Mandarin syllables speech trainer based on F1 and F2 formant frequencies

Computer based speech training system is one of the applications in speech technology that aims to provide a facility to learn foreign language. Language teaching nowadays increasingly focuses on pronunciation skills since the teaching standard within language teaching has shifted towards more emphasis on the ability to communicate orally. In this project, a system was developed to train user on pronouncing Mandarin syllables, by observing the first two formant frequencies, F1 and F2. These two values are obtained from Linear Prediction Coefficients and are affected by jaw opening and position of tongue, respectively. The user is requested to adjust these two aspects in order to improve the pronunciation. The level of accuracy of the syllable pronounced by user was obtained by comparing the formant frequencies with the standard pronunciation, which was pronounced by three Mandarin lecturers. The system was tested on a group of students and the result shows that these students can pronounce the syllables correctly in less trial compared to another group of students who were trying to imitate the syllable by just listening to the sample pronunciation.