students repeat after the model and then practice the dialog
with a partner. Even when doing controlled practice,
encourage learners to speak with feeling, as if they were
really in the situation of the dialog.
Stories and anecdotes: Reading prepared stories out loud
can provide good controlled practice if the material contains
the pronunciation elements that you’re practicing. However,
a disadvantage of reading aloud is that it divides students’
attention and e"ort between pronunciation and decoding the
written symbols. Be sure that the story contains language that
students are familiar with and can read easily so that they
can give more attention to pronunciation.
Strip stories: Cut up a simple story into individual
sentences and mix them up. Give the sets of strips to pairs or
small groups of students and ask them to reassemble the
story. The pronunciation practice comes as students read
each strip while arranging them, and then read the whole
story after it’s assembled.
Guided practice
Guided practice is a bit freer than controlled practice. Words,
phrases, and examples are given or suggested, but complete
sentences or dialogs are not predetermined. The teacher gives
a framework, but students have to create their own “script”
or !gure out what to say to accomplish a task. Some of the
activity types listed below are most often thought of as
speaking activities, but if they are planned so that students
must use the sounds being practice in order to complete the
task, they are also good pronunciation practice. Here are
some examples of types of guided practice activities:Information gaps: An information gap activity, or info
gap, is a pair-work activity in which each partner has some of
the information needed to complete a task, but neither one
has all of it. The partners need to talk to each other and
combine their information to solve a problem, !ll out a chart,
etc. In the simplest kind of info gap, the partners might each
have a grid in which some boxes are empty and others have a
picture or word containing the target sound. They ask each
other questions like “What word is in Box 2?” and !ll in the
blanks with the information they learn. There are many
variations of info gap activities that make good guided
pronunciation practice if the words or names are chosen to
include the sound being practiced. The next paragraphs
describe some of these.Calendars and schedules: Each partner has a schedule of
his/her imaginary daily activities. They try to !nd a meeting
time that works for both of them by asking and answering
questions about their schedules.
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