‘Weisse Maus in meinem Haus’: using poems and learner strategies to help learners decode the sounds of the L2

Abstract

Learners' pronunciation errors when reading aloud in the L2 often suggest an inability to use the language's sound – symbol relationships, or grapheme – phoneme correspondences (GPCs). UK teaching methodology has failed to provide systematic instruction in L2 phonological decoding, and there is an absence of research on the effectiveness of teaching L2 GPCs. The present study evaluates a GPC training programme delivered to a mixed-ability Year 7 class of 28 beginner learners. The GPC training is based on the use of short poems in conjunction with a sequence of cognitive and metacognitive strategies which I have labelled ‘referring back’. Essentially, this encourages learners to derive the pronunciation of unknown words by making analogies with familiar ones. Pre- and post-test scores showed a small but significant improvement in pronunciation accuracy for the experimental group, but not the comparison group, when reading unknown L2 words aloud. Evaluation questionnaires, interviews and field-notes highlighted the popularity of the GPC training materials with pupils. However, there is also evidence that more time was needed in order for training in the ‘referring back’ strategy to be effective. Overall, the study suggests that the approach to GPC training evaluated here can be effective, but that a longer-term intervention study is desirable. The article includes a brief account of the teaching methods and a copy of the poems used, in the hope that others may wish to try them out in their own classrooms.