• Have tutors feel the difference between voiced and unvoiced consonants by having them place their hands lightly on the front of their throat and say “s” and then “z.” They should be able to feel the voicing of the “z.”
    • Tell them that it is important to note that most voiced and unvoiced consonants fall into pairs; one consonant of the pair is voiced and the other unvoiced. In other words, the sounds are produced in the same way, the only difference being the use or not of the vocal chords. Examples of these pairs are b-p, d-t, g-k and v-f.
  2. Activity about consonants:
    • Pass out one strip of paper to each tutor.
    • Tell them that some consonants also use more explosive puffs of air.
    • Use Handout 12.6: Consonant Sounds in Canadian English and show them how to say each sound with the piece of paper close to your mouth.
    • Ask them to find out which sounds made the biggest puffs.
    • Get their observations (p, f and th as in thing should be obvious).
  3. Points to cover about vowels:
    • All vowels are produced with voice, that is, with vibrations of the vocal chords.
    • They differ from consonants in that the outward flow of sound is largely unrestricted or diverted by one of the articulators.
  4. First activity about vowels:
    • Ask tutors to divide up into groups and give each group a mirror.
    • Ask them to pronounce the vowels in Handout 12.5: Vowel Sounds in Canadian English.
    • Ask them to tell you what vowel sounds are easy to see because they have a distinct lip shape and what vowels are produced by movements within the vowel sound such as the oy in boy.
    • Hopefully tutors will pinpoint the vowels in beat, bait, boat and bought as easy to see.
    • They should see and feel some movement as they say the sounds in bough, buy and boy.
    • Suggest the mirrors could be helpful in teaching these sounds.
  5. Second activity about vowels:
    • Tell tutors that some vowels are held longer than their shorter counterparts.
    • Show this with the elastic bands.
    • Demonstrate by saying bat and bait and pulling the band as long as the word sounds and then ask tutors to copy. They should be able to see and feel a small difference.
    • Tell tutors that this activity might be useful if the learners have trouble distinguishing between long and short vowels.
  6. Remind tutors that a person has to be able to hear a sound before he can reproduce it. Therefore, the ear also plays an important part in pronunciation.
  7. Tell tutors that as adults, our articulatory muscles are accustomed to moving in certain ways and they have a great deal of trouble moving in a new or different way. Those muscles are used to form the sounds needed to speak our first language. For example, some African languages use clicks from the back of the throat that we would have difficulty duplicating, if we ever could.
  8. Remind tutors to explain to the learners that they, as adults, will probably never lose their accents, and probably should not want to. Canada is a wonderfully diverse country with a rich cultural heritage that is acknowledged and nurtured. Accents are only a problem when they interfere with communication and are very much a part of a person’s unique identity.