Images of successful listening

Images of successful

listening

By Inga Jelkinienė

Kaunas, 2010

2010.11.12I. Jelkinienė2

Content• Listening in general• Problems for students• The importance of pre- listening• While listening activities• Follow-up tasks• Other sources of listening• Sample activities• The results of a survey in our faculty


Listening is like jogging


Remind to take small steps at the beginning

and increase difficulty


Summary of J. Scrivener’s ideas on teaching and learning listening• effort put into listening and

searching for an answer is crucial

• process vs. product• listening to a piece more than

once• the importance of task based

approach• success-oriented tasks


Listening

Tou

gh to

teach an

d

learn

Practice often

Frustrating

for students

No rules

A receptive skill

Practice

for s

hort perio

ds


Problems for students

• Unfamiliar context. • Unknown vocabulary.• Lack of time to process information,

lack of concentration and anxiety about longer texts.

• Too fast. Can’t distinguish separate words.

• Can’t follow the rhythm. Not able to recognise sense groups, inferred message, mood or intonation.

• Difficult accents.• Background noises.


The importance of pre-listening• prepare students for listening • facilitate the listening process• accelerate the acquiring of the

skill • help to to concentrate on

listening if you have little interest in a topic or situation


Types of pre-listening tasks • Setting the context • Generating interest • Acquiring knowledge• Activating vocabulary /

language • Predicting content• Checking / understanding the

listening tasks


Pre- listening tasks in detail• Context

• Activating vocabulary

• Activating the knowledge

• Interest

• Who the speakers are? Where is the place?

• Introduce unknown words, some activities

• Help the unknown with spider graphs or brainstorm

• Visuals • A story from

teacher’s experience


Visuals in detail

• People remember more if their experience is multi-sensory

• More learning styles can benefit


The usage of visuals aimed

at more learning styles

for instance Fleming’s VAK (VARK) model

50-85% for visual learners


It is also claimed that audio visuals account for 2o-30 %


Visuals in detail

• Pictures• Posters• Objects• Flashcards• Drawings on the board


Visuals in detail•Maps


Visuals in detail

• Line graphs • Bar charts• Pie charts• Numbers


and power point presentations


Activating current knowledge

• what do you know about…?• have the students brainstorm

vocabulary related to the article's topic with spider graphs

• true or false statements about any topic.


Activating vocabulary

It is important to activate vocabulary by:

• Matching words to definitions • Synonym matching• Fill-in-the-blank• Vocabulary speculation• Vocabulary selection/sort


While listening activities

…done during or immediately after the time they are listening

• allow them to read through it before listening;• keep writing to a minimum during listening; • from global to details;• use questions to focus students' attention;• use predicting to encourage students; • give immediate feedback whenever possible.


Follow-up tasks

1. Give meaning to the whole listening

2. Students use new knowledge or vocabulary in a less controlled way. Examples:

• Role Play • Discussion: “Have you ever experienced such a

situation?”

• Debate: "Do you agree/disagree?"


Feedback and Correction

The warm up and the feedback and correction stages are the bookends of an effective lesson!

The following can be covered:• Correction• Review • Feedback and Motivation


Are there any other sources

for listening?


Other ways to encourage listeningPodcasts

Podcasts help with the most up-to- date listening:

• released episodically• can be downloaded easily for

free• can be transferred into a

portable device


Interesting and useful material online6 Minute English

Learn and practise useful English language for everyday situations with the BBC. Your weekly instruction manual for saying or doing something in English is published every Friday. Each programme is six minutes long and contains examples and explanations to help you improve your knowledge of the English language across a wide range of topics. Updated: weekly Subscribe to this podcast and automatically receive the latest episodes. http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/6min


The example of a podcast

• Media Blackout: 5 November 2010• Fri, 5 Nov 10• Duration:

7 mins• Dan and Alice talk about an experiment

at Bournemouth University in England to see how students react if they don't use any media for 24 hours. The people who volunteered were asked to unplug their media devices, such as laptops, phones and TVs for a full day.

Download 3MB (right click and save target as)


Other ways to encourage listeningVideos

• beneficial • communicate cultural and 'non verbal'

aspects Activities:• turning off sound and asking

students to create the dialogue from a scene

• getting one part of the class to watch and describe to the others then exchange

• use a freeze frame technique – for prediction


Other ways to encourage listeningSongs

English songs can be used for a wide variety of ESL learning and teaching activities:

• Great for teaching listening (fill in the blanks etc.)

• Start a discussion• Teach grammar• Compare accents• Teach new vocabulary


Sample activities for attentive listening• Listening to a personal teacher’s

story with visuals- pictures or slides• Listening to a story – students ask

questions to the story • Chain Gang Stories -One student

begins with any portion of a sentence, or full sentence. The next student repeats the prior sentence and adds to it

• Dual dictation• Listen for lies


Sample listening activity- what can a teacher make of it?An example how a teacher can

employ various pre-listening and post listening activities

Advertising Adventure; • Topic: health/appearance, • Level: pre-interemediate


Advertising Adventure –Pre-Listening • Show visuals: photos of healthy-

looking people; before-and-after photos. Before-and-after photos showing a hippopotamus and a spider. Photos of people doing exercise.


Advertising Adventure –Pre-Listening

A teacher could ask questions while showing pictures:

• Have you seen photos of before and after? How do you feel about them? Do you believe all of the adds like that? What adjectives can we use for a hippo or a spider? Which way to loose weight is more effective and longer lasting?



Adjectives can be presented in a spidergraph- brainstormed together with the students:


Read over the ideas for adverts for a slimming product. Which one do you think is the best? Why? Which one is the most ridiculous?

Be healthier and more confident with

with Adios slimming!!! Why are you still overweight?


Fat to Fit with PHEN 35Get thin this summer


Advertising AdventureWhile- listening

Listening I• You are going to listen to two people discussing adverts for

a slimming product Slimmer You. Listen once and answer this question: Which idea do they mention?

• Listening II• Complete the sentences/questions with the words from

listening. Then, listen again to check your answers.• 1. …the diet drink that comes in fabulous flavours.• 2. Market research shows that customers like photos of …• 3. So, is that why your “before”........... is of a

hippopotamus?• 4. Look, Brian, you cannot use a photograph of a .......• 5. Well, it’s a South American giant bird-eating ...... to be

precise.• 6. If we did that, we’d get thousands of .........


Advertising AdventureFollow- upDiscussion• Have you seen any slimming ads

recently? What images did they use?

• What’s the funniest ad you’ve ever seen? Why was it funny?

• If you had to create an ad for a slimming product, what images would it have?


A short survey on listening


Basic level students are positive about listening

Do you like listening?read tasks

very well 28,5

no; 4,8

when I'm good; 29,2

yes; 46,3


Basic level students usually read questions

Pre-listening

read tasks

very well 28,5

look at pictures;

19,5

read question

s; 42,8

nothing; 9,5


They are going to practice mostly in class and at home

Where are you going to practice listening?

everything; 4,8

read tasks very well

28,5

in class/at home;

60,9

in my car; 24,3

in class; 7,3


The teacher may ask a question after the first listening

The teacher's own questions after the 1st listening?

no; 38

yes, sometimes

; 59


Teachers usually do not use visuals

Visuals

no; 60

yes, sometimes

; 40


Basic level students would like them to be used

Visuals more often

no; 23,8

yes; 76,1


It is easier for them to watch videos and to listen

Is it easier to listen while watching?

no; 15

yes; 85


The results of a short survey in our faculty

A survey among basic and the second level students.There are some general trends obvious:

BASIC LEVEL:• The teacher most likely will repeat the item for

students;• Ss like listening and especially when they are good at

it;• Ss improve their listening skills after listening in

class/at home and on the Internet- never in a car;• teachers usually ask questions after the first listening

and only sometimes give feedback; sometimes use visuals

• they watch videos and they like listening while watching them.

• fill- ins and questions are the most difficult tasks for them


The results of a short survey in our faculty

THE SECOND LEVEL:No great differences could be noticed

between basic and second level.• a few more people do not like listening

tasks;• fewer people will rely on the Internet for

further practice • easier to listen and write at the same

time• teachers do not often use visuals• they less often watch videos • filling- in exercises seem to be the most

difficult for them.


To sum up• creating an

environment, which encourages listening;

• positive interaction, actively listening to all students and responding in an open and appropriate manner;

• various possibilities to listen.

Any

questions?

Education

Images of successful listening