I´m sorry, you said that the ship is "thinking"?

Teaching another language is a challenge. As teachers, we have to deal with the students´ insecurities and difficulties with the new language. The fact that there are some phonemes in English that don’t exist in Portuguese causes a lot of trouble. In my opinion, the [θ] sound is the most difficult one for Brazilian students, as in "think"/"sink", "thank"/"sank" or "three"/"tree". I think that the [ð] is also difficult, because the students usually say "doze" instead of "those" and "dough" instead of "though". The /t/ and /tſ/ are also very confusing for Brazilian students, because they mix "two"/"chew", "tip"/"chip" and "tease"/"cheese", for example.

As a teacher, I always try to correct my students´ pronunciation by saying the words more slowly or exaggerating the sounds. I say "guys, it´s 'THere', not 'dare'. I also try to show them where the sound is produced, the place of articulation. Of course that I don´t tell them the formal names, so I don´t scare them, but I say, for example, "put your tongues between your teeth and say 'thank you'”, or “put your hand on your throat” as in 'how' or 'home', to feel if it vibrates or not. As for intrusive vowels, I write the word on the board and say "pretend that the letter 'e' doesn´t exist", for example, 'lived, closed, loved'. I get my marker and cut the letter "e" off. It has been working so far!

The Phonetics and Phonology course has been very helpful throughout the semester and I believe that the knowledge that´s being acquired will last forever. It´s so important for ESL teachers like me. I believe that the most helpful content so far has been "Brazilian Portuguese Speakers´ Difficulties with American English Consonants". In my opinion, it is so because it applies perfectly to our reality in the classroom. It shows the difficulties that Brazilian students have, how it affects semantics causing communication problems and how we, as teachers, can help them.

Mistakes such as mixing "thank and sank, math and mass, three and tree, through and true, they and day, though and dough, home and Rome, hose and rose, Pam and pan, rum and run, two and chew, tip and chip, ship and chip, shop and chop" are very, very common in all levels and ages. I´m already applying the newly-gained knowledge by pointing the students´ mistakes. Sometimes I exaggerate the word; sometimes I even show the phonetic symbol to help the students understand the difference between one word and the other, and how it may cause trouble in communication. I also tell them that, if they open the dictionary, they will see some symbols that will help them pronounce the word correctly. Then I show the difference between some symbols, for example, [t], [d], [θ], [ð]. 

To conclude, being able to understand the English language better and to pass this understanding on to the students is extremely important. It helps us teachers to comprehend our students´ difficulties better and to help them solve their pronunciation problems, in order to achieve clearer communication.