Of the more speci®c books, Headway Elementary Pronunciation concerned itself
with a wide range of features. Making Sense of Spelling and Pronunciation focused
on segmental and word-level features covering the voicing of consonants, word-
stress and shifting stress, spelling/pronunciation diculties, rhyme, homophones
and homographs. Elementary Conversation did not address segmental features, but
seemed to be more ¯uency-oriented in that it did cover linking and intonation.
Overall, the ordering of phonological items was ®tted into an overall structural or
functional syllabus. This ordering may lead trainees and practising teachers to infer
that there is no cogent underpinning to the teaching and practice of pronunciation.
In turn, this may discourage them from attempting to teach pronunciation, or it
may lead them to teach it in a haphazard fashion. In such an absence of guidance
from textbooks, the links we are postulating Ð between (1) pronunciation-teaching,
(2) a broadly communicative and integrated strategic framework, and (3)
phonology Ð might be at least useful, at most absolutely essential.