Order of Sounds Introduction in the Process of Teaching English after German to Future Teachers

Abstract

One of the factors that intensify the process of teaching the second foreign language pronunciation to future teachers is taking into account their previous experience of acquiring their native and the first foreign languages. It is most effective when students are taught two cognate languages with the first language becoming the main source of language transfer into the second one. Thus, there appears the necessity to define the most optimal order of introducing the second foreign language sounds that would make the process of teaching pronunciation less time and effort consuming. Since English and German are the most common Germanic languages to be chosen by those entering higher educational establishments, the study aims at determining the order of introducing sounds in the process of teaching English as the second foreign language after German. The author suggests classifying English sounds according to similarities/differences of their relevant features in comparison with the corresponding sounds of the German and students’ native languages. The comparative analysis of the sounds of all the languages in contact serves the ground for the author to consider the place of articulation the main relevant feature to be taken into account while determining the groups of English consonants while the position of the tongue becomes the basic criterion for distinguishing English monophthongs. The groups in each classification are arranged in accordance with the principle of increasing difficulty. The easiest sounds for acquisition that belong to the first group are regarded to be those whose relevant features coincide with the characteristics of the corresponding sounds of all the other languages considered, whereas the sounds which differ from both the German and future teachers’ native languages cause most difficulties, thus, belonging to the fourth group.

     In the process of speech consonants and vowels function simultaneously, the author emphasizes the necessity of their parallel introduction. However, considering the complex nature of English diphthongs it is recommended to introduce them after monophthongs, though in the order that is predetermined by their peculiarities in comparison with the corresponding sounds of the first foreign language as well as the analysis of their second element articulation.