Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified in Michigan? Are you interested in teaching English in Flushing, Michigan? Check out our opportunities in Flushing, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English in your community or abroad! Teflonline.net offers a wide variety of Online TESOL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. Here Below you can check out the feedback (for one of our units) of one of the 16.000 students that last year took an online course with ITTT!
The unit discussed the definition of phonology and the intonation, stress and rhythm, as well as, the International Phonetic Alphabet and its use in helping the students to come to an understanding of the pronunciation of English. Stress on words was explained in details. I learnt sound joining techniques in order to sound more natural and the importance of teaching pronunciation. Many teachers give less attention to the teaching of pronunciation because oftentimes, they lack the confidence and training to teach such skill effectively. Native English speakers rarely taught phonetics in school and it can be said that they learn how to pronounce words along the way. As such, learning about phonology including the IPA and teaching it is a foreign concept for them. Pronunciation can affect the quality of student’s communication in many ways. For one, mispronouncing words can alter the meaning of what is being and eventually lead to misunderstanding. It is therefore important for students to understand that correct pronunciation is the key to effective communication. In other cultures, people who often mispronounce words are sometimes perceived as uneducated. If this happens, it can seriously affect the confidence of the English learner and hamper her/his learning. The student would rather stay quiet in class than become the laughing stock of the entire class. While it takes hard work and years of learning for a non-native speaker to sound like a native speaker, what’s important for students is to learn how to speak clearly and ensure they are being understood correctly.
