chapter 10 listening comprehension. in this chapter we explore: listening as a psycholinguistic...

Click here to load reader

Upload: charlene-reed

Post on 30-Dec-2015

251 views

Category:

Documents


8 download

TRANSCRIPT

  • Chapter 10

    Listening Comprehension

  • In this chapter we explore:Listening as a psycholinguistic process that consists of various levels of activityListening as a communicative actThe extent to which classrooms provide for the development of listening as a skillThe development of listening activities for outside the classroom

  • Listening as a psycholinguistic processListening, like reading, has often been referred to as a passiveor receptive skill.Despite the persistence of the terms passive and receptive for listening skills, scholars agree that listeners are active participants during the communicative act and that listening is a dynamic process drawing on a variety of mental processes and knowledge sources.

  • Wolvin and CoakleyWolvin and Coakley (1985) divide the act of listening into three very broad sets or processes:Perceiving aural stimuliAttending to aural stimuliAssigning meaning to aural stimuliAt each step of the way, learners are actively engaged in processing what they hear.

  • Perception of aural stimuliPerception of aural stimuli refers to the physiological aspects of listening.Sound waves enter the ear canal, causing the ear drum to vibrate.These vibrations are converted into electrical impulses that trigger the release of chemicals, which transmits a signal to the brain.

  • Attending to aural stimuliAttending to aural stimuli involves active concentration by the listener.The listener must be focused on the aural stimuli and must select what to pay attention to and what to disregard.The ability to tune out background noises suggests that we all have some internal mechanisms responsible for filtering incoming stimuli.

  • Assigning meaning to perceived and attended stimuliThis is perhaps the most important set of processes in listening for comprehension.Assigning meaning to perceived and attended stimuli is an interpretive act that involves personal, cultural, and linguistic matters interacting in complex ways.

  • For exampleThe word run can mean one of the following (and perhaps more):A fast, forward movement involving the legsNose drippingThe act of seeking a political officeNot turning something offA snag in a pair of pantyhoseThe likelihood of a listener misassigning meaning to the word run is greatly diminished if the word is used as a noun instead of a verb, etc.

  • Assigning meaningAssigning meaning is not limited to the word level.Whole sentences must be interpreted, and sometimes individual words can be assigned meaning only after the entire sentence has been heard.Richards (1983) outlines the complex nature of assigning meaning to attended aural stimuli in six steps.

  • Richards stepsThe speech event or interactional set is determined (lecture, debate).Scripts relevant to the situation or context are recalled (the listener brings forth a master scheme of how the interaction or set is to play out).The speakers goals are determined by way of the situation, the script, and the position of the utterance in the flow if discourse.

  • Richards steps continued4. The propositional or referential content of the speakers utterance is determined.5. An illocutionary meaning is assigned to the speakers utterance (compliment, request, slur, etc).6. The meaning is retained and acted upon, but the actual form in which it was encoded by the speaker may not be remembered (the listener may say 39 but not remember whether the question was How old are you? or What is your age?).

  • No guaranteesAlthough speakers might share a common culture and language that direct them to assign particular meanings to particular streams of speech, this is no guarantee that they will always assign the same illocutionary meanings to utterances they hear in conversations.Meaning assignment during listening is not a purely linguistic act or even a social act; it can also be an individual act.

  • Inference Assigning meaning to aural stimuli can also involve the construction of meaning, even though something specific was not said.This is called inference. Assigning illocutionary meaning to an utterance is a type of utterance, but one can also infer meaning when no utterance was uttered.Note the following exchange.

  • An exampleA: Are you free this evening?B: What time?A: 8:00.B: Pick me up at 7:45.Now compare it to an expanded version.A: Are you free this evening? Id like us to go out.B: It depends when. What time do you have in mind?A: 8:00. Is that okay?B: 8:00 is fine. Pick me up at 7:45.

  • Inference for second language learnersInference for second language learners is as important as it is for first language speakers and can take on characteristics that do not normally occur during native-to-native interactions.Inference can actually include deducing meanings of novel or unfamiliar words and phrases, that is, inferring the referential meaning of words during the act of listening.

  • Listening as communicationIt is clear that a communicative act involves both expression and interpretation of meaning.There are two types of listening situations.Collaborative situations are those in which both speaker and listener work together to negotiate meaning.Yeah, yeah. or Huh?!?Noncollaborative situations are those in which the listener does not participate in the construction of discourse and is merely an observant listener.

  • ModalityListening situations also fall along another dimension: modality, aural versus visual perception.In many, if not most cases, listeners see the other interlocutor and receive information on how to interpret messages via facial expressions, body posture, gestures, signs, slides, and other visual features.

  • In sumWe can say that listening situations can be categorized according to two sets of features:The presence or absence of collaborationsThe presence or absence of accompanying visual stimuli.Please see next slide for details.

  • Dimensions of a listening situationAural onlyAural+ VisualModalityCollaborative

    Noncollaborative

    TelephoneWalkie-talkieInterviewGameRadio newsVoicemailTV newsFormal Lecture

  • Listener performanceIt seems intuitively obvious that strategies may change depending on the collaborative or noncollaborative nature of the situation.For collaborative situations, Rost (1990) summarizes a number of what he calls strategic responses that constitute effective listener performance in collaborative discourse.

  • SkillsRecognizing indicators used by the other speaker to (a) introduce new ideas, (b) change topics, (c) provide emphasis and/or clarification, or (d) express contrary points of viewMaintaining continuity of context in order to assist the prediction and verification of propositions in the discourseIdentifying an interpersonal frame that suggests what the speakers intent is toward the listener

  • Skills continued4. Recognizing changes in prosody- pitch, speed, pauses- and identifying both patterns and inconsistencies in how the other speaker uses these5. Identifying ambiguity and contradictions in what the other speaker says; identifying places where inadequate information is given

  • Skills continued6. Distinguishing between fact and opinion; also, identifying uses if irony, metaphor, and other nonreferential use of language7. Identifying needed clarifications of topics and ideas8. Providing appropriate feedback to the other speaker(Based on Rost, 1990, p. 115)

  • Strategic responsesSkilled listeners willTry to identify points at which they can switch to the speaker roleLook for those places in the discourse where they are to participate in socially appropriate waysProvide appropriate cues to the speaker that they are following the discourseProvide prompts to the speaker to continue the discourse

  • Strategic responses continued5. Provide cues to indicate how they align with the speakers intent6. Evaluate the speakers contributions and reformulate them when they conflict with listener goals7. Be aware of power asymmetries in the discourse and recognize when a superior party is enforcing interpretive rules8. Identify a plausible speakers intent when interpreting an utterance

  • Strategic responses continued9. Afford recognition to the speakers intent in participating in unequal encounters10. Identify parts of discourse needing repair and query those points when appropriate11. Utilize gambits (set phrases and other linguistic patterns that promote interaction) for checking understanding when appropriate(Based on Rost, 1990, p. 116)

  • Maintaining the discourseWhat is clear from these skills and strategic responses is the role that the listener plays in maintaining the discourse. The listener is not a bystander but a co-constructor of the discourse.Another important job of the listener is to signal nonunderstanding through global, local, and transitional queries (Rost, 1990, p.112).

  • Queries A global query functions at the broad level of the entire discourse. I dont understand. Could you start from the beginning?A local query identifies a particular point in the discourse that the listener has not understood and requests clarification of that point: What do you mean by strategic response?Transitional queries indicate difficulty with a hypothesis or prediction made by the listener. Why did she do that?

  • In sumWe see that listening acts can vary along two major dimensions:Type of collaborationAural-visual modalitySkilled listeners develop abilities through communicative interaction itself and not through guided, manipulative practices.

  • Listening in the second language classroomWhat kinds of listening tasks do classroom learners generally engage in?Classrooms are limited in their ability to provide learners a full range of everyday listening tasks and situations.Lee and VanPatten offer some typical classroom suggestions on the next slide; you should think of activities to complete the remaining boxes.

  • Common listening situations in the classroomAural onlyAural+ VisualModalityCollaborative

    Noncollaborative

    ??ClassroomDiscussionLab MaterialsWatching a Video

  • Where is the learner?The classroom second language learner tends to be engaged in only two kinds of listening situations:Collaborative aural+visual situationsClassroom discussionNoncollaborative aural-only situationsLab practice

  • Classroom discussions and conversationsA comparison of classroom and nonclassroom discussions suggests that maximal active participation of the learner as listener is limited in a number of ways.Learners share the instructor with everyone else during the discussion and might be unwilling to show nonunderstanding.Because instructors tend to control the topic of discussion and also make great use of question asking, learner-listeners may not be given the opportunity to function as co-creators in the discourse and to develop appropriate listener responses.

  • More factorsIn the classroom, learners are in an unequal power relationship with their instructors.Whereas the purpose of listening in the nonclassroom situation is either informational or social, the purpose of listening in the classroom is often evaluative.

  • In sumThe classroom, then, may not be an ideal place for the development of all listening skills and strategic responses.Nonetheless, it is the place where such skills and responses can begin to develop.Instructors can take steps toward maximizing class time for the development of listening.

  • Suggestions for maximizing class timeUse the second language to conduct business- making announcements, assigning homework.Allow learners to nominate topics and structure the discourse.Be a participatory listener yourself.Set aside telephone time. Instructors can increase the scope of listening opportunities by encouraging biweekly phone calls.Provide good listening gambits to learners.

  • Academic listening in the classroomThe classroom can also provide opportunities for the learner to listen in noncollaborative aural+visual-stimuli situations.Language instructors sometimes forget that academic listening is a very common type of communicative listening.The instructor can thus include an occasional listening situation that functions like academic listening: delivering a lecture and having learners take notes.

  • Listening in the language laboratoryLee and VanPatten examine the use of the laboratory for developing listening abilities.The exercises in these practices contain sentence-level, dialogue-level, or monologue-level discourse, but they are noncollaborative in nature.Typical examples are described here.

  • Activity A: Sentence level listening practice

    Listen to each sentence and determine whether it is true or false according to the visual clue.

  • Activity B: Dialogue-level listening practiceListen to Alphonse and Christine make plans for this evening. The indicate who said what.This person wants to go out.This person wants to get home early.This person offers to drive.

  • Activity C: Monologue-type practiceListen to the speaker as he talks about Holy Week in Spain. Then answer the questions that follow.What city in Spain is most famous for its celebration of Holy Week?How many tourists visit that city every year for this religious event?

  • Comparison How do these noncollaborative situations in the laboratory compare with other nonclassroom, noncollaborative listening (listening to the radio)?On the next slide, the characteristics of out-of-laboratory noncollaborative listening are contrasted with those of the laboratory.

  • A comparison of noncollaborative listening

    LaboratoryNonclassroomTopic is predeterminedLearner controls the topicPurpose is often to practiceLearner listens for information(same as above)Learners listens for entertainmentInitiation and termination of listening is determined by anotherLearner initiates and terminates listening

  • Informational purposeWe can increase the communicative purpose of listening, that is, listening for information.Laboratory activities A, B, and C presented earlier all lack informational purpose: the learner listens in order to answer questions.But in real life, we often listen in order to report to someone or to summarize information.

  • A questionHow often do learners get the opportunity to do this in the second language?Here are some possibilities for noncollaborative purposeful listening:Listen to a radio broadcast or some other oral text and prepare a written summary, an oral summary, or an outlineListen to a conversation or dialogue and then report it as a narrative.Listen to a set of directions and then perform a task

  • Activity D: SynthesisThe speaker mentioned four principal factors that have contributed to the increase in multiple births. Complete a chart, identifying the factors and how each contributes to this increase.In a short composition, use the information from your chart to explain why there has been an increase in multiple births.

  • Listening is a means to an endThese kinds of activities encourage learners to synthesize information that they have listened to and report on it in their own words.Listening is not an activity in and of itself but, rather, part of a more complex communicative activity that goes beyond listening.Listening is a means to an end; it is not the end itself.

  • Following oral instructionsThe third task type (listening to a set of directions and then performing a task) is rarely found in language teaching materials. It is usually limited to the lesson on giving and receiving directions.Actions that might require following oral instructions:Following a recipeEntering a contestFilling out formsBuilding something

  • Getting ready to listenPrelistening activities are designed to help orient learners before they actually begin listening to something.This orientation helps maximize learners comprehension.In second language situations, consciously orienting learners before a listening task has been shown to increase comprehension.

  • Prelistening activitiesPrelistening activities fall into three general groups that are not necessarily mutually exclusive:Vocabulary preparationReview of existing knowledgeAnticipation of content

  • Vocabulary preparationVocabulary preparation is the simple task of acquainting learners with unfamiliar words and expressions that will be either useful or necessary for the listening excerpt.The goal is not to have learners memorize words and produce them but to recognize them and attach meaning to them when they hear them.

  • Review of existing knowledgeReview of existing knowledge requires learner to reflect on what they already know.A review of existing knowledge explicitly calls forth some of these concepts to check what learners actually know about some topic in its most general sense.

  • ExamplesSome examples of activity types for a review of existing knowledge are listed following.Quizzes- True/False, Multiple choice, Short answerTeacher-led discussionShort readingLearner brainstorming

  • Anticipation of contentAnticipation of content directs learners to predict some of the things that a speaker might say.The same activities used to review existing knowledge cam be used to anticipate content.Learners can be quizzed in some way, they can be taken through a teacher-led discussion, they can read a short text, or they can brainstorm.

  • Listening and cultureAs Lee and VanPatten said earlier, culture is not something that can be divorced from activities.Listening activities are excellent devices for bringing cultural materials into the second or foreign language classroom.Culture can be the content of listening activities that you develop or find.

  • Cultural analysisThe use of culture in such activities should not stop with a series of questions regarding what was listened to.It should also include possible inferences about the society or people related to the content.In this sense, Lee and VanPatten are talking about learners conducting a mini-cultural analysis.

  • Incorporating cultural materialAnother way to incorporate cultural material into listening activities is to use authentic listening texts from television or radio.Commercials, films, and so on reveal things about cultures that are not overt.

  • Cultural sensitivityThe goal of such cultural analyses is not to make learners experts in culture.Lee and VanPatten do not believe that you can teach culture in the same way you might teach the past tense.The goal should be much more modest: to help students develop cultural sensitivity.Cultural sensitivity means understanding that other cultures and societies have values and beliefs different from a students own.

  • Cultural activitiesThe inclusion of cultural material has implications for activity development.We saw earlier that a framework for listening activities would include a prelistening phase to prep learners before they listen in order to maximize the comprehension experience.Because cultural topics may include new information that learners may not be able to decipher without some help, the use of prelistening activities to prepare them for what they are going to hear takes on an even greater importance than in other listening activities.

  • Summary of chapter 10Examined four major areas of second language listening:The psycholinguistic processesListening as a communicative actListening in the second language classroomListening in the language laboratoryListening is far from a passive skill.

  • Summary of chapter 10 continuedSaw that listening is not just aural but, in everyday life, is generally part of communicative situations in which visual and other stimuli are present.Ended with a brief examination of issues related to listening and culture.