5 Useful strategies for improving your students' listening skill

Listening strategies to improve your listening skill

1      1) Reading before listening

It is possible that the listening be part of a test in which you must complete a text, so it is important that you make a previous reading, as this will give you a general overview on the subject and will help you predict the missing words or phrases.

 How to apply it?

To help students using this strategy, the teacher should give them the worksheets of the listening exercise and give them a few minutes, so that they can read at least twice and become familiar with the information they need to complete.

2      2) Predicting content

A good strategy that is very useful to obtain better results in listening, is the ability to understand what is said even if you have not understood all the words you have heard.

For example, to know if an opinion is positive or negative, we must pay attention to the use of intonation or physical expressions made by the speaker.

How to apply it?

Students will first see a video without sound in which they will be able to see two people talking. In this way, students will be able to pay special attention to the body expressions made by the speakers. Then the teacher plays the same video a second time, but this time the video will have sound. In this way, the students will be able to interpret and deduce if the answers are positive or negative according to the expressions observed and the intonation used by the speakers.

3       3)Take notes

It is important that the teacher teaches strategies like this to his students. Since in some tests, especially the more advanced ones, it is not allowed to see the text until after listening to the audio.

How to apply it?

The teacher should previously warn students to take out a sheet of paper and a pen to take notes. When everyone is ready, the first audio or video is played. Then, students should listen carefully and write down the key words or the main ideas.

4       4) Understandig different accents

Beyond American, British or Australian English. We must be prepared to listen and understand the English language from different accents of non-native people such as French, Japanese, or Germans. Many students have serious problems to understand the different accents and try to concentrate only on one. But, in the long run it can be harmful because, in real life we can run into different accents.

How to apply it?

To help students develop this ability, the teacher should present a listening activity with several audios presenting the same content but with different accents. To make this more difficult the audios should first be presented with the less common accents and finally the audio with the accent that is frequently heard by the group of students will be played.

5      5)Take it easy

Listening is one of the most feared tests by learners of a second language. Especially when it comes to an examination test and as in everything else, nerves do not help at all when it comes to listening.

This behavior could be reflected when the speaker has to communicate with native speakers, therefore it is necessary that the teacher accustom the students to feel relaxed and lose the fear of a situation of these.

How to apply it?

A simple way to help students relax is to take some time before the listening activity to present a simple song that even students will be able to sing and tune their ears. This will also help them tune their ears for the lesson.

Biography:

Cancialosi, C. (November 6^th, 2018) The critical role of culture in technology transformation. Forbes. Retrived from https://www.forbes.com/sites/chriscancialosi/2018/11/06/the-critical-role-of-culture-in-technology-transformation/#178bdeb33807

Pedró, F. (2015) Tips to improve your listening in English. Retrived from https://www.wallstreetenglish.com.ar/blog/tips-para-mejorar-tu-listening-en-ingles