Chapter 1 Listening
Listening in the Classroom
The baby was born a short time ago. He senses the love of his mother and recognizes her voice. He is bombarded with many different types of sounds, many of which he doesn't understand. In time, he begins to make distinctions between the sounds. Over the first few months of his life, his eyes begin to focus; he recognizes those closest to him. He slowly comes to understand the words from his mother and father and other close family members.
Listening in a second language
When listening in English for the first time, many adult second language learners have great difficulty distinguishing one word from the next. Like the infant in the example, they eventually are able to differentiate individual words and phrases. This understanding develops over time with regular exposure to the language.
Unlike the infant, though, adults learning a second language have certain advantages. They have developed cognitive skills that allow them to reason and think about things they see and hear. Adult learners also have life experiences and background knowledge (or schema) which aid them in understanding a given message.
In other words, when we listen to something being said, we're not just hearing the words. We bring to the experience certain knowledge we have about the topic being discussed. We also make inferences based on body language, facial expressions, and the context in which the exchange is occurring. This, in turn, influences how we understand what the speaker is saying.
Authenticity
Much has been written about authentic listening tasks in the ESL/EFL classroom. The fact is that only limited authentic practice can be accomplished in the classroom. Authentic listening includes listening to speech with natural repetition, unplanned background noises, starts and stops, incomplete sentences, fast as well as slow speech in the same utterances, possibly ungrammatical phrases, etc.
Many textbooks don't address authenticity. Most of the time, listenings prepared especially for ESL/EFL students feature individuals who enunciate every word clearly and speak in complete sentences, often with no background noise present. The pace is sometimes slow, but always controlled. There are no natural repetitions, nor stops and starts as is common in everyday speech.
An instructor can bring "real" listening to class by recording a television show or news broadcast. This authentic experience is very useful if presented in a purposeful way.
The instructor should also conduct the class in English and not in another language, even in EFL classes. With few exceptions, the language spoken should be at a natural pace and not adjusted for student understanding. Again, it is essential to do this in order to provide authentic listening.
It's also important to remember that there are various types of listening, all of which cannot be fully addressed in the classroom: listening for academic purposes, for enjoyment, or for social interaction. Social interaction might be formal or informal or a combination of the two. Interaction might be to persuade, complain, infer, etc. The list goes on and on.
Listening strategies
There are only limited opportunities to engage in authentic listening in the classroom. In addition, instructors can only give a few examples of the many different types of listening there are. So what can be done to help students become better and more confident listeners in English? The answer is to teach listening strategies.
Listening strategies provide learners with tools they can use to listen and understand spoken discourse in a variety of contexts. Every listening activity in class should help learners develop listening strategies and should be accompanied by a task.
Ultimately, all listening activities, whatever their purpose, should include certain elements to ensure student success.
Listening activities should include the following:
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- a context (The lesson plan will designate this.)
- a clear purpose (Why listen? Does it address the lesson objective?)
- a listening strategy
- a pre-listening task (What preparation do students need to accomplish the task?)
- a while-listening task
- a post-listening task (How successful were students and did they learn?)
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In the chapters that follow, we'll examine different listening strategies and will look at tasks and activities that you can use to help your learners become more confident listeners in English.
Source: http://eltmedia.thomsonlearning.com
