Beyond Nodding When Developing Listening Skills

                                                                                       

By Mayra Yaranga

Receptive skills, in contrast to productive ones, are mostly taken for granted since they are assumed to be easier to develop. Just by nodding, learners may show they can follow someone’s ideas or that they have “understood,” but can listening be reduced to this? In this article, I would like to mention several aspects that are often overlooked when teaching listening.

One of the most important aspects is that all listening tasks have a purpose, and that students should be trained to achieve this purpose rather than “just understand.” This involves, for example, helping them to distinguish between general and specific when they are listening for gist, or ensuring that they understand how to answer certain types of questions if they are being trained for the listening component of an international examination. There are sub-skills and techniques galore for each particular listening purpose, and we should do our bit of research when planning lessons. What is more, we should think of how those strategies will help them cope in real life.

Another neglected aspect is that of the actual nature of speech as opposed to writing. Many students may expect that the information given in a listening task will come in the same neat way as a reading text; that is, with a clear layout and clear progression. The truth is, spoken language is rarely like this in real life. We incur false starts, we get lost for words, we paraphrase ourselves a bit too often, we use malapropisms, we contradict ourselves… Are our students being trained to deal with these “faults” in spoken communication? Or do they always face listening expecting to visualize every single word, with the consequent frustration of not being able to make them all up?

One final aspect is that spoken English can no longer be neatly labeled as “American vs British.” Currently, the idea of English as the language of a few powerful countries is rather contrived. It is best to think of English as a lingua franca, with proper varieties appearing in every country where it reaches official status or is spoken by a sizable percentage of the population. Each variety will have its own idiosyncrasies, particularly in terms of pronunciation (not just “accent”). I recommend Jennifer Jenkins’ seminal book The phonology of English as an international language: new models, new norms, new goals for further insights). Do our classroom materials reflect this reality in any proportional way? How can we compensate for this dangerous lack of diversity?

All in all, listening provides countless opportunities for improvement. It is not just about pushing play on a recording device and throwing students at the deep end. Rather, it is about developing a set of strategies to cope with pedagogical listening tasks and real-life listening.

Now, it’s YOUR turn

What difficulties do your students find when developing listening skills? What strategies do you provide?

Biodata

Mayra Yaranga (1985) Doctor in Education (UNIFÉ); Master’s Degree in Media, Culture and Identity from Roehampton University (London) revalidated by PUCP, a Bachelor’s Degree in Education - UPCH and the Professional Title of Licenciada - IPNM. Currently she is Cambridge Oral Examiner and Member of the Research Area for Universidad del Pacífico Language Centre. She is also ESP coordinator and Pre-University Centre Director at UNIFÉ.

    

A Renewed Look at developing Listening 
Comprehension Skills

        By María de la Lama E.

Can our students progress in acquiring a foreign language without developing strong listening comprehension skills? Can two people communicate orally if one of them is not able to understand what is being said?   Listening is the main door for learning.  As Rivers (1981) pointed out, in normal life we can expect to listen twice as much as we speak, four times more than we read, and five times more than we write. However, how much time do we allow in our lessons to develop in our students this important skill? Usually, it is assumed that   teacher talk will be enough to develop in our learners listening abilities but, is it enough?

Let’s consider some techniques that have been proved to be effective in developing listening comprehension skills:

1.Go beyond the overused technique of listening for the gist or to get the main idea. Try out other activities such as note taking, clue searching, paraphrasing, inferential listening, or graphic fill-ins.

2.Consider that each level i.e. Elementary, Intermediate, Advanced has its own set of activities each one much more interesting than listening to get main ideas. Thus, while Elementary students can do selective listening or listening with visuals, Intermediate students can enjoy other activities such as inferential listening or story rebuilding.

3.Promote the development of different skills, especially those that will have a positive impact on the students’ communicative competence such as distinguishing word boundaries, recognition of stress and rhythmic patterns, recognition of cohesive devices or even retaining short phrases that have been said.

4.Activate the students’ background knowledge of the topic presented in the listening activity. A very effective way to activate their previous knowledge of the topic to be heard in your students is by asking them to predict what is going to be said. Also, check if your students have the knowledge which is prerequisite to understand the text presented. Consider that there is a relationship between background knowledge and command of the language: a good command of the language will free the student to rely on pre-existing knowledge of the topic to understand an oral message.

Remember that if you ask your students to listen to a text whose context is unknown for them, they will struggle too much with the task and will end up demotivated.

5.Bring the real world to your classroom by using authentic materials. Nowadays there is plenty of listening materials that will make your lessons more lively and motivating. Use extracts of movies, TV sitcoms, songs, etc. You do not need to adapt them according to your students’ level, just control the task that they will perform with that material.

6.Do not expose your students to uncomfortable situations during listening comprehension activities. You want them to feel successful and enjoy their learning experience. Some teachers like to call on to individual students to provide the answers after a listening activity. This is not too helpful. It’s much better to ask them to compare their answers in pairs, and before listening to the text a second time, write their doubts on the blackboard. Thus, you will be doing two good things: your students will be listening again with a specific objective instead of a boring “listen again” and you will be preventing those possible frustration feelings from part of the students that did not get the right answer.

Now your turn:

What do you usually do to enhance your students’ listening skills?  How would you rate your techniques?

Let us know by dropping a few lines sharing your experience with us and our readers!

References

Source: Teaching Language in Context

Alice C. Omaggio

BIODATA:

DE LA LAMA, MARIA, holds a Master´s Degree in Applied Linguistics and Bachelor´s Degree in Theoretical Linguistics from the University of California; MBA Universidad del Pacífico. Current Director at Centro de Idiomas de la Universidad del Pacifico.