HELPING INTERNATIONAL TEACHING ASSISTANTS ACQUIRE DISCOURSE INTONATION: EXPLICIT AND IMPLICITL2 KNOWLEDGE

Abstract

This study explored a theoretically-driven permutation of an intervention designed to improve ITAs’ spoken Discourse Intonation (DI). The object was to learn if implicit knowledge growth in DI could be found as the result of an experimental group participating in explicit instruction and in audio-assisted repeated reading treatments using twice-weekly easy, popular science texts for 14 weeks. In a read-aloud condition where speech processing burdens were reduced, both an experimental and control group (who received explicit instruction only) improved over time on speech rate, planning pauses versus hesitation pauses, prominence, tone choices, and length of tone choice pause groups. In a free-response task where processing burdens were increased, however, there was little evidence of change in implicit knowledge of DI for the experimental group. One positive thing was learned: Explicit DI instruction did not reduce participants’ speech rate and thus participants could focus on form as well as meaning in extended speech. Explicit DI instruction, where form is linked to meaning, is worthwhile in that explicit knowledge may become proceduralized and available for learners’ extemporaneous use. Implicit knowledge building in DI, while difficult to demonstrate, may still be worthwhile if it builds learners’ knowledge of vocabulary (to improve prominence) and builds their experience hearing DI features linked to meaning within extended texts