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Вестн. Моск. ун-та. Сер. 19. Лингвистика и межкультурная коммуникация. 2019. № 2
ТЕОРИЯ И ПРАКТИКА ОБУЧЕНИЯ ИНОСТРАННЫМ ЯЗЫКАМ
Alexandra N. Kolesnikova, Alina A. Maslova
THROUGH THE EYES OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS:
WHICH ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION NORM
TO STUDY IN RUSSIA?
Lomonosov Moscow State University 1 Leninskie Gory, Moscow, 119991
University of Oxford, OX1 2JD, Oxford, England, UK
Statement of the problem. This article discusses the necessity to follow a certain pronunciation norm in language teacher education in Russia. Firstly, the article looks at the changes which have happened over the last fifty years in teaching pronunciation at the level of higher education education in Russia. Nowadays the influence of English as an International Language (EIL) is quite strong, which leads to the worldwide tendency to believe that intelligibility of speech is more important than following a certain pronunciation standard. However, when choosing a pronunciation norm for teaching to ELT majors in Russia we should also conform to the existing Russian educational standards. Results. The article also includes the results of a survey conducted among high school students, which has shown that from the point of view of the majority of respondents, a teacher should consistently follow a certain pronunciation norm while teaching English to high school students. Moreover, most respondents prefer the British variant of English as a model of pronunciation to study. Conclusion. Results of the study show the modern preferences concerning the variety of English to teach in high school as well as the correlation between a certain teacher's pronunciation and the high school students' opinions about the teacher's professionalism.
Key words: pronunciation norm; native-speaker pronunciation; pronunciation standard; phonetics.
The concept of English as an International Language (EIL) has drastically changed the role of pronunciation instruction in teaching English as a Foreign Language. Much of the current research suggests that nowadays there is no need for EFL students to do their best to replicate
Alexandra N. Kolesnikova - PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Linguistics and Intercultural Communication, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Area Studies, Lomonosov Moscow State University (e-mail: [email protected]).
Alina A. Maslova - MSc student, Applied Linguistics and SLA, University of Oxford (e-mail: [email protected]).
native-like pronunciation. It is often stated that "a realistic goal of pronunciation teaching in the second language context is to acquire comfortably intelligible rather than native-like pronunciation" [Chen, 2016].
Clearly, the focus has shifted to intelligibility and comprehensibility as the most important features of EFL learners' speech. "We are now at a point where most L2 teachers recognize that there is nothing wrong with having an accent, and that intelligibility and comprehensibility should be the goals of L2 speakers, not native-like status" [Derwing, 2010].
Interestingly enough, some studies have shown that even the most proficient speakers of L2, when compared to native speakers, still sound non-native [Abrahamsson and Hyltenstam, 2009], and thus, "native speaker performance should not be the goal of L2 learners" [Derwing, 2010].
Moreover, EFL students themselves do not see having an accent as an issue or even state their preference for retaining their native accents. For instance, such observation was recorded by A. Wach: 73 out of 102 respondents stated that having an accent is acceptable as long as it does not impede communication [Wach, 2011]. "Grau's (2005) Germany-based study of 231 first-year university students revealed that 65 per cent opted for intelligibility as a pronunciation objective" [Galloway and Rose, 2015: 292]. In the study performed by O. Kang, 26% of the respondents (EFL learners) "indicated that they even occasionally avoided sounding like a native speaker of the target language" [Kang, 2010].
EFL teachers also admit that being intelligible is the most important factor within the EIL perspective. The study administered to 58 pre-service English teachers from Taiwan has shown that: "most participants regard intelligibility rather than accent to be more crucial in communication" [Chien, 2014].
The new requirements towards EFL speakers' pronunciation have been described in the Lingua Franca Core proposed by J. Jenkins: "The Lingua Franca Core consists of: most consonant sounds; vowel length (but not quality) distinctions; absence of word-initial and - medial consonant deletion; and nuclear stress. For ELF, all the rest is in the realm of'non-core'" [Jenkins, 2005].
J. Jenkins also underlined the importance of taking into account the relationship between a speaker's accent and their sociolinguistic identity. Giving students the freedom to retain certain L1 features is seen a beneficial factor in creating their sociolinguistic image. "Learners need acquire only the core items and have these in their pronunciation repertoires available for use as and when required. The non-core items, on the other hand, now assume the status offeatures of the respective (L2) regional accent: German-English, Japanese-English, Spanish-English and the like, thus allowingL2 English speakers the same sociolinguistic rights as those enjoyed by L1 speakers" [Jenkins, 2005].
The surveys conducted by international linguists and their results demonstrated above, fired the interest and determined the necessity to study the question of teaching phonetics in Russia, focusing not only on the existing norm of the English language taught at schools and universities, but also on preferences of high school pupils in terms of what norm they want to acquire and how important the norm is in foreign language acquisition.
The British standard of English, namely Received Pronunciation norm, has traditionally been used in Russia as the medium of L2 instruction [Kolesnikova, 2015] and it is widely presented in coursebooks used for teaching phonetics at both school and university levels: Bondarenko L.P., Zavyalova V.L. Basis of English Phonetics. Moscow, 2009, Vinnik E.V. Practical Course of FL: practical phonetics of English, Novosibirsk, 2009, Vishnevskaya E.M. Practicum of English Phonetics, Moscow, 2012, etc.
Furthermore, Federal State Educational Standard for Higher Education and Moscow State University Educational Standard in the field of 'Linguistics' justify teaching the norm or a particular standard of a foreign language in compliance with the requirements for phonetic skills in verbal communication. The emphasized in the educational standards significance of 'effective verbal' communication also conditions the increased importance of teaching phonetics of a foreign language as the basic 'tool' to produce phonetically correct speech.
Moreover, our previous research conducted among university teachers and students (Lomonosov Moscow State University, 2016) has shown that Lomonosov Moscow State University members of the Faculty of Foreign Languages and Area Studies as well as ELT majors are not yet prepared to waive the professional requirements for English language teachers: they believe that EFL teachers should still strive to acquire native-like pronunciation (95,6% of teachers and 100% of ELF majors said so) regardless of the EIL influence [Maslova, 2017]. Other contemporary opinion research also suggests that if English is a tool used in professional careers, a certain standard should still be followed [Wach, 2011; Coskun, 2011].
Analysing students' needs and opinions is quite a widespread type of research nowadays [Derwing, 2010; Wach, 2011; Coskun, 2011; Chien, 2014], however, it has not proved to be that popular in Russia yet. Still, within the learner-oriented approach to English teaching, which has been widespread in Russia since the end of the twentieth century, it is extremely important to pay attention to the students' needs, which is a starting point of the whole education process [Serikov, 1999: 242].
Since pupils in Russia start studying a foreign language from the 1st or the 2nd grade and study it until they pass Unified State Exam in a foreign language, it is extremely interesting to study their views on lan-
guage learning and teaching, namely which pronunciation norm to teach, to learn and to follow.
The Study
We administered a paper-based survey to 29 final year pupils (eleventh grade) of a state school in Moscow (n=29). All of them had stated that they would like to enroll in a linguistics / ELT course at university. The respondents were given a set of statements (S1 - S3) and closed-ended questions (Q1 - Q3). At the end of the questionnaire the participants were asked to give permission to use their anonymous opinions in this study.
SI : I believe that an English teacher's pronunciation should be close to a certain pronunciation standard.
Table 1. TeacherS pronunciation
%, n = 29
Agree 62
Somewhat agree 20,7
Somewhat disagree 13,8
Disagree 0
I have no opinion 3,5
24 out of 29 (82,7%) respondents agreed or somewhat agreed that a high school English teacher should follow a certain pronunciation norm! 4 students disagreed with this statement and one student said that he/she could not take a position on this matter.
Q1: Which pronunciation standard should an English teacher use at high school?
Table 2. Pronunciation standard for a teacher
%, n = 29
British 62
American 20,7
Canadian 0
Australian 0
No preference 10,3
Other 7
The majority of students (18 students, 62%) stated that they would like to follow the British standard, whereas 20,7% of the respondents opted for the American one. No students chose Canadian and Australian standards. 3 students stated no preference (10,3%). In the «Other» section
2 students mentioned that they would like an English teacher to use «either British or American» standard. The overall preference for the British standard can be explained by the fact that RP is the standard that the students had been taught before they were asked to take part in the survey. Q2: Why do you think so?
Table 3. Justifying the choice of the standard
%, n = 29
I like the sound of it 20,7
It's more popular 34,5
I like the country this standard is associated with 3,4
It's simpler 0
There are more materials available 13,8
I don't know 17,2
Other 10,3
The most popular answer: "It's more popular", accounting for 34,5%, could be regarded as quite objective since student books for teaching English at school are based on the British norm of pronunciation and, consequently, "there are more materials available", as 13,8% of respondents pointed out. Still, 20,7% of the survey participants rely on their own preferences rather than 'doctrinaire beliefs', stating that "I like the sound of it" could be another strong reason to choose a particular pronunciation norm for imitation. In the «Other» section the respondents mentioned the historical aspect (the British standard was seen as «original» due to the historical reasons). Moreover, one of the students stated that he/she had chosen the British norm because it was «more correct».
Q3: Do you think that the pronunciation of a certain English teacher can affect your opinion about this teacher's professionalism?
Table 4. Connection between pronunciation and professionalism
%, n = 29
Agree 48,3
Somewhat agree 34,5
Somewhat disagree 6,9
Disagree 10,3
I have no opinion 0
As can be seen from Table 4, 82,8% of respondents agreed or somewhat agreed that a teacher's pronunciation influences the way students see this
teacher as a professional. This result coincides with the results of a similar survey administered to ELT majors, where 83% of students agreed with a similar statement [Maslova, 2017].
S2:1 think that a high school English teacher does not have to sound like a native speaker - it is enough to sound intelligible.
Table 5. Native-like pronunciation vs. intelligibility
%, n = 29
Agree 17,2
Somewhat agree 17,2
Somewhat disagree 41,4
Disagree 24,1
I have no opinion 0
This statement is closely connected to question 1 (Q1). The aim of this statement was to check whether the respondents answer the questions questions attentively and genuinely. The response sheets that contained obviously contradicting and mutually exclusive answers to Q1 and S2 were not analysed.
S3:1 would like to sound like a native speaker.
Table 6. Native-like pronunciation
%, n = 29
Agree 86,2
Somewhat agree 13,8
Somewhat disagree 0
Disagree 0
I have no opinion 0
All students (100%) agreed or somewhat agreed that they would like to sound like native speakers.
Results
The survey results demonstrate, firstly, the importance of following a certain pronunciation norm both by teachers: 24 out of29 (82,7%) respondents agreed or somewhat agreed that a high school English teacher should follow a certain pronunciation norm (S1), and by students: 100% of respondents agreed or somewhat agreed that they would like to sound like native speakers (Q3). Furthermore, it can be stated that 82,8% of respon-
dents agreed or somewhat agreed that a teacher's pronunciation influences the way students see this teacher as a professional.
In addition, although the American Standard of English is getting more and more popular, the survey results clearly show that the use of the British Standard of English in school education in Russia corresponds to students' needs and preferences today, regardless of the EIL influence and pronunciation norm denial.
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А.Н. Колесникова, А.А. Маслова
ГЛАЗАМИ УЧАЩИХСЯ СТАРШЕЙ ШКОЛЫ: КАКУЮ ПРОИЗНОСИТЕЛЬНУЮ НОРМУ АНГЛИЙСКОГО ЯЗЫКА ИЗУЧАТЬ?
Федеральное государственное бюджетное образовательное учреждение высшего образования «Московский государственный университет имени М.В. Ломоносова» 119991, Москва, Ленинские горы, 1
Оксфордский университет, OX1 2JD, Оксфорд, Великобритания
В статье рассматривается вопрос о необходимости следовать определенной произносительной норме в обучении английскому языку на современном этапе развития образовательной парадигмы в России с учетом существующего опыта обучения фонетике в старшей школе. В статье исследуется влияние концепции English as an International Language (EIL) на обучение иностранному языку в России, а в частности фонетике, когда разборчивость устной речи противопоставляется следованию определенной произносительной норме, что противоречит требованиям Федеральных образовательных стандартов к нормативности в обучении иностранным языкам. В статье представлены результаты опроса, проведенного среди учащихся 11 классов общеобразовательной школы, которые планируют изучать иностранный язык в профессиональных целях в языковых вузах, также приведены результаты опроса среди преподавателей Московского университета факультета иностранных языков и регионоведения, которые выразили свое мнение о том, следует ли следовать определенной норме в обучении иностранному языку, а в частности фонетике, и какую норму выбрать за образец для подражания.
В результате анализа полученных в ходе исследования статистических данных было выявлено, что учащиеся 11 классов общеобразовательной школы г. Москвы убеждены, что в обучении английскому языку должна присутствовать нормативность. 24 из 29 респондентов (82,7%) отметили, что преподаватель английского языка должен следовать определенной произносительной норме, более того 82,8% опрошенных заявили, что произношение преподавателя свидетельствует об уровне профессиональной компетентности преподавателя и влияет на то, как его воспринимают обучающиеся. Также исследование выявило, что 100% опрошенных (29 из 29 респондентов) признали, что сами хотели бы звучать как носители языка.
Ключевые слова: фонетика; обучение фонетике; произносительная норма; фонологическая компетенция.
Сведения об авторах: Колесникова Александра Николаевна — кандидат педагогических наук, доцент кафедры лингвистики, перевода и межкультурной коммуникации факультета иностранных языков и регионоведения МГУ имени М.В. Ломоносова (e-mail: [email protected]); Маслова Алина Андреевна -студентка магистратуры университета Оксфорд, Великобритания (e-mail: [email protected]).
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