Reflecting Teaching and Learning

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Teaching aural/oral skills

Websites for Listening Skills

Out of the given websites I have visited these sites http://www.bbc.co.uk, http://www.avoa. gov, http://npr.org, http://www.npr.org/programs/morning-edition/, http://www.npr.org/player/v2/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=140949453&m=141229934I, http://www.esl-lab.com/

bbc.co.uk is a very good site with lots of news articles and other information and good for different level of students. I tried listening some news form the site. I felt that the voice was very clear and pronunciation very beautiful. This might be because British English is preferred in Maldives. I tried http://npr.org and it lead me to npr books. There are lots of interesting book reviews music reviews and author interviews. Book review is just what I am teaching in my class this semester so, I listened to a book review. Although I won’t be able to try it in class as my face-to-face classes have already finished, I am going to recommend the site to my students.
Npr books http://www.npr.org/player/v2/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=140949453&m=141229934I

The most amazing site I have visited this week is Randall's Cyber Listening Lab: http://www.esl-lab.com/. This is one of the few websites that includes pre-, during, and post- activities. It's organized by topic and level with general listening quizzes, basic listening quizzes, listening quizzes for academic purposes, ESL vocabulary lessons, language learning life tips and long conversation with real/video. Most of these quizzes have three levels; easy, medium and difficult; but very few of them medium or difficult.

Also, I listened to A Day at School from general listening and found that it is good for grade 2 and 3 students . http://www.esl-lab.com/elem/elemrd1.htm
Then I tried Listening quizzes for academic purposes. It says in order to prepare for TOFEL those lectures; interviews and conversation could be used. So, I guessed it would be a good level for my students. I chose the difficult level and chose Space Radio Theater. It was wonderful and there were pre-listening, while listening and post listening exercises as well. Definitely I will recommend the site to my friends and I am going to use it as well to develop my students listening skills.

2 comments:

  1. Hi Roza,

    Greetings from Nicaragua,

    Defenitely www.esl-lab.com is kind of easy to use by any type of student. We can find a variety of exercises and I saw something I can print and use in class.

    About http://www.npr.org/ I found it useful with my students on my ESL Class which are adults. I used newspapers sometimes but it would be nice to have a debate prepared by one of this real events. We can even use it with vocabulary activities.

    Thanks for that option. I had not entered to that link.

    Nice blog Roza,

    Regards,

    Yariela

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  2. Hello Roza,
    Thank you for sharing different links for listening exercises. But, the link that I never heard about is //www.npr.org/player/v2/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=140949453&m=141229934I. I checked it and saw that is includes different options for listening activities. You can even create a playlist.

    Again, thanks for sharing it!

    Warm regards from Kosovo,
    Blerta

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