THE LEGACY OF THE COURSE “PHONETICS AND PHONOLOGY” IN TEACHING AUTHENTIC PRONUNCIATION: WHERE THE VISUAL FEEDBACK PARADIGM WILL DO THE MOST!

The increasing use of speech analysis technologies in classrooms and recent developments in pronunciation research and pedagogy have heightened the need to investigate the efficacy of computer-assisted pronunciation teaching (CAPT) and course instructions and led to a proliferation of studies. This study extended this line of research and first attempted to explore the degree to which the course Phonetics and Phonology, a Bachelor’s degree course focusing on segmental and suprasegmental features, can have potential impacts on the identification of problematic areas (i.e., segmnetals) and authentic productions in an EFL setting. The second aim was to examine the usability of imagery and electronic visual feedback in pronunciation authenticity. To this end, thirty students majoring in English literature were recruited from the Vali-e-Asr University of Rafsanjan, based on convenience sampling. Half of the students were assigned to the control group, and the others took part in the experimental group. Both groups had the same instructor during their sixteen sessions. However, a visual feedback paradigm, integrated into a computer-assisted language learning (CALL) program, was only employed in the experimental group. All participants attended the course Phonetics and Phonology after taking the pre-test on the pronunciation of some specific words. The analysis focused on the accuracy of the segmental features. Additionally, a post-test was administered to check the two groups’ improvement in producing authentic pronunciation of the same words. The findings revealed that the experimental group slightly outperformed the control group in terms of authenticity. This study also concluded with practical implications for key technological competencies needed by any researcher or instructor who investigate pronunciation-related issues.

کلیدواژه ها:

CAPT ، phonetics ، phonology ، authentic pronunciation ، visual feedback paradigm