Abstract:
The overall purpose of this study was to examine the major pronunciation difficulties of
preparatory students and the negative influences of these challenges on their global EFL
speaking skills. Specifically, the study explored 1) some of the major pronunciation challenges
that the students faced both at segmental (vowel and consonant sound) and suprasegmental
(prosody) levels; 2) the negative influences of these (segmental and suprasegmental) difficulties
on their EFL speaking skills, and 3) the attitude of students toward learning English
pronunciation. To achieve the general and specific objectives of the study, the researcher
devised three distinctive types of data gathering tools. These were: a) pronunciation and
intelligibility tests which aimed to diagnose the students’ speech production and comprehension
difficulties on the target pronunciation items both at segmental and suprasegmental
phonological features; c) questionnaires and d) guided interviews. The questionnaires and the
guided interviews were used to investigate the needs analysis of the students’ attitude toward
learning pronunciation skills. For the manageability of the pronunciation and intelligibility tests,
25 grade eleven students whose NL was Amharic were purposefully selected since the
researcher’s mother tongue is Amharic, and since attitude is not affected by NL, 110 students
from the same grade level whose mother tongue was homogeneous were recruited for
questionnaire responses, and 12 students were randomly selected for the interview responses
from Jimma Preparatory School grade eleven. To this end, the students faced the /θ/ and the /ð/
consonant sounds the most frequently mispronounced sounds; the long vowels such as /i:/, /ɜ:/,
/ɔ:/, /ɑ:/, /u:/ were indistinguishably mispronounced as their short vowel counterparts /ɪ/, /ə/, /ɒ/,
/ʌ/, /ʊ/ respectively; and /ʊə/, /ɪə/, and /eə/ diphthong vowel sounds were found to be the most
problematic pronunciation difficulties at segmental levels. The students also encountered
problems in using correct stresses and comprehending speeches in connection, meaning
comprehensions from sentence stress and intonation at the suprasegmental features. However,
they showed an enthusiasm to acquire and to have good pronunciation skills by different means.
Finally, the researcher recommended that curriculum developers and syllabus designers
incorporate pronunciation lessons in attainable and consistent ways for better Ethiopian EFL
industry.
