林静 How to Improve Students' Listening Skills

1 How to Improve Students Listening Skills 广东广州市番禺区市桥侨联中学广东广州市番禺区市桥侨联中学 林静林静 摘摘 要要 听力 是语言学习的前提 它位于听 说 读 写四项技能之首 处于一个非常重要的 地位 在教学实践中 学生的说 读 写的能力往往比较容易提高 而听力的提高却显得比 较困难 初中英语教学的一个重要组成部分就是听力的培养 听的过程是人们运用各种知识 和技能的过程 听力的提高既依赖又能促进各种语言知识的学习 而且听的过程能帮助学生 增强对词汇和语言结构的记忆 要想提高和改善学生的听力技能 就必须针对学生在听力中 常遇到的主要问题 采取有效的方式进行听力教学 Key words main problems listening skills improve Nowadays the development of listening skills in English has recently received growing attention in Chinese middle schools Many teachers have now realized the importance of listening skill They pay more attention to develop the students listening skill in their English teaching but they also meet with some difficulties in improving the students listening ability In teaching listening what problems should we take notice of In addition how should we deal with them We must think them over 1 some main problems in listening comprehension When we do some listening at first we should make clear the form of listening materials Is it a dialogue or an article While listening we should receive some information about the listening materials After that we must analyse and judge the information we have received The information not only includes words phases and sentences but also includes sounds intonation stress and even some noise Some of the information is useful for us to understand listening materials and work out the problems but some else is not useful The following are about some main problems in listening comprehension 1 Hearing the sounds When we listen to a dialogue or an article we take more notice of some easily confused sounds We must learn English sounds well and can discriminate each of them especially the similar sounds such as thirteen and thirty food and foot We should also pay attention to some 2 homophone and homonyms Homophones are some words with different meanings which are pronounced in the same way but are spelt differently such as new and knew are homophones Homonyms are some words which have the same sound and usually the same spelling as another though different in meaning or origin such as the noun bear and the verb bear are homonyms 2 Understanding intonation and stress Intonation means the rise and fall of the pitch change of the voice Intonation is an important element of speech An analysis of English intonation may help us to know fairly the sentence structure and the attitude of a speaker We have also seen that every word of two or more syllables However in connected speech we do not hear a stress on every word Some words lose their stress According to sentence stress we can know the important words in the sentence In addition we should notice that any word in a sentence might be logically stressed if it implies special emphasis or contrast 3 Understanding colloquial vocabulary There are marked differences between the formal and colloquial language some sounds are always joined together to form words and groups of word In connected speech some sounds under the influences of their neighboring sounds influence each other and are replaced by a third sound that is different from both the original sounds In colloquial language many common English words have two or more pronunciations in speech depending on their positions in sentence a strong form and one or more weak forms 2 Certain frequently used listening skills 1 Accumulate the knowledge Students should try to accumulate more English words The understanding of the vocabulary is the base to improve listening skills Besides grasping the vocabulary from the text books students should increase the vocabulary by extending outside reading For instance they can keep on reading an article which is suitable to their own level every day In addition language is the expression of the culture while the culture is the intension of the language So students ought to develop their view and understand the habit and the local customs of foreign countries Only when they know the culture and the differences between China and the foreign countries can they understand the meaning of the listening materials more easily quickly and correctly Suppose students are needed to listen to a passage about Halloween If they know the background of the festival like trick or treat they can better understand the passage and get the answers more easily 2 Learn to make predictions 3 Students should make full use of the short time given before listening to skim through the questions and the choices From the choices students can make predictions of the listening material and guess which may be the correct answers Then they can choose the correct one easily through listening carefully with a clear purpose For instance in listening A Unit 2 of 7B Oxford English students are required to complete the poster by putting one word in each space after listening Come and help us plant some trees Eight reasons to help plant trees 1 Trees make streets more A 2 Trees make streets less B 3 Trees make our air C 4 Trees make our air D 5 Trees make oxygen to keep us alive and E 6 Trees provide us with F things like G and paper 7 Trees help us fight H 8 Trees are in I Before listening to the material students can predict the answers Usually they predict the answers according to the part of the speech of the words and the meaning of the context In fact they can easily predict most of them like A beautiful B noisy E healthy F useful H pollution I danger Though they cannot predict some of them exactly like C purer D cooler G fruit they can also be sure about the part of the speech of the words Thus they can get the answers more easily and correctly after prediction 3 Learn to ignore some unnecessary information In listening materials there is some unnecessary information For example noise They disturb the listener s attention Therefore students must judge which are necessary and which are unnecessary Students must learn to ignore some unnecessary information We should be clearly aware that not every clue is equally important to message We should try to capture some key words phases and sentences 4 Take notes while listening When we are listening to an article especially a long listening material besides the main idea of the article we must remember some detailed information However while listening it is difficult for the students to remember all of the information Perhaps you remember some but miss more 4 information So while we are listening we must take notes with some simple symbols Simple symbols refer to some meaning symbols one or two letters and so on For instance in Listening A Unit 3 of Book7B Oxford English the students are needed to label a floor plan to show different places after listening to the instruction of a hotel As time is limited while listening we can use abbreviations like b for bedroom o for office d for door and so on After we finish listening we can complete the words easily Also we can use this way to listen for the price the name the age and so on which makes the problems easier to us 3 Some detailed steps to teach listening During the school life the teacher must create a kind of atmosphere to attract our students Besides the teacher should try to organize the class in English Next between the teacher and the students even among the students English should be used to communicate as much as possible Thus the students can have a good habit to think in English As for the listening training I think the teachers should try to do the following 1 Before students listening the teachers should introduce some background knowledge and ask some questions related to the listening material By introducing background knowledge asking and answering the questions on the one hand it helps to arouse the students interest and students can be prepared for the formal listening on the other hand students can be made to listen to it with a clear purpose so as to enhance student listening efficiency 2 While students listening first let students listen to the material without a break in order to help them grasp the main idea and important details in this way students can understand it as a whole Next replay the tape and get students to listen and repeat it after the tape The teacher may explain what the students did not understand Then play the tape again and let students listen to it coherently and discuss the questions in pairs and report their answers At last check the answers with the whole class In this way students develop their listening skills and abilities systematically 3 After students listening and finishing the exercises the teacher can get the students to discuss in groups about some topics on the listening materials Then the teacher may get some students to report their results to the class The step helps to deepen students impression of what they have learnt Their listening and speaking skills are further practiced The aim of using language knowledge is finally reached 4 Some useful ways to improve Students listening in class In order to improve students listening comprehension I always think of different interesting and flexible ways to train them As for the teaching materials I ll choose some from the text books 5 Also I ll design some other teaching materials which are useful for students Here are some efficient ways to improve students listening skills 1 Listen and choose the words Choose some groups of words and each group contains 4 words with similar sounds Each time the teacher read out one word in a sentence once Students are needed to circle the word read for the first time tick the one read for the second time and underline the one read for the third time Besides the sound they should also consider the meaning of the context 1 thought through though although 2 might light right bright 3 invent invite invitation inventor 4 watch match March month 2 Listen and choose the sentence Choose some sentences which have few differences Students put them into correct orders according to what they hear The same materials can be used for several times for practice The teacher can change the order and work up some speed 1 I can do it easily 2 I can t do it easily 3 He said he could do it 4 He said he could not do it 3 Listen and match Choose 4 pictures and use some sentences to describe them Students match the pictures with the sentences they hear 1 A star is inside a box 2 A star is on the left of a box 3 A star is above a box 4 A box is over a star 4 Listen and act The teacher gives some instructions orally and students present the actions 1 Hold up your books 6 2 Clap your hands twice 3 Put up your hands 4 Nod your head 5 Answer the correct questions and correct the wrong ones Choose some questions Some of them are wrong The mistakes may be about grammar vocabulary idiom and so on Students are required to Answer the correct questions and correct the wrong ones 1 What is the notice say 2 What time is it now 3 Do you usually wear a pair of glass 4 Does the ruler belongs to you 6 Listen and order the sentences Choose a passage and break it into several sentences Scramble the order of the sentences and ask the students to put them into logic order according to what they hear 1 Why not Father the boys ask 2 The boys repeats the same sentences clearly 3 Are you going to China by plane by train or by sheep Father 4 Oh How can I get to China on a sheep No Never Father answers 5 Tom is an American boy 6 What Father asks 7 Once his father wants to go to China for a visit 8 You should pay attention to your pronunciation 9 Before he starts out Tom asks him 10 My boy I even cannot get to China on a horse I ll go to China by ship not by sheep The word ship should be read as p not p The original Tom is an American boy Once his father wants to go to China for a visit Before he starts out Tom asks him Are you going to China by plane by train or by sheep Father What Father asks The boys repeats the same sentences clearly Oh How can I get to China on a sheep No Never Father answers Why not Father the boys ask My boy I even cannot get to China on a horse I ll go to China by ship not by sheep The word ship should be read as p not p You should pay attention to your pronunciation 7 Listen and guess 7 Collect some interesting riddles Students guess the answer after listening 1 Your aunt has a brother But he is not your uncle Who is he your father 2 What has hands but no feet a face but no eyes tells but does not talk a clock 3 What belongs only to you and yet is used more by others than yourself your name 4 What season is the most dangerous one autumn Because it is also fall 8 Listen to the song the joke or the poem Students fill in the missing blanks after listening to a song a joke or a poem For example before learning Unit 3 Trouble Book 7A Oxford English the teacher can play the song Trouble At the same time the students fill in the blanks Therefore it can help lead to the topic and arouse students interest Trouble is a friend 1 will find you no matter where you 2 oh oh No matter if you re fast no matter if you re slow oh oh The 3 of the storm wanna cry in the morn oh oh You re fine for a while but you start to lose control He s there in the dark he s there in my heart He waits in the wings he s gotta play a 4 Trouble is a 5 yeah trouble is a friend of mine Trouble go eye part friend 9 Listen and draw Present an uncompleted picture to the students The teacher describe what to draw to the students orally Students finish drawing what they hear Also they can pair up to listen and draw 10 Listen and retell Students listen to a passage and retell it The teacher can p