Abstract
This paper presents a reflection on two technologies – automatic speech recognition (ASR) and Text-to-Speech (TTS) – to improve learners’ pronunciation, aiming for successful spoken communication. It sheds some light on the practical usage of these technologies, demonstrating their effectiveness, qualities, and limitations to assist teachers in deciding the most efficient digital resources applied to their students’ needs. A review of literature on previous empirical studies was carried out, with quantitative and/or qualitative studies conducted by researchers in the field, investigating teachers’ and learners' perceptions and the use of ASR and TTS as a pedagogical tool for pronunciation practice. As a result, it was concluded that a) the presented resources seem to have the potential to enhance pronunciation practice, both in terms of perception and production; b) technology can result in considerable benefits to learners, mainly as a supplement to pronunciation teaching; and c) the use of these digital resources is a way of giving learners the opportunity to focus on their specific difficulties and receive personalized feedback while becoming more autonomous in their learning process.
Highlights
Spoken communication to be effective must consider pronunciation as a fundamental part of it (PENNINGTON; ROGERSON-REVELL, 2019) since the primary medium of language is speech (SLABAKOVA, 2016)
∗Email: william.gottardi@posgrad.ufsc.br †Email: janainafernandadealmeida@gmail.com ‡Email: celsotumolo@yahoo.com.br (SLABAKOVA, 2016). When it comes to second language acquisition (SLA), we must consider the different dimensions of second language (L2) speech: intelligibility, comprehensibility, and accentedness
In agreement with Thomson and Derwing (2014) that informed instruction combined with practice opportunities will help learners improve speech production and considering the importance of pronunciation to spoken communication and pronunciation teaching to SLA, all the resources available to help accomplish the goal of pronunciation development are welcome
Summary
Spoken communication to be effective must consider pronunciation as a fundamental part of it (PENNINGTON; ROGERSON-REVELL, 2019) since the primary medium of language is speech. The objective of this paper is to present a reflection on two technologies - automatic speech recognition (ASR) and text-to-speech (TTS) - to improve learners’ pronunciation, aiming for successful spoken communication For this purpose, the reflection will address the affordances of the technologies by reviewing both quantitative and qualitative pieces of research from authors in the field. The following section will detail recent empirical findings on pronunciation teaching, especially as a means to draw learners’ attention to L2 phonological forms of the target language input By focusing on these aspects, learners can achieve improvements in their L2 pronunciation skills in order to reduce communication breakdowns due to inaccuracy in speech perception or production and, in turn, enhance speech intelligibility and comprehensibility
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