Teaching Listening

Two themes will wind through this discussion. The first is the necessity of supporting students’ learning. Listening in another language is a hard job, but we can make it easier by applying what we know about activating prior knowledge, helping students organize their learning by thinking about their purposes for listening, and if speaking is also a goal of the classroom, using well-structured speaking tasks informed by research.

Another theme will be motivation. Because listening is so challenging, teachers need to think carefully about making our activities successful and our content interesting. Both themes are united by a focus on the students. We need to capitalize on the knowledge and interests they already possess. Then we need to help them apply that knowledge and those interests so they can become effective listeners. Download here.