Listening Comprehension 2

Listening Comprehension

1. General questions

   • Why is the development of listening comprehension essential?
   • How does the current situation in the EFL classroom concerning listening comprehension look like?
   • Why is listening often regarded as the most difficult language skill to learn?
   • Which advantages do accrue when giving pre-eminence to listening comprehension (particularly in the early stages of SLA)?

2. implications for teaching listening comprehension

   • applying a three-stage framework in the comprehension process
     • Stage 1: pre-listening
     • Stage 2: while-listening
       • tasks with non-verbal response
       • tasks with short verbal response
     • Stage 3: post-listening
   • Designing a task
     • Manipulating of the input
       • Different listening activities
       • Text selection for the classroom
     • Manipulating of the task
     • criteria for evaluating activities and exercises
   • goals
     • listening for comprehension (learning to listen)
     • Developing strategies
       • metacognitive strategies (listening comprehension checklists)
       • cognitive strategies
       • interactive strategies
     • listening for acquisition (listening to learn)
   • priciples for teaching listening in primary school

3. A model of language comprehension: Top-down processing and bottom-up processing

   • Do the two models of language comprehension oppose each other?
   • In which way is our knowledge stored?
   • What is the top-down process and what happens there?
   • Which types of knowledge do we use in the bottom-up process to understand spoken language?
   • What is the bottom-up process and what happens there?
   • What is listening on a general level?