The Use of English Songs to Improve the Pronunciation of Problematic English Consonant Sounds for Thai Learners

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Published: Jan 1, 2012

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Piyakamol Phintuyothin

Abstract

This study investigates the use of English songs to improve Thai students’ pronunciation of ten problematic English consonant phonemes that do not exist in Thai, /ɡ/, /v/, /z/, /r/, /θ/, /ð/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/, /tʃ/, and /dʒ/. The method of using English songs was compared with the direct teaching of formal rules in order to see which method leads to better results since the latter is said to be commonly used in teaching L2 pronunciation (Jones 182). Quasi-experimental research was conducted on 30 high-school students, half of whom were in the direct-teaching group and the other half in the English-song group. It was found that both methods could improve the students’ overall pronunciation of the problematic phonemes at a significant level of 0.05. However, the difference between the pre- and posttest scores of the direct-teaching group was slightly larger than the other group’s. Also, the use of English songs significantly improved student pronunciation in only six out of the ten phonemes, while the direct-teaching method significantly improved eight phonemes. Thus, although learning L2 pronunciation through songs alone can be effective, it is generally not as effective as the direct-teaching method in improving the pronunciation of certain phonemes. Qualitative data observed during the experiment and some important issues are also discussed.

Article Details

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No. 1 (2012): Thoughts 2012
Section
Articles

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Author Biography

Piyakamol Phintuyothin

Piyakamol Phintuyothin obtained her bachelor’s degree in 2008 from Chulalongkorn University with first-class honors in Education, majoring in English and Thai. Then she continued with a master’s degree in English at the Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University. Her fields of interest are second-language acquisition, interlanguage, and phonetics and phonology. She is particularly interested in employing authentic materials such as songs, movies, and public signs to enhance English-language learning.

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