Sing first: listen later: Noticing new or different sounds in L2 pronunciation learning

Here's one for all of us who make extensive use of singing in class. (Here is yet another case where experienced practitioners know it works from experience but have been just waiting for research to catch up and tell them why!) Research by McLachlan, Marco,  Light and Wilson at Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, summarized, as usual, by Science Daily . . . notes the following:

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 "What we found was that people needed to be familiar with sounds created by combinations of notes before they could hear the individual notes. If they couldn't find the notes they found the sound dissonant or unpleasant . . . This finding overturns centuries of theories that physical properties of the ear determine what we find appealing."

 

In other words, at some very basic level, appreciation of a style of music is learned. The "notes" in the study had to be first encountered in relation to others in the system before they could be identified or appreciated. Singing in language instruction--and probably to a lesser degree, listening comprehension techniques with pronunciation-- certainly serve that function. This is an important study, one with very interesting potential ramifications for our work. I will try to get the full research report and report back . . ..

Notice: Here is my annual apology for using sometimes less than reliable or politically neutral  secondary sources, such as Science Daily or The New York Times or research abstracts from studies that receive  public support but publish in journals that you can't access with out being a member of "The Guild" or can't afford to pay $32 per article for (or wouldn't just on ethical grounds if you did have the spare change lying around): Sorry about that. (There. Done.)

Let's (not) get (too) physical in pronunciation teaching!

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With apologies to Olivia Newton-John, I still get that response occasionally in workshops and in reaction to blogposts. The focus of HICPR is not on developing a "physical" method or approach to pronunciation teaching but rather on ensuring that the body is given an appropriate place in the process, especially with the development of technology and haptic-grounded virtual reality. Those who are not by nature "connected" to their bodies, either they (a) don't listen to it much at all or (b) are overly sensitive to how it feels and looks, may not be at ease in the "haptic" lesson or integrating movement, touch and general body awareness in their work.

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Have done a couple of earlier posts related to mindfulness theory, meditation practices and body representation. A fascinating study by Dykstra and Barelds of Groningen University, entitled, "Examining a model of dispositional mindfulness, body comparison, and body satisfaction," suggests something of a different approach to better orienting learners and instructors to haptic engagement: dispositional mindfulness training. The research demonstrated " . . . a positive relation between mindfulness and body satisfaction: as individuals are more mindful, they are more satisfied with their body . . . consistent with the fact that non-judgment, a central component of mindfulness, is also highly relevant to the construct of body image . . . "

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The key element there is "dispositional," part of a general, eminently trainable, response to internal and external pressures and stressors, characterizing one's disposition or style of responding (varying from extremely reactive to non-reactive, for example). Combine that with mindfulness, a general, relatively nonjudgmental  awareness or comprehension of what is going on, and you have what appears to be a near optional mindset for learning pronunciation for any . . . body. Dispositional (haptic-integrated) mindful pronunciation learning: DHIMPL!

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Some of that is embodied in EHIEP today, the felt sense of confident, comfortable, (dimpled?) managed pedagogical movement, but it should also be the model underlying language instruction in general. The secret to getting there is your point of departure, Lessac's dictum: Train the body first!

Your pronunciation teaching going off in all directions? Good!

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At least a-parent-ly! As reported in previous blogposts, semiotically, almost any framework for personality, behaviour, groups or the nature of the visual field can be positioned on north-south, east-west axes. Here's another example. A study by led by Hunter at the University of Virginia, summarized by Science Daily, provides a categorization schema for describing four "family cultures" in contemporary US. Each category " . . . represents a complex configuration of moral beliefs, values and dispositions -- often implicit and rarely articulated in daily life -- largely independent of basic demographic factors, such as race, ethnicity and social class." Here they are, followed by my interpretation of their general "direcction" in parentheses:

 A. The (American, idealistic) dreamers (27%) " . . . defined by their optimism about their children's abilities and opportunities." (North = Externally oriented, more meta-cognitive, extrovert-ish)

B. The (less educated, pragmatic) detached (21%) "Let kids be kids and let the cards fall where they may." (South = Internally oriented, less-conscious, introvert-ish) 

C. The (liberal) engaged progressives (21%) " . . . guided . . . by their own personal experience or what "feels right" to them." (East = Change oriented, creative) 

D. The (conservative/traditional) faithful (20%) " . . . seek to defend and multiply the traditional social and moral order." (West = Stability and structure-oriented) 

The four stereotypes presented in the (necessarily) brief summary are wonderfully artificial--especially in how they covertly reintroduce race, ethnicity and social class, despite the disclaimer, in the form of parenting cultures. (It is worth reading just for the entertainment value. I assume the full research report is still also worth reading for a more complete, scholarly contextualization of the study.) What is relevant is the basic set of four "directions," based on "beliefs, values and dispositions."  The "finding" of the research appears to be that the culture is fracturing, with ominous consequences, of course. Substitute in "learners" for children/kids and "cognitive/behavioural" for progressive/conservative above. 

The same principle applies to any integrated system, including pronunciation teaching, especially how it is experienced by the learner. For an interesting exercise, identify your "coordinates." (In this model a "perfect program" might  even be at 0/0, in fact, although at times in the process it may veer off radically in one direction or another for various intermediate learning outcomes) I'd position EHIEP, by design overall, generally at about 10 degrees North latitude and 20 degrees East longitude. In other words, requiring somewhat more public risk taking/performance and also more ongoing experience of change, but still not too far off center, particularly in reference to language structure and private, "inner speak." 

EHIEP "haptic video" system development update!

 By late February everything should be ready for use in local programs, most anywhere on the planet. At this point, these courses could be in several formats: 

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• A one-hour introductory session and then 
• 8 or 9 weeks of classes, one module per week (or just selected modules, relevant for that class)
• Each class would begin with a 30-minute instructional video, and then
• could involve either 
•      *immediate in class follow up by the instructor, or
•      *assigned homework, or 
•      *(simply) integrated use of the techniques by the instructor in subsequent speaking, listening or vocabulary instruction. 
• For each module there are 3 homework practice videos, accompanied by a section from the student workbook. 
• There are also about 12, 5-minute mini-modules for selected consonants. 

Image: AMPISys

EHIEP can be done

• online, 
• in schools or at
• informal venues,
• as independent study,
• by trained or untrained instructors.

Based in part  on the recent "TED" blogpost, will have some new video to introduce the EHIEP system, etc. to prospective students. Have been talking with the university about collaboration in some venues to get official certificates or join in w/advertising, etc. Will also set up "profit sharing" framework for other potential partners who run or sponsor a class. 

Am setting up one-day teacher training workshops in a number of places, beginning in April. (We are doing one already at the TESOL convention in Dallas.) The idea there will be to do a day of training at relatively low cost to participants and then make available the online video and materials, either by download or subscription. WIll announce those here as they are confirmed. 

If you'd like to try out a specific, pre-publication EHIEP "haptic" video in your class, let me know. (wracton@gmail.com)

Grasping Haptic II: Haptic presence

So what does it "feel" like, what is the "felt sense," when one is fully engaged in haptic-integrated pronunciation work? About the best term or metaphor I have encountered is "grasp," in the sense that McLuhan was alluding to (掴む 'tsukamu' in Japanese is even better.) It entails both perception of the object or person and the sensation of near-physical presence or connectedness to it. In this piece by Abeele et al (2007) the discussion of the distinction between social presence and connectedness points to the key notion in haptic anchoring: the former is entirely outward directed; the latter, more  internal, emotional.

In other words, effective haptic anchoring depends upon being able to totally embrace, momentarily, the somatic (body), internal sensations of a sound--completely disregarding "incoming" data and stimulation:  total, undivided attention! The ability to do that should later result in both more efficient monitoring of--and integration of new sounds into--spontaneous speech. And that is easily within the 掴む of any learner.

Why do "HICP-EHIEP?"

I realize that that working title for the English application may be a little hard to embrace. (Hiccuping apes, in general, do not have an easy time of it!) Here is an elaborated version of what is now in the right column.  HICP-EHIEP:

• Is a different way to learn pronunciation, based in part on Arthur Lessac’s notion of “Training the body first” 
• Looks somewhat like a combination of aerobics, sign language and Taichi 
• Provides a basic foundation for continued, self-directed pronunciation learning and classroom instruction 
• Is 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
• Can be delivered entirely through (haptic) video and (optional) web-based consultation

Coloring (haptic-integrated) English vowels

There are traditions and analogous studies related to synaesthesia and vowel symbolism that link colors with vowel quality, both neurophysiologically and metaphorically. How about if were were to combine some of those frameworks, identifying vowel positioning in the visual field with their relative intensity, energy and hue, roughly speaking: high-front=yellow, mid-front=orange, high & mid-back=green, low central and back=blue, and schwa=dark gray. It might look something like this: We linked this 2007 study by Lowrey and Schrum last year in an earlier post on the phonaesthetics of English vowels. (with "gray-ground," of course!) 

In HICP we use something similar, except typically "coloring" only stressed vowels in words and/or phrases and altering hues as appropriate. (The coloring of the previous sentences uses only basic colors.) There are many different pedagogical systems that use colors mnemonically to connect to vowels, such as blue, red, green, etc., to help students remember vowels. One of those three, "red" colored red, actually does, in fact, match the HICP framework, using the intense red/orange for the mid-front (relatively vibrant) vowel felt sense in (at least) some dialects of English, including my own! (Note: This is a pedagogical system that has developed and been tested in the classroom, primarily.) 

The connections to research are intriguing but not the "prime mover" in what has evolved in the last year.) Forgive the vocal singing performance pun, but what your vowel teaching may need is just a little "color-a-tour-a!"