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This unit explains the basics of pronunciation and phonology and techniques for teaching. Pronunciation is one of the most neglected aspects of teaching in English language and when teaching pronunciation the concentration is usually on individual sound which is not necessary the most important aspect. Phonology on the other hand is a study about physical properties of sound and includes whole sound system of a language. There are different areas of phonology, one of them is intonation. Intonation can be explained as a message in a sentence. It is used to express emotions, and when questioning, agreeing, disagreeing, and confirming. There are three patterns of Intonation: rise/fall, fall/rise, and flat. Rise/fall pattern, also known as normal pattern, is used to indicate (with intonation falling at the end) that the speaker finished what he wanted to say and no reply is needed. Fall/rise pattern is used to express surprise, disagreement, and the speaker is expecting a reply or the speaker has not finished speaking yet (eg: You?ll never guess!). With flat Intonation (no rise or fall) the speaker is not interested in talking to that person or has not that much to say. Other areas of phonology are stress (which part of the word should be stressed, the strong part), connected speech and linked speech (native English speakers usually link some words or sounds together or drop few sounds when speaking), and phonemic alphabet. Phonemic alphabet is an alphabet that forgets about a traditional spelling of a word and focuses on the sound you make when speaking, with set of symbols. There are voiced and unvoiced sounds. Voiced sounds produce vibration of vocal cords (bat), with unvoiced there is no vibration (pat) being produced. There are few techniques for teaching pronunciation of individual sounds. Teachers can use tongue twisters, pictures of a mouth when a particular sound is made, peer dictation (one student speaks, the other one writes down what he or she is saying), and many more. In this unit I learned about different aspects of pronunciation, and techniques for teaching them. Especially phonetic alphabet can be hard for a non native teacher to teach and students to learn because it is a set of all new symbols and are used not for creating words but breaking them down and focusing on pronunciation. Just learning how the word is written, and how to pronounce is not enough, if we really want the students to learn how to speak properly (and with all the rules and exceptions the English language has, not every word written the same is pronounced the same) breaking down the words to sounds and teaching them about stress and intonation can make the learning more beneficial.
