Barriers and Strategies to Effective Listening

Abstract

Listening has been the greatest worry for most

students. This issue mainly concentrates on three barriers

to effective listening: inappropriate text selection

(materials out of date; improper level of difficulty),

stressful listening environment, fast speed in native

speech and their solutions. The issue provides three

strategies to guide an effective listening course. They are

developing listening comprehension via oral practice,

proper use of prediction and guessing, and visual support.

These strategies can be carried out through different

activities. The essential purpose of using strategies is to

promote a more conscious, more dynamic and interactive

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relation between listeners and texts. Thus, listening is

not a passive and intangible process. It can be an

enjoyable and exciting experience.

Keywords: effective listening, barrier, strategy

Listening has posed a biggest challenge to EFL students

in all kinds of exams ranging from interview to College

English Tests. It is mainly because listening is used to

being considered as a completely unconscious process,

during which neither teacher nor student himself could

perceive clearly enough. Therefore, teachers feel helpless

for the students who have no idea of what to do with

listening comprehension at all, but make them an empty

promise “Keep listening and you will make progress!”

Keeping listening is definitely no wrong but it is

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absolutely not enough. There are far more things that we

need to do to improve our listening ability than merely

listen. Great attention should be paid to the process of

listening and observe what happened during the course and

what we must do to make it more consciously controlled and

less hard.

First, we will have a look at the nature of listening.

Listening, like speaking, reading and writing, is a basic

language skill. By no means is it easy or simple. It is the

most crucial skill for humans to learn language and to

learn about others. However, for most students, this skill

seems to be the most unreachable among the all. There are a

number of causes which should be blamed for the difficulty

and we also found the solutions to them.

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Inappropriate Text Selection

Inappropriate text selection ought to be the primary

factor. Text must be chosen on the basis of the

characteristics of learner and should obey the rule of

being motivating, inspiring, and interesting in order for

students to engage easily and have the confidence and

desire to go further.

1. Materials out of date

The most popular listening material used by English-

major students is “Step by Step” published by Huadong

Normal University in 1983. It contains a lot of news items

in 1940’s, such as “Sihanouk had a friendly talk with

Chinese premier Zhou Enlai.” It is not hard to imagine how

difficult it is for the generation of 1990’s or 2000 to

understand, let along to engage. The out of date material

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is a big barrier to successful interpretation, for

students’ lack of relevant background knowledge. They are

unlikely to mobilize all their interest, curiosity and

confidence to concentrate on the text.

2. Improper level of difficulty

Grading texts is problematic, and the difficulty of a

given text will depend to a great extent on the learner. 1

It is suggested that start from the shortest and easiest.

Therefore, most listening books always devote the final

units to news items which are the most demanding part for

listeners.

Solutions to Inappropriate Text Selection:

All teachers are recommended to use authentic listening

materials in the EFL classroom. Teachers tend to worry that

1 Tony Lynch and Anne Anderson, Listening, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988, p. 80

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the materials might be too difficult. Students, however,

need to be exposed to the opportunities to listen to

native-speakers as often as possible. As Morrison said:

Authentic listening materials can, and

should, be used at all levels from beginners to

advanced, because it is only through exposure

from the initial learning stages that the

learner can fully integrate the individual

listening micro-skills that may be isolated and

presented by the teacher. Moreover, the

provision of authentic listening materials

allows students to supplement the inevitably

limited amount of listening material that their

teachers and classmates can provide. …authentic

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materials often go beyond the actual level which

the student is judged to have, they are

preferable to non-authentic materials, whose

reduced and simplified forms are often

culturally inappropriate, difficult to

accommodate into existing syllabuses, expensive,

and difficult to obtain.1

There are a wide range of materials to select: songs,

plays, short stories, jokes, discussions, daily talks,

interviews and science reports on VOA Special English.

Using authentic materials applies to not only reading but

also listening.

Stressful Listening Environment

1 Bruce Morrison, “Using New Broadcasts for Authentic Listening Comprehension”, ELT Journal, Volume 43/1, OxfordUniversity Press, January 1989.

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Stressful listening environment does great harm to

effective listening. As English teachers and learners, we

are quite aware of a fact that the effect of listening is

closely related to listeners’ psychological conditions.

One under great-pressure can never do well in a listening

course, while a relaxed mind can respond quickly.

Unfortunately, Chinese students are often required to keep

absolute quiet, which is traditionally thought as a

necessary psychological preparation for the coming sound.

In fact, dead quietness easily arouses listeners’

uncertainty and fear. One might has experienced that

standing in a big empty hall, nothing heard, you suddenly

feel small, unconfident and in a panic. That is why most

listeners will lose points for the first one or two

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questions.

Solutions to Stressful Listening Environment:

Being quiet is not always a good for getting prepared;

on the contrary, playing some lively tune can effectively

help listeners to relax. A beautiful familiar English song

can be even better to get students involved in English

surroundings in an unconscious way as soon as possible. It

needs to be confirmed that the song should be familiar or

already learned; otherwise listeners would start worrying

about missing its meaning. It is also suggested that

teacher play the listening text with a soft music

background on the premise of harmony. Proper music

selection and application is not an obstacle but a good

dose to reduce listeners’ affective filter. The more

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stressed you are, the harder you feel to get down to the

actual happening.

Fast Speed in Native Speech and Its Root

It is commonly heard that listeners complain much of

the fast speed; however, once we take a further look at

the problem, it is found that speed solely does not hamper

listening course. Speed is a fairly complicated matter

which results from many factors. First, it may result from

the problem of phonemes which change constantly according

to natural speech discourse. After many years of English

study at school, students have been accustomed to the

“classroom dialect” which is simplified and unnaturally

slow English spoken by teachers for the purpose of

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facilitating students’ understanding. 1 However, it is not

the case in native speech. Generally, certain consonants

are obliterated and this phenomenon is likely to mislead

foreign students of English. In the sentence “What happened

to you yesterday?” the past-tense inflection is not sounded in

connected speech, because it is followed by another

similar consonant. Without enough alert to the phenomenon,

students may be confused and misled. Teacher needs to help

them to use contextual cues to work it out. “Yesterday” is

such an indicator. The same can be seen in “I have just finished

my homework”; the past-tense inflection is obliterated,

while “have” helps us to determine the form of the verb

with ease. In addition, contractions (e.g. I’m) occur in

rapid speech, and vowels are weakened in unstressed

1 Nsakala Lengo, “Developing Listening Comprehension and Oral Fluency via the Language Laboratory”, English Teaching Forum, V.24, No.1, January 1986.

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syllables. This phenomenon is so usual in speech that

students need to be aware. 1 Moreover, natural speech has

accent, colloquial language, stress, intonation and

linking. In the sentence “Where are you?” verb is stressed,

but in “Where are you?” the question word is stressed.

Syllable stress can be different based on various

attitudes of narrator. Intonation can change meaning of a

whole sentence. If one reads “You are tired” with a falling

tone, it means he asserts that you are really tired. With

a rising tone, he asks “Are you tired?” Linking is a common

seeing in native speech which means if a consonant is

followed by a vowel, they should be linked up to create a

new connected sound. Such as “come on”, we actually

pronounce it as [’].

1 Nsakala Lengo, “Developing Listening Comprehension and Oral Fluency via the Language Laboratory”, English Teaching Forum, V.24, No.1, January, 1986.

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Surprisingly, it is found that “the advanced students

preferred narratives spoken with non-native accent at

approximately the same speeds or faster than native

listeners. And individual listeners may exhibit somewhat

different rate preferences …” (Zhao, 1997)

All the factors jointly make up of the fast speed

barrier.

Rate is sometimes a scapegoat when other

factors are more directly pertinent to

communication difficulties. Furthermore, it

would seem that learners’ listening

comprehension skills might well be enhanced from

exposure to a variety of speakers from different

language backgrounds speaking at normal rates. 1

1 Tracey Derwing and Murray J. Munro, “What Speaking Rates do Non-native Listeners Prefer?” Applied Linguistics, 22/3, 2001.

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This statement reconfirms the idea of using authentic

listening materials.

Skills and Strategies

1. Oral Practice: Imitation and Repetition

After a general view on the phonological features of

listening, this issue will focus on the strategies used to

reduce the difficulty. As a language learner and teacher,

I insist developing listening comprehension via oral

practice. According to Boyle:

In listening situations where the opportunities

for oral practice are much fewer than for

listening, more attention should be given in

teaching to exercises that link listening to an

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improvement of speaking skills. 1

Why the speed at which a sentence is spoken by native

speakers is the greatest problem for students? It is

because listeners have never experienced the language

orally. They have no spontaneous framing for the possible

stress, intonation and linking in native speech. Oral

practice related to listening serves as the medium to

abridge the gap. By introducing all the phonological

characteristics to students, teachers can record both

native and students’ voices to help them analyze the

differences. One could internalize the rules only through

times of imitation of the tape and repetition. Kalivoda

(1980), too, emphasizes the importance of oral repetition

when he says that “this simple activity tends to sharpen

1 Erlinda R. Boyle, “An Alternative Approach to Improving Listening Skills”, English Teaching Forum, V.31, No.3, July, 1993.

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listening skill, because it is hard to repeat an extensive

sentence without understanding what you are saying.”

Imitation and repetition can be very stimulating and

enjoyable. The tape is played with the students’ reading

aloud along with it. Some can follow; some can not. The

whole class becomes very noisy and hilarious. This is

called shadow-reading activity by Boyle. 1 Students are

encouraged to repeat the sentence from their memory and

speak it as fast as they can by using all the phonology

varieties. This activity successfully makes listeners

interact with the tape and personally experience speaking

the language with the same speed, tone, stress,

pronunciation and familiarize themselves with the

features. Listening is not an isolated task any more.

1 Erlinda R. Boyle, “An Alternative Approach to Improving Listening Skills”, English Teaching Forum, V.31, No.3, July 1993.

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The purpose of this shadow-reading is to give

the students experience with the differences in

tone, stress, accent, and pronunciation among

different varieties of English, and also to show

them how they stand in relation to native-

speaker speech. 2

This activity naturally brings about competition and group

work in class, in which students learn different skills

from their peers. It is an easy logic that if we can speak

faster than tape, we surely will not miss it.

2. Prediction and Guessing: Schema and Scaffolding

Another strategy to conquer speed barrier is the proper

use of prediction and guessing. Prediction is a key process

in reading as well as in listening. This process will

2 Ibid.

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eliminate listeners’ fear of the sudden happening.

Native speakers, when listen, use their

perception of he key features of context and

their knowledge of the world to limit the range

of possible utterances they are about to hear.

It means they do not have to pay attention to …

every word… They can simply process the message

for deviations from what was expected, thus

reducing their memory load in order to monitor

the incoming message more efficiently and in

order to set up further predictions. 1

Hymes indicated not only the necessity but also the way to

make prediction. That is to “use their perception of the

key features of context and their knowledge of the world”.

1 Dell Hymes, Language in Culture and Society, New York : Harper & Row, 1964

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Selecting key features effectively reduces the memory load

and one can concentrate on the main idea better. Outline,

key words dictation, and blank filling are designed for

practicing key words selection.

Another way is to use one’s knowledge of the world,

which is named “schema” (an abstract knowledge structure

summarizing what is known about a variety of cases).

1Schema supports us to make predictions in numerous cases.

The more schemata one has, the more accurate his

prediction is. Analogy with one’s prior knowledge is in

most common use. While listening to a text, learners

recall the past similar experiences and shared knowledge

to enhance their interpretations. Holding an expectation

to listen will make the listening text less abrupt. Schema

1 Carrell, P., Devine, J. & Eskey, D. (Eds.) Interactive approaches to second language reading. New York. Cambridge University Press, 1988, p.42.

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is dynamic and open to every new element. Teachers need to

help students set up as many schemata as possible by

providing them with cultural and literal background

references and to promote further extensions constantly.

During the predicting process, scaffolding strategy is

recommended as well. That is the listening text is not

given to students as a whole but separately. I used to

present a telephone invitation to first year undergraduate

students. I stopped the tape after the caller said hello

and asked his friend if she was available that Sunday.

Learners were urged to predict with their stereotyped

invitation schema: what would happen next; what the woman

would probably answer. Students were very excited about

the guessing and they predicted that the man wanted to

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date with the woman; they might go to movie, a concert, a

fancy dinner or an excursion. All were entertainments.

Their evidence was very convincing --- the time was

Sunday. The dialogue was played and they were right

because the man planned to invite the woman to see a new

play. The dialogue was stopped there and I asked what they

thought the woman would respond to the invitation. Their

answers were three kinds: to agree because she loved plays

or the boy; to refuse with excuse since she did not like

the boy or plays; to suggest other activities. In the

dialogue, the woman accepted the invitation with joy.

After getting the answer, the tape was stopped again.

Students were required to imagine if they were the two

speakers what they would talk about then. They got it all

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right. The two speakers were discussing about the time and

place for meeting. This dialogue is a typical life event

with universally shared sequence. Approaching to the end

in a scaffolding way offers opportunities for predicting

and makes the text not a story of “others” any more. A

positive and active interaction happens between listeners

and the recorded sound.

3. Visual Support

Audio-tapes listening are much more difficult than

face-to-face listening due to lack of visual support.

Teachers might as well reduce the difficulty by providing

related pictures, graphs, diagrams, maps.

Visuals can help learners by supplying

cultural information and by enabling them to

predict more accurately (a picture of the

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speaker really is worth a thousand words).

Visuals can also provide support during

listening by reinforcing the aural message … by

focusing learners’ attention on the important

parts of the message and training them to listen

for specific information.1

For low-intermediate learners, I insist that teachers

consciously make the listening text stimulate more than

one their senses. I would call it multi-senses input which

involves making the pure aural materials visual, touchable

and even flavourous by using visual aids or real objects.

I used to bring a real pizza to class when the students

were listening to a story of making pizza. The whole class

1 Susan Sheerin, “Listening comprehension: teaching or testing?” ELT Journal, Vol. 41/2, Oxford University Press, April 1987.

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shared the pizza after my brief introduction. With the

help of the hot delicious visual aid, listeners

successfully set up a simple schema about pizza with their

tongues, noses, and eyes. The little cooking story is no

longer an imagination based on an empty frame. As for

advanced learners, mono-sense input (just listen) is more

favored. That is because advanced learners have had the

mental schemata for the issue already. They can

automatically call up the schemata while listening. For

them, I have a good training program --- seeing Charles

Chaplin’s silent movie. There are only few simple

dialogues in his early movies. You can see the speakers’

lips moving but no sound. The captions are only used where

absolutely necessary. My students often play the dubbing

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game. By carefully watching the lips moving, they, using

proper schemata, have to figure out what the speakers are

talking about. This activity makes my class very

inspiring, challenging and interesting.

Above all, listening is not considered as a passive

process as before. Listeners can have a shared part with

it and personally experience it orally. With an

appropriate text selection and a relaxed listening

surrounding, guided by teachers to use effective and

proper strategies, as imitation, repetition, visual aids,

prediction and guessing, some prominent listening barriers

can be overcome. In order to have an inspiring,

motivating, and invigorating listening experience, the

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research on listening skills, however, has just started.

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Bibliography

1. Bruce Morrison, “Using New Broadcasts for Authentic Listening Comprehension”, ELT Journal Volume 43/1,

Oxford University Press, January, 1989.

2. Charge and Karen Giblin, “Learning English in A Video Studio”, ELT Journal, Volume 42/4, Oxford

University Press, October, 1988.

3. Christine C.M. Goh, “How ESL learners with different listening abilities use comprehension

strategies and tactics”, Language Teaching Research, Vol. 2.2, 1998.

4. Erlinda R. Boyle, “An Alternative Approach to Improving Listening Skills”, English Teaching Forum, V.31,

No.3, July, 1993.

5. John Field, “Skills and strategies: towards a new methodology for listening”, ELT Journal, Volume 52/2,

Oxford University Press, April,1998.

6. John M. Levis and Linda Grant, “Integrating Pronunciation into ESL/EFL Classrooms”, TESOL Journal:

V.12, No.2, 2003.

7. Mambungi wa Sangwa, “Hints for Teaching a Listening Comprehension Lesson”, English Teaching Forum, Vol.

25, No.1, January, 1987.

8. Nsakala Lengo, “Developing Listening Comprehension and Oral Fluency via the Language Laboratory”,

English Teaching Forum, V.24, No.1, January, 1986.

9. Rao Zhenhui, “Reconciling Communicative Approaches to the Teaching of English with Traditional

Chinese Methods”, Research in the Teaching of English, V.30, No.4, December, 1996.

10. Susan Sheerin, “Listening comprehension: teaching or testing?” ELT Journal, Vol. 41/2, Oxford

University Press, April, 1987.

11. Tony Ridgway, “Listening strategies --- I beg your pardon?” ELT Journal, Volume 54/2, Oxford

University Press, April, 2000.

12. Tracey Derwing and Murray J. Munro, “What Speaking Rates do Non-native Listeners Prefer?” Applied

Linguistics, 22/3, 2001.

13. Xing Tian, “The Impact of Strategy Training on Listening Comprehension”, Teaching English in China, V.26,

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No.3, pp.76-79, 2003.

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