Every English language student is expected to master the four language skills: reading, writing, listening and speaking. Among these, listening is a greatly integrative skill and it plays a vital role in the process of language learning, promoting the rise of other language skills since it is the first skill students are exposed to. It is a receptive skill which involves taking in information through the ears, processing and understanding the message and its importance and giving feedback. Actually, listening is the most common communicative activity in daily life, since people listen twice as much as they speak, four times more than they read, and five times more than they write (Morley, 1991:82). In spite of its importance, teachers appear to avoid teaching the listening skill to their students and focus only on speaking, writing and reading skills. Listening is commonly viewed as the most challenging skill both to learn and teach, because of its temporal nature, the complexity of the listening processes and the special features of spoken language (Ur, 1984). What is more, the constrained class time, lack of resources at …show more content…
Hearing refers to the “physical perception of sound, while listening is a complex combination of hearing, seeing, comprehending and interpreting communication” (Battel, 2006). In this sense, listening goes far beyond the natural and involuntary hearing process. It involves paying attention to the message while making an effort to understand it. The aim if this active skill is to interpret information and act upon it. In the EFL classroom, it is widely assumed that listening leads to learning since it is the main source of input. Besides, learners listen before learning to speak, write or read. Though teachers and textbooks acknowledge this skill as the fundamental one in language learning, it is usually given minimal class time or overlooked
Turner (2009) mentioned that ‘Listening is used at least three times as much as speaking and at least four times as much as reading and writing. Listening is an essential skill
It's highly unlikely, regardless of how good you are as a key account manager, that you will never face the prospect of an unhappy customer in one of your key accounts. Issues happen. There are always aspects that are out of your personal control, so being prepared to deal with one of your key customer's unhappiness ahead of time is well advised. In the heat of the moment is not when you want to strategically try to come up with a plan to diffuse your customer as quickly as possible.
Whom do you call when you have exciting news or when you are feeling down? What makes this person a good listener? Are you a good listener in return? Who is the person who calls you when they have exciting news or when they are feeling down? Why do you think they call on you? Based on what you read in this chapter, how can you continue to improve your listening skills?
In our daily lives, while interacting with others, there is a continual integration of the four skills. Interaction in the classroom setting is not different in this sense, as we will find that in our lessons, reading, writing, listening and speaking are inevitably interrelated, supporting each other. The fact that the four skills have been divided, so as to understand the processes involved in the mastery of each of them, does not mean that they do not coexist. For example, a written prompt for discussion involves not only reading and speaking, but also listening to appropriately respond to what has been said. Also, after discussion the prompt a written activity can be set.
The ability to listen actively is the most primitive of the communication skill yet the most difficult to master. Active listening is also essential to communicate well with others. Active listening demonstrates both verbally and nonverbally when having a reciprocal conversation that the listener is truly attentive to what it is being said.
A conundrum about teachers’ attitudes towards students as listeners is that although most teachers assume students come to school knowing how to listen, those same teachers agree that students need to learn more about listening since it is a skill crucial for learning. Four types of listening have been distinguished according to an individual’s purpose for listening. Those types are: discriminative listening, aesthetic listening, efferent listening, and critical listening. From early years, students take part in discriminative and aesthetic listening, as these types of listening create the early groundwork for learning to read. Students engage in efferent listening when they begin to understand that they listen to learn specific information
I am glad that you emphasized active listening skills. As stated in the first post, communication is defined as a two-way process to express a message or pass on information and this process has to include a speaker and a listener.
Communication is an essential part of our daily lives. We communicate on a daily basis for a number of reasons however many people are unaware of the vast complexity of the communication process (Haynes, Moran & Pindzola, 2005). Listening and speaking skills are essential in the educational sector. Students need to listen to their educators, as well as peers in order to create meaning of texts. In this way they can give intelligent answers and demonstrate critical thought. Speaking is also essential because students need to be able to associate with others and develop effective strategies for communication. There are certain issues that educators face when it comes to listening and speaking skills. In this essay I would critically discuss factors such as; Hearing impairment, Auditory Processing Disorder (APD), Boredom, Emotional barriers, Language, stuttering and phonological
with each child, because they will all have different personalities and each will have their own issues they may be dealing with.
Most of my experience in trying to quickly establish a helping relationship of mutual trust and respect is with people in the middle of a traumatic event. I always remain calm and keep a level voice, I want them to feel like they are being treated in a warm and friendly manner. I normally use active listening skills in order to convey respect for the individual and make them feel like their problem is important and a priority. Especially when helping someone in a panic state, using repetitive persistence has been very beneficial. In that, I will repeat as many times as needed, “I need you to tell me what you need so we can help you (or a family/friend that may be in distress),” to get the person to focus on the situation and let them know
Listening is one of the important four skills that need to be mastered when acquiring a second foreign language. Among the four skills, listening is recognized as the most difficult one (Young, 2012). Students’ difficulties in listening comprehension may start from the bottom stage, such as they can’t recognize a sound that they may know if it is in written form or they can’t comprehend complex and long speeches. If they hear a sound that they don’t know, sometimes they can’t rely on dictionary to know the meaning as they can’t figure out its spelling. Given those problems, however, listening comprehension still received the least attention in the teaching of Second Language learning. Generally, it is the least skill that taught by the teacher in school. Listening
Listening is more complex, and it encourages one to analyze and think about an idea, rather than to simply accept it (or “hear” it). Hearing is a skill that is beneficial for every aspect of life. As long as we have our ability to hear, we will always perceive different sounds, music, and voices. Listening, however, is beneficial to us in specific instances. It is important for us to attain good listening skills in education, the work force, and in our relationships with others in order to succeed. Good listening in education will bring about confident participation in class discussions; good listening in the workplace will lead to cooperation and good teamwork among colleagues; good listening in relationships is healthy and positive, for it is important to hear what an individual has to say in order to know how they feel.
6. Describe your listening skills. In what ways are you good at listening? How are your listening skills lacking? Why?
In the classroom where formal learning takes place, learners are engaged in a lot of listening and speaking activities. The quality of listening and speaking activities affects the quality of learners’ communication competence. This somehow affects succeeding tasks that are dependent on the speaking and listening skills. A teacher may favor more activities on reading, writing and listening skills to reduce the classroom noise but it is equally vital to provide speaking activities as the development of the speaking skill is invaluable in the everyday interactions with people and eventually in the workplace.
A fundamental aspect of acquiring skills in a new language is the ability to communicate messages in writing. For a teacher of English as a second language, nurturing students to develop sound writing skills is crucial to the success of the student both as a learner of the language, and their skills communication skills in reading, speaking and even listening in English. The natural ability of native speakers to communicate in a given language does not automatically indicate proficiency in their writing skills, which must be acquired.