English in Primary School: Theoretical Aspects of Teaching Listening In Contemporary Methodology 

by Natalia Fotina

                                                                                                                           What is listening in primary school?

     Listening is the ability of a child to percept and to understand aural utterances of a speaker. In other words, it is the ability to retract required information from aural speech as efficiently as possible.  There are several misconceptions about listening. The first of these is that listening and hearing is the same thing. Hearing is the physiological process of registering sound waves as they hit the eardrum. Young learners have no control over what we hear. The sounds they hear have no meaning until they give them their meaning in context.  Listening on the other hand is an active process that constructs meaning from both verbal and nonverbal messages.

     Listening situations constantly happen in primary pupils’ real life when hearing to the commands, instructions, warnings, descriptions of the objects, watching cartoons, plays, TV programs, listening to the songs, playing games, hearing concerts, listening to audio-books, attending a lesson etc. Thus, there exist a number of reasons for listening, but they can be roughly grouped into two main groups: listening for pleasure and listening for information. And the first thing, English teachers should always keep in mind is that in primary school listening for pleasure and listening for information should coincide.

      The main problems of listening comprehension in primary school

      Certainly, there exist a lot of problems of listening comprehension. They can be divided into linguistic and non-linguistic. Linguistic problems are related to the language itself and they commonly appear on the phonetic, grammatical and lexical level.

     Listening difficulties on the phonetic level include the following:

-         misunderstanding due to confusing similar sounds (sick – thick, man – men, mouse – mouth, here – hair – hear, the – they);

-         misunderstanding due to strange linkage like great apes – grey tapes, plain eyes – play nice;

-         misunderstanding due to reduction or elision ( do you – due);

-         misunderstanding caused by intonation.

Listening difficulties on the grammatical level include

-         confusion of shortened forms (his, he’s, he has, he is)

-         confusion of the shortened form with a full word (want – won’t)

-         large amount of analytical forms which is not characteristic of the learners’ mother tongue;

-         grammatical homonymy, when the words coincide in spelling but have different grammatical meaning (water – to water, fish – to fish, one fish – three fish).

Listening difficulties on lexical level include

-         recognition of homophones (night – knight, not – knot, no – know)

-         recognition of paronyms ( ship – sheep, slip – sleep)

-         recognition of opposites (right – left, east – west)

-         recognition of words used figuratively (drive nuts)

-         abundances of structural words ( the, be, get)

-         frequent use of non-specific vocabulary (thing, stuff, one)

-         frequent use of a number of fillers (like, Hm, well, so, so on etc.) which distract learners’ attention;

-         frequent use of repetition, self correction, re-phrasing etc.

The importance of teaching pronunciation for listening skills development

     Thus, analyzing listening comprehension issues, we can conclude, that teaching listening is closely connected with teaching pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary. The importance of teaching pronunciation at primary school cannot be overestimated. It helps the students to understand spoken language they hear and to make their own speech more comprehensible and more meaningful to others. Aspects of pronunciation to focus on are as follows:

-         individual sounds;

-         word stress;

-         sounds and connected speech;

-         rhythm and stress in sentences.

Ways of introducing new sound include

-         imitation;

-         description of articulation;

-         comparison with the sound of the mother tongue;

-         saying the sound in connected speech and word combination.

Sound presentation procedure consists of five steps:

-         the teacher introduces a new sound in connected speech;

-         the teacher pronounce the word with the new sound clearly at least four times and then a new sound alone;

-         the teacher explains articulation and if its necessary the teacher shows the difference between the new sound and the sound of the mother tongue;

-         learners pronounce the new sound after the teacher, first, in a low voice, chorally, and then individually in a loud voice;

-         learners pronounce words or pairs of words and phrases with the new sound

   A set of phonetic exercise is divided into two groups. The first group includes exercises which are based on recognition. They develop learners’ ability to distinguish sound and sound sequences. For example, teacher asks learners to listen to the words and count how many times the sound appears. Or teacher asks the learners to put up their hand when they recognise the sound. The second group of exercises is based on reproduction. They develop learners’ ability to pronounce and articulate English sounds carefully and combine sounds into words, phrases and helps them to speak English. In this group of exercises listen-and-imitate technique is used very often. For example, repeat after the teacher the special sound, syllable with this sound, then words with this sound, name the objects in the pictures, complete the word with given separate sounds etc.

                                                                                          The importance of teaching vocabulary for listening skills development

     The role of vocabulary in teaching listening comprehension is as great as the role of pronunciation. It is especially significant at elementary level, as it is not easy task to enlarge the vocabulary all through the course of study. The dominant learning theory in vocabulary teaching is cognitive theory. It means that learners should understand the meaning, the use, the function and the formation of the word in order to apply it meaningfully and appropriately.

                                                                                                         Non-linguistic problems of listening comprehension include

-         lack of confidence;

-         lack of control over the speed of utterance;

-         inability to get the utterance repeated;

-         absence of purpose of listening;

-         poor understanding of speakers’ intention;

-         inability to focus on key information and not pay the attention to every word;

-         external noise;

-         learners’ memory is overloaded;

-         a listener is tired or in a bad mood etc.

     In order to overcome all these difficulties the teacher should prepare young learners in appropriate way giving them a certain support in form of visuals, adjusting a reading text; giving an opportunity to listen to the text twice if necessary; making pauses between the parts of the text which make learners to understand better and remember information.

     But the teacher mustn’t change the speed of the listening text; it should be natural even for young listeners.

                                                                                                                 Main Stages of a Listening Part of the Lesson

     Listening part of the lesson in primary school can be divided into three main stages:

-         pre-listening stage;

-         while listening stage;

-         post-listening stage

     The purpose of the pre-listening stage is to help prepare young learners, or listeners for listening by activating their existing knowledge and previous experience. If it is their first experience, the teacher should provide learners with a listening purpose: - Can you see the box? Let’s find out what is in the box? They serve as a guiding questions leading to the meaning of the text.

     While-listening stage helps learners to develop their listening skill and the skill of getting meaning from spoken language. Different activities may focus on various aspects of the skill such as

-         listening for the gist (the main idea and meaning of what someone has said);

-         listening for details;

-         listening for specific information;

-         coping with missing elements and background noise etc.

     Post-listening stage embraces all the work related to a particular listening text: a teacher checks learners’ understanding and reveals reasons why some of them have failed to understand or missed parts of the utterance or failed to use the information from the text in other types of activities ( pronunciation exercises, speaking, writing, copying the intonation etc.)

     Activities for developing listening skills in primary school include three groups of exercises according to the three stages of listening part of the lesson.

Pre-listening activities are as follows:

-         Learners may read something relevant, connected with the text they are going to listen to; in primary school it can be the title for the story.

-         Teacher may discuss with learners the topic connected with the text (for example, a birthday party, a birthday present, food and drinks they like).

-         Learners can answer questions connected with the text.

-         Learners can do exercises on vocabulary and grammar which they can find in the text, for example, look at the card and say the word/phrase;

-         Learners can ask questions connected with something they want to know from the text using their mother tongue.

Thus, activities on this stage integrate different skills while activating pupils’ knowledge and previous experience. At least two activities should be done at this stage.

While-listening activities in primary school are:

-         Learners may choose the picture to the text;

-         They may put the pictures in order;

-         They may complete the picture;

-         Colour the picture;

-         Draw the picture;

-         Complete the grid;

-         Fill the gabs;

-         copy out specific information;

-         respond to the command you hear etc.

At least one activity should be done at this stage.

Post-listening activities in primary school can be as follows:

-         clap your hands if you hear particular words;

-         decide which of the statements are true and which are false;

-         correct the false statements;

-         multiple choice;

-         gap filling;

-         exercises with pictures;

-         identify relations between the speakers;

-         role play;

-         dictations;

-         write some statements on what they have heard;

-         pair work (interviewing each other)

-         retelling the text etc.

 

                                                                                                                            Values of listening texts and activities  

     Undoubtedly all listening texts and activities should have an appropriate set of values. Teaching values is important as it focuses on children’s personal and social development, not just on their listening skills. It improves young learners’ awareness of good behaviour, and how their behaviour and attitudes can impact on the people around them and their environment. Areas for values in listening include helping young learners to understand about:

-         community, for example, following school rules, understanding the needs of people and other living things, understanding what harms and what improves our environment, contributing to the life of the class and school;

-         Health and hygiene, e.g. understanding the basics of healthy eating, maintaining personal hygiene, rules for keeping safe around the house and on the road.

-         Interacting with others, e.g. listening to other people, playing and working cooperatively, sharing, identifying and respecting the differences and similarities between people, helping others in need etc.

     Summarizing all mentioned above we can come to the conclusion that in contemporary methodology listening is one of the four basic skills and listening comprehension skills have a key role in learning foreign languages. Actually, foreign language study begins with listening. Through listening we present new sounds, words and word combinations, enlarge learners’ vocabulary. We also acquaint young learners with certain grammar structures and speech patterns through listening dialogues and other texts, and then teach them to use these structures meaningfully and appropriately in their speech. Listening helps us to present texts, songs, plays, stories etc. Thus, teaching listening and teaching pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, reading, speaking, writing and values are closely interrelated and always go side by side.