An Investigation On The Correlation Between Phonetic Accuracy Of The RTV University Students And Their Listening Skills

A large number of college graduates of English major join in society every year. Although many of them have done well in exams, some are actually rather poor in oral communication. However, phonetics is among the compulsory courses at the basic stage of English teaching and there are three definite requirements in terms of pronunciation, intonation and speech flow, which are specified by The Teaching Program for English Major at Colleges and Universities and are issued by the National Education Department in 2000. Several other factors must also be taken into consideration: Phonetic training costs much time and attention but is still inefficient; The problems with the English pronunciation of Chinese students result from different reasons. For example, conventional and rigid teaching approaches have been overwhelmingly adopted; Students' spontaneity and potential have not been able to be mobilized and tapped due to limited classroom practice as well as the lack of good sample phonetics materials designed for teaching and imitation drills; qualified phonetics teachers are insufficient for those at the critical age of foreign language learning. All the above mentioned factors have led to the deep-rooted problematic pronouncing habits and poor phonetic knowledge, not only in primary schools and also in colleges and universities. These problems have troubled us all these years.From my teaching experience, I have found that phonetic problems have affected the students' English learning to a great extent. Students have been severely hindered and discouraged from pursuing accurate pronunciation and intonation. Some even have lost heart in English learning. Therefore, I conducted an investigation on the correlation between phonetic accuracy of RTV University students and their listening comprehension among 60 students of two English and Commerce classes in order to solve their problems with English pronunciation and listening skills. In my experiment, I have taken some effective measures to strengthen my phonetic teaching and help improve phonetic knowledge and the skills of class conduction. The one-term-long experiment strongly proves that not only the students' phonetic skills, but also their listening comprehension has been greatly improved. The findings from the investigation suggest that improved phonetic skills will result in a greatly improved listening comprehension.