Teaching Tips

Providing Individualized Homework and Accountability for Itas via Internet Resources

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Abstract

Pronunciation instructors of international teaching assistants (ITAs) frequently provide individual feedback highlighting the fluency, suprasegmental, and segmental challenges most likely to inhibit a particular ITA’s successful interaction with undergraduates. Yet providing ITAs with practice actually implementing individual feedback given, adequate to enabling their development of new, more communicatively effective pronunciation habits, remains difficult. However, the Internet and learning management systems (LMSes, e.g., Moodle) contain resources capable of supporting and holding students accountable for focused, self- directed work on nearly any pronunciation-related target. This article briefly overviews the challenge faced by ITA instructors of advanced pronunciation, the feasibility of individualizing assignments in advanced pronunciation classes, the second language acquisition (SLA) foundations for a series of exercises designed to address common ITA difficulties, and sample directions for all exercises described.

How to Cite:

Richards, M., (2015) “Providing Individualized Homework and Accountability for Itas via Internet Resources”, Pronunciation in Second Language Learning and Teaching Proceedings 7(1).