First things first: exploring Spanish students' attitudes towards learning pronunciation in Australia

ABSTRACT

The number of Spanish students in Australia is increasing. This growth coincides with a period of revival in the teaching and learning of pronunciation in the foreign language classroom. However, unlike their peers in the UK and especially in the US, no specific materials are available for Australian students. In order to assist them, the first essential step must be examining their attitudes and beliefs, which is necessary to recognise the ways in which they conceive of learning pronunciation and thus shape further work, as the literature has long established. Therefore, we analyse here the results of an anonymous survey distributed among Australian university students of Spanish. The results show positive attitudes and loci of control towards the subject but also reveal the need for strengthening awareness and a number of tensions where action is still needed in order to ensure adequate pedagogical procedure for pronunciation success.

KEYWORDS:

• pronunciation
• attitudes
• Spanish
• Australia
• students

Acknowledgements

We want to thank our colleagues Alfredo Herrero de Haro and Alicia Mellado for their comments and support. We are likewise grateful to the anonymous students surveyed in this article for their participation. All usual disclaimers apply.