Putting Vowels on the Map

Putting Vowels On the Map
Putting Vowels On the Map: from article in Modern English Teacher

In this article, I will present and explain a map of the vowel system specifically created to guide the general English language learner. The map is designed with three main aims in mind:

  1. To provide useful insights for the learner.
  2.  To support memorable and effective classroom activities.
  3. To be relevant in an international context by being flexible enough to deal with accent variation.

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Pronunciation SIG Event in Chester

IATEFL PronSIG poster for event in the beautiful city of Chester on February 17th, 2018.

IATEFL PronSIG is holding an event in the beautiful city of Chester on February 17th, 2018. Only 2 hours by train from London, Chester is a place steeped in layers of history, and the event will take place at the city’s University. ‘Pronunciation: the Missing Link’. As the title implies, many of the presentations at this event will be about the link between pronunciation and other areas of language teaching – links which are often neglected.

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PronPack in Modern English Teacher

Article by Mark Hancock and a review by Brian Brennan in MET
Article by Mark Hancock in MET

The PronPack Sound Chart is featured on the cover of the latest issue of Modern English Teacher. Inside the magazine, I have written an article explaining the vowel chart entitled “Putting Vowels on the Map”.

Meanwhile, in the “Book I’ve Used” section, there is a review of PronPack written by Brian Brennan of Ih Barcelona. Here are a few quotes…

“Hancock’s approach is strikingly innovative”
“Hancock has reconceptualised our pron chart brilliantly”
“PronPack sets out to fill a gap and it does so admirably”

PronPacking in Moscow

Presenting in Moscow at the  MISis University conference on EAP, ESP and EMI. I suggested that pron teachers need to keep in mind the three questions what, how and why. (Thanks to Beata Walesiak for the photos)

Symposium: Pronunciation Teaching in a Lingua Franca Context

Moscow, 24th Nov 2017: The globalisation of English has multiple implications for the teaching of the language, especially to those learners whose main use of English will be for international communication, often in the absence of native speakers. Nowhere are these implications more far-reaching than in the teaching of pronunciation. This symposium looks at the goals of pronunciation teaching in this new era, and at learner attitudes to new goals, and at classroom practices suited to achieving the new goals.

TESOL Italy 2017

Mark Hancock at TESOL Italy, Rome, Nov 17th 14:00

“Pronunciation: be a teacher not a preacher”

Pronunciation teaching can be fun, but in a world where English is a lingua franca, we need to take a flexible approach. We can’t simply preach a single ideal target model, instead, we must teach learners to be adaptable, both receptively and productively. In this session, I will demonstrate this.