Listening is the first receptive ability a learner acquires. Despite being relatively simple, this skill is frequently considered to be challenging to teach or learn. Teachers today are keener on engaging their students in learning. Although the word “interactive” is incredibly appealing, putting it into practice may be quite tricky.
Instructors frequently concentrate on encouraging their students to speak, but this is only one aspect of helping them communicate. We spend the majority of our day communicating, and listening accounts for 40% of that conversation. Listening is an essential component of how we communicate. There are many factors to take into account and it can be overwhelming when trying to help adult EFL students improve their listening abilities.
Top ways For EFL Learners To Improve Listening Skills
Streamline Your Preparation
You need to get ready to deal with something fresh to focus on and listen to, just like you would for reading or speaking. You can achieve this by combining exercises that improve your hearing, memory, and language retention with real, authentic materials. One of the most effective strategies to improve your English listening abilities is to use real movies and audio. Just like speaking, reading, and writing, listening practice benefits from having goals and objectives to achieve. However, remember to include learning grammar in your goals since you will need to comprehend specific sentences and structures in order to listen to them when playing the video or audio.
Focus On Real Content
Instead of using materials created for learners, it’s crucial to switch to real, authentic English-language videos and articles because these are frequently too simple for intermediate learners and don’t help you become familiar with the dialect that native English speakers actually use in daily life.
Get Acquainted With The Right Vocabulary
To understand the content, it is quite helpful to study the terminology beforehand. Not every new word needs to be mastered the first time. Simply pick a few that are crucial, study them, and then play the audio or video. This makes practicing listening more efficient and manageable.
It might be beneficial to review your vocabulary list of five to nine words before watching the video or listening to the audio. Consider how you can use the terms in a more interesting way rather than just reading through a lengthy list. Additionally, there may be terms that you already know but are saying incorrectly or that you need to practice pronouncing. Most of the time, you hear what you pronounce. Therefore, bear it in mind while selecting content that highlights particular vocabulary words. Your capacity for hearing will be severely impacted by this.
Start With Understanding Listening Types
Due to the fact that listening necessitates intake rather than output, or providing information, it is regarded as a receptive skill. That gives the impression that listening is a passive, simple skill, but it’s not! Receiving, understanding, remembering, assessing, and responding are the five stages of hearing, which is an active process.
English language learners who actively listen must absorb, comprehend, and infer meaning from what they hear. However, passive hearing doesn’t involve as much mental processing as active listening, even though it is still vital. Students should schedule time for active listening in addition to passive listening because the brain is actively working even when we are not paying attention. Passive listening is excellent for helping students immerse themselves in English.
Eliminate Subtitles
Especially while listening rather than reading, you must be able to comprehend and reply without constantly translating in your mind. Although it may appear to be a simple, comfortable technique at first, if it becomes embedded in you, you won’t be able to speak English fluently.
Make sure to remove the subtitles from the videos once you start using the material for practice. Because, despite their value, transcripts and subtitles cause you to read instead of listen. Additionally, a lot of students tend to depend on them and have trouble understanding movies without subtitles. Therefore, it is usually wiser to start out well than to struggle afterward.
The After-listening Plan
Never fail to take the time to write down the pain points after each practice session. This will assist you in clearly knowing the areas you need to concentrate on. Additionally, if you have any questions, you can talk through them with your EFL instructor to fully understand the idea. This is an important stage because, in reality, so many language learners believe that they can’t completely express themselves in English, which is necessary for boosting confidence.
The Art Of Summarizing
Accessing any authentic audio content is incredibly beneficial for EFL learners since it allows them to improve their listening skills and broaden their perspectives. Reading a speaker’s body language and facial expressions, which might differ from culture to culture, is a significant aspect of listening. Therefore, the majority of the time, you need to practice “listening” by viewing recordings of you talking or telling stories. You might also take the time to listen to a podcast that interests you and then explain it to your instructor, friends, or even family members. This gives you more self-assurance and, together with listening, helps in speaking practice.
Lastly, Practice as much as you can!
It is crucial that you hear the narrative again or watch the video as soon as you can after the first time. It’s crucial to continue doing this later and at wider intervals. Every time you repeat something, you will both reinforce the previously learned material and learn something new.
