Practice Your Listening
2024-11-09
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1Hello! This week on Ask a Teacher, we answer a question from Zekeriya in Turkiye about listening to English.
2Dear teacher,
3When I practice listening, I focus a lot and do a lot of repetitions.
4After a while, I realized that I was actually memorizing the audio recording instead of practicing listening.
5How do you think I should do an ideal listening exercise?
6Thank you,
7Zekeriya
8I'm happy to answer this question, Zekeriya.
9There is not one ideal listening exercise.
10Instead, there are several good ways to improve your listening.
11The repetitions you are doing can be necessary and helpful for you to understand what you hear.
12And repetitions likely help you remember new words and how to pronounce them.
13But let's look at more ways you can practice listening.
14First, try to find listening material that is just a bit above your ability.
15This will help you learn new words without making it too difficult for you.
16It is best to listen to English material that has words written either in captions or in the body text, such as a VOA Learning English article.
17This will help check your listening.
18You can test yourself by first listening to parts of the audio without reading the words.
19Note the main ideas and the things you clearly understood.
20Then, listen to it again and try to understand more details. This is when you can do shorter repetitions.
21Next, you can check how much you understood by reading the words as you listen to the audio again.
22One of the best ways to practice listening is by writing every word you hear.
23This is called transcribing. Even with audio examples as short as one minute, you can learn a lot of English using this method.
24For example, if you are transcribing an interview, you might notice differences between spoken English and written English.
25By transcribing, you can notice and learn new expressions, grammar rules and spelling.
26This method also helps make new words stay in your memory when you read them.
27That is because you are discovering the answer to a problem you have already tried to solve through listening.
28Try listening to English spoken at different speeds.
29Over time, you can follow spoken English at a faster speed.
30Many videos online let you increase or decrease the speed of playback.
31Practice listening to English spoken in different foreign accents.
32This is a useful skill because English is spoken in so many places around the world.
33Center your listening on specific sounds or grammatical points.
34For example, preposition use in English can be difficult.
35Try listening for prepositions and the words they connect with.
36This can help you use them correctly in your speaking and writing.
37Remember that, like any skill, you can improve listening by practicing often and having detailed plans for the methods you will use.
38For our readers and listeners, what are your questions about American English? We'd like to hear from you.
39Send us an email at learningenglish@voanews.com.
40And please include where you are from in your email, too.
41And that's Ask a Teacher.
42I'm Andrew Smith.
1Hello! This week on Ask a Teacher, we answer a question from Zekeriya in Turkiye about listening to English. 2Question 3Dear teacher, 4When I practice listening, I focus a lot and do a lot of repetitions. After a while, I realized that I was actually memorizing the audio recording instead of practicing listening. How do you think I should do an ideal listening exercise? 5Thank you, 6Zekeriya 7Answer 8I'm happy to answer this question, Zekeriya. 9There is not one ideal listening exercise. Instead, there are several good ways to improve your listening. 10The repetitions you are doing can be necessary and helpful for you to understand what you hear. And repetitions likely help you remember new words and how to pronounce them. But let's look at more ways you can practice listening. 11Listening methods 12First, try to find listening material that is just a bit above your ability. This will help you learn new words without making it too difficult for you. 13It is best to listen to English material that has words written either in captions or in the body text, such as a VOA Learning English article. This will help check your listening. 14You can test yourself by first listening to parts of the audio without reading the words. 15Note the main ideas and the things you clearly understood. 16Then, listen to it again and try to understand more details. This is when you can do shorter repetitions. 17Next, you can check how much you understood by reading the words as you listen to the audio again. 18Transcribing 19One of the best ways to practice listening is by writing every word you hear. This is called transcribing. Even with audio examples as short as one minute, you can learn a lot of English using this method. For example, if you are transcribing an interview, you might notice differences between spoken English and written English. 20By transcribing, you can notice and learn new expressions, grammar rules and spelling. This method also helps make new words stay in your memory when you read them. That is because you are discovering the answer to a problem you have already tried to solve through listening. 21Other tips 22Try listening to English spoken at different speeds. Over time, you can follow spoken English at a faster speed. Many videos online let you increase or decrease the speed of playback. 23Practice listening to English spoken in different foreign accents. This is a useful skill because English is spoken in so many places around the world. 24Center your listening on specific sounds or grammatical points. For example, preposition use in English can be difficult. Try listening for prepositions and the words they connect with. This can help you use them correctly in your speaking and writing. 25Remember that, like any skill, you can improve listening by practicing often and having detailed plans for the methods you will use. 26For our readers and listeners, what are your questions about American English? We'd like to hear from you. Send us an email at learningenglish@voanews.com. And please include where you are from in your email, too. 27And that's Ask a Teacher. 28I'm Andrew Smith. 29Andrew Smith wrote this lesson for VOA Learning English. 30______________________________________________ 31Words in This Story 32focus -v. to center one's attention on something 33memorize -v. to learn something so you remember it exactly 34ideal -adj. having the qualtiy of being exaclty what you want or the highest quality 35captions -n. words that show on screen in a video that match the words being spoken 36interview -n. a conversation in which a journalist asks questions to someone such as a famous person or government official. 37accent -n. a way of pronouncing words that shows what country or background a person comes from