The research student journey

I have been at the Albury campus of Charles Sturt University (CSU) over the past few days.

One reason for my visit was to celebrate with Dr Jane McCormack at her PhD graduation ceremony (see previous post). Jane has been awarded the most outstanding PhD thesis in the Faculty of Education for 2010. This is an amazing achievement. She is now a lecturer in speech pathology at CSU.
ABC Radio recorded an interview on the day of her graduation about her research here:


Dr Jane McCormack, Vice Chancellor Ian Goulter,
A/Prof Linda Harrison, Prof Sharynne McLeod

  While in Albury, Jane and I have also spent time with Nicole Limbrick, our new honours student. Nicole is examining speech pathologists' protocols and decision making during assessment of children with speech sound disorder (speech impairment). She is at the exciting stage of finalizing her question and designing the research methodology.



Jane McCormack, Nicole Limbrick, and Sharynne McLeod

 

It is always a pleasure to walk alongside students as they read, plan, implement, and write up their research -- and are rewarded for their efforts at graduation.

Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara

Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara are two similar, but distinct dialects of the Western Desert language group spoken by the Anangu people in the centre of Australia near Uluru-Kata Tjuta.

Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara have been written using 14 letters from the English alphabet, with some consonants being underlined to indicate that the sound is retroflex (made with the tongue tip back). There are  

6 vowels: a, aa, i, ii, u, uu  

2 diphthongs: au, ai

17 consonants:

5 stops: p, t, t, tj, k

5 nasals: m, n, n, ny, ng

7 liquids and glides: l, l, ly, w, r, y

1 trill: r (never in word-intial position)

The first syllable of every word is stressed.

Many words are created with the addition of suffixes. For example, karu = creek, kutu = to, therefore karukutu = to the creek.

In the Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara picture dictionary there are no words listed for hello, thankyou, or yes. There are four different words for go (go away from, go hunting, go in, go past). Here are some words





Sharynne at Uluru near rock paintings by the Anangu people



no = wira

talk = wangkanyi, watjani

tongue = tjalinypa

teeth = katiti

For more information see: http://www.environment.gov.au/parks/publications/uluru/pubs/pn-anangu-language.pdf

Source: Ekert, P. (2007). Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara picture dictionary. Alice Springs, NT: IAD Press.



Uluru, Kata Tjuta and the Anangu people in central Australia

During April I have taken annual leave with my family. We are visiting Uluru - Kata Tjuta National Park in the centre of Australia. Uluru (named Ayers Rock by white explorers), is one of the largest monoliths in the world with a circumference of 9.4 kilometres. Kata Tjuta means “many heads” (named The Olgas by white explorers). It consists of more than 30 rounded red domes rising from the desert floor. There has been a lot of rain recently, so the landscape is lush with vegetation, and the gorges contain water. This is very unusual for this desert region of Australia.

The Anangu people are the traditional Aboriginal owners and oversee the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. They believe that there are three ancestors to the region: Mala (hare wallaby), Kuniya (woma python) and Liru (poisonous snake). Uluru and Kata Tjuta are sacred to the Anangu people.

The Anangu people mainly speak Pitjantjatjara (pronounced as pit-jan-jah-jarra) and Yankunytjatjara (pronounced as yan-kun-ja-jarra) (see next post) and some Anangu people speak up to six languages.

Statistics

I spent today in a workshop run by Alan Taylor from Macquarie University on SPSS(R) Statistics Training. It was useful to brush up my statistical skills and to find additional tricks in the latest version of this powerful statistical program.

History of Electropalatography

This week I worked with Bill Hardcastle from Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh on our book titled Electropalatography for Speech Assessment and Intervention. Bill was visiting Sydney from Scotland, so we took the opportunity of being in the same place (and country!) to select figures for inclusion in the book.
This photograph from the 1970s shows Bill demonstrating the Reading EPG2 system.



Reading EPG2 system designed to work with the Commodore computer



Cantonese

Cantonese is spoken by over 40 million people in southern China in the Guangdong (including Hong Kong) and Guangxi Provinces, as well as in Britain, Canada, Australia, and USA and many other parts of the world. There are 19 consonants, 11 vowels, 11 diphthongs, and 9 tones in Cantonese.

Cantonese has16 oral consonants

/p, p^h, t, t^h, k, k^h, k^w, k^wh, ts, ts^h, f, s, h, w, j, l/

and 3 nasal consonants /m, n, ŋ/.

There are 11 vowels in Cantonese: 7 long vowels /i, y, ɛ, œ, а, ɔ, u/ and 4 short vowels /ɪ, ɵ, ʊ, ɐ/. Of the short vowels, /ɪ, ɵ, ʊ/ are allophones of /i, œ, u/ respectively.

There are 11 diphthongs /аi, ei, ɐi, ui, ɔi, аu, ɐu, iu, ou, ɵy, eu/.

The syllable structure of Cantonese is (C)V(C) and there are six possible syllable structures in Cantonese: V, C, CV, VC, CVV, and CVC. Only two syllables have a single consonant as a syllable: namely /m/ and /ŋ/.

Cantonese uses tones to differentiate lexical meaning. There are six contrastive tones (high level, high rise, mid level, low fall, low rise, and low level) plus three entering tones for syllables that end with /–p/, /–t/ or /–k/.

Cantonese uses syllable-timed rhythm.

Source: So, L. K. H. (2007). Cantonese speech acquisition In S. McLeod (Ed.), The international guide to speech acquisition (pp. 313-326). Clifton Park, NY: Thomson Delmar Learning.
With advice from Dr Carol Kit Sum To.

Visitor from Hong Kong

Dr Carol Kit Sum To has spent the week in Bathurst at Charles Sturt University. Carol and I worked together at the University of Hong Kong last year. Since then we have been working on journal articles, a book chapter, conference presentation, and a grant. This week she spoke with my research students about professional practice in Hong Kong and we submitted a journal article about children's acquisition of Hong Kong Cantonese. While she has been here it has been interesting comparing Bathurst with Hong Kong -- we have very few cars and people and a lot of grass and open space compared with HK.

Memorial service for the people of Ōkuma and Japan

Over 140 members of the Bathurst community came together at Bathurst City Uniting Church on Wednesday 23 March for a memorial service for the people of Ōkuma and Japan following the earthquake and tsunami. The service was attended by the Mayor and Bathurst Regional Council members, the Sister City Working Party, clergy and members of the churches of Bathurst, staff and students from Denison College (Bathurst and Kelso High Campuses), Charles Sturt University, MacKillop College, St Stanislaus College, All Saints School, and citizens of Bathurst who have visited and hosted visitors from Ōkuma and Japan. It has been estimated that over the past 20 years around 1000 Bathurst residents have either visited Ōkuma or hosted visitors from Ōkuma. Father Yoshihiro Okawa from Japan also was involved in the service. As a result of the service $1088.90 was donated to the Bathurst-Ōkuma Appeal. School students made hundreds of paper cranes, that will be sent to the residents of Ōkuma.
We also remembered the people of Christchurch in New Zealand, who also are rebuilding their city and their lives after recent earthquakes.

Western Advocate stories (22 March 2011; 24 March 2011)
Insights story (April, 2011)

Mrs. Fudeko Reekie, Father Okawa, Cr. Monica Morse,
Prof. Sharynne McLeod, Rev. 'Oto Faiva

Japanese

Japanese is spoken by over 127 million people in Japan as well as by immigrant groups, particularly in Hawai’i and Brazil.

Japanese has 15 consonants: /p, b, t, d, k, g, m, n, N, r(flap), s, z, h, w, j/ and a number of allophones.

Japanese has five short vowels, /a, i, u, e, o/, and five long vowels /a:, i:, u:, e:, o:/.

The syllable structure of Japanese can be described in the formula: (C)(j)VV(C).

Only two types of consonant can occur at the end of a syllable:

• a nasal: that can occur at the end of a syllable and/or a word (e.g., /hoN/ [hoN] ‘book,’)
• a plosive or fricative: that can only occur within a word (e.g., /sak.ka/ [sak:a] ‘writer,’)

The only cluster allowed is a two-consonant onset cluster with /j/ in the second position. (e.g., /kjoo/ [kjo:] ‘today’).

Japanese is often cited as a textbook example of a lexical pitch-accent language. All words are either accented or unaccented, and accented words have one accented syllable. The accent consists of a sequence of high and low pitch levels.

Three writing systems are used.

• Kanji, is a set of ideographic characters borrowed from Chinese. The Japanese Ministry of Education teaches a set of 1,945 characters to primary and secondary school students, but most educated people know a few thousand more characters. Each character represents a semantic concept.
• Hiragana has 46 symbols to represent sound units. Hiragana is mainly used to write inflections and various bound morphemes. Each symbol stands for a portion of the syllable. (e.g., /toru/ ‘to take’ is written as とる (to-ru)).
• Katakana also has 46 symbols to represent sound units. Katakana is used to transcribe foreign loanwords.

Source: Ota, M., & Ueda, I. (2007). Japanese speech acquisition In S. McLeod (Ed.), The international guide to speech acquisition (pp. 457-471). Clifton Park, NY: Thomson Delmar Learning.

Earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear crisis in Japan

This week the world has been shocked by the news of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis in Japan. The city of Ōkuma is where the Fukushima Daiichi (No.1) nuclear power plant is located. Ōkuma is the sister city of my own city, Bathurst.

The school that my children attend was to host 11 students from Ōkuma this week (arriving 20th March). Of the 11 students, 7 have fathers who work at the Fukushima Daiichi (No.1) nuclear power plant. This news story from the Sydney Morning Herald is likely to be about some of these children.

My son has previously visited Ōkuma as part of learning Japanese at his local high school. Here is a photo of him near the Fukushima Daiichi (No.1) nuclear power plant in 2009 (source: Facebook).

In April this year I was to visit Ōkuma with my husband, children, and 41 others from their high school. I had taken leave to do this, but knew that it would assist me with my Future Fellowship, to give me great insights into: the lives of Japanese children, how Australian and Japanese children learn languages, and the Japanese language. The trip has been cancelled and our thoughts are with our sister city in Japan. This is a news story from our local paper, the Western Advocate and another story.

In response to the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis I have been on the team to organise a memorial service to be held at Bathurst City Uniting Church on 23rd March, 2011. This service will be attended by the Mayor and Bathurst City councillors, students and teachers from local high schools, university staff and students, and people from across Bathurst who have visited Japan, hosted visitors from Japan, and who are thinking of the people of Japan at this sad time.
The service will also remember the people of Christchurch, in New Zealand, where 182 people died as a result of the earthquake in February. I was in Christchurch only a few weeks before the devastating earthquake. My colleagues and friends are all safe, but all have been affected by these events.

Students in 2011

I am very fortunate to work with talented research higher degree students. This year they include

• PhD students: Kate Crowe and Jacqui Barr
• Masters student: Rebekah Lockart
• Honours students: Nicole Limbrick and Hannah Wilkin 

In March, I have also spoken to:

• Masters students studying Pharmacy at Charles Sturt University (CSU) about writing their literature reviews
• Research supervisors across CSU about my philosophy of research higher degree supervision

International speech acquisition: A world tour

On 24th February, I presented a one-day workshop in Sydney for Speech Pathology Australia. The workshop was titled "International speech acquisition: A world tour".

The workshop covered:

• definitions and aspects of multilingualism
• the range of languages spoken by children in Australia
• similarities and differences between aspects of speech (consonants, vowels, syllable structure etc) for a wide range of languages
• typical speech acquisition for monolingual children who speak languages other than English
• speech acquisition for multilingual children
• speech assessment for multilingual children, including techniques for differentiating difference from disorder in children’s speech, and ways to listen to children's perspectives
• speech intervention for multilingual children

I really enjoyed working with the group of enthusiastic participants who are equipped with many respectful techniques for working with children from multilingual backgrounds.

Year 2 begins

During February, I have been fortunate to work with some wonderful people in order to continue to achieve the aims of my Future Fellowship. These have included:

• Gail Fuller, Spatial Analysis Network, Charles Sturt University - to analyse Australian census data
• Rebekah Lockart, Macquarie University - to begin a project on speech pathologists' transcription of the speech of children from non-English speaking backgrounds
• Dr Elise Baker, The University of Sydney - to write both a grant and a book on children's speech
• Dr Yvonne Wren, University of West of England  - to write a grant and journal articles
• Professor Sue Roulstone, University of West of England - to edit a book on listening to children and young people with speech, language, and communication needs
• Professor Helen Grech, University of Malta - to write an invited book chapter on multilingual speech and language development and disorders

Elise Baker and her lovely children

Year 1 of my Future Fellowship

The first year of my Future Fellowship concluded on 7th February, 2011. Over the past year, Kim Woodland from The Research Institute for Professional Practice, Learning and Education (RIPPLE) has summarized the year in a series of updates published in the RIPPLE newsletter. I have copied these below.


AUSTRALIAN RESEARCH COUNCIL FUTURE FELLOWSHIP UPDATES
Speaking my language: International speech acquisition in Australia

UPDATE 1:
Sharynne McLeod has created a blog—‘Speaking my languages’—to record her experiences while working on her ARC Future Fellowship research. Sharynne’s fellowship will allow her to conduct research into communication impairment in multilingual children, which is currently both undiagnosed and over‐diagnosed due to a lack of culturally‐sensitive measurement tools. Her blog can be found at http://www.speakingmylanguages.blogspot.com/.

Over the last few months, Sharynne has combined research and travel, as she explores communication impairment in multilingual children. In May, Sharynne visited Hong Kong University, where she presented two seminars for speech therapists: ‘Children’s speech acquisition’ and ‘Prevalence, risk, and impact of childhood speech and language impairment’. This was followed by a trip to the United States in June, where Sharynne visited the East Tennessee State University and presented another two seminars: ‘Speech sound disorders in children: Typical acquisition, prevalence, risk, and impact’ and ‘Listening to children through the Sound Effects Study’. Sharynne also visited the Child Study Centre at the University. Next was a trip to Oslo, Norway, to give an invited speech at a children’s speech acquisition workshop, and to attend the 13th International Clinical Phonetics and Linguistics Conference. Sharynne co-presented three papers/posters at the conference.


UPDATE 2:
Prof McLeod has continued at her usual incredible pace in the past six months, covering more of the globe than many people do in a lifetime. The Commonwealth-sponsored Future Fellowship "International speech acquisition in Australia", has provided opportunities to present her amazing research to a multitude of people across the world. On 8 July, she was invited to attend a reception at Speakers House, Houses of Parliament, in London. The event honoured the work of Afasic, the national organisation supporting families of children with speech, language and communication needs in preparation for the 2011 UK National Year of Children with Speech, Language and Communication Needs. While in the United Kingdom, Sharynne spent July working at the Speech and Language Therapy Research Unit (affiliated with the University of the West of England) at Frenchay Hospital in Bristol (which she revisited in late August). Later in the month, Sharynne travelled to Zambia for the International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development (ISSBD) conference in Lusaka on 18-22 July. At the conference, Sharynne presented a paper on behalf of the Sound Effects team (Linda Harrison, Lindy McAllister, and Jane McCormack). While in Zambia she visited a village, and the Mwandi Orphans and Vulnerable Children Project. From 22 to 26 August, Sharynne attended the International Association of Logopedics and Phoniatrics (IALP) conference in Athens, Greece. Along with colleagues, Sharynne presented four papers, hosted a symposium, and also met with the IALP Education Committee, of which she is a member. Sharynne then travelled to Stockholm from 4 to 6 September, to meet with the editorial staff who publish the International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, of which she is editor. From 7 to 10 September, Sharynne worked with colleagues at Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh, on an upcoming book titled Electropalatography for Speech Assessment and Intervention. Back in Australia, Sharynne presented a 2-day workshop (20-21 September) at the Victorian Department of Education and Early Childhood Development Speech Pathology conference at LaTrobe University in Melbourne.

Hello and thank you!

During my international travels I always try to learn to say "hello" and "thank you" in the languages and dialects of the places I visit. I have received appreciative smiles from taxi drivers in Hong Kong, and waiters in Zambia for undertaking this small courtesy.

One of my colleagues in the UK has recently shown me this fantastic website, that contains videos of school  children saying "first words" in a huge number of languages:
http://www.newburypark.redbridge.sch.uk/langofmonth/index.html


The words they speak and write are: welcome, hello, goodbye, good morning, good afternoon, thank you, sorry, please, yes, no, come here, well done.

I am certainly going to use this site to prepare for my future travels.

Multilingual norms

Last year the following book chapter was published:

McLeod, S. (2010). Laying the foundations for multilingual acquisition: An international overview of speech acquisition. In M. Cruz-Ferreira (Ed). Multilingual norms (pp. 53-71). Frankfurt: Peter Lang Publishing.

A review of the book, Multilingual Norms has been published in the Journal of Linguistics and Language Teaching (JLLT), vol.2(1). It concludes: " Altogether, the current publication, edited by Madalena Cruz-Ferreira, can be regarded as highly valuable for teachers, researchers and language clinicians. The authors successfully present an eminently readable book which is based on solid empirical research and which hopefully finds the readership it deserves."

Website containing the review
Madalena Cruz-Ferreira's blog

AusTalk: An audio-visual corpus of Australian English

I am an associate researcher on the Australian Research Council project to map Australian speech. The project is titled AusTalk: An audio-visual corpus of Australian English. Australian speech will be recorded across the entire country, including at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst.
On Australia Day (26th January), the AusTalk project will be launched, and soon after, Australians' speech will begin to be recorded.
AusTalk website
ABC News

Congratulations Jane!

Jane McCormack has received her excellent PhD examination reports while visiting Bathurst with her supervisors (A Prof Linda Harrison, A Prof Lindy McAllister). We have been working on a postdoctoral fellowship application to continue Jane's important research. Recently, Jane has commenced a lecturing position in speech pathology at CSU. We look forward to seeing Jane's continued contribution to the profession and to children with speech, language, and communication needs.

Jane McCormack and her PhD supervisors Sharynne, Linda Harrison and Lindy McAllister

More details about Jane's PhD can be found here

Māori

Te reo Māori (the Māori language) is spoken by the Māori people of New Zealand.

Around the year 1300 AD, seven boats containing the Māori people left their home in Rangeātia, Tahiti and travelled to Aotearoa (literally, the land of the long white cloud, and later called New Zealand). Six boats settled in the North Island and one in the South Island. The Māori people were warriors, and are known for the haka (performed internationally by New Zealand rugby teams), poi dancing, tattoos, carving, and weaving.

In written Māori there are 5 vowels: a, e, i, o, u
10 consonants/diagraphs: p, t, k, m, n, ng, wh, h, w, r

• Short vowels are pronounced as /a, e, i, ɔ, u/
• Long vowels are indicated with a macron: ā, ē, ī, ō, ū
• Long and short vowels are phonemic. For example, keke (cake), kekē (creak), kēkē (armpit).
• The consonant ‘t’ sounds like /t/ before the vowels i and u, but /d/ before the vowels a, e, o
• ‘wh’ is pronounced as ‘f’(or possibly a bilabial fricative, such as found in Japanese)
• ‘r’ is a tap/flap, but there are dialectal differences

Important words

• kia ora (welcome)
• tēnā koe (hello to one person), tēnā kōrua (hello to two people), tēnā koutou (hello to three or more people)
• tēnā koe (thankyou to one person), tēnā kōrua (thankyou to two people), tēnā koutou (thankyou to three or more people)

A Māori proverb I like is:

• Ui mai koe ki ahau he aha te mea nui o te ao, Māku e kī atu he tangata, he tangata, he tangata! (Ask me what is the greatest thing in the world, I will reply: It is people, it is people, it is people)

Sources:

Staff and information at the Te Puia Māori Cultural Centre, Rotorua
Niwa, H. (2009). Pronounce Māori with confidence. Auckland: Reed Publishing.
Reed, A. W. (2001) The Reed concise Māori dictionary (6th ed). Auckland: Reed Publishing.

Sharynne and Jessica talking with a Maori elder who has worked in early childhood education throughout her life. We were at at Te Puia, the Maori Cultural Centre in Rotorua

New Zealand vs. Australia

New Zealand and Australia are often said to have sibling rivalry. In many ways their culture and history are similar, with white (British) people settling in each country at similar times. There are many similarities between New Zealand and Australian English consonants, vowels and diphthongs. The most noticeable difference is in the pronunciation of the high front vowels ‘i’, ‘e’ and ‘a’. Speaking the phrase “fish and chips” is one way many people use to differentiate these two dialects of English. Another area of difference is the vast size of Australia vs. the compactness of New Zealand. Australia’s size means the Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander people speak hundreds of different languages. In contrast, Māori is the same (although with some dialectal differences) throughout New Zealand.