1.

0 Introduction

Student A is a nine year old Sino-Murut girl which is a Chinese-Murut mix blood
student from Sabah. Due to the ethnic background and place of origin, student A’s
first language is Chinese language.

2.0 Data in orthographic and phonemic transcription

The Monkey and the Chicken

It was a dark cold winter night in the big dangerous city. A cheeky monkey was
shivering as he was walking down a dark street. It was so dark that he could not see
where he was walking. As he was walking, he tripped over a creepy fat cat.
“Ah!” the monkey yelled as he fell and hit the bottom. Splash! “Yuck! I’m covered in
stinky litter and goo!” The monkey had fallen into a dark stinky sewer. He was
trapped and terrified because he could not get out.
A little while later a foolish chicken walked by and saw the monkey down in the
sewer. “Hey monkey! What are you doing down there?” asked the chicken. “Hi
chicken! Come down here so we can play and have a nice swim!” said the monkey. “I
don’t know, what is that awful smell?” asked the chicken. The monkey replied, “It is
so nice down here. The water is warm and clean. It is only stinky up there.”
So the silly chicken decided to jump down into the deep dark stinky sewer. As soon
as he did, the monkey quickly jumped onto the chicken’s back and climbed out of the
sewer leaving the brainless chicken behind. The chicken yelled up to the monkey,
“Help me!” the monkey just laughed and ran away leaving the chicken in the cold
dark stinky sewer.

ðə mʌŋki ænd ðə ʧɪkɪn 
ɪt wəz ə dɑːk kəʊld wɪntə naɪt ɪn ðə bɪg deɪnʤər sɪti. ə ʧiːki mʌŋki wɒz swɪvərɪŋ æz 
hiː wɒz wɔːkɪŋ daʊn ə dɑːk stret. ɪt wɒzsəʊ dɑːk ðæt hiː kʊd nɒt siː weə hiː wɒz wɔːkɪ
ŋ. hæz hiː wɒz wɔːkɪŋ, hiː trʌpt ˈəʊvər ə kriːpi fæt kæt. 
“ə!” ðə mʌŋki jɛld æs hiː fɛl ænd hɪt ðə bɒtəm. splæʃ!
“jʌk! em kʌvəd ɪn stinki: ˈrɪtəl ænd guː!” ðə mʌŋki hæd ˈfɔːlən ˈɪntuːə dɑːk stinki: səʊ
əhiː wɒz træpt ænd tɛrɪfaɪd bɪˈkɒz hiː kʊd nɒt gɛt aʊt. 
ə lɪtl waɪl letər ə fuːlɪ ʧɪkɪn wɔːkt baɪ ænd sɔː ðə mʌŋki daʊn ɪn ðə ˈsəʊə.
“heɪ mʌŋki! wɒt ɑː juː duːɪŋ daʊn ðeə?” ɑːsktðə ʧɪkɪn.
“haɪ ʧɪkɪn! kʌm daʊn hɪə səʊ wiː kæn preɪ ænd hæv ə naɪs swɪm!” sɛd ðə ˈmʌŋki.
“aɪ dəʊnt nəʊ, wɒt ɪz ðæt ˈɔːfʊlsmɛl?” ɑːskt ðə ˈʧɪkɪn. ðə ˈmʌŋki rɪˈplaɪd,

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“ɪt ɪz səʊ naɪs daʊn hɪə. ðə ˈwɔːtər ɪs wɔːm ænd kliːn. ɪt ɪs ˈəʊnli stinki: ʌp ðeə.” 
səʊ ðə ˈsɪli ˈʧɪkɪn dɪˈsaɪdɪd tuː ʤʌmp daʊn ˈɪntuː ðə diːp dɑːk stinki: ˈsəʊə. æz suːn 
æz hiː dɪd, ðə ˈmʌŋki ˈkwɪkli ʤʌmpt ˈɒntʊðə ˈʧɪkɪnz bæk ænd klaɪmd aʊt ɒv ðə ˈsəʊ
ə ˈliːvɪŋ ðə ˈbreɪnlɪs ˈʧɪkɪn bɪˈhaɪnd. ðə ˈʧɪkɪn jɛld ʌp tuː ðə ˈmʌŋki, “hɛlp miː!” ðə
ˈmʌŋki ʤʌst lɑːp ænd ren əˈweɪ ˈliːvɪŋ ðə ˈʧɪkɪn ɪn ðə kəʊld dɑːk stinki: ˈsəʊə. 

3.0 Problems identified

3.1 Supra-segmental errors

The first supra-segmental error that student A makes is a problem with her
connected speech in her reading. She tends to read each syllables individually
showing boundaries between them. For instance, she says each syllable in words
like ‘terrified’, ‘because’, ‘chicken’ and ‘monkey’ very precisely with prominent
boundaries between them. This could be due to her first language being Chinese
which is a monosyllabic language. Meaning that every syllable needs to be
pronounce individually with the same amount of attention in order to ensure the
meaning of the word or sentence is maintained (Duanmu, 2013). Whereas in English
words would sometimes even undergo assimilation where the consonant final or
consonant initial influence each other and change to allow easier pronunciation of the
words (Roach, 2009). This is unusual for Chinese speaking natives because in
Chinese, words rarely end with consonants especially consonants like /z/ and /ʧ/, so
they would find that using assimilating consonants to be unusual (Huang & Brown,
2009). So they would usually pronounce each syllable individually.
This brings us to our second supra-segmental error which is the stress-pattern
when she is reading. For example, she pronounce each syllable with too much
emphasis and care that it effects the stress pattern of the word and the entire
sentence causing it to sound unnatural and forced especially to native English
speakers. In the recording she said “It was so dark that he could not see where he
was walking” with the same stress and rhythm showing no difference in their stress
pattern. There could be two reasons behind this error. The first being non-native
speakers tend to lack confidence when using the language and try very hard to avoid
making pronunciation mistake (Flowerdew, Miller & Li, 2000). Thus, causing her to be
cautious with her reading and why she reads it slowly as well as carefully. The
second reason, she could be struggling is because her mother tongue language is a
monosyllabic language. As mention earlier, this means that every word and syllable
must receive the same amount of attention. In comparison to English which is an
expressive language that allows for different rhythmic stress and patterns to convey

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different meanings and contexts. This could be why she reads with a fixed rhythm
and stress.
The last supra-segmental error is the intonation in her reading. Throughout
her reading she maintains a level tone which only falls slightly when she forgets how
to pronounce a word and only slightly rises when she remembers how to pronounce
it. For instance, she pronounce the words like ‘creepy’, ‘sewer’ and ‘foolish’ in a fall
tone because she is unsure of the word. When in fact she should be using the
different tones throughout her reading to show the meaning of the passage. She also
pronounces words like ‘yelled’ and ‘ah’ in a level tone when it should be a rise tone.
This is could be because the Chinese language only uses different tones to
differentiate meaning between individual words but it does not changes according to
the context of the word (Duanmu, 2013). Unlike English which maintains the literal
meaning of a word despite the tone but the context of a situation can influence the
tone. Thus, indicating different expressions like sarcasm, sincerity and half-
heartedness.

4.0 Solutions for identified problems

Based on the problems identified, one of the solution that could be applied in
overcoming the first problems which is the connected speech problem is through
songs. According to Boyd (2018), connected speech in pop music could help in
improving the fluency of speaking English language. This is due to the reason that
pop music are repetitive as it also provide opportunity to notice link between words.
There are five feature of connected speech that could be related to pop music which
are elision, assimilation, cantenation, intrusion and the schwa. Through pop music, it
helps improve the assimilation and elision aspects where student A was having
problem in reading each syllable individually.

The second problem stated that student A was having problem in stress pattern
while reading. Stress is important in the English language as it provides proper
rhythm for the sentences. Other than that, the proper usage of stress pattern in the
syllable indicate the word class in the sentences. So, one of the way to solve this
problem is by indicating the stressed and unstressed syllables in the sentences. For
example, colours can be used to show the stressed and unstressed syllables.

“It was so dark that he could not see where he was walking”
Apart from that, the second solution for this problem would be the usage of big

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circle (O) and small circle (o) to show the stressed and unstressed syllable.

To indicate the stressed (O) and unstressed (o)

 It ---> O
 See ---> O
 Walking ---> Oo

The solution for the last problem which is regarding the intonation will be first
exposing student A to the different type of intonation. This can be done by showing
English language video to introduce the type of intonation to the student and only
then it is easy to label the words with proper intonation using the correct labels. For
example, we can label the correct intonation above the words to show the intonation
in the sentences.

To show rise tone :

 ‘ah’ ---> ‘ah’

 ‘yelled’ ---> ‘yelled’

5.0 Conclusion

In a nutshell, there are many aspects needed to be taken into consideration in

mastering English language. So, it is vital for us to be aware of the problems and also
ways to overcome it in order have a firm grasp in English language.

References

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