Teachers need to pay more attention to listening(19349)-英语教育-(6)-21英语网

本文作者： ESL MAGAZINE

　　FOR too long a time now, listening has been given a secondary position in English language teaching in the classroom. It is very strange that listening has not received greater attention in the past since it is the language skill most often used in everyday life. More than 40 per cent of our daily communication time is spent on listening.

　　Lindsay Miller, associate professor of language education at City University of Hong Kong, has suggestions on how listening can be improved with authentic materials.

　　The question of how to help develop effective listening skills has to do with the type of materials teachers introduce learners to. The aim of all listening lessons should be to give the learner a greater degree of independence when listening to the foreign language in a real world context. That means using authentic texts. An authentic text is any spoken text that has not been specially prepared for language learners. And it is often delivered via technology like radio, television, video, or the Internet.

　　Using real-time radio in class is one of the more easily accessible forms of authentic listening practice. The airwaves are filled with programmes 24 hours a day. And the low cost of radio means that most language teachers can get a radio and take it to class. Meanwhile, many non-English speaking countries also broadcast some programmes in English, or they may have stations dedicated to English programming. To apply the use of radio programs to the classroom, a teacher needs to select a programme at a suitable time and has to decide on some global listening tasks for the learners.

　　Using television or videos in the classroom gives learners access to more information when they listen. That is, the learners can now see what is happening as well as listen to the text. Non-verbal behaviour, or paralinguistic features of the spoken text, are available to the learners. That means they can develop their listening skills in a richer language context. Many language learners watch movies outside of class, but few consider this an opportunity to develop their listening skills. Teachers in the classroom can, however, make learners more sensitive to ways they can make use of movies to help them develop their second language listening skills.

　　There has been a rapid increase in the development of Internet facilities. Teachers can now direct learners to a site on the Internet where they can practice their listening ? as long as they have access to the computer hardware. When they run into problems, the learners can go online for help. There are, for example, glossaries and online scripts. In addition, many younger learners wish to learn or use their computer skills nowadays. So, the prospect of developing computer skills along with developing their language may seem attractive to these learners.

　　There is an increased awareness of the need to help second-language learners develop effective listening skills. With the greater availability of technology these days, teachers can explore more creative ways to teach listening, both in and outside the classroom, using authentic materials. Once they begin to explore the possibilities, which have been described here, they can provide a richer language learning experience for learners.