TONGUE TWISTERS

A lot of people don’t know how to work pronunciation with children; I think that tongue twisters are useful to practice it.

So, tongue twister could be use to practice saying a particular sound in a tongue twister; to raise awareness of how particular sounds are formed; to improve pronunciation skills.

- Draw the children’s attention to the particular sound to be practiced in the tongue twister and demonstrate how it is made. For example, in the case of /s/ followed by a consonant, hold your index finger to your mouth and make a hissing noise like a snake.

- Repeat, but this time turn the hissing noise into a word, eg Sssssss….snake! Do this several times with different words the children know followed by a consonant, eg school, spider, Spain, star. Demonstrate that there is no vowel sound before ‘s’ at the beginning of words.

- Say the tongue twister you have prepared slowly, eg Stupid Steve stole sixty scary spiders from a school in Spain and get the children to repeat it with you. If you like, write it in the board.

- Get the children to say the tongue twister again three times, going faster each time.

- Divide the class into pairs.

- Ask the children to see how many times they can say the tongue twister with their partner in one minute. If you have a stop watch, use it to time the activity.

-  Ask the children to report back how many times they managed to say the tongue twister.

- You can also ask them to tell you any tongue twisters they know in their own language.

EXAMPLES:

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers;
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked; 
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
Where's the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?

She sells seashells by the seashore,
The shells she sells are seashells, I'm sure.
So if she sells seashells on the seashore, 
Then I'm sure she sells seashore shells.

Give your students the opportunity to imitate (you/recordings/songs/TV/internet). Reviewing the parts of the mouth can help your students clearly understand how to make appropriate English sounds. Practice the use of that sound or sound pattern.