LISTENING

- Michael Rost
From
The Cambridge Guide to Teaching English to
Speakers of Other Languages, CUP (2011)
Summary by Sajit M Mathews, IIT Kanpur

Listening
Complex process that allows us to understand spoken language.
A critical means of acquiring a second language.
Involves real time language processing
Involves bottom-up processing of incoming data and top-down
processing of using existing knowledge to make meaning.
Phonological, grammatical, lexical and propositional levels of cognitive
organization.

Listening- background
Until recently, foreign language was presented to learner primarily in
the written from.
Focus was grammar, and correct translation.
With linguistics reform movement in late 20th century, child language
acquisition became the focus of research, and listening began to be
considered a means of foreign language learning- Audiolingualism.
Focus became accuracy of perception and clarity of auditory memory.

Listening- background
Bloomfield: One learns to understand and speak a language primarily
by hearing and imitating native speakers. (Bloomfield, L. (1942)
Outline Study of Practical Study of Foreign Languages. Baltimore, MD:
Linguistic Society of America
This led to audiolingual method in America
It is a behaviourist approach that intended to train learners through
intensive structured and graded input and change their hearing
habits.

Listening- background
Situational approaches (Firth) context of situation determined
meaning of utterances rather than linguistic units themselves.
Meaning is a function of situational and cultural context
Language understanding involves integration of
Linguistic comprehension
Non-linguistic interpretation

Listening- background
Chomskys innatist views led to natural approach to learning
Mind naturally seeks meaning.
Learner works from internal syllabus using language input to construct
target language system.
Chomsky: Language competence- understanding of how language is
structured internally
Hymes: Communicative competence- understanding of how language
is used

Listening- background
Conversation analysis: sociological approach- influenced syllabus
design
Council of Europe defined Common Core of communicative language
that should necessarily be learned in the early stages of instruction.
CLT saw listening as integral to communicative competence.
Listening for meaning became focus
60s, 70s: applied linguists recognized listening as primary L2 input
channel, therefore is the trigger for acquisition.
80s: Input is seen as primary vehicle for language learning.

Listening- Research in SLA

In SLA research, linguistic environment is very important- provided by
native speakers, and their interaction.
Acquisition comes from understanding language in academic and
social situations.
Part of it is done through foreigner talk and its strategies.
Krashen: comprehensible input is necessary condition for language
learning
Input hypothesis: language development through i+1 input.
It is comprehension that turns input into intake.
Speech adjustments made to learners and learners use of shared
knowledge of the context are that which helps understand new
language

Listening- Research in SLA

Pica speaks of strategic adjustments made by learners to understand
new language
This research helps understand how listening helps language
development and outlines dimensions and strategy use required for
successful listening development.

Listening- Speech Processing

Factors activated in speech processing:
Phonetic quality
Prosodic patterns
Pausing
Speed of input
All of them influence comprehensibility of input
There is one semantic store for both L1 and L2- single coding
But there are two phonological stores- dual coding
Phonological tag activates semantic knowledge, thats how we understand
what is heard

Listening- Speech Processing

Phonological coding, grammatical parsing and word recognition
together account for keeping up with the speed of spoken language.

Listening- Speech Processing

Each language has its preferred strategies for aural decoding- L1 child
acquires it, L2 learner may partially get it.
Four fundamental properties of spoken language involved:
Phonological system
Phonotactic rules- possible sequences
Tonic melodies- indicates lexical or discourse meanings
Stress system

Listening- Speech Processing

Bounded language (syllable-timed): stress is located at fixed distances
from the boundaries of words
Binary rhythmic units
Listeners listen to equally strong syllables
Unbounded language (stress-timed): stress is pulled to the nucleus of
the syllable.
Clusters of syllables organized by trochaic (strong-weak) or
iambic (weak-strong) rhythm
This generates weak consonants and vowels, slurring, etc.

Listening- Speech Processing

If L1 and L2 of the listener are different in any of the above aspects, it
can create difficulty in word recognition, while similarity in one or
more of them makes it easy
Ex: Japanese- difficult to understand English- different stress system,
while Danish speakers find it easier, because stress, tone, phonology
and Phonotactic systems are similar.

Listening- Speech Processing

Stress is the most difficult item on the list.

Listening- in Interactive Settings

Interactive settings will reveal the dynamics of L2 learner participation, and
interactive listening
How control and distribution of power is routinely employed through the
structure.
Cultural pragmatics is important in understanding dynamics of L2 listening
in context- directness, indirectness, pace, when to speak, when not to,
tone, etc. are culture based.
Difficulty arises at informational packaging and conceptual representation
of the content.
Elliptical utterances (omission of taken-for-granted information), difficulty in
assessing speakers intent- leading to breakdown in communication.

Listening- in Interactive Settings

Social procedures for successful listening:
Identification of topic shifts
Providing backchannelling cues
Participating in conversational routines
Shifting to topic initiator role
Initiating queries and
Repair of communication problems
Successful listening is a combination of interactional work and
linguistic processing

Listening- Strategy Use

Strategies are Conscious plans to deal with incoming audio data (Rost
and Ross, 1991)
Hypothesis testing (asking for specific information)
Lexical push-down (asking word meanings)
Global reprise (asking for general repetition)
Kasper (1984): L2 listeners form initial topic, then try to fit incoming
data into that framework.
Vandergrift (1996): metacognitive, cognitive and socio-affective
strategies were used as suggested by OMalley and Chamot.
Metacognitive strategies are used more at higher proficiency levels

Listening- Practice
Effective teaching of listening involves:
Careful selection of audio sources (authentic, interesting, varied,
challenging)
Creative design of tasks (structured, having learner opportunities
to use their knowledge and monitor what they are doing)
Assistance to help learners enact effective listening strategies (C,
MC, SA)
Integration of listening with other learning purposes (S, R, W)
Listening for meaning became the standard by 1980s (as against
listening for language practice)

Listening- Practice
Proposals by practitioners
Morley: information focused activities
Ur: real life listening with a purpose
Anderson and Lynch: based on various input types
Underwood: 3 phases: pre, while and post listening activities
Richards: top-down or bottom-up processing
Rost: 4 classes of active listening- listening to focus on meaning,
intensive listening to focus on form, selective listening to focus on
specific outcomes, interactive listening to focus on strategy development
Nunan: developing cognitive strategies, developing listening with other
skills, listening to authentic materials, using technology

Listening- Practice
Proposals by practitioners
Lynch: types of negotiation tasks
White: principles for activities, focus on what went wrong in the
process

Listening- Practice
Learner training: in use of strategies for listening
Ex: activation of schemata before listening
Rost: 5 types of listening strategies: predicting, monitoring,
inferencing, clarifying and responding.
Using target language for instruction is a strategy.
Ongoing demonstration of the importance of listening
Opportunity to continuously integrate other skills and listening
Listening for academic purposes

Listening- Current and Future

Trends
Listening pedagogy: study of listening processes of individual learners- in
specific tasks and longitudinally.
Lynch: learners change in product, process and perception.
Role of phonology: word and phrase recognition (Kim, Ross, Quinn),
phonological strategies, compensatory strategies needed when faced
with gaps in input.
Input Enhancement: marking input with features for students to notice: to
trigger awareness to move to learning
Academic listening/extended listening for specific purposes: lecturing
styles, speech perception, text-structure analysis, note-taking, aural
memory, etc. are researched.

Listening- Current and Future

Trends
Listening technology: vast amount of materials is available. So
selection of appropriate input, chunking into manageable, useful
segments, developing support material, training of learners in best
uses of this input are crucial (Benson and Voller 1997).
Learner interaction with computers simulating human interaction:
speech synthesis, speech enhancement, speech recognition
technology, etc.
Intelligent methodology is necessary not to falsely equate use of
technology with instruction

Listening- Conclusion
Central role in language learning
Skills and strategies in listening
Listening is not yet properly understood- a mystery
Material design lags behind current theory- input selection, strategy
development
Assessment is far behind current view of listening
Curriculum design, teaching methodology, materials design, learner
training and testing need to be modernised