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Listening for specific informationA Guide to teaching English
5.3 Listening for specific information
This is where we listen to specific information and disregard the rest. For example,
recently I was very interested in Paul McCartney’s divorce. When the news was on the
television, it was generally running as background noise. As soon as McCartney’s
name was mentioned, I stopped whatever I was doing and listened to the news. I was
listening to specific information.
5.4 Listening for detailed information
This is the type of listening you engage in when listening to announcements in a
railway station or when listening to directions in a street. You are listening intensively in
order to understand all information given.
5.5 Predicting
When we are listening in our mother tongue, we are constantly predicting what is going
to come next. This action of predicting helps us understand the thread of the
discourse. Start encouraging your students to predict; you can even do this at low
levels.
For example, if you’re about to listen to a recording of Richard Branson talking about
his life, before listening you can ask students what things they think he’ll mention.
Possibilities include: sports, ballooning, Virgin, etc. Students can listen to check
whether their predictions are correct.
You can also do a prediction exercise during the listening task. You can stop a
recording at appropriate points and ask your students what they think will come next,
e.g. when listening to a song with a simple rhyme, stop and ask students to guess the
final word in the sentence that completes the rhyme. When listening to instructions for
a recipe, the final phrase might be “serve up and enjoy!” Stop the recording before the
phrase and ask students what they think will be said.
Your students will need practice in all of the above sub-skills if they are to become truly
proficient. Extensive listening is more difficult to organise in class and is not the best
use of time. You can however, encourage your students to do this outside the
classroom.
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Copyright © Lucy Pollard 2008 All Rights Reserved
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