Daily bread 10/02/2014

• Onboarding: Training from “Yes to Desk” by Ben Muzzell : Learning Solutions Magazine

• New ESL Teacher Resource: Academic Language Site | broadyesl

• English Writing Exercises: Resources for ESL Students

• Google for Education: Announcing Drive for Education: The 21st century backpack for students

• Classroom by Google

• Russell Stannard "Simple ICT Tools" - YouTube

• Resources for teachers | Cambridge English

• Koprowski - Ten Good Games for Recycling Vocabulary (TESL/TEFL)

• Either Vs. Neither | ESL Library Blog

• How to brand your language or literacy program | Literacy, Languages and Leadership

• 12 Old Words that Survived by Getting Fossilized in Idioms | Mental Floss

• Player of the week | Premier Skills English

• Colombian Coffee Triangle: An Introduction | Colombia Travel Blog by Marcela & See Colombia Travel

• 18 Signs You've Found Your Soulmate

• Colombia ha perdido casi la mitad de su territorio - Taringa!

• Cinemark

• Age and my Accent – EnglishCentral: The Official Blog

  "However, in order to understand this research evidence, we first need to understand what English pronunciation ability is. Generally speaking, we can understand English pronunciation in terms of two different levels: the first level is called the segmental level, which contains the basic sounds of words in English. At the segmental level, we can understand words in terms of how vowels and consonants connect to form syllables, and how different syllables connect to form words. The other level is called the “suprasegmental level.” This level refers to the patterns of rhythm and stress that connect words into sentences and sentences into discourse. Many researchers have looked at how these two levels of pronunciation interact with each other, and how this interaction influences a non-native English speaker’s ability to be understood by others. Tracy Derwing and Murray Munro are two of the most important researchers in this area, and both have published a series of studies related to accent and understandability. Their research has provided evidence that suprasegmental features are more important for understandability than segmental features. In other words, if someone says the English sentence, “This is my father,” and mispronounces the “th” sound as a “z” sound, but speaks with the correct rhythm and stress, then they will be more easily understood than someone who pronounces the “th” sound perfectly, but with incorrect rhythm and stress. In addition to this, while there is strong evidence that adult English learners cannot learn to pronounce segmental features exactly like native speakers, there is also strong evidence that suprasegmental features can be learned and improved through practice and training. So, while English with an accent is inevitable for adult English learners, it is still possible for them to communicate effectively. In fact, it is very likely that, with enough perseverance and training, any adult English learner can eventually speak the language in a way that is understandable to almost any other English speaker. This is encouraging, given that the purpose of language learning is to understand and be understood by others."

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