Meta-pronunciation: Just do it!

Nice post by Wilson and Conyers on Edutopia blog looking at teaching metacognitive skills to kids. (Some of the links off the post are good as well.) So how does that relate to haptic pronunciation teaching (HPT)? Pretty directly as a matter of fact. They give 5 general principles:

1. "Explicitly teach students about this essential learning skill by defining the term metacognition." (Basically, managing or "driving" your brain in their terms!)
HPT principle: Learn to control attention during haptic work and manage homework and practice effectively. (See previous posts on "mindfulness.")

2. "Ask students to describe the benefits and supply examples of driving their brains well."
HPT principle: Explicitly work with students on their strategies for "brain control" during pronunciation work and other subjects and follow up with some kind of written, reflective journaling to assist them in using their time efficiently.

3. "Whenever possible, let students choose what they want to read and topics they want to learn more about."
HPT principle: Students must quickly begin finding more words and phrases on which to practice, as well as writing them down consistently during class work.

4. "Look for opportunities to discuss and apply metacognition across core subjects . . ."
HPT principle: The HPT strategies, called pedagogical movement patterns, should be used in all classes for correction, modelling and feedback.

5. "Model metacognition by talking through problems."

AHEPS v2.0

HPT principle: One key feature of HPT is that the new or changed sound pattern must be anchored immediately to an exemplar, a word or phrase:
(a) That word or phrase should be annotated at least by identifying the vowel number on the stressed syllable,
(b) probably while looking at the graphic representation of the word (as it is written in type-form.) In some cases,
(c) the phonetic representation should accompany that. Finally,
(d) instructor and student together should practice the exemplar together (ideally 3 times) with rich vocal resonance out loud, accompanied by a pedagogical movement pattern (one of 10 or 12 in the system.)

The end of (pronunciation) homework!

Clip art:
Clker

How essential is homework/practice to the success of your students? Interesting set of four pieces on homework linked off the ASCD website entitled: "The end of homework." The theme of each is as follows: (a) purpose, (b) multi-level and multi-faceted, (c) focus on achievable goals and benchmarks, and (d) getting students to take ownership and "create" their own systematic homework.

 What is the overall "end" of your pronunciation homework assignments? Here is one model.

I came back to the relevance of homework recently when I had lost track of the time and did not have enough left at the end of class to set up the students adequately for homework. On the way out the door, I told them that I'd email them their practice routines for the coming week. Here is the essence of what I sent them: (The italics are for you, not for them. They know the drill!)

1. Before next week, practice your personal word and phrase list at least three times. The words or phrases have been targeted in class or in a 1-on-1 session for additional work. 

Integrating new words into spontaneous speech typically takes a couple of weeks; integrating new sounds, depending on proficiency level can take at least that long or much longer, as in the case of fossilized pronunciation where each word with the target sound must be identified and practiced for a couple of weeks.

2. Each 15-30 minute practice session should run basically as follows: (a) Do a quick vocal warm up, (b) Turn on your recorder, (c) Do each word or phrase ONLY 3 times, using the appropriate haptic-based pedagogical gesture as you say it. STOP recorder.

3. Listen to the recording, focusing just on the third repetition of each word. Note (write down) which of the words or phrases still seem to need work. Record just those again, 3x, and listen back. Just write down what you hear and move on!

4. Add additional words or phrases to your word list. Check dictionary pronunciation before practicing them. Students have been trained in a 6-step dictionary protocol for getting pronunciation from the dictionary. They may have to check pronunciation again before doing the word list practice.

I may check progress next class, sometimes just before class begins formally, or ask student to send me a recording of word list practice as it is done the 3rd time. We decide together which words or phrases to add or delete from their lists--when adequate control of them is evident and they have been practiced at least 5 or 6 times. Students should gradually take over management of the list themselves. 

Have posted many times on homework-related topics. This one really struck "home!"

Situating pronunciation practice with "directed thinking?"

Clip art: Clker

So how do you get learners to regularly practice their pronunciation, either as homework or using self-directed spontaneous strategies? There are many approaches, from pleasure to pain, but the most widely tried are strategies such as "getting them to focus on the L2 identity or think about either why they should do it or what their desired outcome will be." Turns out those approaches may not be the best way to do it.

In a  2007 study of strategies for enhancing exercise engagement by sedentary college sophomores by Eyck, Gresky and Lord (summarized by Science Daily), it was found that "directed thinking" about what they could do to increase the likelihood of their being able to do their conditioning routines, that is the actions they could take to facilitate that activity--rather than why they should (desirable outcomes) or the exercises, themselves--produced significantly better results. They had been instructed to first create a list of such beneficial or enabling activities that they could do and then daily, at a regular time, mentally review the list for eight weeks. Exercise persistence and increased levels of conditioning followed.

Perhaps most importantly, the approach of Eyck et al. addresses what are often the most common impediments to practice: scheduling conflicts and manageable "temptations." (May be one reason I have worked with so few "fossilized" accountants over the years!) Having learners plan their week's practice in class is often effective, as is working with the pragmatics of "context management," i.e., how to set up people around you to practice on. From that perspective, there should be no excuse for no practice. 

Good to great pronunciation: the "happiness" model

One of the most challenging aspects of pronunciation work is the "meta-communicative" function of appropriately identifying change and then predicting what is next. I was struck by the analogy between that process and aspects of this 2012 study by Sheldon of University of Missouri-Columbia (Summarized by Science Daily) that suggests that sustaining happiness involves two main factors: " . . .   the need to keep having new and positive life-changing experiences and the need to keep appreciating what you already have and not want more too soon." (The validity of the study may, of course, be compromised by the fact that it involved 481 subjects living in the Riverside, California area . . . )

The criteria underlying that definition of "happiness" are wonderfully revealing, culturally "Californian" and near debilitating. Evolving pronunciation may not be correlated with many positive "life-changing" experiences, but the question of instructor and learner awareness of what the process is and how it is going is often crucial, especially at points such as the move from "good to great." (Collins' 2005 book, Good to Great, a business classic, describes that general threshold well.) In other words, it is often not the target that is the problem, but the surreal expectations involved. Western teaching methodology in general too easily relies on motivation to finish the job--or take responsibility for failure.  

There was a time, of course, when the bar of native speaker-like pronunciation was set impossibly high--for any number of reasons-- but at least it did give one a scale to work with.  But now that at least some (informed theorists and teachers) have accepted the target of "intelligible" speech, it has become easier to "appreciate what you have and not want more . . . " 

Clip art: Clker

Until there is considerably more change in societal attitudes and human nature, however, problematic pronunciation may still interfere with the need for positive, life-changing experiences, like going from a good job to a great one--or from English class to any job. You and your students happy with that? If not, what do you expect? More importantly, what do you expect them to expect? 

Grow Staged (Haptic-integrated) Self-directed (language) learners

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Here is a Slideshare presentation of Grow's (1991) Staged Self-Directed Learner model. The four learner stages (dependency, interested, involved and self-directed) are matched with instructor stages (authority or coach, motivator or guide, facilitator, consultant or delegator). The EHIEP system focuses especially on the first two stages in order to enable the latter two, which are more a function of the complete language study and experience, not just pronunciation, per se. For any number of reasons, the nine basic modules of EHIEP are tightly controlled and monitored. At the conclusion of that program, at Grow's Stage Three, the learner should be well trained with a set of learning and anchoring strategies that are appropriate for both individual and classroom work.

As noted in a couple of earlier blogposts, one of the "shibboleths" or critical benchmarks of effective HICP work is what we call for lack of a better term, full-body listening. Learners consistently report that they are much better at being able to listen and "play back" what they hear, not just the words but the expressiveness involved--through their bodies. Some say it is as if the recording goes on in the chest as well as the ears. Good (haptically-integrated) pronunciation and listening is GROW'n--not just bored into being that way!

FRIENDS of pronunciation teaching

Attending a MA thesis defence that involves examination of the well-known, but highly controversial,  FRIENDS anxiety management program for kids. The acronym FRIENDS stands for: "FEELINGS,  REMEMBER to relax, I CAN do it! (I can try my best!),  EXPLORE solutions and coping step plans, NOW reward yourself! (You've done your best!),  DON'T forget to practice! and SMILE! Stay calm for life." One of the basic mantras is: Your body is  your friend!

That is a nice, memorable mnemonic. The question, of course, from our perspective is, in essence, what specific haptic-based techniques are associated with each step in the process and how are they related and scaffolded. It is actually an interesting glimpse at the relationship between basic  learner meta-cognitive frameworks so widely promoted today (by cognitive phonologists, for example)  and potential method protocols, which can vary almost infinitely.  Try connecting up your current teaching framework to  FRIENDS. Anxiety-provoking? If so, try something more HICP-FRIENDLY . . .