What to Do in a Listening Lesson If Your Students Don't Understand the Audio

Summary

In this instructional video, Shannon, an experienced ESL teacher trainer, addresses common concerns about teaching listening lessons. She offers practical advice on how to handle situations where students struggle to understand audio tracks, emphasizing the importance of setting context, clear tasks, and using the task-feedback circle method. Shannon also suggests simplifying tasks to match the difficulty of the audio and using transcripts or subtitles as a last resort to aid understanding. The goal is to foster progress in listening comprehension, not necessarily perfect understanding.

Takeaways

• 😀 Teaching listening lessons can be challenging, especially when students struggle to understand the audio content.
• 🔍 It's crucial to establish context and set clear tasks before students listen to the audio to help them know what to focus on.
• 📚 Teachers should anticipate potential difficulties in the audio track and plan accordingly, such as speakers with unfamiliar accents or fast-paced conversations.
• 🎯 The goal in listening lessons is progress, not perfection. Teachers should guide students through the process rather than focusing solely on the final understanding.
• 🔄 The 'task feedback circle' method, introduced by Jim Srier, is an effective way to guide students through listening tasks, allowing them to discuss answers in pairs and receive feedback from the teacher.
• 👂 Listening comprehension tasks should be adjusted based on the difficulty of the audio. Teachers can simplify tasks or focus on less challenging parts of the audio to build students' confidence.
• 👀 Pair checks during listening exercises are valuable as they help students discuss and clarify what they heard, enhancing their understanding.
• 📈 Teachers should monitor students' progress and adjust the pace of the lesson based on their performance, ensuring that they are ready to move on to more challenging tasks.
• 💻 Using subtitles or transcripts at the end of a lesson can be beneficial for students who still find the audio difficult, allowing them to see the words as they listen and identify areas of difficulty.
• 📚 Encouraging students to mark phrases where the spoken and written forms differ can help them understand connected speech and improve their listening skills.

Q & A

What is the main concern addressed in the video script?

The main concern addressed in the video script is how to handle situations in listening lessons where students do not understand the audio despite multiple attempts.

Why might teachers be hesitant to incorporate listening comprehension work in their lessons?

Teachers might be hesitant to incorporate listening comprehension work in their lessons due to the fear that their students will not understand the audio content, which could be discouraging for both students and teachers.

What is the first recommendation for teachers to improve listening comprehension lessons?

The first recommendation is to check and fine-tune teaching techniques, such as establishing context before listening and setting clear tasks for each listening stage.

What are common mistakes or misconceptions that new teachers might make in listening lessons?

Common mistakes include not establishing context before listening and not setting clear tasks for each listening stage, which can make understanding the audio content more challenging for students.

What should teachers do if they anticipate that their students might have trouble with a particular audio track?

Teachers should anticipate potential difficulties in their planning process and consider what might be causing the struggle, such as unfamiliar accents, fast speech, or colloquial language, and prepare strategies to address these issues.

How can teachers help students when they are unsure about the audio content?

Teachers can warn students about potential difficulties like fast speech or unknown vocabulary, pre-teach some of the unknown vocabulary, and provide guidance on what to listen for.

What is the task feedback circle as described in the script?

The task feedback circle is a method where teachers set clear tasks for each listening stage, allow students to listen and discuss their answers in pairs, and then bring the group back together for feedback and discussion of the answers.

Why is it important for teachers to monitor students during pair checks in the task feedback circle?

Monitoring students during pair checks helps teachers understand how well the students are doing on the task, identify areas of difficulty, and adjust the lesson pacing and content based on the students' progress.

What advice is given for grading tasks in listening lessons?

The advice is to grade the difficulty of the tasks, not the text. Teachers should design tasks that are achievable for students after a couple of rounds of listening and avoid asking questions that require understanding every single detail.

How can using subtitles or transcripts at the end of a listening lesson be beneficial?

Using subtitles or transcripts at the end of a listening lesson can help students understand parts of the audio they struggled with and can be a jumping-off point for further vocabulary or connected speech practice.

Outlines

00:00

🤔 Addressing Student Struggles in Listening Comprehension

The video script begins with the instructor addressing a common concern among teachers regarding students' difficulties in understanding audio during listening lessons. The instructor empathizes with the issue, acknowledging its potential to discourage both students and teachers. The focus is on understanding why students might struggle with comprehension and introducing strategies to tackle these challenges. The instructor also introduces herself as Shannon, an ESL teacher trainer, and invites new viewers to subscribe for practical teaching techniques.

05:00

📝 Fine-Tuning Teaching Techniques for Listening Lessons

The second paragraph delves into the importance of setting context and clear tasks in listening lessons. The instructor points out common mistakes made by new teachers, such as failing to establish context or set clear tasks, which can hinder students' comprehension. She suggests watching a separate video for detailed explanations and solutions to these issues. The goal is to ensure that students understand the objectives before listening and are guided through the process effectively.

10:02

🔍 Anticipating and Addressing Audio Comprehension Difficulties

In this paragraph, the instructor advises teachers to anticipate potential difficulties students might face with specific audio tracks. She recommends self-reflection on the nature of the audio, such as accents, speed of speech, or use of slang, and suggests pre-emptive measures like warning students about fast speech or pre-teaching vocabulary. The emphasis is on being proactive in identifying and addressing comprehension hurdles to facilitate a smoother learning experience.

15:04

🔄 The Task-Feedback Circle for Dynamic Listening Lessons

The instructor introduces the 'task-feedback circle' as a method for dynamic and responsive teaching during listening lessons. This involves setting tasks, allowing students to listen and discuss in pairs, and then reviewing answers as a group. The instructor emphasizes the importance of monitoring students' progress and adjusting the pace of the lesson based on their understanding. The task-feedback circle ensures that students are actively engaged in the learning process and that teachers can adapt to their needs in real-time.

🎯 Adjusting Task Difficulty in Listening Comprehension

The final paragraph discusses the importance of adjusting the difficulty of comprehension tasks to match the students' ability to understand the audio. The instructor suggests that while the audio track's difficulty is fixed, teachers can control the complexity of the tasks and questions they set for students. This includes designing tasks that build students' confidence and focusing on general understanding rather than minute details, especially when dealing with particularly challenging audio sections.

Keywords

💡Listening Comprehension

Listening comprehension is the ability to understand spoken language, which is a critical skill in language learning. In the video's context, it refers to the challenges teachers face when students struggle to understand audio material during lessons. The script discusses strategies to improve students' listening skills, such as setting clear tasks and using the task-feedback circle method.

💡Task-Feedback Circle

The task-feedback circle is a teaching method mentioned in the script, which involves setting clear tasks for students, allowing them to attempt the task, discussing in pairs, and then providing feedback as a whole class. It is used to gauge students' understanding and adjust the pace of the lesson accordingly, ensuring that students are not just passively listening but actively engaged in the comprehension process.

💡Context

Establishing context is emphasized in the script as an essential step before students listen to an audio track. It involves providing background information or setting the scene to help students better understand and anticipate the content they are about to hear. The script suggests that without proper context, students may find it more challenging to comprehend the audio material.

💡Accent

An accent refers to a distinctive way of pronouncing a language, often associated with a particular region or social group. In the script, the presenter mentions that an unfamiliar accent could be a barrier to understanding for students, especially if the audio contains speakers with accents that students are not accustomed to.

💡Connected Speech

Connected speech is a natural phenomenon where words run together in fluent speech, often with some sounds being slurred or omitted. The script discusses how this can make it difficult for students to understand audio tracks, as the rapid and fluid speech may obscure word boundaries and meanings.

💡Slang

Slang refers to informal words and expressions that are typical of a particular group or subculture. The script points out that the presence of slang or colloquial language in an audio track can pose comprehension challenges for students, particularly if they are not familiar with these expressions.

💡Colloquialisms

Colloquialisms are informal expressions or phrases that are commonly used in everyday conversation but are not typically found in formal writing. The script suggests that teachers should be aware of the potential difficulty students may have with understanding colloquial language in listening exercises.

💡Progress

The script emphasizes the importance of viewing listening lessons as an opportunity for students to make progress rather than achieving perfection. It suggests that teachers should focus on the development of listening skills over the course of the lesson, rather than on the final outcome of complete understanding.

💡Breakout Rooms

Breakout rooms are a feature in online teaching platforms that allow teachers to divide students into smaller groups for discussions or activities. In the script, they are used for pair checks, where students discuss their answers after listening to an audio track, facilitating peer learning and deeper understanding.

💡Transcript

A transcript is a written version of the spoken content, typically used for reference or study. The script suggests using a transcript towards the end of a listening lesson as a tool to help students understand parts of the audio that were particularly challenging, and to highlight differences between spoken and written language.

Highlights

Question addressed: What to do if students don't understand the audio in a listening lesson.

Concern that prevents teachers from doing more listening comprehension work.

Fear of students not understanding even after setting clear tasks and playing the audio multiple times.

Introduction of Shannon, an ESL teacher trainer, and the purpose of the video.

Importance of establishing context before students listen to the audio track.

Need to set clear tasks for each listening stage to guide students on what to listen for.

Common mistakes and misconceptions in teaching listening lessons.

Advice to anticipate difficulties in understanding the audio track during planning.

Strategies to deal with fast speech, slang, and colloquialisms in the audio.

Emphasizing that understanding every word is not necessary for progress in listening comprehension.

Using the task feedback circle to guide students through listening stages.

Importance of monitoring students during pair checks to gauge their understanding.

Adjusting tasks based on students' confidence and understanding during the lesson.

Advice on grading the task, not the text, to match the difficulty of the audio.

Controlling the comprehension tasks to match the students' ability to understand the audio.

Using subtitles or transcripts at the end of the lesson for difficult audio tracks.

Engaging students in activities to identify phrases with different pronunciation in connected speech.

Encouraging teachers to have confidence in teaching listening lessons and focusing on progress, not perfection.

Transcripts

so when it comes to teaching listening

lessons there's a question that I

commonly get asked by teachers and in

this video I want to share a little bit

of advice in response to that question

and that question is if I'm teaching a

listening lesson what do I do if my

students just don't understand the audio

this is a really understandable question

and I know that this particular concern

is what holds a lot of teachers back

from doing more listening comprehension

work in their lessons and honestly I've

experienced this before myself and so I

get that there's still always that

little bit of fear there going into a

listening lesson what if even after I

set clear tasks for the listening stages

even if I play the audio track multiple

times what if my students just still

don't understand what if they still

aren't able to do the listening tasks

that I give them or answer the

comprehension questions what do we do

then so obviously a situation like that

could be discouraging for your students

and probably not very comforting for you

as the teacher either but there are some

things that you can do to help with this

situation so let's go ahead and dive

into first of all why this might be

happening and then we'll get into some

strategies for how to deal with this

situation and just in case you're new

here hey welcome I'm Shannon I have

worked as an ESL teacher trainer for

many years now and if you are an ESL

teacher particularly somebody who works

with adult ESL students and you're

looking for online teaching techniques

that are practical and easy to implement

then go ahead and subscribe to this

channel because I put out more videos

pretty much weekly just like this one

okay so let's go ahead and get back to

the topic at hand which is that big

question what can you do if you're

teaching a listening lesson you play the

audio track and it just seems like no

matter how many times you play it or

what you do your students just don't

understand so the first thing I

recommend is to check whether you need

to fine-tune a couple of your teaching

techniques when it comes to helping your

students with listening comprehension

there are a couple of common mistakes I

often see new teachers make in listening

lessons or maybe we can call them

misconceptions in terms of teachers

thinking they should do something that's

actually not that helpful for the

students so if you are somebody who is

doing any of these things don't worry

because these issues are really pretty

easy to fix as soon as you know what to

do instead so for example something

that's really important to do in a

listening lesson is to establish context

before students listen to the audio

track it's also really important to set

a clear task for each listening stage so

in other words giving your students

guidance as to exactly what you want

them to listen for before you actually

push play on that audio so if you're not

doing those things then it's going to

make the whole process of understanding

what they're hearing especially

challenging

I actually made a separate video where I

go into way more detail on each of these

common issues and suggest really helpful

Solutions so the first step if you

haven't already watched that video is to

go ahead and watch that one just to

eliminate those things as potential

factors here okay so now assuming you've

watched that video and all of that has

been taken care of so your setting

context your setting clear tasks for the

audio you're playing the audio track

multiple times what if your students are

still still struggling the next thing I

would suggest is to ask yourself what is

it exactly about that particular audio

track that you think might be difficult

for them to understand and you can even

ask yourself this question in your

planning process in fact I would

recommend that you try to anticipate

this in your planning process for

example if I'm worried that my students

are going to have trouble understanding

a particular audio track um you know

before I even teach the lesson in my

pration I'm going to ask myself that

question so what is it exactly here that

I think is going to trip them up is it

that the speaker has a certain accent my

students aren't used to is it a

conversation between two people where

both speakers are talking very quickly

and using a lot of connected speech

where their words are kind of getting

slurred together are there maybe a lot

of slang words or colloquialisms in the

conversation that I think my students

probably won't know or is it something

else or some combination of all of these

factors so obviously before you're

actually in the lesson and the audio is

actually playing you might not be 100%

sure as to what exactly the reason could

be right or you might not even know

whether or not your students are going

to have trouble with that particular

audio track at all but either way I find

it helpful to at least try to anticipate

this because once you have a clearer

idea of what the actual problem with the

audio is right what exactly is it that's

causing your students to struggle it's

much easier to try to preempt or deal

with that issue so to go back to some of

those example issues if you think the

problem is that the speakers are talking

really quickly in the audio recording

you could warn your students about that

ahead of time so right from the start

before you even push play you could tell

the students that the speakers are going

to be talking very quickly and that they

probably won't be able to catch

everything so that way the students go

into it even the very first time they

listen knowing in advance that you're

not expecting them to understand

everything they have some warning going

in so that could help eliminate that

kind of negative surprise right that

very first time to hear speech that's

much faster than they were expecting if

on the other hand you think the issue is

that there's a lot of unknown vocabulary

or slang or colloquialisms in the audio

then you could pre- some of those

unknown vocab items before diving into

the listening exercise so the point here

is really that the more specific you can

be about the anticipated Problem

whatever you anticipate the difficulty

for your students to be right not just

I'm afraid my students won't understand

but what exactly you think will cause

this then the more likely it is that

you'll be able to deal with this and

actually help your students through it

in the way that you structure and

approach the listening stages in your

lesson my third piece of advice here is

to consider reframing how you think

about listening lessons in general so we

know that not realistic to expect our

students to understand every single word

the first time they listen to the audio

but even by the end of the lesson it's

really not necessary for the students to

have understood every detail uh even to

have gotten a lot out of that listening

experience remember that the goal in

practicing listening comprehension is

progress not Perfection and so our goal

as teachers is just to guide students

through this process of practicing their

listening comprehension skills right not

to focus on the final product of exactly

how much they understood so as long as

we're not teaching in a more specific

context like exam prep then we're really

not assessing our students on the

percentage of the audio or the number of

words that they were able to understand

or even really the number of

comprehension questions that they were

able to get correct it's all about just

letting students practice playing the

audio multiple times so that they can

hear a little bit more in response to

whatever task you've set each time so a

great way to guide the students through

this process that I'm talking about is

to use what Jim scrier calls the task

feedback Circle how this works is that

you set a clear task for each listening

stage and the tasks typically should

progress from more General and therefore

less challenging to more detailed which

probably means more challenging and then

for each task you're just guiding

students through the same cycle where

first you set the task and let students

listen alone to try to do that task then

you allow students to discuss their

answers in pairs so if you're teaching

online this does mean putting them into

breakout rooms and then the next step is

to bring the whole group back together

and go over the answers what's important

here is that instead of just going

through the motions you know just

waiting while the students are in their

breakout rooms and then just giving them

the correct answers during feedback you

want to be really proactive in paying

close attention to how the students are

doing and feeling during each of these

steps so in my lessons while my students

are doing the pair check I'm actively

monitoring by going from room to room or

if you're teaching in person great you

can just walk around the room and listen

in a little bit on each pair's

discussion and so while I'm doing this

I'm making a mental note of how the

students did on the task it's difficult

of course to get a completely accurate

read on every single student's answers

but I can usually get at least a pretty

good sense of overall how difficult my

students found the audio and the task

and even which aspects of the task or

maybe even which particular questions

they found the most challenging so while

I'm listening in I'm not interjecting

I'm just listening and I might hear my

students saying things like oh wow I I

couldn't understand anything that was

way too fast or maybe okay number one I

got but did you hear the answer to

number two I totally missed it all of

those kinds of comments give you really

valuable information about how the

students did on the task and how

confident they're feeling about it so

from there when I bring the group back

together to go over the answers for

feedback then I'm going to get even more

information so if I try to elicit the

answer for the task and all of my

students answer correctly and

confidently then I know they did well

and I can move on to the next task but

if they don't seem so confident in the

answer if most of my students say that

they couldn't really hear the answer or

the answers if there were multiple

questions or maybe only some of the

students feel confident about the

different questions on the task okay

then that's a good indication that we

need to stay on this task this stage a

little bit longer and listen again for

that same task and here's another really

important tip when using the task

feedback Circle so if your students are

not confident about all of the answers

for that particular task don't just give

them the answers anyway and then move on

to the next task so let's say just as an

example that my students were all very

confident about the answer to question

one but only some of them seemed

confident in their answer to question

two and hardly any of them really seemed

confident at all or are saying that they

even heard the answer for question three

so as the teacher one option would be to

just tell them yes this is correct for

question one and here's the answer for

two and here's the answer for three but

instead of doing that instead of

confirming the right answer for number

two and telling them the answer for

question three I'm going to hold off on

this instead I can confirm they got

question one correct since they were

confident about that one but then I can

say okay now let's listen again just for

questions 2 and three to see if you can

hear more information after the students

listen again they then go back into

their pairs in their breakout rooms in

order to discuss once again any

additional information that they heard

and answer to those two questions so

this is the task feedback Circle in

action we're making decisions and pacing

the lessons based on what's actually

happening in the moment based on how our

students are doing with the listening

and we're using that information to

decide whether we're ready to move on or

whether we need more time on that

particular task and don't underestimate

the power of those pair checks you'd be

surprised how much they really help

sometimes what I'll notice when I'm

teaching or observing a lesson is that

after the audio is played for the first

time and the teacher says okay now go to

your breakout rooms and check with your

partner the students will say uh wait

can we listen again I didn't understand

everything my advice there if that

happens would be to reassure your

students don't worry you'll have a

chance to listen again but even if you

didn't understand everything for this

task or even if you couldn't understand

enough to answer all of the questions

that's okay just talk to your partner

about what you did he just talk together

and get the answers to as many of the

questions as you can because you'll

notice once you actually start listening

in on those breakout room conversations

that the students actually did

understand a lot and by talking it out

with somebody else with their partner

they're able to bring up a lot of key

words and they're able to help each

other get more information that they

heard uh in relation to the questions

that they're trying to answer so you'll

hear students say things to their

partner like oh wait you heard that word

for question three okay I didn't hear

that word but I'm going to listen again

and I'm going to see if I hear it this

time so all of that stuff coming up is

going to help them right it's going to

support them give them clues about more

things to listen for in the next

listening round so this is why the task

feedback circle is so powerful because

the students are essentially setting the

pace of the lesson for you and with

those pair checks they're helping each

other in understanding a little bit more

each time and as the teacher you don't

have to feel like you're just guessing

about how much they understood or just

going through the motions and wondering

if it's actually helping you're getting

real valuable information each time the

students listen about what they need and

how they're progressing okay another

piece of advice if you're worried about

your students just not understanding the

audio is this grade the task not the

text what I mean by grade here is

simplify like the grade of difficulty

not grade as in assess and so what I

mean by that is that you really can't

control the difficulty of the actual

audio track because it's pre-recorded I

mean I guess technically you could use

some sort of technology to slow down the

speed of the track but let's assume that

the point here is to help students

practice with the audio at the regular

speed so that means the audio track

essentially is what it is right you

really can't control or change that you

can't change the difficulty if the

speakers are talking very quickly but

what you can control is what you ask the

students to do with that audio track

you're in charge of the comprehension

tasks the comprehension questions so if

you're concerned that the audio is

really difficult then maybe don't ask

questions that require the students to

understand every single detail design

tasks that you think the students will

be able to do at least after a couple

rounds of listening questions that you

think they can answer that don't require

them to understand every single word so

if there's a particular part of that

audio that's super fast or maybe super

subtle or has a crazy amount of

connected speech or contains a phrase

that's almost impossible to understand

because of a particular accent or

something then maybe don't ask a ton of

really detailed comprehension questions

about that particular part right and if

you do want to focus on that particular

super difficult section then maybe come

back to that part of the audio later

maybe more near the end of your lesson

where you can really dive in and dissect

it after you've built students

confidence with the other more General

less challenging tasks that they were

able to do first so I think the

take-home message here is that you're in

control of this right even if there are

audio tasks already made for you in the

book you're not necessarily married to

those tasks you don't have to do those

tasks you can adapt them you can change

them the only exception here again is if

you're teaching listening for exam prep

then yes I would fully advise you to

proceed through the audio exercises in

the exact same way that students will be

taken through the audio during the

actual exam and that's a different thing

what I'm talking about in this video is

helping your students with listening in

more General English lessons and I think

in that case sometimes as teachers we

don't really take as much agency as we

could to take more more control over the

lesson and really help our students

through more difficult aspects of the

material all right and then finally if

you have an audio track that's just

really difficult and even after you've

played the audio multiple times using

the task feedback Circle you could

consider working with that audio track

using subtitles or the transcript at the

end of the lesson so remember you don't

want to rely on subtitles or the

transcript near the beginning of the

lesson because if you give the students

the transcript the first or even the

second or even the third time they

listen they end up really just reading

they're not really developing listening

comprehension at that stage because they

have the words right there in front of

them but if it's something where the

students have listened many times

already just to the audio and they're

still feeling a bit frustrated or like

there was just a lot that they couldn't

understand then this can be a useful

practice maybe as kind of the final

stage in the listening process where

students get to Len one final time or

maybe a couple final times with the

transcript and from there that could be

a really cool jumping off point even

into some work with vocabulary or

connected speech so for example often if

I teach a lesson based on authentic

listening material like a short clip

from a movie or episode in a series even

my Advanced students will still have

parts of it that they don't understand

no matter how many times we listen

because there's a lot of connected

speech or a colloquial vocabulary it's

material that's not designed for

language Learners so after we go through

all of the actual listening stages I'll

let my students listen again with the

transcript in front of them and I'll ask

them to do an activity where they

highlight or underline or Mark any

phrases where they think the sound what

they're hearing is much different than

the words that they're seeing so this is

a great way for me to let my students

kind of take charge and point out

phrases in English where how proficient

speakers pronounce it in very fast fluid

natural speech sounds way different than

how the words look written on paper so

once they've chosen some of the ones

that stand out to them we'll take a look

at those phrases and the features of

connected speech at play in those

phrases when they're spoken quickly and

then we'll do some modeling and drilling

with connected speech so this is a

really fun satisfying way for my

students to end the lesson feeling like

they were able to understand more at the

end right there weren't just these

mystery phrases left floating around and

it's a nice way to prepare them to be

better able to hear that really fast

connected speech in the future all right

I hope this was helpful and I hope this

gives you a little bit more confidence

in approaching your listening lessons

and feeling a little bit less worried

about that what if my students don't

understand concern and always remember

that even if your students don't

understand everything Perfection or 100%

comprehension is never the goal it's

still so valuable for you to help your

students progress in their listening

comprehension skills all right do you

still have any questions about teaching

listening comprehension or listening

lessons in general let me know in the

comments if you do and I'll see you next

time