When listening, it is also possible to get the ‘whole picture’ but with one crucial difference: information comes in a sequence. From that height, it is possible to see what the entire area is like, how densely populated it is, the kind of houses in each area. Imagine you are a superhero flying in the sky. If you are taking a listening test, skim through the questions first and try to predict what kind of information you need to listen out for. A question beginning 'How many.?', for example, will probably require you to listen for a specific number or quantity of something. Try to predict what is going to happen or what the speaker might say next. Watch or listen to a recorded TV programme or clip from YouTube. Moreover, when we predict the topic of a talk or a conversation, all the related vocabulary stored in our brains is 'activated' to help us better understand what we're listening to. Our knowledge of the world helps us anticipate the kind of information we are likely to hear. You'll probably hear the use of the future tense: 'It'll be a cold start to the day' 'there'll be showers in the afternoon', etc.ĭepending on the context – a news report, a university lecture, an exchange in a supermarket – you can often predict the kind of words and style of language the speaker will use. You can expect to hear words like 'sunny', 'windy' and 'overcast'. What do you imagine he is about to tell you? Most likely, this is going to be a weather forecast. You see a man in a suit standing in front of a large map with the symbols of a sun, clouds and thunder. While the challenges posed by the speaker or the situation may be out of the listener’s hands, there are a few skills or 'strategies' that English learners can use to help them along. The speaker, the situation and the listener can all be the cause of these difficulties.Ĭontributing factors include the speaker talking quickly, background noise, a lack of visual clues (such as on the telephone), the listener’s limited vocabulary, a lack of knowledge of the topic, and an inability to distinguish individual sounds. There are many difficulties an individual may face in understanding a talk, lecture or conversation in a second language (and sometimes even in their first language). Listening challenges for English language learners This is all the more remarkable as learners often say that listening is the most challenging of all the skills in English. Yet, for all its importance, students (and even teachers) often fail to give listening the attention it needs. This is significantly more than speaking, which accounts for 30 per cent, and reading and writing, which make up 16 per cent and nine per cent respectively. It should not be difficult to realise the importance of listening when we consider that it occupies about 45 per cent of the time adults spend in communication. How can learners improve their listening comprehension? Teacher Raphael Ahmed shares some useful strategies in one of our top five articles of all time, illustrated by artist Jamie Johnson.
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