If you want to use a listening passage for both 'learning to listen' and 'listening to learn' purposes, then you will probably need to plan a cycle of activities.

Below, we propose four stages in designing such a cycle.

1. Preparation
   This involves setting the scene so that learners have a schematic framework for understanding. If you are using an extract that focuses on a particular topic, get students to discuss what they know about this topic before they listen. Tell students briefly about the passage they are about to hear, and ask them to write questions they think might be answered in it. You may also need to familiarize learners with key vocabulary before they listen in order to prime their bottom-up processing. For suggested exercise types, see Section 5.3.1, Tasks for top-down processing.
   
   
2. Gist understanding
   As we mentioned in Section 5.1.4, humans aim first for meaning! So, get learners to try to establish the key information from a passage as quickly as possible - get them to have confidence in making intelligent guesses on the basis of what little they may have understood. Further, get them to identify questions that they may need to answer during a second or third listening in order to confirm or modify their initial guesses. As a rule of thumb, set no more than five gist questions. If your class are likely to find answering five questions demanding, distribute the questions around pairs or groups in your class: one group then only has to focus on one question. Multiple choice and True/False questions can be particularly useful at this stage, as they can reinforce key vocabulary while still engaging learners in active listening.
   
   
3. Checking and focusing on detail
   Learners constantly need to check their understanding and then focus, if necessary on more detail. Depending on the level of the students, it is at this stage that they will need to focus more carefully on the way the information is presented in the passage and the precise language used.
   
   
• 'Note down' exercises (eg 'note down all points mentioned for... and all points mentioned against', 'note down all the details that are mentioned about...').
• Correction exercises focusing on details such as dates, sizes, towns, numbers etc.
• Who said what? exercises (see Section 5.3.2 Tasks for bottom up processing)

Finally, at this stage, particularly with more advanced learners, it is appropriate to ask learners to 'interpret' the significance of what has been heard more fully. Questions such as 'Why did the reporter mention ....?', 'What do you think X really meant when he said ...?' or 'Do you think X will ... ?' . These kinds of questions encourage learners to understand the passage at what we have referred to as Level 3 (Section 5.1.4), where the speakers' intentions, and not just their meanings, are interpreted. You can then encourage your learners to move on to Level 4 where they need to respond to what they have understood.

4. Language focus Here learners' attention is focused on language that they may want to learn, so bottom-up processes are engaged. See the range of exercises in Section 5.3.2, Tasks for bottom-up processing.

Reflective task 16

English version (translation)

French version (original)

Click here to hear the original dialogue

When you've made your notes, click here to compare your ideas with the original.