Three mistakes pronunciation instructors may make (especially if they play guitar badly)

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 It is not a coincidence that language instructors who gravitate toward speaking and pronunciation instruction tend to be musical. (My guess is that they play or have played an instrument or are singers of some sort as well. That connection is mentioned in several studies but I can find no systematic research on it.) Being a guitar player, one of the sites I stumbled on, Guitarscalesystem.com, has a list of 3 mistakes to avoid and 6 principles to practice. (Unfortunately, to get to this list you have to sign up for the newsletter, etc.!) The "translation" to pronunciation work is very straightforward . . . if you play an instrument, especially the merging of motor learning and meaning (My extrapolations are in italics):
Mistakes:
1. Too many scales and keys without ever deeply mastering a single scale - Acting like simply "pointing out" problems is effective technique.
2. Not making real music out of the scales - "Rich" repetition of targeted sounds, with haptic-integration and/or engaging expressiveness is the antidote.

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3. Mindlessly repeating scale patterns - If you do "mindless" repetition, without multiple-modality involvement, you should be teaching something else, not pronunciation. 
Principles of good practice:
1. Memorize your scale patterns - Yes, teach learners how to memorize more efficiently, based on their personal cognitive style preferences.
2. Learn to jump to anywhere on the neck - Link target sounds across lexical sets and exemplars. (Pedagogical movement patterns, based on haptic research in several areas, should do that.)
3. Learn to switch direction in the blink of an eye - Use the visual field for anchoring targeted sounds consistently. 
4. Know the building block shapes and how they interact together - Yes . . . the "sense" half of "felt sense" means having very concise, clear cognitive and rule schemas for learners as well.
5. Learn your scales on single strings, as double stops and beyond . . . This is critical, focusing on targeted sounds with maximal attention, in an "uncluttered" visual and emotional setting in class.
6. See the entire keyboard as one "monster pattern!" - Both instructor and learner need to understand how the whole system functions, instructors at a theoretical level; learners, by being equipped with a simple set of explanations, practices and anchoring procedures--especially the latter. 

Time to face the music on how you manage drill, repetition and anchoring? 

Better pronunciation? Better sleep on it!

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Clip art: Clker

The basic visual, pedagogical "tool" of HICP work--and the EHIEP system--is a 3 by 3 matrix enveloping the visual field in front of the learner. Vowels, stress assignment, rhythm and intonation are anchored in various ways in that conceptual space. It is, for vowels, for example, a mirror image of the standard IPA matrix. In part because learners use the "matrix" so extensively in learning and practicing target pronunciation, it is not uncommon to hear reports of them dreaming related to the experience. In a rather remarkable 2010 experiment, summarized by Science Magazine, Wamsley, Stickgold and colleagues at Harvard School of Medicine had subjects work with a maze problem--before taking a nap! Those who reported dreams related to it while asleep--performed significantly better on the problem after they woke up. Hmm . . . I have generally recommended that students do their practice in the morning before work, for any number of reasons, including just time management and having a fresher  mind and body to work with. I may reconsider, or at least begin something of an informal experiment, asking some students to practice daily after morning coffee, as usual, and the rest, just before falling asleep. Sounds promising. We'll see what happens. Until we get some "dreamy" data, however . . . better just sleep on it!

Intonation deafness? The fix may be "psycho-or-somatic!"

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Clip art: Clker

Have students who have great difficulty imitating intonation contours? Could be tone deafness or "amusia," in varying degrees. (If you have a question, there is a self-administered test off the first link that may be of some help.) Both studies, summarized by Science Daily, relate to singing, not speech intonation directly. The "phenotypes" identified, however, are of interest to us: (a) those who have difficulty perceiving pitch and pitch change and (b) those who sing away, regardless. I have worked with several over the years of the latter type. (In diagnostic work I often will have learners sing along with me on some simple songs to check their singing pitch control.) The relationship between intonation problems and inability to sing is complex, of course. Occasionally, serious hearing or speech production disorders were involved; other times, there appeared to be interpersonal, psychological issues of identity and self-confidence. I have been unable to find credible, published research on effective "treatment" for tone deafness. Intonation "deafness" may be something of another matter, caused by a wider range of factors. Sometimes haptic anchoring of pitch (by using PMPs set high or low in the visual field as a phrase or word is articulated) can be moderately effective, or at least serve to enhance slightly the lack range or production of pitch change, such as "rise-fall" contours. That type of work, based loosely on Lessac and Observed Experiential Integration Therapy, has to be done one-on-one at this point in time and it can be time consuming, but the potential for "embodying" that concept in a computer-mediated system is intriguing. The approach, regardless, must be very much "whole-person," mind and body, "psycho(and)somatic!" 

The "Nocebo" effect in pronunciation teaching.

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Clipart: Clker

I wrote an article in 1997 entitled "Seven suggestions of highly successful pronunciation teaching." It began with a quote from the introduction of a then popular pronunciation book (no longer in print):

"Acquiring good pronunciation is the most difficult part of learning a new language. As you improve your articulation you have to learn to listen and imitate all over again. As with any activity you wish to do well, you have to practice, practice, practice, and then practice some more . Remember that you cannot accomplish good pronunciation overnight; improvement takes time. Some students may find it more difficult than others and will need more time than others to improve (Orion, 1988, pp. xxiii-iv)." 

My point in quoting that rather foreboding piece was to illustrate the sometimes "less than encouraging"  language (and attitude) used by instructors to orient learners or attempt to motivate them during pronunciation work. At the time I didn't have a term for it; now I do: a "nocebo"--as contrasted with a "placebo." In the research summary by Winfried Häuser and co-researchers of the Technical University of Munich, summarized by Science Daily, defined 'nocebo' effects as " . . . adverse events that occur during sham treatment and/or as a result of negative expectations . .   or by unintended negative suggestion on the part of doctors or nurses. . ." The above "nocebo" may, for many, be at face value a realistic prognosis, but there is almost certainly a less "nocebic" way to put it. So, along with "noticing" we need to add the term "nocebo-ing" or "nocebo-ation" to our haptic toolbox--or try to eliminate it!

Get in the mood for pronunciation work? Try a touch of vowel color!

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Clip art: Clker

According to this research by Ackermann and colleagues at MIT, summarized by ScienceNow, touch--expressed in texture and hardness--can not only "color" one's mood but "impact . . . how we perceive the world!" For example, " . . . running your hand over sandpaper may make you view social interactions as more hostile and competitive." In the study, subjects put together either a puzzle with pieces that had sandpaper-like texture or one where the pieces had by contrast, a very smooth surface. Depending on which puzzle they had assembled, their mood in responding to a video clip varied accordingly. So, how is what students touch in your class affecting how they feel about the work? In the EHIEP vowel protocol (a set of techniques for teaching and anchoring the vowels of English), there are four distinct touch-textures: (a) a light tapping (lax vowels), (b) gently dragging the fingernails across the palm of the other hand (diphthongs or tense vowels plus off-glide), (c) holding the hands together gently (tense vowels), and (d) one hand pushing the other hand about 5 centimeters either to left or to the right (lengthened lax vowels before voice consonants). Those pedagogical movement patterns (PMPs) are also performed while articulating the vowel with as much "euphonic resonance" as possible, anchoring the sound to the movement and touch-texture. The mood encouraged by those PMPs, based on the sensations experienced on the hands, is at least pleasant (See earlier post.), if not slightly stimulating. (This sense of the potential "coloring" of one's mood by "vowel-texture-touch" is different from but somewhat related to the inherent visual intensity or phonaesthetic quality of vowels in English, addressed in several earlier posts.) Assuming that the class began with something of a full-body warm up, the effect of haptic-integrated touch-on-vowels should at least help learners to perceive the process more positively. It does more than that, of course, but systematic attention to "mood maintenance' is always a nice touch. 

Pronunciation modelling on "cue?" You said it, MAM!

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Interesting 2010 study by Luypen at the University of Pennsylvania and colleagues on the relationship between verbal cues and visual processing. They investigated the potential impact of hearing a word before it or the object it represents appears on a screen in the visual field. In effect, hearing the name first significantly enhanced subsequent visual recognition. Somewhat surprisingly, however, they also found that, " . . . A visual preview did not make the invisible target visible. Getting a good look at the object before the experiment did nothing to help participants see it flashed." What this appears to "speak to" is how to best sequence haptic feedback with pedagogical movement patterns (PMP) in instruction. For example, when a learner produces an inaccurate pronunciation of a word, the instructor, in cueing a more appropriate model (MAM), has some options:

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(a) Verbally model the MAM.
(b) Do just the appropriate PMP, moving across the visual field.
(c) Verbalize the MAM while doing the PMP.
(d) Just provide the name of the PMP (in the case of vowels their numbers, such as "3y" or intonation contours, "Rise-fall" or rhythm grouping, "2-3"--indicating the number syllables appearing before after the prominent syllable).
(e) Ask the learner to do the PMP once and then try the MAM, speaking out loud.

And there are a few other possible combinations. The research seems to suggest that (d) might be the more efficient cue, first saying the name--which should evoke both the visual and haptic dimensions of the anchor before the instructor then provides feedback in the form of the PMP and MAM done simultaneously. Try it out with me in your classroom and report back either here on on the "data" blog! What's in a name? Possibly a great deal in this work. 

Haptic phonetics for pronunciation teaching

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Clipart: Clker

Most would agree that some training in phonetics is essential for both instructor and learner. How and when that is done can vary greatly, of course. (See summary article by Ashby on the LLAC website, for example.) Most consonant work in phonetics instruction involves a substantial amount of kinaesthetic and tactile engagement, directing learner awareness to points of contact and movement of various parts of the vocal tract. (In EHIEP work, the techniques used for basic consonant change are quite standard, although how that new felt sense is anchored once it is established can be quite different, more systematically L2 learner-oriented.) The haptic-based procedures for teaching the vowel system of a language have been designed for presentation and adaptation of the vowels of any language, not just English. Anchoring sounds in the visual field means positioning higher vowels relatively . . . higher, lower vowels relatively . . . lower, front vowels more to the right, and back vowels more to the left. Diphthongs and vowels with off-glides involve movement across the visual field. Tense vowels involve intense concentration on the sound without movement. Lax vowels involve a light tapping of hands with the articulation, etc. (Those are just representative of how movement and the felt sense of vowel resonance and quality can be anchored in the visual field.) I have done demonstrations of haptic-anchored versions the vowel systems of many languages and dialects, including Korean, French, Japanese, Spanish, Russian, various US dialects, often in first anchoring the learner's L1 before moving to English. Will begin posting Youtube comparative vowel systems this fall. Train the body first, but do "Phonhaptic" training right after that! 

Inattentive students? (Too much task-based pronunciation instruction?)

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Clipart: Clker

In a 2011 study of what they term "inattentional deafness," researchers at University College London (summarized in Science Daily), Lavie and Macdonald observe that, " . . . In our task, most people noticed the sound if the task being performed was easy and did not demand their full concentration. However, when the task was harder they experienced deafness to the very same sound." Several other posts have addressed the "competition" between visual and auditory processing, where one in effect cancels out the other in conditions of tightly focused attention. So, what does that mean for pronunciation instruction? Currently task-based instruction is "seen" by most as being the optimal format for integrating instruction, where communicative interaction and metacognitive engagement (attention to the principles and rules involved) are paramount. This research would suggest, somewhat ironically, that the extent to which attention is drawn away from the felt sense of the articulated sound--to context and informational parameters, the less effective the anchoring in memory of the targeted change may be. Managing that balance is key. As also noted repeatedly in reports on "haptic" research,  relatively speaking, movement and touch as anchoring mechanisms seem to function more independently from that of auditory and visual processing. In other words, a little "inattention" here and there is probably a good thing. Just keep in touch . . . 

Let's get clinical (pronunciation instruction)!

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Clipart: Clker

With apologies to the all time favorite aerobic dance anthem, having read over yet one more thread of comments, "a near-conversation" between clinical and experimental psychologists on a blog, the parallel to where we are in the field of pronunciation teaching today was too much to miss. In essence, the experimental types were saying "There is no real evidence for the validity of your clinical practice, especially the procedure that you are recommending." The clinicians, in response, were responding that "Your studies are pretty much irrelevant when it comes to dealing holistically with our real clients. Experience, especially as it is applied to "similar" treatment contexts--and people--is enough to go on, at least for the time being." Sound familiar? A recent research study summarized by Science Daily on the efficacy of online peer support groups, which does relate somewhat to recent posts on group learning theory, ends with the quintessential retort from researcher/clinician, Salazar of Temple University: "These groups likely provide some degree of comfort in sharing a similar experience . . . While we can't yet quantify the benefit with our measurements, it does appear that participants benefit in online contacts with one another . . . If anything, clinicians should become more familiar with online groups because of their prevalence . . . They should be discussing their use with clients, and talking about ways to safely navigate online resources to get the maximum benefit." Now, substitute in any pronunciation teaching technique that you find especially effective for the word "online or groups" in that quote. Does that work in the context of your integrated, "clinical" pronunciation practice? It should. If not, just consider this your online support group and tell us all about it . . . here or on the EHIEP teaching blog!

Visual intonation in pronunciation instruction

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Clipart: Clker

One of the early inspirations for the EHIEP system, as reported earlier, was my work with deaf students at the university who communicated with American Sign Language (ASL). Sign gestures, along with upper body and facial expressiveness have been researched extensively; I have referred to those studies several times in trying to better understand how ASL behaviors can be effectively exploited in our pronunciation work. I found this 2009 study on "visual intonation"in Israeli Sign Language recently which demonstrates vividly the role of the systematic movement of facial muscles (e.g. raised eyebrows, squints, knitting brows) in conveying prosody, especially as it accompanies pitch change. The analogous pedagogical movement patterns of EHIEP are designed primarily to help the learner get the felt sense of intonation, where learners' hands and arms move around the visual field to anchor pitch (H, M and L) and pitch change (fall-rise, rise-fall, etc.) However, once a student is able to "repeat" a PMP along with the instructor in articulating a target word or phrase, the "visual intonation" portrayal also serves to communicate to the instructor and student something of accuracy of the pitch or pitch change. In other words, an instructor also uses the visual PMPs in both assessing and providing feedback in class on intonation. Just as in the case of the ISL study, spatial-gesture serves more than just as an analogy for pitch and pitch change--it is potentially a very powerful physical anchor. See what I mean? 

Pleasant (physical) pronunciation practice

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Clipart: Clker

Do you generally associate the word "pleasant" with "pronunciation practice?" You should--or could--according to this Penn State University study of the effect of 15 minutes or more of exercise on mood. What the research revealed was that even mild physical exercise results in a temporary "pleasant-activated feeling" which seems to encourage one to keep it up. (Earlier posts looked at the factors involved in general exercise persistence.) Beginning the day or class with a body-based warm up which might include movement and stretching of not only the vocal tract but much of the entire body, for example, (See previous post!), should get things off in a better mood. Add to that various "pleasant"  pedagogical movement patterns accompanying presentation, review, anchoring and correcting of language being focused on in the speaking or listening class and both attitude toward pronunciation--and results can't help but improve. In other words, there should be a felt sense of physical engagement and "exercise" that is ongoing, especially in speaking instruction. That is clearly the case in most good public speaking programs, some even creating an almost dance-like mood to capture the dynamic of speaker and audience rapport and communication. In my experience, even coming back to haptic or just kinesthetic engagement intermittently during a lesson achieves much the same effect. If you do a bit of systematic choreography such that you have physically active anchoring near the end of the class in some form, the overall reaction to the work of the day on the part of the students--and myself!--will inevitably be more positive. Plan on it. 

Haptic-integrated pronunciation . . . and "Ro-butts?"

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Clipart: Clker

(Caveat Emptor: There is probably a serious point in the following but it may not be all that obvious!)  The character in the  EHIEP logo off to the right, what we affectionately refer to as "EHIEP-bot," embodies a few key features of the system, including controlled, precise movements, the sounds of language in the visual field--and attitude! But up until now there was no plausible analogy or connection between the robot personna and the efficacy of touch in learning. Now there may be. Japanese inventor, Takahashi, has figured out how (or at least where) to do haptic anchoring with robots: on the gluteus maximus! I suppose, were it not for certain cultural constraints--or lack of them for example, here in a Youtube of a German folk dance move -- that might work on us non-robots in doing pronunciation, particularly rhythm, as well. Instead of using the visual field, looking forward, we might focus on pronunciation in retrospect! Actually, doing two of the more rhythm-oriented protocols when seated, the critical butts-in-chairs variable in group dynamics and sales-- does seem to help anchor or "nail down" the pattern being attended to, especially with the right Latin beat in the background. Wow. A whole new area of research and exploration here? This is supposed to be a "whole brain and whole body approach," after all! Ah . . . perhaps we'd better sit on that for the time being!

To bee or not to bee: in class vs one-on-one pronunciation teaching

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Clipart: Clker

The clipart of the "lazy" bee in the last post reminded me of what a line of research on honey bees has revealed about the striking impact on learning of individual vs group or community based learning. In essence, what happens is that older forager bees, when brought back into the hive to take on nurturing "duties," experience a significant increase in ability to learn again. The analogy here to pronunciation work will be evident to anyone who has worked with changing the pronunciation of older L2 learners: studying in small groups is generally far more effective than tutoring. (I'll post a case study related to this idea shortly on the EHIEP "data" blog.) Clearly, social practice is critical for almost any integration of pronunciation change, but experience (at least) has shown that it is especially so with "fossilized" students. There have been a number of posts that have dealt with parameters of effective social practice and how to manage it in this field. I have not been able, however, to locate good, empirical studies of that "old bee vs new bee" phenomenon in the general adult learning literature, but I'm certain it is there. (If you know some of that research, please let us know!) How do you keep your classroom buzzing with excitement--or learning?  "Apiarical" linguists of the world, unite!

Lazy students? It's their "pronunciation literacy's" @ fault!

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Clipart: Clker

Interesting piece by Howard of National Geographic News citing Harrison, “Literacy makes you lazy; we don’t memorize 10,000-line epic poems any more," David Harrison, the director of research for the Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages, told an audience at the Aspen Environment Forum in Colorado this past weekend." His point, in part, is that literacy in English is achieved more and more by being able to speak fluently and access information when necessary--not by keeping all that stored in the brain--or being able to produce or reproduce "it" with inordinate (or extreme) accuracy, etc. Fair enough. He doesn't really unpack that statement much, especially in terms of the functions of memorizing poetry, which generally demand extraordinary attention to the expressive dimensions of language. (If it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become an expert, perhaps 10,000 lines of poetry is enough to make you an honorary native speaker as well?) From that perspective, from the standpoint of the English learner, he may have a point. The emphasis on comprehensible input and output, along with the  high priority on communicative, intelligible interaction has unquestionably produced a new ideal or model of the successful learner's pronunciation that, almost by necessity must ignore attention to the finer nuances of L2 expressive speech. In fact--and I'll come back to this later--for many theorists today it is as if some level of the expressive system of the L1 must remain firmly in place, surviving principally as "accent" and higher forms of pragmatic competence, to ensure that the L1 identity of the learner is not washed out or assimilated in the process, what we might call "Lazy faire pronunciation literacy." 

Getting a Beckham-like "kick" out of pronunciation

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Clipart: Clker

A group of physics students at Leicester University have figured out how Beckham was able to execute those incredible bending shots on goal. What the group found, the formula they derived (with a little analogical, creative liberty) extends to anchoring (making a change stick) in haptic-integrated pronunciation instruction: My HICP interpretations are in italics.

• The distance a ball bends (D) - the success of the anchoring experience
• as a result of this force (the contact, the kick) - the intensity or "stickiness" of the haptic anchor
• is related to the ball's radius (R) - the size/scope of the anchoring experience, both in time and size
• the density of air (ρ) - the resistance to learning in the individual or in the class
• the ball's angular velocity (ω) - the evidence of cognitive and somatic engagement in anchoring
• it's velocity through the air (v) - the residual, felt sense of the anchoring as it is enacted
• it's mass (m) - the size and emotional relevance of the target being anchored
• and the distance travelled by the ball in the direction it was kicked (x) - the amount of context and connectedness that is accessed during the anchoring

That is, of course, actually a very good framework or set of parameters for assessing the nature and potential efficacy of an anchor in any type of training, not just pronunciation. In HICP, for example, that might mean, a pedagogical movement pattern which accompanies the overt pronunciation of a word with changed vowels, consonants or stress pattern. What a kick!

NEW BLOG! "Haptic-integrated pronunciation teaching"

Have just created a blog for publishing reports, formal or informal, on classroom applications of haptic-integrated teaching. I have collected dozens of stories and anecdotes from the over the past six or seven years relating to the use of EHIEP protocols in teaching. Some have already been reported on this blog and will gradually be linked again off the new one. Anytime a report is posted there, it will also be linked here in the right column. If you have brief reports or stories you'd  like to contribute, email me (wracton@gmail.com) and I'll put you on as an author. I'll post my first report from one of the early EHIEP classroom "experiments" tomorrow. Keep in touch!

The (left-to-) right way to teach and anchor pronunciation

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Clipart:

Clker

Earlier posts have examined aspects of the visual field. In general terms, for at least English speakers, the right side comes off as (a) somewhat brighter, (b) more energetic, (c) more analytic, (d) more change-oriented . . . and, it turns out,  according to this study of soccer referees, (e) a bit more positive (or less "foul"?)--when an action is seen as moving left to right, rather than in the opposite direction. If the potential foul incurred by a player moving right to left, versus left to right in the visual field of the referee, there was a statistically significant chance that it was more likely to be called. According to the ScienceShots research summary, this phenomena is established in other fields as well and is actively exploited, for example, by cartoonists. Of course, some of the basis for that has to do with the fact that each eye is (roughly speaking) "controlled by" the opposing hemisphere of the brain. The research and popular understanding of "left" vs "right" brain functioning corresponds to many of those differing characteristics of the visual field as well. The fact that most of the EHIEP pedagogical movement patterns go from left to right and terminate in the right visual field is, however, post-theoretical. By that I mean that the practice developed through classroom experience initially, not based on the neurophysiological evidence that has come to light since. The "positive" bias goes consistently in the student's direction. In the visual field of the instructor observing students doing PMPs, on the contrary, all the motion appears to go . . . right to left. I'm going to explore this. In the meantime, just check your mood before class begins (See previous post!) and go easy on "yellow" carding of pronunciation and sloppy PMPing, eh!

Transformation and "Transdiagnosis" of pronunciation

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Clipart: Clker

In this article from ScienceDaily, summarizing the research of Norton of the University of Houston, it is reported that "Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy" (CBT) for a client who has some "pronounced" anxiety problem--and also focuses appropriately on related psychological phenomena, such as mood, general confidence, self-image or self-awareness--will have the effect of "improving" those as well. The distinction that Norton is making is that even though normally that kind of "collateral" improvement happens anyway, it is substantially stronger when the initial diagnosis and ongoing treatment focuses on them proportionately as well. So what does that mean for pronunciation instruction, especially haptic-integrated work? Essentially, it is a reaffirmation of the "whole person" approach to instruction with one important difference. From the CBT perspective, as in Critical Phonology and other "critical" frameworks, the bottom line is that explicit, 2-way, reciprocal,  interactive connections are made in the mind of the learner between the main focus of "instruction" (in this case, pronunciation) and potential changes in related, generally affective factors such as attitude, motivation, L2 identity, etc. In other words, since a positive attitude enhances pronunciation change, the converse is also the case. As "common-sensical" as that is, the practical implications of that in the classroom are worth considering. If you can at least moderate the bad mood or negative attitude of a learners in class before pronunciation work, should you actively do that? And how? You often will not be able to simply "talk them out of it"-- but with regular, carefully choreographed, Lessac-like, body-based warm ups and haptic-based (movement and touch) exercises--you can, almost invariably. Just do it. 

Write off anxiety about problematic pronunciation?

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Clipart: Clker

In our continuing series about dealing with stress associated with pronunciation change, here's another possible technique suggested by research by Ramirez and Beilock on mediating test anxiety. (Something analogous is often suggested in recommendations on the use of pronunciation "logs" or "diaries," as well.) In their study, they found that " . . . The students who aired their anxieties (in writing) showed an average 5% improvement on the second test, whereas the others broke under pressure and their scores dropped by 12% . . . the cathartic effect of writing about your emotions is exemplified by blues music. Putting your thoughts and feelings down has been shown to increase emotional and even physical well-being," Of course, if not managed right, that could be also be a pronunciation-pedagogical "Pandora's Box," but that function is basic to all effective change process. In a very real sense, the act of "embodying" the concerns regularly in a notebook probably contributes much more than the comments in reply made by the instructor. (I'd even go so far as to say that the physical, kinaesthetic act of doing that on on paper with a pen, as opposed to electronically, is essential to effective catharsis and anchoring!) I'll conclude with a couple of verses from a song, a 12-bar blues, I wrote several years ago on the lack of respect given to the syllable in pronunciation teaching, The Syllablues: 

Oh . . sometimes I do get stressed, Baby

And sometimes, I don't.

Oh . . sometimes I do get stressed, Baby

And sometimes, I don't. 

But when I do, Teacher,

Jus' "swish" you'd take note.

But when I get stuck in a backgrounded theme, I

Get real down an' doubt.

But when I get stuck in a backgrounded theme, I

Get real down an' doubt.

I get confused, compressed and depressed

Can't get my feelings out. 

I feel better already. 

Touching: relieving the pain and stress (of pronunciation work!)

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Clipart: Clker

EHIEP protocols make use almost exclusively of self-touch, generally at the terminal point of a pedagogical movement pattern by one or both hands across the visual field. Among the many "touch therapies," Jin Shin Jyutsu is well known for its healing and restorative power. In a recent study, where Jin Shin Jyutsu was used with cancer patients, summarized by Science Daily, it was discovered that " . . . in each session patients experienced significant improvement in the areas of pain, stress, and nausea . . . During a Jin Shin Jyutsu session, patients receive light touches on 52 specific energetic points called Safety Energy Locks as well as fingers, toes, and midpoints on the upper arm, upper calf and lower leg in predetermined orders known as "flows." Setting aside for the moment the cultural, hygiene and interpersonal (especially "inter-gender") issues involved in having learners touch each other in class, what we might call "pair anchoring" does have real potential--especially if I can figure out how to use some of those "safety energy locks!" By that I mean, for example, one learner safely touches the hand of another on stressed elements in words, phrases and sentences. I have experimented some with "tag teams" (kind of a nice analogy there to teams in professional wrestling, in fact.) I have done that occasionally when I have had couples studying with me or by using gloves, pencils, tennis balls and other "interfaces" during student-on-student anchoring exercises. That seems to at the very least relieve some of the pain and stress! Generally speaking, it is also very motivating in making pair work, work. In one protocol, in fact, having students use boxing gloves to develop better rhythm (See my earlier, relatively goofy, Youtube "Fight Club"!) seems to be amazingly effective. Unfortunately, boxing gloves are expensive, hard to get on an off and also relatively unsanitary by today's standards. But you get the idea. In time, with virtual reality haptic systems, "tag team haptic anchoring" will be more pedagogically acceptable, I'm sure. In the meantime,  try a few of the protocols with your BFF, "manno-a-manno!"

Phonetic (or phonemic) gesture revisited (in the classroom)

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In the development of our understanding of speech perception, one of the terms used by some researchers was "phonetic gesture." It essentially referred to the process by which sounds are perceived--the articulatory, not the acoustic properties. The key question was just how much one's ability to articulate a sound determined ones's ability to perceive it. What subsequent research has shown is that it is a mixed bag; the relationship between external properties of sound and our internal processing of it is very complex and developmental as well. In short, ongoing perception of speech turns out to be more a matter of our conceptual systems "expectations" than it is with the actual physical properties of what we hear. That is not to say that the felt sense of the bodily "mechanics" is not important and cannot contribute both to understanding and learning. I like the term, phonetic gesture, as relating to the somatic, physical side of sound production and perception. In our work, a better application of that idea might be "phonemic gesture," that is pedagogical movement patterns that represent key meaningful units of sound within English, including vowels, rhythm patterns, stress assignment and intonation contours. As noted earlier, one of my first, informal research studies was to sit in classes of my colleagues and take notes on the use of gesture they used to accompany pronunciation instruction. Those observations got me started on this line of thinking about 20 years ago. That language instructors adapt gesture for many purposes was the subject of this research by Stam and Teller. (Their work is reported in other publications as well.) One interesting finding was the expansion of the range and depth of field of motion of gesture used " . . . an equivalent of shouting in gesture form." So, what is your current pedagogical "phonemic gesture inventory?" What do you mean? 

Pronunciation teaching depressing? In a phonological phunk? Try some Tai Chi!

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This is a fun article from the UK Independent (not exactly @ the top of the list of my favorite sources of research studies . . . ) on the potential effect of Tai Chi on depression. The claims for the benefits of Tai Chi are extensive, from bigger brains, to longer life . . . to antidepressant. One of the EHIEP protocols, in fact, is termed the "Tai Chi fluency protocol," inspired by watching amazingly flexible and "tranquil-looking" seniors do Tai Chi every morning out in front of my apartment in Japan. In addition to bilateral brain engagement (basically making both hands touch on every pedagogical movement pattern), each of the protocols has at least one other distinct meta-function:

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• Warm up Protocol - Expanding the visual and physical field of operation
• Body Flexibility Protocol - Muscle flexibility of the face, shoulders and hips
• Vowel Resonance Protocol - Focus vowel centers (between the eyes, voice box and upper chest)
• Matrix Anchoring Protocol - Precision of node positions (points where hands touch)
• Vowel/Word stress Protocol - Establish relative conceptual, spatial and haptic "distances" between vowels
• Sensuous Syllable Butterfly Protocol - In addition to bilateral grounding (bringing the learner back into the room, etc.), establish the felt sense of English rhythm groups--up to 7 syllables
• Touch-i-nami (intonation) Protocol - Anchor basic intonation contours and expressiveness
• Tai Chi Fluency Protocol - Fluency and expansion of general pitch range
• Rhythmic Feet FIght Club - Compact conversational phrases and anchor pause structure
• Baton Integration Protocol - Integrate most of the above . . . 

If one of those won't "move" you and your class out of a temporary "phonological funk," nothing will!

TIme for pronunciation change

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Following up on a few recent posts dealing with what goes on outside of class, today we'll look briefly at a set of principles of time management for clinical research professionals that provides a nice model for students. (If you, too, could use a little more productive time, this piece could be helpful as well.) In any teaching context the use of some kind of systematic pronunciation diary or log that includes a time management or practice scheduling function can be very effective. I have for decades used both: (a) Students plan their practice sessions that will take place before the next class--before they walk out the door (sometimes requiring my approval as well!), and (b) they also keep regular notes on how the practices went and related reflections on relevant "pronunciation events" (for them personally and their specific goals) that occur either in or out of class. Here is the recommended "clinical researcher's" framework, with my annotations:

• Use only one prioritized list — planner system, notebook, or calendar — for home as well as work. And make at least parts of that available for instructor review or consultation. 
• Update the list at the end of the day, rather than the morning . . . including reflections and "data."
• Consider the penalty, impact, and payoff of  . . .  a task. This can be a radical proposal for many learners, having to take full responsibility for the actions and time. 
• Review you goals and action plans each day prior to compiling your list . . . in the morning after coffee, breakfast and doing your basic pronunciation work. 
• Before you start a task that is not on your list, ask yourself, “Will what I am about to do move me closer to my objectives?” That, of course, assumes that the objectives are clearly articulated and achievable!
• Give yourself time to relax, meditate, or “goof-off.” (I, personally, also recommend regular aerobic exercise for my students as well.) Even if that only means sufficient sleep, research has validated repeatedly the place of critical "down time" for the brain in efficient learning. (In the EHIEP system, practice is scheduled on alternative days, not daily, although a morning warm up is highly recommended.) 

Got time to do some of that with your students? 

Fossilized pronunciation: recidivism unanchored

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A grad student is doing a research paper looking at the conditions under which learners are able to anchor new pronunciation outside of the classroom, in conversation with those around them or strangers. (I may report on that later, too.) This has been a key theme of my work (especially pronunciation classes for nonnative business professionals) for decades. About the time I was publishing my first article on fossilized pronunciation, I became aware of the model for preparing prisoners for return to society developed by Prison Fellowship entitled, Innerchange Freedom Initiative. (That, in turn, was  based on a project created by the Catholic church in Brazil sometime earlier.) That approach to rehabilitation, which continues to have a very impressive record in avoiding recidivism (having to go back to prison after being released) was based on several principles:

• Participants are assigned a mentor who stays with them throughout and beyond the program. 
• It begins two years before release and continues for one year after.
• It is a holistic, involving, academic, vocational, spiritual, life skills, and substance abuse training. 
• In the post-prison phase, prisoners are assisted in finding employment and getting connected to a local church.

Now not to run too far with the analogy here of "fossilized" learners being "imprisoned" by their heavily accented pronunciation . . . There were two aspects of the IFI framework that caught my attention and became integral to the system I developed for dealing with fossilized pronunciation, other than the holistic, integrated whole person model: the importance of (a) the value of the learner's connection to the local community in ensuring that change lasted, and (b) maintaining a less formal "mentoring" or consulting relationships for at least a short period beyond the program. What I discovered early on was that (a) could often greatly enhance (b), pointing students to quality opportunities for practice and giving them advice on strategies and preparation--something more than "Now go practice your English with your friends or the tourists . . . " 

Focus on "Phon" (in integrated pronunciation instruction): Post hoc FOP

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"Focus on form" has become a basic construct of contemporary language teaching. (Wikipedia has a nice, concise definition, based on Long 1991.) Although there are several variants on this theme today, Long's key assumption was " . . . the learner must be aware of the meaning and use of the language features before the form is brought to their attention." [Italics, mine.] In other words, that would appear to exclude doing a little mini-lesson just before learners are to encounter a problematic form. (That is actually a bit extreme, but let's go with that for now.) Go a step further and focus on those situations where the learner (not just the instructor) is also aware of the "problem," perhaps based on a breakdown in communication or a very evident pronunciation or articulation difficulty--even if the task was not entirely compromised at the time. In other words, an obvious, easily recognized mis-pronunciation happens which deserves "treatment." We'll call this one "Post Hoc FOP." There are at least three other logical possibilities (my terms here): "Pre-Hoc FOP," and "Mid-Hoc FOP" and "Sub-Hoc FOP" which will be dealt with later. Those are, in a very real sense, relatively spontaneous clinical interventions based in real-time communication. So, what do you do? Here are a few to get the ball rolling (One of these, some combination of these or something else.) Instructor . . .

• Ignores it.
• Notes covertly and consults with student privately later. 
• Requests target be repeated out loud, by learner or class as a whole
• Leads learner to correct approximation of the sound.
• Models correct pronunciation once or twice without further attention.
• Passes to learner written note on "error."
• Does a quick, impromptu (probably canned) insightful explanation
• Instructs learner to "notice" something . . .
• Uses gesture signalling pronunciation issue (may be very differentiated to indicate part of speech, etc.)
• Points to Gattegno-like wall chart . . . 
• Instructs learner to put the target sound or word on personal practice list or in pronunciation diary or "log." 
• Has peer point out error. 
• Has peer makes notes to be shared later.
• (Haptic-integrated) does word or phrase with learner using appropriate pedagogical movement pattern a couple of times. 
• (Haptic-integrated) instructs learner to do word or phrase as homework. (See also earlier posts on EHIEP-based homework frameworks.)