Download CHAPTER 11(part2)

Listening strategies
Learning strategies: Techniques, approaches, or deliberate
actions that students take in order to facilitate the learning
and recall of both linguistic and content area information
People are usually not conscious of how they listen in their
first language unless they encounter difficulty.
What do second or foreign language learners need to
do when they are listening???
They need to make conscious use of the strategies
they use unconsciously in their first language.
Learning strategies are usually divided into metacognitive,
cognitive, and social/affective
Meta cognitive strategy: It is developing a conscious
awareness of the strategies we find ourselves using as we
listen.
Cognitive listening strategy: it would be listening to the way
people address each other (Darling or Dr Rose or Jamie)as a
clue to the interpersonal relationship between them.
Social/affective strategy: asking for assistance from the
interlocutor.
How do skillful listeners use them???
Skillful listeners use them in combination, varying
their use according to the needs of the specific
situation.
How do we gain insights into listening?
Settings
Methods
WHERE
HOW
Settings
1. Experiments
2. Pedagogic Tasks
3. Test Performances
4. real life communication
Experiments
SETTING
Experimental investigation has concentrated on
aspects such the effects of prosodic patterns or
speech recognition. We know that the characteristic
patterning of speech in our L1 provides a metrical
template that influences the way we process L2
speech.
These unconscious L1 metrical habits caused
listeners problems up to relatively advanced levels of
L2 proficiency.
Pedagogic Tasks
SETTING
The literature on L2 listening has tended to focus on
pedagogic settings, such as the lecture theatre.
Test Performances
Researchers with access to candidates’
performances in listening in world-wide tests,
such as IELTS and TOEFL, have been able to
investigate listening skills on a very large scale.
Real life communication
An important source of insight into listening is
our own first-hand experience of communicative
encounters and the listening problems to which
they give rise.
Methods
1. Observation
2. Introspection
3. Retrospection
Observation

METHODS
Observation takes many forms, from informal
noticing of real life examples of
misunderstandings to experiments designed to
create ambiguities and referential conflicts.
Introspection:(think aloud protocol)
It is Comments by the listener at, or immediately
after, the time of listening
Introspection studies are open to three main criticisms:
First: the demands of online reporting may lead listeners to listen differently
from normal.
Second: the data obtained can be greatly influenced by the listeners’ skill in
verbalizing mental process, especially if the self- reporting is done in the L2
Third: listeners’ reports may reflect prior knowledge, rather their listening.
These last two problems can be reduced by allowing subjects to report in L1
OR by selecting unfamiliar topics.
Retrospection
The listener is asked to recall the experience of
comprehending some time later, usually
prompted by memory support such as reviewing
a recording of the original conversation.
Observation, introspection and retrospection need not be
mutually exclusive. Applying them in judicious combination is
probably the best approach to finding out how individuals
listen and how they deal with comprehension problems.
From theory to practice: issue in teaching L2 listening
The point of contact between theory and application
is to be found in the work on learning strategies.
Diagnostic approach: in which a listening lesson
would involve pre-listening ,listening and then an
extended post-listening session’ in which gaps in the
learners’ listening skills could be examined and
redressed through short micro listening exercises’
Difficulty factors in listening
Five characteristics that affect listening:
Text characteristics
 Interlocutor characteristics
 Task characteristics
 Listener characteristics
 Process characteristics

Listening text will be easier if:






There are few speakers and objects
The speakers and objects are distinct and different
from one another
The spatial relations are clear
The order of telling the events matches the order in
which the event occurred.
The inferences called for are those that one would
have predicted.
The content of the text fix with what the listener
already knows.
Teaching versus testing of listening
Weakness
1. The students were seldom given any pre-listening
activities to activate their schematic knowledge
2. The students were rarely told what sort of
questions they would be asked after listening
3. The students were expected to listen to all texts in
the same way
4. The listening material was usually audiotaped,
depriving the learners of any visual clues
Authenticity of text and task
Authenticity of text
Authentic: not designed or recorded for nonnative speakers or for
language learning purposes.
Is it always possible to use only authentic materials?
No
Why?
For example: if we are teaching students to deduce interpersonal
relations between speakers by listening for the ways in which they
address each other, it is unlikely that we will find in ‘naturally occurring’
texts sufficient occurrences of the use of names ,nick names and titles
to provide adequate practice.
Authenticity of Task
Ever since the advent of communicative
language teaching (CLT), efforts have been
made by materials developers and teachers to
make learning tasks as realistic as possible.

Example: information gap
Strategy instruction
It is at the root of teaching learners how to tackle a listening text. It involves showing
learners clues as to how to get at meaning when there are gaps in their competence
making this difficult.
SIMT
Mendelsohn (1994), as part of his strategy base approach ,offers examples of strategies to
determine setting (S) ,interpersonal relationships(I),mood(M) and topic(T)
S: WHERE WHEN
I: WHO
M: HOW
T: WHAT WHY
EXAMPLE:
A: Jane, have you met the new office secretary?
B: No, not yet. Why?
A: She’s really nice. Did you know that she’s pregnant?
Skills training
A certain level of linguistic proficiency is required
in order to handle listening comprehension.
Some of the features that need to be practiced are:
 Discriminating between similar sounds
 Coping with and processing ’fast speech’
 Processing stress and intonational differences
 Processing the meaning of different discourse markers
 Understanding communicative functions and the nonone-to-one equivalence between form and functions
Title