The Use of Pronunciation Drills in Teaching Fluency and Phonics Recognition among Grade Six Pupils of Pinamukan Ibaba Elementary School

Abstract

INTRODUCTION

Pronunciation skills are vital to fluency and phonics. Teachers can enhance pupils' linguistic development through pronunciation drill activities thus developing their fluency. With these, the study aimed to identify the difficulties of the Grade 6 pupils in the development of fluency and phonics recognition. It described the pronunciation drills and its extent of utilization of pronunciation drill activities that are applied in areas of fluency and phonics recognition. Significantly, in order to be proficient in speaking and reading the English language, it is highly essential that learners must develop fluency and phonics recognition.

METHODS

Descriptive method of research was utilized. Phil-IRI reading test, questionnaire, and interview were conducted to gather data.

RESULTS

The data showed that difficulties on areas of fluency, phonics, and word recognition are mispronunciation, substitution, and repetition. Teachers frequently utilize pronunciation drills such as chorus drills, repetition drills, songs, and rhymes. They use pronunciation drill activities to a moderate extent to enhance fluency and phonics recognition as they let pupils listen and sing songs to practice pronunciation, stress, and intonation, and demonstrate facial exercises when producing sounds. The respondents are limited to 33 Grade 6 pupils of Pinamukan Ibaba Elementary School. The implications of the study revealed pronunciation drills should be part of English lessons from the kindergarten level.

DISCUSSIONS

The study has identified the difficulties of the Grade 6 pupils in the development of fluency and phonics and the pronunciation drills that are used in teaching fluency and phonics recognition. It has an end view of LAC session guide that may be designed to enhance the use of speech drills in teaching reading fluency and phonics recognition. The key understanding/s in the session guide is the unleashing of skills and knowledge of the teachers. It is also recommended that Pronunciation drills should be part of English lessons from the kindergarten level, teachers should utilize contextualized and unique pronunciation drill activities to motivate and increase fluency of the pupils as they learn English and teachers should be asked to attend English proficiency training that focused on fluency and phonic recognition. Future researches on the effective linguistic productive skills on speaking are also suggested.