Every language has a different inventory of sounds, different rules for combining these sounds into words, and different stress and intonation patterns. To be an effective CAPL system, it is essential to have an understanding of what factors influence pronunciation learning. We believe that such understandings will allow us to develop a feedback method to help the learners to produce L2 sounds correctly.
Above all, a common observation made by many experienced L2 teachers
is that adult learners do have more difficulty than children in
acquiring native-like pronunciation in L2. Related to this problem,
there is one hypothesis
that
languages are learned differently by children and adults and their
proficiency is a direct result of the maturation of the brain.
However, it is also true that some adult learners do achieve
native-like pronunciation and the degree of pronunciation accuracy
varies considerably according to the training method.
Secondly, the sound system of native language (L1) influences the learners' pronunciation of target L2 in several ways: 1) difficulties may arise when a learner encounters sounds in L2 that are not part of the sound inventory of the the learner's L1, and 2) as we briefly described in section 2.1, the pronunciation of sounds depends on the proper use of the muscular in the mouth, and thus adult learners may be unable to produce new sounds because they have never exercised their mouth in the particular way required to pronounce certain L2 sounds.
Thirdly, L1 not only affects the ability to produce L2 sounds but also
the ability to hear L2 sounds. Many L2 teachers mention the
frustration involved in having learners continually repeat a
mispronounced word or sentence in the same way. They may seem
impervious to correction but, in fact, the problem often arises
because the word or sentence is heard through the sound system of L1.
Thus, the sounds which occur in L1 will be heard rather than the
actual sounds of L2 which are being produced by the
teacher. This highlights a very important point
concerning the influence of L1.
