Presentation given on Apr. 30, 2015 at the APPI Conference in Lisbon, Portugal about _Pronunciation Made Easy for Portuguese-Speaking Learners of English_, an e-dictionary that I published in Sep. 2014.

1. Teresa Almeida d’Eça
30 April 2015
29th APPI Conference
Lisbon, Portugal

2.  Jan. 2003
 beginning of the pronunciation strategy in class
 APPI 2013
 introduced Pron Made Easy
 was still working on it
 Sep. 2014
 published Pron Made Easy as a .pdf e-book

3.  Apr. 2015
 website was redone
 changed the look
 expanded the content
 included a newsletter sign-up form
 launched a newsletter
Please fill in the sign-up form on your desk!

4. http://teresadeca-pronmadeeasy.weebly.com/

5.  part of speaking & making yourself understood
generates
 intelligibility, comprehensibility
contributes to
 effective communication
 fluid & fluent conversation

6. about "pronunciation",
a neglected area of teaching & learning English
"encourage students to listen to different accents and get
used to non-standard pronunciations"
"Pronunciation is very important to me: majority of
students expressed a strong agreement"

7. How students feel
 "lack of proper pronunciation training is what causes
discomfort for students in real-life communication causing
them to shy away from speaking with other non-native and
native speakers"
 "if they were better with pronunciation, they would be more
confident in English (85%)"

8. Strategies students use to improve pronunciation
"listening to music, watching films, series, podcasts and so
on"
"reading all sorts of materials in English – books, magazines,
newspapers and various articles"
"speaking with other people …, followed by usage of the
Internet"

9. A conclusion of the paper
"There is no need to strive to acquire native-like
pronunciation in the era of world Englishes"
“Students' Attitudes towards Learning English Pronunciation” (A White Paper by
Saundz Research: 12 Jan. 2015)
http://saundz.com/students-attitudes-towards-learning-english-pronunciation/
(http://goo.gl/7LuXsg)

10. "Your students will be basing their production of English
sounds on the sounds they already have from their
language. So it's your job to make them aware of the
sounds they have to produce to sound more fluent in
English."
(John Kay, teacher trainer, 26 Aug. 2014: a video recorded in Indonesia
http://goo.gl/Splixv)
 this comment struck a chord!
 I totally identified with it!
 this *is* my strategy!

11.  rooted incorrect pronunciation can generate
incomprehensibility (at the worst of times)
 a “humorous” example of a tragic situation: a
tragicomedy!
http://www.tubechop.com/watch/5773508
 not even the context saves this situation!
 this won't happen if you use Pron Made Easy!

12. the beauty of it is…

13.  simple
 intuitive
 learner-friendly
because…
 based on familiar sounds
 bridges the L1 and L2
besides
 the pronunciation is partly "student-generated"… so
 learners easily identify with it

18.  common sounds of the L1 are applied to the L2
 a "connection" to the native language
 a connection to sounds that the learners master

19.  sounds are easy to grasp
 pronunciation is intuitively decoded

20.  good for self-study
Using Pron Made Easy is
a fun journey of discovery!

21. No! That was the big challenge!
some sounds
 don’t have an exact equivalent
 are difficult to represent
 need attention, guidance and practice
end product: a code agreed on by Ss and T

22.  "a" as in cat, black = /aé/ (a softens the é)
/kaét/ /blaék/
 "th" as in think = /s/ by someone who lisps
/think/
 "th" as in the, this = kind of a soft /d/
/tha/ /thiss/

23.  "w" as in wall, where = /u/
/uól/ /uér/
 "y" as in yes, your = /i/
/iéss/ /iór/

24.  most English vowel sounds have equivalent vowel
and diphthong sounds in Portuguese
 schwa = generalized as the "a" in "agora"
bus cousin lovely
/bass/ /kazin/ /laveli/
 several consonants

25. ô = cold old gold
/kôld/ /ôld/ /gôld/
ê = friend went
/frênd/ /uênt/

26. Letters that have different sounds in different words
"gh" as /f/ or silent /-/
cough, enough, plough, though, through
/f/ /f/ /-/ /-/ /-/
"gh" as /g/ = ghost, spaghetti

27. Letters that have different sounds in different words
different sounds of "ou"
cough, enough, plough, though, through
/ó/ /a/ /au/ /ou/ /u/

28. Letters that have different sounds in different words
"x" as /z/ = xylophone
"x" as /kss/ = excuse, explain
"x" as /gz/ = auxiliary, example, exist

29. A perfect example of the lack of sense
The Chaos
English Pronunciation
G. Nolst Trenité
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5myI9TDFDw
(http://goo.gl/a2QYMO)
How can anyone make sense out of all this chaos
where "any similarity between spelling and sound is
pure fiction"??!!

30. with a pronunciation dictionary such as
Pron Made Easy
Why insist on complicated pronunciation decoding
when a simple dictionary can
“make light out of darkness”,
“turn chaos into order”?

31.  3.500 English words | pronunciation | translation
 a dictionary in .pdf viewable and searchable in
several e-book readers such as Adobe Acrobat,
Kindle and iBooks
 handy, always with you… just a click away!

32.  tables with all the sounds used and example words
 videos with the main sounds and example words

33.  a newsletter

34.  updated versions with words suggested by the
users
 more videos on sounds
 short "how to" videos showing how I started and
developed this project

35. Pron Made Easy,
that is the question!
It's a "tried, tested and proven" strategy
in class
with hundreds of Portuguese students.

36. Don’t stick to the status quo
when you don't believe in it!
Think for yourself!

37. Dare to be different!
Teach outside the box!

38. Students are our #1 priority!
We know what’s best for them!
Follow your intuition and feelings!

39. Give Pron Made Easy a try!
See for yourself how intuitive
English pronunciation becomes.
Show your students a new way to
"learn, practice and improve" pronunciation!

40. "bridging L1 and L2" proved to be a highly effective
strategy
teachers in the following levels praised my students'
pronunciation
Pron Made Easy will prove to be a very helpful tool!

41. Pron Made Easy
http://teresadeca-
pronmadeeasy.weebly.com/
E-mail
teredeca@gmail.com
Twitter
@teresadeca

42. time for Q & A!
I'll gladly answer any questions
or clarify doubts.