(1) PDP Framework

P = Pre-listeningD = During-listeningP= Post-listening

Pre-listening

(1) Pre-listeningPurposeHelp students prepare for what they are going to hear (which will give them a greater chance of success in any task)

Activities Activate schemata (to help predict content) Generate interest in the topic Teach lexical items Set up a reason to listen

(1) During-listeningPurposeStudents interact with the text to improve their listening skills

Activities (step-by-step – carefully sequenced and scaffolded) Main idea/Gist (general) Details (specific) Inferences (what is not explicitly stated) Summarize (comprehensive)

*Need to do a different task for each repeated listening (x3).

(1) Post-listeningPurposeBuild and expand on what students have learned in the lesson (which includes integrating other language skills and personalizing content)

Activities Comprehension questions Vocabulary review Response to content (orally and/or in writing) Extension work or project(s)

(2) Role of the teacherTailor (text must fit class – appropriate topic, level, genre, etc.)Stand-up comedian (best source of input; hold an audience)Sleuth (analyze lesson language before class for comprehension)Engineer (working knowledge of equipment)Spy (observe students while listening)Doctor (expert at diagnosis – things that went wrong)Firefighter (get out of trouble – lesson/listening text is too difficult)Tour guide (point out what’s interesting and ignore what isn’t)

(3) Cole and Jakimek (1980)

“In mud eels are, in clay none are”

Listeners had to report back what they had heard, but proved totally incapable of understanding the sentence.

Relevance: Shows that, without a clear context, connected speech often becomes inaccessible.

(4-5) Context and Pre-listening

Who is speaking and who is listening? Why? What is their relationship? Where are they and what are they trying to achieve? What language are they using (verbal and body) and how are

they using it (tone, pitch, accent, volume, speaking style, etc.)?

What information will be heard in the listening text (to include length, function – persuading, and structure – monologue)?

What is the topic? Familiar or requires special knowledge?

(6) Activating schemata Brainstorming (generate ideas > narrow down) Visuals (immediate and evocative) Realia (link classroom to outside world;

memories/associations) Texts and words (vital information, motivates us to

investigate) Situations (typical/routine – familiarity helps

predict/anticipate) Opinions, ideas and facts (broadens and involves)

(7) Establishing reasons for listening

1. Make the purpose realistic (task must reflect type of listening text)

2. Make the goal achievable3. Get the students involved (time, effort, and thought)

(8-9) Most motivating task

Listen for answers to our own (generated) questions

1. Higher-order questions: Analyze something or personalize the issue (open-ended, produce deep/critical thinking)

2. Lower-order questions: Require basic factual information (usually have just one correct answer)

3. Display questions: Teacher asks for a correct form (rather than for any thought)

*Higher-order and lower-order questions help activate schemata.

(10) Pre-teaching vocabulary (factors)

Time it takes to teach each word Whether the word is worth the effort (key:

efficiency – familiar context, pronunciation, do something with it – sentence, personalize)

Number of words to be pre-taught (fewer the better)

(11) Chang and Read160 Taiwanese students – Pre-teaching vocabulary isn’t very effective

Newly-learned vocabulary is usually not accessible to students during the mid-listening phase (can’t process spoken form of the word and meaning simultaneously > needs to be automatized – several opportunities to process over time)

Pre-teaching vocabulary tends to encourage students to focus on the target vocabulary rather than the meaning of the passage as a whole

Guessing unknown words is a valuable skill (one that students should practice regularly)

*Teachers need to think carefully about which words to pre-teach, how to pre-teach them and whether the meaning of unknown words can be inferred and checked in the post-listening phase).

(12) Pre-listening: Things to avoid

1. Don’t let the pre-listening stage drag on (keep short, fast-paced)

2. Don’t give away too much information to the students (introduce the topic; don’t give all the answers)

3. Don’t do a listening before the listening (no teacher monologues; let students do as much speaking as possible)

4. Don’t just talk about the general topic (focus on content of the passage; relevant to what students will hear)

While-listening

(1) While-listening: Why and help

1. Help students understand the listening passage Provide a focus Allow them to perceive the text’s structure Help them chunk the listening into sections or units of information Provide clues as to how they might respond Keep them concentrating throughout the passage Contribute towards the entertainment factor

2. Have students show evidence of understanding or non-understanding

(2) Production vs. Recognition1. Productive responses

Note-taking Writing answers to questions Correcting errors Completing tables, charts, diagrams, sentences

2. Recognition responses Answering multiple-choice and true/false questions Ticking words and phrases that are heard Matching and choosing pictures

Wise to remember: Listening is comprehension – not production

While-listening tasks1. Listening for gist2. Listening for detail3. Inferring4. Participating actively5. Note-taking6. Dictation7. Listen and do

(3) Listening for gist

On their first encounter with a passage in the classroom, students usually listen for gist – the main

idea.

Before we can develop any discussion of themes, analyze language used, examine features of

pronunciation, etc., the students need to have grasped the overall communicative intention of the speaker.

This forms the basis and context of all other work that we do on the text.

(4) Listening for detail

After listening for gist, students usually listen in detail or for specific information

(5) Inferring

A thinking skill in which we make deductions by going beyond what is actually (explicitly) stated

When we infer at a higher level, the situation must demand an inference (i.e. either something latent

remains unsaid or there is a hidden truth below the surface of the situation – a gap the listener fills in)

(6) Participating actively: How to

By listening and responding either verbally or by categorizing aspects of what they hear

(7) Note-taking

Note-taking promotes a higher level of attention

(8) Dictation: Benefits Forces students to be active during and after the

task Works well for mixed-ability and large classes Provides access to interesting texts Is a multiskilled activity Is a great way to focus the attention of over-

animated students or daydreamers at the back of the class

Is very flexible (with numerous variations)

(9) Dictation: Common approach

(10) Dictation: Built-in danger

Students could slip into robot mode – writing down what they hear without actually thinking about the content (i.e. become speech transcription devices)

(11) Listen and do: Useful

Good for mixed-ability classes as most activities don’t require an oral response – plus the (TPR) commands tend to be very short (requiring the listener to pay

attention to just a few words)

Post-listening

(1) Pre-listening and While-listening

Pre-listening prepares students for listening by getting them interested in the topic, activating schemata and

working with top-down ideas

While-listening is when students are on-task and engaged in real-time processing of the input (easy to

difficult, general to specific – e.g. gist > details > Inferences)

(2) Post-listeningPre-listening involves: Checking answers Going into detail by looking at both top-down

features (e.g. setting of the passage or information about the speakers) and bottom-up features (e.g. individual words or phrases)

Looking at what students found problematic (i.e. do troubleshooting)

(3) TroubleshootingWhere was there a breakdown in communication? Why? Was it caused by pronunciation? Was it an unknown or unrecognized vocabulary that

caused the problem? Was it the speed at which the speaker talked? Was it a problem related to

syntax/grammar/structure/order of words? Was it world knowledge?

(4) DiagnosticLike good doctors, we offer remedies – strategies, techniques, exposure to grammar, vocabulary and discourse markers, and further listening practice

We also find out what the students didn’t struggle with and how they came to their answers (i.e. does their

success represent improvement with a particular skill/set of skills or was it a lucky guess?)

(5) Long-term goalEnsure a successful process (i.e. intelligent use of top-

down and bottom-up information, as well as good strategy use) as much as a successful product (i.e. the

correct answer)

(6) Post-listening activitiesChecking and summarizing (assess student understanding of the text)Discussion (opportunities for comments and personalization)Creative responses (involve both writing and speaking)Critical responses (awareness of the speaker’s viewpoint, biases, prejudices)Information exchange (share information – e.g. jigsaw)Problem-solving (listing, sorting, ranking, ordering, solving, etc.)Deconstructing the listening text (play short segments of the text > focus on salient features – e.g. grammar or vocabulary + using transcripts)Reconstructing the listening text (provide fragments of the text > have students put back together – e.g. dictogloss or gap-fill)