1st DAY ORIENTATION

By: Teacher Randy

OBJECTIVES
To familiarize student with his/her teacher
through FREE TALK
To familiarize teacher with his/her student
To measure the current English proficiency of
the learner
To design a unique course plan for the student
 VIETNAMESE PRONUNCIATION PROBLEMS IN ENGLISH

1. Omission of final consonants

As in the case of several Asian languages,
Vietnamese does not contain words ending
with consonants; so naturally, learners are
usually very confused with final consonants
and thus end up deleting most of them. The
consonants commonly omitted are: /z/, /s/,
/t/, /v/, /ks/, //
EXAMPLES:
/z/: tables; rose; rise; bags
/s/: mice; class; mess; rice
/t/: right; fight; hate; fruit; start
/v/: love; drive; retrieve; Steve
/ks/: six; lakes; cooks; hacks
//: manage; bridge; engage
2. Omission of Medial sounds
Some sounds occurring in the middle of words
are also omitted by Vietnamese learners as
such occurrence is an unfamiliar phonetic
phenomenon: These sounds are: /z/, /s/,
/t/, /v/, /ks/, //
EXAMPLES:
/z/: Wednesday; president; rising
/s/: master; western
/v/: severe; savage; rival; never
/ks/: mixer; Foxtel; excel; vaccine
//: pledger; virgin; midget; bludger
3. Replacing /t/ /tr/ /d/ with /t/
A significantly common error committed by
Vietnamese learners is to replace /t/ /tr/ &
//, with //. That shows that learners
struggle greatly with the concept of combining
purely alveolar sounds with post palatal ones.
EXAMPLES
/t/: time; task; talent; cuter
/tr/: trash; transit; hatred; tried
//: cage; Jamaica; badge; grudge
4. Confusing // for /d/ or /z/
Vietnamese learners find it difficult as most
English learners to place the tongue tip
between the teeth, so they resort to an easier
solution that is to bring the tip into contact
with the back of the teeth or alveolar
sometimes in the form of /d/ or /z/.
EXAMPLES
//: weather; loathe; then; rather
5. Confusing// for /s/Or/s/ for //
Vietnamese learners use /s/ and // interchangeably, however, based
on my classroom experience, I have found that // is more
commonly confused for /s/ especially when it is the initial sound in a
word as in [shoe], which becomes [sue] and sometimes when its
final as in [cash] which becomes [Cass]. There are times when the
opposite is true but more commonly when /s/ is located in the
middle of the word as in [castle] which sounds as [cashol?]. Due to
the lack of distinction between the two sounds, its very difficult to
establish a pattern of error. Teachers then are strongly advised to
provide the students with step-by-step instructions on how to
produce these consonants and train their ears to distinguish
between them.
EXAMPLES
/s/: muscle; person; percent; mouse and rats
//(initial): shovel; shine; sheep; shape; shallot
//(final): reddish; selfish; cash; rush; tarnish
 THINGS YOU CAN DO TO IMPROVE YOUR
ENGLISH
1. Dont be afraid to make mistakes. Be confident
2. Practice every day
3. Practice the 4 core skills: reading, writing,
speaking and listening. They all need to be
worked on for you to improve
4. Keep a notebook of new words you learn. Use
them in sentences and try to say them at least
3 times when you speak
5. Get help! If you dont understand something
youve got to ask someone. Ask your teacher,
classmates or friends for help.
6. Review! Review! Review! Make sure that you
take the time to review things you have studied
in the past.
7. Watch DVDs rather than TV. Its better to use
something that you can watch over again to catch
information you might have missed the first time
8. Read a whole novel. You can do it! Youll feel
great afterwards.
9. Use English whenever you can. Its as simple as
that!
10. Dont translate into English from your own
language. Think in English to improve your
fluency. Talk to yourselfbut not on the bus
otherwise people will think you have gone
crazy!
11. You cant learn English from a book. Like
driving a car, you can only learn through doing it
12. The most natural way to learn grammar is
through talking
13. Sing your heart out! Show the world your
beautiful voice! Learn English songs and sing
along with them to improve fluency and
intonation anyone for Karaoke?
14. Use an English/English dictionary as it will help
you to keep thinking in English and not translating
15. Dont give up! Stay positive! Sometimes you will
feel that you arent learning quickly enough.
Everyone feels like this, dont worry about it.
Youll get there in the end.
16. There are many types of English: British,
American, South African and so on. None of these
are wrong or not as important. English is English
17. Meet new people. Make the effort to mix
with English speakers in your town. You could
join a club or go to bars where foreigners hang
out. Buy one a drink, they love that!
18. Its not enough to only learn English words.
You can teach a parrot English words but that
doesnt mean it can speak English! You still
need to have an understanding of grammar
19. Verb tenses are used by English speakers to
talk about the timing of actions. You might not
have the same expressions in your own
language. Its important that you know these
tenses and when to use them
20. Keep it up! If you take a break from speaking
English, you will find that your level decreases
and all your hard work has been wasted
21. Learn English with a friend. Youll have someone you
can practice with and you can motivate each other to
study
22. Textbook English is often different from the way we
casually speak. To learn casual slang watch movies
23. Use the correct article (a/an, the). Be aware that there
is more to this rule than a/an= non specific, the=specific.
For example: A university (not an university because it
begins with a consonant sound). An hour (not a
hour because the h is often silent).
THE END