A theoretical assessment of ASR-based pronunciation activities for classroom learning

Gottardi, William; Silveira, Rosane

doi:10.1590/1983-3652.2025.56636

The use of digital technologies in the daily routine of second language (L2) classes became unavoidable when teachers needed to overcome mobility restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. In countries where access to technological resources in regular classrooms is still limited, the use of free digital resources for pedagogical purposes is a valuable alternative. This pedagogical paper explores the use of Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) for L2 pronunciation teaching and learning. Three ASR-based activities drawn from Gottardi (2023) are presented and discussed. The assessment is based on the criteria provided by two frameworks. From the pedagogical perspective, we adopted the communicative pronunciation teaching framework (Celce-Murcia; Brinton; Goodwin, 2010), which proposes five steps to teach pronunciation and design materials, including explicit instruction, perception, and production tasks, with different degrees of teacher guidance and feedback. Considering the use of technology and the design of pedagogical activities, we draw on Chapelle’s (2001) six criteria to evaluate educational software and activities. We analyzed each ASRbased pronunciation activity in terms of language learning potential, learner fit, meaning focus, authenticity, positive impact, and practicality. Thus, the objective of this pedagogical paper is to 1) discuss how ASR technology can assist L2 pronunciation practice; 2) provide practical examples of ASR-based pronunciation activities designed to be used by L2 teachers; and 3) examine the pedagogical appropriateness of the proposed activities. Finally, pedagogical implications of using ASR for pronunciation practice are discussed.

Keywords:
Computer-Assisted Language Learning; Pronunciation teaching; Pronunciation learning; Automatic Speech Recognition; Intelligibility

[1] Source: Celce-Murcia, Brinton, and Goodwin (2010, p. 45)

1- Description and analysis	Oral and written illustrations of how the feature is produced and when it occurs within spoken discourse.
2- Listening discrimination	Focused listening practice with feedback on learners ability to correctly discriminate the feature.
3- Controlled practice	Oral reading of minimal-pair sentences, short dialogues, etc., with special attention paid to the highlighted feature in order to raise learners consciousness.
4- Guided practice	Structured communication exercises, such as information-gap activities or cued dialogues, that enable the learner to monitor for the specified feature.
5- Communicative practice	Less structured, fluency-building activities (e.g., role play, problem solving) that require the learner to attend to both form and content of utterances.

l- Language learning potential	The degree of opportunity present for beneficial focus on form.
2- Learner fit	The amount of opportunity for engagement with language under appropriate conditions given learner characteristics.
3- Meaning focus	The extent to which learners’ attention is directed toward the meaning of the language.
4- Authenticity	The degree of correspondence between the CALL activity and target language activities of interest to learners out of the classroom.
5- Positive impact	The positive effects of the CALL activity on those who participate in it.
6- Practicality	The adequacy of resources to support the use of the CALL Activity.

Learning Focus	Pronunciation self-assessment
Level	A1 – A2
Age	Teenagers or adults
Time	30-60 minutes
Target Feature	Raising awareness about pronunciation patterns that might disrupt communication.
Communicative Framework Phase	Description and Analysis (1) and Guided Practice (4) with an information-gap exercise.
Dictation Passage	Dictation Passage & Example: I am ________ [number] years old.

Learning Focus	Raising awareness about acoustic features of each vowel and how to distinguish them in production.
Level	A2 and above
Age	Teenagers or adults
Time	30 – 45 minutes
Target Feature	Producing the vowel contrast /I/ and /i/
Communicative Framework Phase	Description and analysis (1) and Controlled Practice (3) with sentence-level minimal pairs.
Dictation Passage	Example: Look at that sheep! / Look at that ship! (see Section B)

Learning Focus	Speech rehearsal for fluency and accuracy improvement
Level	B2 and above
Age	Adults or late teenagers
Time	1 hour – 2 hours
Target Feature	Raising awareness about pronunciation patterns that might disrupt communication in a real-life situation
Communicative Framework Phase	Communicative Practice (5) with a role-play activity
Dictation Passage	Common questions in a job interview (see Section C).

A theoretical assessment of ASR-based pronunciation activities for classroom learning

Avaliação teórica de atividades de pronúncia baseadas em tecnologia de reconhecimento de fala para aprendizagem em sala de aula