INTERNET-BASED PRONUNCIATION TEACHING: AN INNOVATIVE ROUTE TOWARD REHABILITATING TURKISH EFL LEARNERS’ ARTICULATION PROBLEMS

Abstract

This study attempts to find out which English vowels cause articulation problems for Turkish EFL learners and reveal whether students taught via internet-based pronunciation materials by their teacher are better at articulating problematic English vowels than those taught via printed pronunciation materials by their teacher. To achieve this purpose, thirty students' voices were recorded as they read aloud thirty words with problematic English vowels. After writing the impressionistic transcriptions of the words with problematic vowels on the tables and calculating the average number of correctly articulated or misarticulated words, problematic English vowels for Turkish EFL learners were identified through concrete evidence. After the determination process, three problematic English vowels were taught to the students in the experimental group via internet-based pronunciation lessons. However, students in the control group were not exposed to internet-based pronunciation lessons but pronunciation instruction in a traditional fashion. Then, the post test data were analyzed to see whether Turkish EFL learners can solve their articulation problems with three problematic English vowels and hence improve their L2 pronunciation by being exposed to internet-based pronunciation lessons. The results of the study showed that /  /, /  / and /  / were three most problematic English vowels for Turkish EFL learners and that Turkish EFL learners can solve their articulation problems with three problematic English vowels by being exposed to internet-based pronunciation lessons.