Listening to Transactional

Discourse

Oktari Aneliya

• What is transactional discourse?• How do we know listeners

performances on listening transactional discourse?

• What are listening strategies to listen transactional discourse?

What is transactional discourse?

• Watching television program• Announcement on a train platform• Listening to news• Classroom lectures

How do we know listeners performances on listening transactional discourse?

1. On-line tasks (activity performed

while listening)

Open task: note-taking in lectures

Closed task: completing an

information grid

On-line task open tasks: note-taking

1. Provide some evidence of how they focus on information during parts of lecture.

2. No clear correspondence between quantity of notes and quality of understanding (DiViesta and Gray, 1972; Dunkel, 1985; Chaudron et al., 1988).

3. Experienced note-takers learn to type of shorthand and thus minimize the time they must focus on writing (Janda, 1985).

4. Experienced listeners will take notes in accordance with their expectations for subsequent tasks (Dunkel, 1985; Chaudron et al., 1988).

Types of listener notes

Topic-relation notes

• Topicalizing • Translating• Copying• Transcribing • Schematizing

Concept-ordering notes

• Sequence cuing

• Hierarchy cuing

• Relation ordering

Focusing notes

• Highlighting• De-

highlighting

Revising notes

• Inserting • Erasing

Closed taskcompleting an information grid

1. Closed tasks are easier to interpret than open tasks.

2. The listeners must at times focus on the act of completing the grid rather than on the listening text.

3. Completion tasks may provide useful evidence of listener attention and understanding when completions tasks are limited to minimal writing, minimal visual interpretation, and maximal attention to the spoken text.

How do we know listeners performances on listening transactional discourse?

2. Retrospective tasks(activity performed after

listening to a text)

Listener representations

Strategies for updating representations

Type of the task:1. Open task: summarizing

2. Closed task: multiple-choice selection

Listener representation 1. Verbatim : recall specialized terminology or

names or numbers2. Propositional : representing the gist of a text. The

listener must select and reduce the information to a generalization which can be later modified (Schank, 1982).

3. Schematic : formulaic ways of representing a text without assigning a specific semantic relationship.

4. Argument : functional models of a text. They account for what the speaker is trying to do in the text.

Strategies for updating representations

1. Context implication : contextual cues to generate relevant links between two or more propositions in the text.

2. Generalization of ambiguous segment : using a principle of analogy

3. Selection and prioritization on inferences : identify salient lexical items or propositions and give priority to inferences based on these items.

Type of the tasks1. Open task : summarizing

summary-writing strategies:- The zero strategy- Deletion/selection- Addition/invention- Reduction/generalization

Evaluating summaries:2. Effectiveness of summary.3. Including facts which supports the main ideas.4. Overall fluency and cohesion of the summary

text.5. Originality in wording.(Angel and Young, 1981; Zabrucky, 1986; Flottum,

1985; Brown and Day, 1983)

Type of the tasks2. Closed task: Multiple-choice

selectionindividual items on m/c tests may be considered as selected probes of text representation rather than indications of the listener’s understanding of the overall text.

How do we know listeners performances on listening transactional discourse?

3. Prospective task (pre-listening tasks): prediction - Provide another indirect type of evidence of listener text representation strategies.- Prediction involves using a context-implication strategy in which the listener projects schematic expectations onto the text.

Strategies for updating listeners representations of transactional discourse

1. Formulating propositional sense for a speaker’s utterance- Deducing the meaning of unfamiliar lexical items.- Inferring information not explicitly stated, through filling in ellipted information, making bridging inferences.- Inferring links between two or more propositions.

2. Formulating a conceptual framework that links utterances together.- Recognizing indicators of discourse for introducing an idea, changing topic, emphasis, clarification and expansion of points, expressing a contrary view.- constructing a main idea or theme in a stretch of discourse, distinguishing main points from supporting details.- Predicting subsequent parts of the discourse at conceptual levels.- Identifying elements in the discourse that can help in forming a schematic organization.- Maintaining continuity of context to assist in prediction and verification of propositions in the discourse.- Selecting cues from the speaker’s text to complete a schematic prediction.

Principles for developing listening skills

1. Listening ability is knowledge-based:- The listener uses pragmatic knowledge to estimate sense of unknown/ unclear items and to make predictions about discourse events.- The listener uses procedural knowledge to accomplish tasks based on what is understood.- The listener remembers and represents discourse meaning in a usable form.

2. Listening ability is interaction-based:- The listener identifies understanding problems – detecting meaning problems in speaker’s contribution; identifying inadequacy of speaker’s message for task at hand. - The listener demonstrates understanding or non-understanding in an appropriate way.- The listener, in some settings, collaborates with an interlocutor to arrive at acceptable mutual understanding or to accomplish collaborative task.