| Vocabulary plays an essential role in the learning of English.How to improve learner’s English pronunciation and spelling is a significant issue in foreign language teaching.Phonics instruction and International Phonetic Alphabet(IPA)instruction are two vocabulary teaching methods that have been received scholars attention.Still,there is no unanimous conclusion on the effectiveness of these two methods on vocabulary teaching.This research aims to explore the effects of phonics instruction and IPA instruction on the teaching of English pronunciation and spelling in seventh graders and compare the effects of the two methods in order to find out the most suitable teaching method for teaching English pronunciation and spelling to seventh graders.Three research questions are explored in this research:(1)What are the effects of phonics instruction on the pronunciation and spelling of seventh graders?(2)What are the effects of IPA instruction on the pronunciation and spelling of seventh graders?(3)Which instruction has better effects on the pronunciation and spelling of seventh graders?In this research,123 students in Grade seven of a junior high school in Yongzhou,Hunan Province were randomly divided into a phonics group(41 students),an IPA group(41 students),and a control group(41 students).There was no significant difference among the pronunciation and spelling exam scores of the three groups(p >.05).The phonics group received phonics instruction,the IPA group received IPA instruction,and the participants in the control group memorized the words they learned on their own during the scheduled intervention instruction period.Intervention instruction was given for ten weeks,two hours per week.Regular English instruction in the three groups was delivered by their original English teachers,and the intervention instruction was delivered by the researcher.The research consisted of pretest,training,immediate posttest,and delayed posttest.The format of the tests was consistent across all three sessions,with each test including a pronunciation test and a spelling test.The research found the following results:(1)The phonics group showed significant improvements in pronunciation and spelling in the immediate posttest,and it showed retained effects in the delayed posttest a week later.(2)The IPA group also showed significant improvements in pronunciation and spelling in the immediate posttest,and it showed retained effects in the delayed posttest a week later.(3)The phonics group had more significant gains on pronunciation and spelling than the IPA group.And the retention of pronunciation and spelling after one week was more significant in the phonics group than in the IPA group.According to the results,the researcher concludes that phonics instruction was more effective in improving the pronunciation and spelling of seventh graders than IPA instruction.Moreover,phonics instruction was more effective in retaining the effects after one week than IPA instruction.The researcher recommends that phonics instruction be extended to the teaching of English vocabulary in grade seven.And when conducting phonics instruction,teachers should guide learners to review regularly to promote better retained effects of phonics instruction.Thus students could gain pronunciation and spelling ability well. |
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