectivefeedbackinpronunciationteachingandlearninginanEFLcontextwhereithasnothithertobeenresearched,namelyVietnamesetertiaryeducation.TheresearchinvestigatedthepronunciationteachingpracticesofsixEFLteachersataVietnameseuniversity,andtheteachers’andstudents’perspectivesregardingtheseteachingpractices.Dataincludednon-participantobservations,video-recordingsofsixninety-minuteEFLclassesandinterviewswithbothteachersandstudents.Stimulatedrecallinterviewswerefortheteacherstoelaborateontheirdecision-makingandfurthersoughttoeliciteachteacher’sstatedbeliefsabouttheeffectivenessoftheirteachingpracticetotheirstudents’pronunciationlearning.Focusgroupinterviewsaimedtoexaminehowthestudentsperceivedthebenefitsoftheirteachers’classroompracticestotheirpronunciationlearning.AlltheinterviewsweretranscribedandtranslatedintoEnglishforanalysisusingatheme-basedapproach.Thefindingshighlightedtheteachers’preferenceforcorrectingstudents’pronunciationerrorsthroughlisten-and-repeatactivitiesandtheirstatedbeliefsaboutthesepractices.Thefindingsalsoshowedthestudents’perceptionsandattitudestowardstheirexperienceofbeingtaughtpronunciationandrevealedimportantmisalignmentsbetweentheteachers’andstudents’preferencesandbeliefs.Keywords:pronunciation,correctivefeedback,VietnameseEFL,teachingpractices,statedbeliefs.

Testingthemalleabilityofteachers’judgments

MaryO'Brien,AllisonBajt,PavelTrofimovich,&KymTaylorReid

Researchinvestigatingaccentednessandcomprehensibilityholdsuplistenerratingsasthegoldstandard(e.g.,Eskenazi,2009).Anumberofsuchstudiesrelyonteachers’expertjudgments(e.g.,Trofimovich&Isaacs,2012),andresultshavedemonstratedhighlevelsofinternalconsistencyintheratingsprovidedbyteachers,regardlessofwhethertheyarenativeornonnativespeakersofthetargetlanguage(Kim,2009).Ontheotherhand,ithasbeendemonstratedthatteachers’evaluationofstudents’writtenworkmaybeaffectedbysocialbiases(Ford,1984).Thegoalofthecurrentstudyistodeterminetheextenttowhichteachers’judgmentsofL2learners’speechareaffectedbyafellowteacher’sbiasedcommentsaboutlearnerspeech.Participantsinthecurrentstudywere20Germanschoolteacherswhoratedsemi-spontaneousspeechsamplesthatwereproducedby24L2learnersofGerman.Theteachersratedeachsamplealongfive1,000-pointcontinua:accentedness,comprehensibility,vowelandconsonanterrors,flow,andintonation.Participantsweredividedintotwogroups(n=10)onthebasisofwhetherornottheywereexposedtoabiasingorientationbeforetheratingsession.ThoseinthenegativebiasconditionwereexposedtoashortcommentaryaboutthenonnativespeechofGermanstudentsbeforetheybegantheratingsession,andthoseinthecontrolconditioncompletedtheratingtaskwithouthavingheardthesamecommentary.Althoughnoneoftheteachersmentionedthebiasingorientationinthedebriefingsession,theresultsofpreliminaryanalysespointtoharsherratingsamongteachersexposedtothebiasingorientation.Inaddition,teachersinthisgroupweremorelikelytoexpresstheirownnegativeopinionsaboutnonnativespeech.Theresultsofthestudypointtotheimportanceofexplicitlyacknowledgingbiasinspeechassessmenttraining.References:Eskenazi,M.(2009).Anoverviewofspokenlanguagetechnologyforeducation.Speech

Communication,51,832–844.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.specom.2009.04.005Ford,C.E.(1984).Theinfluenceofspeechvarietyonteachers’evaluationofstudentswith

comparableacademicability.TESOLQuarterly,18,25–40.https://doi.org/10.2307/3586333

Kim,Y-H.(2009).Aninvestigationintonativeandnon-nativeteachers’judgmentsoforalEnglishperformance:Amixedmethodsapproach.LanguageTesting,26,187–217.

Trofimovich,P.,&Isaacs,T.(2012).Disentanglingaccentfromcomprehensibility.Bilingualism:LanguageandCognition,15,905–916.https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728912000168

L2JapanesePronunciationInstruction:Itseffectsonimprovinglearners’pronunciation,foreignaccentedness,comprehensibility,andfluency

TomokoOkuno

ManyL2learnerswanttoimprovetheirpronunciationbecauseitisimportantforsuccessfulcommunication.Teachersalsoadmittheimportanceofteachingpronunciation;however,pronunciationinstructionisnotcommonlyincorporatedintoJapaneselanguageclasses.ThisispartlybecausemanyJapaneseteachersarenotsurehowtopracticepronunciation.ThepresentstudyinvestigatedtheeffectivenessofL2Japanesepronunciationinstructionanditseffectsonimprovingforeignaccentedness,comprehensibility,andfluency.

Atotalof20L2learners(L1English)enrolledintwosemestersofintensiveJapanesecoursesparticipatedinthisstudy.Theycompleted14setsofpronunciationpracticesincludingbothsegmentalandsupersegmentallevelssuchasword/sentenceintonationandpausing.Foreachpractice,theparticipantslistenedtoaudiofiles,practicedpronunciation,andaudio-recordedshortphrases,narratives,ordialoguesoutsidetheclassafterabriefpracticeinclass.Eachparticipantreceivedfeedbackontheirpronunciationfor10minutestwoorthreedaysaftereachaudio-filesubmission.Atthebeginningandtheendofthestudy,theparticipantswereaskedtoreadandaudio-recordashortnarrativethatservedasapretestandaposttest.Ashort,freeconversationbetweeneachparticipantandhis/herinstructorwasalsorecordedattheendofthestudy.

Participants’productionswereevaluatedtoseewhethertheyhadimprovedtheirpronunciationthroughtheinstruction.NativeJapanesespeakersratedtheirpronunciation.Resultsindicatedsignificantimprovementforbothsegmentalandsupersegmentallevels.Thenativespeakersalsoratedthelearners’productionsintermsofforeignaccentedness,comprehensibility,andfluency.Theresultsrevealedthatbothcomprehensibilityandfluencysignificantlyimproved;however,foreignaccentednessshowedmixedresults.Teachingimplicationsandfactorsaffectingtheratingofforeignaccentednessandcomprehensibilitywillbediscussed.

TheFormationofInteractionalIntelligibilityduetoSegmentalRepairamongELFDyads

GeorgeO’Neal

Segmentalrepairistheinteractionalco-constructionofamoremutuallyintelligiblepronunciationafteritsbreakdown(O’Neal,forthcoming).Matsumoto(2011)andO’Neal(2015,2016)demonstratedthroughobservationalresearchthatspeakersutilizesegmentalrepairsequencestobetterapproximatemutuallyintelligiblepronunciation.ThispresentationdescribesexperimentalresearchthatinvestigatedtheeffectofsegmentalrepairontheintelligibilityofsecondlanguageEnglishusers.

First,45Japanesesubjectsand45non-Japanesesubjectswererecruited,whowerepairedinto45ELFdyads(Jenkins,2000;Seidlhofer,2011).Next,dyadscompletedataskinwhichtheydescribedthelocationsof(verydifficult)minimalpairwordcardstoeachother.Assuch,thisexperimentoperationalized“mutualintelligibility”astheabilityofthespeakertodescribeacardanditslocationtothelistener,whowouldplaceitinthespecifiedarea.Furthermore,thedyadswererandomlyassignedtooneofthreeexperimentalconditions,eachofwhichlimitedcommunicationstrategies:1)an“anystrategyallowed”condition,2)a“onlysegmentalrepairallowed”condition,and3)a“nointeractionallowed”condition.Eachdyadcompletedthetaskthreetimes,withadelayofabouttendaysbetweeneachtask.

A3(independentmeasures)x3(repeatedmeasures)mixeddesignANOVArevealedthattheintelligibilityscoresweredifferentaccordingtoconditionandtime.Furtherpost-hoctestingrevealedthatthedyadsinthe“anystrategyallowed”conditionweremoreintelligiblethanthedyadsinthe“onlysegmentalrepairallowed”condition,whichdidnotsupportoneofthehypotheses.However,acorrelationanalysisbetweenthenumberofsegmentalrepairsequencesandtheintelligibilityscoresofthedyadsinthe“onlysegmentalrepairallowed”conditionrevealedastatisticallysignificantrelationship.Thisstudyconcludesthatsegmentalrepairisasignificantcontributortothegrowthofmutuallyintelligiblepronunciation.

VowelepenthesisinKoreanEnglishlearners’pronunciation:atthecrossroadsofperception,mentallexicon,andcognitiveabilities

HanyongPark&IsabelleDarcy

AcommonfeatureofKorean-accentedEnglishistheinsertionof“spurious”vowels(epenthesis)tobreakupinitialconsonantsequencesinEnglishwords.Forexample,“proud”mayberealizedas[pʊɹaʊd].Differencesinphonotacticrestrictionsbetweenlanguagescanexplainwherevowelinsertionhappens.Inthiscase,whileEnglishallowsinitialobstruent-liquidconsonantsequences(CC),Koreandoesnot,andepenthesisisalearners’repairstrategy.Nevertheless,learnersvarygreatlyinhowoftentheyapplyepenthesis,andthereasonsfortheseindividualdifferencesareunclear.Weexplorepossiblereasonsforvariableepenthesisratesbyexaminingwhethertheyrelatetolearners’perception,cognitiveabilities,phonolexicalrepresentations(theformofwordsstoredinthementallexicon),andvocabularysizeinL1andL2.ThirtyKoreanlearnersofEnglishparticipatedinaseriesoftasksmeasuringtheirproduction(ofCC-initialEnglishwords),theirperception(segmentalcategorization;wordstress),andtheirphonolexicalrepresentationsforCC-initialEnglishwords(lexicaldecisiontask:“ispʊroudaword?”).Wealsoassessedthelearners’cognitiveabilities(workingmemory,attentioncontrol,processingspeed)andlexicalknowledgeinL1andL2.Wemeasuredepenthesisratesthroughatrainedlistener’stranscription,alongwithacousticanalysis,oftheproducedEnglishwords(CC-portion).Waveformsandspectrogramswereexaminedtodetermineepenthesis,forthepresenceofavocalicportionwithintensityhigherthansurroundingconsonants.Correlationanalysesrevealedsignificantrelationshipsbetweenepenthesisrates(production)anderrorratesonsegmentalperceptionandlexicaldecisiontasks.Also,processingspeedandvocabularysizeinL1andL2wererelatedtoepenthesisrates.TheseresultssuggestthatvowelepenthesisinL2learners’pronunciationmirrorsacomplexinterplayamongperceptionofsegmentalproperties,accuracyoflexicalrepresentations,aswellasvocabularyknowledgeandprocessingspeed.Resultswillbediscussedinlightoflearners’overallphonologicalproficiencyprofilesandpossibleinstructionalavenues.

BringingtheAppliedAliveinanOnlineMATESOLPronunciationCourse

BetsyParrish&SuzanneMcCurdy

Thegoalofanycourseinappliedphoneticsandphonologyshouldbetoproviderigorousinstructioninlinguisticprinciples,whileatthesametimeprovidingteachercandidateswithskillsandpracticestheycanreadilyapplyintheirclassrooms.Theappliedaspectscanbeparticularlychallenginginanonlineenvironment(Bolingetal.,2011).

ThepresenterssharetheirapproachtoteachingMAcandidatesinanonlineenvironmentthroughanapproachthatincorporatesinstructionalpracticescommonlyusedinESL/EFLclassrooms.DrawingonexamplesfromtheironlineMATESOLcourseinappliedphoneticsandphonology,theyuseexperientialanddiscovery-basedactivitiestoleadteachercandidatestoanunderstandingofsuchtopicsas:

• Perceptionsofaccentedness,intelligibilityandcomprehensibility• SpeechcommunitiesandEnglishasalinguafranca• ProsodicfeaturesofEnglish• PhonemesandallophonesofNAE• Linkingandreductionsinspeech

Theteachingstrategiesdemonstratedinthissessioninclude,1)analysisanddiscussionofspeechsamplestoidentifytheirperceptionsofaccentedness,intelligibilityandcomprehensibilityacrossspeechcommunities;2)smallgroupanalysisofspeechsamplesgatheredbyteachercandidates;3)videodemonstrationsofpracticesforteachingprosodicfeatures,includingwordandsentencestress,prominenceinthoughtgroups;4)personalizationinthepresentationofphonemes;5)Wikisanddiscussionsonapplyingreadingsandcourseinputintheirownsettings;6)Jigsawandsmallgrouppresentationsofassignedphonologicalprinciples.Thepresentersshareguidingprinciplesfordevelopingthecoursetasksandassessments.Asnapshotofparticipants’reactionsfromcourseevaluationsaresharedaswell.Thepresentersalsosharehowtheyusethesesametechniquesintheirface-tofacecourses.

Boling,E.,Hough,M.,Krinsky,H.Saleem,H.&Stevens,M.(2011).Cuttingthedistanceindistanceeducation:Perspectivesonwhatpromotespositive,onlinelearningexperiences.TheInternetandHigherEducation,15(2),118-126.

Designandevaluationofacomputationalsystemforlearner-customizedhigh-variabilitytrainingonsegmentalperceptioninwordsandsentences

ManmanQian,EvgenyChukharev-Hudilainen,&JohnLevis

SummaryAself-containedonlinesystemwasdevelopedtoprovideadaptivehigh-variabilityphonemicperceptiontrainingwithfourtypesofperceptualdiscrimination/identificationexercises.Theeffectivenessofthetrainingwasevaluatedbyexaminingthepre-,post-,anddelayed-testperformanceofatreatmentgroupwith150studentsversusacontrolgroupwith100students.AbstractTherehasbeenacallforthecreationofacomputer-assistedpronunciationteachingprogramthatprovidesindividualizedneeds-basedtrainingbasedonfirstlanguageandlearnerproficiency(Levis,2007;Munro,Derwing,&Thomson,2015).Inthecurrentstudy,suchacomputationalsystemwasdesignedinPerlandJavaScripttoprovideword-levelperceptualtrainingonstudents’abilitytodiscriminateandidentifysegmentalcontrastswithfourtypesofexercises:same-differentdiscrimination,odditydiscrimination,simpleidentification,andyes/noidentification.Integratingautomatedassessmentandalearnerdiagnostic,thesystemprioritizeslearner-specificproblemsandadaptstrainingintensityaccordingtoreal-timelearnerprogress.Thesystemalsorecognizestheefficacyofmulti-voicemodelsforperceptualacquisition(Thomson,2011,2012;Wang&Munro,2014)byutilizinghigh-variabilityphonetictrainingexercisesdevelopedusingautomaticallyextractedtext-to-speechvoices.Thetrainingeffectivenesswasevaluatedbyanalyzingthepre-andposttestperformanceof150nonnativeEnglishlearnersusingthesysteminaself-paced,low-stressenvironment.Thetrainingstimuliwerecontrolledtoexaminethelearners’potentialtransferofperceptualgainstothreenovelconditions:totrainedwordsspokenwithuntrainedvoices,tountrainedwordsspokenwithtrainedvoices,andtotraineditemsinsentences.Thelearners’performancewasre-testedfourweeksafterthetrainingfinishedtoinvestigatetheretentionoftraininggains.Datawereanalyzedbycomparingthetreatmentandcontrolgroups’performancechangesovertime.Inthepresentation,wewillfirstintroducethefeaturesofthetrainingsystembyexplainingtheadaptivelearningalgorithmunderlyingthesystemdesign.Then,wewillprovidestatisticstoevaluatetheeffectivenessofthesystem.Thesystemwasrobustinimprovingperceptionoftrainedphonemes,demonstratingtheefficacyofadaptive,high-variabilitytraining.Transferoflearningwasrelativelylessconsistent,providinginspirationsforfutureenhancementstothetrainingsystem.SubstantialvariationsamongthelearnererrorsandpaceoflearningsuggestedthatL2phonemicacquisitionisnotmerelyL1-specificbutshouldbecustomizedtoindividuallearners.

EffectsofperceptualphonetictrainingontheperceptionofKoreancodasbynativeMandarinlisteners

Na-YoungRyu&YoonjungKang

Purpose:Numerousstudieshavefoundthatsecondlanguage(L2)learners’perceptionbenefitsfromperceptualtraining(Bradlowetal1997,Lopez-Soto&Kewley-Port2009,Wong2013).Mandarinlearnerswithonlytwonasalcodas/n,ŋ/intheirnativephonologyoftenexperiencedifficultyperceivingKoreanvoicelessstops/p,t,k/,nasals/n,m,ŋ/,and/l/incodaposition.ThisstudyinvestigatestheeffectoftrainingonMandarinL2learners’perceptionofKoreancodasandcomparestheeffectofexplicitandimplicittraining.Method:Theparticipantswere30nativeMandarinspeakersenrolledinabeginner’sKoreancourse.Group1wastrainedtoidentifyKoreancodasinmonosyllabicwordswithexplicitinstructionandfeedback,whileGroup2wasexposedtothesamestimuliasGroup1butwastrainedonKoreanvowelsratherthancodas,inordertogaugetheeffectofimplicitexposure.Bothtraininggroupscompletedeightonlinesessionsofhigh-variabilityperceptualtrainingandweretestedatpre-testandpost-test.Group3receivednotrainingandonlyconductedthepre-andpost-tests.Results:ResultsofamixedeffectlogisticregressionmodelrevealedthatlearnerswhoreceivedexplicittrainingoutperformedonKoreancodaperceptionthanthosewhoreceivedimplicittrainingornotraining.Specifically,Group1withexplicitinstructionimprovedsignificantlyfromthepre-testtothepost-test(14%),butGroup2,withimplicitinstruction,resultedinmarginalimprovement(4%),andthenon-trainedcontrolgroupshowednosignificantincreaseinKoreancodaperception.TheseresultssuggestthatlearnersareabletoimproveL2codaperceptionaccuracywhentheyareawareofwhattheyarelearning.Conclusions:ThisstudyprovidedempiricalevidencefortheinfluenceoftrainingonKoreancodaperceptionbyMandarinlearnersofKorean.Theresultsdemonstratethatonlinetrainingexertspositiveeffectsonnon-nativephonemeidentification.Inparticular,explicitphoneticinstructionleadstogreaterimprovementthanimplicitinstructionforL2codaperception.

Oral corrective feedback timing: The case of an Iranian EFL context

HoomanSaeli

Twounder-researchedcomponentsoftheEnglishpronunciationsystem,butessentialtoL2speechintelligibility,arelexicalstress(e.g.Jenkins,2002;Field,2005)andsentenceintonation(e.g.Kang,2010;Baker,2011)accuracy.Aimingtoprovidefurtherempiricalevidenceontheeffectsoforalcorrectivefeedback(OCF)onlexicalstressandsentenceintonationaccuracy,thecurrentstudysetouttoinvestigatewhether,andifso,how,feedbacktiming(e.g.,immediatevs.delayed)influencestheefficacyofteacherexplicitOCFonlexicalstressandsentenceintonationinanIranianEFLcontext.Thedatawerecollectedfromupper-intermediatestudents(N=61).Usingapretest-treatment-posttestdesign,alistof50newwordswerecontextualizedin50statements/questionstomeasurepossiblegains.MANOVA,coupledwithpost-hocanalysis,resultsconfirmedthattheteacherimmediate(interruptionàcorrectionàstudentrepetitionofcorrectform)OCF(n=20)andteacherdelayed(nointerruptionàcorrectionafterutteranceàstudentrepetitionofcorrectform)OCF(n=20)groupsoutperformedthecontrolgroup(n=21),andthatallthreegroupshadsignificantpronunciationgainsafter2.5months.Post-hocanalysis,however,revealedthatthefirstandsecondgroupswerenotsignificantlydifferentinlexicalstressaccuracygains.Contrastively,theteacherimmediategrouphadsignificantlyhighergainsthantheteacherdelayedoneinsentenceintonationaccuracy.TheresultssuggestthatteacherexplicitOCFcanbecomplementarytotheteachingofpronunciation.Also,inIranianEFLcontexts,theimmediatenessofOCFmighthavesignificanteffectsontheefficacyofteacherfeedbackforanumberofsocioculturalandpedagogicalreasons.

Learners’perceptionsofanon-standardAmericanEnglishdialect

MariSakai

Althoughsecondandforeignlanguageclassroomstendtorelyontheuseofjustonedialect,studentswillcertainlyhaveaneedtocomprehendvariousdialectsofthetargetlanguage(Major,Fitzmaurice,Bunta,Balasubramanian,2005).Previousresearchproposesthatfamiliaritywithadialectincreasescomprehension(Perry,Mech,MacDonald,Seidenberg,2018),buthowdoesthistranslatetosecondlanguage(L2)instruction?Asafirststep,thisstudyexaminedsourcesoflearnerdifficultywhenlisteningtoanon-standarddialect.Thirty-oneadultswithvaryingfirstlanguages,enrolledinanAmericangraduateprogram,transcribedanaudiorecordingfromNPR’sStoryCorps,whichaimsto“preserveandsharehumanity’sstories”fromacrosstheUnitedStates(storycorps.org,2018).The2-minuterecordingfeaturedafatheranddaughter,discussingtheaftermathofthedaughtercomingoutasalesbian.Thefather,anolder,African-AmericanmanfromAlabama,speakswithanon-standarddialect,whilehisdaughterspeakswithadialectthatisclosertostandardAmericanEnglish.Participantshadapproximately25minutestocompletethetranscription.Asequential,exploratorymixed-methodsdesignwasemployedinthisstudy(Cresswell&Cresswell,2018).First,transcriptswereevaluatedquantitatively,utilizinginterpretingandtranslationconventions(Barik,1994)adaptedforL2analysis.Transcriptswereassessedword-by-wordforaccuracy;“departures”werecodedas(1)additions,(2)omissions,or(3)substitutions(Barik,1994,p.122).Next,alldeparturesandtheirencompassingclauseswereextractedandanalyzedqualitativelyusingtextualanalysis(Fairclough,2003).Preliminaryresultsrevealedthatthereweresignificantlymoresubstitutionsandomissionsinthefather’stranscribedspeech.Qualitativeanalysisrevealedfourcategoriesthatpatternedwithomittedorsubstitutedtext:non-standardidiomaticexpressions(e.g.,“threwmeforawhammy”),non-standardgrammarusage(e.g.,“Idonegrowed”),standardidiomaticexpressions(e.g.,“toremyheartout”),andparticipant-drivenlanguageerrors.Resultswillbediscussedfromapsycholinguisticandpedagogicalperspective.

References

Barik,H.C.(1994).Adescriptionofvarioustypesofomissions,additionsanderrorsoftranslationencounteredinsimultaneousinterpretation.InS.Lambert&B.Moser-Mercer(Eds.),Bridgingthegap:Empiricalresearchinsimultaneousinterpretation(pp.121-137).Amsterdam,NL:JohnBenjamins.

Creswell,J.W.,&Creswell,J.D.(2018).Researchdesign:Qualitative,quantitative,andmixedmethodsapproaches.ThousandOaks,CA:Sagepublications.

Fairclough,N.(2003).Analysingdiscourse:Textualanalysisforsocialresearch.London,UK:Routledge.

Major,R.C.,Fitzmaurice,S.M.,Bunta,F.,&Balasubramanian,C.(2005).Testingtheeffectsofregional,ethnic,andinternationaldialectsofEnglishonlisteningcomprehension.LanguageLearning,55(1),37-69.

Perry,L.K.,Mech,E.N.,MacDonald,M.C.,&Seidenberg,M.S.(2018).Influencesofspeechfamiliarityonimmediateperceptionandfinalcomprehension.PsychonomicBulletin&Review,25(1),431-439.

AStrategy-BasedPronunciationModelforImprovingEnglishLinking

VeronicaSardegna

Researchfindingsonlinkinginconnectedspeechsuggestthatlinkingisamarkeroffluentspeech(Alameen,2007;Anderson-Hsieh,Riney,&Koehler,1994;Hieke,1984)andthatnativeEnglishspeakers’linkingaffectsnon-nativeEnglishspeakers’listeningcomprehension(Henrichsen,1984).Unfortunately,verylittleisknownaboutwhetherlinkingcanbelearnablethroughexplicitinstruction.Thisstudyevaluatedthelong-termeffectivenessofastrategy-basedpronunciationmodelforimprovingEnglishlanguagelearners’abilitytolink(orcombine)soundswithinandacrosswords.FollowingsuggestionsfromThomsonandDerwing(2014),todeterminelong-termretentionofinstructionandtocompareinstructedpronunciationlearningoutcomestonaturalisticL2pronunciationdevelopment,pre-post,anddelayedpost-testswereconductedontwocomparablegroupsofinternationalgraduatestudents(interventiongroupN=15;controlgroupN=15)atanAmericanuniversity.FromTime1(pre-test)toTime2(post-test)(i.e.,4months),theinterventiongrouplearnedstrategiesonhowtoimprovesounds,phraseandwordstress,intonation,andlinkingwhilethecontrolgroupdidnot.FromTime2(post-test)toTime3(delayedpost-test#1)(i.e.,8months)andfromTime3(delayedpost-test#1)toTime4(delayedpost-test#2)(i.e.,9months)neithergroupreceivedpronunciationinstruction.ResultsshowedthattheinterventiongroupsignificantlyoutperformedthecontrolgrouponlinkingtargetsatTime2andTime3.Delayedread-aloudpost-testscoresfromtheinterventiongroupatTime4indicatedlong-termmaintenanceofimprovementwithlinkingtargetsfromTime3toTime4.Amixed-methodsanalysisthattriangulatedstudents’read-aloudtestscoresonlinkingandself-reportsofstrategypracticeduringthestudy(i.e.,21months)revealedanumberoffactorsthatcontributedtoindividualdifferencesintheinterventiongroup’simprovementwithlinkingovertime(Time1-Time3/4).Pedagogicalimplicationsofthefindingsarediscussed.

WhoFollowstheRules? DifferentialRobustnessofPhonologicalPrinciples

JohnScott

Althoughsomephonologicalrules(e.g.,GermanDorsalFricativeAssimilation)receiveemphasisinpronunciationinstruction,acquisitionofphonotactics—theprinciplesgoverningwherecertainsoundsoccur—remainspoorlyunderstood.Inparticular,howlearnersassociatephoneswithnovelphonemesandacquireotherlanguage-specificdistributionknowledge(e.g.,Englishdefectivedistributionof/ŋ/)isunderstudiedinL2(althoughseeShea&Curtin,2010).

AsasteptowardunderstandingacquisitionofallophonyandsyllablephonotacticsinL2,thisstudyemploysphonememonitoring(Foss,1969)toinvestigatenativeandL2learner(L1English)sensitivitytoviolationsoftwoprinciplesofGermanphonology.InGerman,dorsalfricatives[xç]assimilatetomatchthefrontnessorbacknessoftheprecedingphoneinthesamemorpheme,so[baxt]/[bɛçt]arewell-formed,whereas*[bɛxt]/*[baçt]arenot.InbothGermanandEnglish,thephoneme/h/hasdefectivedistribution,limitedtosimplesyllableonsets(e.g.,[hamt]),notclustersorcodas(e.g.,*[baht]).

A[t]-detectiontaskwasdesignedwithCV_[t]nonwordstimulifortwocomparisons:Match([baxt]/[bɛçt])vs.Mismatch([baçt]/[bɛxt])andOnset-[h]vs.Coda-[h],andreactiontimes(RT)wererecorded.

StimulusconditionwassignificantlydifferentforbothGermans(N=14),F(3,34.032),p<.000,andL2learners(N=23),F(3,15.400),p<.000,indicatingthatallparticipantsweresensitivetoprincipleviolations.ThemeanRTofCoda-[h]trialswasrobustlyslowerthanOnset-[h]forbothL1Germans(38ms)andlearners(86ms).Incontrast,bothgroupstendedtowardfasterRTforMismatch([baçt]/[bɛxt])trialsthanforMatch([baxt]/[bɛçt]),butthiseffectwasnotsignificantforeithergroup,althoughonemightexpectsuchaneffectifDorsalFricativeAssimilationwererobustforGermans.Instead,thiscompositetrendreflectedvariousindividualRTeffectpatterns.Thisfindingraisesimportantquestionsregardingtherobustnessofcertainphonological“rules”forL2perceptionandpronunciationinstruction.

References

Foss,D.J.(1969).Decisionprocessesduringsentencecomprehension:Effectsoflexicalitemdifficultyandpositionupondecisiontimes.JournalofVerbalLearningandVerbalBehavior,8,457–462.

Shea,C.E.,&Curtin,S.(2010).Discoveringtherelationshipbetweencontextandallophonesinasecondlanguage:Evidencefordistribution-basedlearning.StudiesinSecondLanguageAcquisition,32,581–606.

Theperception-productioninterfaceintheacquisitionofpalatalizedconsonantsinL2Russian

AlaSimonchykThetraditionalperspectiveontheperception-productionlinkinL2acquisitionsupportedbytheSpeechLearningModel(Flege,1995)statesthataccurateperceptualtargetsarenecessarytoguidelearnerstoaccurateproduction.However,previousresearchhasshownthatlearnerscanacquirethecorrectarticulationoftargetphonemeswithoutbeingabletodifferentiatethemreliablyinperception(e.g.,Darcy&Krüger,2012;Sheldon&Strange,1982).Thegoalofthisstudywastoexaminetheperception-productioninterfaceintheacquisitionofRussianpalatalizedconsonants,whichareknowntoposemuchdifficultytoL2learnersbothinperceptionandproduction(e.g.,Hackingetal.,2016;Lukyanchenko&Gor,2011).FortyAmericanlearnersofRussianperformedtwoABXtasks(withnonwordsandrealwords)andanoralpicturenamingtask.Resultsshowedthatlearners’experiencewiththetargetlanguagehadnoeffectontheirabilitiestodifferentiateplainandpalatalizedconsonantsperceptually.Low-intermediateandhighly-advancedlearnersofRussianbothhadanerrorrateofaround30%ontheABXtasks.However,ontheoralpicture-namingtask,advancedlearnersweresignificantlymoreaccurateintheirproductionofpalatalizedconsonantsthantheintermediatelearners.Moreover,therewerestrongandstatisticallysignificantrelationshipsbetweenadvancedlearners’performanceontheABXsandtheoralpicturenamingtask:moreaccurateperceptionwasassociatedwithmoreaccurateproduction.Therewerenosuchsignificantrelationshipsintheperformanceofintermediatelearners.Perceptionandproductionskillsseemtobemisalignedattheintermediatelevelofproficiencyandthenbecomealignedandinterdependentattheadvancedlevel.Therefore,eventhoughlearners’perceptualskillsdonotchangesignificantlyovertime,advancedlearnersseemtomakebetteruseoftheirperceptualabilitytodiscriminateplainandpalatalizedconsonantsinordertoimprovetheirproduction.

Darcy,I.,&Krüger,F.(2012).VowelperceptionandproductioninTurkishchildrenacquiringL2German.JournalofPhonetics,40,568–581.

Flege,J.E.(1995).Secondlanguagespeechlearning:Theory,findings,andproblems.InW.Strange(Ed.),Speechperceptionandlanguageexperience:Issuesincrosslanguageresearch(pp.233–277).Baltimore,MD:YorkPress.

Hacking,J.,Smith,B.,Nissen,S.,&Allen,H.(2016).Russianpalatalizedandunpalatalizedcodaconsonants:AnelectropalatographicandacousticanalysisofnativespeakerandL2learnerproductions.JournalofPhonetics,54,98–108.

Lukyanchenko,A.,&Gor,K.(2011).PerceptualcorrelatesofphonologicalrepresentationsinheritagespeakersandL2learners.InN.Danis,K.Mesh,&H.Sung(Eds.),Proceedingsofthe35thAnnualBostonUniversityConferenceonLanguageDevelopment(pp.414–426).Somerville,MA:CascadillaPress.

Sheldon,A.,&Strange,W.(1982).Theacquisitionof/r/and/l/byJapaneselearnersofEnglish:Evidencethatspeechproductioncanprecedespeechperception.AppliedPsycholinguistics,3,243–261.

Pronunciationteaching:Whosedomainisitanyways?

RonThomson&JenniferFooteSeveralscholarshaveraisedethicalconcernsaboutcurrentpracticeswithinthefieldofsecondlanguagepronunciationteaching(e.g.,Derwing,Fraser,Kang&Thomson,2014;Derwing & Munro 2015; Foote, 2018; Lippi-Green, 2012), and have questioned theextenttowhichlanguageinstructorsandspeechlanguagepathologistsarequalifiedtooffer instruction (e.g., Thomson, 2014). In this paper,we provide an evidence-basedviewofwhowebelieveshouldandshouldnotbedeliveringpronunciationinstruction.First,we review relevant ethics and standards documents, developed by professionalassociations for North American English language teachers and speech languagepathologists (e.g., TESOL, TESL Canada, ASHA). After establishing what theseassociationsprescribeintermsofethicalandbestpractices,wethenreportresultsofasurvey of 58 English language instructors, and 54 speech language pathologists, whooffer what they describe as pronunciation instruction or accent modification/accentreductionservices.Thesurveyexaminesinstructors’educationalqualifications,aswellas the adequacy of their knowledge-base. Mixed results indicate that while someinstructors appear to adhere to their professions’ ethical guidelines and standards,many do not. With reference to the survey results, we provide some possibleexplanations for this disconnect, including instructors’ faulty assumptions about thetransferability of general knowledge to this specialized domain, and a lack ofprofessional development. Finally, we conclude with recommendations for positivechangeinthisarea.

Perceptualtraininginaclassroom-setting:PhonemiccategoryformationbyJapaneseEFLlearners

RuriUeda&Ken-ichiHashimoto

Itiscommonlysaidthatthereisalinkbetweenperceptionandproductionskillsforpronunciationsincebothskillssharethesamephonemicrepresentations(e.g.,Flege,1995).Thistheoryhasledtostudiesonperceptualtrainingwhichconsistedonlyofauditoryidentificationtasks,manyofwhichsucceededinimprovingL2learners'perceptionandpronunciationskillswithoutarticulationexercises(e.g.,Bradlowetal.,1997;Thomson,2011).Thesestudies,however,weremostlylab-based,anditisstillunclearifthepositiveeffectscanalsobeobservedinclassroom-basedtraining.Thepresentstudytestedwhetherclassroom-basedperceptualtrainingexertedsimilarpositiveeffectsbothonperceptionandproductionskills,inasimilarwaytolab-basedtraining.Twenty-fourL1Japaneseuniversitystudentshadten-minutehighvariabilityperceptualtrainingtasksatthebeginningoftheironce-a-weekEnglishclassforsixweeks.Threeminimalpairs—/b/-/v/,/l/-/r/,and/s/-/θ/—werechosenasthetargetphonemes.Inthetrainingsession,theparticipantscompletedtwo-alternativeforcedchoicetaskswiththerecordedminimalpairspresentedtothewholeclass.Beforeandafterthetraining,identificationtasksandrecordingtaskswereconductedtomeasuretheirimprovementinperceptionandproductionrespectively.Theresultsshowedtheirimprovementinbothperceptionandproductionperformancesforthe/b/-/v/and/s/-/θ/contrastsascomparedwithacontrolgroup,butthepositiveeffectswerelimitedtothewordsusedforthetraining.Toexaminemorecloselythechangesofrelationsbetweentheirperceptionandproductionoverthetrainingperiod,correlationanalyseswereconducted,whichshowedmoderatecorrelationsforthe/b/-/v/and/s/-/θ/contrastsonlyaftertraining.Theseresultsimplythatalthoughlearninggeneralizationswerenotobservedinnewwords,potentiallyduetotheshortlengthoftrainingtime,perceptualtrainingdidinfluencetheirL2Englishphonemiccategoryformation.Bradlow,A.R.,Pisoni,D.B.,Akahane-Yamada,R.,&Tohkura,Y.I.(1997).TrainingJapaneselistenerstoidentifyEnglish/r/and/l:IV.Someeffectsofperceptuallearningonspeechproduction.TheJournaloftheAcousticalSocietyofAmerica,101(4),2299-2310.Flege,J.E.(1995).Secondlanguagespeechlearning:Theory,findings,andproblems.InW.Strange(Ed.),Speechperceptionandlinguisticexperience:Issuesincross-languageresearch(pp.233-277).Timonium,MD:YorkPress.Thomson,R.I.(2011).ComputerassistedpronunciationTraining:Targetingsecondlanguagevowels:Perceptionimprovespronunciation.CALICOJournal,28(3),744–65.

Theeffectsoftaskrepetitionontheuseofepistemicstancemarkers:Corpus-basedstudy

TaichiYamashita

InstructedSLAhasinvestigatedvariousform-focusedtechniques,andtaskrepetitionhasbeenoneoftheheatedareas(Bygate&Samuda,2005).Althoughstudiesreportedlearners’overtimeimprovementofL2productionthroughtaskrepetition(Lynch&MacLean,2000),practitionershaveraisedconcernsthatlowproficiencylearnersmaynotbenefitfromsimplyrepeatingataskwithoutanyexplicitform-focusedinstruction(Date,2015;Hawkes,2011).Thiswouldbeespeciallythecasewhenthetargetfeatureaddressespragmaticaspectsbecauseoftheiropaqueness(Fordyce,2014;Nemeth&Kormos,2001).Tothisend,thepresentcorpus-basedstudyinvestigatesthepotentialmoderatingeffectsofproficiencyontheeffectivenessoftaskrepetitionfortheuseofepistemicstancemarkers.ThepresentstudyemployedaspokenmonologuecorpusintheInternationalCorpusNetworkofAsianLearnersofEnglish(ICNALE)(Ishikawa,2014),focusingonJapaneselearnersofEnglishoffourproficiencylevels(N=114).Thelearners’monologueswereelicitedfourtimesbytwoargumentativetopics(i.e.,2cycles)with60secondsgiventoeachenactment.Theirtaskperformancewasmeasuredbyhowmanytokensofepistemicstancemarkerswereusedper50wordsforeachenactmentwithcomprehensivesearchitems(e.g.,Biber,2006).Statisticalsignificancewasassessedbyconductingrepeated-measuresANOVAsforeachtopicwithEnactmentandProficiencybeingtwoindependentvariables.ThepreliminaryanalysesshowednosignificantmaineffectsforeitherEnactmentorProficiency.Furthermore,Enactment×Proficiencyinteractioneffectswerenotsignificanteither.However,qualitativeanalysesrevealedthatwhereaslowproficiencylearnersreliedonaconsiderablylimitedvarietyofepistemicstancemarkers(e.g.,Ithink),moreproficientlearnersemployedvariousepistemicstancemarkers(e.g.,itistruethat,certainly).Pedagogicalimplicationsandfutureresearchdirectionswillbediscussedwithacallforamoretask-supportedtypeofinstructionforpragmaticdevelopment.

RelevanceofSpeechFeaturesinBuildingandEvaluatingAutomatedScoringModels:AMachineLearningApproachforITASpeakingAssessment

ZiweiZhou

Recentadvancementinspeechandnaturallanguageprocessing(NLP)technologieshasbroadenedthescopeofautomaticevaluationofspeakingproficiencybymovingbeyondsurface-level features to “capture the entire range of linguistic expression andrepresentation that human raters expect in spontaneous speech” (Wang, Zechner, &Sun, 2016; Loukina, Davis, and Xi, 2017). Innovations automated scoring have alsore-ignitedthere-conceptualizationofthekeyinferenceswedrawabouttheappropriateinterpretationsandusesofmachinescores.Ascurrentautomatedscoringsystemsareexpanding their feature inventories, it is time to investigate of the role of speechfeatures (both segmental and suprasegmental), which was most widely studied inautomated scoring, in the development and evaluation of automated scoringmodels(Ginther & Kang, 2017). Making use of a variety of non-proprietary speech and NLPsystemsaswell as state-of-the-artmachine learningalgorithms, this study focusesonbuildingandevaluatingautomatedscoringmodelsforanin-houseITAspeakingtest.Byexplicatingthescoringlogicandproceduresadoptedbytheautomatedscoringmodels,this study demonstrates that high accuracy (95.76%) can be achieved by using onlyspeech features (N=90) through 10-fold cross-validation for the K-Nearest Neighboralgorithm,followedbyArtificialNeuralNetwork(81.36%),andRandomForest(74.01%).Interestingly, performance degraded when vocabulary features are incorporated forprediction.Model stability issues are addressed by constructing both theoretical andempirical95%confidenceintervalsaswellasextrinsicevaluationsbytestingmodelsonnew speaking prompts. Beyond demonstrating the correspondence between humanandmachinescores,thisstudyseekstounderstandtheconstructrepresentationwithinthe automated scoring procedures by adopting various feature selection schemes.Resultsindicatethat,ingeneral,fluency(e.g.speechrate,averagesyllableduration)andsegmentalfeatures(e.g.worderrorratesandconfidencevaluesfromASR)figuremoreprominentlythanaudiosignalfeatures(e.g.MFCC,spectralflux).

POSTERS

IntelligibilityandComprehensibilityinRealTime:TheNeuro-andPsycholinguisticsoftheL2Parser

JohnArchibald

Persian(Yousefi,2017)andSaudi(Alhemaid,2018)L1subjectsdemonstratehighaccuracyscoresintheirperceptionofEnglishsCclusters(e.g.[sl],[sn],[st]).UnlikeJapanese(Matthews&Brown,2004)andBrazilianPortuguese(Cardosoetal,2007)L1subjectswhoshowedpoor(chance)discriminationability.NoneoftheL1sallowsCclusters,butPersianandSaudiallowcomplexright-edgeappendices(Vaux&Wolfe,2009)asshowninFigure1,whileJapaneseandBPdonot.Englishallowscomplexleft-edgeappendices(Goad,2016)ofempty-headedsyllableswiththe[s]inthecoda,asshowninFigure2.Author(2018)arguedthatthesePersianandSaudiL2learnersareabletoredeploytheirL1(right-edge)appendixstructuretoacquiretheL2(left-edge)appendices.Iargueherethat(1)perceptionaccuracystemsfromtheabilitytoparsetheL2input,(2)parsingsuccessstemsfromtheL1appendixstructure,and(3)parsingL2wordsmakesthemintelligibletothelistener.Intelligibilityshouldbeconsideredwithinmodelsofspokenwordrecognition.Aparsermapssegmentsontohierarchicalstructure.WhenJapaneselistenershearaninputstringlikestow,theycannotparsethe[st]sequence.WhenPersianlearnershearthesamestring,theycanassignthe[s]toacodaandthe[t]toanappendix.TheEnglishwordsareintelligibletothePersianandSaudilisteners.Neurolinguisticresearchsuggeststhattheseleft-edgeparsingproblemshaveintelligibilityconsequences.Gwilliamsetal(2018)showinanMEGstudythatinitialphonologicaluncertaintyaffectslexicalactivation.L2acousticinputisareal-worldscenariowiththesameresults.Whenthenativelistenerisuncertainhowtoassignaccentedinputtocategoriesthenparsingcanbeslow.Thus,phonologicaluncertainty-leadingtodelayedlexicalactivation-canbereflectedinbothattenuatedintelligibilityandcomprehensibilityscores.

Figure1.

Figure2.

ReferencesAlmehaid,A.(submitted).Theperceptionandproductionofinitial/sC(C)/clustersbySaudisecondlanguagelearnersofEnglish.Cardoso,W.,P.John,&L.French(2007).Thevariableperceptionof/s/+CoronalonsetclustersinBrazilianPortugueseEnglish.InProceedingsofNewSounds2007.Pp.86-106Goad,H.(2016).Phonotacticevidencefromtypologyandacquisitionforacoda+onsetanalysis

ofinitialsCclusters.Kimetal.,eds.Proceedingsof33rdWCCFL.CascadillaPress.Pps.17-28.Gwilliams,L.,D.Poeppel,A.Marantz&T.Linzen(2018).Phonological(un)certaintyweights

lexicalactivation.Proceedingsofth8thWorkshoponCognitiveModelingandComputationalLinguistics.Pps29-34.Marslen-Wilson,W.D.(1987).Functionalparallelisminspokenwordrecognition.Cognition25(1-2):71-102.Matthews,J.&C.Brown.(2004).Whenlanguageintakeexceedsinput:languagespecificperceptualillusionsinducedbyL1prosodicconstraints.InternationalJournalofBilingualism8(1):5-27.Vaux,B.&A.Wolfe(2009).Theappendix.InRaimy&Cairns,eds.ContemporaryViewsonArchitectureandRepresentationsinPhonology.MITPress.Yousefi,M.(2017).EpenthesisinsConsetclustersinPersian-Englishinterlanguage:linguisticandextra-linguisticfactors.NorthAmericanconferenceonIranianLinguistics.April.

Guatemalanseasonalworkers’attitudestowardsL2French:Alongitudinalstudy

AnnieBergeronTofaceCanada’slabourgapinagriculture,morethan16,000Latin-AmericanworkersarehiredannuallyintheFrench-speakingprovinceofQuébec(FERME,2017).Sociallyandlinguisticallyisolated,theyaretotallydependentontheiremployer,insomecasesbeingtheonlypersontheywilleverinteractwithduringtheywholestayinCanada(e.g.,Faraday,2012).Inastudyconductedamong600temporaryworkersinOntario,Hennebry(2012)revealedthat71%wereinterestedinlearningL2English.However,nostudyhaseverexploredthedevelopmentofseasonalworkers’linguisticattitudes.

Thecurrentqualitativestudyexamined12Guatemalanmigrants’attitudestowardslearningandusingFrench.Specifically,theSpanish-speakingmen,whowerecomingfortheirfirst(n=5),second,(n=1),third(n=2),fourth(n=1),fifth(n=2)andsixth(n=1)year,weremetatthreedifferenttimeperiodsduringtheirworkcontract.Semi-structuredinterviewswereconducted,usingtheLanguageContactProfile(Freed,Dewey,Segalowitz,&Halter,2004)andthemini-AMBT(Gardner&MacIntyre,1993).

Individualparticipants’responseswerecomparedandcontrastedtodeterminethepresenceofcommonalitiesandvariationsovertime.ResultsrevealedthatallforeignworkersinitiallyarrivedinCanadawithpositiveattitudes.However,theydevelopednegativeattitudestowardsFrench-speakersthroughouttheirstayduetoconflictswiththeiremployers,andtowardsthelanguageitselfthroughouttheyears,sinceworkersmentionedthatFrenchwasnotsuitedtofindbetterjobopportunitiesinGuatemala,incomparisontoEnglish.WhileyoungerworkerswereawareofonlineapplicationstolearnL2French,theywerealsotoldthatthesewereteachingFrenchasspokeninotherareas,thusdevelopingnegativeattitudestowardsthelocalvariety.Thesefindingswillbeinterpretedintotangiblerecommendationsonhowtofacilitatetemporaryworkers’linguisticintegrationinruralareas.

LearningPronunciationThroughCulture

FatemehBordbarjavidi&ErikGoodaleLearningPronunciationThroughCulturewascreatedintheinterestofhelpingnon-nativespeakerslearnEnglish.thecreatediBookwillutilizewidgetssuchasvideos,audiofiles,andinteractiveimagestohelpstudentspracticelisteningandspeakingvariousvocabularywordsandexpressions.ThisiBookalsousesaspectsofIranianandAmericanculture,specificallyholidays,toprovideanoverarchingthemethatwebelievereaderswillfindinterestingandengaging.WhyIranianandAmericanculture?WethinkIranhasarichbutnotnecessarilywell-knownculture.Learnerswouldlikelyfindthecustomsandtraditionstobesomethingnewandinteresting.RegardingAmericanculture,theUnitedStateshasthelargestpopulationofnativespeakersofEnglish.Withsomanyspeakers,itisnaturalforstudentstolearnAmericanEnglishandbyextensiondesiretolearnmoreaboutAmericanculture.LearningPronunciationThroughCultureprovidesaccesstobothculturesinwaysthatmightotherwisebeinaccessibleduetodistance,finances,orpolitics.

Non-NativeLearner’sSpeechPerceptionofInternationalTeachingAssistantsinNorthAmericanUniversities

SondossElnegahy

Reverselinguisticsstereotyping(RLS)isaprocessinwhichlisteners’perceptionsareshapeddependingonsocialstereotypes(Rubin,1992;Kang&Rubin,2009).PreviousstudieshavemostlyfocusedonnativeEnglishspeakers’perspectivesofhowtheyperceivednon-nativespeakers(NNSs)generallyorInternationalTeachingAssistants(ITAs)specifically.ThisstudyistryingtofillinthegapbyinvestigatinghowinternationalstudentswhoareNNSs,ChineseandArabstudentsinparticular,perceivethespeechofITAs,intermsofaccentednessandcomprehensibility.ThematchedguiseprocedurewasadaptedfromMcGowan(2015)inwhichNNSsweredividedintothreegroups.Group1listenedtoarecordingofanArabicaccentedEnglish(ArE)accompaniedbyapictureofablondfemale.Group2listenedtothesamerecordingaccompaniedbyapictureofthesameblondfemalebutwearingaheadscarf.Group3listenedtosameArErecordingaccompaniedbyasilhouettepicture.Afterlisteningtotheaudiorecording,participantsfilledaquestionnairethatincluded:1)accentednessandcomprehensibilityscales.2)AhomophilyscalethatincludedquestionsontheirevaluationsoftheITAs.Followingthequestionnaire,participantswereinterviewedtorevealreasonsbehindthechoicestheymadeabouttheITA’saccentandcomprehensibility.Thestudyresultsshowedthatbothnon-nativelisteners,ArabsandChinese,hadahighertendencytoratetheITAwithaheadscarfwithaheavieraccentthantheITAwithouttheheadscarf.However,theChineselistenersfoundtheITAwithaheadscarftobelesscomprehensiblethantheArablisteners.TheanswersfromthehomophilyscalesandthequalitativeanalysisrevealedthatArabstudentsfeltanempathywiththeITAwithaheadscarf,unliketheChineselisteners.SuchfindingsmayexplainhowinvisiblesocialfactorscanhaveaninfluenceonhowinternationalstudentsperceivespeechofITAsand,asaresult,affecttheirjudgmentsontheITAsprofessionalcapabilities.

Englishlearners'perceptionofintonationindifferentquestiontypes

RomyGhanem,OlgaSormaz,PaulaSchaefer,&QiuquQinSuprasegmentalfeatures,includingintonation,havebeendemonstratedtobeakeyfactorinnonnativespeech(Kang,2010;Pickering,1999).Intonationpatternsandcontours,inparticular,havebeenexaminedthroughvariousmeansandmeasures,suchaslengthofresidence/experience,nativespeakerperception,andpragmatics(Henriksen,2012;Vion&Colas,2006;Kang,Rubin,&Pickering,2010;Chen,2009;Pickering,2009).Veryfewstudies,however,haveexaminedlearners’perceptionsofintonationindifferenttypesofquestions,especiallyinregardstomiscomprehensionbetweennativeandnonnativespeakers(Srinivasan&Massaro,2003).Thispresentationwillreportonastudythatinvestigatesstudents’abilitytoidentifythecorrectintonationalpatternandmeaningofthreetypesofquestions:yes/no,open-choice,andclosed-choicequestions.Thefirstportionofthestudypilotedatestof30items(10foreachquestiontype)thattargeteddifferentaspectsofeachquestion(thenumberofoptionsitsuggests,themeaningofthequestion,the(im)possibleanswerstothatquestion).Twonativespeakersrecordedthequestionswithexplicitcontourdifferencesamongthethreequestiontypes.Thirty-oneadvancednonnativespeakersofvariousL1backgroundstookthetestthroughaQualtricssurvey.Resultsdemonstratedthatstudentsseemabletorecognizeclosed-choicequestiontypes,yethaveconsiderabledifficultyidentifyinganopen-choicequestionandayes/noquestion(over35%ofthetime).Thesecondsectionofthepresentationexplorestheeffectofexplicitteachingonstudents’acquisitionofintonationpatterns.Thiswillbeachievedbyprovidingstudentswithshortonlinevideotutorialsdevelopedbytheinvestigatorsandmeasuringthelearners’improvementthroughpost-anddelayedpost-tests.Thefindingsfromthisstudycouldaidinthedesignofapronunciationclassandthedevelopmentofclassroommaterials.Theteachingmethodsusedcouldalsohelpidentifysuccessfulteachingapproachestointonationinstructionofdifferentquestiontypes.

AnAcousticPhoneticAccountoftheConfusionbetween[l],[n],and[ɰ]bySomeMandarinSpeakersofEnglish

PaigeGibbons,LipingMa,&EttienKoffi

Richards(2012)reportsthatsomeMandarinL2speakersofEnglishconfuse/l/and/n/.Koffi(2017:277)indicatesthattheF3,duration,andintensityof/l/and/n/producedbyMandarin 6F, 8M, and 9Mmask each other. Preliminary evidence suggests that thispronunciation is confined to speakers fromHubei, Sichuan, Shangai, andNajing. Thegoal of this study is to undertake a comprehensive study involving 27 Mandarinspeakersandtheirpronunciationsof/l/ininthepropername<Stella>.Thesegment/l/ismoreprone tomispronunciationswhen itoccurs in syllableonsetsorbetween twovowels. Thecurrent investigationcoverstwoaspects inthepronunciationof/l/. ThefirstisaconfusionstudybasedontheIPAtranscriptionsof27speakersfromTheSpeechAccent Achieve. It calculates the rate of confusion between /l/ and its variousallophones [l], [n], and [ɰ]. The second aspect deals with an acoustic phoneticinvestigationoftheallophonesof/l/sandmeasurestheirF3,intensity,anddurationtoseeiftheymaskeachother.TheJustNoticeableDifferencethresholdsthatcorrespondtothesecorrelatesareusedtoassessthedegreeofmaskingbetweenthem.Onceitisdeterminedthattheseallophonesareacousticallysimilar,their impactonintelligibilityis calculated using Catford’s (1987) Relative Functional Load indices. Thereafter,pedagogicalstrategiesaresuggestedtotohelpMandarinlearnersofEnglishproduce/l/intelligibly.

ACorpus-AnalysisofGenderedItemsinPopandCountryMusicfromthe90stoNow

AgataGuskaroska&JoshuaTaylorThis studyexamineshowgenderhasbeenportrayed inmusicacross the last30yearswithinPopandCountrymusic.Wehaveinvestigatedstereotypicalrepresentationsofmaleandfemalein song lyrics using a corpus based-approach. The purpose of this study is to reveal moreinsightfulperspectivesandattitudes towardgender,aswellas interesting trendsof languageuseindifferenttypesofmusic.Inordertoperformthisanalysis,webuiltacorpuscontainingthelyricsofthemostpopular80songsacrossPopandCountrymusicgenresfromthe1990’sandnow(20fromeachtimeperiodforbothgenres,totaling80)byusingkeywordanalysisoffivepreviouslyselectedlemmas(girl;woman;boy;manandbaby).WeusedregularexpressionsintheprogramAntConctoanalyzethe corpus. Thiswas followedby qualitative analysiswherewemanuallywent through eachinstance inorder to categorize the selectedwordsbasedonhow theywereused,what theyrefer to, and what they portray within each lyric. We then identified common trends,similarities,anddifferencesbetweenandwithinourdatasets.Throughalinguisticanalysisofsonglyricsacrosstimeandgenre,weareabletoobservehowthechangingoflanguagefunctionswithinAmericanculture.Wearguethatthesefindingscanenhance the CALL classroom by providing a relevant and relatable approach for students toutilize technologyandcultural artifacts inorder tomoreeffectively learnand interactwithaforeign language. The resultsdemonstrated thatuseof languagehas changedover timeandgenresandthescopeofthesenounscanbemuchwiderthantheirtraditionaldefinitions.Thefindingspointout importantpedagogical implicationsemphasizing thevalueof song lyricsasteaching/learning materials which can be useful for showing the students differentconnotationsindifferentcontexts,musicgenresandtimeperiods.

ThepotentialoftheASRprogramforfacilitatingvowelpronunciationpracticefor

Macedonianlearners

AgataGuskaroska

ThispaperexaminesthebenefitsandlimitationoftheAutomaticSpeechRecognitionProgram– the Enhanced dictation feature available for MAC users and its possible use in providingfeedback invowelproduction forEnglish L2 learners.Thepurposeof the study is to test theASRprogramandexamine thepossibility forusing this feature forpronunciationpractice forESL learners.ThestudyfocusesonMacedonianL2 learnersandprovidesdetailedcomparisonbetween theMacedonianand theEnglish vowel systems.Basedon the comparison,minimalpairvowelswereselectedandalistof12sentenceswascreatedandgiventotheparticipants.TheparticipantswhotookpartinthisresearchareL2learnersinMacedonia,aged18-19.The Macedonian learners and two American native speakers (control group) provided theirspeech for evaluation. They read aloud the sentences and recorded their speech on acomputer/smartphone. The sound files were used for examining pronunciation (segmental)accuracy.Thespeechsamples (recordings)wereturned intotextbyusingtheASR(EnhancedDictationfeature)whichturnsspeechintotext.Thetextsampleswereanalyzed,startingwithtwonativespeakersusedasacontrolledgroup.Thetranscribedwordswerecomparedtothecorrect form, i.e the programmay have writen "LEFT" when the learner was attempting topronounce "LAUGHED". A qualitative method was used and all the words were manuallyexaminedforaccuracy.Theresultsofthenativespeakerswerecomparedtonativespeakers'results.The twoprimary researchquestionsare (1)Howwelldoes theASRprogram facilitateautonomyforlearnersbyprovidingreliablefeedback?and(2)BasedonRQ1,whatarethewaysinwhichtheASRprogramcanbeusedintheESLclassroombyMacedonianteacherstopracticepronunciation?The resultsdemonstrated that theprogram ishighly reliable formostof thevowel contrastsrelyingonAmericannativespeechrecognition.Hence, thedetectederrorsbytheprogramintheMacedonianL2speechareconsideredtobegoodfeedbackprovidedbytheprogram.Thepedagogical implications point out to ESL classroom use and individual autonomous use forpronunciationpractice.

TheroleofconsonantclustersinEnglishasaLinguaFrancaintelligibility

MaraHaslam,ElisabethZetterholmWhileresearchershavesomeideaofwhataspectsofpronunciationincreaseintelligibilityinEnglishwhennativespeakersarethelisteners,littleisunderstoodaboutwhataspectsincreaseintelligibilityfornon-nativelisteners.However,anestimated75%to80%ofEnglishusersarenon-nativespeakers,makinginteractionsbetweennon-nativespeakers(EnglishasaLinguaFranca,orELFinteractions)common.Jenkins(2000)publishedtheLinguaFrancaCore,asuggestedsyllabusofpronunciationfeaturestobetaughttoELFusers,basedonobservationsfromherdataonELFinteractions.TheLinguaFrancaCoreincludestheclaimthatconsonantclustersimplificationbyvowelepenthesis(e.g.“state”->[səteIt])shouldresultinaformthatismoreintelligiblethantheresultsofconsonantclustersimplificationbyconsonantdeletion(e.g.“state”->[seIt])because,intheepenthesizedform,theoriginalconsonantsarerecoverable.Inthisstudy,nativespeakersofSwedishwhoarenon-nativespeakersofEnglishparticipatedinanonlineexperimentwheretheylistenedtorecordingsofwordswithconsonantclustersfromproducedbyspeakersofseverallanguagesinanELFcontextandwereaskedtotypewhattheyheard.ResultswillpresentanalysesoftheirresponsesincomparisonwithacousticanalysistoshedlightonthecorrectnessoftheLFC’sclaimaboutconsonantclusters.Thisstudyisafollow-uptotheauthors’previousworkevaluatingtheLFCandprovidesinformationthatcanhelpteachersofEnglishpronunciationprioritizewhattoworkwithfortheirstudents.

DifferentdegreesofeffectsofpausesonEnglishrateperceivedbyEnglishandJapanesespeakers

YoshitoHirozane

1.IntroductionPausingisaveryimportantfactorwhenlistenersjudgethespeakingrate(Lass,1970).However,pausefrequenciesarequitedifferentbetweenEnglishandJapanese.Roughlyspeaking,JapanesehasthreetimesasmanypausespersentenceasEnglish.AnotherdifferenceisthatEnglishhasa‘rallentando’oraslowingdownthroughouttheintonationphrase(Dankovicová,1999).Duetosuchgreatdifferences,thedegreesofeffectsofpausesonperceivedratecouldbedifferent.Thishypothesiswastestedwithanexperiment.2.MethodologyTwenty-twonativeJapanesespeakers(4malesand18females)and25nativeEnglishspeakers(25females)participatedintheexperiment.FifteenEnglishpassageswereselectedastheinitialmaterialsforthestimulustokens.Foreachpassagetwodifferentversionsoftokensweresynthesized.Oneofapairhadonlytwointer-sentencepauseswhiletheotherhadsomeintra-sentencepausesaswell.ThefifteenpairsofEnglishpassageswererandomlypresentedtotheparticipantoverheadphones.Theparticipantwasaskedtoindicatewhichsequenceofagivenpairsoundedfasterorifbothsoundedthesameintermsofrate.3.ResultsLowpausefrequencypassagestendedtobeperceivedasfasterbybothJapaneseandEnglishspeakers.However,theproportionoftheJapanesespeakerswhojudgedthatthelowpausefrequencypassagewasfasterwasgreaterthanthatoftheEnglishspeakers.4.ConclusionsLowpausefrequencypassagestendedtobeperceivedasfasterbecausemorepausesmakeiteasierforthelistenertounderstandspeechbyhighlightingphraseboundariesorprovidingthemwithextratimeforlanguageprocessing.ThistendencyappearedtobestrongerforJapanesespeakersanditcouldbeexplainedbythelackofrallentandosinJapanese.

TrainingJapaneseEFLlearnerstoperceiveEnglish/l/,/r/,and/w/usingacloud-based,HighVariabilityPronunciationTraining(HVPT)application

AtsushiIino,RonThomson

WhilenumerousstudieshaveexaminedtheefficacyofHVPTfortrainingJapaneselistenerstoperceiveEnglish/l/and/r/contrasts(Logan,Lively,&Pisoni,1991;Bradlow,Akahane-Yamada,Pisoni,&Tohkura,1999,amongnumerousothers),weareonlyawareofstudiesthathavebeenconductedinhighlycontrolledphoneticlaboratories.Further,withfewexceptions,moststudieshavenotexaminedwhetherthistrainingtransferstoproduction(seeThomson,2018).Finally,previousJapanese/l/-/r/studiesfocusonabinarydistinction,whichfailstorecognizethatforthesamegroupoflearners,English/r/-/w/arealsoknowntobeconfusable(Guion,Flege,Akahane-Yamada,&Pruitt,2000).Withtheaimofextendingpreviousresearch,thecurrentstudyundertooktouseacloud-basedHVPTprogram(www.englishaccentcoach.com)totrainlearnerstoperceiveathree-wayEnglish/l/-/r/-/w/distinction,inanauthenticlanguageclassenvironment.Participantswere40JapaneselearnersofEnglishenrolledinfreshmanEnglishataJapaneseuniversity.Trainingcomprisedthree-200itemperceptualtrainingsessionsperweek,overatenweekterm.Onegroupof20learnerswastrainedtoperceivetheEnglishconsonantsinsyllable-onsetpositioninCVframesforfivesessions,followedbyCVCframesforfivesessions.Anothergroupof20learnerswastrainedintheoppositeorder.Pre-,mid-andpost-testsrevealedsignificantimprovementinperceptionintrainedcontexts,butnon-significantimprovementinuntrainedcontexts.Whilegainsinpronunciation,beforeandafterperceptualtraining,werealsodetectedbynativespeakerlisteners,thisvariedacrosslearners,acrosssoundscategories,andwasimpactedbythephoneticcontext(i.e.,CVvsCVC)inwhichthesoundsoccurred.Implicationsforteachingandlearningwillbediscussed.

TheEffectOfASemester-LongPhoneticsCourseinTheProductionOfL2-SpanishVowels

AneIcardoIsasaThepronunciationofthefiveSpanishvowels/a,e,i,o,u/byL1-Englishspeakersisconsideredasimpletaskduetotheirrelativestabilityacrossdialectsandspeakers([15]).However,lexical-stresspatternsaredifferentintheselanguages:unstressedEnglishvowelsaresystematicallycentralized,whereasthedifferencesbetweenstressedandunstressedvowelsaresmallinSpanish([13]).Researchhasshownstrongcentralization/reductiontendenciesinunstressedSpanishvowelsbyL1-Englishlearnerswithvariabilitypervowel([2][3][5][6][12])andproficiencylevel([3][7][14]).Theauthordidapilotstudyfocusingonwhetherexplicitphoneticinstructionwouldhaveaneffectinvowelcentralization/reductionaccuracy.Sentenceread-aloudproductionsfromtwoL2-Spanishadvancedgroups(enrolledinaSpanishphoneticscourseversusaSpanishliterature/culturecourse)werecollectedinapre-testandpost-testwithina3-weekwindow.F1/F2midpointvalueswereextractedusingPraat.Theresultsoftwomixed-effectsregressionsconfirmedthatL2unstressed/a/and/u/hadhigherF1andlowerF2values,respectively,whencomparedtounstressednative,andstressednativeandL2productions.However,theinstructiontypeandtesting-timedidnotsignificantlyaffectvowelcentralization.Theshort-termtreatmentwindowandlackoftaskvarietycouldhaveelicitedthisnullresult([8][16]).Researchhasshownapositiveeffectoflong-terminstruction([1][4][5][7][9][10][16])andtheuseofmetalinguisticawarenessmeasures([9][10])insegmentals.Variabilityhasalsobeenfoundpertask([4][16]).Thisstudy(inprogress)replicatesthepreviousanalysisandanalyzestheeffectofasemester-longtreatment,theeffectofdifferenttasks,andaddsaself-evaluationandafollow-upsurvey.Itisexpectedthatparticipantswillperformbetterbyreceivingalong-termtreatment,thattherewillbeaneffectoftask(word-reading>sentence-reading>freespeech),andthatmetalinguisticawarenessmeasureswillelicitadifferenceacrosstesting-times.

SelectedReferences [1]Castino,J.(1996).ImpactofaphoneticscourseonFLlearners’acquisitionofSpanish

phonology.Selecta:JournalofthePacificNorthwestCouncilonForeignLanguages,17,55–58.

[2]Cobb,K.(2009).Lapronunciacióndelasvocalesátonasenespañol.(MastersThesis)UniversityofArizona,Tucson.

[3]Cobb,K.,&Simonet,M.(2015).AdultsecondlanguagelearningofSpanishvowels.Hispania,98(1),47-60.

[4]Derwing,T.M.,Munro,M.J.,&Wiebe,G.E.(1997).Pronunciationinstructionfor“fossilized”learners:Canithelp?AppliedLanguageLearning,8,217–235.

[5]Elliott,R.A.(1995).Foreignlanguagephonology:Fieldindependence,attitude,andthesuccessofformalinstructioninSpanishpronunciation.ModernLanguageJournal,79,530–

542. [6]Elliott,R.A.(1997).Ontheteachingandacquisitionofpronunciationwithina

communicativeapproach.Hispania,80,95–108. [7]GarcíaPerez,G.M.(2005).PerceptionofEnglishvowelsbynativespeakersofSpanishina

regularclassroomsetting.RevistaVirtualDeEstudosDaLinguagem3(5),1-9LanguageTeachingResearch,19.

[8]Kissling,E.M.(2015).Phoneticsinstructionimproveslearners'perceptionofL2sounds.(3),254-275.

[9]Lord,G.(2005).(How)canweteachforeignlanguagepronunciation?OntheeffectsofaSpanishphoneticscourse.Hispania,88,557–567.

[10]Lord,G.(2008).Secondlanguageacquisitionandfirstlanguagephonologicalmodification.InJ.BruhndeGaravito&E.Valenzuela(Eds.),Selectedproceedingsofthe10thHispaniclinguisticssymposium(pp.184–193).Somerville,MA:CascadillaProceedingsProject.

[11]Lord,G.(2010).Thecombinedeffectsofimmer-sionandinstructiononsecondlanguagepronunciation.ForeignLanguageAnnals,43,488–503.

[12]Menke,M.,&FaceT.(2010).SecondlanguageSpanishvowelproduction:Anacousticanalysis.StudiesinHispanicandLusophoneLinguistics,3(1),181–214.

[13]Nadeu,M.(2014).Stress-andspeechrate-inducedvowelqualityvariationinCatalanandSpanish.JournalofPhonetics.46(1),1-22.

[14]Piske,T.,MacKay,I.R.A.,&Flege,J.E.(2001).FactorsaffectingdegreeofforeignaccentinanL2:Areview.JournalofPhonetics,29(2),191-215.

[15]Ronquest,R.E.(2013).AnacousticexaminationofunstressedvowelreductioninheritageSpanish.SelectedProceedingsofthe15thHispanicLinguisticsSymposium,157–171.

[16]Saito,K.,&Lyster,R.(2012).Effectsofform-focusedinstructionandcorrectivefeedbackonL2pronunciationdevelopmentof/(turnedr)/byJapaneselearners,LanguageLearning,62(2),595-633.

Polishuppersecondaryschoollearnerswishtoimproveaccuracy:Alongitudinalstudyreport

AnnaJarosz

MuchresearchandliteraturededicatedtopracticalphoneticsinstructionconcentratesoneitherstudentsattheEnglishdepartments(Waniek-Klimczak,1997,2002;Waniek-KlimczakandKlimczak,2005)orESLlearners(Kim,1995;DerwingandMunro,2005;Derwing,MunroandThomson,2007).Fewstudies,however,explorethepotentialofsecondaryschoollearnersaswellastheirneeds,expectations,beliefsandperceptionsonpronunciationasacrucialelementoflanguagelearning.Thestudyreportedhereaimstofilltheexistinggapintheresearchpracticesandliterature.

Thepaperpresentsresultsofalongitudinal(one-year)studyconductedwithagroupof10Polishsecondaryschoollearnerswhoexpressedtheireagernesstoattendanadditional,stand-alone,extracurricularpronunciationcoursedevotedentirelytopronunciationinstructionandaddressingthelearners’needsexpressedbeforethecoursestarted.Theyexplicitlyvoicedtheirexpectationstolearntosoundcorrectlyandtopronouncewordsinanaccuratemanner.Consequently,thelearnerswereofferedpronunciationtraining,basedpredominantlyonsegmentalfeatures,withsomeaspectsofprosodysuchasconnectedspeech,rhythmandweakforms.Thestudyemployedvariousdata-collectiontools,whichincludedquestionnaires,participantobservation,interviewsaswellaspre-andpost-courserecordings.Thedataanalysispermitstoarriveatconclusionswithrespecttolearners’pronunciationneedsandexpectations,theawarenessraisingprocess,pronunciationlearningstrategiesdevelopment(Peterson,2000;Eckstein,2007)andfosteringlearnerautonomy(Dam,2002;Pawlak,2006)thathelpedthembuildtheirconfidenceinthefieldofphoneticinstructionandcommunicationingeneral.Theperceptionsofthelearnersregardingtheirtheirownimprovementduringtheone-year-longstructuredandsystematicpronunciationtraining(onehourperweek)andtheirperformancearejuxtaposedwiththeauditoryassessmentsoftheirreadingthatwasrecordedbeforethecoursestartedandafteritwascompleted.Theresultssuggestthatsystematicpronunciationinstructionfocusedonsegmentsandaccuracyleadstoconsiderableimprovementinself-confidence,prosodyandfluencyofthelearners.

References

Dam,L.(2002).Developinglearnerautonomy–preparinglearners“forlifelonglearning”.In:Pulverness,A.(ed.).IATEFL2002YorkConferenceSelections.Whitstable,Kent:IATEFL.41-52

Derwing,T.M.&Munro,M.J.(2005).Secondlanguageaccentandpronunciationteaching:Aresearch-basedapproach.TESOLQuarterly,39.379-397

Derwing,T.M.,Munro,M.J.&Thomson,R.I.(2007).AlongitudinalstudyofESLlearners’fluencyandcomprehensibilitydevelopment.AppliedLinguistics,29.359-380

Eckstein,G.T.(2007).ACorrelationofPronunciationLearningStrategieswithSpontaneousEnglishPronunciationofAdultESLLearners.Provo:BrighamYoungUniversity

Kim,R.(1995).Theeffectofage-of-L2onsetonL2production:TheEnglish/iː-ɪ/distinctionmadebyKoreanspeakers.EnglishTeaching,50.257-279

Pawlak,M.(2006).Theplaceoflearnerautonomyinpronunciationinstruction.In:Waniek-Klimczak,E.&Sobkowiak,W.(eds).(2006).Neofilologia,tomVIII.Dydaktykafonetykijęzykaobcego.ZeszytyNaukowePaństwowejWyższejSzkołyZawodowejwPłocku.Płock:PWSZ.131-144

Peterson,S.S.(2000).Pronunciationlearningstrategies:Afirstlook.Unpublishedresearchreport.(ERICDocumentReproductionServiceED450599;FL026618)

Waniek-Klimczak,E.(1997).ContextforTeachingEnglishPhoneticsandPhonologyatPolishUniversitiesandColleges:ASurvey.In:Waniek-Klimczak,E&Melia,J.P.(eds).AccentsandSpeechinTeachingEnglishPhoneticsandPhonology:EFLperspective.Frankfurt:PeterLang.5-17

Waniek-Klimczak,E.(2002).ContextforTeachingEnglishPhoneticsandPhonology.In:Waniek-Klimczak,E&Melia,J.P.(eds).AccentsandSpeechinTeachingEnglishPhoneticsandPhonology:EFLperspective.Frankfurt:PeterLang.139-152

Waniek-Klimczak,E.&Klimczak,K.(2005).TargetinSpeechDevelopment:Learners’Views.In:Dziubalska-Kołaczyk,K.&Przedlacka,J.(eds.).(2005).EnglishPronunciationModels:AChangingScene.Bern:PeterLang.229-249

TheroleoftechnologyinvocabularydevelopmentofEFLlearners

RajaKhan,NoorRadwan,MuhmaadShahbaz&AionalHaryati

Technology has transported innovative methods in language learning and communication.Currently, technology is greatly used as ameans of communication in general as well as ineducation. Conveying ones message effectively, speaking skills is core of communicationprocessand language learning.Thepresentattemptexamines theeffectsof readilyavailabletechnologyondevelopingspeakingskillsoftheEFLlearners.ThestudyaimstoinvestigatetheintegrationofWhatsAppforthespeakingenhancements.Forthispurpose31EFLlearnersofapublic university participated in the study. The study used the quasi experimental researchdesign. Learners were asked to practice their speaking through android devise. They weregiventopictodiscussinWhatsAppgroup.Allthelearnersinexperimentalgroupwereaskedtotakepartinthegroupactivities.Leanersspeakingperformancewasmonitoredforacourseof5weeks.LearnerswhousedWhatsAppfordiscussioninthegroupsignificantlyoutperformedthelearner who did not take part in WhatsApp activities on the posttest. The results of theexperimentsuggestthattheintegrationofWhatsAppwiththesupportofclassroomactivitieswaseffectiveinthedevelopmentofspeakingperformance.Moreover,mostoflearnersshowedpositive attitude and perceptions in using WhatsApp activities with traditional classroomsactivities.The findingsassert thatuseof technologyasasupportwith traditionalactivities inEFL learningclassroomcanfosterthespeakingskills.Learnerscanexpressthemselvesbetter,developtheirspeakingcompetency,andprogresstheirlanguagelearningprocess.

ThemeasurementofJapaneselexicalrhythmasasecondlanguage

NaokoKinoshita&ChrisSheppardThedevelopmentofsecondlanguagerhythm,inparticular,whetheritislearnedasageneralrulewhichcanbeappliedtonewwords,orwhetheritislearnedaspartofthelexicalitem,onebyone,requiresmoreinvestigation(i.e.KinoshitaandSheppard,2017),Inordertodofurtherstudy,however,ausefulmeasureofthelearners’rhythmicdevelopmentisnecessary.Thispaperreportstheresultsofapilotstudydesignedtoinvestigatemeasurementmethods.SixChinesebeginninglearnersofJapanese,whohadneverbeentoJapan,wererecruitedfrombeginningclassesataChineseuniversity.Tomeasuretheirrhythmicproduction,theywereaskedtorepeat120wordsimmediatelyafteraJapanesenativespeakerinacarriersentence.Thewordswereselectedbasedontheirfrequencyintheparticipants’input:highfrequencyofoccurrence(40),lowfrequencyofoccurrence(40),andnon-words(40).TheirproductionwasrecordedonaSonyPCMrecorder(48KHz)inasoundbooth.TherhythmwasanalyzedbycalculatingthePairwiseVariabilityIndex(Grabe&Low,2002),foreachofthewordsproducedbytheparticipantsandthenativespeaker.Theresultsdemonstratedthat,incontrarytoexpectations,theparticipantsoftenproducedthelexicalrhythmofthehigh-frequencyinputwordsfurtherawayfromthenativespeakerstandardthanthelow-frequencyinputwords.Thisislikelybecause,toreproducetherhythmoffamiliarwords,theparticipantsaccessedtheirmentallexicon(Levelt,1993)toretrieveitspronunciation.However,whentheydonotknowtheword,thenativespeakerutterancewasheldinthephoneticloopoftheirworkingmemoryandproducedfromthisrepresentation,asthereisnoitemtoretrievefromthementallexicon.Theimplicationsoftheseresultsarediscussedintermsofthemeasurementoflexicalrhythm,itsacquisition,anditseducation.

It’snotallGreektoyou:UsingexplicitphoneticinstructionintheL2ModernGreekclassroom.

MariaKouti

This classroom-based study investigates the effects of explicit pronunciationinstructionontheacquisitionofModernGreekL2voicelessunaspiratedstops/ptk/.OraldatawascollectedfromL1Englishstudentsenrolledinanundergraduatesecond-semesterModernGreek language class at apublic university in theMidwest, at thebeginningandendofa14-weeksemester.During the instructionalperiod,studentsreceivedshortphoneticsandpronunciationinstructionandpracticeactivitiesdesignedtoimprovetheirperceptionandproductionofvoicelessstops/ptk/ofModernGreek.AlltargetsoundswereisolatedandanalyzedindividuallyusingPRAAT(Boersma,1995)andvariousstatisticalanalyseswerecarriedthroughSPSS. Preliminaryresultsrevealthatthetreatmenthadasignificanteffectonlearners’pronunciation,especiallyfor/k/and /t/ but not for /p/, indicating that the participants receiving explicit training onarticulatory phonetics increased their production accuracy on L2 Modern Greekphones.Also,thispreliminarystudyonL2ModernGreekcorroboratesthehypothesisthat explicit instruction is in fact beneficial to L2 learners, based on the results ofpreviousworkonotherforeign languages(Archibald1998;Major1998;Moyer1999;Lord2005).

Suprasegmentals+sitcoms=becomingmorecomprehensiblewhilehavingfun!

EdnaLima&ZoeZawadzkiSuprasegmentalsarecrucialforthedevelopmentofcomprehensibility(Gordon&Darcy,2016;Saito&Saito,2017).Therefore,theyshouldbeincludedasakeycomponentofpronunciationtraining.Sitcomclipsareanengagingmethodofteachingtheperceptionandproductionofsuprasegmentals.Theyallowteacherstomakeuseofdramatictechniques,suchasshadowingandimitation,whichareaneffectivemethodofteachingpronunciation(Celce-Murcia,Brinton,Goodwin,&Griner,2010).Forstudents,sitcomclipsprovideauthenticinputandthepossibilityofmoreengagingandmotivatingpronunciationpractice.Forinstance,whenaskedaboutherfavoriteactivityinanonlinepronunciationcourse,astudentmentionedthather“favoriteactivitywasimitatingandrecordingthedialoguesfromthedifferentvideoclips...ThemainreasonforthisbeingmyfavoriteisthatInevergotbored,evenifIrecord[ed]mydialoguesfor100times.ThisactivitywasfunandmademerealizethatifIfollowtherhythmproperlywhilespeaking,itwouldsoundmoreinterestingtothelistener.”Thisposterpresentationwillfeatureavarietyofengagingactivitiesthatemployshortsitcomclipstohelpstudentsinanonlinecourseimprovetheirperceptionandproductionofwordstress,rhythm,andintonation.ReferencesCelce-Murcia,M.,Brinton,D.M.,Goodwin,J.M.,&Griner,B.(2010).Teachingpronunciation:A

coursebookandreferenceguide(2nded.).Cambridge,NY:CambridgeUniversityPress.Gordon,J.,&Darcy,I.(2016).ThedevelopmentofcomprehensiblespeechinL2learners.

JournalofSecondLanguagePronunciation,2(1),56–92.https://doi.org/10.1075/jslp.2.1.03gor

Saito,Y.,&Saito,K.(2017).Differentialeffectsofinstructiononthedevelopmentofsecondlanguagecomprehensibility,wordstress,rhythm,andintonation:ThecaseofinexperiencedJapaneseEFLlearners.LanguageTeachingResearch,21(5),589-608.doi:10.1177/1362168816643111

Short-termgainsinL2speechduringanoralskillscourse:Examiningspeechrateandfluency

PekkaLintunen&PauliinaPeltonen

IncreasedL2spokenproficiencyisanimportantlearninggoalforL2learners.Theamountofexplicit instruction on pronunciation and overall spoken skills varies depending on, forexample, teachingmethodologies and thewashbackeffect from final exams.Although L2learningisalongprocess,recently,researchershavealsobeeninterestedintheshort-termgains inL2(e.g.,Trofimovich,Kennedy&Blanchet2015,Tavakoli,Campbell&McCormack2016).Inthisstudywewereinterestedintheshort-termeffectsofexplicitspokenlanguageteaching.Agroupofuppersecondaryschoollearners(n=20)wastestedatthebeginningandendofa7-week course on spoken English.We tested their pronunciation accuracy and utterancefluency.Wewilldiscussourresults focusingespeciallyonfluencymeasuresrelatedtothespeed and breakdown (pausing) dimensions of utterance fluency (see e.g. Skehan 2009).Our findings suggest thatmanymeasures reveal development, but individual differencesand, inourdataespecially,theeffectoftheteacher’spreferencesontheresultsobtainedare important factors toconsider.Althoughwe focusonshort-termfluencydevelopment,wewill alsodiscusshow formaleducationonspoken language featurescanhavepositivelong-termandaffectiveeffects.

Skehan,P.2009.Modellingsecondlanguageperformance:Integratingcomplexity,accuracy,fluency,andlexis.AppliedLinguistics30,510–532.Tavakoli, P.,C.Campbell, and J.McCormack2016.Developmentof speech fluencyoverashortperiodoftime:Effectsofpedagogicintervention.TESOLQuarterly50(2),447–471.Trofimovich, P., S. Kennedy, and J. Blanchet 2015. Phonetics instruction in L2 French:Contributions of segments, prosody, and fluency to speech ratings. In J. Przedlacka, J.,Maidment, and M. Ashby (eds), Proceedings of the Phonetics Teaching and LearningConference.London:UniversityCollegeLondon,101–105.

TonalRecall:Musicalabilityandlanguage-learningability

JaneLorenzen

Becausemusicandlanguagebothinvolveauralpatternsandsegments,ithasbeenspeculatedthattheysharecognitiveprocesses.ResearchbyBowles,etal.(2016)foundthatmusicalitydidnothaveas great aneffect asdid linguistic pitchprocessing abilityonparticipants’ ability toremember Mandarin nonce words. The current project investigated whether there is acorrelationbetweenmusicalabilityandreceptivephonology(theabilityofa listenertomakedistinctions between language sounds). Specifically, this project addressed the followingresearchquestions:IsthereacorrelationbetweenmusicalmemoryandtheabilitytorecognizeMandarin tonemes? If there is a correlation, does this correlation differ between men andwomen?Does the correlation differ by age? The participants in this study, all adults, took atone-deafness test that measured their pitch perception and short-term musical memory.Participants thenwatchedaYouTubevideothatexplainedthe tonesused inMandarin.Afterwatching thevideo, theyplayed twoonlinegames (oneeasyandonemoderate) tomeasuretheir ability to identify the Mandarin tones that they had just learned. Finally, participantsrecorded their scores and demographic information (language history, age, gender, musicaltraining)onanonlinesurvey.Thecorrelationbetweenparticipants’musicalandtonemescoreswas calculated.Preliminary results showedaweak-to-moderatepositive correlationbetweenthe two scores, with a higher correlation for men than for women, and with a significantlyhighercorrelation forolderparticipants.The results suggest thatmusicalability isoneof theindividualdifferencesmightconferaslightadvantageonadultsecondlanguagelearners.

InfluenceofEducationalandLinguisticBackgroundonRaterPerceptionofSecondLanguageOralPerformance

IvanaLučić

Oneofthepotentialsourcesofvariabilityinsecondlanguage(L2)oralperformanceassessmentisraterbias.Thisvariabilitycancomefromfourratereffectsdimensions:1)raters’overallleniency,2)biastowardsaparticulargroupofexaminees,3)differencesinratingscaleinterpretation,and4)internalscoringconsistency(McNamara,1996).ThesedimensionsmayberelatedtothedifferenceinperceptionofL2speechbynative(NS)andnon-native(NNS)raters,andraters’familiaritywithspeakers’firstlanguage(L1).Also,raters’educationalbackgroundcanshapeL2speechperceptiontoanextent.ThisstudyexploredthepossibilityofraterbiasarisingfromNSandNNSraterswhencontrollingforeducationalbackground.ThedatafromthespeakingportionofanEnglishplacementtest(EPT)atalargemidwesternuniversitywasused.FourNSandeightNNSdoctoralstudentsinappliedlinguisticsrated99L2speakersofEnglishonfourcategories(pronunciation,grammarandvocabulary,fluency,andinteractionalcompetence).ThescoreswereanalyzedusingMulti-facetRaschmeasurement,andafour-facetmodelwasspecified.TheresultsindicatethattheNSandNNSratergroupswereequivalentintheirconsistencyandseveritylevelswhenratingL2speakersofvariousL1backgrounds.Additionally,itwasrevealedthatratersexercisedequallevelsofseveritywhenitcomestothefourratingcategories,andthattheconsistencywithineachcategorywashigh.ThefindingssuggestthatsharededucationalbackgroundcontributedtoconsistentperceptionofL2speech,andtherefore,thevarianceinraterperformancewasreduced.Also,itmaybethatextensivelinguistictrainingoftheratersinthecurrentstudyhelpedtoincreasetheconsistencyinassigningscorestoeachofthescoringcategories.Thisstudyprovidesvaluableinformationforhigh-stakestestingsituations,andsuggestsbetterpracticesforratertrainingprocedures.

References:McNamara,T.F.(1996).Measuringsecondlanguageperformance.AddisonWesley Longman.

L2pronunciationoffirstyearEnglishDepartmentstudentsinPoland:progresstesting

MartaNowacka

Theprimary aimof this study is to determine if the phonetic instruction receivedby firstyearEnglishDepartmentstudentsinPolandhasbeenbeneficialandiftheinitialgoalshavebeenachieved.Ourintentionisalsotoverifyifafterthecourseotherphoneticproblemsstillremain and if the learners’ communicative effectiveness has improved (Celce-Murcia etal.,1996;DerwingandMunro,2015;ReedandLevis,2015).Aself-designeddiagnosticpronunciationtest,wasadministeredto100freshersintheirfirstweekofstudyattheuniversityandthenrepeatedtwiceafterthefirstsemesterandattheend of the course. The test consists of two speech elicitation tasks, i.e. a sample of eachlearner’sextemporaneous speech (adescriptionof interests)and readingaloud tasks.Theword-reading exercise encompasses 35 lexemes which present a variety of phoneticallydifficulties, includingorthographyand lackof transparent letter-to-sound correspondence,i.e.silentlettersingnaw,problematiclettersandlettercombinations,e.g.‘o’inovenversusprotein,or‘ch’incharlatanversusarchivesand‘wordscommonlymispronounced’(ancient)togetherwithexamplesexhibitingfrequentword-stressmisplacement(area).Thesentence-reading task comprises among other things such phonetic aspects as weak forms,contractions(mustn’t), ‘trap’words(dough),wordswithdifficultwordstress(determined),renditionofverbformsaswellasplacenames(NiagaraFalls).This evidence-based testing method should provide findings on which aspects of Englishphoneticshaveimproved,whichstillcallattentionandshouldbeworkedontoenablethefutureEnglishlanguagespecialistovercomethisdeficiency.References:Celce-Murcia, M., Brinton, D. & Goodwin, J. (1996), Teaching Pronunciation: a ReferenceBook for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Cambridge: CambridgeUniversityPress.Derwing, T. M. and M. J. Munro (2015) Pronunciation Fundamentals: Evidence-basedPerspectiveforL2TeachingandResearch,Amsterdam:JohnBenjaminsPublishingCompany.ReedM. and J. M. Levis (2015) The handbook of English Pronunciation, Chichester: JohnWiley.

TheEffectivenessofImplicitandExplicitInstructiononL2GermanLearners’Pronunciation

PeterPeltekovPreviousresearchhasinvestigatedtheeffectivenessofimplicitandexplicitinstructionalmethodsonsecondlanguage(L2)learners’grammaticalaccuracy.However,thereisascarcityofstudiesfocusedontheeffectsofthetwoteachingmethodsonL2learners’pronunciation.Tofillthisgap,thepresentstudyexaminestheeffectsofimplicitandexplicitinstructiononthepronunciationofbeginnerlearnersofGerman.Onegroupoflearnerswastaughtpronunciationexplicitly(i.e.,usingphoneticrules),anothergroup—implicitly(i.e.,throughperceptionactivities),andathirdgroupreceivednopronunciationinstruction.Apretest-posttestdesignwasusedtomeasurelearners’improvementinaccentandcomprehensibility.Nosignificantdifferenceinprogresswasfoundacrossthethreegroups.Thefindingssuggestwhatlearnervariablesmightbebetterpredictorsofimprovementthanthetypeofinstruction.Moreover,notallpronunciationfeatureswereequallyrelevantforL2learners’comprehensibility.TheresultshaveimplicationsforL2pronunciationteaching.

Whenperceptionofsuprasegmentalmeaningvariesacrosslanguages,whatisateachertodo?

MonicaRichards&ElenaCotosThehumanvocalmechanismisthesameacrosslanguagesandthereareonlyafinitenumberofwaysitcanbeconfigured.Asaresult,languagessometimesdiffernotsomuchintermsofwhichsuprasegmentalfeaturestheyincludebutratherinthemeaningstheyattributetovariousfeatures(Celce-Murcia,Brinton&Goodwin,2010).Asaresult,arguablythebiggesthurdleL2learnersfaceinperceivingandproducingcertainsuprasegmentalfeaturesofL2pronunciationsuchasintonationandintensity(volume)islearningtoattributeL2meaningstothesefeatures.Forexample,speakersofmanylanguagesdonotuseintonationastheprimaryindicatorofmeaning,stanceorattitude(cf.,thegrammaticalandmodal–i.e.,mood–particlesofMandarinChinese).L1Englishlistenerscanthereforeperceive,forexample,L2learners’relativelymonotoneEnglish(Wennerstrom,1994)asexpressingboredom,coldnessorevenhostility,whilelearnersviewthebroaderpitchrangeofL1Englishspeakersasunnecessarilyexaggeratedandemotionalandthereforeresistadoptingitforthemselves.Similarly,thoughlistenersineverylanguageexpectspeakerstouseappropriatevolume,AmericanEnglishlistenerscaninterpretstudents’relativelyquietvolume(Hanley,Snidecor&Ringel,1966)asindicatinglackofconfidence–andpossiblythereforelackofcompetence–potentiallyhurtingjobprospectsforlearnersaimingtoworkinL1Englishcontexts.Therefore,althoughincreasedfocusonintelligibilityandcomprehensibilityoveraccentiscertainlywelcome(Munro&Derwing,1999)asisrecognitionthatlearners’goalsmayfocusonEnglish-as-a-Lingua-Franca(ELF)ratherthanESLcommunication(Jenkins,2000),thispresentationrecommendsteachersdiscusswithstudentstheirpersonalELFvs.ESLcommunicationgoals,informthemofL1listeners’potentialsociolinguisticinterpretationsofvarioussuprasegmentalsandifstudentsdesire,introduceseveralstrategiesandtoolsrecommendedinthispresentationforindependentlyincreasingtheircalibrationtoL1norms.

Frenchstereotypicalaccentandpronunciationdevelopmentof/p/,/t/,and/k/

VivianeRuellotThisstudyaimstocontributetoemergingresearchinvestigatingtheimpactofsecondlanguageaccentimitationinthenativelanguageonthelearningofsecondlanguagepronunciation(e.g.,Everitt,2015;Rojczyk,Porzuczek&Bergier,2013).Unlikepreviousstudies,thepresentoneisbasedonstereotypicalratherthanauthenticaccentimitation,andexaminestheimpactofsalience(fromexaggeration),simplerprocessing(withEnglishasthecarrieroftheaccent),andfamiliaritywithstereotypicalaccent(fromearlyexposurethroughthemedia)onpronunciationimprovement.Previousresearchhasfocusedonvoicelessplosivevoiceonsettime(VOT)mostlyinEnglishandSpanish.ThepresentstudyfocusesonthesamefeatureinFrench.Overthreeweeks,twelveAnglophonelearnersofFrenchataMidwestinstitutionreceivedinstructionaboutFrenchpronunciationfeaturesandbasedtheirpracticeonmodelsinoneofthreegroups:thestereotypicalaccentgroup,inwhichthemodelsspokeEnglishwithastereotypicalFrenchaccent(n=4),theauthenticaccentgroup,wheremodelsspokewithanauthenticFrenchaccent(n=4),andtheFrenchgroup,modeledbynativespeakersofFrenchspeakingFrench(n=4).Learnersrecordedtheirpronunciationoftextstheyreadandpicturestheydescribedbeforeandafterpractice.Wordsfeaturingthevoicelessplosivesininitialpositionwerepresentedtothreenativespeakerratersforassessment.Inaddition,VOTmeasuresweretaken.WhilenativespeakerratingsindicatenopronunciationimprovementofFrench/p/,/t/,and/k/,VOTmeasuresdo.However,resultsdonotsupportpreviousfindings:thegroupfocusingonstereotypicalFrenchaccentwasnotatasignificantadvantageforreducingVOTsofFrenchvoicelessplosives.Resultsarediscussedintermsofperceptionofaccentednessversusacousticmeasurement.Alsoaddressedaretheissuesoflengthoftraining,numberoffeaturesinvolved,andlearners’expectations.

EffectsofL1phonotacticconstraintsonL2codaperception: AcasestudywithnativeEnglishandMandarinlearnersofKorean

Na-YoungRyu

Introduction:Manycross-languagestudiesfoundthatfirstlanguage(L1)phonotacticconstraintsaffectsecondlanguage(L2)perception(FlegeandWang1989,Bradlow1995,BroselowandZheng2004).ThisstudyexaminedhowaccuratelyMandarinandEnglishL2learnersidentifyKoreanstopandnasalcodasinrelationtotheirL1phonotacticrestrictionstoL2perception.Mandarinhasaphonotacticrestrictionagainstconsonantclusters,andonlytwonasals/n,ŋ/areallowedincodaposition,whereasEnglishhasvoiceless/voicedobstruentsandthreenasals/n,m,ŋ/aswellastwoliquidsincodaposition.Methods:38Mandarinand28EnglishlistenerslearningKoreanasaforeignlanguageparticipatedinaforced-choiceidentificationtask.10nativeKoreanspeakersactedascontrols.Thetaskconsistedof150monosyllabicKoreanwordscontainingstops/p,t,k/andnasals/n,m,ŋ/incodaposition.ParticipantswereaskedtolistentoaKoreanstimulusandidentifyitbypressingacorrespondingnumberonthekeyboard.Results:TheresultsofamixedeffectslogisticregressionmodelshowedthatMandarinL2learnerswholackvoicelessobstruentsand/m/codashadmoreperceptualdifficultieswithKoreancodasthanEnglishL2learners,whichdoesnothavemanyrestrictionsonwhatsegmentsappearsyllablefinallyasMandarindoes.Inaddition,EnglishlistenersreachedtheaccuracylevelofnativespeakersofKoreanforKoreancodas.MandarinlistenerswerebetteratidentifyingKoreannasalcodasthanstopcodas.Morespecifically,eachnasalandstopcodaisperceivedatdifferentlevelsbyMandarinlisteners.Korean/n/wasrelativelyeasyforMandarinlistenerstoperceive(around89%accurate)comparedtoKoreanvelarnasal/ŋ/(77%).ForperceptionofKoreanstopcodas,MandarinlearnershadthelowestperceptionaccuracyrateforKorean/k/(58%)andhadthehighestaccuracyrateforKorean/p/(84%).Overall,thisstudyprovidedempiricalevidenceoftheinfluenceofL1phonologicalconstrainsonL2codaperception.Summary:ThegoalofthisstudywastoinvestigatetheeffectsofL1phonotacticconstraintsonL2codaperception.Englishlearnerswithvoiceless/voicedobstruentsandthreenasals/n,m,ŋ/incodapositionintheirnativelanguageoutperformedMandarinlearnerswithonlytwonasalcodas/n,ŋ/inlearningtoperceiveKoreancodas,indicatingthatL2perceptionisinterferedwithbyL1phonotacticconstraints.

IncreasingPre-ServiceTeachers’ExpertKnowledge,Effectiveness,andAgency

VeronicaSardegnaRecently,thepronunciation-teachingmodelhastendedtofocusonlearnercomprehensibilityandintelligibility(Derwing&Munro,2005;Levis,2005).However,sofarfewattemptshavebeenmadetoteachthismodelwithinTESOLprograms.Despitecallsforspecializedtraininginteacherpreparationprograms(Cullen,1994;Kamhi-Stein,1999),andargumentsinfavorofincorporatingsupportedfieldexperiences(Zeichner,2010),specializedtrainingandresourcesforteachingEnglishpronunciationareseldomofferedinTESOLprograms(Derwing&Munro,2005;Murphy,2014).ThisstudyinvestigatedtheeffectivenessofanapproachthatincorporatedasupportedpronunciationtutoringinterventioninaMATESLteachingpronunciationcourse,andexploredtheeffectsoftheapproachoneighteenpre-serviceteachers’expertknowledgeandagency.WhilereceivinginstructiononhowtoteachEnglishpronunciation,eighteenpre-serviceteachers(nativeEnglish-speaking/NES=8;nonnativeEnglish-speaking/NNES=10)tutoredoneortwoESLlearnerstwiceaweekforsixweeks.Amixed-methodsanalysisofthetutees’(N=26)biweeklyreflectionsandpre-andpost-read-aloudtestscoresrevealedthatthetutoringwasuseful,appreciated,andeffectiveinimprovingtheirabilitytoreducevowels,linksounds,stressphrases,anduseappropriateintonation.Aqualitativeanalysisofthepre-serviceteachers’reflectionsindicatedthattheirexpertknowledgeaswellastheircapacitytoteachpronunciationpurposefully,reflectively,andautonomously(i.e.,theirteacheragency)positivelychangedduringthetutoring,andthatthesechangesresultedfromtheirindividualeffortsandthecontributionsoffivecontextualandstructuralfactors:TheMATESLcourseinstruction,thetutoringexperience,feedbackfromtutoringobservations,observationsofpeers’teaching,andcriticalreflectionsonteaching.AsixthfactorwasfoundtocontributetoachangeonlyintheNNESteachers’expertknowledgeandagency:useofonlineresourcesandothermodelsasteachingaids.Pedagogicalimplicationsandsuggestionsforfutureresearcharediscussed.

OnSpanishTrillProductionImprovementforL1EnglishLearners

BenjaminSchmeiserThepresentstudytreatsthepronunciationoftheSpanishtrillbyL1Englishlearners.TheSpanishvoicedalveolartrill,/r/,isproducedbymakingtwo(ormore)occlusions,betweenwhichisavowel-likefragmentcalledasvarabhaktivowel.Thatsaid,theSpanishtrill,isnotasimplerepetitionoftapgestures,butratheradifferentarticulatorymechanismaltogether.Withthisinmind,thepresentstudyfirstpresentstheSpanishtrillinacoustic,articulatory,phonemic,andallophonicterms.Then,IconsidergeneralfindingswithspecificregardtoL1Englishlearnerproductiononthetrill.Overthelasttwentyyears,researchers(Reeder,1998;Lord,2005;Waltmunson,2005;Face,2006;Johnson,2008;Olsen,2012;Scarpace,2014;Schmeiser,inpress)haveincreasedourunderstandingoftrillproductionbyL1Englishlearners.Ingeneralterms,threetendenciesemergefromthesestudies.First,manylearnersobtainahigherpercentageoftargetproductioninstages,fromtheretroflex/ɹ/tothetap,andfinally,tothetrill.Second,formany,theintervocalictrill(especiallyword-medialposition)iseasiertoproduce,followedbyword-initialposition.Third,surroundingvowelheightaffectstrillproductioninthattrillproductionincreasesfromhightomidandmidtolowvowels.Thecurrentstudyisnovelinthat,basedonthesetendencies,itofferspracticalsolutionstoimprovetrillproduction.Duetospacelimitations,Idiscussheremyanalysisingeneralterms:First,learnersshouldlearntoperceivethedifferencesbetweentheAmericanEnglishretroflex/ɹ/,theSpanishtap,/ɾ/,andfinallythetrill;thisshouldbefollowedbyexplicitarticulatorypractice,withemphasisonbothplaceofarticulationandairflow.Then,learnersshouldpracticetrillproductionintermsofwordposition(i.e.wordinitialvs.word-medial).Finally,thereshouldbeexplicitinstructiononvowelheight,followedbyexercisesthatisolateeachvowel.

Face,T.L.2006.“IntervocalicRhoticPronunciationbyAdultLearnersofSpanishasaSecondLanguage.”InSelectedproceedingsofthe7thConferenceontheAcquisitionofSpanishandPortugueseasFirstandSecondLanguages,eds.C.KleeandT.Face,47-58.Somerville,MA:CascadillaProceedingsProject.

Johnson,K.E.2008.SecondLanguageAcquisitionoftheSpanishMultipleVibrantConsonant.DoctoralDissertation.TheUniversityofArizona.ProQuest.1-237.

Lord,G.2005.“(How)CanWeTeachForeignLanguagePronunciation?OntheEffectsofaSpanishPhoneticsCourse.”Hispania88(3):557-567.

Olsen,M.K.2012.“TheL2AcquisitionofSpanishRhoticsbyL1EnglishSpeakers:TheEffectofL1ArticulatoryRoutinesandPhoneticContextforAllophonicVariation.”Hispania95(1):65-82.

Reeder,J.T.1998.“EnglishSpeakers’AcquisitionofVoicelessStopsandTrillsinL2Spanish.”TexasPapersinForeignLanguageEducation3(3):101-118.

Scarpace,D.2014.“TheAcquisitionoftheTap/TrillContrastWithinandAcrossWordsinSpanish.”In

ProceedingsoftheInternationalSymposiumontheAcquisitionofSecondLanguageSpeech

ConcordiaWorkingPapersinAppliedLinguistics5:580-596.COPAL. Schmeiser,B.inpress.“IssuesintheTeachingofSpanishLiquidConsonants.”InKeyIssuesintheTeachingofSpanishPronunciation:FromDescriptiontoPedagogy(RoutledgeAdvancesin

SpanishLanguageTeaching),ed.RajivRao.Oxfordshire,UK:Routledge.

Waltmunson,J.C.2005.“TheRelativeDegreeofDifficultyofL2Spanish/d,t/,Trill,andTapbyL1EnglishSpeakers:AuditoryandAcousticMethodsofDefiningPronunciationAccuracy.”PhDdiss.,UniversityofMassachusetts,Amherst.

TheRoleofSpeakerIdentityinHighVariabilityPhoneticTraining

AlifSilpachai,EvgenyChukharev-Hudilainen,JohnM.Levis,TatianaA.Klepikova,&GabiMitchell

PreviousstudieshavereportedsuccessinusingtheHighVariabilityPhoneticTraining(HVPT)totrainlistenerstoperceivenonnativesegmentcontrasts,evenwhenthestimuliweregeneratedbyatext-to-speech(TTS)system(Qian,Chukharev-Hudilainen,&Levis,2018).Althoughthesestudieshaveoftenreportedthattalkervariability(e.g.,stimuliproducedbymultipletalkers)isamajorcontributingfactortothesuccessoftheparadigm,itisunclearwhichfactorsunderlyingTTStalkervariabilityinfluencedimprovementduringtraining.Thisindicatesthatfeaturesrelatedtospeakeridentitymaybefruitfulvariablestoexamine.Thepresentstudythusaimedtodeterminewhethertrainingsuccessisdependentonvaryingtwocuesrelatedtospeakeridentity:vocaltractsizeandfundamentalfrequency(f0).RussianlistenersweretrainedusingtheHVPTparadigmtoidentifytwoTTS-generated,Englishvowelcontrasts(/i/-/ɪ/and/ɛ/-/æ/)thatwereeitherproducedbytwoTTSvoices(maleandfemalevoices),oronemaleTTSvoiceandthesamemalevoicewithamanipulatedvocaltractsizeandf0,sothatthevoicesoundedfemale.Thus,intheformercondition,manyacousticcuesintwovoicesweredifferent,whereasinthelatter,onlyspeaker-identitycuesweredifferent.ResultsoftheexperimentarediscussedinrelationtoEFLclassroomsettingswherethereisascarcityofnativespeakerswhocanproducetrainingstimuli.ReferenceQian,Manman,Chukharev-Hudilainen,Evgeny,&Levis,John.(2018).ASystemforAdaptiveHigh-VariabilitySegmentalPerceptualTraining:Implementation,Effectiveness,Transfer.LanguageLearning&Technology,22(1),69-96.

Across-linguisticstudyonlexicaltoneprocessinginMandarinL1andL2

Kuo-ChanSunThepresentstudyinvestigatedhowtonalinformationisutilizedbyEnglishlearnersofMandarinChineseduringthecourseofspokenwordrecognitionbycomparingtheirperceptualperformancewithnativespeakers’.TorecognizeaspokenwordinMandarinChinese,unlikeIndo-Europeanlanguages,listenershavetoextractbothsegmentalandtonalinformationfromthespeechsignal.Previousstudiespresentedtwodifferentaccountsregardingtheprocessinginteractionbetweensegmentalandtonalinformation.Some(e.g.,Malins&Joanisse,2010)suggestedthatbothtypesofinformationareaccessedconcurrentlyandplaycomparableroleswhileothers(e.g.,Sereno&Lee,2015)showedthatsegmentalprocessingoccursearlierthantheprocessingoftonalinformation.Tofurtherclarifytheprocessingoflexicaltone,thecurrentstudybuiltonpastworkbyexaminingthisissuethroughanauditorylexicaldecisionexperimentconductedwithbothnativeandL2listeners.TwosetsofmonosyllabicMandarinwordswereconstructedinthestudy.Thestimuluswordsselectedinthefirstset(3-tonecondition)weresyllablesthatcanbeassociatedwiththreeofthefourMandarintones(i.e.,T55,T35,T214andT51)whilewordsinthesecondset(1-tonecondition)weresyllablesthatcanbeassociatedwithonlyonetone.Bothlistenergroupswereaskedtomakeaword/nonworddecisiononthesyllabletheyheard.Resultsshowedbothgroupsrecognizedfewerwordsfromthe3-toneconditionthanfromthe1-tonecondition.However,L2listeners’performancewasinferior(loweraccuracyandlongerRTs)tonativelisteners.Theseresultssuggestthattonalprocessingoccurslaterthansegmentalprocessing,providingsupportingevidencetotheserialprocessingaccount,nottheparallelprocessingone.TheobservedL1/L2differenceislikelyduetoL2listeners’relativeinexperiencewithMandarintonesandtheirconsequentlyhavingdifficultiesperceivingtoneaccuratelyandactivatingandselectingthecorrectlexicalitempromptly.

UsingReadersTheatertoBridgetheOralSkillsGapFromPerceptiontoProduction

MarkTanner&AlishaChuggReadersTheaterisatechniquethathasbeenusedlargelywithelementaryschoolstudentsasameansofimprovingoralreadingskills(Corcoran,2005;Keehn,Harmon,andShoho,2008).LittleattentionhasbeengiventhoughtohowthistechniquecouldbeutilizedinbuildingAdultEnglishlanguagelearners(ELLs)speakingfluencyandaccuracy.WhiledramatictechniqueshavebeenusedinESLclassroomsforseveralyears(Boudreault,2010),role-playsstudentsmayparticipateinareonlypracticedforafewminutesduringanindividuallessonasameansengaginglearnersinconversationaldiscourse.ReadersTheater,ontheotherhand,canmakeuseofpreparedscriptsthatincorporateaspecifiedgrammarprinciple,idiomaticexpressions,andlessonvocabularyrelatingtotheunittopicbeingstudied.AnotheradvantageofReadersTheateristhatthetechniquedoesnotdemandtheuseofextensivecostuming,props,orscenery(Moran,2006).Thispresentationwillsharetheresultsofanactionresearchprojectconductedwith12low-intermediateadultELLsages18to36yearsoldfromavarietyofL1backgrounds.Theselearnersparticipatedinaseriesoffourreaderstheateractivitiesimplementedoverthecourseof14weeks.Studentfeedbackinsurveysandend-of-coursefocusgroupsshowedthattheyfeltthetechniquehadapositiveimpactontheirperceivedlevelsoffluency,accuracy,andlevelofself-confidence.Beyondresults,thepresentationwillshareasamplescriptanddiscusswaysthatESLteacherscanimplementthisfunandengagingactivitythatenricheslearners’oralfluency,accuracy,anduseofsuprasegmentalsindiscourse.(253)

LongitudinalstudyofFrenchliaisonsandthelong-termeffectsofexplicitinstruction

AnneViolin-WigentAlthoughlanguageacquisitionisdescribedasaslowprocess,instructorsareconstrainedbythetimelimitofasemestertoevaluatetheirstudents’progress.Mostlongitudinalresearchusesthesametimeframeorevenless.Inthispresentation,IfollowadozenlearnersoverthecourseofthreeorfoursemesterstoanalyzetheevolutionoftheiraccurateproductionofFrenchliaisons.Thecorpusincludesrecordingsoftextsreadduringa3rd-yearpronunciationclassaswellassentencesreadaloudandspontaneousspeechcollectedduringa4th-yearclassonFrenchsyntax.Spontaneousdatacomesfromseveralpaireddialoguesduringwhicheachstudenttalkedforabout10minutes.Overall,thereseemstobelittlevariationacrosstimeandtask,althoughthe4th-yearreadingdatashowsthelowestaccuracy.The3rd-yearandthe4th-yearclassesshowadifferenceintermsofwhatfactorsareretainedassignificantbyGoldVarb.Inthe3rdyear,onlythetypeofliaisonswassignificant,withforbiddenliaisonsbeingmorelikelytobeproducedaccuratelythanobligatory.Thissuggeststhattheactualpronunciationofthis‘extra’liaisonconsonantwasproblematicand,therefore,notacquired.Byopposition,inthe4th-yearclass,bothinthereadingandspeakingtasks,thecontextofliaisonwassignificant(butthetypewasnot).Thisreflectsarefinementintheacquisitionofliaisons,frombroadercategoriesof‘always’vs.‘never’(types)tofinercategories(contexts).Moreinterestingly,thecontextsthemselvesshowadifferencebetweenthetwotasks.Somecontextsaresimilarinbothformatswhileothercategoriestendtoshowbetterresultsintheguidedtask.Onlyonecontext(afterapreposition)showsbetterresultsinaspontaneousformat.Thisseemstosuggestthat,whilesomeacquisitionhastakenplaceforthelearners,somecontextsremaindifficultevenafterseveralsemesters.

SuccessfactorsandconstraintsdeterminingtheacquirementofintelligiblepronunciationamongimmigrantsintheUnitedStates

MarcinWojciechTelidecki

Correctarticulation isaccountable forour intelligibility, therefore it isoneof thekeyaspectsresponsible for conveying our meaning without causing unnecessary confusions for theinterlocutor. This study emphasized the importance of learning pronunciation by adult ESLlearnersonthepathtothesuccessfulandmorereliablecommunication.Theprocedure in the studywasas follows:oneexperimentalgroupconsistingof20 learnerswere subjected to an intensivepronunciation training. The subjects of the studywerePolishlearnersofEnglish,whowereinstructedbytheresearcherforaperiodofthreemonthsintheEnglish pronunciation. The pronunciation training was both practical and theoretical. In thestudy,theresearcherusedthreepronunciationtestsprovidedtolearnersatthebeginningandat the end of the course, where the most important issues related to segmental andsuprasegmentalfeaturesofEnglishweretested.In this research, the study concerning students’ abilities influenced by their first language(comparable analysis of both Polish and English sounds), perception, and awareness of theirlimitations towards the learningofpronunciationwasdescribedandanalyzed. In the lightofthe findings it seems justified to introduce ESL pronunciation formal instruction as early aspossible, to allow ESL learners (majority immigrants) to acculturatewith the target languagesocietyandachievesuccessincommunicationwithnativespeakersofEnglish.Terrible articulation will make individuals misconstrue the speaker effortlessly, while greatelocutionwill urge them to listen the speakereagerly. There isno successful communicationwithout a correct pronunciation. The study findings give a useful insight into the area oflearningpronunciationaswellasprovidestablegroundsforfurtheranalysisandresearch.Keywords:intelligibility,formalinstruction,perception,pronunciation

VariationsintheProductionoftheNeutralr-coloredVowelinL1SpanishSpeakers

MatthewYaksic

Inthepresentstudyweexaminetheproductionofneutralr-coloredvowelsinEnglishbynativeSpanishspeakersinwordswithdifferentorthographicrepresentationsofthetargetsound([ɝ]or[ɚ].)WehypothesizethatnativeSpanishspeakerswillbeinfluencedbyorthographyintheirproductionofthesesounds,whereasnativeEnglishspeakerswillnot(i.e.,thevowelsof‘girl’and‘earth’willbepronouncedthesame).

Method:Participants:ParticipantswerefourmaleL1SpanishSpeakersenrolledinanEnglisheducationprograminCali,Colombia.Eachwasinthefourthsemesterofthe10-semesterprogram.ThecontrolgroupconsistedofthreemalenativeEnglishspeakersfromtheMidwest.

Procedure:Participantsreadalistof16targetand43fillerEnglishwords.Formulti-syllabicitems,thetargetitemshadeither[ɝ]or[ɚ]representedasastressedorunstressedsyllable.Thetargetitemsrepresentedpossibleorthographicrepresentationsofther-coloredvowel:<<er>>,<ir>,<ur>,<or>,<ear>.

Analysis:Firstandsecondformantsmeasurementsofthevocalicportions(midpoint)foreachtargetwordweretakenandwherepresent,F3wasalsomeasured,todeterminethedegreeofrhoticism.ThedependentvariablesofthisexperimentweretheF1,F2,andF3formantsofthevowelqualitiesofeachutteranceofthetargetwordsproducedbytheparticipantsandtheindependentvariablesweregroup(L1Englishvs.L1Spanish)andorthographiccondition.

PreliminaryresultssuggestthatorthographyplaysakeyroleindetermininghownativeSpanishspeakersproduceneutralr-coloredvowels.Specifically,theSpanishspeakersoftenalteredthepronunciationofthevowelqualityforeachorthographicalvariation,whilethenativeEnglishspeakersdidnotdemonstrateanysuchchanges.Theseresultsarediscussedinlightoftheinteractionbetweenorthographyandphonology.

ImprovingITAs’InstructionalConfidenceThroughStructuredContactActivitieswithU.S.UndergraduateStudents

KatherineYaw,OkimKang,&JanayCrabtree

Internationalteachingassistants(ITAs)inNorthAmericaninstitutionsofhighereducationboosttheacademicqualityofeducationavailabletoundergraduatestudents,butmanyuniversitystudentsregardITAsnotasopportune,butasproblematic.ITAresearchshowsthatnegativeperceptionsofITAscanbemitigatedbyITAprograms,whichintroduceopportunitiesforstructuredcontactbetweenundergraduatesandinternationalstudents(Kang,Rubin,&Lindemann,2015).Structuredcontactprogramscanpromotecollaborationandsupportpositiveeffectsofcontactonintergroupattitudes(Pettigrew&Tropp,2006).However,previousresearchmostlyaddressedU.S.undergraduatestudents’biasesintheirjudgmentsofITAs’speechbutdidnotexaminehowsuchstructuredcontactactivitiescouldimpactITAs’perceptiontowardUSundergraduatestudentsandtheirteachingconfidence.ThecurrentstudyfocusedonITAs’attitudechangesthroughstructuredcontactprogramsthatcouldofferbenefitstoITAsandinvestigatedtheimpactofsuchcontactonITAs’confidenceintheirteachingabilityandunderstandingofU.S.culture.Onehundredoneinternationalgraduatestudentstookanattitudesurveytwotimesatthebeginningandtheendoftheacademicsemesters.Theyallparticipatedinalong-standingITAprogramatamajorresearchuniversity.TheprogramwasdevelopedtohelpprospectiveITAsimprovetheirlanguage,interculturalcommunication,andteachingskills.InternationalstudentsinteractedwiththeirU.S.undergraduatepartnersonceaweekforeightweeksforonehoureachtime.Resultsshowedthatafterthiscontact,theprospectiveITAsgainedsignificantlymoreconfidenceinunderstandingspokenAmericanEnglishandgearingtheirteachingtotheiraudience.FutureapplicationsofcontactactivitiesthatpromisetoimprovebothITAsandU.S.undergraduates’comprehensionarediscussedandspecificrecommendationsaremadeforthedevelopmentoftheglobalcitizenship.

AnAcousticPhoneticAccountofVOTinRussian-AccentedEnglish

MikhailZaikovskii

VoicedOnsetTime(VOT)isdefinedasthelengthoftimethatpassesbetweenthereleaseofastopconsonantandtheonsetofvoicingorthevibrationofthevocalfolds.Russianisknownasa “true voice” language because it has a short positive VOT for voiceless stops and a longnegative VOT for voiced stops. This study investigates whether or not Native speakers ofRussian transfer the negative VOT of their L1 into L2 English. The VOTs and duration of theutterances that contain voiced and voiceless English stops produced by five males and fivefemalesaremeasuredinrunningspeech.Sancier&Fowler(1997)studiedVOTsinatruevoicelanguage such as Brazilian Portuguese. They found that the native speaker of BrazilianPortuguese in their study had a longer VOT after an extended stay in theUnited States andshorterdurationafteranextendedstayinBrazil.Theauthorscameupwiththeexplanationofthese results as the influence of the English stops with long-lag VOT (typical for aspiratinglanguages) on the duration of positive VOT in the speech of native speaker of BrazilianPortuguese. In light of the above, the goal of this study is twofold. The first is to find out ifRussianspeakersofEnglishtransfertheVOToftheirnativelanguageintoEnglish.Thesecondisto investigatewhetherornot the lengthof residence inanEnglish-speaking countryhasanyimpactonthedurationofVOT.

INVITED PRESENTATIONS

PSLLT2018Plenary

Highvariabilitytraininginthelabandinthelanguageclassroom

AnnBradlow

Whyisitsohardforsecond-languagelearnerstogaincontrolovercertainsoundsinaforeignlanguage?And,whatisthemosteffectivewaytoimproveperceptionandproductionofdifficultforeignlanguagesounds?Inthispresentation,Iwillreviewtheprinciplebehindaparticularlyeffectiveapproachtonovelspeechsoundlearning,namelythehighvariabilitytrainingapproach.Importantly,thistrainingapproachbuildsoncurrenttheoriesandmodelsofspeechperceptioninwhichnaturallyoccurringvariabilityacrosstalkersandcommunicativesettingsisviewedasasourceofinformationaboutunderlyingcategorystructure,ratherthanasnoisethatmustbeseparatedfromthesignalinordertoaccessessential,invariantlinguisticinformation.Iwillthenpresentdatafromtwolinesofresearchthathaveexploredthistrainingprincipleinlaboratory-basedstudies:(1)acquisitionoftheEnglish/r/-/l/contrastbyJapaneselisteners,and(2)perceptualadaptationbynativespeakersofAmericanEnglishtoforeign-accentedEnglish.Bothlinesofresearchdemonstrateremarkableflexibilityinspeechperceptionandproductioneveninmonolingualadults.Atthesametime,forbothnovelL2contrastlearningandadaptationtoforeign-accentedspeech,flexibilityisconstrainedinprincipled,andthereforecontrollable,waysbyL1-L2structuralmismatchesaswellasbythetrainingconditions.Translationofthesebasictrainingprinciplestolanguageclassroomsisthenextfrontierforthisresearchagenda.

ArephonologicalupdatesintheL2mentallexiconperceptuallydriven?

IsabelleDarcy&JeffreyHolliday

Thisstudyexamineshowsecondlanguage(L2)learnersmentallystorewords.LexicalencodingofdifficultL2phonemiccontrastshasbeenshowntobechallenging,butlittleisknownabouthowlearnersupdateinitiallyinaccuratelexicalrepresentations.Overtime,sustainedinputhelpstheL2phonologicalsystemdevelop,andprocessingofphonologicaldimensionsbecomesmoreaccurate.Similarly,learners’lexicalrepresentationsbecomemoreaccurateovertime.Giventheassumedlinkbetweenperceptualabilityandwordformlearning[e.g.Pallieretal.,1997;2001],itispossiblethatimprovementsinlexicalrepresentationsdependonimprovementsinperceptualaccuracy—yetthisisstillanopenquestion.Learnersmayupdatetheirlexiconasaresultofperceptionimprovement:asaperceptualdimensionisacquired(e.g.aspecificvowelcontrast),wordscontainingitareupdated.WeexaminethisquestionusingalexicaldecisiontasktargetingtwovowelcontrastsinKorean:/o/-/ʌ/(test)and/o/-/a/(control),withthetestcontrastbeingespeciallychallengingforL1MandarinlearnersofKorean.Eachword(8foreachvowelwithinthecontrast)wasmodifiedtocreateapairednon-wordbyswitchingthevowel(e.g./o/for/ʌ/andviceversa).Thisresultedin64itemspercontrast(32test,32control).160distractorswereadded.Participants(n=13)completedthelexicaldecision,avowelidentificationtask,abackgroundquestionnaire,andawordfamiliarityquestionnaire.Amixedeffectslogisticregressionmodelrevealedasignificanteffectofcontrast(testbeinglessaccuratethancontrol;β=1.17,z=3.34,p<.001).Vowelidentificationdatarevealedthatlistenerswhoconfused/o/and/ʌ/lessoftenwerealsolesslikelytoincorrectlyacceptnon-words(R2≈0.352,p<.02),suggestingthatL2learners’lexicalrepresentationsareupdatedtoreflecttheircurrentrepresentationofL2phonologicalcontrasts.Thus,lexicalupdatesappearperceptuallydriven.References:Pallier,C.,Bosch,L.,&Sebastian-Gallés,N.(1997).Alimitonbehavioralplasticityinspeechperception.Cognition,64,B9-B17.Pallier,C.,Colomé,A.,&Sebastian-Gallés,N.(2001).Theinfluenceofnative-languagephonologyonlexicalaccess:exemplar-basedversusabstractlexicalentries.PsychologicalScience,12,445-449.

UtopianGoalsRevisited

TraceyM.Derwing

In2009,IgaveapresentationattheinauguralPSLLTconferenceentitledUtopianGoalsforPronunciationTeaching.Inthisyear’spresentation,Iwillrevisitthosegoalstoseehowfarwehavecome,andhowfarwestillhavetogo.PronunciationisnolongertheCinderellainappliedlinguisticsresearch;infact,ithasbecometheBelleoftheBall,inthatnotonlyaremanymorePhDsgraduatingwithafocusonL2pronunciation,butestablishedacademicswhoseprimaryinterestsareinanotherareaofsecondlanguageacquisitionarenowteamingupwithcollaboratorstoexaminepronunciationinrelationtotheirownresearchspecialty.WehaveseenahugeincreaseinthenumberofempiricalstudiesonL2pronunciation,andtheestablishmentofajournaldevotedtoL2pronunciationissues.Innovationsintechnologydevotedtopronunciationimprovementhaveemergedaswell.Furthermore,researchdirectionsnotenvisionedtenyearsagohaveopenedup.(However,thereisstillconsiderableroomforimprovementanddevelopmentinourfield.IwilladdressthesevenUtopiangoalsidentifiedintheoriginalpaper,outliningprogressthusfarandsuggestingwaysforward.Thosegoalsarethefollowing:afocusonteachereducation;appropriatecurriculumchoices;afocusonintelligibility/comprehensibility;moreusefulsoftware/othertechnology;afocusonNSlisteners;nomorescapegoatingofaccent;andbetterstrategiesforintegratingnewcomersintothecommunity.

TheRipplesofRhythm:ImplicationsforInstruction

WayneDickersonTheworkofBrazil,Coulthard,&Johns(1980),Bolinger(1986),Cauldwell(2001),Wells(2006)andothershasledtoagrowingconsensusaboutspontaneousEnglishphrases:Theirrhythmconsistspredominantlyofonlyonepitchaccent(nucleus)ortwopitchaccents(onsetandnucleus)whosealternationwithunaccentedsyllablesistheessenceofitsrhythm.Deaccentedlexicalitemsarecharacteristicofunaccentedstringssurroundingpitchaccents,stringsthatmustbedeliveredwithenoughspeedtopromotescomprehension.Ifweacceptthesefindings,thenourpronunciationteachingwilldifferfromourtraditionalapproach,whichhasbeenshapedbyPrator’s(1951)versionofstresstiming.ThepaperaddressestheimplicationsofthisconsensusmodelforthecontentofESLpronunciationinstruction,including:• Rhythm,insteadofbeinganotherpronunciationtopic,comesfirstinthecurriculumbecause

itistheprinciplethatorganizesallothertopics. • Pitchaccents:Thecontentofinstructionincludesthepositionofthenucleusinaphraseand

alsothepositionoftheonset. • Wordstress:Weattendtothepositionofstressinawordandalsotothelevelofthemain

stressinphrasalcontexts. • Vowels:Weteachthearticulationofvowelsandalsohowtousetheirsuprasegmentalsto

createpitchaccentsandhighlightthemincontrasttosurroundingunaccentedstrings.

• Consonants:Ourexercisesincludethephonemicsegmentsofwordsandalsosegments arisingfromrhythmiccompressioninunaccentedstrings.

• Intonation:Wefocusonpatternsassociatedwiththenucleusandalsoonpatternsassociated withtheonset.

Investigatingthephonologicalcontentoflearners’lexicalrepresentationsfornewL2words

RachelHayes-Harb&ShannonBarrios

Adultlearnersareknowntoexperiencedifficultyusingnovelsecondlanguage(L2)phonologicalcontraststodistinguishwords.Forexample,nativespeakersofJapaneseexhibitdifficultydistinguishingEnglish/l/-/r/minimalpairs.Indeed,eventheabilitytoperceiveand/orproduceanovelcontrastwithrelativeaccuracydoesnotguaranteeanabilitytoimplementthecontrasttodistinguishwordsintasksthatrequirelexicalaccess.Theseobservationsleadtoquestionsregardingthephonologicalcontentoflearners’lexicalrepresentationsofdifficultL2contrasts.InthepresentstudyweuseanartificiallexicondesigninvolvingnaïveL2learnerstoexaminethelexicalencodingandimplementationofnovelL2phonologicalcontrasts.Inthefirstexperiment,nativeEnglishspeakersweretaughtasetofsixJapanese-likeauditoryminimalpairsalongwithpicturedmeanings.Themembersofeachpairweredifferentiatedbyvowellength(e.g.,[teki]vs.[teeki]),whichiscontrastiveinJapanesebutnotinEnglish.Participantswerethentestedontheirabilitytomatchthepicturestoauditorywords.Thesetestitemswereinfourconditions:matched(seepictureofthe‘teki’,hear[teki]),mismatchedforvowelduration(see‘teki’,hear[teeki],consonantdurationmismatch(see‘teki’,hear[tekki]),andmismatchedforboth(see‘teki’,hear[teekki]).Accurateperformanceinallconditionswouldindicatethatparticipantsencodedandusedrepresentationsthatcapturedthephonologicallengthcontrastandassociatedthecontrastwiththevowelsegments.However,wefoundthatwhileparticipantscorrectlyidentifiedmatcheditemsasmatched,theyweremoreaccurateatrejectingwordformsmismatchedforconsonantlengththanforvowellength.Theresultsfromthisandfollow-upexperimentssuggestthatthatlexicalprocessingofnewly-learnedwordsmaynotreflectatarget-likememoryforthephonologicalstructureoftheL2.

UsesandMisusesofSpeechRatingData

MurrayJ.MunroSecond-languagespeechcanbeusefullydescribedandevaluatedintermsofanumberofpartially-correlated,continuousdimensions.Inparticular,utterancescanexhibitvaryingdegreesofintelligibility,comprehensibility,fluency,accentednessandtargetaccuracy(amongothercharacteristics).Theseaspectsofspeechcanbeassessedthroughlistenerjudgments.Wheninterpretingspeechratingdataofthissort,askepticalapproachisneededtoensurethatoverly-simplisticconclusionsareavoided.Forinstance,misunderstandingsofthevalueofaccentednessdatacontributedtoatroubling20th-centuryshiftawayfrompronunciationteachingandresearch.Evenquiterecently,someresearchershaveinappropriatelyequatedaccentratingswith“phonology”or“success”inacquisition.Despitesuchmissteps,thereliabilityandvalidityofspeechratingdataaresupportedbyextensiveempiricalfindings.Evidencealsoindicatesthattheeffectsofcertaincognitiveandsocialbiasesthatmightinfluenceraterjudgementscanbecontrolledoratleastmitigated.SpeechratingdatacanthereforebeimmenselyvaluableinhelpingustounderstandthenatureofL2pronunciationandtoidentifysuitablegeneralgoalsandspecificfociforinstruction.Inthisdiscussion,Iproposeformulatingasetofbestpracticesforcollectingandinterpretingspeechratingdata.Suchapursuitrequiresareviewofourcurrentunderstandingofthecognitiveandsociophoneticbasesofcomprehensibilityandintelligibility,aswellascarefulconsiderationofwhatwemeanbysuchnotionsas“bias”and“subjectivity.”

DiscourseIntonation:Wherearewenow?

LucyPickeringCouper-Kuhlen(2015:82)beginsherchaptertitled“intonationanddiscourse”withthecomment:“Whatwasthestateoftheartinthefieldofintonationanddiscourseahalf-centuryago?Actually,therewasnosuchfield.”Withthis,sheremindsusofhowfarwehavecomeinacomparativelyshorttime.Researchinthe1990sand2000sfirmlyestablishedafieldofenquirythathasgeneratedasophisticatedunderstandingoftheroleofintonationandarobustframeworkwithinwhichtoaddnewfindings.Althoughdirectapplicationstoteachingduringthistimehavebeenlessconsistentandwidespread;nonetheless,wecanpointtochangesinpedagogicalapproachesthathaveintegratedthesedevelopments.UsingexamplesfromPickering(2018),Irevisitsomeoftheimportantadvancesinourunderstandingofdiscourseintonationincludingsystematicusesofpitchandprominencestructuretocontributetoboththeinformationalandinteractionalsignificanceofthediscourseforinterlocutors.Ialsohighlightsomeofthemostrecentfindingswithregardtotheteachabilityandlearnabilityofintonationindiscourseandthewaysinwhichwemightapplythemtoourclassroomteaching.Couper-Kuhlen,E.(2015).Intonationanddiscourse.InD.Tannen,H.Hamilton,&D.

Schiffrin(Eds.).Thehandbookofdiscourseanalysis(2ndEd),pp.82-104.WileyBlackwell.

Pickering,L.(2018).Discourseintonation:Adiscourse-pragmaticapproachto teachingthepronunciationofEnglish.UniversityofMichiganPress.

COLLOQUIUM

TowardsaProtocolforaMultilingualCorpusforPronunciationResearchers

AmandaHuensch&ShelleyStaplesAtPSLLT2017,TraceyDerwingandMaryGranthamO’Brieninitiatedadiscussionaboutthepossibilityofdevelopingaprotocolforthecreationofamultilingualcorpus/corporaforpronunciationresearchers.Fromapracticalperspective,suchaprotocolwouldresultinanopen,freelyavailableresourcethatwouldtakeanyoneresearchermuchtime,effort,andcosttodevelop.Fromatheoreticalperspective,theresultingcorpuswouldallowforawide(r)varietyofL1-L2pairings,whichisespeciallyimportantgiventhatEnglishcomprises88%oflearnercorpusresearchandevenwithinEnglishonly2%ofresearchisfocusedonpronunciation(Paquot&Plonsky,2017).Thiscolloquiumprovidesanextstepbytakingstockofexistingresourcesandexploringneedsandfeasibility-relatedissuesoftheproject.Wewillbeginbypresentingasynthesisofandreflectiononexistingcorpora,includinganoverviewofavailablecorpora(e.g.,FLLOC,IJAS)andacriticalreflectionontheiradvantagesanddisadvantages(e.g.,accessibility,easeofuse).Whilethesummarywillprovideavaluableresource,perhapsmoreimportantlyitwillactasaguidetomakingdecisionsaboutfutureprotocolcreation.WewillcontinuewithareportonfindingsfromasurveyofthePSLLTcommunityabouttheircurrentuses,perceivedneeds,interests,andpotentialuse-casesrelatedtothedevelopmentofmultilingualcorpora.Finally,wewillendwithanopendiscussionaboutmovingforwardwiththeproject,whichiscriticalasameansofinvolvingstakeholderstoensurethefeasibility,viability,andlong-termsuccessoftheproject.

Theroleofcross-languagephoneticsimilarityinL2consonantlearning

AnabelaRato

TheoreticalmodelsofL2speechacquisition(Best&Tyler,2007;Flege,1995)hypothesizethatdegreeofperceivedphoneticsimilaritybetweentheL1andL2speechsoundsystemspredictstherelativeease/difficultylearnershavewhenacquiringtheL2phonologicalsystembuttheynotfullyaccountfordegreeofproductiondifficulty.Therefore,thegoalofthisstudyistofurtherourunderstandingoftheroleofbothparametersinL2speechacquisitionbyexaminingtheirpredictiveroleinL2consonantlearning.Specifically,itaimsto(1)assesscross-linguistic(CL)perceptualandacousticsimilaritybetweentheconsonantsofL2EuropeanPortuguese(EP)andL1CanadianEnglish(CanE),(2)assessarticulatoryaccuracyinconsonantproduction,(3)makepredictionsregardingthelearningofEPconsonantsounds,and(4)testthepredictionsbyexaminingtheperceptualandproductionperformanceofL2learners.Twentyinexperiencedand14experiencedadultL2learnerscompletedaperceptualassimilationtask(PAT),arateddissimilaritytask(RDT)andtwoelicitedproductiontasks.Preliminaryanalysesindicatethatboththedegreeofperceivedandacousticcross-linguisticphoneticsimilaritybetweenCanE(L1)andEP(TL)consonantspredicted,toagreatextent,thelearningofthetargetspeechsounds;(2)however,thetwomeasuresofcross-linguisticcomparisonwerenotbesufficienttopredictthelearningoftheTLsoundswhichdifferedinarticulatorydifficulty;therefore,degreeofproductiondifficultycomplementedpredictionsregardingL2speechlearningsinceitaccountedforthosecasesinwhichlearnerscouldperceivethedissimilar(i.e.,new)TLsoundbutnotproduceitaccurately.Flege,J.(1995).SecondLanguageSpeechLearning:Theory,FindingsandProblems.InStrange,

W.(Ed),SpeechPerceptionandLinguisticExperience:IssuesinCrossLanguageResearch(pp.233-277).Timonium,MD:NewYorkPress.

Best,C.&Tyler,M.(2007).Nonnativeandsecond-languagespeechperception:Commonalitiesandcomplementarities.InBohn,O.&Munro,M.(Eds),LanguageExperienceinSecondLanguageSpeechLearning–InHonorofJamesEmilFlege(pp.13-34).Amsterdam/Philadelphia:JohnBenjaminsPublishingCompany.

PronunciationintheL2Frenchclassroom:Studentandteacherattitudes

JessicaSturm

Pronunciationinstructionhasbeen,relativetootheraspectsofthelanguage,neglectedintheL2classroom(Olson,2014)andspecificallyintheL2Frenchclassroom(Sturm,2013a;2013b;2017).Hannahs(2007)notedthelackofresearchfocusonL2Frenchpronunciation,thoughthatisrapidlychangingasresearchandpedagogicalinterestinL2pronunciationteachinggrows.ThecurrentresearchinvestigatesstudentandteacherattitudestowardpronunciationinstructionintheL2Frenchclassroom.Anecdotally,andfromsurveyresearchpublishedinpaperssuchasHarlowandMuyskens(1994)andGrimandSturm(2016),studentswanttolearn.GrimandSturm(2016)suggestedfromtheirsurveyofteachersandstudentsthatstudentsaremoreinterestedinlearningpronunciationthanteachersareinteachingit.However,theirsurveydidnotaskexplicitquestionsaboutpronunciations;theyaskedaboutclassroomprioritiesandnotedthatstudentsmentionedpronunciationmoreandrankedpronunciationhigherthanteachersdid.ThissurveyasksstudentsandteachersdirectlyabouttheirattitudestowardpronunciationintheL2Frenchclassroom.Resultssuggestthatstudentsare,asreportedbyHarlowandMuyskens(1994)andGrimandSturm(2016),quitemotivatedtolearnpronunciationandthattheteacherssurveyeddo,infact,teachpronunciationintheirpost-secondaryclassrooms.

PerceptionofFrenchlearners’mistakes

AnneViolin-Wigent&VivianeRuellot

Inthispresentation,weseektodiscussandestablishaprotocoltoinvestigatehowmistakesinAmericanlearners’pronunciationofFrenchtargetsoundsareperceivedbynativeFrenchspeakers.Inthefirstpart,wewillreviewsomeofthepublishedliterature,withaparticularfocusoninstrumentsandresultsfromIsaacsandTrofimovich(2012)forEnglishandfromWalz(1980)andBergeronandTrofimovich(2017)forFrench.Basedonthis,wewillpresentsomepreliminaryresultsofasmall-scalestudyonhowmistakesinFrenchliaisonsareperceivedandevaluatedbynativeFrenchspeakers,whoareknownnottoalwaysbecooperativewithlearnersorforeigners.Fromthis,wewillleadadiscussioncenteredonhowtoinvestigatewhatspecificelementsintermsofphonology/pronunciationhaveastrongerorweakereffectonnativespeakers’evaluationsand/oroncomprehensibility.Bytheendofthecolloquium,wewouldliketohavebuiltaresearchteamwhereeachpersonorgroupwouldcommittoinvestigatingoneparticularfeatureofFrench(intonation,liaisons,stress,finalconsonants,speechrate,specificsegments,etc.).Inaddition,wewouldliketohavedesignedaninformalprotocolforcomparability,compiledalistoffeaturesandassociatedresearcher,aswellasacalendartoshareourfindings.

PerceptionofMandarinconsonants:Cross-linguisticmappingandtheeffectofL2experience

XinchunWang

TheperceiveddifferencesbetweenL1andL2soundsandlearners’L2experienceinfluenceL2speechperception(Flege,1995).HowandtowhatextentsuchdifferencescontributetoL2speechperceptionhasbeenexploredinpreviousstudiesbutthefindingsarenotconsistent.ThisstudypresentstheresultsoftwoperceptualexperimentsonMandarinconsonants.InExperiment1,16nativeEnglishlistenersparticipatedinacross-linguisticmappingexperimentinwhichtheyidentifiedMandarinconsonantsinCVsyllablesintermsofEnglishconsonants.ThelistenersthenratedthesoundsforthegoodnessoffittingtotheirL1Englishconsonantsastheyidentifiedonascaleof1(poorfit)to7(goodfit).ToassessthedegreeofmatchofMandarinconsonantsontoEnglishsoundsasperceivedbythelisteners,thepercentageidentificationsandthegoodnessratingscoresarebothtakenintoconsiderationtoderivethefitindexes.InExperiment2,twogroupsofEnglishspeakingChineseasaForeignLanguage(CFL)learnerswithdifferentproficiencylevelstookaperceptualtestinwhichtheyidentifiedMandarinconsonantsinCVsyllabusinaforcedchoicetask.MandarinsoundsthathavehighfitindexestoEnglishsoundswerebetteridentifiedbylearnersacrossthetwogroups,whilesoundsthathavelowfitindexeswerepoorlyidentified,especiallybythelowerlevellearners.ThefindingssuggestthatphoneticmappingpatternofL2ontoL1soundsbythenativeEnglishlistenerspredictedtheEnglishCFLlearners’perceptualdifficultieswithatleastsomeMandarinconsonants.L2experienceisalsoanimportantfactorfortheparticipants’successinperceptuallearningofMandarinconsonants,althoughbothgroupsdemonstratedverysimilarperceptualdifficultieswiththesamecategories.ThefindingsarediscussedincrosslinguisticspeechperceptionandL2speechlearningmodels.

TEACHING TIPS

Improvingintelligibility:Usingthethree-minutethesisasaprosodicmodel

HeatherBoldt&MargaretaLarssonIntonationis“longthoughttobeakeytoeffectivenessinspokenlanguage”(Levis&Pickering,2004).However,producingtheexpectedpatternofintonationpresentschallengesforstudents,manyofwhomfindthattheirproductionofEnglishsuprasegmentalsisinfluencedbytheirL1,whichcanleadtoobscuredmeaning.Luckily,videosofthe3-Minute-Thesiscompetition(3MT),heldannuallyathundredsofuniversitiesinover60countries,providesteacherswithhigh-qualityexamplesofclearlydeliveredwinningpresentations.Sincethecompetitionchallengesitsparticipantstocommunicatetheirresearchinthreeminutesorlesstoanon-specialistaudience,eachvideoisashortyethigh-qualityexampleofeffectiveoralcommunicationfilledwithpowerfultemplatesentences“inwhichalllevelsoftheprosodicsystemarepresent(Gilbert,ascitedinGrant2014,p.130).Thepurposeofthispresentationistodemonstratehowtwoexperiencedpractitionershavesuccessfullyused3MTvideostoimprovetheintelligibilityofstudentsenrolledinintermediateoralcommunicationclassesattwoseparateuniversities.Thepresenterswillshareaseriesofactivitieswhichincorporatecurrentbestpractices,includingtheuseofauthenticlanguage,focusonsuprasegmentals,theimportanceofperceptionoftargetlanguage,andtheuseofgesturetoenhancecommunication;allwiththeultimategoalofincreasedintelligibility.Closeanalysisandmirroringoflanguage,withafocusonthoughtgrouping,stressandintonation,helpsstudentsproducethemultiplepeaksandvalleyswithinthoughtgroupspointedoutbyDickerson(2016)inhistwo-peakmodel.Also,sincesomeofthe3MTpresentersareNNSofEnglish,theyserveasvaluableaspirationalmodels.Wewillalsoshareideasonhowtoteachperceptionandproductionwithothermodels.Usingourframework,studentsreportfeelingmoreconfidentandmoreabletousetheirvoiceseffectively,notonlyinpresentationsbutalsooutsidetheclassroom.

Smothernewsorthesaymoldstory?CoaxingtheEmmacrosstheborder

MarshaJ.ChanWrittenwordsareseparatedonthepagebyspaces;spokenwordsinthestreamofspeecharenot.BeginningandintermediatelearnersareoftenunabletoparseutterancesinspokenEnglish,whicharetypicallyemittedincontinuousstreamsofsoundscarriedbyprosodicelementsofstress,intonation,andrhythm.Spokenwordsboundedtogetherinphrasesarealteredbyphonologicalprocesses.Forexample,consonantsoundsthatbelongorthographicallytotheendsofwordsarelinkedtothebeginningsofwordswhoseorthographicformsbeginwithvowels.Consonant-to-vowel(C-V)linkingisamongthemostcommontypesofconnectedspeech,yetmanyadultlearnersofEnglish,particularlythosewhohavelearnedthelanguagethroughthewrittenversion,lackabilitytoperceiveandproducelinkedwordsinspeech.Thisteachingtipfocusesonhelpinglearnersforwhomfinal/m/isdifficulttoproduceduetothefactthattheirprimarylanguagesdonotusethebilabialvoicedcontinuantatall,orinthesameway,asEnglish,eventhoughinitial/m/maybepresentintheirlanguages.Beyondprovidingdescriptionsthatexplainplace,manner,andvoicing,thissessionshowswaysthatteacherscanguidespeakersoflanguagessuchasChineseandSpanishtotransfertheirsuccesspronouncinginitial/m/topronouncingfinal/m/insentenceswithC-Vlinkingthrough(1)lipsensitivityandvisual,auditory,andtactileperceptiontraining,(2)gestures,(3)movingofpaperM’sacrosswordboundaries,(4)practiceofphrasebuild-up,and(5)videorecordedpracticematerial.

ThePowerofPrompts:FourPromptPoints

JenelleCox

Correctivefeedbackforsecondlanguagelearnersgenerallyincludesrecastsandpromptsdirectedtowardsstudents’pronunciationerrors.Prompts(cuesofastudent’serrors,butnocorrectionsgiven)(Gooch,Saito,&Lyster,2016)havebeenshowntopushstudentstoproducemodifiedoutput(Ellis&Sheen,2006).Opportunitiesformodifiedoutputseemtogivestudentstheabilitytomovetowardthecorrecttargetproduction,beitgrammar,pronunciation,orvocabulary(Gooch,Saito,&Lyster,2016).Pushingstudentstoself-repairortoretrievepriorknowledgemaystrengthentheirfutureabilitytoself-correct.Retrievingtheirownanswerswhenaproblemispresentedorattemptingtosolveanincorrectanswerbeforethecorrectanswerisgiven,tendsto“leadtoincreasedlearningandlongerretentionofthecorrectanswerorsolution,evenwhentheattemptedresponseiswrong,solongascorrectivefeedbackisprovided”(Brown,Roediger,&McDaniel,2014).Allowingstudentstogeneratetheirownanswersandtoself-correctthroughpromptsgivesthemtheopportunitytoengageinhigher-orderthinkingtasks,(forexamplepullingfromlong-termmemory),ratherthanjustreceivingknowledgegiventhembyothers.Thisteachingtipwillhelpteacherstorealizethebenefitsthatcomefrompromptsinencouragingstudentstoreachintotheirlong-termmemorytoself-correct.Teacherswillbeshowntheimportanceofcreatingasafeenvironmentforcorrectivefeedback,howtousepromptsintheclassroom,whypromptsmaystrengthenmemory,andunderstandwhyencouragingself-correctionmayultimatelyleadtoautomaticityinESLstudents.

Improvingspeakercomprehensibility:Usingsitcomsandengagingactivitiestodeveloplearners’perceptionandproductionofwordstressinEnglish

EdnaLima&ZoeZawadzki

ResearchershaveagreedthatEnglishsuprasegmentalsarecrucialtoL2speakercomprehensibilityandintelligibilityandshould,therefore,beanintegralpartofpronunciationinstruction(Celce-Murcia,Brinton,Goodwin,&Griner,2010;Derwing&Munro,2015).Thus,avarietyofmethodsandtechniqueshavebeenproposedtoteachsuprasegmentalsmoreeffectivelytoEnglishlearnersintermsofbothperceptionandproductionskills.Twoofsuchtechniquesaredramaandimitation,asthey“offerdiscourse-levelpracticewithstress,intonation,andconnectedspeech”(Goodwin,2013,p.7).Theactivitypresentedinthissessionisdesignedtohelpstudentsimprovetheirperceptionandproductionofwordstressthroughtechnology-implementedmaterials.First,studentsbecomeawareofwordstressfeaturesthroughaminivideolecture.Next,theycompleteaperceptionactivity.Inthisactivity,theywatchashortclipfromTheBigBangTheoryandcompleteaclozeexercisewheretheychoosethewordtheyhearwiththecorrectstressfromadropdownmenu(e.g.,ex.PER.i.mentorex.per.i.MENT).Finally,studentscompleteaproductionactivitywheretheyrecordthemselvesinAudacityimitatingtheactors.Theyrecordasmanytimesastheywishuntiltheyaresatisfiedwiththeirperformance.Whentheyarefinished,theyuploadtheirrecordingtothecoursesiteforfeedback.Thepresenterswillalsoprovidesuggestionsforadaptingthefocusoftheactivity(e.g.,intonation),theactivityformat(e.g.,paper-based),andthetextgenre(e.g.,afable)forauthenticlisteningmaterialstoprovideteacherswithideasonhowtovarytheactivityandkeeptheirstudentsengagedandmotivatedtolearn.ReferencesCelce-Murcia,M.,Brinton,D.M.,Goodwin,J.M.,&Griner,B.(2010).Teachingpronunciation:A

coursebookandreferenceguide(2nded.).Cambridge,NY:CambridgeUniversityPress.Derwing,T.M.,&Munro,M.J.(2015).Pronunciationfundamentals:Evidence-based

perspectivesforL2teachingandresearch.Philadelphia,PA:JohnBenjamins.Goodwin,J.(2013).Pronunciationteachingmethodsandtechniques.InC.A.Chapelle(Ed.),The

EncyclopediaofAppliedLinguistics.Retrievedfromhttps://doi.org/10.1002/9781405198431.wbeal0970

UsingTaskstoDevelopComprehensibilityofSpokenSecondLanguageSpanish

AviziaLong,LorenaAlarcón,&SergioRuiz-PerezThisstudyexaminestheefficacyoftasksfordevelopmentofcomprehensibilityinsecondlanguage(L2)Spanish.Tasks—definedaslanguage-teachingactivitiesduringwhichlearnersnegotiateformeaningtoachieveanonlinguisticoutcome(e.g.,Ellis,2009)—havebeenshowntoencouragedevelopmentofL2grammarandlexis.Recently,scholarshaveinvestigatedtheroleoftasksinpromotingL2pronunciationdevelopment(seeGurzynski-Weiss,Long,&Solon,2017),andthissmallbodyofworkhasfocusedonsegmentalandsuprasegmentalaspectsofL2s.InresponsetothecallformoreresearchonperceptionsofL2intelligibilityandcomprehensibility—constructsbelievedtobecrucialforeffectivecommunication(Derwing&Munro,2009;Munro&Derwing,2015)—thisstudycombinesdevelopmentsinthefieldsoftask-basedlanguageteaching(TBLT)andL2pronunciation,respectively,toexplorethepotentialfortaskstofacilitatedevelopmentofL2Spanishcomprehensibility.ThreetaskswillbepresentedfortheirpotentialtofacilitatecomprehensibilityofSpanishspokenbyfirst-andsecond-yearadultclassroomlearners.EachtasktargetsaspecificfeatureknowntonegativelyimpactcomprehensibilityofnativeEnglish-speakinglearners’spokenSpanish(McBride,2015)—specifically,vowels,wordreduction,andfluency.Eachtaskhasbeendesignedsuchthat,inpairs,learnersmustattendtothetargetpronunciationfeaturetocompletethetask.Afterbriefdemonstrationofeachtask,ratingsofcomprehensibilityoflearners’spokenSpanishcollectedfromnativeandnear-nativelistenersofSpanish(allofwhomreportfamiliaritywithspokenlearnerSpanish)willbepresented,andpracticalstrategiesforclassroomimplementationwillbesuggested.ReferencesDerwing,T.M.,&Munro,M.J.(2009).Puttingaccentinitsplace:Rethinkingobstaclestocommunication.LanguageTeaching,42(4),476-490.Ellis,R.(2009).Task-basedlanguageteaching:Sortingoutthemisunderstandings.InternationalJournalofAppliedLinguistics,19(3),221-246.McBride,K.(2015).WhichfeaturesofSpanishlearners'pronunciationmostimpactlistenerevaluations?Hispania,98(1),14-30.Munro,M.J.,&Derwing,T.M.(2015).Intelligibilityinresearchandpractice:Teachingpriorities.InM.Reed&J.Levis(Eds.),ThehandbookofEnglishpronunciation(pp.377-396).JohnWiley&Sons.Solon,M.,Long,A.Y.,&Gurzynski-Weiss,L.(2017).Taskcomplexity,language-relatedepisodes,andproductionofL2Spanishvowels.StudiesinSecondLanguageAcquisition,39(2),347-380.

ImprovingArticulatoryGestureswithSelfies

AlisonMcGregor

Ithaslongbeenestablishedthatspeechperceptionfornative-speakingEnglishlistenersisanauditory-visualphenomenon(McGurk&MacDonald,1976);thatis,thereisarelianceonvisualorlip-readingcuesinfluencinglisteners’speechperceptionofEnglish(Sekiyama&Burnham,2008).Fromanarticulatoryphonologyperspective,movementsofspeecharticulatorsaretheconsequenceofgestures(lipand/orfacialmovements)inspeechproduction.Gesturalmotionsofarticulators,therefore,functionasbothvisualaswellasauditorycuesintheperceptionofspeechandintheproductionmechanicsofaccuratespeechproduction.InEnglishpronunciationteachingandlearning,commonL1pronunciationchallengesforatleast12differentlanguagesrevolvearoundcross-linguisticdifferencesinarticulatorygesturesormotionsforthefollowingAmericanEnglishsounds:/l/,/r/,/w/,/ʃ/,/ʒ/,/tʃ/,and/dʒ/.Thegestureofliprounding,althoughcommonlytaughtasadistinctivefeatureforspecificvowels,isnottypicallyusedinarticulatortrainingforconsonants.Thisteachingtipaddressesthisgapbyintroducingathree-categoryliproundinggesturetechniqueandaseriesofselfie-modecellphonestepsforawarenessraisingandtargetedpracticetoaddresscommoncross-linguisticchallengesinlearningEnglishpronunciation.Participantswillengagein1)awarenessraisingforlipmotions,2)modelingwithexplicitinformation,and3)step-by-steppracticestrategiesforcommonL1pronunciationchallenges.Videoclipsofstudenttrainingandprogresswillbeusedtodemonstratethetechniques.Teacherresourcesandtechniqueintegrationtipswillbeprovided.

McGurk,H.,&MacDonald,J.(1976).Hearinglipsandseeingvoices.Nature,264(23),746-764.

Sekiyama,K.,&Burnham,D.(2008).Impactoflangaugeondevelopmentofauditory-visualspeechperception.DevelopmentalScience,11(2),306-320.

ANewWayofUsingtheKazootoTeachIntonation

ColleenMeyers

Intonationisimportantforclearcommunicationbecauseit“carriesmeaninginEnglish(Wichmann,2005).”Ithasthepowerto“reinforce,mitigate,orevenunderminethewordsspoken(p.229).”Amongotherfunctions,intonationisusedtomarkfocusandtoindicatethebeginningsandendingsofspeechparagraphs(Pickering,2004).However,intonationisnotalwayseasytoperceive,evenfornativespeakersofEnglish.Teachingintonationcanbeevenmorechallengingforteachers.JudyGilbert(Gilbert,2014)haslongbeenaproponentofusingthesimplepartyfavor,thekazoo,asawaytohelplearnersofEnglishtoperceiveandtoproducetheintonationpatternsofNorthAmericanEnglish.Recently,researchbyHardison(2018)hasfoundthat“basedonperceptionandneuroimagingstudies,speechisamultimodalphenomenon…whichcontributestocomprehension.”Shegoesontostatethat“ResearchshowsacoordinationofmovementssuchaseyebrowraisesandeyeblinkswithpitchforEnglishspeakers.”BasedonHardison’sfindings,thisteachingtipwillhighlightyetanotherwaythatuseofthekazoocanaidlearnersinperceivingandproducingNorthAmericanintonationpatterns.Thatis,throughfocusinglearnerattentiononwhatbodymovements(eyebrowraisesandeyeblinks)makeiteasiertoproduceNorthAmericanintonationpatterns,theselearnerswillgainanothermodeofperceivingintonationinother’sspeechandproducingintonationintheirownspeech.ThepresenterwilldemonstrateavideoinwhichaspeakerofFarsiisabletouseakazootoperceiveandproduceeyebrowraisesandeyeblinkstobetterperceiveandemployeffectivepatternsofNorthAmericanintonation.(262words)Gilbert,J.(2014).PronunciationMyths:ApplyingSecondLanguageResearchtoClassroomteaching.Myth4:Intonationishardtoteach.TheUniversityofMichiganPress.AnnArbor,107-137.Hardison,D.M.(2018).VisualizingtheAcousticandGesturalBeatsofEmphasisinMultimodalDiscourse:TheoreticalandPedagogicalImplications.JournalofSecondLanguagePronunciation,Volume4,Issue2.Pickering,L.2004.Thestructureandfunctionofintonationparagraphsinnativeandnonnativespeakerinstructionaldiscourse.EnglishforSpecificPurposes,23:19-43.2Wichmann,A.(2005).Theroleofintonationintheexpressionofattitudinalmeaning.Englishlanguageandlinguistics,9(2),pp.229-253.

ListeningSkillsInstruction:PracticalTipsforProcessingAuralInput

MarnieReedEnglishL2learnersfacetwolisteningchallenges:successfullyidentifyingwordsincontinuousspeechandunderstandingaspeaker’sintendedmeaning.Instructorsneedpracticaltipstohelplearnersparsecontinuousspeechanddiscernspeakerintent.ThisTeachingTipsharestwo3-partstrategiestofacilitateprocessingutterancecontentandinterpretingmessagemeaning.

Segmentalaccuracy:Arecommendedtrainingsequenceformovinglearnersfromaccurateperceptiontoaccurate(andautomatic!)productioninthestreamofspeech

MonicaRichards&ElenaCotos

AkeyreasonL2learnersstruggletopronouncenewsegmentalsisbecausetheirL1hastrainedthemtohearL2phonemesasallophonic(Best&Tyler,2007;Broersma&Cutler,2008;Flege,1995;Jenkins,2000;Qian,Chukharev-Hudalainen,&Levis,2018;Richards,2011).L2learners’segmentalpronunciation,therefore,mayexactlyreplicatewhattheyhearandstillfailtounmistakablyproducetheL2phonemetheyintend.Whenlearnerscannotaccuratelyhearaword’sphonemicstructure,theycanonlyself-assesstheirL2pronunciationbycomparingtheirconsciousknowledgeofhowthewordshouldbepronouncedwiththephysiological“feel”oftheirvocalorganmanipulation.Butisperformingthisconscioustaskonaregularbasisduringthestreamofspeechevenpossible?Afterall,indiscourseL2learnersmustsimultaneouslyengageinseveralhigher-levelcognitiveprocessesthatarealsomuchharderinL2thanL1:

1) Comprehendingwhatothersaresaying;2) Identifyingconnectionsbetweenwhatothersaresayingandwhattheyalreadyknow;3) Figuringoutwhatideastheywanttosaynext;and4) Figuringouthowtosayit(intermsofinformationstructure,politeness,grammar,etc.)

ItisthereforevitalthatL2learners,likeL1speakers,beabletopassivelyself-assesswhilelisteningtotheirowntalkthatthephonestheypronouncetrulyarecategorizedintheL2asthephonemetheyintend.Forthesamereason,learners’physicalproductionofaccurateL2phonemedistinctionscannotremainconsciousbutinsteadmustbecomeautomatedandhabitual(Jenkins,2000).Thispresentationthereforeintroducesarecommendedtrainingsequenceformovinglearnersfromaccurateperceptiontoaccurate(andautomatic!)productionofchallengingL2segmentalsinthestreamofspeech.

PracticingPronunciationthroughDigitalStorytelling

MaryRitterEnglishlanguagelearnersare“frequentlymisinterpretedasrude,abrupt,ordisinterestedsolelybecauseoftheprosodicsoftheirspeech”(Celce-Murcia,1996).Indeed,target-likeprosodycontinuestobeanobstacleeveninadvancedclasses.Thispresentationwillshareasimple,accessiblevideo-makingappthatencouragesstudentstoexperimentwithprosodywhileengagingindigitalstorytelling.AdobeSparkVideoisafreeappthatallowsuserstocreateanimatedvideosfeaturingtheirrecordedvoicesalongwithdrawings,icons,andmusic;becausetheyinvolveanunseennarrator,thesevideosrelyheavilyonthevoicetocommunicatemeaning.Inmypresentation,IwilldiscussandshowexamplesofanAdobeSparkVideoprojectinwhichstudentsproducednarrativesaboutcreativedifferences;inscaffoldingthisproject,Ihadstudentsexploreprosodicfeaturesofstorytelling,movingfromcontrolledandguidedpracticetofreeproduction.SessionparticipantswilllearntorunAdobeSparkVideoandcreateashortvideobasedonascript.Iwillthendrawattentiontotheroleofintonationinthisvideoformat,considertheinfluenceofpausing,pacing,andvolume,andhighlighttheroleofrepeatedpracticeincreatingthesevideos.Finally,Iwilldiscusshowtoadaptthisdigitalstorytellingprojecttodifferentlevelsofproficiencyortomultilingualgroups.ViewerswillwalkawaywiththeabilitytouseAdobeSparkVideoforteachingpronunciationthroughdigitalstorytelling.

Teachingtip:Developingatask-basedpronunciationsyllabus

MariSakaiEachyear,alawschoolontheEastCoastoftheUnitedStatesisthehostofnearly450internationalattorneyswhoareintheU.S.foroneyeartocompleteaMasterofLaws(LL.M.)degree.Inordertosupportthesestudents’languageneeds,theLegalEnglishLanguageCenteroffersnon-creditwritingandconversationworkshops.Idevelopedthesyllabifortwoeight-weeklongcoursesthatfocusonEnglishconversationskills.Bothcoursesweredesignedusingatask-basedapproach.Thefirstcoursecomprisesprofessionalandacademicconversationandspeakingtasksthatthelawstudentswillfaceduringtheiracademicyear,whilethesecondcoursefocusesontasksthatarelikelytooccurinsocialsituations.Duringtheteachingtipsroundtable,Iwillgiveconferenceattendeescopiesofthetwosyllabi,andIwillsharekeyfeaturesofeachcourse.FirstIwilldescribethe8conversationtasksthatwereselectedforeachcourse.Forexample,theprofessionalandacademicconversationcourseincludesasessiononsmalltalkatnetworkingevents,andthesocialconversationcourseincludesasessiononorderingatcoffeeshopsandrestaurants.ThenIwillpresenttherationalebehindthestructureofoneclasssession(e.g.,warmupwithaperceptiontaskandreviewofpreviousweek’saudioflashcards).

TeachingTips:EnhancingThoughtGroupPedagogyThroughPerceptionandProduction

MarkTanner

AlthoughpronunciationisakeycomponentinhelpingELLsachievefluencyandaccuracyintheirL2(Goodwin,2014),ESLteachersoftenlackconfidenceandcompetenceinknowinghowtobestteachpronunciation(Foote,etal.2013;Gilbert,2009,p.1),whichcausesittooftenbeneglectedinESLclassrooms(Derwing&Munro,2014).ThisisunfortunatebecauseresearchhasshownthatafocusonglobalpronunciationfeaturescanimproveELLs’intelligibilityandcomprehensibility(Derwing&Rossiter,2003;Hahn,2004;Zielinski,2008).Akeyglobalfeaturecentraltolearners’intelligibilityisthatofthoughtgroups(Murphy,2014).Manypronunciationtextbooks(Gilbert,2012;Grant,2009;Hahn&Dickerson,1999;Miller,2007;Reed,2005)teachthatthoughtgroups(grammaticalunitswhichareseparatedbypausesinspeech)arefundamentaltoimprovinganELL’spronunciation.Teachers,however,stillarenotincorporatingthispowertoolintheirrepertoireofinstructiontechniques.ThisteachingtipisdesignedtohelpTESOLpractitionersexperiencehowtoeffectivelyintegratefocusedthoughtgroupinstructionintotheireverydaylistening/speakingclassroommaterialsandinstruction.ComebepartoftheTESOLcommunitywhoknowshowtoteachESL/EFLlearnersanessentialpronunciationfeaturedesignedtoimprovestudents’intelligibilityandpronunciation.

Personalizingpeakvoweltraininginstressedsyllables:AsneakpeekatBlueCanoeforperceptionandproduction

LaraWallace&SofíaFernandez

Circumferenceorcircumstance?Percentageorpersonpage?Atbest,placingstressonadifferentsyllablecanmomentarilyconfuselisteners;othertimes,itcanleadtolisteners’miscomprehension(Bond,1999).Likewise,usingadifferentpeakvowel(think“circular”Vs“secular”)canhavesimilarresults.WithnearlythreetimesthenumberofvowelsoundsasletterswehaveforwritingvowelsintheEnglishlanguage,learningthesesoundscanbechallenging.Todistinguishbetweenthem,theColorVowelChartgivesusacommonlanguagetousesothatwecanunderstand,forexample,thatthepeakvowelis“purpleshirt”circular,not“redpepper”secular.ForInternationalTeachingAssistants(ITAs)whoarechargedwithinstructinguniversityclasses,itisofutmostimportancetoboththemandtheirstudentstobeabletopronounceintelligiblysuchimportantwordsintheirlessons.Oneofthekeystodoingsoproficiently,asKangandMoran’s(2014)researchsuggests,requiresthesespeakerstohavefewvowelerrorsthatareofhighfunctionalload.Inthisteachingtip,wewillhavealookatamethodforidentifyingsuchwords,thentraininglearners’perceptionofvowelsoundsandpracticingtheirproductionofthesoundsincontext.Thismultimodalmethodisbasedonacommunicativeframework(Celce-Murcia,Brinton,&Goodwin,2010)andutilizestheColorVowelChartandsomeofthefeaturesofBlueCanoe,anappcurrentlybeingpilotedthathasbeendesignedaroundtheColorVowelChart.Participantswillcomeawaywithaworksheettheycanusewiththeirstudentsandasneakpeekatthispromisingapp.References:Bond,Z.(1999).Slipsoftheear.SanDiego,CA:AcademicPress.Celce-Murcia,M.,Brinton,D.,andGoodwin,J.(2010).Teachingpronunciation:Acoursebook

andreferenceguide(2nded.).NY:CambridgeUniversityPress.Kang,O.andMoran,M.(2014).Functionalloadsofpronunciationfeaturesinnonnative

speakers'oralassessment.TESOLQuarterly,48(1).Retrievedfromhttp://doi.wiley.com/10.1002/tesq.152

psllt/tsll 2018€¦ · session 5 presentations 2:30-3:00 pm . towards a deeper, uh, understanding...

Documents