John Field Universities of Reading and Cambridge, uk

Dealing with unknown words

• I found out that the thud was the cat
• the sound was the cat
• I found out that the front was the cat
• the thing was the cat the fog of the cat
• I found that the sun in the cat
• I found out the frog and the cat
• I found out that is a cat
• I found that was the cat
• I thought it was a cat
• in the front was the cat
• I found out where was the cat
• what I thought that a cat

Unfamiliar words

• I found out that the thud was the cat.
• L2 listener in class
• ‘Can you work out the meaning from the context?’
• L2 listener in the real world
• the thought / front / sun was the cat
• L1 listener hearing a new word:
• Identify as new word rather than known
• Ignore – Generalise – Infer meaning from context

New word or known? Exercise types (Field: Listening in the Language Classroom, Chap 12)

• a. ‘Which word doesn’t belong? Write it.’ Teacher dictates sets of words, where the ‘odd one out’ is an unfamiliar word that resembles a familiar one.
• summer – autumn – string – winter
• purple – yellow – drown - green – orange
• cousin – sister – nephew – ankle – daughter
• b.Teacher plays a short authentic passage. Learners identify new words (e.g. count how many, attempt to transcribe them).