to maximize their comprehension of aural

input, identify relevant and non-relevant

Teaching Listening & Speaking information, and tolerate less than word-
by-word comprehension.

The Nature of Listening

Demonstrate understanding of the Listening takes as much as 50% of our
nature of the four language macro- everyday communication time. It is the
components (listening, speaking, main channel of classroom instruction and
reading, writing, including grammar) the most used language skill at work and
and the theoretical bases, at home. Many learners want to develop
principles, methods, and strategies effective listening comprehension because
in teaching these components. it is a crucial to their academic,
professional, and personal success.
Prof. Sonia R. Manzano When we teach listening we consider
Prof. Maria Sarah A. Palma what the object of our instruction is. We
look at ideas that have influenced
Part I: CONTENT UPDATE thinking of learner listening in English
language teaching.
Introduction
Listening is the neglected Kinds of Listening
communication skill. While all of us Teachers can help students become
have had instruction in reading, effective listeners by making them aware
writing, and speaking, few have had of the different kinds of listening, the
any formal instructions in listening. different purposes for listening, and the
Most of us spend seven of every 10 qualities of good listeners. Wolvin and
minutes of out walking time in some Coakley (1992) identify four different
form of communication activity. Of kinds of listening.
these seven minutes (or 70% of the  Comprehensive(Informational)Listening
time we are awake). 10% is spent -Students listen for the content of
writing, 15% reading, 30% talking, the message
and 45% listening.  Critical(Evaluate) Listening- Student
Think of it! We spend nearly judge the message
half of our communication time  Appreciative(Aesthetic)Listening-
listening but few of us make any real Students listen for enjoyment.
effort to be better listeners. For  Therapeutic(Empathetic)Listening-
those who do, however, the effort Students listen to support others but
pays great dividend-higher not judge them.
productivity, faster learning, and
better relationships. The Purposes for Listening
Listening is more than merely Listening requires conscious mental
hearing word. Listening is an active effort and specific purpose. The purposes
process by which students receive, of listening relate to “types” of
construct meaning form, and respond listening:
to spoken and or non-verbal messages
(Emmert, 1994). As such, it forms an  Are you listening to receive
integral part of the communication information?
process and should not be separated
 Are you listening to follow
from the other language arts.
instructions?
Listening comprehension complements
reading comprehension. Verbally  Are you listening to evaluate
clarifying the spoken message before, information?
during, and after a presentation  Are you listening for pleasure?
enhances listening comprehension.  Are you listening to emphasize?
Writing, in turn, clarifies and Students should be able to determine
documents the spoken message. what their purpose should be in any given
listening situation.
The Goal of Teaching Listening Listening Comprehensive skills or Enabling
As teachers, we want to produce skills:
students, who even if they do not have  Listening for details-involves
complete control of the grammar or an listening for specific information
extensive lexicon, can fend for themselves  Listening for gist- listen for main
in communication situations. In the case ideas
of listening, this means producing  Drawing inferences- ability to fill
students who can use listening strategies in gaps in the input
  Listening selectively- listen only  Utilization occurs when listeners
to specific parts of the input. relate mental representations of the
 Making predictions- ability to input to existing knowledge in long-
anticipate before and during term memory
listening what one is going to
hear. Bottom-up Listening
Listening as a PRODUCT This refers to a process by which
It shows what listeners do in order sounds are used to build up units of
to demonstrate their understanding. It is information, such as words, phrases,
described in terms of outcomes which are clauses and sentences before the aural
stated either verbally or non-verbally. input is understood.
Examples of listening outcomes: Kjkj
 Follow instructions Top-down processing
This refers to the application of
 Organize and classify information
background knowledge to facilitate
 Take effective notes comprehension.
 Take dictation It is generally believed now that
 Transfer information into graphic both top-down and bottom-up processing
forms occur at the same time in what is known as
 Reconstruct original text parallel processing (Eysenck, 1993). In
 Make appropriate oral response some instances, one type of processing
might take precedence over the other,
Listening as a PROCESS depending on the amount of practice an
Students do not have an innate individual has had on a specific task.
understanding of what effective listeners
do; therefore, it is the responsibility ofJhg Factors that Influence Learners’ Listening
teachers to share that knowledge with Three sources of information are
them. Perhaps the most valuable way to crucial to how language learners listen:
teach listening skills is for teachers to
model them themselves creating an 1. Background knowledge (schematic)
environment which encourages listening. 2. Knowledge of the situation and co-
Teachers can create such an environment by text (contextual)
positive interaction, actively listening 3. Knowledge of the language system
to all students and responding in an open (systemic)
and appropriate manner. Teachers should
avoid responding either condescendingly or Listening can be best understood as a
sarcastically. As much as possible, they combination of low and high inferences
should minimize distractions and (Rost,1990). Listeners make low-level
interruptions. It is important for the inferences when they use their knowledge of
teacher to provide numerous opportunities linguistic features to infer (decode) the
for students to practice listening skills sounds in an utterance. To understand what
and to become actively engaged in the a message means, they engage in higher
listening process. level inferences by using on their
Listening is a mental process. Our knowledge of both linguistic and pragmatic
brain processes linguistic information in nature.
three ways: Another cognitive perspective on
learner listening is the issue of listening
1. Attend to signals (sounds or comprehension strategies. These are mental
print) and identify them as words. mechanisms used to process and manage
2. Process information in the most information. There are three categories of
efficient way listening strategies are:
3. Draw on knowledge stored in the
long-term memory.  Cognitive: process, interpret,
store and recall information. This
Anderson proposed a three-phase language involves strategies such as
comprehension model: inferencing and prediction.
 Metacognitive: manage and
 Perception is the encoding of sound facilitate mental process; cope
signals with difficulties during
 Parsing is the process by which an listening. Examples of such
utterance is segmented according to strategies include comprehension
syntactic structures or meaning cues monitoring and visualizing.
to create a mental representation of  Social-affective: as the help of
the combined meaning of the words. others to facilitate
comprehension; manage ones
 emotions when listening such as words, leaving the discussion of these
confidence building and words until after the presentation. At
cooperation. this page, teachers need to point out
the role the oral punctuation, body
Stages in a Listening Lesson language, and tone play in an oral
presentation.
The three phases of the listening
process are; pre-listening, during 3. Review Standards for Listening.
listening, and after listening Teachers should stress the importance
of the audience’s role in a listening
Pre-listening situation. There are interactive
relationship between audience and
During the pre-listening phase, speaker, each affecting the other.
teachers need to recognize that all Teachers can outline the following
students bring different backgrounds to the considerations to students:
listening experience. Beliefs, attitudes,
and biases of the listeners will affect the O Students have to be physically
understanding of the message. In addition prepared for listening
to being aware of these factors, teachers
should show students how their backgrounds O Students need to be attentive
affect the messages they receive.
O “Listen to others as you would have
Before listening, students need them listen to you”
assistance to active what they already know
about the ideas they are going to hear. 4. Establish Purpose. Teachers should
Simply being told the topic is not enough. encourage students to ask. “Why I am
Pre-listening activities are required to listening?” “What is my purpose?”
establish what is already known about the students should be encouraged to
topic, to build necessary background, and articulate their purpose.
to set purpose for listening. Students’
needs to understand that the act of Before a speaker’s presentation,
listening requires not just hearing but teachers also can have students
thinking, as well as good deal of interest formulate questions that they predict
and information which both speaker and will be answered during the
listener must have in common. Speaking and presentation. If the question is not
listening entail...three components: the answered, students may pose the
speaker, the listener, and the meaning to questions to the speaker. Students
be shared; speaker, listener, and meaning should as well be encouraged to jot
from a unique triangle” (King, 1984) down questions during listening.

There are several strategies that An addition strategy is called

students and their teachers can use to TQLR. It consist the following steps:
prepare for a listening experience. They
can: T— Tune-in

1. Active Existing Knowledge. Students (The listener must tune- in to the

should be encouraged to ask the speaker and the subject, mentally calling
question: what do I already know about up everything known about the subject and
this topic from this, teachers and shutting out all distractions.)
students can determine what
information they need in order to get Q— Question
the most from the message. Students
can brain storm, discuss, read, view (The listener should mentally
films or photos, and write and share formulate questions. What will this
journal entries. speaker say about this topic? What is the
speaker’s background? I wonder if the
2. Build Prior Knowledge. Teachers can speaker will talk about... ?)
provide the appropriate background
information including information L— Listen
about the speaker, topic of
representation, purpose of the (The listener should organize as it
representation, and the concepts and is received, anticipating what the
vocabulary that are likely to be speaker will say next and reacting
embedded in the presentation. Teachers mentally to everything heard.)
may rely upon the oral interpretation
to convey the meaning of unfamiliar
R- Review Usually found in: generalization plus
example (but may be found in enumeration
(The listener should go over what has and argumentation)
been said, summarize, and evaluate  Time words: first, second, third, while,
constantly. Main ideas should be next, finally, at last, today, tomorrow,
separated from subordinate ones.) soon.
Usually found in: narration,
5. Use a Listening Guide. A guide may chronological patterns, directions (and
provide an overview of the whenever events or examples are
presentation, its main ideas, presented in a time sequence)
questions to be answered while
 Addition words: in addition, also,
listening, a summary of the
furthermore, moreover, another example.
presentation, or an outline.
Usually found in: enumeration,
While- Listening Stage description, and sometimes in
While- listening tasks are what generalization plus example
students are asked to do during listening  Result words: as a result, so,
time. The listening tasks should be accordingly, therefore, thus
enjoyable and meaningful to the students. Usually found in: cause and effect
It should be simple and easy to handle.  Contrast words: however, but, in
It should provide opportunities for contrast, on the other hand,
students to succeed. nevertheless Usually found in: comparison
Students need to understand the and contrast (and whenever speaker makes
implications of rate in the listening a comparison or contrast in another
process. Nichols (1948) found that people pattern) (Devine, 1982).
listen and think at four times the normal
conversion rate. Students have to be Most students need practice in
encouraged to use the "rate gap" to making inferences while listening. A
actively process the message. In order to simple way to help students become aware
use the extra time wisely. that there is meaning between the lines
Effective listeners: is to read a passage from literature
 Connect- make connections with which describes a character’s actions,
people, places, situations, and appearance, or surroundings. From this
ideas they know information, students make inferences
 Find meaning- determine what the about the character’s personality.
speaker is saying about people, Teachers can also encourage guided
places, ideas imagery when students are listening to
 Question- pay attention to those presentations that have many visual
words and ideas that are unclear images, details, or descriptive words.
Students can form mental pictures to
 Make and confirm predictions- try
help them remember while listening.
to determine what will be said next Although listeners need not
 Make inferences- determine what capture on paper everything they hear,
will speaker’s intent by "listening there are times that students need to
between the lines"; infer what the focus on the message and need to record
speaker does not actually say certain words and phrases, such mote-
 Reflect and evaluate- respond to making ("listening with pen in hand")
what has been and pass judgment. forces students to attend to the
message. Devine (1982) suggests
"Comprehension is enormously strategies such as the following:
improved when the speaker’s schema or  Give questions in advance and
organizational pattern is perceived by remind listeners to listen for
the listener" (Devine 1982). Teach possible answers.
students the various structures (e.g.,
 Provide a rough line, map,
short story, essay, poetry, play),
chart, or graph for students to
organizational patterns (e.g.,
complete as they follow the
logical, chronological, spatial), and
lecture.
transitional devices. Effective
listeners can follow spoken discourse  Have students jot down "new-to-
when they recognize key signal me" items (simple lists of
expressions such as the following: facts or insights that the
listener has not heard before.
 Example words: for example, for
instance, thus, in other words, as  Use a formal note-taking
an illustration system.
 Transcribing or writing down live Critical listeners must understand
or record or recorded speech can the nature and appropriateness of the
sharpen student’s listening, evidence and reasoning. What evidence
spelling, and punctuation skills. is used? Expert testimony? Facts?
 Teacher selects an interesting Statistics? Examples? Reasons?
piece of writing. Opinions? Inappropriate evidence
might include untrustworthy
 The selection is read aloud to the
testimony; inadequate, incorrect,
class (and perhaps discussed).
inappropriate, or irrelevant facts,
 The teacher then dictates the statistics, or examples; or
passage slowly to the class. The quotations out of context or
students transcribe the form and incomplete.
conventions (i.e., spelling,
 Analyze the speaker’s reasoning
punctuation, and capitalization)
Critical listener must understand the
as accurately as possible.
logic and reasoning of the speaker. Is
 Students compare their this evidence developed in logical
transcription with distributed arguments such as deductive, inductive,
copies of the original. casual or analogous? Faulty reasoning
might include hasty or over- inclusive
Critical thinking plays a generalization, either- or argument,
major role in effective listening. casual fallacy (therefore, because of
Listening in order to analyze and this), non sequitur (confusion of cause
evaluate requires students to and effect), reasoning in a circle,
evaluate a speaker’s arguments and begging or ignoring the question, false
the value of ideas, appropriateness analogy, attacking the person instead of
of the evidence, and the persuasive the idea, or guilt by association.
techniques employed. Effective
 Analyze the speaker’s emotional appeals
listeners apply the principles of
Critical listeners must understand
sound thinking and reasoning to the
that persuaders often rely on emotional
messages they hear at home, in
appeal as well as evidence and reasoning.
school, in the workplace, or in the
Critical listeners, therefore, must
media,
recognize effective persuasive appeals
Planning and structuring
and propaganda devices. A skilled
classroom activities to model and
critical listener identifies and
encourage students to listen
discounts deceptive persuasive appeals
critically is important. Students
such as powerful connotative (loaded)
should learn to: words, doublespeak, and appeals to fears,
 Analyze the message Critical prejudice, discontent, flattery,
listeners are concerned first stereotype, or tradition. The listener
with understanding accurately must also identify and discount
and completely what they hear propaganda techniques such as bandwagon
(Brownel, 1996). Students should appeals, glittering generalities,
identify the speaker’s topic, inappropriate testimonials, pseudo-
purpose, intended audience, and scientific evidence, card- stacking, and
context. The most frequent name-calling.
critical listening context is
persuasion. They should keep an Problems that Language Face During
open- minded and objective Listening
attitude as they strive to
identify the main idea(s)/ Text
thesis/ claim and supporting Three types of text features can affect
arguments/ points/ anecdotes. listening:
They should ask relevant 1. Phonology and speech rate
questions and restate 2. Discourse features
perceptions to make sure they 3. Text types
have understood correctly. Task
Taking notes will enhance their They are influenced by the types of
listening. question, the amount of time and whether
 Analyze the speaker Critical or not the listener can get the
listeners must understand the information repeated.
reliability of the speaker. Is
the speaker credible? Interlocutor (speaker)
Trustworthy? An expert? This includes accent, fluency, gender,
Dynamic? and standard or non-standard usage.
 Analyze the speaker’s evidence
Listener Listening Tasks for Communicative
Listener characteristics include: Outcomes
language proficiency, gender, memory,
interest, purpose, prior knowledge, Communicative Outcomes Examples
attention, accuracy of pronunciation, Lists Similarities/
topic familiarity, and established differences/
learning habits. errors
Sequenced information Picture sequence,
Process lyrics
This refers to type of processing Matched items Pictures with
that listener’s use, whether top-down or texts, themes
bottom-up or both. The type of listening with texts
strategy used by the listener is an Restored texts Complete the gap
important factor. in a text
Diagrams or pictures Floor plan,
Post-Listening Stage sketches of
This is usually at the end of a people
lesson. These are off- shoots or Notes Short notes
extension of the work done at the pre- during
and while listening stage. At this stage presentations
the students have time to think, reflect,
discuss and to write.
Students need to act upon what they One-Way Listening Tasks (transactional)
have heard to clarify meaning and extend It involves listening and responding
their thinking. Well- planned post- through different ways to achieve outcomes.
listening activities are just as They do not have to interact with the
important as those before and during. speaker while listening. It is mainly
Some examples follow. concerned with obtaining information and
 To begin with, students can ask knowledge.
questions of themselves and the Task Response
speaker to clarify their understanding Restoration Include omitted words
and confirm their assumptions. or phrases
 Hook and Evans (1982) suggest that the Reconstruction Create original message
post- mortem is a very useful device. with words heard or
Students should talk about what the noted down
speaker said, question statements of Sorting Sequence, rank,
opinion, amplify certain remarks, and categorize items
identify parallel incidents, from life Evaluation Identify
and literature. inconsistencies and
 Students can summarize a speaker’s contradictions
presentation orally, in writing, or as Task Response
an outline. In addition to the to the Matching Match information from
traditional outline format, students listening to pictures
could use time lines, flow charts, or written texts
ladders, circles, diagrams, webs, or Jigsaw Create a whole from
maps. different parts
 Students can review their notes and Two- Way Listening Tasks (interactional)
add information that they did not have The listener has to interact with the
an opportunity to record during the speaker by asking questions, offering
speech. information and expressing opinions.
 Students can analyze and evaluate
critically what they have heard. Tasks Response
 Students can be given opportunities to Creative dictation Dictate to each other
engage in activities that build on and to complete the text
develop concepts acquired during an Description Sequence/ reproduce/
oral presentation. These may include complete pictures or
writing, reading, art, or drama. diagrams
Simulation Listen and express
opinion in simulated
situations
Presentation Listen and support to
formal and informal
presentations
Some Practical Listening Strategies and  Getting information by listening to
Activities an announcement
 Working on group projects
Comprehensive Listening Strategies  Critiquing a peer’s draft of a story
(elementary) after listening to it
 Enjoying good literature that is well
 Forming a picture (draw an image, presented orally
then write about it)
 Evaluating an issue that is being
 Putting information into groups debated
("categorizing, chunking")
 Evaluating products advertised in
 Asking questions (Why am I listening commercials
to this message?; Do I know
 Evaluating candidates from their
what__means?; Does this information
campaign speeches
make sense to me?)
 Discovering the plan (description, TEACHING SPEAKING
sequence, comparison, cause and
effect, problem/ solution) Introduction
 Note-taking (demonstrate by taking
notes with the children) Speech is the most basic means of
 Getting clues from the speaker (both communication. "Speaking in a second
visual and verbal cues) language or foreign language has often been
viewed as the most demanding and
Critical Listening (intermediate to high challenging of the four skills" (Bailey and
school) Savage, 1994. What specifically makes
 Help children to recognize: persuasion speaking in a second language or foreign
and propaganda, deceptive, language, language difficult. According to Brown
loaded words, propaganda devices. (1994) a number of features of spoken
 Steps: language includes reduced forms such as
1. Introduce the commercial(s) contractions, vowel reduction, and elision;
2. Explain deceptive language slang and idioms; stress, rhythm, and
3. Analyze it intonation. Students who are not exposed to
4. Review concepts reduced speech will always retain their
5. Provide practice full forms and it will become a
6. Create commercials disadvantage as a speaker of a second
language. Speaking is an activity requiring
 The same procedure applies to
the integration of many subsystems.
advertisements.
The Goal of Teaching Speaking
Appreciative Listening (primary)
 Enjoyment is reason enough to read The goal of teaching speaking skills
aloud to children. is communicative efficiency. Learners
 Appreciate listening is important for should be able to make themselves
reading aloud to students repeated understood, using their current proficiency
readings, and oral presentations. to the fullest. They should try to avoid
 Teaching Appreciative Listening confusion in the message due to faulty
1. Before reading-aloud: activate pronunciation, grammar, or vocabulary, and
prior knowledge, background, set to observe the social and cultural rules
purpose for reading that apply in each communication situation.
2. During reading-aloud: Use Directed
Reading Thinking Activity (DRTA) – To help students develop
make predictions, reasoning and communicative efficiency in speaking,
further predictions, prove if instructors can use a balanced activities
predictions are true approach that combines language input,
3. After reading-aloud: share their structured output, and communicative
log and relate to their lives. output.

The Nature of Speaking

Authentic Listening Activities (for
different levels) Oral communication is a two-way
 Acting out a story from one that is process between speaker and listener (or
read (or being read) listeners) and involves the productive
 Making or doing something by skill of speaking and the receptive skill
following oral directions of understanding (or listening with
 Participating in class or group understanding). Both speaker and listener
discussions have a positive function to perform. In
simple terms, the speaker has to encode the
message he wishes to convey in appropriate 4. Affective factors
language, while the listener (no less
actively) has to decode (or interpret) the One of the major obstacles learners
message. have to overcome in learning to speak is
the anxiety generated over the risks of
Different views of speaking in language blurting things out that are wrong, stupid,
teaching or incomprehensible. Our job as teachers is
to provide the kind of warm, embracing
A review of some of the views of the climate that encourages students to speak,
current issues in teaching oral however halting or broken their attempts
communication can help provide some may be.
perspective to the more practical
considerations of designing speaking 5. The interaction effect
lessons.
The greatest difficulty that learners
1. Conversational discourse encounter in attempts to speak is not the
multiplicity of sounds, words, phrases, and
The benchmark of successful language discourse forms that characterize any
acquisition is almost always the language but rather the interactive nature
demonstration of an ability to accomplish of most communication. Conversations are
pragmatic goals through interactive collaborative as participants engage in a
discourse with other speakers of the process of negotiation of meaning. So, for
language. the learner, the matter of what you say is
often eclipsed by conventions of how to say
2. Teaching pronunciation things, when to speak, and other discourse
constraints.
There has been some controversy over
the role pronunciation work in a David Nunan (1991) notes a further
communicative, interactive course of study. complication in interactive discourse: what
Because the overwhelming majority of adult he calls the interlocutor effect or the
learners will never acquire an accent-free difficulty of a speaking task as gauged by
command of a foreign language, should a the skills of one’s interlocutor. In other
language program that emphasizes whole words, one learner’s performance is always
language, meaningful contexts, and colored by that of the person
automaticity of production focus on these (interlocutor) he or she is talking with.
tiny phonological details of language? The
answer is "yes," but in a different way Factors that Influence Learners’ Speaking
from what was perceived to be essential a
couple of decades ago. The six factors below suggest that
any learner who really wants to can learn
3. Accuracy and fluency to pronounce English clearly and
comprehensibly. As the teacher, you can
An issue that pervades all of assist in the process by gearing your
language performance centers on the planned and unplanned instruction toward
distinction between accuracy and fluency. these six factors.
It is clear that fluency and accuracy are
both important goals to pursue in 1. Native Language
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT).
While fluency may in many communicative If the teacher is familiar with the
language courses be an initial goal in sound system of a learner’s native
language teaching, accuracy is achieved to language, she will be better able to
some extent by allowing students to focus diagnose student difficulties. Many L1 to
on the elements of phonology, grammar, and L2 carryovers can be overcome through a
discourse in their spoken output. focused awareness and effort on the
learner’s part.
The fluency/accuracy issue often
boils down to the extent to which our 2. Age
techniques should be message oriented (or
teaching language use) as opposed to Children under the age of puberty
language oriented (also known as teaching generally stand an excellent chance of
language usage). Current approaches to "sounding like a native" if they have
language teaching lean strongly toward continued exposure in authentic contexts.
message orientation with language usage Beyond the age of puberty, while adults
offering a supporting role. will almost surely maintain a "foreign
accent," there is no particular advantage
attributed to age.
3. Exposure 3. Reduced forms

It is difficult to define exposure. Contractions, elisions, reduced vowels,

One can actually live in a foreign country
for some time but not take advantage of
being "with the people," Research seems to
support the notion that the quality and
intensity of exposure are more important
than mere length of time.
4. Innate phonetic ability
Often referred to as having an "ear"
for language, some people manifests a
phonetic coding ability that others do not.
In many cases, if a person has had exposure
to a foreign language as a child, this
"knack" is present whether the early
language is remembered or not. Others are
simply more attuned to phonetic
discriminations. Strategies-based
instruction, however, has proven that some
elements of learning are a matter of an
awareness of your own limitations combined
with a conscious focus on doing something
to compensate for those limitations.
5. Identify and language ego
Another influence is one’s attitude
toward speakers of the target language and
the extent to which the language ego
identifies with those speakers.
6. Motivation and concern for good
pronunciation
etc., all form special problems in teaching
spoken English. Students who don’t learn
colloquial contractions can sometimes
develop a stilted, bookish quality of
speaking that in turn stigmatize them.
4. Performance variables
One of the advantages of spoken language
is that the process of thinking as you
speak allows you to manifest a certain
number of performance hesitations, pauses,
backtracking, and corrections. Learners can
actually be taught how to pause and
hesitate.
5. Colloquial language
Make sure your students are reasonably
well acquainted with the words, idioms, and
phrases of colloquial language and those
they get practice in producing these forms.
6. Rate of delivery
Another salient characteristic of
fluency is rate of delivery. One of the
language teacher’s tasks in teaching spoken
English is to help learners achieve an
acceptable speed along with other
attributes of fluency.
7. Stress, rhythm, and intonation

Some learners are not This is the most important

particularly concerned about their characteristic of English pronunciation.
pronunciation, while others are. The extent The stress-timed rhythm of spoken English
to which learners’ intrinsic motivation and its intonation patterns convey
propels them toward improvement will be important messages.
perhaps the strongest influence of all six
of the factors in this list. If that 8. Interaction
motivation and concern are high, then
Learning to produce waves of language in
necessary effort will be expended in
a vacuum-without interlocutors-would rob
pursuit of goals.
speaking skill of its richest component the
Problems that language learners face during creativity of conversational negotiation.
speaking
Types of Task/Response
Douglas Brown (2000) identified eight Performance
factors that can make speaking difficult. Imitative  Student simply parrots
Speaking back (imitate) a word
1. Clustering or phrase or possibly a
sentence.
Fluent speech is phrasal, not word by  Tasks:
word. Learners can organize their output - word repetition
both cognitively and physically (in breath - pronunciation
groups) through such clustering. drills (stress,
intonation)
2. Redundancy
Intensive  one step beyond
Speaking imitative speaking to
The speaker has an opportunity to make
meaning clearer through the redundancy of include any speaking
language. Learners can capitalize on this performance that is
feature of spoken language. designed to practice
 some phonological or - short speeches
grammatical aspect of - retelling a story
language or a news event
 Tasks: - summaries
- directed response - picture-cued
- read-aloud storytelling
- sentence/dialogue
completion tasks
- oral questionnaires Stages in a Speaking Lesson
- picture-cued tasks
- What is the role of the language
teacher in the classroom? In the first
Responsive  Short replies to
Speaking place, like any other teacher, the task of
teacher or student-
the language teacher is to create the best
initiated questions or
conditions for learning. In a sense, the
comments (a good deal
teacher is a means to an end an instrument
of student speech in
to see that learning takes place. But in
the classroom is
addition to this general function, a
responsive) replies do
teacher plays specific roles in different
not extend into
stages of the learning process.
dialogues such speech
can be meaningful and The Presentation Stage
authentic
 Tasks: This is also known as the pre-
- question and answer activity phase of the lesson where the
-eliciting instructions teacher introduces something new to be
and directions learned. At this stage of a speaking
- paraphrasing a story lesson, the teacher’s main task is to serve
or a dialogue as a kind of informant. As the teacher you
Interactive  Transactional dialogue know the language you select the new
Speaking – carried out for the material to be learned and you present this
 Transactional purpose of conveying or in such a way that the meaning of the new
(dialogue) exchanging specific language is as clear and as memorable as
 Interpersonal information involves possible. The students listen and try to
relatively long understand. Although they are probably
(dialogue)
stretches of saying very little at this stage except
interactive discourse when invited to join in they are by no
 Interpersonal dialogue means passive. Always be on guard against
– carried out for the the danger of spending too much time
purpose of maintaining presenting so much so that the students do
social relationships not get enough time to practice the
 Tasks: language themselves.
- interviews The Practice Stage
- discussions
(arriving at a At the practice stage it is the
consensus, problem students turn to do most of the talking
- solving) while your main task is to devise and
- games provide the maximum amount of practice
- conversations which must at the same time be meaningful,
- information gap authentic, and memorable. This stage is
activity also called the While (or Main) Activity or
- telling longer the Speaking Activity stage. Your role then
stories as teacher is radically different from that
- extended at the presentation. You do the minimum
explanations amount of talking yourself. You are like
Extensive  usually for the skilful conductor of an orchestra
Speaking intermediate to giving each of the performers a chance to
(monologue) advanced levels task participate and monitoring their
involve complex performance to see that it is satisfactory.
relatively lengthy
stretches of discourse The Production Stage
extended monologues can
be planned or impromptu It is a pity that language learning
 Tasks: often stops short at the practice stage or
- oral reports does not go regularly beyond it. Many
teachers feel that they have done their job 2. Ms. Cruz gave her class a group
if they have presented the new material assignment. The class must come up
well and have given their students adequate with possible solutions to the parking
– though usually controlled- practice in problem in their school during drop-
it. No real learning should be assumed to off and pick-up hours. Each group is
have taken place until the students are expected to come up with a proposal.
able to use the language for they provision What kind of speaking task is she
to use language must be made part of the using?
lesson. At any level of attainment the
students need to be given regular and A. imitative C. responsive
frequent opportunities to use language B. intensive D. interactive
freely even if they sometimes make mistakes
as a result. This is not to say that The activity is characteristic of task-based
mistakes are unimportant, but rather that instruction which is (D) interactive, specifically
free expression is more important and it is transactional, since it is a problem – solving task
with a proposal paper as the outcome and on which
a great mistake to deprive students of this
student’ assessment will be based. Talk as
opportunity.
transaction is therefore expected to be used more
than talk as interactional. (A) Imitative, (B)
It is through these opportunities to
intensive, and (C) responsive speaking tasks do not
use language as they wish that the students involve such lengthy and complex linguistic
become aware that they have learned structures as a group problem-solving activity
something useful to them personally and are does.
encouraged to go on learning. Thus in
providing the students with activities for
free expression and in discreetly watching 3. Nora heard the phone ring, but she
over them as they carry them out as teacher ignored it. What kind of listening
take on the role of manager, guide, or has she been to?
adviser.
A. Marginal C. Critical
Although the sequence described above B. Attentive D. Appreciative
– presentation – practice- production – is
The correct answer is option A because
a well –tried approach to language learning
marginal listening refers to someone who does not
and is known to be effective in average have any focus to what he/she hears or the listener
(i.e., non - privileged) classroom hears the sounds but ignores. Attentive listening
conditions it should not however be is focused listening and the listener does not
interpreted too literally. These stages are ignore the sounds he/she hears hence, B is not the
not recipes for organizing all our lessons. answer critical listening calls for higher-order
In the first place the actual "shape" of a thinking skills like passing judgment deciding on
lesson will depend on a number of factors the worth of an idea, hence B is not the answer
such as the amount of time needed for each neither can it be appreciative listening because
stage. Activities at the production stage this type of listening makes the listener derive
in particular can vary a great deal in pleasure from what he/she hears. It can stem from a
length. Also, stages tend to overlap and song or lines of poetry listened to.
run into one another for example some
practice may be part of the presentation 4. Mr. Ramos made his students listen to
stage. an American visitor and asked his
students to identify the reduced forms
PART II: Analyzing Test Items in fast speech (elision and
assimilation). What listening skill is
1. Jose, a student spends of his he trying to develop?
waking hours at school by simply
listening to his teacher’s daily A. Perception skills
lectures and his classmates’ daily B. Interacting with speaker
conversations. C. Dealing with information
D. Using knowledge of the world
A. 50% B. 30% C. 10% D. 20%
The correct response is option A.50%.
5. Every time Lorenz listens to her
According to researches listening is our primary favourite teacher’s lecture she uses
communication activity. Studies show that we spend her schema regarding the topic and
about 80% of our waking hours communicating and at draws inferences about it. The process
least 45% of that time is spent listening. In used by Lorenz is the top-down process
business, listening has often been cited as being which involves
the most critical managerial skill. It is A. information available within the
impossible that the correct response would be text only
smaller amounts of percentage form the distracters B. inside information that the
B, C and D. listener brings to be text
 C. language information, contextual A. Speak C. Write
clues, and prior knowledge B. Read D. Listen
D. the ability to process acoustic
signals 11. Mrs Cruz, noticed that one of her
students, Joana is having trouble when
6. The students are asked to listen to an she is communicating to her classmates
excerpt from the speech of President in a face-to-face situation. What kind
Obama to scan for certain information. of communication is taking place?
What type of listening is that?
A. Intrapersonal C. Public forum
A. Intensive C. Selective B. Public speaking D. Interpersonal
B. Responsive D. Extensive
12. When asked by Mr. Ramos if he
7. Ms. Cruz asked her students to listen understands the problem, Jose said,
for key words or phrases from a "I’m afraid, I don’t understand."
listening passage. On the worksheet is Michael’s utterance employs
a list of twelve key words or phrases. __________.
When they hear a particular word or
phrase, they check it off on the
worksheet. If they don’t hear a A. formal English
particular item they leave it blank. B. informal English
What process of listening is involved? C. colloquial English
D. semi- formal English
A. Bottom up processing
B. Top down processing 13. Mr. Paterno asked his students to
C. Interactive processing produce different consonant sounds.
D. Personalization First, he told the students to form
some sounds by completely obstructing
8. Over lunch, your friend tells you a the stream of air with either their
story about a recent holiday, which lips or their tongues and then
was a disaster. You listen with suddenly releasing air stream. He
interest and interject at appropriate taught them to produce _________.
moments, perhaps to express surprise
or sympathy. How do you listen in this A. fricatives C. nasals
situation? B. affricates D. Plosives

A. Bottom up processing 14. The students of IV- 1 were asked to

B. Top down processing watch the movie "Shake- spear In Love"
C. Interactive processing to understand Shakespearean works
D. Personalization better. After the literature activity,
the teacher asked them to re-enact the
9. Which among the four basic types of characters of William Shakespeare and
speaking requires to parrot back Anne Hathaway. These students were
words, phrases, and sentences which asked to _________ "Shakespeare In
they hear? Love."

A. Imitative C. Extensive A. simulate C. role play

B. Interactive D. Responsive B. discuss D. Present

10. Teacher Ali, a high school English
teacher entered his first year
classroom. He greeted the class, did
the routine tasks and started the
lesson. He turned over head projector
and asked the class to read silently
the following questions projected on
the screen:
What do you have to do before you can
speak?
What does a child learn before he
talks?
What do we do before chatting?
What do you think is right to answer
to the question above?
15. Mr. Ramos presented the issue of
abortion for the students to debate
upon
This particular activity is speaking
task that is also a _________
A. Consensus-seeking activity
B. Problem-solving activity
C. Humanistic activity
D. Moral dilemma activity
16. Mario did not understand when the
teacher said that the lady in the
picture is expecting. He asks the
teacher, "What is the lady pregnant
expecting for?" this connotative
 meaning is a _________ to Llarenas choose radio and television
communication. programs?

A. language barrier A. She wanted to use authentic

B. psychological barrier materials
C. physical barrier B. She wanted to use created
D. emotional barrier materials
C. She wanted to use structured
17. Maria is talking to an American speeches
tourist. She cannot be understood D. She wanted to use content
pretty well by the American. In materials
order to meet the needs of her
listener, she has to adjust to the 22. Teacher Jem wanted to focus on the
________ critical thinking skills of her
students after allowing them to
A. Source C. feedback listen to a campaign speech. Which
B. situation D. Noise question should be asked?

18. The language learner modulates her A. What was the message of the
voice by actually checking out its speaker?
loudness and softness of her voice. B. Is the speaker credible? Why? Why
She must be pretty working out her not?
voice’s ________
23. Elsa wants to use metacognitive
A. Volume C. pitch strategy before listening to a text?
B. projection D. Stress Which should she use?

19. Ms. Padilla varies the content of the A. Set a purpose for listening
sentence. That is the teacher gives B. Check for inaccurate inferences
a word for one of the words in a C. Monitor one’s comprehension and
sentence. So instead of only saying, the effectiveness of strategies used
"Where is the train station?" the D. Determine whether the combination
students might also be called, of listening strategies has been
"Where is the post office?" This is effective
called ________
24. A teacher asked his students the
A. repetition drill following questions after they had
B. transformation drill listened to a speech:
C. chain drill "What is your opinion of the
D. Substitution drill speaker?"
"Do you agree with his stand?"
20. Ms. Tess, an English teacher divided "What made it difficult for you to
the class into groups and gave a understand the speaker?"
problem-solving activity entitled What was the purpose of the teacher?
"Dessert Dilemma". She wanted to A. She wanted the students to stay
monitor closely the students in the focused and attentive
ground who knows how to signal that B. She wanted the students adjust to
one wanted to speak. What specific the listening cues.
speed routine used in the C. She wanted the students to
conversation did Ms. Tess adhere to? evaluate the speaker and the
message.
A. negotiation of meaning D. She wanted the students to
B. feedback respond to the speaker and the
C. interaction message.
D. turn taking
25. Which activities should Mr. Joven let
21. Ms. Llarenas wanted to prepare her his students do if he wants to
students for the types of listening promote interpersonal dialogue?
they would need to do when using the
language outside the classroom. One A. interviews, role plays
technique she used was letting her B. directed responses, read-aloud
students listen to English radio activities
program and watch an English C. short question and teaching
television program. Why did Ms. answer activities, pronunciation
drills
 D. sentence completion tasks classes will most likely be
found________
Part III. Enhancing Test taking Skill
A. producing language for genuine,
1. In teaching speaking, the language meaningful communication
learners should recognize three areas B. focusing on formal correctness as
knowledge that are inherent in oral a primary goal
communication. Which of the following C. exclusively using the target
is not included in these areas? language for instruction
D. reading difficult classical texts
A. mechanics C. notions at an early level
B. functions D. rules and norms
7. Mr. Gomez is a very innovative teacher.
2. Students watch a self-contained video He makes it a point to explore
clip from a film divided into several pedagogical means for real-life
parts. Working in pairs, they tell communication in his language
each other what they think will classes. What method does Mr. Gomez
happen at each stage. What one-way use for his classes?
listening task do you involve your
students in? A. Grammar Translation Method
B. Cognitive Code Learning
A. Restoration task C. Communicative Language Learning
B. Reconstruction task D. Audiolingual Method
C. Prediction task
D. Comparison task 8. Mr. Dizon, English Department Head,
has observed that it is a common
3. Your best friend came to your house practice in Miss San Juan’s grade 6
crying because her boyfriend decided classes to have group learning
to put an end to their relationship. activities that are dependent on
What type of purposeful listening socially structured exchanges of
will you be involved in? information between students. What
conclusion can be drawn from his
A. Discriminative C. Therapeutic observation of Miss San Juan’s
B. Comprehensive D. Critical classes? Her classes are________.
A. cooperative C. content-based
4. Mr. Dela Cruz gave his class a list of C. collaborative D. task-based
topics to research on. He assigned
the students to work in pairs and 9. Students are asked to listen to a
gave them three weeks to prepare to series of advertisements. Then they
share with the class the information list them under the following
they have gathered. He encouraged his headings:
students to use visual aids and to be Jingle ‘On Air’ by a DJ
creative with their report. This Conversational
activity is an example of what kind Mini-Drama
of a speaking performance task? What specific listening task is
involved?
A. classroom group discussion
B. problem-solving activity A. Classifying C. Analyzing
C. chatting with friends B. Sequencing D. Predicting
D. oral presentation
10. Mrs. Dela Fuente is an ESL teacher
5. Impromptu monologues wherein students for 15 years. When teaching
are encouraged to speak about their pronunciation to her students, she
feelings about a particular literary usually points out to them the
work and their perceptions of how the specific English sounds which
work applies to their belief system Spaniards commonly find difficult,
primarily address assessment in which such as /j/ and /h/. Which factor
domain? within learners is she trying to
address with this practice?
A. cognitive C. psychomotor
B. social D. affective A. Innate phonetic ability
B. language ego
6. Mr. Flores strives to make his adult C. native language
English-classes interactive. His D. motivation
11. Which of the following description of
authentic and meaningful language
use in the classroom?
A. Mrs. Cruz explains linguistics
concepts to her grade 3 pupils using
"canned" language and terms like
"present progressive" or "relative
clause". She aims for near-native
mastery of language.
B. Mr. Perez is a grade 6 English
teacher. In teaching grammar, he
simplifies teaching concepts by
breaking language into many bits and
pieces for his students to analyze.
C. In teaching English to her Grade
5 class, Ms. Ramos stresses the
connections among various language
skills and calls grammatical
concepts to her students attention
by showing them certain patterns and
examples.
C. Since proficiency leveLis low in
the ESL beginner’s class of Miss
Ramos and since most of her students
are adults, she has resulted to
using "caretaker" talk and to
keeping repetition task to a interactive language activity for
minimum.
12. Mateo is not yet very comfortable
about speaking English with his
colleagues. He has however devised a
way to make-up for his "thinking
time" whenever he tries to speak in
English. Instead of silently
pausing, he has learned to insert
certain fillers such as uh, well,
and you know when he speaks. What
characteristics of spoken language
did Mateo advantage of?
A. rate of delivery
B. reduce forms
C. colloquial language
D. performance variables
13. Teacher Marie asked her grade three
students to work together in pairs
to see how many words they can make
out of one long word; for example,
the word important. She gave each
pair a different word. This activity
is descriptive of what type of a
speaking performance task?
A. responsive C. interactive
B. imitative D. intensive
14. Susan was born and raised in Cebu.
She is currently studying languages
in a university in the U.S. she is
in her second year. Her American
classmates have often commented that
Susan has a certain "knack" for
language because her ease in
speaking English as well as the
foreign languages she is studying
seems to come naturally to her. What
pronunciation variable influences
her speaking skills?
A. her native language which is
Cebuano
B. her innate phonetic ability
C. her young age of twenty
D. her exposure to academic life in
the U.S
15. Teacher Jenny is a popular teacher in
the language center where she works.
Foreign students always enjoy being
in her class because according to
them she never fails to provide the
kind of warm, embracing climate that
encourages them to speak no matter
how halting or broken their attempts
in English may be. Which learner
factor has teacher Jenny succeeded
in helping her students overcome?
16. Mrs. Ramos wants to design an
her ESL intermediate class. Which
task is she most likely to use?
A. oral presentation
B. read aloud activity
C. affective factors
D. small group factors
17. Teacher Cherry teaches English for
beginners. It is part of her class
routine to write 3-4 words on the
board which she reads to the pupils
and which pupils are to say aloud
after her. What type of task do the
pupils perform?
A. an imitative task
B. a responsive task
C. an interactive task
D. read-aloud task
18. You are at a rock concert. There is a
lady standing behind you rattling
about her new diet. A guy in front
of you is talking to his buddy about
new car he’s thinking about buying
and the band leader is giving an
explanation of how the group came
together and wrote their latest hit
song. A vendor is going up your
aisle selling soft drinks and
sandwiches. Who are you going to
listen to attentively?
 A. The lady standing behind you
B. The guy talking about buying a
new car
C. The band leader explaining about
the group
D. The vendor selling food

19. Your best friend came to your house

crying because her boyfriend decided
to put an end to their relationship.
What type of purposeful listen do
you involved in?

A. Discriminative
B. Comprehensive
C. Therapeutic
D. Critical

20.

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