D EVELOPING LISTENING SKILLS

L ISTENING EXPERIENCES Write a list of all the things you listened to in the last 24 hours. For example, watching news on TV last night, listening to voic .

L ISTENING EXPERIENCES Decide which of your listening experiences: a) involved you speaking as well as listening, i.e., interactive, as opposed to non- interactive. b) Involved listening to a speaker who was physically present c) Involved listening for specific information d) Involved listening more for pleasure or entertainment e) Required you to listen closely and attentively f) Allowed a less attentive style of listening

L ISTENING EXPERIENCES Rate these types of listening in terms of their difficulty for a second language learner. Watching the news on TV Listening to the news on the radio. Listening to a song on the radio Talking about the news with a friend face to face. Talking about the news with a friend on the phone Listening to a recording of the news in the classroom.

C OMPREHENSION Listen to two (unrelated) texts, Text A and Text B, and answer the questions. 1. Did you understand all the words in the texts? 2. Did you understand the overall meaning of the texts?

C OMPREHENSION Listen again and answer all these questions. 1. What was different about each text the second time? Were the texts easier to understand? 2. What factors make comprehension easier or more difficult? 3. What are the implications of this activity on listening and reading in the classroom? 4. What can the teacher do to make comprehension easier?

C OMPREHENSION Comprehension depends on a number of factors and is not simply a case of ‘understanding every word’. In the first text, first version you probably understood every word but unsure whet the text was about. You lacked the background information – the top-down knowledge. In the second text, first version you were unfamiliar with some of the words. You lacked bottom-up knowledge. But you had a clear idea of the situation and so could guess some of the missing linguistic information. Comprehension results from the interaction of both top-down and bottom-up information.

C OMPREHENSION How can we help learners before they read/listen? Establish the general situation, topic, context of the text (to activate top-down knowledge) Provide help with individual words (bottom-up knowledge), i.e. pre-teach vocabulary

L ISTENING TEXTS AND TASKS Match each listening text type with an appropriate task. 1. a,c,g 2. d,g 3. f,j 4. a,b 5. a 6. a,f,h,i,k 7. a,e,g 8. a,d,e,h

A LISTENING LESSON Look at the course book extract and identify the purpose of the activities marked with an arrow. Activity 1a: (pre-listening): activating interest and background knowledge; also pre-teaching vocabulary. Activity 1b (while listening): gist listening; gaining overall familiarity with content. 2a (while listening): Detailed listening. Activity 3a: using transcript to match spoken and written texts, and resolve problems of understanding (re-listening); focus on one feature of the spoken text (in this case sentence stress: post-listening) Activity 3b: application of these features (post- listening) Activity 3c: checking (re-listening)

A LISTENING LESSON Put these stages of a listening task into a logical order. There is no single correct order all the time. But there is a sort of ‘default’ order. As you do this prepare to explain the rationale for each stage.

A LISTENING LESSON d. activating interest and background knowledge helps understanding. e. pre-teaching vocabulary helps understanding f. setting a task provides a motivation to listen; more general tasks precede more specific ones. b. more specific tasks, requiring more intensive listening, follow more extensive tasks. c. following the transcript helps solve residual problems of understanding a. the text is used as a source of language focus, but only after it has been thoroughly understood.

A LISTENING LESSON Pre-listening: d, e While-listening: f, b, c Post-listening: a

C LASSROOM APPLICATION Have a look at a listening skills lesson in your course book. Now, can you identify the reason for each stage?