PronPack 1: Pronunciation Workouts: Volume 1

PronPack is a set of four resource books to help teachers focus on English pronunciation in class – each takes a slightly different approach to pronunciation teaching. You can select the approach you prefer, or use the various books to complement one another.

PronPack 1: Pronunciation Workouts are extended drills focusing on specific areas of English pronunciation. Think of them like the scales and other exercises which pianists use to improve their fingering technique. But in the case of pronunciation, it’s the vocal articulators which are getting trained – the tongue, lips, jaw and vocal cords.

The workouts can benefit learners in two different ways – practice and perception. Practice: The workouts can help the mouth muscles to get accustomed to the unfamiliar movements required to speak in English. Perception: The workouts help learners to notice features of English pronunciation. Because the target pronunciation feature is repeated so often in the workout, it becomes much more obvious.

The earlier workouts in the book focus on the sound system of English. They serve to familiarize the learners with the system as a whole by exploring the PronPack Sound Chart. They explore different regions of the system, such as the short vowels or the stop consonants, and they help the learner to become more aware of the articulators in the mouth and vocal tract. The later workouts in the book focus on suprasegmental features such as word stress, connected speech and tonic stress.

This printed book contains worksheets for the students and teacher’s notes for you. The teacher’s notes give a short background to the pronunciation point plus step-by-step guidelines for using the activity in class. They also highlight the teaching focus, the minimum student level and indicate printing requirements. Additional materials including audio and printable resources to accompany Pronunciation Workouts are available on www.pronpack.com

Other books in the PronPack series are:
Book 2: Pronunciation Puzzles – puzzles and game-like activities.
Book 3: Pronunciation Pairworks – communication activities.
Book 4: Pronunciation Poems – poems, raps and chants.

Mark Hancock started teaching English over 30 years ago and wrote his first English language teaching book – Pronunciation Games – published by CUP over 20 years ago. His approach in both teaching and writing ELT materials is to engage the learner and inspire their intrinsic interest in the content and in the process of the lesson. This is driven by his belief that teaching and learning a language can and should be an enjoyable experience. He studied Geography and Philosophy at St. Andrews University, followed by teacher training courses and finally an MA in Teaching English from Aston University. Mark has taught in Sudan, Turkey, Brazil, Spain and currently lives and works in the UK. Apart from teaching and writing, he also presents at international conferences and leads on short teacher training courses. In his free time, Mark plays the saxophone and guitar, paints in oils and walks in the mountains.