1. Introduction to the Sciences of Language
The relationship between linguistics and English
language teaching
Final Project
Linguistic component:
___________________PHONETICS_______________________________________
Participants:
Daniel Felipe Álvarez Rojas ID: 257904
Paula Andrea Henao Ariza ID: 256457
Diana Katherine Orjuela Cujabán ID: 265105
NRC: 6230
Step 1: Write a 200-word paragraph explaining your component of language.
According to The sounds of language in Yule, G. (2006). Phonetics and Phonemic
Transcription in Akmajian, A et all. (2001). Phonetics: The Sounds of Language in
Fromkin, V., Robert, R., and HYAMS, N. (2003). Phonetics in Jeffries, L. (2006). Phonetic is
the part of linguistics that study how humans can produce sounds of speech, combination,
description, and it representation of it by symbols in all languages (not specific).
Also it is a science of linguistics that is based on studies of human joints, which involve:
lungs, larynx, pharynx, oral cavity and nasal (vocal apparatus) so giving, sound to the
symbols that we call consonants and vowels that compound the alphabet. These letters
united make syllables, at the same time, the syllables make up words and the words form
phrases for our daily communication. Actually phonetic has three components.
• Acoustic  Is the study of the way listeners perceive these sounds.
• Auditory  Is the study of the physical properties of the sounds themselves.
• Articulatory  Is concerned to the physical production of speech, describes which
organs are involved in its production, the position they take and how these positions
vary, producing different sounds. Like Vowels & Consonants that in speaking of the
alphabet, we may call “a” a vowel and “b” a consonant, but that means only that we
used the letter “a” to represent vowel sounds, and the letter “b” to represent consonant
sounds.

2. References
• The sounds of language in Yule, G. (2006). The study of Language. Third Edition.
Cambridge University Press. Pages: 29-40.
• Phonetics and Phonemic Transcription in Akmajian, A et all. (2001). Linguistics:
an Introduction to Language and Communication. Fifth Edition. MIT Press. Pages 65-
73.
• Phonetics: The Sounds of Language in Fromkin, V., Robert, R., and HYAMS, N.
(2003). An Introduction to Language. Seventh Edition. Thomson-Wadsworth. Pages:
231-242.
• Phonetics in Jeffries, L. (2006). Discovering Language: The structure of modern
English. PALGRAVE MACMILLAN. Pages: 8-17.

3. Step 2: In your English textbook, identify three different activities that helps
learners to develop your component of language. Write a 50-100 word
paragraph providing an explanation of why and how that activity develops
knowledge and practice of the component.
Activity 1
Analysis activity 1
In this first activity, we want to emphasis in the practice of the sounds /θ/ and /ð/. In the point
number one, you can see what kind of words you can say with the sound /θ/, like "thing" and
with the sound /ð/ like "there". In the second point we want that you identify what word
corresponds to each sound. And finally you have to practice the production of the sounds.
/ θ / Sound / ð / Sound
If you want to make these sounds. You have to put the tip of the tongue visible between the
teeth, the air escaping between tongue and teeth; aspirations for / θ / in any position, but not
for / ð /.

4. Activity 2
Analysis activity 2
In this activity we have the sounds /n/ and /ŋ/.
Both /n/ and /ŋ/ are pronounced with air coming through your nose, with you blocking the air
in your mouth with the front of your tongue for /n/ and the back of your tongue for /ŋ/.
/n/ sound /ŋ/ Sound
So in the activity, we want to practice these sounds, like in the second point, where you can
see the endings of some words like "been" (finish in sound /n/) and "being" (finish in sound
/ŋ/), that you later have to identify and practice.

5. Activity 3
Analysis activity 3
This last activity, pretend to make a practice of the sounds /æ/ and / ʌ/, where the letter 'a' is
pronounced /æ/, and the letter 'u' is pronounced / ʌ/.
/æ/ Sound /ʌ/ Sound
/æ/ and /ʌ/ are the two closest vowel sounds in English and so it is very difficult to hear and
pronounce the difference. In fact, in some American accents there is no distinction between
the two. For that, we're going to practice this sounds making the differences between the
words like in first point, and recognizing the sounds in phrases and practice it.
References
• Sonidos de las consonantes. In Wright-McGillivray (1959). Aprendamos Ingles (Let’s
Learn English). Edicion Completa. Page: xxvi.
• Minimal Pairs /n/ and /ŋ/. English Club. In the URL:
http://www.englishclub.com/pronunciation/minimal-pairs-n-ng.htm
• Minimal Pairs /æ/ and /ʌ/. English Club. In the URL:
http://www.englishclub.com/pronunciation/minimal-pairs-a-u.htm

6. Step 3: Choose one of the activities from your analysis, and create an improved
version of it. Identify something in the activity that you can change, adapt
or add so that it better develops your component of language. You don
not need to explain your creation.
As a suggestion
According to the last activities we can recognize that the phonetics cannot be just referring as
a reading part, it needs a listening part that shows the sound of each symbol.
So we can recommend a program called Sephonics in which you can practice and improve
your listening and pronunciation skills.
Here you can download Sephonics, it is a free download software:
http://www.wartoft.nu/software/sephonics/

8. So you have many options to practice Phonetics.
Activity design.
We want to emphasize in the sounds / θ / and
/ ð /, for that, we make a web site, where you
can find, first the whole project, second, an
interactive way to play and learn with the IPA, third, in this page
http://cambridgeenglishonline.com/Phonetics_Focus/ you have many activities to improve
your phonetic skills, fourth, you have two wordsearches to recognize the sounds / θ / and /
ð /, and finally, you have some flash cards that just have as a guide, a picture and the
phonetic script.
According to the activity 1, we create the next activities:
1. Go to this web site: http://hyphenquote.jimdo.com/get-used-with-the-pronunciation/?
logout=1
2. Practice with the activities that you found in the page.
3. Now, According to the previous activities guess what is the word in the flash cards,
according to the sounds / θ / and / ð /.

11. Step 4: Based on steps 1, 2 and 3, and based on the readings for module 5. Write
a 200-250 word text explaining the relationship between linguistics and
language teaching and learning.
“What is the relationship between linguistics and language teaching?”
The relationship between phonetics as a linguistic component and language teaching is that,
phonetics refers to the general pronunciation in a language and language teaching is how the
knowledge is teaching to someone.
According to this, when you teach a language you need to have the knowledge and the
practice, that means, for example if you try to teach any language you minimum has to know
the basic structures and the basic components of the language because "the view of the role
of explicit grammar instruction in the process of effortful learning has changed" 1.
In other hand language teaching uses the linguistic as a guide to teach a language, but the
linguistics are just for the ones who want to study to become a bachelor in English.
In other words linguistics are in a general context for everybody, in fact, " linguistics begins
as a descriptive science: it aims, at the very least, at an accurate description of what people
actually say when they speak" 2, but if you are studying to be a teacher, you need to learn the
components of linguistics, each one separately because just the Bachelor is the one who
specifically knows the component and it uses but the common people just need to know it
application.
Although that, many people who knows a language teach it, but they really knows the
components of linguistics? Or they just know how use to it? That is the reason to know a
person who knows the application of the components of linguistic because just the bachelor
knows how use it for a great knowledge performance.
We can conclude that this project gave us a new perspective about the English teaching, and
more specifically, the teaching of the phonetics, because this component it's very important
to develope the speaking and the pronunciation, that is essential in learning and teaching
process of any language, even, in the creation of this work, we identify how is necessary
learn about phonetics, and work on this, because we want to improve more, not only on
phonetics, but also in the other components that are the base of our learning process.
References
• Linguistics in Language Teaching in Brinton, L., and Brinton D. (2010). The
Liguistic Structure of Modern English. John Benjamins Publishing Company. Pages:
368 and 373.