Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Big_Bird]

Hello to those of you teaching in Korea,

1) I'm wondering which pronunciation problems are most prevelant in your classroom.

2) I'm wondering what methods you employ to help your students overcome these problems.

All responses are welcome (even if you are a new teacher, and can only answer question 1).

Cheers

[Big Mac]

The biggest problems I noticed had to do with their inability to distinguish between "r" and "l" sounds. They will often replace "r" with an "l." So "rope" would come out "lope." It takes a lot of practice for them to get this one right.

My students used to laugh at me because I would freak out every time I heard them say words like "change," "page" or "Mudge." They always add a double "e" sound to the end. So it comes out pageeeeeee. It drives me up the wall. That's one you should point out to them too.

[jangsalgida]

[chessmaster9000]

[quote="jangsalgida"]

[kathycanuck]

I agree that l and r are two big problems. I play "stop the train" with the kids, where they have to come up with English words in number of categories to score a point. It helps to point out mistakes such as listing "lobster" under animals in the "r" category....the kids love the game and they learn lots. I also am waging an unsuccessful battle against the eeeee phenomena. I've made up silly dialogues using tons of problem words like English, lunch, much and zoo (jew) so they can practice while having a giggle. It's less frequent but I still get Englisheee and luncheee from the Korean English teachers...no wonder the kids have problems.

[andrew]

.....

[Sliver]

This is the problem with the system in Korea. They employ people without basic linguistic knowledge to teach pronunciation whilst at the same time they ask for us to not do much more than teach pronunciation.

NOT YOUR GUYS FAULT AT ALL, I WAS THE SAME WHEN I GOT HERE.


To help the R and L problem in simplistic terms.


'L' needs the tongue on the teeth, and 'R' needs the tongue 'hanging' in the middle of the mouth while the sound comes from the neck.

The reason Koreans have trouble is because Korean has a similar sound '��' which, in most cases, the tongue touches the aveolar ridge, somewhere in between the teeth and if you were just letting the tongue dangle.

Hope it helps.

[the_beaver]

[Privateer]

Koreans are actually taught to pronounce English words incorrectly at school. The Korean English teacher will write an English sentence on the board, then write it in transliterated hangeul underneath, then make them repeat it:

"Look at this page"
"��ũ ��Ʈ �� ����"

So 'page' comes out 'pa-jeee', and this is drilled into them.

The good news is that it isn't so difficult for them to pronounce 'page' properly once you show them the correct way.

With any pronunciation problem, you can drill them on it as and when the problem appears: it takes less than a minute out of class time. Draw attention to the shape of your mouth and position of your tongue as you pronounce whatever sound it is slowly. Drill chorally and then individually.

Other examples of problems are they pronounce 'v' as 'b', 'z' as 'j', and can't pronounce short 'i' so it comes out 'eeee'. I find the word 'it's' comes out as 'iss' or 'iz' because the combination of 't' and 's' is hard for them. It's less of a problem but the Korean version of 'p' is not aspirated so if you get them to say 'puh' holding a piece of paper in front of their mouths the paper doesn't move: that's good for a laugh at least, if you're teaching a phonics class.

Other than when teaching phonics classes, I've never made pronunciation the focus of my whole lesson. You can make a good bingo game using minimal pairs words (e.g. 'ban' and 'van'), however. The game gets kids to really pay attention to these small but significant sound differences, English phonemes.

I agree with the_beaver that problems of syllabic and sentence stress are more important. I find students will repeat back sentences to me with articles dropped and/or inserted so 'She's going on a picnic' will come out 'She's going on picnic'. My theory is this is because the word 'a' is not (in a sentence with normal stress) stressed thus making it difficult to hear. If anyone has a good way of dealing with this problem please post it. In fact does anyone have any good tips on how to teach sentence stress generally or a whole lesson on stress? (please no lame jokes in reply)

[SeoulMan6]

"Let's go to the 'Jew' to see the lions and giraffes."

"I live in Suwon 'Shhitty' so I take a 'tack-she'."

"Little Red Riding Hood saw the Big Bad 'Eulp'"

"The pen is "unduh" table." ("on the" or "under"?)

"My father is "sirty-pibe" years old."


How to fix it? You probably can't, but you can improve it.

1. patience
2. showing them where you're tongue should be, though sometimes it's difficult and creates a giggling fit.
3. insistence

[Sliver]

the-beaver wrote

[Lemonade]

Students have trouble pronouncing the word "the." They don't position their tongues properly so the word comes out like "duh." When I hear this I say, "No, say it like this "the" and get your tongue on your top teeth so you don't say, "duh." "Duh" sounds stupid." So they laugh a LOT and keep practicing it properly with me over and over until I say, "good." It works.

Many words that have "ed" at the end they tend to pronounce wrong when they are learning. So words like "learned" get pronounced as "learn-ED" "help-ED." This happens so often when I hear them read that I don't always have time to correct them, but I try. I understand that some of those words have an "ED" sound and it's difficult to know such as "added" or "needed." I figure they just need more time and experience in class to know which words like this are pronounced.

I once had a student who kept saying "b i t ches" and it threw me for a loop until I realized she was trying to say, "beaches." So I wrote the two words on the board and we practiced them. She asked, "what does b i t ches mean?" I explained that it means female dog and it's used negatively against women. She said, "what do you call men then, b i t chers?" I couldn't help but have a laughing fit. She wasn't amused. I got my composure and explained that there is no such word for men. The student looked depressed and said, "oh that's not fair!" I then went on to explain the meaning of "jerk." That seemed to make her happy. LOL

[The Bobster]

[Zyzyfer]

A good way to get students to at least see the differences is to relate the sounds to animals or something else that's extremely obvious.

R - growl like a tiger/lion
L - tongue on teeth thing like sliver said
Z - what sound do bees make?

etc

[Lizara]