How to Teach Listening

• The importance of the listening skill has gained more importance.

WHY?
• As Rost (2005: 503) confirms,

‘In L2 development, listening constitutes not only a skill area in

performance, but also a primary means of acquiring a second
language.’
Reasons for Listening
• Listening to the radio: news, a play, Parliament, a comedy programme (sometimes on a car radio).
• Conversations with neighbours, colleagues, friends.
• Answering the telephone at home and at work.
• Overhearing other people talking to each other: on a bus, in the office.
• Attending a lecture.
• Listening to arrival and departure announcements at the railway station.
• Watching TV.
• Listening to a list of names being read out at a prize-giving.
• While working in the library, trying not to listen to other people talking.
Factors Affecting Listening
Comprehension
• there is great range and variety in the type of ‘input’ – in length or topic
• in some situations we are listeners only, in others our listening skills form
just a part of a whole interaction, and an ability to respond appropriately
is equally important.
• there are different purposes involved (to get information, to socialize, to
be entertained and so on), so the degree of attention given and possibly
the strategies used will differ.
• in some cases, interference or background noise may affect our ability to
process what is being said.
• the people involved in the listening context
• Is listening an active or a passive skill?

Listening skills is an active skill

• Decoding
• Comprehension
• Interpretation
Listening Skill Exercises in the
Coursebooks
• Predicting What People Will Say

• Listening for Specific Information

• Fill In the Gaps with the Missing Words

• Listening for Gist

• Listen and Write the Information in the Chart

Parts of Listening Comprehension
• Processing sound
• Processing meaning
• Using knowledge and context
Parts of Listening Comprehension
• Segment the stream of sound and recognize word boundaries.
• Recognize contracted forms.
• Recognize the vocabulary being used.
• Recognize sentence and clause boundaries in speech.
• Recognize stress patterns and speech rhythm.
• Recognize stress on longer words, and the effect on the rest of the word.
• Recognize the significance of language-related (‘paralinguistic’) features,
most obviously intonation.
• Recognize changes in pitch, tone and speed of delivery.
Processing Meaning
• What seems to emerge is that the linguistic codes are processed to

create somekind of mental representation in our minds as we

construct meaning.
Processing Sound Processing Meaning
Phonological Semantic
Lower-order/automatic skills Higher-order skills of organizing

and interpreting
Recognition of sounds, word Comprehension
Localized: the immediate text Global: the meaning of the whole
Decoding what was said Reconstruction after processing meaning
Perception Cognition
• White (1998: 8–9) lists under the following headings all the subskills that go
to make up the overall skill of listening,
• perception skills
• language skills
• knowledge of the world
• dealing with information
• interacting with a speaker

‘good listeners need to be able to use a combination of sub-skills

simultaneously when processing spoken language: the skill they will need at
any particular moment will depend on the kind of text they are listening to,
and their reasons for listening to it’.
• We sometimes have an idea of what we are going to
hear.
• We listen for a variety of reasons.
• Important information-carrying words are normally
pronounced with more stress.
• In face-to-face interaction, gestures and expression are
important, as well as the actual words used.
• Natural speech is characterized by hesitation,
repetition, rephrasing and self-correction.
Listening Comprehension: Teaching
and Learning
• Learners are at various stages of proficiency, and they differ across a
range of characteristics – age, interests, learning styles, aptitude,
motivation and so on.
• The only claim that can be made is that learners, by definition, are not
fully competent listeners in the target language.
Learners
1. The learner–listener cannot control speed of delivery.
2. He/she cannot always get things repeated.
3. He/she has a limited vocabulary.
4. He/she may fail to recognize ‘signals’.
5. He/she may lack contextual knowledge.
6. It can be difficult to concentrate in a foreign language.
7. The learner may have established certain learning habits, such as a
wish to understand every word.
Questions for Classroom Practices
• What is a suitable balance for the classroom between ‘tasks’ (the skill) and
‘text’ (the language material)?
• How closely should the classroom attempt to replicate authentic language
and authentic listening tasks?
• To what extent should spoken material be modified for presentation in the
classroom?
• Is it more appropriate to grade tasks?
• What resources do we need to teach listening comprehension effectively?
• We can think of the listener’s role on a scale of decreasing involvement
from participant to addressee to overhearer
Materials for Listening
Comprehension
Putting
A pictures in a correct
short reading passagesequence
on a similar topic
• Pre-listening activities Following directions on a map
Predicting content from the title
Checking off items in a photograph
• Listening activities Commenting
Completing on a picture
a grid, timetable or photograph
or chart of inform
Using notes
Answering made whileorlistening
true/false
Reading through to writequestions
multiple-choice
comprehension a summary
questionsin advance
Predicting what comes next (preceded by a pause)
• Post-listening activities Reading a related
Working text
out your own opinion on a topic
Constructing a coherent set of notes
Doing a role play
Inferring opinions across a whole text
Writing
Filling on the
gaps same
with theme
missing words
Identifying
Studying newnumbers and letters
grammatical structures
Picking out particular facts
Practising pronunciation
Recognizing exactly what someone said