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Extensive listening
Extensive listening can be used for two different purposes. A
very basic use is the re-presentation of already known material
in a new environment. This could be a recently taught
structure or, say, a lexical set which was introduced months
before and needs revision. The advantage of exposing the
student to old material in this way is that he sees it in action in
a genuine, natural environment rather than in the classroom
context in which it was probably first presented.
Psychologically, extensive listening to the ‘real’ as opposed to
purpose-written English is very satisfying since it
demonstrates that the student’s efforts in the classroom will
pay dividends in life in an English-speaking environment. One
of the greatest and most common failures of language teaching
is that what the student is taught is totally inadequate for
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dealing with the welter of aural stimuli coming at him from all
sides when he first sets foot in England. Extensive listening of
this type helps him considerably.
The materials he hears need not of course be only a re-
presentation of what is already known.
Extensive listening can serve the further function of letting
the student hear vocabulary items and structures which are as
yet unfamiliar to him, interposed in the flow of language
which is within his capacity to handle. There might be
unknown, rather technical words or an unfamiliar verb
form,—for instance, the passive for elementary students or the
subjunctive for the advanced. In this way there is unconscious
familiarisation with forms which will shortly become teaching
points in a language lesson. Story-telling, especially appealing
to younger age groups, is an example of extensive listening and
often includes a considerable proportion of unknown lexis
and some untaught structures. Comprehension is not
normally seriously impeded since the compelling interest of
the story holds the attention and the familiarity of the great
body of the language is enough to provide a sufficiently
explanatory setting for the unknown material.
The teacher himself is the source of the model in story
telling. As one of the aims of extensive listening is to
represent old material in a new way, it is often best that this is
done by means of authentic tapes of English people talking
together (and so providing the model), where the teacher
himself is not involved. Of course it is possible to write a
script for recording which illustrates the particular points to
be made, but this is a highly-skilled task and the student gets
enough specially written material in his textbooks anyway.
Much more effective and convincing are extracts of real, live
English speech. It is surprisingly easy to build up a library of
suitable tapes. An expensive way is to buy commercial tapes
put out by the big publishing companies. The tapes that
accompany Crystal and Davy’s Advanced Conversational
English, for instance, are invaluable at the most advanced
levels. There is also a Workbook by K.Morrow to help
exploit the material.
Generally, the best resource for extensive listening
passages is going to be the recordings which the teacher
makes himself. These can be from a wide variety of sources—
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recordings made whilst in England, recordings of local native
English speakers, recordings from local English language TV
and radio broadcasts (including advertisements), and,
perhaps most accessible of all, recordings from the BBC
World Service which can be heard worldwide and has an
enormous selection of programmes to choose from.
Once a collection of tapes of this nature has been made,
they have to be graded according to language level
(elementary, intermediate, advanced) and according to the
points they illustrate. They also have to be made available to
students to listen to. If the teacher wants the whole class to
listen to a passage for revision or to prepare the way for
future lessons, this can of course be done in the normal
sequence of a lesson. One of the advantages of extensive
listening passages is that they need not be under the direct
control of the teacher but function as back-up material for
the student to listen to in his own time at his own speed. At
the most sophisticated level, this can be done in the language
laboratory, which should have a library facility providing
tapes for extensive listening. The language lab. is particularly
useful in providing listening rather than speaking practice.
Many language classrooms today have one or more tape
recorders which can be used for individual or small group
listening purposes either during class time (with no
disturbance to other people working on other things, if good
headphones and a junction box are used) or during a fixed
period outside regular hours when supervision is provided.
The most flexible system, however, is to make available
cassette tapes for home loan, since cassette recorders are
commonplace in many parts of the world today. The student
can then work when and where he likes, as often as he likes.
Whichever system, or mixture of systems, is adopted, even
greater benefit is possible if a stencilled sheet of instructions
and follow-up questions goes with suitable tapes.
Occasionally, notes might be provided to introduce and give
a setting for the recording. Some types of tapes lend
themselves to reinforcement by visuals—a picture guide to
London is a good accompaniment to a conversation about
the city, and it can be used in class as a visual form of
preparation for the tape itself.
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