A difficult aspect of learning the Spanish language for non-native speakers is pronunciation. Most Americans learning Spanish have trouble with correct pronunciation of the letter “e” in Spanish. That’s why I enjoy using sound and audio files in my Spanish classroom to let students hear native speakers speaking at native speeds and with native pronunciation. You’ll enjoy the following famous YouTube presentation that has some glaring Spanish mispronunciations, but kids love it.
I tell my students we have two friends in Spanish, Wes and Les. But we also have three enemies, Ace, Lace, and Trace. The letter “e” in Spanish should always rhyme with our two friends, and never with our three enemies. I’ll explain below. Yes, there is an argument that the number “seis” (6) which rhymes with our enemies, but seis contains a diphthong, and that changes everything. There are always exceptions, including verbs conjugated with the vosotros form which I NEVER teach. Most of them contain diphthongs also. But suffice it to say that a diphthong is not just the letter “e”, it is the combination of two vowels.
Most Spanish language students tend to pronounce the letter “e” as if it were a long ā in English. But in Spanish, the number 3 (tres) does not rhyme with “trace”, but rhymes with Wes and Les, as if we were saying train trestle. Aside from having difficulty with trilling their “r’s” the letter “e” is complex. Another good example of the difficulty in pronouncing the “e” correctly is in the Spanish word for “afterwards”, “despues”. Often its pronunciation seems to rhyme with our enemies trace, ace, and lace, but it actually rhymes with Wes and Les, our two good friends.
As a teacher that has about 46 years experience with Spanish, (although I’m not a native speaker) I am always looking for resources to help my students pronounce Spanish perfectly. I personally have no problems with Spanish pronunciation, but I like to supprt my students’ learning by using sound or video files of native speakers. If you’ll click the link under video files on the right side of the first page of my blog, you’ll find an excellent resource from the University of Texas. Once you arrive there, click on the beginning tab at the left, and 15 categories drop down and you can choose numbers, for example, and have your students listen to various native speakers. It’s an excellent resource.
What are your suggestions for other teachers of Spanish? Do you think the issue of teachers that are not fluent in the language they teach is a big issue or not? I’d be interested in hearing from you.
By the way, as another hint on using digital technology, have you ever wanted to save a web address, and later it disappears or goes down? With Furl.net, you can “furl” a web site and it will be saved forever on your account even if the original site goes down. Try it, it’s free!
Wednesday, March 26, 2008 at 7:20 am |
I like your concept for a blog, helping non-native speakers teach Spanish. There is so much that we can learn when we share resources.
I think the best way to improve both fluency and pronunciation is with input: reading and listening. Studying grammar rules will work for a small percentage of students, but for most it does not lead to fluency. If it did, we wouldn’t hear our students using “I had went to school” or “All the sudden”. After all, they’ve had 8 – 9 years of English grammar study, and probably aced it. They speak what they hear most often. So, our challenge is to find ways for them to hear the Spanish phrases enough times to learn them correctly.
As for nonnative speakers as teachers, we can supplement our teaching with music, video resources, and recorded stories by native speakers. We just have to build in as much reading and listening as possible. Students are learning during input, during output (worksheets, speaking activities, games, etc.) they are not learning so much; we are using the output to assess their skills.
Comprehensible input is vital to learning a language.
Friday, March 28, 2008 at 10:33 am |
Your article is very informative,and covers the subject well.
Friday, March 28, 2008 at 10:36 am |
This will even help teachers in the United States who can not pronounce tres right, to do so
Friday, March 28, 2008 at 10:47 am |
This article should help alot. It really covers everything and is very informative.
Monday, April 7, 2008 at 5:31 pm |
I really enjoyed reading your blog. I really liked the les & wes idea. Very interesting. I really wanted to express my views about your other questions: “Do you believe it is possible to teach Spanish conversation without grammar?” and, “Can we Spanish teachers teach grammar while speaking Spanish as if the focus was on conversation ability no matter the subject matter, e.g. grammar?” I agree with Jan about input. Input is probably the single most important aspect of acquiring a language. Studies have show though that output is also important [Swain]. In my opinion many langauge learners must also produce the language, they crave to produce the langauge. Receptive skills or input is part of the learning but so are the productive skills of writing and speaking. Grammar instruction is another aspect that I also consider important, but it must be accompanied by as much input as possible and also output opportunities for the learner. So to answer your questions. Is it possible to teach Spanish conversation without grammar? I choose to believe that most learners can benefit from ”grammar” instruction in conjunction with input and output and that they create an internal system of rules that monitor and that help the learnters to improve their production and accuracy with the language. However you choose to teach structure, intuitively or actively, is up to the teacher but nevertheless, it is part of the learning. I am always interested in other peoples ideas.