Abstract

Because students’ pronunciation needs cannot always be sufficiently treated in class, it’s crucial for students to have opportunities for independent pronunciation practice (McCrocklin, 2016). Although technology tools offer various opportunities for such autonomous practice, many current applications and websites designed to improve pronunciation often do not meet pedagogical requirements and may lack meaningful input, substantial examples, or opportunities for useful feedback (Neri et al., 2002; Levis, 2008). This presentation will introduce a new, teacher-created website, developed under university grant funding and piloted in an advanced ESL speaking course, which is designed to enable students to not only learn about individual sounds of English, but also practice them in a meaningful way outside of the classroom. The website provides students with pronunciation tutorials that guide them through perceiving and producing English sounds and practicing those sounds at word, sentence, and discourse level. This tool can increase student motivation and reduce student’s speaking anxiety by empowering them to take charge of their own individual pronunciation goals and both learn and practice pronunciation in a meaningful way outside the classroom. It also benefits teachers by reducing in-class instruction time and enabling them to provide individualized assignments and feedback based on each student’s needs.