In times past, listening was seen as the least important of the macro-skills. It was primarily used as a way of presenting new grammar structures; the target language shown in model dialogues.  Greater importance was placed on speaking, reading and writing, evidenced by the fact that a listening component was only introduced into the Cambridge FCE exam in 1970. It was around this time that a few forward thinking linguists began to see listening in its own right; Abbs, Cook and Underwood pioneered the way with their listening course in 1968, followed by Underwood’s authentic interviews and oral narratives of 1971 and 1976.

Despite this change of view, fifty years later, the listening skill is still considered by some to be the ‘Cinderella Skill’, (Nunan 1999) indicating its undervalue in the classroom: It’s often the first thing abandoned when contact hours are reduced, the problems of weak listeners often go undiagnosed, the methodology of listening has been little discussed, researched or challenged (J.Field:2008).

Why a neglected skill?

Teaching listening skills is one of the most difficult tasks for any ESL teacher. Various reasons have been suggested for this. From a student’s perspective, listening activities can be frustrating because of the lack of clear rules as in grammar teaching. While speaking and writing have very specific exercises that can lead to improved skills, from a teacher’s perspective, listening is somewhat a ‘passive skill’, one that is in the hidden reaches of the learners mind. It’s not tangible in the way that speaking and writing are. Demonstrable results are difficult to quantify.

This lack of measurable benefits has meant some teachers have become complacent; making the assumption that listening will develop automatically along with the other skills as in the case of L1. As infants, we acquire listening skills without being conscious of any cognitive demands being made upon us. Some teachers reason therefore that students will inevitably understand the foreign language for themselves without too much intervention from the teacher. This view is supported by Anderson and Lynch who state that data research indicates ‘similarities rather than differences between L1 and L2 comprehension’ (Anderson and Lynch 1998). Penny Ur takes this a step further by suggesting that features of spoken English indicating mood and attitude are international; evidenced by the fact that we are able to appreciate foreign films, books and plays (Ur, 1989). Both writers argue that over time, L1 listening skills and abilities are simply transferred to L2.

This view is not shared by all however. Field asserts that this assumption is flawed as L2 listening is often time unsuccessful: ‘It is plain that the L2 listeners [succeed] in decoding far less of input that their teachers [tend] to assume. It is not a question of linguistic knowledge’, (Field 2008)

Another factor in possible classroom avoidance is that in many classrooms, listening skills are being ‘tested’ and not ‘taught’. Often, recorded passages and exercises which claim to foster listening comprehension skills are actually tests of listening ability (Holden 2002). Harmer states that many tasks by nature of their format appear to fall halfway between teaching and testing: they demand a right answer (e.g. is this right or wrong/ true or false)’ (2007 pg 274)

Why then should we teach listening? As teachers, we would be failing if we didn’t take in to consideration learners’ own perceptions of their needs. If we asked a typical group of high level learner to rate the difficulty of the four language skills, listening would probably head the list. (Graham 2006)  What can be done in the classroom to aid higher level students develop this necessary skill? In my next blog entry, I will analyse two different listening processes, top down and bottom up, looking at strategies within these two processes that can exploited to help high level learners in this regard.

Daniellar Amoah

UK Academic Manager