Bill Acton's Embodiment Blog: TWU

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Sunday, April 10, 2022

KINETIK English Fluency and Pronunciation Course (5/26~8/9)!

The course is being offered to the public for the first time by the Trinity Western University MATESOL (LIVE on Zoom or by viewing the class video later.) It has a somewhat unorthodox time format:

Instructor: Bill Acton
May 26 – August 9, 2022 (12 weeks), 3-4 hours per week

Thursday: 7 – 8 p.m. PST
And Wednesday, the following week: 7 - 8 p.m. PST
Homework: 15-20 minutes per day, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.

Specifics:
This course is for those who want to improve their speaking fluency and pronunciation of English. It is especially helpful for students who have IELTS level of 4.5+ and do not have time or opportunity to practice speaking English outside of class, themselves, but have reasonably good listening skills.

The KINETIK teaching method includes neuroscience-based haptic techniques (using special gestures and touch) to improve memory for new vocabulary, pronunciation and and confidence in speaking.

In addition to one hour of class each week and one hour of homework review every week on Zoom, for best results students should practice their homework exercises at least 15-30 minutes per day, 4~5 days a week. Book and practice video recordings are provided.

A brief, preliminary interview on Zoom is required to be admitted into the course. If interested, contact Professor Bill Acton (William.acton@twu.ca) in the MATESOL Department at Trinity Western University. Classes are recorded. If a class is missed, it can be watched later. Certificate is awarded for 80% attendance.

Course fee: $500 CAD ($400 USD) Group discounts available.

Also: The 4-week version of the instructor certificate course is also available this summer, on campus, in Langley, BC, July 18th ~ August 12th. One hour of class, 4 days a week and approximately 6 additional hours per week of preparation and practice. Cost: $800, all materials included. (A zoom hybrid of the course may be available as well.) Contact me, if interested: william.acton@twu.ca.

Keep in touch!

Bill

Tuesday, September 8, 2020

Next Haptic Pronunciation Teaching (Free!) Webinars!

We (the MATESOL at Trinity Western University) are doing two FREE introductory webinars on haptic pronunciation teaching: Friday, October 2nd and Saturday, November 14th, 2020. The webinars are held from 7:30 p.m. PST to 9:00. Contact: william.acton@twu.ca for more information and reservations. (Places limited!) At least two reasons we are offering those:

First, "haptic" is the only way to teach pronunciation (at least in our modest opinion!)

Second, every spring, beginning in mid-January, we offer an online, 3-credit graduate course, Ling 611 - Applied Phonology. Roughly one quarter of that course is "Haptic Pronunciation Teaching."

For more detail on the webinars noncredit haptic course and the grad course, go here!

You can apply to take either the regular course (for about $2200 CAD, as a special student) or the noncredit haptic stream by itself (for about $500--comes with a certificate.)

You do need some prerequisite work to do Ling 611, for example, some background in phonetics, linguistics and pronunciation teaching. (Check with me if you have a question on that.) No prereqs required for the haptic stream, however. The grad course runs 14 weeks; the haptic certificate, 12. The grad course takes about 8~10 hours a week; the certificate, about 3.

Ling 611 or the certificate course can also be hosted at your school or program, done for groups or individually.

See you next month!

Bill

william.acton@twu.ca

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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.)