Task types and text types to accompany different kinds of listening

Activity 6

Look at the bank of text types for listening and choose the most relevant to develop each of the four kinds of listening. Discuss and complete the table below.

Text types: announcements, advertisements, instructions, weather forecast, songs, news, documentaries, radio plays, TV / video films, talk shows, cartoons, conversations, interviews, speeches, lectures.

Listening for gist	Listening for specific information	Listening for details	Critical listening

Activity 7

What should we do with these texts to improve the basic listening skills? Tasks for teaching listening - what are they?

Divide the listening tasks into four groups according to the kind of listening the task is designed to develop.

Listening for gist	Listening for specific information	Listening for details	Critical listening

Which tasks are more appropriate for testing students' ability to understand oral discourse in a foreign language and which are more effective for improving it?

Activity 8

The analysis of sample tasks

a) You are going to listen to three people talking about their holiday plans. Listen to the discussion once and decide which of the three types of holiday in the photographs above each of the speakers want.

Alistair:__________

Barbara:_________

Mike:____________

b) Listen again and make notes on where these people are going to go, and what they are going to do there.

Name	Where?	How to spend their time?
Alistair
Barbara
Mike

c) Can you remember exactly how the people talked about their future plans? Try to complete the sentences below.

Alistair: ____________________at eight tomorrow morning.

Barbara: ___________to Tenerife ____________to Greece.

Mike: ________________________________ in the car.

Now listen again to check your answers.

(based on the materials from “Soundings” // Jan Bell)

Activity 9

Jigsaw listening

A Day in the Life of …

Participants work in three groups (A, B, C) to solve a communicative task – to define the job each speaker has.

(based on the materials from “Soundings” // Jan Bell)

Name	hours	duties	advantages	disadvantages	job
Ivy
Heather
Stephen

1) Listen to a person describing his / her job. As you listen, fill in the information about the person in your part of the box. Compare your notes within your group.

2) Form new groups. Each group must contain at least one member of group "A", "B " and "C". Exchange the information and fill in the whole box.

3) Return to your initial group, share the information and guess about the job of each speaker.

4) Listen to the whole passage together to check your answers.

Listening tasks examples

- You will hear a man talking about his first visit to Italy. As you listen, decide which of the statements are true (T)and which are false (F). Put a tick in the appropriate box. You will hear this story twice.

T/ F

1. The storyteller was complaining about a bad luck time that he had in Italy.

2 .He had lost his camera at the very first day of his stay.

3. The frequent breaking down of his car caused him little surprise.

4. His car had been repaired at the garage four times for that period in Italy.

- You will hear a woman telling a story about the period of bad luck in her life. You will hear the story in five sections. Each time the tape stops, try to guess what will happen next by completing the sentences.

Section 2 It was a great surprise for me that my car …

Section 3 When at last I took it from the garage, it appeared to be …

Section 4 Do you remember my lovely necklace? It …

Section 5 The last straw was …

- Look at the key words from the text you are going to listen to. Predict what the text might be about.

destruction chaos

rescue nature

collapse unpredictable

Think of at least three questions the answers to which you would like to get from the text.

- On the tape, which you have just listened to, two young people were discussing their holidays. In groups of three, plan the holiday of a lifetime for you. Write down the necessary details under the following headings:

Destination______________

Way of travelling__________

Accommodation__________

Duration of your stay______

Activities on holiday______

Tell the rest of the class what you have planned.

Aims for the 2^nd series of lessons:

· to emphasize stages of a listening lesson;

· to consider different types of listening materials;

· to discuss some criteria for choosing the text;

· to assess the difficulty of listening passages;

· to discuss the guidelines for teaching listening.

1. Stages of a listening / reading lesson

Every listening/reading task will achieve its purpose if it is deliberately integrated into a carefully planned route-map of a listening/reading lesson on a definite topic and with a clear aim. Study the following working procedure (adapted from J. Scrivener, 1998) for listening/reading lessons and comment on the objectives of each stage.

In most books on teaching listening/reading three lesson stages are singled out:

· Pre-listening Pre-reading

· While-listening While-reading

· Follow-up / Post-listening Follow-up / Post-reading

Consider several tasks that were probably used at the listening lessons with you as students, discuss them in groups and agree on the stage you would use each of them as teachers in future.

2. What listening materials can be used in developing different kinds of listening?

Activity 1

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the materials suggested?

Kind of material	advantages	disadvantages
Live-listening
Recorded materials
Authentic materials
Video

3. What criteria should the teacher bear in mind for choosing the text for listening in the classroom?

Activity 2

Answer the following questions about the use of listening materials, they will help you to deduce a set of criteria for choosing the text.

Questions	Criteria
1. Do you think the content of the text should be interesting?
2. Should the content allow students to compare what is happening in the text with their life?
3. Should the text bring any information about the target culture?
4.Should students have enough background knowledge to understand the text? Should language load be suitable?
5. Is it necessary for students to have the experience of listening to the same text type in Russian?
6. Is it enough to listen to 2-3text types?
7. Should the text suit your aims and objectives?
8. Should the text be "real"? Should it sound natural?

4. How is it possible to assess the difficulty of the text?

What makes the listening passage easy or difficult?

Activity 3

Consider the following areas which are relevant for assessing the difficulty of the listening passage. Discuss what will increase / change / become faster etc. and fill in the grid.

- Speech - The structure of the text

- Acoustic signals - Number of the speakers

- Accents - Familiarity of the subject matter

- The amount of information - New vocabulary

Easy Difficult

Activity 4

Let's try to pool together the things we have just discussed in order to evaluate some listening materials. Listen to two texts on the topic of "Travelling" and assess the difficulty of both of them according to the criteria suggested above.

Which text would you choose to develop "listening for specific information" skill in your class of intermediate-level students? Give your reasons.