Putting Prosody First – Some Practical Solutions to a Perennial Problem: The Innovalangues Project

• Authors: Dan Frost , Francis Picavet
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

This paper presents some of the difficulties of teaching languages, in particular English, in the context of LSP/LAP2 programmes in French universities. The main focus of this paper will be the importance of prosody, especially in English, as an area where these difficulties may be addressed. We will outline the various solutions that are currently being put into place as part of the Innovalangues project, a six-year international language teaching and research project headed by Université Stendhal (Grenoble 3), France. The project has substantial funding from the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research and its mission is to develop innovative tools and measures to help LSP/LAP learners reach B2 on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFRL). The languages concerned are English, Italian, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese and possibly French as a foreign language. Initially the project will be focusing on the needs of Grenoble’s students, but the objective is to make the tools and resources developed freely available to the wider community. Oral production and reception are at the heart of Innovalangues. We believe, along with many other researchers, that prosody is key to comprehension and to intelligibility (Kjellin 1999a, Kjellin 1999b, Munro and Derwing 2011, Saito 2012), particularly given the important differences between English and French prosody (Delattre 1965; Hirst and Di Cristo 1998; Frost 2011). In this paper, we will present the particular difficulties inherent in teaching English (and other foreign languages) in the context of ESP/EAP3 in French universities and some of the solutions that we are implementing through this project (Picavet et al., 2012; Picavet et al 2013; Picavet and Frost 2014). These include an e-learning platform for which various tools are being developed, teacher training seminars focusing on prosody and the collection of data for research.

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Łódzki. Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego
• Journal: Research in Language
• Year: 2014
• Volume: 12
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 233-243

Dates

published

2014-09-01

online

2014-10-15

Contributors

author

Dan Frost

• Université de Savoie, France

author

Francis Picavet

• Institut Polytechnique, Grenoble, France

References

• Anderson-Hsieh, J. 1994. “Interpreting Visual Feedback on Suprasegmentals in Computer Assisted Pronunciation Instruction », Calico Journal, 11(4): 5-16.
• Astésano, C. 2001. Rythme et accentuation en français. Invariance et variabilité stylistique. Paris: Editions L’Harmattan, Collection Langue et Parole.
• Bailey, T., K. Plunket, and E. Scarpa,. 1999. “A Cross-Linguistic Study in Learning Prosodic Rhythms: Rules, Constraints and Similarities”, Language and Speech, 42, (1): 1-38.
• Beaucamp, J. 2008. « Enseigner une langue vivante étrangère à l'école (cycle 3) : opportunité d'un début de réflexion métaphonologique et métalinguistique ». Les Cahiers de l'Acedle, 3: 15-39.
• Benguerel, A-P. 1973. Corrélats physiologiques de l’accent en français. Phonetica 27: 21-35.[Crossref]
• Bertinetto, P.M. 1989. “Reflections on the dichotomy ‘stress’ vs. ‘syllable-timing’”. Revue de Phonétique Appliquée 91-93, 99-130.
• Baker, A. and J. Murphy. 2011. “Knowledge Base of Pronunciation Teaching: Staking Out the Territory”, TESL Canada Journal / Revue TESL du CANADA: 29-50.
• Bolinger, D. 1958. “A Theory of Pitch Accent in English”, Word, 14: 109-149.
• Brossard, J. (1995) Enseigner la phonétique anglaise. Paris : Bordas.
• Campione, E., and Véronis, J. 1998. “A statistical study of pitch target points in five languages”, 5th International Conference on Spoken Language Processing (ICSLP'98), Sidney: 1391-1394.
• Council of Europe. 2001. A Common European Framework of Reference for learning, teaching and assessment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Dahan, D. and J-M. Bernard. 1996. “Interspeaker Variability in Emphatic Accent Production in French”, Language and Speech, 39(4): 341-374.[PubMed]
• Delattre, P. 1965. Comparing the Phonetic Features of English, French, German and Spanish: An Interim report. Heidelberg: Julius Groos Verlag.
• Di Cristo, A. 1998. “Intonation in French”, in D. Hirst and A. Di Cristo, (eds). Intonation Systems: A Survey of Twenty Languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 3-45.
• Dupoux, E, S. Peperkamp and N. Sebastian-Galles. 2001. A robust method to study stress-deafness. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 110(3.1): 1606-1618.[PubMed]
• Dupoux, E. and S. Peperkamp. 1999. Fossil markers of language development: Phonological ‘deafness’ in adult speech processing. In Laks, B. and J. Durand, (eds), Cognitive phonology. Oxford: Oxford University Press: 168-190.
• Frost, D. 2004. « L’enseignement de l’accent lexical dans le secteur LANSAD : quelques notes sur une expérience de recherche-action en auto-apprentissage », ASP 43-44: 99-106.
• Frost, D. 2008. « The Stress Site la conception d’un parcours multimédia pour un travail en autonomie sur l’accentuation des mots » ASP 53-54: 111-127.
• Frost, D. 2010. Stress cues in English and French: a perceptual study. Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 41(01): 67-84.
• Gilbert, J. 2008. Teaching Pronunciation Using the Prosody Pyramid. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Gilbert, J. 2010. “Pronunciation As Orphan: What Can Be Done?”, As We Speak (TESOL Newsletter) 7(2).
• Ginet, A. (dir.) et al. 1997. Du laboratoire de langues à la salle de cours multi-médias. Paris: Nathan.
• Goulier, F. 2007. Les outils du Conseil de l’Europe en classe de langue. Cadre européen commun et Portfolios. Paris, Strasbourg : Conseil de l’Europe, Didier.
• Guichon, N. 2007. « Recherche-développement et didactique des langues », Les Cahiers de l’ACEDLE 4: 37-54.
• Henderson, A., D. Frost, E.Tergujeff, A. Kautzsch, D. Murphy, Kirkova-A. Naskova, E. Waniek-Klimczak, D.
• Levey, U. Cunningham, and L. Curnick, Lesley. 2012. “The English Teaching in Europe Survey: Selected Results. Research in Language 10(1): 5-28. DOI: 10.2478/v10015-011-0047-4[Crossref]
• Hirst, D. and A. Di Cristo (Eds). 1998. Intonation Systems: A Survey of Twenty Languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Jenkins, Jennifer. 2000. The phonology of English as an international language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Jun, S. and C. Fougeron. 1995. “The accentual phrase and the prosodic structure of French”. 13th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences (ICPhS 12), vol. 2: 722-725.
• Kjellin, O. 1999a. “Accent Addition: Prosody and Perception Facilitates Second Language Learning”. In O. Fujimura, B. D. Joseph, and B. Palek (Eds), Proceedings of LP'98 (Linguistics and Phonetics Conference) at Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, September 1998 (Vol. 2), Prague: The Karolinum Press: 373-398.
• Kjellin, O. 1999b. “Five Cornerstones for Second-Language Acquisition - the Neurophysiological Opportunist’s Way”. Unpublished: 1-9.
• Lacheret-Dujour, A. and F. Beaugendre. 1999. La prosodie du français. Paris: CNRS.
• Levey, D. 2001. “Stressing Intonation”, in Harris, T., I. Roldan, I. Sanz, and M. Torreblanco, (eds). ELT2000: Thinking Back, Looking Forward. Granada: Greta: 35-45.
• Lindblom, B. 1968. “Temporal organization of syllable production”. Speech Transmission Laboratory Quarterly Progress, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden, 2-3: 1-6.
• McQueen, J. and A. Cutler. 1997. “Cogntive Processes in Speech Perception”, in W. Hardcastle and J. Laver, (eds), The Handbook of Phonetic Sciences. Oxford: Blackwell: 556-585.
• Major, R. C. 2008. “Transfer in second language phonology. A review”, in J. Hansen Edwards and M. Zampini, (eds) Phonology and Second Language Acquisition. Amsterdam: John Benjamins: 63-94.
• Martin, P. 2013. « La structure prosodique opère-t-elle avant ou après la syntaxe ? ». TIPA. Travaux interdisciplinaires sur la parole et le langage, 29.
• Munro, M.J. and T.M. Derwing, (2011). “The foundations of accent and intelligibility in pronunciation research”. Language Teaching 44 (3): 316 - 327.
• Murphy, J. 2004. “Attending to Word Stress while learning new vocabulary”, English for Specific Puposes, 23: 67-83. Murphy, John et Kandil, Magdi. 2004. “Word-level stress patterns in the academic word list”, System, 32: 61-74.
• Odlin, T. 1989. Language Transfer. Cross-Linguistic influence in Language Learning. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.
• Patel, A. 2008. Music, Language and the Brain. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Pennington, M. 1996. Phonology in English Language Teaching. London: Longman.
• Peperkamp, S. and E. Dupoux. 2002. “A typological study of stress deafness”, in Gussenhoven, C. and Warner, N. (eds). 2000. Laboratory Phonology 7. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter: 203-240.
• Picavet, F., V. Aubergé. and S. Rossato. 2012. “Can a guided rhythmic approach contribute to the oral performance of learners of L2 English? A case study”. Methodological Perspective on Second Language Prosody. M.G. Busà, A. Stella, (eds). Padua, Italy: Cooperativa Libraria Editrice Università di Padova (CLEUP): 73-77.
• Picavet, F., V. Aubergé. and S. Rossato. 2013. « Production orale en anglais : travailler en rythme, produire du sens et être compris ». Les Langues Modernes, 4: 104-114.
• Picavet, F. and D. Frost. 2014. « Le lot THEMPPO dans le projet Innovalangues : recherche-action en prosodie et en production orale ». LEND - Lingua e Nuova Didattica, 1: 29-35.
• Pike, K. 1945. The Intonation of American English. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
• Rasier, L. and P. Hiligsmann. 2007 « Prosodic transfer from L1 to L2. Theoretical and methodological issues », Nouveaux Cahiers de linguistique française, 28: 41-46.
• Rossi, M. 1979. « Le français, langue sans accent ? », in I. Fónagy and P. Léon (eds) L’accent en français contemporain. Montréal / Paris / Bruxelles: Didier: 93-106.
• Saito, K. 2012. “Effects of instruction on L2 pronunciation development: A synthesis of 15 quasi-experimental intervention studies”. TESOL Quarterly, 46(4): 842-854.
• Scarcella, R. and R. Oxford. 1994. “Second Language Pronunciation: State Of The Art In Instruction”, System 22(2): 221-230.
• Taillefer, G. 2002. « L’anglais dans les formations spécialisées à l’Université : un cheveu sur la soupe? Peut-on rendre le plat plus appétissant ? », ASP 37-38: 155-172.
• Taillefer, G. 2007. « Le défi culturel de la mise en oeuvre du Cadre européen commun de référence pour les langues : implications pour l’enseignement supérieur français ». Les Cahiers de l’APLIUT 16(2): 33-49.
• Turk, A. and S. Hufnagel. 2007. “Multiple targets of phrase-final lengthening in American English words”, Journal of Phonetics 35(4): 445-472.[Crossref]
• Wenk, B.J. and F. Wioland. 1982. “Is French really syllable-timed? Journal of Phonetics 10: 193-216.
• Wennerstrom, A. 2000. “The Role of Intonation in Second Language Fluency”, in H. Riggenbach (ed) Perspectives on Fluency. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press: 102-127.
• Vaissière, J. 2002. Cross-Linguistic Prosodic Transcription: French versus English. Problems and Methods in Experimental Phonetics, in honour of the 70th anniversary of Prof. L.V. Bondarko,. N. B. Volslkaya, N. D. Svetozarova and P. A. Skrelin. St. Petersburg: 147-164.

Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/rela-2014-0002