Theoretical And Practical Developments In English Speech Assessment Research And Training

This edited book presents and discusses theoretical, practical, and research developments in English pronunciation in order to establish evidence-based directions and recommendations for best practices in English speech assessment, research, and training. It features leading pronunciation experts from diverse contexts who share cutting-edge research and valuable insights. The collection consists of six parts. Part 1 introduces the aims, focus, and structure of the book, and describes its intended audience. Part 2 reviews, provides empirical evidence, and offers critical analyses guiding different aspects of English speech assessment. Parts 3 and 4 report empirical findings and research perspectives on the perception and production of English speech. Part 5 shares current practices in phonetic training and their effect on learners and listeners. Part 6 presents theoretical perspectives on the acquisition of phonology in multilinguals.

This book presents and discusses theoretical and practical perspectives on English pronunciation theory, research and practice in order to establish evidence-based pronunciation teaching models, teaching and research priorities, and recommendations for best practices in teaching English pronunciation. The chapters provide a balanced view of theory and practice based on the authors’ empirical findings and their extensive professional experiences in English as a second/foreign language (ESL/EFL) and lingua franca contexts. The book identifies pronunciation teaching priorities that take into account individual learner variables, disseminates knowledge about theoretical frameworks, explores teachers’ and learners’ beliefs and practices regarding pronunciation instruction, and shares empirical findings regarding teacher education and teaching interventions in diverse contexts with English learners of different ages and language backgrounds. Overall, the chapters highlight the need to focus on intelligibility models that consider individual learner differences, and teacher and contextual variables.

In our increasingly multilingual modern world, understanding how languages beyond the first are acquired and processed at a brain level is essential to design evidence-based teaching, clinical interventions and language policy. Written by a team of world-leading experts in a wide range of disciplines within cognitive science, this Handbook provides a comprehensive overview of the study of third (and more) language acquisition and processing. It features 30 approachable chapters covering topics such as multilingual language acquisition, education, language maintenance and language loss, multilingual code-switching, ageing in the multilingual brain, and many more. Each chapter provides an accessible overview of the state of the art in its topic, while offering comprehensive access to the specialized literature, through carefully curated citations. It also serves as a methodological resource for researchers in the field, offering chapters on methods such as case studies, corpora, artificial language systems or statistical modelling of multilingual data.

Second language (L2) pronunciation has become increasingly visible as an important area of L2 teaching and research. Despite the growing number of resources available focused on L2 pronunciation, technology in L2 pronunciation has received much less attention. While technology has been an enduring strand of L2 pronunciation research, it has also been somewhat inconspicuous. Indeed, research has examined a wide variety of technologies such as language-learning platforms, speech visualization software, and Automatic Speech Recognition. Despite the abundance of research, it can be difficult to gain a full sense of work in this area given the lack of a comprehensive and consolidated resource or reference. This book endeavors to fill that gap and make L2 pronunciation technologies more visible by providing teachers and researchers an introduction to research in a wide variety of technologies that can support pronunciation learning. While working to introduce practitioners to numerous technologies available, it also dives into the research-basis for their use, providing new studies and data featuring a wide variety of languages and learning contexts.

This Handbook is a comprehensive volume outlining the foremost issues regarding research and teaching of second language speaking, examining such diverse topics as cognitive processing, articulation, knowledge of pragmatics, instruction in sub-components of speaking (e.g., grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary) and the attrition of the first language. Outstanding academics have contributed chapters to provide an integrated and inclusive perspective on oral language skills. Specialized contexts for speaking are also explored (e.g., English as a Lingua Franca, workplace, and interpreting). The Routledge Handbook of Second Language Acquisition and Speaking will be an indispensable resource for students and scholars in applied linguistics, cognitive psychology, linguistics, and education.

Language Development From Theory to Practice provides a survey of key topics in language development, including research methods, theoretical perspectives, and major language milestones from birth to adolescence and beyond, and language diversity and language disorders. Each chapter bridges language development theory and practice by providing students with a theoretical and scientific foundation to the study of language development. The authors emphasize the relevance of the material to students’ current and future experiences in clinical, educational, and research settings; emphasize multicultural considerations and how they affect language development; focus on using evidence-based practices for making educational and clinical decisions; show the relevance of a multidisciplinary perspective on the theory and practice of language development; and include a number of outstanding pedagogical features to motivate and engage students. The new edition builds on the strengths of the earlier editions while featuring a chapter reorganization that promotes better understanding, more detailed coverage of topics of particular interest to students, expanded categorization of language-development theories, and a variety of helpful new pedagogical features.