The Effect A Case Study of University-Mohammed Seddik Ben Yahia of Jijel artial Fulfillment of the Requirements of the Master Degree in TEFL Board of Examiners Academic Year: 2018/2019 of the Age Factor on Second Language Pronunciation Learning

Abstract

The present study tries to shed light on the effect of the age factor on second language pronunciation learning. To meet this objective, and on the basis of the Critical Period Hypothesis, an experiment was conducted on three groups of learners from different ages (n= 42) at Fly High private school of languages. The first group consists of eleven (11) year old learners (before puberty), the second group is composed of thirteen (13) year old learners (age of puberty) and the third group includes fifteen (15) year old (after puberty). The participants were given a pre-test to determine their prior level, and then they had had six sessions on pronunciation learning before they were given a post-test which provided an overall view on the level of improvement for each group. Following a quantitative approach to data collection and analysis, it is hypothesized that Algerian learners may learn better pronunciation if they are exposed to the target language in an early age. The findings of the experiment show that there is a huge gap in terms of improvement from the pre-test between the three groups. The first group shows the highest level of improvement followed by the second group while the third group shows the lowest level. It can be concluded, then, that the younger the learners are, the better and the quicker they attain the pronunciation of the target language.