Speech Production Science Guide | SPPA 2040 Course Details

1. I. Text MacKay, Phonetics: The Science of Speech Production: This book is on reserve in the Learning Resource Center (1st floor, near the café). II. Grading SPPA 2040: Your grade will be based on three exams and several quizzes: Exam 1 (30%) Exam 2 (30%) Exam 3 (40%): Exam 3 is comprehensive. Lab Section: There will be a quiz almost every week. Your grade for the lab section will be the average of these quizzes.Labs begin this Friday. There will be no way to make up quizzes. I’ll calculate your grade based on however many you take. But, if you don’t miss any of the quizzes I’ll drop your lowest grade. Grad Assistant: Anna Poggensee

2. Exams: • The usual stuff: short answer, short essay, multiple choice, matching, phonetic transcription, and making and/or labeling drawings. • The dates for exams 1 and 2 will be announced at least a week in advance. The final exam will be comprehensive, but with greater emphasis on the new material since exam 2. • The date for the final is published in the schedule of classes. • Reviewing exams: We will review exams thoroughly in class, but you will not be able to stop in later to review your exams. Sorry, but there is a good reason for this. Transcription quizzes: • Examine your knowledge of the phonetic alphabet. • Not sure yet how many, but probably around a dozen. • There will be some time pressure – a little at the beginning, more later. This is a good reason to commit the symbols to memory ASAP.

3. Attendance: • I do not take attendance, but it’s a good idea to show up. (This is hardly ever a problem.) • If you cannot make it to class for some reason, you do not need to call or email me. It’s better if you don’t. If you’re not in class (and I notice, which is unlikely), I’ll assume there’s a good reason for it. • If you have something special going on that will require to you miss more than a class or two, please let me know. • If you do miss class, please please do not email me to ask me what you missed. (a) Get the notes. (b) Ask a classmate if there were any announcements that you missed.

4. Lab Quizzes The quizzes are done live voice, so there is no way to make the quiz up. If you do not miss any quizzes, your lowest quiz grade will be dropped. Otherwise, your grade for the lab section will be the average of however many quizzes are taken. Everyone will be allowed one unexcused absence from lab. After that, a grade of 40 will be entered for any missed quiz. If you have a good reason for missing lab, let the lab instructor know (not me). You will be asked to provide documentation.

5. Reading Assignments • Reading assignments are listed in the course outline. Specific dates are not given. You should be reading the material that is related to the topic that we are covering in lecture. An example (in red) from the course outline is given below: • Phonetics and the Structure of Language • Areas of study within phonetics • Grammar: universal vs. language-specific, descriptive vs. prescriptive • Linguistic modules: semantics, syntax, lexicon, morphology, phonology, and phonetics • Dialect and Style/Register • Reading: Chapters 1 and 2, Grammar Puss (available on my 2040 web page; read this around the time we’re talking about dialect) • So, when we are talking about the structure of language in lecture, you should be doing the readings listed above. Read ahead of the lectures rather than behind them. Reading assignments

6. Letter Grades 93-100: A 88- 92: BA 83- 87: B 78- 82: CB 70- 77: C 66- 69: D below 66: E

7. III. Me Office: CHHS 4468 Phone: 387-8066 Office Hours: T,Th 2:00-3:00, or by appointment, or just stop by. If you plan to stop in, please email me – even if it’s during my standard office hours. Homepage: homepages.wmich.edu/~hillenbr Email: james.hillenbrand@wmich.edu

8. IV. Miscellaneous • Lecture notes • Most lectures are done with Powerpoint. These lectures, along with exercises and other material, can be downloaded from my website. • homepages.wmich.edu/~hillenbr/204.html • It’s ok to download the lectures now or just prior to class, but I may make changes as we go along. You may need to grab fresh copies later. • Email: • Check your email – the address that the University has for you. I do not have a way to send email to any other address. • Two notes: • I’m happy to answer questions by email – if it can be answered in a sentence or two. I do not have time to write essays, so you may have to make an appointment. • If I answer your question, say thank you. (If anyone does anything for you, say thank you.)

9. IV. Miscellaneous (cont’d) • Email: • Check your email – the address that the University has for you. I do not have a way to send email to any other address. • Two notes: • I’m happy to answer questions by email – if it can be answered in a sentence or two. I do not have time to write essays, so you may have to make an appointment. • If I answer your question, say thank you. (If anyone does anything for you, say thank you.)

10. Alvin computer transcription exercises • Exercises designed to help you learn the IPA. • The latest version of the software runs on both Windows machines and Macs. When the time comes I’ll show you how to install it. It’s pretty easy. • If you have problems getting Alvin to install or run properly, the exercises can be run the computers in the Learning Resource Center (south end of bldg, near the café). If that option doesn’t work for any reason, see me. • Alvin will display your results after you complete each exercise. Print this file (File>Print) and keep the hard copy in a notebook or something (or email the file to yourself). (If you don’t have a printer attached there’s a way to print the results out later. See me.) I will ask to see these hard copies at some point. There will be a half-letter grade penalty if you haven’t been keeping up with the exercises.

11. The software will tell you how you are doing on (almost) every exercise. (A few give feedback trial-by-trial but do not give a summary.) If you are not doing well on the exercises, there’s something wrong. Seeme and we’ll get you back on track.

12. Paper and Pencil Exercises There are several paper-and-pencil exercises on my 2040 web page. The text below is from the course outline: I. Phonetics and the Structure of Language • Areas of study within phonetics • Grammar: universal vs. language-specific, descriptive vs. prescriptive • Linguistic modules: semantics, syntax, lexicon, morphology, phonology, and phonetics • Dialect and Style/Register Reading: Chapters 1 and 2, Grammar Puss (available on my 2040 web page; read this around the time we’re talking about dialect) Exercises: Counting speech sounds (http://homepages.wmich.edu/~hillenbr/204/countingspeechsounds.pdf) Counting morphemes (http://homepages.wmich.edu/~hillenbr/204/morphemeexercise.pdf) Orthography vs. phonetics (http://homepages.wmich.edu/~hillenbr/204/orthographyversusphonetics.pdf) Message: (1) Do the exercises. (2) Put them in a notebook. (2) I may ask you to turn them in. These are the links to the exercises

13. V. Advice • Pay attention in class and take good notes. • The parable of the unannounced quiz 1 (SPPA 2040) • 2. Don't miss class, especially in the beginning of the course. (I will not take attendance, though.) • 3. Keep up with things. • Don’t wait until I announce and exam to get engaged in learning the material. • Taking good notes, keeping up with the readings, and reviewing • your notes between classes are much more important than cramming for exams. • The parable of the unannounced quiz 2 (SPPA 6190) • The parable of the vestibular system (SPPA 2060) • If you find yourself requiring more than a few hours to prepare for an exam you are almost certainly not keeping up well enough. • 4. Do the homework and the computer exercises. Nearly all the exercises I distribute will have solutions attached. If you don’t understand something see me.

14. 5. If you are having trouble with the material, come in for help. 6. Memorizing: There’s no way to learn phonetics, and especially phonetic transcription, without doing some memorizing; e.g., there’s no way to avoid learning that the 1st consonant in “shoe” is the IPA symbol [ʃ], or that the vowel in the word “book” is the IPA symbol [Ʊ]. Things will go a lot easier if you do the memorizing as soon as possible. The memorizing isn’t that big a deal: There are a little over 40 symbols needed for English, but most of these are really obvious (b, d, g, p, t, k, w, l, r, etc.). Once you subtract the obvious ones, you’re left with about 12 vowel symbols and about 12 consonant symbols. Transcription will be a lot easier if you commit these to memory ASAP. 7.Focus on understanding the material. Your exam grades will pretty well take care of themselves.

15. Summary • Learn things as they are taught. Do not sit in class and make lists of things that you plan to learn later. No one does this consciously, but many students do it. • Wanting to get good grades is not, by itself, very helpful. Focus on understanding the concepts. Your grades will follow along behind you. • I am NOT asking you to work harder. Learning things as they are taught is the lazy way. Cramming for exams is a lot more work – and it does not pay off anywhere near as well as the lazier way. • I know that you are very busy, but that’s exactly the point: You are way too busy to do all that cramming, especially when you have several exams in a short period of time.