After viewing the SparkPost, it reminded me about my experience with crowdsourcing a problem I encountered with a student. At the time, I was teaching a more advanced English conversation class than I normally taught. My students were all English Language and Literature majors. Most of the students were quite proficient at English, but I had one student who scored poorly on pronunciation on a test and she wanted additional help. I set up a meeting with her in my office so we could find a way to improve her pronunciation.
While we had the meeting, I encountered a problem I had never experienced before. In conversation, her intonation and pronunciation were very influenced by her native tongue. It was difficult for me to understand her and it is my job to understand students. When she was site reading a text, her intonation and pronunciation dramatically improved. It was surprising to me how good it was in comparison to her conversational English. My normal activities for helping students improve pronunciation didn't work at all.
First, I asked all the other professors in my department. I got very different answers. I then turned to Facebook. I got a wide variety of answers from other EFL teachers, teachers with ESL experience in the US, and laypeople with no experience. In the end, we were able to figure out a plan.
My final analysis was just based on cognitive load. She just hasn't practiced speaking English aloud much. She could either focus on pronunciation or thinking of what words to say. On top of that, she was nervous when speaking to me. (Koreans often describe having a disease of speaking English, especially with foreigners.) By having her practice more, we could lower the cognitive load of pronunciation and thinking of what to say. By the time she had her final exam, she had markedly improved.
Crowdsourcing works!
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