Problems in Listening and Effective Approaches

张美春

【Abstract】The teachers often speak of the four skills—listening， speaking， reading， and writing. That means each of them is important. You can`t say that you have mastered the language without any of them， listening， one of the means of language communication， is used most widely in peoples life. So， in this article I emphatically analyze the main elements that affect students` listening comprehension and point out the ways and skills to deal with listening.

【Key words】importance； main problem and study techniques

Introduction

English plays an important part in the modern society； it is widely used in the word. In china， English is learned as a foreign language and opportunities for speaking and listening are few. The emphasis of learning is put on the development of reading. So， the most of students are good at grammar， while they are poor in listening. The student have studied English for at least six years， but many of them still find themselves unable to understand English and speak English at natural， frequent speed. With the development of science and technology， the social demands are getting higher and higher for foreign language. Therefore the listening in English has recently received growing attention in Chinese. Many people have now realized the important of listening skill. So many schools pay more attention to develop the students` listening skill in their English teaching， but there are many difficulties in improving the students` listening skill. How do we improve our listening ability？ In addition， how should we deal with them？ So we must think them over.

Ⅰ. Some main problems in listening

When we do some listening， at first we should make clear the form of listening materials， while listening， we should receive some information about the listening materials. After that， we must analyze and judge the information we have received. The information not only includes words， phrases and sentences but also includes sounds， intonation， and stress. Some of the information is useful for us to understand listening materials and work out the problems. But some else is not useful. The following are about some main problems in listening.

1. Listening to each words

Many students have their own listening habits. For example some students often try to listen to each word or each sentence. They will think hard when they meet some difficult words or sentences， and a great many students could understand the material directly， they often translate the English into Chinese in their heart. It is not necessary to understand each word， they should catch the most important points at all.endprint

2. Hearing the sounds

When we listening to a dialogue or material， we pay more attention to some easily confused sounds. We must learn English sounds well and can discriminate each of them， especially， the similar sounds such as“thirteen and thirty”，“ship and sheep”，“dawn and down” .if students can`t tell what they hear is“it is a ship” or“it is a sheep”， their ears can hardly be developed.

We should also pay more attention to some homophones and homonyms. Homophones are some words with different meanings， which are pronounced in the same way， but the spelling is different . For example：“write” and“right” are homophones. Homonyms are some words， which have the same sound and usually the same spelling as another， though different in meaning or origin. For example：the noun“bear” and the verb“bear” are homonyms.

3. Understanding colloquial vocabulary

There are differences between the formal and colloquial vocabularies. In colloquial language， some sounds are always joined together to form words and groups of words. In connected speech， some sounds， under the influence of their neighbors， are replaced by other sounds. Sometimes some neighboring sounds influence each other and replaced by a third sound that is different from both the original sounds. In colloquial language， many common English words have two or more and one or more weak forms.

4. Understanding stress and intonation

Intonation means the rise and fall of the pitch change of the voice. Intonation is an important role of listening materials . The English intonation may help us to know fairly the sentence structure and the attitude of a speaker. We have also seen that every word of two or more syllables， when said alone， has a stress on one of its syllables. However， in connected speech we do not hear a stress on every word. Some words lose their stress. According to sentence stress， we can know the important words in the sentence. In addition， we should notice that any word in a sentence might be logically stressed if it implies special emphasis or contrast.

Ⅱ. Effective approaches about listening

“Roman was not built in a day”， we cannot improve our listening one-day. The listening is complex and has no panacea， we must have hard work and commitment can improve our listening. Everybody knows the largest difference between mother language learning and foreign language learning is the environment.

For a mother language， we have lots of chance to hear and say. But for a foreign language， we can meet it only in formal places. For example classes. otherwise， we can hardly have a chance to hear it. So I will introduce some way to improve our listening skill.endprint

1. Pronunciation and intonation

First of all， pronunciation and intonation are important to listening to pure English spoken by foreigners who treat is as their mother tongue. So we should receive special training in pronunciation and intonation. When listening to the tape， we had better try to imitate after it. Only by doing so can we pronounce accurately， and understand native speakers` pronunciation easily.

Another important thing is that our listening materials should be arranged step by step. Beginners may listen to minimal pairs of sounds， words and sentences alike in both written form and oral form， by this means， our ability of differentiating sounds will surely by greatly improved . No matter how complex the listening materials are， we can understand them as long as you receive special training in listening step by step.

2. Vocabulary

“Without grammar， little can be conveyed. Without words， nothing can be conveyed.” like that， plentiful linguistic knowledge is not enough. Abundant vocabulary plays an important role in listening precedes. Besides remembering as many new words as we can， the following notes also can`t be neglected.

We should try to master as many meanings as a word may have. An English word may have several different meanings under different circumstances. The more we know them， the more easily we will understand them. Try to catch the key words of a sentence. English words are divided into two parts. One is called notional words and the other is functional word. Notional words include verbs， nouns， adjectives and adverbs. Readers are used to putting emphasis on notional words. Since notional words have strong linguistic flowing and slow speed， listeners easily understand them.

We also try to read short English story or 21st century every day. we may get much more abundant new words from them. Watching TV or movie can be very helpful. But watching movie， we should watch films in English with no Chinese subtitles.

3. Oral reading skill

We should pay attention to the oral reading skill. It is also very important to improve our listening. We also enlarge our knowledge about English， and try to read something in our spare time about geography， history， culture， stories and so on. For example， there are two materials of the same difficulty， one explains something about chinas Spring Festival， and the other is about Thanks giving Day of the western countries. The former is easy to understand but the latter is more difficult. It is clearly because the students know little about the latter.endprint

To learn English well， we must master background language of English –speaking countries. Sometimes knowledge of culture， convention and custom is significant in comprehending listening materials. Therefore we try to establish English circumstances.

4. Some detailed steps about listening

Before listening， we should know some background knowledge and think some questions related to the listening material. This method can help us listen to material with a clear purpose so as to enhance our listening efficiency. While we are listening， we listen to the material without a break in order to us grasps the main idea and important details， in this way； students can understand it as a whole. Next， replay the tape and listen and repeat it after the tape， we may know that we did not understand. We also write some key words or phrases or structure， then listen to the tape again carefully and try to repeat this dialogue or an article. This skill can help you improve your listening.

5. Take our exams with ease

During the process of the exams， we may find some familiar contents become unfamiliar because of our intense and anxious feelings. Frightened psychology is a barrier of dealing with exams high efficiently. Ordinarily speaking， the more confident we feel， the more active we will become in the exams. And come to a conclusion by inference. Do not get nervous if we are faced with new words. What we should do is to try to guess the meaning of the new words according to the whole listening material .Whether we can keep calm when meeting with new words decides whether we are able to catch the main idea of the passage or not. In a way， excellent diathesis is the best key to success.

Before we listen to tape we had better make full use of the time to look through the answer sheet. Especially， we should pay special attention to the difference of the choices and estimate what has been recorded on the tape. When we are listening to passage， we should put our heart into the key words and key sentences.

It is easy for us to remember a lot of things in our mother tongue. Yet things are quite different for a foreign language. Usually， we are not able to catch so many messages expressed in a foreign language. What we can do is to try to dictate key words and sentences as many as we can. Here， I do not mean you must write down all the materials， but the most important ones such as numbers， theme， date， names of people or place and so on. We will be sure to catch the main idea of the materials as long as we receive special training in this kind of skills. Sometimes elimination can also work without doubt when we are in trouble. We may choose proper method useful and helpful to us from our own studying experience.

Conclusion

To sum up all these above， we can draw the conclusion that listening is one of the most important skills. Listening plays an important part in English learning. so， if we want to improve our listening， it is not easy， we may meet a lot of difficulties during our improvement of listening. The learning of listening is complex and it has no panacea only hard work and commitment . Therefore， we should believe that“where there is a will， there is a way.”

References：

[1]催建社.影響英语听力理解的因素分析[J].外语界，1991（3）.

[2]李磊，王优.英语听力点金术[M].武汉测绘科技大学出版社， 1998.

[3]秦杰.听力理解过程中应注意的几个问题[J].外文界，1991（5）.endprint