How to Teach English Phonetic Components to Speakers of Japanese : A Review of Previous Studies

The purpose of this paper is to compare some salient suprasegmental and segmental differences between English and Japanese, to identify difficulties that Japanese learning English may encounter, and to revisit effective pronunciation teaching based on previous research findings. Current tendency is to focus on integration of suprasegmental and segmental features rather than choosing either of them. Regarding setting priority in teaching pronunciation, a consensus between experienced teachers on relatively important pronunciation features for Japanese learning English was recently provided by Saito (2014). As for teachers’roles and responsibilities, there are many factors (e.g., learners’goal, proficiency level, and development stage)which pronunciation teachers need to take into account. With this in mind, teachers are responsible for selecting appropriate approaches, instructional materials, and learning activities from a wide range. Above all, phonemic distinction exercise,articulatory descriptions or diagrams seem beneficial especially for beginners. Form Focused Instruction (FFI) and social interaction with others are regarded to be effective approaches to improve phonetic abilities in spontaneous communication.