Listening Logs for Extensive Listening Practice PDF

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Page 1 of 16 LISTENING LOGS Listening Logs for Extensive Listening Practice Betsy Gilliland ([email protected]) Department of Second Language Studies, University of Hawai‘i Manoa Citation: Gilliland, B. (2015). Listening logs for extensive listening practice. In D. Nunan & J. C. Richards (Eds....

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Listening Logs for Extensive Listening Practice Betsy Gilliland Language Learning Beyond the Classroom

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Listening Logs for Extensive Listening Practice Betsy Gilliland ([email protected]) Department of Second Language Studies, University of Hawai‘i Manoa

Citation: Gilliland, B. (2015). Listening logs for extensive listening practice. In D. Nunan & J. C. Richards (Eds.), Language learning beyond the classroom (pp. 13-22). New York: Routledge.

Introduction Learning to listen in a new language takes practice and time, often more time than learners have in class. In order to improve their listening abilities, learners must do more than just listen to interesting programs—they must also think about how they are listening and what they could do to improve their listening. Teachers can facilitate learners’ out-ofclass listening by helping them access appropriate materials and teaching them ways to reflect on their listening experiences. This chapter describes Listening Logs, a flexible activity that can be adapted for use in either second or foreign language settings to support students’ development of extensive listening skills in any language. Listening Logs are an ongoing assignment through which students document their participation in out-of-class activities and reflect on how such participation helped them improve their listening abilities. Listening Log assignments require learners to attend a variety of authentic (real world) events, take notes on the content, and reflect on their own comprehension of each event. Teachers initiate the process in class by introducing

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students to a range of extensive listening strategies and modeling how to summarize and reflect on the experience. Students then choose what to attend and when to go as they document their experiences in the community. This chapter explains how I have used Listening Logs to enhance intermediate and advanced level students’ extensive listening proficiency. I describe introducing the assignment to a class and supporting students’ participation in a range of listening experiences. I suggest ways that the Listening Log assignment can be adapted for students from different levels of language proficiency in both second and foreign language settings. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the benefits and drawbacks of the Listening Log assignment and suggestions of ways to resolve potential problems in students’ participation and out-of-class learning. Finally, I review listening resources that learners can use to practice extensive listening. Vignette I first discovered extensive listening as an undergraduate studying abroad in Russia. After language classes focused on grammar and pronunciation, I joined my host family every evening to watch the TV news and soap operas. Some evenings, we also watched classic Soviet films. After hours watching television, I found I could understand people talking on the street with much greater ease. Years later, I was teaching advanced oral communication at a university intensive English program in California. My students complained that their classmates were all international students, so they did not have contact with American English speakers, one reason they had chosen to study in the United States. These students had high TOEFL scores and wanted either to gain admission to degree programs in US universities or to

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increase their English proficiency for business purposes. They said they had no trouble understanding their teachers or classmates, but could not grasp what the McDonalds cashier was saying. My challenge as a teacher was helping my students improve their listening and speaking to the point that they could effectively participate in university classes the following semester. Because we had limited time together, I wanted to take some of the listening out of the classroom. Based on memories of watching TV in Russia, I asked my students to document their listening practice after school hours. They kept Listening Logs where they summarized what they had heard, responded to the content of the program, and reflected on their listening ability. I introduced the Listening Logs process during class time. We watched an episode of Friends, a TV show popular in my students’ home countries. I played the entire episode, encouraging students to focus on how they were making sense of the characters’ interactions as well as what was going on. After watching the show, we collaboratively summarized and discussed the plot. In this episode, the characters threw a baby shower, so we discussed American traditions and how they differed from what people do before someone has a baby in the students’ home countries. Then we examined strategies the students had used to understand the story and whether they had encountered any new vocabulary or phrases. This discussion modeled the process for students to follow in listening and writing Listening Log entries. I distributed a template (in the Applications section of this chapter) and asked them to submit five entries every four weeks. They could decide what to listen to and when to listen during that period. I also set some requirements to challenge them

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to go beyond their comfort zone: they had to document a range of different listening events, including at least one live (non-recorded) activity like a public lecture or a movie in a movie theater. To support the students’ search for a variety of listening opportunities, I shared announcements from the local newspaper and the university campus. Most students focused their Listening Log activities on TV shows, particularly those available online. Others, however, attended lectures on campus and around the city. The following reflections from their logs demonstrate their strategies for understanding some challenging events: •

One student took a guided tour of an art museum: …the subject of the museum now is about politics, so it was pretty difficult to understand every art. The guide helped me to understand very well… The guide told about the background of those arts and explained very well… This field trip was really fun and interesting for me, so I could concentrate on looking at arts and listening to the guide. Sometime I couldn’t understand what she said about history or politic of 60 years ago.

•

Another participated in a service-learning project teaching elementary school children: Even small kids, as long as they were native speakers in English. We still need to pay attention of what they said, and I found that sometimes it was difficult to follow that speed they speak in English. …Children couldn’t use difficult vocabulary, but their speaking speed are really fast more than I think. Adults are good to practice our English, and they could critic our grammar at the same time. But I like children I like to talk to them. I feel so comfortable when I have chance to talk with them.

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Other students noted that they had some difficulty with the listening, reflecting on why an experience was not as easy to follow: •

A student attended a campus lecture about the death penalty followed by student questions: I would like to try new Listening Log especially on tough topic in class. It is a social issue internationally and I have a concern about capital death. …I think the topic is a social problem and it is not talked in normal life. Therefore I could not understand the most parts of lecture. There is no additional informant such as hand out and especially optical informant. Some students spoke so fast I could not understand at all.

•

Another watched a documentary on ancient Egypt: While I listened and saw the documentary, I was so sleepy and often lost my concentration on film. The narrator’s boring voice was terrible to hear.

After several semesters of Listening Logs, I surveyed my students about the process. They mentioned that Listening Logs had encouraged them to try new genres. Overall, their favorites were TV comedies, dramas, and feature films. Their least favorites were lectures, news, and documentaries. Many mentioned learning about American culture through television shows, and a few said they had become involved with campus activities because of the assignment. Several commented that they had noticed an improvement in their listening abilities and critical thinking skills.

Principles The Listening Logs described in this chapter document extensive listening, “listening for pleasure and without obligating the listener to keep demonstrating a

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satisfactory level of understanding” (Field, 2008, p. 54). Extensive listening differs from intensive listening, which focuses on brief listening texts for the purpose of making sense of a language structure or extracting exact details (Waring, 2010). The principles of extensive listening, similar to those of extensive reading (Day & Robb, this volume), promote improved listening through access to greater quantities of listening texts (audio and video recordings and events such as lectures). 1. Learners need access to a wide variety of authentic listening texts. In contrast with the slow, scripted recordings accompanying textbooks, the events students listen to outside class provide authentic input, at a natural pace, in realistic situations (Field, 2008). As my students noted in their Listening Logs, they watched and listened to different language styles, from spontaneous banter in a reality TV show to formal, planned analysis in an academic lecture. Students further benefit from access to the cross-cultural and social dimensions of listening. 2. Learners choose listening opportunities based on individual interests. They should have some background knowledge about the topic in order to draw on prior experience to make sense of what is going on (Field, 2008). With free choice, learners show greater interest and motivation to practice listening and continue learning on their own time (Lynch, 2009). Although I did set some restrictions (such as requiring a variety of genres of TV shows and one live event), within those broad expectations, my students had options. They could select documentaries on topics about which they already had some knowledge or choose a film based on a book they had read in their home language, thus using schema from the past to help understand the present.

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3. Listening texts should be at “i minus 1” level for maximum comprehension. This means that listeners can make sense of almost everything that is being said without much effort (Vandergrift & Goh, 2012). There are many reasons to select listening texts at this level: learners build motivation to continue practicing; they can figure out their limitations; it encourages self-efficacy; and they can focus on content rather than language (Field, 2008). One of my students noted what made comprehension possible in a situation comedy on TV: “…the story and joke is very understandable. Any countries people must have the same problem. …This story about family, so I could understand most of the story.” 4. Students should listen on a regular schedule for a minimum duration each time. In extensive listening, students should make an achievable plan and commit to practicing their listening (Vandergrift & Goh, 2012). With recorded listening texts, learners have control over when, how often, and how long they listen, as well as when, whether, and how often they repeat the recording (Field, 2008). By listening regularly, learners maintain exposure to their new language when they are not in class. My students chose when they listened and attended events with friends, making the assignment a social activity as well. 5. Learners should repeat some listening texts multiple times. “…listening to the same text again allows learners to become familiar with the content, vocabulary, and structure of the spoken text” (Vandergrift & Goh, 2012, p. 201). Repeated listening helps students develop bottom-up skills and learn new language beyond overall comprehension (Field, 2008). Many of my students watched recorded videos more than once to increase their understanding. I believe, however, that learners also need the challenge of live events to

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train their ability to use contextual cues, revise interpretations based on new input, and draw on background knowledge to make sense. 6. Learners should develop metacognitive knowledge about their own listening processes. Repeated listening only helps if leaners know ways to make sense of what they do not immediately understand (Field, 2008). Students should learn strategies to automatize the comprehension process (Goh, 2005). Teachers can help students develop strategies through awareness raising and focused practice (Vandergrift & Goh, 2012). One of my students noted her strategy for understanding Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech: “Actually, it is difficult to hear his voice because he uses high-level vocabularies. However, I can understand the general ideas. He spoke repeatedly some sentences such as I have a dream that one day the state… I have a dream that one day every valley… therefore his presentation was very strong and he made people to be persuaded and understand easily what he said even though they could not understand a lot.” 7. Subtitles may help—but they may hurt. One debate is whether or not learners should use subtitles when watching recorded videos. Vandergrift and Goh (2012) suggest that research shows that students using subtitles had greater listening comprehension and vocabulary learning, although these results may be due to learners’ dependence on reading, rather than on their improved listening abilities. Field (2008) points out that listeners using first language subtitles may not focus on the spoken language. He suggests listening several times before turning on subtitles in the language of the video for subsequent listening. I required my students to attend live events or movies in the theater to ensure that they listened without subtitles once in a while.

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Applications Listening logs allow intermediate and advanced learners to practice extensive listening outside the classroom. Waring (2010) suggests that extensive listening is unsuitable for beginners, who need practice with comprehensible texts at an appropriate level for their language abilities. There are, however, real world listening texts recorded specifically for lower-level learners, such as the BBC and VOA Learning English recordings. (See the Resources section of this chapter for suggestions.) In target language settings, students have opportunities to listen to unedited spoken language in many venues. In other countries, new technologies allow students to develop listening proficiency while learning about other cultures. Students need help finding these opportunities and using them to improve their listening proficiency. A Listening Log entry includes these elements: •

Brief summary of the event

•

Personal response to the content

•

Reflection on the listening experience, including a plan for improving comprehension in the future

•

New idioms, expressions, or vocabulary learned through the experience

Each element of a Listening Log entry advances learners’ listening development. To write a summary, they must attend to main points rather than details. To respond, they must engage with the concepts, connecting background knowledge with what they heard. Reflecting on the experience promotes metacognition, pushing listeners to think about strategies they used for making meaning. Finally, listing new lexical items connects this out-of-class experience with learners’ overall language learning. Teachers should provide

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students with guidelines for how long each section should be and how to present vocabulary words. When Listening Logs are an extension of the classroom, teachers can support students’ independent learning through preparation activities during class time. Teachers must introduce the principles behind extensive listening and the Listening Logs, including the importance of variety and risk-taking to promote language learning. Because most students want to improve their listening abilities, if they understand how the Listening Logs fit their own goals, they will try new genres of listening texts. Students may need guidance in summarizing and response. In my classes, we created a model Listening Log entry after watching a TV show together. Teachers could model language-focused metacognitive reflection. The Metacognitive Awareness Listening Questionnaire (Vandergrift, Goh, Mareschal, & Tafaghodtari, 2006) helps students understand strategies they already use and which they could try in the future. Teachers can support students’ access to listening opportunities available in their region by providing web links to bookstores and organizations with lectures, movie theater listings, and campus events. Lower level students benefit from support of their listening experiences. Students could watch a film in class and discuss it instead of writing an evaluation. Students could use a language self-assessment checklist or rubric (see Wilson, 2003 for a model). Teachers could select appropriate films, shows, or podcasts for a class library or website with links and support materials (vocabulary lists, pre-listening background information, etc.). They could invite guest lecturers to speak on a topic for which the students all have appropriate background knowledge and vocabulary.

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Independent learners keeping Listening Logs will need to find events by themselves. In target-language-speaking countries, they may choose to attend public lectures, audit courses at a university, attend theatre performances, watch movies in the theater, or observe cooking demonstrations at a store. Universities host guest lectures, libraries and bookstores invite authors to read from their books, and movie theatres screen films not available on video. These learners also have access to internet options discussed below. Independent learners in other countries may have limited access to live events, but they can find resources on the internet, including TED talks, streaming audio radio programs, podcasts from VOA, BBC, and NPR, movies, and TV shows. More advanced students may enjoy satire news sites like the Onion. Lower-proficiency learners may focus on “English learning” podcasts and recordings for learners. See the Resources section for links. Regardless of their location, independent learners may want to share their Listening Logs with “Listening Buddies” (Vandergrift & Goh, 2012). Buddies can watch shows together and discuss their responses and what they learned, improving their own learning and gaining new perspective on the content. Advanced students could write listening guides for lower proficiency students, providing a preview of challenging vocabulary or explaining cultural practices in a film or TV show. These could be published on a blo...