Elsa Speak App: Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) for Supplementing English Pronunciation Skills

Nowadays, artificial intelligence (AI) became a special concern in language
teaching for the reason that it can assist and enhance language learning for all
levels of education. Again, it had beneficial roles for supplementing language
teaching like ELSA Speak App one of Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR)
used for teaching pronunciation. It studied how students heard, voiced,
uttered, vocalized, and asserted the English words in the oral language, but the
students often pronounced incorrect words with the result that the uttered
words had faulty meaning. This study aimed to carry out English Language
Speech Assistant (ELSA) Speak App to improve English language
pronunciation skills to higher education learners that were the English
Department Students of Nahdlatul Ulama University of Yogyakarta (UNU). The
data were collected using a test of pronunciation and interview. The researcher
also taught in the classroom. The results showed that ELSA Speak can increase
the students‟ pronunciation skills. It can be seen from the average scores
obtained from the teaching cycles from two to four in grade. Clearly, ELSA
Speak helped the students pronounce diverse words more easily and
comprehensively. Also, the available features offered by this app like instant
feedback enabled the students to pronounce precisely. In conclusion, ELSA
Speak can improve the students‟ pronunciation skills well and effectively.
Indeed, it can motivate the students to engage in learning to pronounce.