May 18, 2006
Toward clearer English: New program seeks to help smooth pronunciation
If English isn’t your first language and you would like to improve your ability to speak it more clearly, a new program starting at the UW Speech and Hearing Clinic may be of help. Beginning this summer, the clinic will work with people who have good skills in English vocabulary and grammar but who need help with pronunciation.
“We’re not aiming to make people sound like native born Americans,” said Laura Sargent, Speech and Hearing Sciences lecturer, who has been spearheading the program. “We just want to help them make themselves understood more easily.”
Non-native speakers who qualify will go through an assessment this summer; the actual training begins in fall quarter and may continue into winter, depending on the need. “We are after outcome data,” Sargent said. “We want to know how long it will take to get people to a level where they’re better understood by their colleagues, friends and strangers.”
The training will be done by supervised graduate students in the speech-language pathology clinical program. Program graduate Kathy Nagle has been hired to oversee it.
The graduate program is expanding, Sargent said, and the department is exploring new opportunities to give its students clinical experience. That need dovetailed nicely with the needs of employees who are non-native speakers. Members of the community at large will also be eligible for the service.
Working with adults in this way isn’t greatly different from working with the more traditional clinic clients, like children who have speech difficulties, Sargent said, although “adults’ sound perception systems are more established and less flexible than children’s. They might have more difficulty hearing the correct pronunciation.”
The assessments are designed to zero in on the areas where a client is having the most difficulty and then establish a baseline record against which progress can be measured. The training itself will be one-on-one, starting at an easy level (single sounds) and then practicing skills at more complex levels (words, sentences and conversation). There will be two one-hour sessions per week, with optional evening group sessions for practice. Supervisors will be asked to grant release time for the program.
“Mostly the clinician will help the client hear differences between the client’s production and the desired speech target. In addition, the clinician will try to find ways to explain how to pronounce a sound or how to place a stress in a word to the client and model how it should sound,” Sargent said. “The client repeats what has been modeled and continues practicing at home.”
Sargent is hoping that a proposal to fund the program through the UW’s English in the Workplace Program will be approved. The proposal, which has already been approved by Provost Phyllis Wise, goes to the Board of Regents today. If funded, the training would be free to UW employees.
If it is not funded, the clinic will keep the cost low. The assessment will be free regardless, and the training will be $25 per session plus an overall materials fee of $250. (Non-UW clients will pay this fee regardless of what happens with the funding proposal.) According to Sargent, this compares to community programs that can charge more than $1,200 for 12 to 14 sessions.
Anyone interested in the program can get more information by calling 206-543-5440 or e-mailing uwspeak@u.washington.edu. A flyer and application are available at http://depts.washington.edu/sphsc/clinic_about.htm.
