There are plenty of posts online explaining typical pronunciation errors from Thai speakers of English. Most seem accurate, and are a good starting point if you don’t have a copy of Swan’s Learner English to hand. (more…)

There are plenty of posts online explaining typical pronunciation errors from Thai speakers of English. Most seem accurate, and are a good starting point if you don’t have a copy of Swan’s Learner English to hand. (more…)
(This is a follow-up to my post on phonology-based activities. I’m sharing it now because some of our teachers are about to begin training for the Trinity DipTESOL. Phonology/pronunciation features quite a bit on that course, so I want to offer our teachers an ideas bank to help them explore this area in class)
Here are a load of random pronunciation activities to try out in class. These activities have pretty worked well for me with students aged 9-16. This is a work in progress! I’ll add more to this list when I get more time or try new things. (more…)
I like teaching word stress. I have various ‘go to’ activities for noticing and practising word stress – stuff like this:
Copyright Marks and Bowen (2012)
What have I been trying recently?
I’m trying to make things more fun for young learners…
The other fun thing is this…
Pic from dhgate.com
Board the stress patterns, e.g. like this:
Say a word. The students discuss which stress pattern it has with their team. They throw their sticky balls at the correct pattern. Work out some kind of points system. They seem to love this game, or perhaps they just love ‘accidentally’ throwing the balls at me…!
You could also make them throw their ball at a particular stress pattern. They must then think of a word they know with that pattern.
I’m writing a series of short posts in response to Martin Sketchley’s blog challenge. You can view his new blog here.