Interference challenges of ewondo learners elf: case study of gbhs ekounou and lycée leclerc in Yaoundé

Abstract

This study examines the effect of the Ewondo language on the spoken productions of Ewondo learners of English. The work was motivated by the observation that, when most secondary school Ewondo speakers learning English speak, they negatively transfer phonological features of Ewondo, their mother tongue, to English. The researcher was therefore interested in identifying such aspects of negative transfer at the phonological level and systematically analysing them; assess the effect of these aspects of the negative transfer on communication; identifying the different factors that are responsible for the negative transfer in order to: suggest appropriate measures to be taken and reduce problems of Ewondo learners of English in terms of speaking. In order to systematically investigate the issue at stake, the work was undertaken within the theoretical framework of error analysis. The data were collected through survey methods of investigations and were analysed through both quantitative and qualitative methods. So this study probes into EFL teaching methodology in two secondary schools in Yaounde with a view to gauging their effects on the acquisition of EFL and the attitude of teachers towards a contrastive approach to pronunciation in the Cameroonian multilingual context. The findings reveal that, the spoken English of Ewondo learners is full of aspects of negative transfer. This could be attributed to factors that are psychological, linguistic, social and pedagogical. Some of these factors include students‟ negative attitude towards English and lack of sufficient exposure to English, difference between English and Ewondo sound systems, laziness and the lack of focus on pronunciation in the classroom.