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ERIC Number: ED579890
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 2013
Pages: 4
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-2165-6266
EISSN: N/A
Using English and French Proverbs as Comparative Pairs to Teach the Terminal Junctures
Yurtbasi, Metin
Online Submission, Journal of Teaching and Education v2 n3 p169-172 2013
Junctures are pauses used in speech separating thought-groups from one another in order to give the listener time to digest the utterance to signal the end. Where junctures are present, hearers find it easier to understand what is said as they are able to discern the individual words between such verbal breaks. Junctures being universal suprasegmental features in all languages, learners of foreign languages should also be made aware of their existence and importance while trying to capture the skill of conveying their oral messages intelligibly. In an innovative approach to teach the three forms of junctures, namely, the sustained junctures (short or long pauses in sentences), the falling junctures (pauses after statements) and the rising junctures (pauses after questions) could be demonstrated in a "comparative pairs technique". This technique may involve the matching of some famous proverbs common in both languages (the source and the target languages, i.e. L1 vs. L2) to prove the universality of such suprasegmental elements. For instance, "the sustained juncture" could be taught using such a match as "Friends--may meet--but mountains--never greet--" vs. "Il n'y a que les montagnes--qui ne se rencontrent jamais--" As an example of a "falling juncture", another identical proverb-pair such as: "Rome wasn't built--in a day/"vs. "Paris ne s'est pas fait en un jour /" could be given. And finally for "the rising juncture" yet another pair in the question form this time could be used: "Which--came first--the chicken--or the egg--/Qui est venu en premier--la poule--ou l'oeuf/" Thus, in this presentation, the functions of the terminal junctures will be shown both through English and French proverb examples as suprasegmental phonemes in the intonation of English. We often encounter the challenge of teaching suprasegmentals to foreign language students in Turkey as a serious problem. So comparing identical proverbs while teaching students junctures could increase their awareness of such a feature of oral communication and thus allow them express themselves more clearly and understandably. Keywords: Juncture, Sustained juncture, Falling juncture, Rising juncture, Suprasegmental, Pauses.
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Turkey
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A