HICPR: "De feet" - a new, winning (haptic) strategy for teaching English rhythm

Thursday, April 27, 2017

"De feet" - a new, winning (haptic) strategy for teaching English rhythm

Clker.com

Alert: This post is best read while standing barefoot with some of your favorite dance music in the background or while walking or jogging to it. New research by Greene and colleagues at New Mexico Highlands University summarized by Science Daily, demonstrates just how you can ensure that your brain is really "pumped" about what follows.

Next Friday morning (at 8:30 A.M. no less!) at the annual BCTEAL (British Columbia) conference in Vancouver, we'll be rolling out the new v5.0 version of the "Rhythmic Feet Fight Club". If you are new to haptic pronunciation teaching here is the 2009 version and here is the 2013 version.

If you are new to what the rhythmic feet of English are about, here is a (somewhat technical) but nice set of slides by Goldstein at USC or this straightforward one from a "handbook" at Emory University. "Feet" are, in essence, groups of syllables that determine the flow of English speech, each grouping having one (stronger) stressed syllable that creates foregrounding or focus in that grouping.

There are hundreds of techniques on the web that use something like dance, where one foot or the other lands on stressed syllables of words or phrases; some, such as Jazz Chants, that have learners clapping hands while they do. v5.0 is a bit like that. Haptically, along with the feet touching the floor, the hands either squeeze something or rhythmically (in boxing gloves) hammer at the boxing gloves of another learner, as in the (relatively "foot-loose") 2009 version above.

What is "new" in v5.0 is the explicit (fun) inclusion of light, enthusiastic foot stomping--while doing something like shadow boxing--on stressed syllables of rhythmic feet. (We'll post a video of that session next week.) I realize that sounds a bit too "full body" and cognitively complicated for 8:30 a.m., but it is actually quite easy to master, as long as you carefully ramp up with each of the "body parts" involved as you do.

Before I take off the gloves, in fact, I'm going to have a serious, f2f "conversation" with the conference scheduler who put us (Shine Hong and myself) in that pre-conscious-pre-coffee early presentation slot. (It should be a "knock out" of a session, nonetheless!)

Join us.

Key citation:
Experimental Biology 2017. (2017, April 24). How walking benefits the brain: Researchers show that foot's impact helps control, increase the amount of blood sent to the brain. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April 26, 2017 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/04/170424141340.htm

1 comment:

Selinda EApril 27, 2017 at 6:01 AM
Sounds cool! Best of luck at BCTEAL!
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What is haptic pronunciation teaching?

Basically, it is using gesture, touch and movement to teach pronunciation of English (or any language). What makes this method unique is that it is based on controlled and systematic use of gesture in doing that. (Often the problem with gesture use in language learning is that it can be "crazy" or random or intimidating or inconsistent, or not well-developed and tied to clear outcomes.)

The earlier "Essential Haptic-integrated English Pronunciation (EHIEP) approach," now KINETIK, does a better job of enhancing presentation, modelling, feedback and correction. The method is simple and easy to follow. Once a 30-minute module is finished, teacher and students have a set of techniques to use in class anytime a pronunciation problem or opportunity comes up!

Haptic Preliminaries

I often begin workshops or papers with the comment that in about 40 years in the field I have had just one idea: that the systematic use of body movement is essential to effective and efficient pronunciation instruction. That has never been more relevant than today, with the general deemphasis on pronunciation and introduction of technology into the field. From both perspectives, the "haptic" perspective approach developed here offers great promise. I can at least promise you a "moving" experience!

What is the KINETIK Method?

KINETIK is the name of the new v6.0 haptic pronunciation teaching system. About six years earlier we were using the acronym, "Haptic Integrated Pronunciation for Other/Extended Circle English Speakers" (HIPOECES)--still there in the url of this blog!

Haptic-integrated clinical pronunciation is:

A different way to learn pronunciation, based in part on Arthur Lessac’s notion of “Training the body first.” It is also based on research in the use of movement and touch in learning and training. It:

Looks somewhat like a combination of aerobics, sign language and Taichi

Provides a basic foundation for continued, self-directed pronunciation learning and classroom instruction

Designed for use by relatively untrained teachers but appropriate for all teachers (and learners) of all levels

Focuses on pronunciation used in conversation (not all words in English)

Is a highly “brain-and-body-friendly” system that promotes efficient learning of integrated tasks in general

Designed to promote integrated classroom pronunciation instruction and enable integration of conscious pronunciation work into spontaneous speaking.

Introduction

This blog was formerly named: HIPoeces (pronounced 'hI-pƏ-cIs), basically an approach to teaching English pronunciation to speakers of "outer and expanding" circle Englishes (including that population commonly termed: non-native speakers) but also compatible with the use of local models other than simply Standard" American" or RP. Using Kachru's "Inner, expanding and outer circles" model to characterize the breadth of Englishes and speakers of those, HIPoeces (now HICP) systems focus on developing haptically-centered pedagogical models and methods which can be adapted for teaching the pronunciation of various Englishes as they are spoken and taught by "owners" of those varieties.

In theory, the underlying principles can be applied to teaching the sound system of any language. Most language instructors intuitively use a great deal of movement and tactile anchoring in the classroom. The essential question is how to use that resource systematically, especially so that those learners who are less "haptic" in nature are also "moved" by the method.

Simply put, the HICP model/method is based on the idea of speaking along with arm and hand movement, not all that different from that used in sign languages. Most movement patterns are taken from either typical classroom pronunciation instruction practice or from related fields, such as psychotherapy or sports.

Most blog posts link to research that relates to the general HICP model, that is studies dealing with the role of gesture, touch, movement, learning modalities, learning in output, use of the visual field in learning, and experiential learning.

DEFINITIONS:

"Haptic" techniques- procedures that involve both movement and touch (Obvious examples include clapping hands, tapping feet, or holding an object and shaking it to the rhythm of a poem.)

"HICP techniques" - procedures that are haptic and also explicitly coordinated with phonological structures and/or discourse prosody (For example, clapping hands on primary stressed syllables in multi-syllable words, or doing a dance step on key words in conversational turns.)

"Haptic integration"- The haptic dimension probably functions as much to anchor visual and auditory material as it does to assist the learner in getting the "felt sense" of the sound or sound process. Lack of integration into spontaneous speech being such a serious potential shortcoming of instruction, haptic engagement seems a promising bridge to more accurate fluency.

"Visual field" - in HICP extensive use is made of the visual field in front of the learner. (For example, a modified version of the IPA vowel chart is anchored haptically in the imagination of the learner, directly in front of the upper body, and used for several purposes throughout the program.)