I happen to have a one-to-one lesson with an adult student who is doing an intermediate level. However, English pronunciation for her is a big isssue.  Among other problems, I’ve identified that she experiences difficulties in pronuncing the /dʒ/ sound.


Lesson

Aim.: To introduce and drill the new sound    /d ʒ/

Level : Intermediate or lower

Time: 30 min

Materials:  Beatles CD with the song imagine + lyrics and homework handouts + flashcards with illustration of the position of the mouth and tongue and the symbol   

Procedure

Tell her today’s class is going to be fun and relaxing (lower her affective filter). Ask her to close her eyes and simply listen to a song. Teacher plays  ‘Imagine’. After the student listens, elicit information about the song just as a good warm up.

Write  on the board  the word  /imædʒin/

Introduce the sound  / place it under the letter g

Ask the student to repeat again all the words written on the board always exagerating the sound.

Show illustration of the mouth and model the sound.

Ask the student to repeat it 2 or 3 times

Drill it while introducing other words with the same sound  John, Jill, George, Jake, Georgia, Juice, June.

Ask her to provide more examples (hopefully she will come up with: July or any other name with the J or G letter in it.

Ask the student to listen to the song again, but this time reading the lyrics and when she listens to and reads the /d ʒ/ sounds she should stand up of her seat.   She should do this 6 times.

When the song is over ask her to add the new words in the lyrics containing the sound. (Religion – Join)

Ask the student now to have a look at all the words and to invent a tongue twister, and not to worry about sense it must be silly so as to have fun. Provide an example on the board using other words

EX:  Jane and Jill are DJs and jive with J LO’s song.

Allow time for this, when is over ask her to read her piece of work, slowly first, then faster and faster.

 
Homework

Give her a short text for her to read and identify the target sound. She sould circle the word that contains it and underline the part of the word which she thinks should be stressed.  The idea is to introduce stress for the following lesson.

                                          

1-Read the text and circle all the words that contain the sound  /dʒ/ in the text below.

2-Now read again and  this time  underline /dʒ/ in all the words the part where you think that the word should be stressed   Ex: Jefferson

Homework   Text.

John Jefferson has been the regional general manager of General Motors Corporation for about 5 years. His job keeps him very busy and his agenda is always full.  Mr Jefferson is always the object of criticism when the workforce meets to discuss wages, however, he finds the time to indulge himself with an orange juice and ginger.

 

Flashcard picture taken from :  http://www.uiowa.edu/~acadtech/phonetics/#

Song: Imagine 

Teacher:  Mery Pereira Núñez
English Language Solutions
Uruguay