There are two groups.
Group 1 meets Tuesdays from 16:15 to 17:45
Group 2 meets Wednesdays from 16:15 to 17:45
Meetings will take place as MS Teams videoconferences. Students can attend whichever meeting they want, either Tuesday or Wednesday, but please let me know in advance if you are switching groups just for one week. Based on the experience of last semester, we may perhaps decide to shorten the meetings to just 45 minutes, from 16:15 to 17:00. Weekly meetings will start in the first week of lectures (13, 14 April); however, most of the work for the first few weeks is available online and can be worked through in your own time and at your own pace, so do not panic if you miss the first week's meeting.
A major restructuring of this course is long overdue, but on the assumption that major restructurings typically end up being minor ones, the following may serve as a non-binding guide to what we will be doing.
The course will be structured in a number of blocks:
The first block will involve exchanging contact details and making decisions about communication channels and frequency of virtual contact, as well as providing a general overview of free online resources available for doing phonetics.
The second block will involve you sending me a voice message in which you read aloud two paragraphs of English prose. You can then tell me what aspects of your pronunciation you think you need to work on, and I can tell you whether I agree with you or whether there are other things I think you should work on. I will then point you to the resources you will need to practice with. (I would like to do this block in the form of brief one-on-one MS Teams meetings, if time permits. We could discuss the arrangements for this at the first meeting.)
The third block will involve becoming more familiar with the basic concepts and terminology of Systemic Functional Linguistics and of phonetics and phonology; there will be reading material as well as slide shows. This block will also involve weekly exercise sheets and listening exercises.
The fourth block will consist of practice in describing and producing the individual consonant and vowel sounds of English and putting them together to form syllables.
The fifth block will involve becoming more aware of what happens when syllables are strung together to form larger rhythmic units.
The sixth block will consist of practice in English intonation, based on material by M.A.K. Halliday.
The seventh block will involve assessment. In a 20-minute online oral exam, students will demonstrate that they can read IPA transcriptions, and will read aloud the same passage as at the beginning of the course, as well as discussing a topic of their own choosing.
All materials will be made available via:
- DozentIn: Robert Spence