Pedagogical decisions in the teaching of segmentals and suprasegmentals

Abstract

This short article summarizes the pedagogical decisions behind the implementation of treatment in our 2022 study (Gordon & Darcy, 2022). In this study, we provided explicit pronunciation instruction to three groups of first-semester English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) classes at a small university in Costa Rica. We included a group trained on suprasegmental features and connected speech (Suprasegmental Group), a second group that received instruction on vowels and consonants (Segmental Group), and a third group that received a combination of segmentals and suprasegmentals as in the other two groups (Mixed Group). We collected speech samples in a pretest and a posttest, which were rated by a group of L1-English speakers for comprehensibility, fluency, and accentedness. In this article, we provide details about the selection of content, materials development, and the implementation of instruction in the three experimental groups in our study.