• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.19-25
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• 2020

This study examined thirty-one Korean students' pronunciation of an English passage using a speech recognition application, Speechnotes, and two Canadian raters' evaluations of their speech according to the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) band criteria to assess the possibility of using the application as a teaching aid for pronunciation education. The results showed that the grand average percentage of correctly recognized words was 77.7%. From the moderate recognition rate, the pronunciation level of the participants was construed as intermediate and higher. The recognition rate varied depending on the composition of the content words and the function words in each given sentence. Frequency counts of unrecognized words by group level and word type revealed the typical pronunciation problems of the participants, including fricatives and nasals. The IELTS bands chosen by the two native raters for the rainbow passage had a moderately high correlation with each other. A moderate correlation was reported between the number of correctly recognized content words and the raters' bands, while an almost a negligible correlation was found between the function words and the raters' bands. From these results, the author concludes that the speech recognition application could constitute a partial aid for diagnosing each individual's or the group's pronunciation problems, but further studies are still needed to match human raters.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2000.07a
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• pp.338-349
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• 2000

Pronunciation teaching is once again coming into the foreground of ELT. Japan is, however, lagging far behind many countries in the development of pronunciation curricula and in the actual speech performance of the Japanese learners of English. The reasons for this can be found in the prevalence of communicative methodologies unfavorable for pronunciation teaching, in the lack of trained professionals, and in the large numbers of students in Japanese foreign language classes. This paper offers a way to promote foreign language pronunciation teaching in Japan and other countries by means of employing computer and internet facilities. The paper outlines the major directions of using modem speech technologies in pronunciation classes, like EVF (electronic visual feedback) training at segmental and prosodic levels; automated error detection, testing, grading and fluency assessment. The author discusses the applicability of some specific software packages (CSLU, SUGIspeech, Multispeech, Wavesurfer, etc.) for the needs of pronunciation teaching. Finally, the author talks about the globalization of pronunciation education via internet resources, such as computer corpora and speech and pronunciation training related web pages.

• MALSORI
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• no.41
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• pp.61-71
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• 2001

How to teach intelligible, communicative pronunciation is a continuous question in the English education. Without good input, we can not expect good output. However, in EFL situation, it is very difficult to input the good English pronunciation, therefore, we have to find out the efficient and effective material for teaching pronunciation. One of the materials is song, because songs contain the linguistic and cultural traits of the language. The purpose of this paper is to clarify the reason why songs are good for teaching pronunciation. Koreans, who are syllable timed language users, have difficulties in English pronunciation of stress, rhythm, consonants cluster, linking or blending in connected speech. The 134 songs from wee sing are analyzed for how these traits show in songs. The result shows that we can acquire the traits easily and naturally through songs. And a lesson plan is offered as an example for teaching songs.

• Journal of Korean language education
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.251-268
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• 2017

This study is based on differences of syllable type between Korean and Chinese language pronunciation. For example, Nasal consonant ending 【n】 and 【${\eta}$】 reside in both Korean and Chinese phonetics simultaneously. However, in experiential training, Chinese learners will make errors in pronunciation of the Korean syllable nasal consonant ending like 【n】 and 【${\eta}$】. In the previous research, analysis of pronunciation errors were often based on the perspective of phonological system and combination of the phoneme rules. However, in this study, the analysis is based on the differences between Korean and Chinese syllables category to indicate the cause of pronunciation errors. The main findings of this study indicated that in the process of pronunciation of Chinese, nasal consonant syllable rime and its 【back】 tongue vowel are combined with each other. However, this rule does not apply in Korean pronunciation. Therefore, the Korean syllabic types like "앤, 응, 옹, 앵, 은, 온, 언" also exist in the Chinese language. When theChinese learners pronounce these types of syllables, the combination of the voweland nasal syllable rime rule will be taken, which will result in pronunciationerrors.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.129-134
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• 2010

Jenkins (2000, 2007) suggested lingua franca core (LFC) of English as an international language (EIL) context. According to her, intelligibility of English pronunciation of L2 English speakers and English learners is more important than pronunciation accuracy in English communication. Her suggestion has been widely accepted in Korean classroom situations, so the systematic teaching of English pronunciation has been rarely emphasized. In this paper it is argued that the LFC of English is widely misinterpreted in Korea while some of her suggestions themselves are also misleading. This paper tries to redefine Jenkins' LFC and provide suggestions for teaching LFC in Korea.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2007.05a
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• pp.183-186
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• 2007

This study analyzes Korean high school students' pronunciation errors in word-initial onglides in English. For this study, 24 Korean high school students read 34 English words including glide-vowel sequences in word-initial positions and vowel-initial words in a frame sentence. The results showed 2 different error types: glide deletion and vowel distortion. After the analysis of the first recording, the subjects were taught how to pronounce glide-vowel sequences properly in a 60-minute class. Comparison of the analyses of the first and second recordings showed that the subjects improved on the pronunciation of glide-vowel sequences. After the training, the pronunciation errors of diphthongs unique to English, [$j_I$], decreased substantially. However, most subjects still had difficulties in pronouncing [$w{\mho}$], [wu], and [wo]. There was no significant correlation between English course grade and error reduction.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.13-20
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• 2023

This study explores the potential of automated speech recognition (ASR) in assessing English learners' pronunciation. We employed ASR technology, acknowledged for its impartiality and consistent results, to analyze speech audio files, including synthesized speech, both native-like English and Korean-accented English, and speech recordings from a native English speaker. Through this analysis, we establish baseline values for the word error rate (WER). These were then compared with those obtained for human raters in perception experiments that assessed the speech productions of 30 first-year college students before and after taking a pronunciation course. Our sub-group analyses revealed positive training effects for Whisper, an ASR tool, and human raters, and identified distinct human rater strategies in different assessment aspects, such as proficiency, intelligibility, accuracy, and comprehensibility, that were not observed in ASR. Despite such challenges as recognizing accented speech traits, our findings suggest that digital tools such as ASR can streamline the pronunciation assessment process. With ongoing advancements in ASR technology, its potential as not only an assessment aid but also a self-directed learning tool for pronunciation feedback merits further exploration.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2000.07a
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• pp.117-134
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• 2000

Kim, Key-Seop(2000). English Restructuring and A Use of Music in Teaching English Pronunciation. JSEP 2000 voU This study has two-fold aims: one is to clarify the restructuring of English in utterance, and the other is to relate it to teaching English pronunciation for listening and speaking with a use of music and song by suggesting a model of 10-15 minute pronunciation class syllabus for every period in class. Generally, English utterances are restructured by stress-timed rhythm, irrespective of syntactic boundaries. So the rhythmic units are arranged in isochronous groups, of which the making is to attach clitic(s) to a host or head often leftwards and sometimes rightwards, which results in linking, contraction, reduction, sound change and rhythm adjustment in utterance, just as in music and song. With English restructuring focused on, a model of English pronunciation class syllabus is proposed to be put forward in class for every period of a lesson or unit. It tries to relate the focused factor(s) in pronunciation to the integrated, with teaching techniques and music made use of.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 1996.02a
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• pp.79-84
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• 1996

The two existing romanization systems in Korea, namely the recently promulgated Ministry of Education version sponsored by the National Academy of Sciences incorporating for the most part the McCune-Reischauer system and the Hangeul Haghoe or the Korean Language Society's version, must be judged as failures: He fennel for its disregard of Korean orthography and pronunciation, use of Latin-oriented pronunciation despite its assertion that English is the standard used, and the greatest weakness of all, its use of phonetic symbols neither found in regular typewriters, teleprinters, word processors and telex machines nor understood by laymen, sometimes not even by specialists. And the latter suffers from its undue emphasis on Korean orthography, Latin-oriented pronunciation being only partly capable of representing Korean pronunciation, among other shortcomings. Since the two existing romanization systems of Korean in South Korea, and romanization system of Japanese with Latin-oriented pronunciation are woefully inadequate, in today's world where English is used as if it were the international language almost all over the world, the present writer has invented a completely new system of romanizing Korean and Japanese by the so-called pseudo-phonetic method. This method employs the roman letters only and uses thorn in place of phonetic symbols as long as the letters thus applied are believed to have constant sound value. The English pronunciation is the standard used for this system.

• MALSORI
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• no.41
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• pp.1-18
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• 2001

The purpose of this paper is to slove problems with English pronunciation education and to correct the misbelief that misbelief that English pronunciation can be thught effectiverly by native speakers or good speakers. Best sellers have many mistakes even in the description of sounds and most English education departments in national universities teach English phonetics theoretically only for 1 semester, More than 10 years' investigation into native speakers' and good speakers' teaching methods in various ways confirmed that they couldn't know English phonetics teachers should have a theoretical and practical knowledge of phonetics of English and students' dialects and the abilities to find the same or similar English sounds their students can make in normal or abnormal situations, to make both correct sounds and incorrect ones their students can make and to make them perceive the differences by using various ways.