May/June 2021 Issue 280 - IATEFL VOICES 280 - May/June 2021 www.iatefl.org 2019 - Pronunciation Science
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www.iatefl.org IATEFL VOICES 280 – May/June 2021
2019
ISSN 2412-6578
May/June 2021
Issue 280
14 IATEFL VOICES 280 – May/June 2021 www.iatefl.org
Uncommitted materials: support
for spontaneous interaction in class
Piers Messum and Roslyn Piers Messum has
But many teachers (for whom we use
Young discuss what charts taught in Japan, France female pronouns in this article) hesitate
and pointing bring to the and the UK. He has a
PhD in Phonetics from
to take up these opportunities,
classroom UCL about how children
perhaps because their training has
learn to pronounce L1. given them limited ways to deal
Committed and He and Roslyn work for with the unexpected. The textbook,
uncommitted materials Pronunciation Science ‘committed’ by design, doesn’t help at
Most language learning materials are Ltd.
such moments.
committed: they support the teaching The uncommitted PronSci (/prɒnsaɪ/)
To her surprise,
or learning of particular points, or Roslyn Young has charts and the pedagogy they enable
prompt discussion on particular topics. become competent in were designed to help teachers when
Coursebooks are good examples. In teaching online. She they ‘depart from the plan’. By using
contrast, a few tools and materials are previously taught at the
them, teachers can improvise more
University of Franche
uncommitted: they provide support for Comté. Her PhD in readily, better, with greater confidence
the teacher whatever the point, whatever Applied Linguistics was and with students at any level.
the topic. The whiteboard, dictionaries about the pedagogy
and Cuisenaire rods are examples.
underlying the Silent Way.
The PronSci charts
Uncommitted materials don’t look The PronSci charts are hung on
impressive at first sight. No one enters improvised, the parts where ‘the students’ the classroom wall. There are three
a classroom and enthuses over the learning unfolds in front of us, the types: a chart showing the sounds of
whiteboard, but who would want to unpredictable starts to happen, and we the language; a set of Word charts
teach without one? The whiteboard is depart from the plan to attend to what is containing all the function words of
indispensable as soon as the teacher needed’ (Underhill, 2014). English—about 55 per cent of words
wants to present a grammar point or Many people have suggested that it is spoken (Pennebaker, 2011)—and some
work on an underlying problem that has during such spontaneous interactions, other common words; and a chart
led to a mistake. when a student’s immediate needs showing sound/spelling relationships.
become the focus of the lesson, that They were inspired by Gattegno’s
Uncommitted materials as much of the real learning occurs. Indeed, Silent Way charts and were designed
support for spontaneous in some human-centred approaches— for use with students who are non-
interaction Community Language Learning, Silent beginners.
No lesson ever completely follows the Way, Dogme—the whole lesson may be At first sight, these charts look
script. There is always much that is improvised for this reason. like no more than a colourful display
Students working together on a problem.
www.iatefl.org IATEFL VOICES 280 – May/June 2021 15
2019
pointed, generating a high level of shared
attention in the class. Furthermore, during
the pointing, many students will be saying
‘‘ The teacher and
students interact with the
the sentence under their breath and
charts using telescopic
developing an opinion on the problem. pointers, producing
As soon as the pointing is finished, the sequences of sounds,
class is ready to contribute.
spellings and words, as
A third modality
To work on a problem, students must
examine what has been said. Language
needed.
’’
classes generally work on problems and pronunciation problems become
in two modalities: (1) speech and (2) apparent.
writing on the whiteboard. Speech is fast, As importantly, as a student points, the
writing is slow. Each has its place, but teacher also discovers something about
speech is often too ephemeral to allow his inner state: his doubts and certainties
students to examine the language, while are revealed by his demeanour and the
the permanence of writing reduces a way he moves the pointer—smoothly
speaking task to a reading one and as a or chaotically, in a well-thought-out
consequence the work loses intensity. sequence or in a series of tentative taps,
Pointing a sequence of words on etc.
Chart 10: Time words. charts, whether done by the teacher or Getting a student to point a sentence
the students, gives us a third modality, with a problem unpacks it for everyone.
of basic words. However, just as a midway between speech and writing: It gives the student a better chance to
whiteboard starts to be useful when you ❚ Pointing takes place more slowly than self-correct, and gives the teacher greater
write on it, what animates the PronSci speech for those times when speech is insight into his difficulty. We know of
charts is the activity of pointing. The too fast for its details to be followed; no other diagnostic technique which
teacher and students interact with but faster than writing, saving time approaches its sensitivity.
the charts using telescopic pointers, because words need only be touched.
producing sequences of sounds, ❚ Pointing is not as ephemeral as Words on display
spellings and words, as needed. speech because the students do see All the function words and some other
When following pointing, students see the words; but it is not as permanent high-frequency words of English appear
the words of the sentence in a written as writing because each word is left on the charts, which are themed so that
form but hold them in their minds in an behind when the pointer moves on. words with grammatical or other affinities
aural form until the pointing is complete, For many problems which come up are found together (see Chart 10).
and then they try to say the sentence in class, this third modality is better The grammar of English contains
at normal speed. The process draws adapted than either of the others. On numerous systems. Examples of these
them into being attentive: they have to the one hand, it gives speech enough include the various uses of ‘some’ and
hold the emerging sentence from the permanence to be examined in detail; ‘any’; ‘use’ (n.), ‘use’ (v.) and ‘used
beginning to the end, knowing that they on the other hand, it gives the students to’; ‘have’ (aux.), ‘have’ (v.) and ‘have
can’t glance back. a written version of a spoken sentence to’; ‘already’, ‘always’, ‘still’, ‘yet’ and
without the permanence of writing. ‘not yet’. As in the first three of these
What pointing brings examples, different pronunciations of the
Shared attention Diagnosing problems function words involved often identify
The starting point for a spontaneous Pointing on charts is also a sensitive different meanings.
interaction is often a mistake made by diagnostic tool. In a simple example, These systems cause many of the
a student. But there is a danger that a student might say something that problems that emerge in spontaneous
the other students are not involved. you hear as, ‘They are thirty days in interactions in class. Having all the
Working on the problem using charts at June.’ What did he mean to say? Is his elements of the systems on show,
the front of the classroom presents it to problem grammar or pronunciation? including the meaning/pronunciation
everyone and draws them in. Students If he now points incorrect words, the variants, allows the teacher to work on
have to watch to follow what is being problem relates to grammar. If he points the complexity of a system exactly when
the words correctly, then his problem is it is most meaningful to the students.
Having words on display has another
‘‘
pronunciation. The teacher knows how to
Uncommitted materials begin correcting. advantage. When a student knows a
word but it doesn’t come to him in the
don’t look impressive at When the teacher gets a student to
moment, he has the opportunity to find
point, she discovers to what extent he
first sight. No one enters controls his sentence and exactly where it on the charts rather than being told.
a classroom and enthuses his problems lie. He doesn’t have to The teacher may narrow the choice down
over the whiteboard, but spell, write or pronounce his sentence by saying, ‘The word you need is on this
chart.’
as he points, so grammatical problems
who would want to teach are more clearly revealed. When he has Often the student will find several
without one?
’’ finished pointing, he says the sentence, plausible alternatives, and considering
16 IATEFL VOICES 280 – May/June 2021 www.iatefl.org
‘‘ Reduced forms are an
breaks the word up into its sounds. It also
acts as a key for them: from the colour
of the first vowel in ‘Sunday’, students important feature of English
can see how to pronounce the vowel pronunciation. The full form
in ‘Monday’, and then ‘come’, ‘does’,
is colour coded, while the
‘among’ and ‘enough’.
The use of reduced forms for about 50 reduced form is shown with
function words is an important feature
of English pronunciation. On the charts,
the full form is colour coded, while the
reduced form is shown with a colour-
a coloured dot.
’’
students learn something, and it is the
coded dot beneath the relevant vowel. time in class where the personal side
Thus the chart that contains all the verb of their students is most apparent. As
auxiliaries (Chart 5) also contains all their uncommitted materials, PronSci charts
pronunciation variants. Students can see give teachers many ways to deal elegantly
that the teacher is right: the reduced and effectively with the unexpected.
forms are indeed legitimate. Here, Students like the various challenges of
too, they are presented with choices working with charts: they enjoy following
to be made and they can explore the the teacher pointing, they enjoy pointing
circumstances in which the full forms themselves, and they enjoy pointing
appear. vicariously when fellow students are
Chart 5: Auxiliaries. With charts on the wall, pronunciation working with the charts. Teachers who
is always in play and easy to integrate have charts soon use them more than
each word in turn forces him to compare into the rest of the lesson. We’ve written they use the whiteboard.
them. An inner dialogue develops: ‘No, I at more length about why and how
don’t think it’s during, could it be while?’ to use charts and a pointer to teach References
Because the student is working on his pronunciation in Messum (2018) and The PronSci charts and guides to their
own question, the act of choosing helps Young (2018). use can be seen at www.pronsci.com/
him to sharpen his criteria for using There is a design principle for all materials
one word rather than another. Without three types of charts, that they should Messum, P (2018). Why we should
charts, it is impractical for the teacher to contain a complete inventory of their use a chart and a pointer for teaching
regularly offer students choices of this field: all the sounds, all the spellings (for pronunciation. Speak Out!, 58, 53–60.
type, but it is very natural if the function vocabulary items) and all the function Pennebaker, J (2011). The Secret Life of
words are on display. words of English. So with charts on the Pronouns. Bloomsbury Press.
wall, the whole language is available to Underhill, A. (2014). Training for the
PronSci charts as be pointed. Unpredictable. EJALTEFL 3(2), 59–69.
pronunciation support Young, R. (2018). How to use a chart and
Students benefit from being shown the Conclusion a pointer for teaching pronunciation.
pronunciation of words, but phonetic Underhill (2014) argued that teachers Speak Out!, 59, 20–26.
script divorces the spoken form from the should develop their skills for dealing with
written form and is off-putting to many. spontaneous interactions. It is already,
Colour (or the shades seen by the colour for many teachers, the part of the lesson p.messum@pronsci.com
blind) superimposes the pronunciation they find the most satisfying: it requires
on the normal written form and visually them to be creative, they sense that their roslynyoung@gmail.com
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