| What a strange title! Soon you'll understand why I | | | | one of the passages or conversations from the |
| chose it. But first, why improve your listening skills? | | | | textbook. He stopped the tape often to give the |
| In talking with students at our college, I find that listening | | | | students a chance to write what they heard. Then the |
| and speaking (conversation) are high on the list of | | | | students listened to the whole passage or |
| reasons they come to Canada to study English. It's | | | | conversation again. After that, they checked their work |
| often hard, even if you got high marks in English in your | | | | and sometimes listened again. |
| own country, to understand native speakers. | | | | So, what difference did it make? At the end of the |
| And yet, listening is probably the most important skill of | | | | month, both groups were better at listening. But the |
| all. It's the first one you learned as a child. You need it in | | | | students who had done the dictation exercises had |
| every conversation. You need it to learn English both | | | | improved more than twice as much! |
| inside class and outside class. | | | | So what does this mean for you? If your ESL teacher |
| Now, why 110 to 165 minutes? | | | | is not a native speaker of English, it is important for |
| Let me start by saying that in the experiment, this time | | | | you to listen to native speakers. Why not buy some |
| was broken up into 11 sessions. Psychologists tell us | | | | ESL tapes or DVDs? You can pause them after each |
| that it's much easier to learn a new skill a little bit at a | | | | phrase, write what you hear, and check it with the |
| time instead of all at once. | | | | student's book or teacher's manual. |
| Sixty men age 20 to 35 who were studying English at | | | | Even if your ESL teacher is a native speaker of |
| a language institute in Iran were put into two groups. | | | | English, the extra practice can still help you; our |
| Both groups were given a listening test at the beginning | | | | students often ask to borrow listening materials. |
| of the experiment. Their results were about the same. | | | | Use this simple technique and learn to understand |
| The same teacher taught both groups of students the | | | | English better and better! |
| next month. Both classes did the listening exercises in | | | | (If you want to learn more about this study, please |
| the textbook, but one group also did 11 dictation | | | | read The Effect of Frequent Dictation on the Listening |
| exercises. These lasted from 10 to 15 minutes. First, | | | | Comprehension Ability of Elementary EFL Learners by |
| the teacher told them what the dictation was about. | | | | G. Reza Kiany and Ebrahim Shiramiry in the TESL |
| Then he played a tape of native speaker(s) reading | | | | Canada Journal, Vol. 20, No. 1, Winter 2002. |