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Abstract:This paper discusses English listening problems in Middle School. The author analyzes the reasons why listening is more difficult than others, telling the importance and the current situations of teaching English listening, and analyzing the reason why English listening is very poor in a middle school. Then the author gives some advice. At the end of the paper, the author emphasises the importance of listening, and hopes all the teachers pay attention to English listening.
Key words: English listening；listening ways；predicting；practising
中图分类号：G632.0 文献标识码：A 文章编号：1992-7711(2013)24-0096
I. Introduction
It is well known that “The aim of English teaching in a middle school is to make the students accept complete training including listening, speaking, reading and writing. Gain the basic knowledge of English and the capability of using English for the purpose of communication.” The right training order of the four skills should be listening is ahead of speaking, speaking ahead of reading, reading ahead of writing, The students of junior middle schools are lively, like to speak and act, eager to get knowledge and imitative, and they are not afraid of speaking wrongly. So most of them can take an active part in the training , especially in the training of listening and speaking. The teachers should insist on training the student’s listening and speaking according to these characteristics, pay more attention to their pronunciation and intonation, guide them to practice listening all the time, to master and use English correctly. It can not only improve the students’ learning interest but also heighten their confidence.It will surely be a good start in their later study. The development of good listening skills often has a beneficial effect on speaking and reading abilities.
From the points of the above, listening precedes speaking and it provides a basic for language learning. So if the teacher wants to develop the students’ reading and writing skills, enhance the quality of English teaching in junior middle schools, more attention should be paid to teaching of listening.
II. The problems of English Listening in Junior Middle School
Unfortunately, in junior middle schools, English listening is paid little attention. It is often neglected. In my opinion, there are some reasons:
1. The mark in listening in the papers is very low
In the usual tests, the papers seldom include the listening. Of course, especially in the countryside, only a few students in one class can go to key middle schools, almost half can not go to senior middle schools, they will go home to engage in other jobs. It seems that there is no need for them to practise and enhance the listening. So teachers pay more attention to reading and writing which is the chief component of the entrance exam. 2. Setting scenes
As we have said before, listening to passages in the classroom can be. more different than listening in real life, because of the lack of context.So the teacher can help provide the background information to activate learners’ schema, so they will be better prepared to understand what they hear. But most textbook do not provide enough variety of types of listening tasks, so the teacher will need to evaluate the tasks provided, adapt and design tasks to provide more variety. Variety is very important, not only does it help students remain interested and motivated to learn, but also it also provides practice in many types of listening situations learners will encounter in real life. So teachers should give more materials that have something to do with the textbook besides the listening materials in the book, such as dialogue in the shop, the neighbors, the school life, humor play and English short news and so on. And teachers can also let students listen to English songs and the context of listening and used to speak of English listening and, pronunciation. Then they will feel listening is not difficult. But we must insist on even if there are no enough time, teachers can make a conversation to let students practise each other, just like seeing a doctor, asking for lean, meeting friends or taking part in party. Student practise their speaking while listening.
3. Practising
The while-listening stage is the most difficult for the teacher to control, because this is where the students need to pay attention and process the information actively. They should know the repeated information. High voice, slow speed might be signals of the important points. Low voice and rapid speaking might show that these mentions are less important points. Here are some activities while listening. The first type is Listen and Act, which concentrates on listening language by listening and responding physically to commands or directions. There are many variations of how this can be carried out in a classroom. With beginners, it is easy to start with simple commands such as “Stand up.” “Sit down.” Walk to the door:“Close the door.” “Point to the window.” “Hold up your pencil box.” “Put your left hand on your head.” “Put your right hand on your left ear.”and so on. At intermediate levels, the commands can become more complex.The second type is Listen and Draw. The students are drawing pictures, diagrams and so on on paper. The third type is Listen and Fill. The students can read alone while they listen to something and fill in blanks with the words that they hear. The fourth type is Listen and Guess. Teachers can provide oral description of a person, place, thing or actions. Learners write down what they think it is. One game that can be played is to ask the students to write down descriptions of themselves after they have learned vocabulary for height, appearance, and personalities. The teacher can collect the descriptions and then choose ten or so to read out aloud to the whole class, so that the students can write down silently who they think is being described. Then, the answers can be confirmed and anyone who guessed all of them correctly is the “winner. Another game is to have the students write down four or five clues that describe an animal after they have learned the names of several animals and some vocabularies such as colors, and some parts of the body such as eyes, feet, feathers, fins, fur, spots and so on. Then the students can take turns coming to the front of the class and reading out their clues, while the rest of the students write down what. Animal they think it is. A variation of the animal game is to divide the class into two or three teams and have the team members take turns to call out what animal they think it might be after each clue is read.
4. Testing
The post-listening stage is where the teacher can determine how well the students have understood what they listened to. So it is important to design the tasks well. One important point to keep in mind is whether we are testing the students’ listening comprehension or their memory. Here are some types: First, Multiple choice questions, it is the most typical type of post-listening task, it can prepare students to take traditional multiple choice tests. Second, Answering questions, it can be helpful for students to remember the content of the text. Third, Noting taking and gap-filling. This is a good example of how while-listening and post-listening is combined. In a word, all exercises are designed in order to let students understand the listening materials.
5. Communicating with each other.
The teacher should use more English less native language when he or she is in class. Because there is a great relationship between listening and speaking, once we think listening speaking are passive, for instance, when we begin our class, we can say something with students using some simple sentences like “Good morning.”“Hello.” “What is the date today?”“What day is today?”“What is the weather like today?”“Who is on duty today’?”If students can answer these questions frequently, it shows that they understand what teachers said. And if they understand what teachers mean, they will communicate with each other. Students can practice their listening and can go over sentences which they have learned, so that they improve their listening. At the same time, teacher can enhance students’ vocabulary while communicating with them. Students must know what they are listening, and what they want to say. So teachers should encourage them to read more news, books and other materials by themselves, so that they can increase their vocabulary. As we know ,it is difficult to remember a lonely word, but if we put them into the text or into the news, it is comparatively easy. And when students read ,maybe they will know more information. It is helpful for them to understand the materials of listening.
IV. Conclusions
We believe that good Listening is very important for students to learn English well. It is helpful to speak ,write and read English. So teachers should use a lot of ways to teach listening so that students can find the best way which is fit for them. At the same time, teachers should encourage students to find more materials to listen and give them more chances of practicing listening, encourage them to listen and communicate with others using correct English as much as possible. Only with these improvements in teaching, can the students’ listening be developed effectively and efficiently.
References:
[1] Msafiri,Sinkala. the Teacher, the student and the classroom[M]. Beijing:Beijing Normal University Press,2002.
(作者单位：内蒙古自治区阿拉善盟阿右旗一中 737300)
Key words: English listening；listening ways；predicting；practising
中图分类号：G632.0 文献标识码：A 文章编号：1992-7711(2013)24-0096
I. Introduction
It is well known that “The aim of English teaching in a middle school is to make the students accept complete training including listening, speaking, reading and writing. Gain the basic knowledge of English and the capability of using English for the purpose of communication.” The right training order of the four skills should be listening is ahead of speaking, speaking ahead of reading, reading ahead of writing, The students of junior middle schools are lively, like to speak and act, eager to get knowledge and imitative, and they are not afraid of speaking wrongly. So most of them can take an active part in the training , especially in the training of listening and speaking. The teachers should insist on training the student’s listening and speaking according to these characteristics, pay more attention to their pronunciation and intonation, guide them to practice listening all the time, to master and use English correctly. It can not only improve the students’ learning interest but also heighten their confidence.It will surely be a good start in their later study. The development of good listening skills often has a beneficial effect on speaking and reading abilities.
From the points of the above, listening precedes speaking and it provides a basic for language learning. So if the teacher wants to develop the students’ reading and writing skills, enhance the quality of English teaching in junior middle schools, more attention should be paid to teaching of listening.
II. The problems of English Listening in Junior Middle School
Unfortunately, in junior middle schools, English listening is paid little attention. It is often neglected. In my opinion, there are some reasons:
1. The mark in listening in the papers is very low
In the usual tests, the papers seldom include the listening. Of course, especially in the countryside, only a few students in one class can go to key middle schools, almost half can not go to senior middle schools, they will go home to engage in other jobs. It seems that there is no need for them to practise and enhance the listening. So teachers pay more attention to reading and writing which is the chief component of the entrance exam. 2. Setting scenes
As we have said before, listening to passages in the classroom can be. more different than listening in real life, because of the lack of context.So the teacher can help provide the background information to activate learners’ schema, so they will be better prepared to understand what they hear. But most textbook do not provide enough variety of types of listening tasks, so the teacher will need to evaluate the tasks provided, adapt and design tasks to provide more variety. Variety is very important, not only does it help students remain interested and motivated to learn, but also it also provides practice in many types of listening situations learners will encounter in real life. So teachers should give more materials that have something to do with the textbook besides the listening materials in the book, such as dialogue in the shop, the neighbors, the school life, humor play and English short news and so on. And teachers can also let students listen to English songs and the context of listening and used to speak of English listening and, pronunciation. Then they will feel listening is not difficult. But we must insist on even if there are no enough time, teachers can make a conversation to let students practise each other, just like seeing a doctor, asking for lean, meeting friends or taking part in party. Student practise their speaking while listening.
3. Practising
The while-listening stage is the most difficult for the teacher to control, because this is where the students need to pay attention and process the information actively. They should know the repeated information. High voice, slow speed might be signals of the important points. Low voice and rapid speaking might show that these mentions are less important points. Here are some activities while listening. The first type is Listen and Act, which concentrates on listening language by listening and responding physically to commands or directions. There are many variations of how this can be carried out in a classroom. With beginners, it is easy to start with simple commands such as “Stand up.” “Sit down.” Walk to the door:“Close the door.” “Point to the window.” “Hold up your pencil box.” “Put your left hand on your head.” “Put your right hand on your left ear.”and so on. At intermediate levels, the commands can become more complex.The second type is Listen and Draw. The students are drawing pictures, diagrams and so on on paper. The third type is Listen and Fill. The students can read alone while they listen to something and fill in blanks with the words that they hear. The fourth type is Listen and Guess. Teachers can provide oral description of a person, place, thing or actions. Learners write down what they think it is. One game that can be played is to ask the students to write down descriptions of themselves after they have learned vocabulary for height, appearance, and personalities. The teacher can collect the descriptions and then choose ten or so to read out aloud to the whole class, so that the students can write down silently who they think is being described. Then, the answers can be confirmed and anyone who guessed all of them correctly is the “winner. Another game is to have the students write down four or five clues that describe an animal after they have learned the names of several animals and some vocabularies such as colors, and some parts of the body such as eyes, feet, feathers, fins, fur, spots and so on. Then the students can take turns coming to the front of the class and reading out their clues, while the rest of the students write down what. Animal they think it is. A variation of the animal game is to divide the class into two or three teams and have the team members take turns to call out what animal they think it might be after each clue is read.
4. Testing
The post-listening stage is where the teacher can determine how well the students have understood what they listened to. So it is important to design the tasks well. One important point to keep in mind is whether we are testing the students’ listening comprehension or their memory. Here are some types: First, Multiple choice questions, it is the most typical type of post-listening task, it can prepare students to take traditional multiple choice tests. Second, Answering questions, it can be helpful for students to remember the content of the text. Third, Noting taking and gap-filling. This is a good example of how while-listening and post-listening is combined. In a word, all exercises are designed in order to let students understand the listening materials.
5. Communicating with each other.
The teacher should use more English less native language when he or she is in class. Because there is a great relationship between listening and speaking, once we think listening speaking are passive, for instance, when we begin our class, we can say something with students using some simple sentences like “Good morning.”“Hello.” “What is the date today?”“What day is today?”“What is the weather like today?”“Who is on duty today’?”If students can answer these questions frequently, it shows that they understand what teachers said. And if they understand what teachers mean, they will communicate with each other. Students can practice their listening and can go over sentences which they have learned, so that they improve their listening. At the same time, teacher can enhance students’ vocabulary while communicating with them. Students must know what they are listening, and what they want to say. So teachers should encourage them to read more news, books and other materials by themselves, so that they can increase their vocabulary. As we know ,it is difficult to remember a lonely word, but if we put them into the text or into the news, it is comparatively easy. And when students read ,maybe they will know more information. It is helpful for them to understand the materials of listening.
IV. Conclusions
We believe that good Listening is very important for students to learn English well. It is helpful to speak ,write and read English. So teachers should use a lot of ways to teach listening so that students can find the best way which is fit for them. At the same time, teachers should encourage students to find more materials to listen and give them more chances of practicing listening, encourage them to listen and communicate with others using correct English as much as possible. Only with these improvements in teaching, can the students’ listening be developed effectively and efficiently.
References:
[1] Msafiri,Sinkala. the Teacher, the student and the classroom[M]. Beijing:Beijing Normal University Press,2002.
(作者单位：内蒙古自治区阿拉善盟阿右旗一中 737300)