Work

The effects of orthograpy on the pronunciation of English “j” and “g” by CLIL and EFL Spanish schoolchildren

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: This study intended to provide empirical evidence on the occurrence of orthographic effects (OEs) on Spanish schoolchildren’s English speech production, with a special focus on the potential mitigating effects of extended exposure in the form of Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) as compared to traditional English as a Foreign Language (EFL) instruction. Participants completed a word–reading–aloud task which included six words containing the graphemes “j” and “g” in onset and/or coda position. Results showed that learners were largely influenced by their L1 orthographic knowledge when producing the target grapheme-phoneme correspondences (GPCs). However, intergroup comparisons pointed to an advantage of CLIL learners over their EFL counterparts in most words, which reached statistical significance only for the initial “j” in “jam”, suggesting that gains were word specific. The attested moderate benefits of CLIL warrant further longitudinal research of other potentially problematic GPCs for Spanish young learners of English.

Source: The Journal of English Studies

DOI: 10.18172/jes.7293

Authors: Déborath Sánchez-Fernández, Francisco Gallardo-del-Puerto

Institution: Universidad de Cantabria

Language: English

Topic: EFL/ESL Teaching and Learning

Subfield: Language and Linguistics

Field: Arts and Humanities

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Quality education

Open Access status: diamond

Funders: Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, Agencia Estatal de Investigación