Creating Learning Partners: A facilitator’s guide for training effective adult literacy tutors

Activity B

Our sound system

This is a brief review of the sounds in the English language and of important points when learning to speak another language.

Coordinator tip

If tutors have not attended a spelling workshop, you will need to give them more time to look over the material.

Use of handouts, discussion
Materials and equipment Handout 12.4: Facts About Speaking Handout 12.5: Vowel Sounds in Canadian English Handout 12.6: Consonant Sounds in Canadian English Preparation Copy handouts and look over them. STEP-BY-STEP PROCESS This activity is adapted from the English as a Second Language Tutor Training Manual published by the Regina Public Library. Distribute the handout Facts About Speaking and highlight any points that you think your tutors need to hear. You may want to ask tutors to reflect on their experience trying to learn another language in high school. Would they agree with these “facts”? Do they have any other points to add to the handout? Review the sound system briefly, using the following as a guideline. The tutors should be familiar with this part from the spelling unit. There is a great difference between spelling and saying English words. There are 6 letters in the English alphabet but over 0 different sounds. This is confusing to ESL learners who probably don’t have this kind of problem in their first language. For example, in Spanish each letter represents its sound exactly. When thinking about pronunciation, a lot of ESL learners try to visualize the printed word they are trying to pronounce and find it very confusing. Learners need to think about the “sound” rather than the spelling. Hand out the charts Consonant Sounds in Canadian English and Vowel Sounds in Canadian English. Talk about the large number of vowel sounds in English. Some languages, by contrast, only have five vowel sounds.

Use of handouts, discussion

Materials and equipment

Handout 12.4: Facts About Speaking
Handout 12.5: Vowel Sounds in Canadian English
Handout 12.6: Consonant Sounds in Canadian English

Preparation

Copy handouts and look over them.

STEP-BY-STEP PROCESS

This activity is adapted from the English as a Second Language Tutor Training Manual published by the Regina Public Library.

Distribute the handout Facts About Speaking and highlight any points that you think your tutors need to hear. You may want to ask tutors to reflect on their experience trying to learn another language in high school. Would they agree with these “facts”? Do they have any other points to add to the handout?
Review the sound system briefly, using the following as a guideline. The tutors should be familiar with this part from the spelling unit.
- There is a great difference between spelling and saying English words.
- There are 6 letters in the English alphabet but over 0 different sounds. This is confusing to ESL learners who probably don’t have this kind of problem in their first language. For example, in Spanish each letter represents its sound exactly.
- When thinking about pronunciation, a lot of ESL learners try to visualize the printed word they are trying to pronounce and find it very confusing. Learners need to think about the “sound” rather than the spelling.
Hand out the charts Consonant Sounds in Canadian English and Vowel Sounds in Canadian English. Talk about the large number of vowel sounds in English. Some languages, by contrast, only have five vowel sounds.

Conversation is the slowest form of human communication.

Author unknown