Teaching Minimal Pairs in English as a Second Language

Minimal pairs are words that differ only by one phoneme, or the smallest part sound that makes a difference in the meaning between words. That one little vowel, consonant, or couple of consonants/vowels can make all the difference to a new English speaker that is trying to communicate in English. Did he say pen or pin? Bit or bat? By focusing on minimal pairs as a part of your English as a second language lesson plan, you will help your students develop vital pronunciation skills in their new language.

It is important that students first recognize the differences in the phonemes between minimal pairs before they can produce them accurately and be aware of similar-sounding words to those minimal pair words practiced in class. Activities that help English students learn the correct pronunciation of minimal pairs can be geared toward their levels and learning styles. Some activities only require listening on the part of students, and other require that students generate their own minimal pairs and learn them by communicating with the teacher and with other students.

Kat Bennet developed some ideas for helping students differentiate between phonemes in English in her independent study course for teaching pronunciation. One of her ideas is to create cards labeled with the letters "S " for same, "D" for different, and "I don't know." Students listen to the teacher or another student speak sentences with minimal pairs or just sets of minimal pairs, and the students hold up a card to indicate if they believe that the two words they hear are the same, different, or that they do not know. Teachers can use dialogs and sentences using minimal pairs to make listening for them more challenging.

Students can also check a box labeled with a particular phoneme or circle the word they hear on a worksheet to demonstrate that they hear a particular sound when the teacher or another student dictates some minimal pairs. Another idea is to have students work in pairs, having one student read words from a list of minimal pairs, and the other student circles the word he hears. Students can then compare what was read to what was heard and then switch roles. Students can also make up their own minimal pairs for a particular phoneme to make the lists of minimal pairs they are working from larger and more varied.

More advanced students can create a story using a list of pre-prepared minimal pairs to demonstrate that they understand the meaning of the words. Then the students could read their short stories in front of the class or to a partner to practice producing the sounds orally. Tongue twisters are another great way to practice minimal pairs. This site has some good ones. Though mainly geared towards children, there are good tongue twisters with minimal pairs that can be used for any age or level.

For a more physical activity, write minimal pair words on the board, spaced evenly apart. Have the class split into two teams. One team member from each group goes to the board and hits the word that they hear the teacher say with a fly swatter or just their hand. The first one to hit the correct word gets a point for his team. The winner stays at the board, and the other team sends up a new team member for the next round.

Teachers should first identify the problem sounds for the students in their classes. Creating a minimal pair list that targets these problem sounds can give a basis for trying some of these activities. Though students speak different languages in ESL classes, they often will experience the same difficulties in producing particular sounds.

Some other resources:

Paul Lindsay provides a short list of common mistakes English learners make in his book Teaching English Worldwide (p. 107). For example, Hebrew, German, and Russian speakers often pronounce "men" like "man," or "men."

Pronunciation Contrasts by Nilsen and Nilsen gives minimal pairs for 51 different languages.

John Higgins has created a site that provides several minimal pairs in the form of a table that indicates the difficulty of the sounds demonstrated by the minimal pairs.

This site has several audio-based quizzes for English as a second language students on minimal pairs.