Motivation to do Pronunciation work: Smell-binding study!

Rats! Well . . . actually . . . mice who are motivated to (voluntarily) exercise more are genetically set up or developed to have better, more discriminating vomeronasal glandular structure. Is that big, or what? Check out the Neuroscience News summary of this unpublished study by Haga-Yamanaka, Garland and colleagues at UC-Riverside, forthcoming in PLOS ONE, Exercise Motivation Could Be Linked to Certain Smells.   I LOVE the researchers' potential application of the research: 

“It’s not inconceivable that someday we might be able to isolate the chemicals and use them like air fresheners in gyms to make people even more motivated to exercise,” Garland said. “In other words: spray, sniff, and squat.”

Being a runner, myself,  I especially like the study since it uses mice who are what they term "high runners!" Admittedly it is a bit of a stretch to jump to the gym and then to the ELT/pronunciation classroom from the study, but the reality of how smell affects performance is well established in several disciplines--and probably in your classroom as well! 

Decades ago, a colleague who specialized in olfactory therapies and was a consultant in the corporate world on creating good-smelling work spaces, etc., sold me on the idea of using a scent generator in my pronunciation teaching. Required a mixing of two or three oils to get students in the mood to do whatever I wanted them to  better. Back then it seemed to be effective but there was little research to back it up and it was before we have been forced to work in "scent-free" and other things-free spaces.

What is interesting about the study to our work is the connection between persistence in physical exercise and heightened general sensory awareness, and the way smell in this case is enhanced. My guess is that touch, foundational in haptic pronunciation teaching is keyed in similar ways. Gradually as students practice consistently with the gestural gross and fine motor gestural patterns, what we call pedagogical movement patterns, their differential use of touch increases. (An earlier post identifies over two dozen "-emic" types of touch in the system.) In other words, touch becomes more and more powerful/effective in anchoring sound change and memory for it. 

That insight is central to the new haptic pronunciation teaching system, Acton Haptic Pronunciation Complement--Rhythm First, which will be rolled out early in 2021. (For preliminary details on that, check out the refurbished Acton Haptic website! )

Killing Pronunciation 10: Clear habits of successful (pronunciation) teaching and change

Next installment in our "Killing pronunciation" series: Bad habits or how to overcome them. (If you are not in the habit of following the blog or have missed any of them, go here!)

I'm doing a new graduate course in the spring where I'll be interviewing experienced "master teachers" in second language work. Some questions they'll all get:

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• How important or effective is homework?
• Do you assign it? 
• Do your students do it?'
• If so, how do you get them to?

Pronunciation homework is one of my favorite topics, in part because it is near critical to real success in haptic pronunciation teaching. There have been a series of blog posts, research studies and conference presentations on that, too. The issue that always arises is: How can I change my own habits, let alone those of my students? Whose fault is it that they don't study outside of class or learn much from what they do work on? Can that be improved?

I have a "Clear" answer for you: Check out this new 2-hour video interview of James Clear by Rich Roll, two of my go-to sources on the inner game of change. It is occasioned by Clear's new book, Atomic Habits, reviewed the NY Times, which I just finished reading. Could be a game changer for you . . .

I'd recommend doing this in at least two, one-hour bites and then getting the book so you can follow Clear's simple but elegant game plan. He is a very straight shooter, one whose blog I have been following for some time. If you have too much psychology or not quite enough, this is highly recommended, especially in how you think about the connection between your teaching objectives and what part student follow up and uptake should involve.

"Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going" (Jim Ryan)

Affluent pronunciation: not so fast!

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Will improving your accent or pronunciation enhance your chances of making more money later? That is a study that has not been done to my knowledge. but just ask anybody other than a prominent pronunciation researcher or methodologist (or one of their students) and the answer is a resounding: Well, of course! I did just that, in fact, an informal poll around the building last week: Yes (22) No (0).

The distinction between "accent" and "pronunciation" instruction is important in the field today. It is essentially this: The goal of pronunciation instruction should be intelligible speech; the speaker is understandable without unduly taxing the ear of the listener. Accent reduction, on the other hand, appears to go beyond this "intelligibility threshold" aiming at more and more native-like pronunciation. There may be any number of reasons to "go near there," of course, including working at an international call center, managerial or executive positions where public speaking persona may still require a certain degree of conformity, such as consular representatives--or, of course, secret agent types!

So, how fast can a learner's accent or pronunciation change and get to a goal or model?

Purely anecdotal evidence from about 40 years of working with accent, suggests that for most students it is a relatively long and incremental process--if attempted at all. There are those of amazing natural ability who almost chameleon-like appear to absorb the second language in all its multifaceted dimensions, accent being just part of the picture, of course. In truth, however, most of those who approach a native-like accent work at it, often for years--or longer. If it is worth doing, for only some, mind you, how do you get there?

One way, of course, could be to go to SpeakMoreClearly and help them become more affluent in getting you there quickly. Or . . . you might, however, want to consider this new research by Hampton, Asadi and Olson at Temple University, Good Things for Those Who Wait: Predictive Modeling Highlights Importance of Delay Discounting for Income Attainment." (Summarized by ScienceDaily.com.)

What their research demonstrated was some validation of the old saw, Good things come to those that wait! In essence, children who were trained to postpone the natural drive for more instant gratification (had more self control), later in life made significantly more money. From the ScienceDaily summary:

"Unsurprisingly, the models indicated that occupation and education were the best predictors of high income, followed by location (as determined by zip code) and gender -- with males earning more than females. Delay discounting was the next most-important factor, being more predictive than age, race, ethnicity or height."

So how does that work for predicting success at obtaining great pronunciation or accent?

(occupation and education) -- (zip code and gender) -- delay discounting. i.e., self control/delayed gratification -- (age, race, ethnicity or height)

That actually might work, as long as you flip the gender (from male in the affluence study to female!) and begin the study at age 12 or so. That would be particularly the case if you factor in DD.  

When it comes to training the body in the gym, the DD principle is a given. Self control and persistence is the only way to get to excellence--and stay there. And what that entails is adopting a commitment to the process, over time, not some abstract goal in the future. In most respects, quick fixes are only temporary, at best. For a great perspective on that, check with my favorite source on such topics, James Clear, here or here!

So, what is your best plan to achieve "a fluent" accent or pronunciation?

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DD-based practice over time (done as embodied and
haptically as possible, of course!) . . . and you can take that to the bank!

R U P? (Txtmsging 4 pronunciation practice persistence)

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There are more and more studies on the use of social media in tempting people to engage in healthy,  constructive, persistent behavior, from direction for those with autism to teenage diet. This study by Yun and Arriaga of Georgia Institute of Technology, summarized by Science Daily, demonstrated the same effect with asthmatics: give them advice and reminders daily and they do a better job of managing their health. What is "different" about the procedures used in the study, is that text messages sent daily did not presumably initiate or invite dialogue but "simply" provided information.

Use of social media and technology for instructor-student communication and relationship maintenance is widely reported in language teaching. Some speech and pronunciation professionals and organizations, for example, do regularly send out helpful "advice" to their clients and students. The Yun and Arriaga study is also different in that it is very much programmatic, that is directly related to ongoing, recommended daily "healthy" practices.  In our (haptic-integrated clinical pronunciation) work, it would mean sending out to students in a class a group text message, using an application such as GroupMe, reminding them of how they should be pr
acticing.

That is, in fact, also the recommended format for managing homework in the AH-EPS system. For example, a typical, daily or three times weekly text message attempting to keep students on track might  look something like this: wrmp, pract 1, pract 2, 2x6, wrdlst 1, wrdlst 2

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1. wrmp (Do your warm up!)
2. pract 1 (Practice key strategies of the previous module.)
3. pract 2 (Practice new strategies of this module.)
3. 2x6 (Practice using new strategies in a written dialogue.)
4. wrdlst 1 (Practice last module's targeted word and phrase list.)
5. wrdlst 2 (Practice this module's targeted word and phrase list.)

Recommendation: Try that!
Suggestions: Report here if you do or when you do?
Reminder: Keep in touch!

Intrusive and proactive pronunciation instruction (IPPI!)

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Love that acronym! Over the life of the blog there have been several posts that relate to exercise persistence. What comes out of that research, from several disciplines, is the idea that advising and helping students managing their time is a very good idea. In this Science Digest summary of MA thesis research by Kansas State student, Tennant, the effect of intrusive and proactive advising and engagement with freshman college students is striking. (US universities are rediscovering the importance of student retention in these difficult economic times, apparently.)  Although Tennant's work focuses primarily on at-risk students, the implications for our work are clear: resources and energy spent on assisting students in mangage life and study outside of class pay off.

What do you know about how your students study and practice of pronunciation on their own? (For that matter, what do you know about their life outside of class?) The ambivalence that we all deal with between learner autonomy and empowerment on one hand-and motivating (or cajoling) them to do their homework that you have assigned for their own good on the other . . . reflects where the field is today. The position that there could possibly be one basic pronunciation program that "fits all"--and that it could be integrated into general speaking and listening instruction--seems very much a throw back to earlier structuralist language teaching.

We have learned a great deal since the 50s about method design and what constitutes the range of strategies and technologies that can be applied to the process. The AH-EPS approach is to (A) use the basic phonological structures of the language as a standard point of departure for enhancing and integrating learners' ability to learn new sounds and vocabulary, and (B) to carefully prescribe a framework for what should go on between formal classes (or working with a haptic video independently.) That framework involves both fixed warm ups and pedagogical-movement routines associated with L2 sound features, and, most importantly, staged extension to learners' individual needs and current program of study.

In a classroom setting that means training both instructors and learners to use a set of techniques for presenting, correcting, remembering and recalling what should be integrated into spontaneous speaking, listening, reading and writing. IPPI! (or perhaps, H-IPPI!)  

Washing your hands (of/during) pronunciation teaching

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This one is too much fun to pass up. Three (female) researchers, Lapinski of Michigan State University, Maloney of University of Pennsylvania, Braz of Westchester University, and Shulman of North Central College did this study at Michigan State University of male hand washing behaviour in campus men's restrooms. What they found was that if you put up a good poster showing a guy how to and accompanying note that 4 or 5 of them do wash their hands . . . and then watch them after they read the sign . . . you find that hand washing goes up nearly 10%. (The summary in Science Daily doesn't indicate the gender of the wash room observers, actually. That certainly COULD be a factor here!) They then go on to extoll the potential benefits to public health. Interesting.

In several previous posts there have been references to hand sensitivity in haptic work. (I often use an aromatic mint-based hand cream, especially in working with small groups or individuals--and almost always in training workshops.) Clearly, in our work being able to attend closely to the felt sense of the haptic anchor (hands touching each other or some part of the body on a stress syllable)--for about 3 seconds according to research-- is highly advantageous. I have tried any number of "treatments" over the years from lotions to lofa. All seem to work, at least temporarily. (Speaking of "temporarily," check out this recent article by Asher on why TPR works and why Rosetta Stone may not for long.)

Need a hand in keeping your pronunciation work "awash" with attention and engagement? You might try a poster . . . or just go check to make sure that at least the boys have washed their hands before class. 

New L2 identity and new pronunciation in 40 days!

Photo credit: Mens Health

40 is something of a magic number when it comes to persistence (For example, staying afloat that long in an ark!) Turns out there may be something to it. Reported on the Mens Health website is a summary of a study by Rutgers researcher, Philips, of subjects who took on a personal development project that required considerable discipline and commitment. One finding was that,

 “If a person performs a behavior regularly and for long enough [40 days in this study], the behavior becomes part of the person’s self-identity or self-concept . . . For example, if I made a goal to start running and succeeded, I’d begin to see myself as a runner."

What a coincidence! EHIEP basic training  (exclusive of the introductory session) is also 6 weeks long, 42 days--a total of about 24 hours (including both in class training and homework.) No wonder students begin to hear themselves differently who manage to  stick with the practice regimen to the end. As they say, "Life (and apparently new L2 identity) begins @40!"

Sticky, persistent, integrated pronunciation change

Disintegration of Persistence
of Memory by S. Dali:
Credit: Wikipedia

A favorite image or visual metaphor of mine for the current state of pronunciation teaching, especially understanding of how to make change "stick" is Dali's "Disintegration of Persistence of Memory." Although the 1954 painting probably relates a little better to the evolving mind and memory of modern man than getting learners to integrate repaired or new pronunciation, the existential issue is the same: flooded with information, insight and other random "edutainments," how can we remember anything? Better yet, with virtual memory in the "clouds" all around us now, why bother?

Several aspects of pronunciation change still require decidedly "pre-modern" kinaesthetic engagement to stick efficiently, where the potentially neurotic, "self talk" interference is at least temporarily absent--what a recent post referred to as "mindfulness" focusing on just one objective: anchoring in memory, or in HICP terms, haptic anchoring. In yesterday's workshop, in response to the question: "What makes pronunciation change stick?",  the suggestions from the audience ranged from "context" to "real communication" to "opportunities for usage" to "collocation" to "paradigm-relation" (similar form) to "comprehensible input" to "personal relevance."

What was not mentioned is most revealing: saying the word or phrase out loud for practice or some kind of somatic "felt sense" of the sound(s), the basis of HICP work. It is as if much of the basic understanding of how pronunciation was to be integrated or "drilled in" of only a couple of decades ago has been lost. Stick with us. Memory persists here . . .

12-step learner pronunciation goals, process objectives, benchmarks and haptic anchors

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Let's say a learner has a GOAL of being able to produce an acceptable "th" sound. A HICP-based model that would give the learner a relatively clear "line of march" might look something the following. (Note: I have linked above one of the most well-known "12 step" processes. I was tempted to unpack the rich analogy, theology and all, between that and this process, but I'll leave it for another post!) Here is the HICP 12 step learning model for fixing such a segmental problem, based, in part, on the types of staged treatment plans used by speech pathologists. (HICP seeks to bring to pronunciation teaching several of the key techniques from that discipline--adapted to the classroom, rather than the individual client.) It helps to focus the learner on what needs to be done and frames the tasks so that progress can be identified. Also, of course, feedback and "homework" can be reasonably concrete. For an upper beginner, this might be a two or three-week project. (PO~= process objective; BMK = benchmark)

1. PO~ Recognize current version and target sound (aural discrimination).
2. PO~ Achieve new articulation (target sound), in this case both voiced and voiceless.
3. PO~ Practice haptic-anchored new articulation.
4. PO~ Achieve appropriate version of target sound in main word-contexts (initial, medial, final.)
5. PO~ Practice haptic-anchored sound in contexts.
6. PO~ Create target word list.
7. PO~ Practice haptic-anchored word list as necessary.
8. PO~ Create target phrase list.
9. PO~ Practice haptic-anchored target phrase list as necessary.
10. BMK I - Recognize instances (the felt sense) of "current" versions (mispronunciations) in spontaneous speech after the fact.
11. BMK II - Recognize instances of target version usage in spontaneous speech after the fact.
12. Goal achieved: Integration of target sound successfully in most contexts.

That protocol is generally appropriate for changing pronunciation at beginning and intermediate levels. Heavily fossilized pronunciation, however, often requires something closer to the "other" 12 step approach!

Pronunciation Homework: Doing the heavy lifting!

As noted in an earlier post, I have been unable to find any good research on the effect of consistent pronunciation homework. (If you know of some please, let me know!) Given the more directly physical character of EHIEP protocols, it seems reasonable to look to a couple of related fields, in this case, formal exercise courses and weight lifting for insights into how to keep learners engaged appropriately. (In pronunciation work, there is a great deal published on pronunciation journals, workouts and after-the-fact reflections on outside of class work, but apparently next to nothing on persistence to prescribed program homework.)

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The college exercise class study linked above used a 3x per week model and found that the required regimen not only achieved course objectives but actually resulted in increased activity beyond the course. An every-other-day pattern of practice is also standard in most weightlifting, running and other sports where recovery time for properly exercised muscles is at least 48 hours (for older and less fit, even longer.)

That has been our experience with HICP homework as well, probably in part because of the body and visual field focus and stretching: 48 hours between "workouts" and no more than 3, 30-minute homework sessions per week. The research in "physical" disciplines (See earlier post on exercise persistence.) suggests that short, intense, programmed, disciplined, spaced, regular exercise is optimal. Prescribing and carefully monitoring pronunciation homework is certainly not "speaking out of school!"

Do your (pronunciation) homework exercises!

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One area of pronunciation instruction that I have been unable to find anything but anecdotal research on is the effect of students' systematic practice outside of class. I have been convinced for decades that if I can just get a student to do prescribed homework on schedule, progress is inevitable and predictable. Just for fun, I once had a student read the phone book every morning for 15 minutes, just focusing on speaking clearly and warmly . . . amazing improvement! (I suspect that accounts for the "success" of some online accent reduction programs:  just do something regularly, almost anything!)

For HICP work, the best parallel is research and practice in physical exercise persistence. In this doctoral study, done in a US upper middle class health club, it was shown that (a) autonomous self direction, (b) basic exercise competence level, and (c) relatedness (identifying with group, such as "the fit" or the club) predicted exercise persistence in terms of duration, intensity and enthusiasm. One factor, need support or perception of a "caring" context by the club, was not significant. (Will do a blogpost on that one shortly.)

Setting aside the obvious cultural dimension that foregrounds "autonomy," those four factors, when adjusted appropriately for the learner population go a long ways in helping us understand how to design homework that will keep learners engaged. In our work, the basic haptic protocols should provide a 10-minute aerobics-like foundation/warm up for homework that the body is more apt to go along with for starters--until the rest of the brain comes on line. So if your students don't do their homework, at least do yours . . .