On the Acquisition of English Stress in Disyllabic Nouns and Verbs: Focusing on Korean Children

Abstract

This study attempts to examine the acquisition of English word stress patterns by Korean children aged 10-11 and explore effective ways of teaching English word stress to them. For these purposes, stress patterns of disyllabic nouns and verbs in English were taught explicitly to two groups of Korean children employing different methods, one group using rhythmic refrains and the other utilizing controlled dialogues. Data was collected through perception and production tasks of which results were analyzed quantitatively. Errors found in the perception and production tasks were also considered in order to examine the Korean children’s acquisition of English word stress with reference to syllable structure and lexical category and the influence of their first language on the acquisition of word stress in English. The results of this study revealed that both methods were effective in improving the children’s ability to perceive English word stress, but neither method was found to be beneficial in increasing the production of it. According to the error analysis, the children might not assign English stress in words according to the distributional patterns associated with syllable structure and lexical category. Pedagogical implications for teaching English word stress were suggested based on the findings of this research, followed by the limitations of this study and the suggestions for further research.