We have two ears and one mouth. Why?
Dec 22, 2015
We have two ears and one mouth. Why?
How do we comprehend spoken language?????
• ¿Qué hiciste ayer?• Ayer nosotros (garble garble) a la tienda.
• Bottom Up• Phase 1 – perceive and decode acoustic signals• What is the smallest meaningful unit in spoken
lang.?• Ok, let’s see we have, an unvoiced fricative,
nasalized palatal, I think we have the word Ayer?! Good, what else do we got???
Phase 2 – Parsing
• Ayer nosotros (garble garble) a la tienda.
• Match it to a huge data bank of linguistic examples.
• Try to get meaning of sounds->syllables->words.
Phase 3 – Utilization
• Ayer nosotros (garble garble) a la tienda.• Now we’ve got it or part of it.• What do we do with it?• Store, use, or discard
Top down
• Use of pre-existing knowledge • Schemata – your blue print of how something
works, What could this consist of?????• How about baseball?
Bottom up y/o Top Down
• processes interact and compensate for each other.
• EG. What do you think I said after nosotros???????
• Bottom up failed, top up compensated
Listening situations
• Collaborative v. Non-collab examples?????????• (interactive) (non-interactive)
Listening situations
• Aural perception v. visual perception• Which one is easier???????? • Is there a time where visual with audio is
harder than audio alone? • If the visual and the audio don’t match. • E.g. Songs with images
¿Te podrías casar con. . .?
Listening Activities Three stages
1. Pre listening
2. During listening
3. Post listening
• Activate background knowledge
• Generate enthusiasm
• Active listening
• Clarify, Extend, Refine
Examples of pre-Listening activities• You, the teacher listens to/views the text ahead of
time :)
• Act like this is really interesting and valuable
• Explain Key Vocab.
• Explain/Discuss relevant Cultural Information
• Tips about what to listen for
• Provide comprehension questions ahead of time.
• Show a picture related to the text and ask questions
• Use a speaking/writing question to help students think about the topic “Ask a neighbor, Imagina que eres granjero y no hay suficiente lluvia, ¿Qué harías?”
• What else?
During Listening Activities• Give students a purpose or goal
eg. Averigua como se siente el cantante hacía su amor.
• Match listening activity to students’ skill level
• Pay attention to cognates. While listening to the song, try to figure out how to say these words…..
• Listen for meaning i.e. gist
• Listen twice, once quickly, once closely
• Identify as many words as you can
• Identify three words or phrases where you here the singer’s regional accent.
• Everyone SINGS ALONG!!!!! No way dude!
Post Listening Activities• Global activities
• Write a brief summary of the text/story/article.
• Explain to your partner in your own words what the story was about.
• What do you think the author’s opinion was of X and why?
Post Listening Activities• Specific information activities (to focus on the details
of the text)
• Multiple choice/short answer quiz/questions¿Dónde estaba Carlos cuando su novia llamó?
• Opinion- ¿Porqué mastican las hojas de coca en los Andes?
Post Listening Activities• Linguistic and cultural activities (use text for lang.
and culture learning)
• Ask students to create a dialogue or role play based on two of the characters from the text.
• Ask students to write a continuation of the story.
• Ask questions and generate discussion based on some of the cultural topics presented in the reading.
• What else????