The Internet TESLJournal
ESL Listening Comprehension: Practical Guidelines for
Teachers
Justine Ross
Kyoto Sangyo University (Kyoto, Japan)
saritojustine [at] hotmail.com
Introduction
Being able to listen well is an important part of communication for
everyone. For our students, guided practice by a teacher is one of the
best ways to improve this skill. A student with good listening
comprehension skills will be able to participate more effectively in
communicative situations. What follows is an exploration of areas that
language teachers may find useful in their classroom and when preparing
listening materials.
Teaching the skill of listening cannot be emphasized enough in a
communicative classroom. For second language learners, developing the
skill of listening comprehension is extremely important. Students with
good listening comprehension skills are better able to participate
effectively in class (Brown, 2001).
The Purpose Should Be Made Clear to the Students
When the learning objective of a language class is explained to
students, they can better focus on specific vocabulary acquisition,
grammar practice, listening for different purposes, and so on. This
clear explanation by the teacher of a lesson's pedagogic goals will
help learners to further develop specific objectives in a shorter
amount of time. For instance, by informing students that the lesson
will be about giving directions, they can consciously focus on
remembering the vocabulary used in that activity.
Progression of Listening Comprehension Activities
This progression of activities allows the learner to use what they
know, to go from being a passive learner, to an active learner.
- warm-up activity
- listening comprehension activity
- controlled practice
- open-ended listening/speaking activity
Example Lesson
If the objective of your class is to understand speech at different
rates of delivery and the topic is daily life, here are some ideas for
the suggested progression of learning activities.
- Warm-up Activity:
Ask students, "What do you do every day?"
- Listening Comprehension Activity:
The teacher could follow with a listening comprehension activity, such
as two people having a conversation about their daily life. Students
must answer true or false questions based on the previous listening
activity.
- Controlled Practice:
Following this, an example of a controlled practice activity could be a
drill activity that models the same structure or vocabulary.
- Open-ended Listening/Speaking
Activity: After this, an open-ended activity could follow
that allows students to have the freedom to practice listening
comprehension and speaking, such as interviewing other members in the
class about their daily life and asking for further information. This
is an example of activities that build on each other and share the same
objective. Communication and listening comprehension should begin with
what students already know so that they can build on their existing
knowledge and skills with activities designed on the same principle.
Design and Layout Considerations
A handout that is filled with too many activities may contribute to the
learner feeling overwhelmed and unable to focus on the particular
purpose of a listening activity. In addition, a worksheet that does not
show examples of the response expected by the question may also lead to
the student feeling confused and frustrated. This may also result in an
inaccurate indication of the level of a learner’s listening
comprehension skills as a consequence of their not being able to
understand the worksheet, rather than because of the listening activity
itself.
Teaching Methodology Considerations
If a teacher always uses the same teaching methodology, they may become
predictable and, perhaps, less interesting for their students. It is
important to vary techniques in order to challenge students. A
variation on the "fill in the missing word listening activity" could be
to use the same listening materials, but to set a pair work activity
where student A and student B have the same worksheet where some
information items are missing. The students must ask each other for the
missing words in a song. That way, the students have to practice
effective communication by accurately forming the correct question
necessary to find out the missing word from their partner. To confirm
that their answer is correct, the students then listen to the song.
Long Listening Activities
Another technique that can be used in a long listening activity is to
assign students different comprehension questions. After listening to
the activity and taking notes to answer questions, students then swap
information to complete the "whole class chart," correlating what each
student has heard to arrive at the big picture. If there are any
questions that remain unanswered during the first or second hearing,
and following the information swap activity, the whole class can listen
to the tape again. The students will then try to find the answer to the
questions that have not been previously understood, rather than the
teacher providing the answers straight away. These techniques involve
group work and problem solving. They also instigate further
communication and facilitate listening comprehension development.
The Use of Authentic Listening Materials
Linguists like Porter & Porter (1987), Brown (2001), and Mangubhai
(2002) recommend the use of authentic text to help students further
develop their communicative skills. The use of authentic listening
materials is an important factor to take into consideration when
designing listening comprehension materials. By using such listening
materials, the learner is given the chance to develop the skills needed
to comprehend and to use language that is commonly found in real
situations.
With the use of authentic listening materials, students learn to
comprehend double meanings, predict meaning, make allowances for
performance errors committed by other speakers, deal with
interruptions, and so on. It is important, therefore, to take the
opportunity wherever possible to expose students to examples of real
language usage to help them become more communicatively competent.
The use of authentic materials stimulates and motivates learners to
comprehend the content of an oral text because the practical benefits
of understanding such authentic language material are obvious. Some
examples of authentic listening materials are listening to a telephone
message for the purpose of understanding a cancelled appointment, or
listening to songs to learn more about well-known bands that sing in
English. Such material is relevant to the students' life and areas of
personal interest. By using authentic listening materials, students are
motivated to improve their level of comprehension as they feel that
they can achieve a level of proficiency that has meaning and adds value
to their life when speaking English as a second language.
Conclusion
It is important to maintain an interactive and communicative approach
for teaching English as a Foreign or Second Language. However, it is
also important to vary the students' learning focus by concentrating on
the skills needed to become proficient in a second language. Listening
comprehension is such a required skill.
When designing lessons and teaching materials to further develop
listening comprehension skills, students need to be motivated and stay
motivated. This is best accomplished by determining the suitability of
the listening materials, the techniques used in classroom teaching, and
the use of authentic materials.
References
- Brown, D. (2001). Teaching by principle–an interactive approach
to language pedagogy. Addison Wesley Longman: New York.
- Mangubhai, F. (2002). Methodology in teaching a second
language–study book. University of Southern Queensland: Toowoomba.
- Porter, D. & Roberts, J. (1987). Authentic listening
activities In Long, H. &
- Richards, J. (Eds.) Methodology in TESOL–A book of readings.
Newbury House: New York. (pp.177-190)
The Internet TESL Journal, Vol. XII, No. 2, February 2006
http://iteslj.org/
http://iteslj.org/Techniques/Ross-ListeningComprehension.html