10/11 Teaching Listening and Reading Skills:
Listening:
A. Features/Difficulties
Before teaching listening skills, one should keep in mind of what are the
features of spoken language when listening (these features are often what makes
listening “difficult” for language learners):
1)
Clusters (words are spoken in “chunks”-
measurable clusters of words)
2)
Redundancy (provides more processing time for the
hearer)
3)
Reduced forms (I’ll/wanna/gonna)
4)
Performance Variables (hesitations, false starts,
pauses…)
5)
Colloquial language (unlike text language it
contains idioms/slangs…)
6)
Rate of delivery (the length of pauses are
crucial to comprehension)
7)
Stress, rhythm, and intonation (prosodic韻律的 features of English is important for
comprehension)
8)
Interaction (good listeners are good responders)
B. How to help learners develop listening skills
1. Focusing listening:
ü listening
with a purpose
ü listening for
gist
ü listening for
specific details
2. Dealing with unfamiliar vocabulary:
ü activating
background knowledge
ü predicting
ü pre-teaching
vocabulary
ü guessing
meaning
ü making sense
of connected speech
ü identifying
linked words
ü identifying
fillers
ü active
listening
C. Standard-Stages of a listening lesson
I. Warm-up
Lead-in:
Ø engage
learners’ interest
Ø activate
learners’ background knowledge
Ø help
learners’ predict the content
Language focus:
Ø introduce
“key vocabulary” (allow learners the chance to explore and predict other words)
II. Main Task
Ø Listen
several times but with different tasks
Ø Tasks: focus
on gist→ details→sub skills
III. Closure
Language focus:
vocabulary/ grammar/ expressions/ a particular structure…
Transfer: Extend the
listening practice to reading or writing or speaking skills based one what has
been taught. (Ex: homework)
D. Selecting listening texts
Select texts on the
basis of interest, relevance and level (i+1).
Select a wide variety of
texts:
ü Different
text types 多樣化
ü Different
situations 不同情境下產生的文本
ü Levels of
formality 不同風格與場合的文本（正式程度）
ü One way
listening/ Two way listening
ü Different
accents 不排斥其他口音，但仍然以常聽口音為教學基礎
ü Different sources 不同來源的資料/不同型式的資料
E. Principles for teaching listening skills
1)
Include a focus on listening in an
integrated-skills course.
2)
Use techniques that are intrinsically motivating.
3)
Utilize authentic language and contexts.
4)
Carefully consider the form of listeners’
responses.
5)
Encourage the development of listening
strategies.
6)
Include both bottom-up and top-down listening
techniques.
Reading:
A. Features
ü Permanence
(cp. spoken language is fleeting)
ü Processing
time (allow readers to read at their own rate)
ü Distance
(between the author and reader)
ü Orthography
(read between the lines)
ü Complexity
(different modes of complexity)
ü Vocabulary
ü Formality
(more formal than spoken language)
B. How to help learners develop reading skills
Ø Focusing
reading
Ø Reading in
different ways
o Skimming
(read all the context very quickly to get the general idea)
o Scanning
(quickly look through the text, look for a particular piece of information
while skipping the rest)
o Reading for
gist (reading for a purpose)
o Reading for
detail
o Extensive
reading (extensive readings are for fun, the level of the text should be a
little lower for the learner; while intensive reading text should be 1+i level, intensive reading is what we use in classroom teaching)
Ø Sub-skills
o Activating
background knowledge (by brainstorming/ mind-mapping/ only introducing the new
vocabularies that are essential to comprehension)
o Predicting
o Guessing new
words
o Using linkers
(because, however… etc transition words; help learners learn to pick up these
signals and to understand the organization of the content)
C. Standard-Stages of a reading lesson
I. Warm-up:
Lead in & Language
Focus--learner’s interest/ background knowledge/ predict/ key vocabulary
II. Main-Task:
Tasks--Read several
times; skimming/ scanning; gist/ details
Sub skills—guessing
meaning/ identifying signals; check comprehension and explain after each
activity
III. Closure
Language focus—最後才回到語言結構的本身
Transfer—use the reading work as basis for work in a different skill, for
example, speaking or writing.
D. Selecting reading texts
Ø Be interesting
and motivating
Ø Be appropriate
to your learner’s level (i+1); 有成就感才有動力往前走！
Ø Have a
variety of different text types (authentic texts taken from real life)
Ø Include both
extensive reading (for enjoyment and fluency) and intensive reading (what we
use in class teaching)
E. Principles for teaching reading skills
1)
In an integrated course, don’t overlook a
specific focus on reading skills.
2)
Use techniques that are intrinsically motivating.
3)
Balance authenticity and readability in choosing
texts.
4)
Encourage the development of reading strategies.
5)
Include both bottom-up and top-down techniques.
6)
Follow the SQ3R sequence.
7)
Plan on pre-reading, during reading, and
after-reading phases.
8)
Build an assessment aspect into your techniques.
