NATIONAL DEBATE COMPETITION

No weak reason to gain what impossibilities in this reality. This sounds really great to discribe my personal impressive experience in Jogja 18-19 April 2015. There was a great and first challenging competition i have ever joined. It was a national debate british parliamentary style which conducted in Islamic State of University Jogjakarta. Many talks i ought to share to review what kinds of lots activities i did during staying over there. This is only to remind me how wonderful my sacrifice to compete this competition.
Those were started by the previous days before joining at he competition. At first, started by how to procced this application. Basically,I did not aware that my university, IAIN Salatiga, got the invitation letter from Student Organisation UIN Jogja. Informed by the chief of Communicative English Club (CEC), i was shocked with this sudden informaation. I tried to clarify and look aver first about the truth. It was really true. Oh my dear, with this short duration, Should i bring about this?, I said. Without knowing what will happen to next, i decide to recieve this form accidentally. Just wanna get something new in my life. That’s i thought in my mind.
On Friday, i prepared to go to UIN Jogja with my friend. Surya. He was also my partner in one team mate as the delegation from campus. Fortunately, the weather was on my way. It was so bright to have a trip in Jogja. Arriving there, i needed a help from my friend to have a homestay during this trip. Surprisingly, i run into with my old friends from Matholi’ul Falah Kajen. He was my junior who provided me a empty room to stay. I thanked fully to him.
On Saturday, that was a challenging competition held in UIN Jogja. I was so impressed and shocked at how could the participants come from all several universities in Indonesia. For instance, UGM, Undip, UNNES, ITB, UIN Makassar, UIN Jakarta and many other weel known universities. And finally, this competition had been finished on Sunday by UGM as the 1st winner, Unnes as the 2nd, and ITB as the 3rd.

PRONUNCIATION – MY OBSTACLES IN LEARNING ENGLISH

A. REVIEW MY PREVIOUS POST
As the previous post i published, it is stated that I have a obstacle in pronunciation in which how to pronounce some words fluently is my goal description. Frequently, i am out of confidence when i want to pronounce a complicated word i have never found before. It seems really hard to give more understanding to the listeners when i am in fault. However, this case absolutely needs taking some points of resolution such as solutions, sharing to friends in same case, goals, and others.

B. FRIENDS IN SAME CASE
Unexpectedly, it happens also to my friends who have the same problem in pronouncing the words well. They are Anas Sofyan, Ahmad Chudhori, and Adri Muzakka as my classmate. We talked over to release a big deal discussion about this case on Tuesday, 28th April 2015 in Lab language. We currently have some similarities which are inclined to lots obstacles in practicing some words in good pronunciation. We realize that It’s difficult to pronounce English words because English pronunciation is tricky , and the vowels have many different pronunciation, for example : the letter ( a ) in the two simple words : “car” and “cat”. None of us gets easy to guess the correct pronunciation when some words seem complicated words.

C. SOLUTIONS
Finally, after having a short discussion with them, i found several solutions referred to some problems above. I try to collect my detail mistakes firstly, and i find the shortcut or the simple way to tackle pronunciation issues.
The first, learning the phonetic transcriptions and using a good dictionary with an audio recordings of the words are the chosen way i decided. And also listening as much as i can and practice reading aloud will improve my pronunciation skill. Additionally, watching movie can be also a source of learning pronunciation directly in keeping on what native speaker said in conversation. That easily increases more my understanding.

The following, i try to study each group of phonetic transcriptions alone and practice them with a clear understanding to the differences between them. The highly recommended dict is Oxford Dictionary as the general handbook for learners in improving vocabulary or pronunciation skills with the trusted transcription. It truly happens to me after studying each transcription of related words i purpose. At first i seem doubt how to pronounce it well, but furthermore, by opening Oxford, i have just got the point what to pronounce correctly.

The next, The effective solution i get is the voice training. If i don’t have a chance to talk to native speakers or people with good pronunciation, so the best way is to record my voices and repeat it many times to notice our mistakes and correct them. This way can be effective and at the same time.

D. MY GOALS
Related to my goal, those solutions hopefully will improve my pronunciation better in any kinds of English words i pronounced. Even though, i don’t have the right source to get a right pronunciation educationally. Also, i don’t have professional teachers to teach me how to pronounce right. But at least, i would like to deepen my ability to overcome some problems by tackling several solutions above. In addition, those solution doesn’t need any extra burden to spend my time. I only need some devices to support my self-learning in order to expand easily some advanced progress.

E. IS IT WORKING?
That will be a question for expectation. Well, after doing several ways above, it is really unbelievable that my pronunciation is increased smoothly. Even if i sometimes find a small disturbance to utter some words correctly. Furthermore, i believe that everything needs a process. This is namely a process to overcome this obstacle. In fact, it really works to me and give me more understanding.

F. HOW LONG IS IT APPLIED?
Related to this question about how long it is applied, it mainly reflects to my effort to improve this subject. As long as i do it properly and habitually, it absolutely can be stuck on my memory. Because i realize that pronouncing the words correctly needs more practicing and applying it. It couldn’t be predicted accurately how long it will work. It is essential that the sooner i apply those methods, the better my pronunciation later.

Regards,

Danang S.W.

This post is published to fulfill Psychology Subject in Sem 6 lectured by Mrs. Roro Dewi in IAIN Salatiga.