1. Teaching Listening
LLT 307!

2. The Nature of the L2 Listening Process
Level-appropriate input  development (i.e., Krashen’s comprehensible input)
Listening is fundamental to speaking
DISCUSS:
1. What do you think are second language learners’ greatest difficulties with listening?
2. To what extent do you think listening can be taught? What do you think the role of the teacher is in a listening class?
3. RQ1: Second sentence of the chapter – No other type of language input is as easy to process as spoken language, received through listening. Do you agree with this statement? Why (not)?
4. RQ3: (Starting on p. 88) – What is meant by “bottom-up” and “top-down” listening. How/where does “schemata” fit in? And how could these models be represented visually? (Try drawing them out.)
5. Post Q1: The reading says little to nothing about integrating skills. How can listening activities be integrated with other skills?
6. Post Q2 : What are some types of pre-activities that might help learners comprehend and carry out listening tasks?

3. Top Down vs. Bottom Up Bottom Up processes rely on:
Sounds (phonemes; [k] [t] [b] [p])
Words
Phrases
Top Down processes rely on:
Context
Topic
World
Text

4. Beginners-Activities
Topics of immediate/personal relevance
Bottom Up
Discriminate intonation contours
Discriminate phonemes (e.g., minimal pairs)
ID morphological endings
Recognize syllables and stress
Be aware of fillers
Select specific info.
Top Down
Discriminate emotion
Get the gist
Recognize topic
Both
Formal or Informal?
Relate words  Categories
Compare incoming info. to memory/experience

5. Intermediate-Activities
Bottom Up
Stress for content and function words
Find stressed syllable
Recognize words w/ reduced syllables
Recognize linked words
Recognize pertinent details
Top Down
ID register and tone
ID speaker/topic
ID main idea and details
Inferences
Both
Stress for intent
Recognize missing grammar (e.g., morphemes)

6. Advanced Focus on idioms, vocabulary, nuance
A qualitative shift—using L2 to acquire content knowledge
Top Down
Predict content from topic, intro., direction, 1 section to next
ID main idea
ID point of view
Both
Use discourse markers to predict content
Bottom up
Use stress to recognize asides
ID written and spoken contrasts
ID ignorable performance slips
ID definition markers

7. Pre-Post Framework for Listening
Pre-listening
Introduce new/important/targeted vocab
Background info / activate schema
While-listening
Extensive listening (longer text) followed by general questions establishing context
Intensive listening (shorter, repeated text) followed by detailed comprehension questions
Post-listening
Analysis of the language in the text
inferring meaning of unfamiliar vocabulary

8. Design a Listening Activity
Write (or find and modify) a simulated but authentic text, and decide what learners will do before, during, and after listening.
Considerations
L1, age/grade, proficiency, subject (if relevant)
Principles on p. 89 of Peterson (2001) 
Focus on bottom-up or top-down listening or both?
Objectives
Pre-post framework
Contextualized, meaningful (vs. mechanical)
Multiple areas of communicative competence?
Strategies needed/helpful?
Assessment

9. Assessing Listening The “classic” listening assessment (Pros? Cons?)
Issues/challenges
Impossible to assess directly
(Appropriate) combination of top-down and bottom-up items
Listening subsumes other skills/knowledge
Responding to listening requires other skills/knowledge
Unauthentic to just listen
ACTFL Guidelines for Listening: