A Look at Pronunciation

Oral Listening

Keywords:
Culture, Discussion, Listening, Presentation, Speaking, Vocabulary, Intonation, Listening, Pitch, Pronunciation

Delivery: Fully online (授業の実施形態: 完全オンライン)

Students will be asked to have their cameras on during live sessions.

Course Description

This course is a combination listening and speaking course suitable for students with a TOEFL Paper-Based Test score of up to 459, or for students who have successfully complete the Gateway English course.

Students will be exposed to a lot listening to aid picking up sounds and comprehending sentences, and through pair and small group work, practice the pronunciation of English sounds, words, and sentences. Throughout the semester, students will be required to listen to and enunciate sounds, words, sentences and longer texts. By the end of the course, students should have the ability to better understand or comprehend English, and when speaking, sound more like a native speaker of English.

Assessment for the course will be short quizzes, some homework, and a peer-assessed short talk about a familiar topic. All homework, summaries and assignments will be done through Moodle.

Student Selection

This course is best suited for students who:

have a TOEFL Paper-Based Test score between 425 and 459
are comfortable taking instruction and participating in English
are happy to perform pair and group work
are keen work hard to develop more native-like pronunciation in English

Instructions:

In addition to regular participation both in class and on-line, students must complete all assignments (and complete them in a timely manner) to pass the course.
Students must pay attention to this university’s attendance regulations in this class.
Some or all of the homework for this course will be online, and or uploaded in digital format. Students enrolling in this course will require access to a computer or at least a smart phone, and the internet. On occasion, students may be required to bring a computer to class.
As 40% of the grade for this course comes from participation, students enrolling in this course will be required to actively participate in pair work and small-group discussion and be prepared to talk in class.

Feedback:

Feedback for this course will be provided by the instructor verbally during class, online through Moodle, or by e-mail. Homework will be checked and graded, and feedback given automatically through Moodle. The final assignment will be uploaded to Moodle and manually graded by the teacher. The presentation will be peer-assessed on-line in Moodle. Periodic updates on each student's grade condition will be provided by the instructor.

Course Objectives

This course will focus on helping learners to improve listening comprehension by better understanding how pronunciation works, and to develop and practice pronunciation techniques to sound more like a native speaker of English. Main objectives include listening to and better identifying sounds and practicing and improving pronunciation

Other objectives include:

increasing vocabulary
developing knowledge about the pronunciation of English

Attendance and Participation: 40%
Homework: 30%
Assignment: 15%
Talk: 15%

1	Session 1 (Tue. 6 Oct. ‘20) Course Introduction, Class Rules, and Moodle Enrollment
2	Session 2 (Tue. 13 Oct. ‘20) Consonant Sounds 1
3	Session 3 (Tue. 20 Oct. ‘20) Consonant Sounds 2 Homework 1
4	Session 4 (Sat. 24 Oct. ‘20) Vowel Sounds 1
5	Session 5 (Tue. 27 Oct. ‘20) Vowel Sounds 2 Homework 2
6	Session 6 (Tue. 3 Nov. ‘20) Stress 1 – Word Stress
7	Session 7 (Tue. 10 Nov. ‘20) Stress 2 – Sentence Stress Homework 3
8	Session 8 (Tue. 17 Nov. ‘20) Rhythm 1 – Linking, Dropping, Adding, and Changing Sounds
9	Session 9 (Tue. 24 Nov. ‘20) Rhythm 2 – Thought Groups and Pauses Homework 4
10	Session 10 (Tue. 1 Dec. ‘20) Intonation 1 – Pitch and Prominence Assignments due
11	Session 11 (Sat. 5 Dec. ‘20) Intonation 2 – Intonation and Delivery Homework 5
12	Session 12 (Tue. 8 Dec. ‘20) Student Talks 1
13	Session 13 (Tue. 15 Dec. ‘20) Student Talks 2
14	Session 14 (Tue. 22 Dec, ‘20) Student Talks 3
15	Online Session - Assignment (Due by 14:30 on Tuesday, 22 December 2020) Song

Come along and discover the richness of English pronunciation. It will be an eye opening and fun course, and rewarding for those willing to put in the hard yards. I won’t be looking at how to pronounce words such as floccinaucinihilipilification, antidisestablishmentarianism or honorificabilitudinitatibus, but this course will help with the correct pronunciation of some more common difficult words like: rollerblading, miscellaneous, Caucasian, deterioration, refrigerator, otolaryngology, tremendous, third, remuneration, and entrepreneurship.