| Body | The purpose of this activity is to engage learners in connecting written language to sounds. While useful for all learners, educators may find it particularly useful for beginning language learners as well as learners of a writing system that is distinct from that of their L1. It is also a beneficial activity for exploring regional differences in pronunciation.
Learning Outcomes:
The learner will be able to:
- Read along with a spoken text
- Identify regional variations in pronunciation in the target language and/or identify patterns in written language systems
Materials: connecting sounds to written language video, two short audio samples in the target language with accompanying transcripts
Procedure:
- Introduce the reading/listening strategy of reading along with a transcript to draw connections between spoken and written language by showing learners this video.
- Explain to learners that they will practice the strategy themselves. For learners of a language with a different writing system than their L1, you may want them to focus on understanding how a single letter or character can be written in different ways. For other learners, you may want them to focus on regional variances in pronunciation or pronunciation more broadly.
- Play a short (see note below) audio sample in the target language. Learners will highlight or underline their transcripts as they read along the first time. If they have difficulty keeping up, slow the audio sample down and let them listen another time.
- Play the audio sample again. This time, ask learners to mark anything that surprises them with a star. They may notice that the way a letter or character seems to be written is different than what they are expecting or that a consonant or vowel is pronounced differently than what they thought would be the case.
- Discuss what learners noticed as a group.
- Repeat Steps 3-5 with another short audio sample and transcript. Depending on the language, you may want to provide the transcript written in a different way than the first transcript. Alternatively, you may want to provide an audio sample that features distinct regional variances in pronunciation.
Notes:
- The length of the audio sample may correspond to the proficiency level of learners. For Novice learners, you may want to select a 30-second sample, and for Advanced learners, you may find that 2-3 minute samples are more appropriate.
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