2. Why Listening Is Difficult for Technical Students in Russia
Listening is one of the most difficult competences in English language learning, as listening is the only kind of speech activity where practically nothing depends on the listening person [
1,
2,
3,
4]. We have analysed references relating to listening comprehension and difficulties arising in listening [
5,
6,
7]. These papers outline potential problems that could hinder listening comprehension during English language learning in classrooms. In general, they include the speed delivery, impossibility for learners to have words repeated, the small size of the learner vocabulary, inability to recognize the signals that the speaker is using to move from one point to another, incapability to concentrate in a foreign language, etc. As we have introduced listening for self-studies via mobile phones outside the classroom, we have also carried out research to outline difficulties our students face in listening. We have divided the variety of these difficulties into four main groups.
- (1)
Difficulties connected with the peculiarities of the listening process and speech activity of a listener.
- (2)
Difficulties connected with the speech of a native speaker.
- (3)
Difficulties connected with the traditions and culture of the studied language country.
- (4)
Difficulties connected with the composition of the recording.
Let’s consider them in the order of appearance.
It is a well-known fact that any activity, including speech, is comfortable for the doer if it corresponds with his or her abilities or if he/she is able to adjust to it, i.e., if a speaker chooses a topic for conversation which is interesting to him. In this case, a listener has to get the information a speaker gives. Sometimes the topic is not familiar, and is too difficult for a listener. Usually, a native speaker does not adjust his language to his listener, so the latter has to understand speech with a certain proportion of unknown materials. Moreover, contrary to a reader, a listener can neither listen to the message repeatedly nor use any reference literature to help himself.
The second group of difficulties is connected with the fact that the speech rate of a native speaker often seems too rapid to a foreigner. So, a listener is not able to repeat the message, and that is why he does not interpret it correctly. Moreover, it is a well-known fact that a listener prefers a rate of speech that corresponds to the rate of his mother tongue, which is normally slower. The process of hearing is unique and continuous; the listener can neither stop, nor listen to the message again. Hence, he has to get the message continuously, and only once. It is obvious that in such conditions, it is rather difficult to receive information, and that is why it is only partially understood. It is also shown [
8] that low male voices are perceived as being easier than females’ and kids’ voices, as the latter have much higher tones.
Next, we look at an example of a paradox in listening. It is amazing but true: a Russian pupil understands the English speech of his teacher and classmates, and as a rule, the English speech of his countrymen, while at the same time, he understands English native speakers poorly. What is the reason? The first is that nowadays, the speech of native speakers differs considerably from written language, and tends to be less formal. The second is that the individual style of the oral speech, including its rate, can be rather varied, making speech difficult to be understood. In the mother tongue, this problem is compensated for by a huge amount of listening practice. This experience allows an accumulation in our memory of the majority of different variants of voices and peculiarities in pronunciation. Because of such experiences in listening to a foreign speech, including the fact that more often, a pupil listens to the same native speaker, individual voice peculiarities of native speakers such as their pronunciation, voice timbre, and rapid speech rate make it difficult to understand them.
The third group of difficulties derives from one of the main principles of communicative competence, that claims that language, being a phenomenon of a certain civilization, should be studied in the context of this civilization. That is why pupils should know the culture of the foreign country. To master a foreign language, one should be aware of the rules of the foreign language in different everyday situations and professional areas. A pupil should perceive and understand an oral message from the position of cross-cultural communication.
Effectiveness in listening also depends on whether students are interested in understanding or not. Experiments have shown [
9] that students understand and memorise better texts which are difficult but rich in context compared to easy and primitive ones. Rich content texts contain new and useful information, but problems in understanding these texts will remain. That is because they usually contain facts connected with the history, ways of life, and the culture of the foreign country. These are so-called realities that are often unknown to students. Results have shown [
10] that among them are geographical names, proper names, the names of the organisations, the press and works of fiction, and also historical facts, political and military terminology, and terminology connected with various fields of art, pithy sayings and expressions, and quotations from fiction. Moreover, topic action in the recording also influences its understanding.
Sometimes, difficulties in listening can be caused by the composition of the oral text. So the absence of the introduction of the protagonists, the venue and time of the events, several subject lines at the same time in one recording, etc., cause additional trouble for students.
5. Results and Discussion
We have been working with podcasts since 2010. In choosing internet resource materials, we aimed at the various topics that correlated with the main issues in student textbooks. The podcasts must be of the same format for intermediate students. Also, it was a very important for us that the podcasts were recorded both by English native speakers, and at the same time, teachers of the English language. Moreover, while choosing podcasts, special attention was devoted to their duration and the speech rate of the speakers.
Speech rate is one of the decisive factors, especially in ESL (English as a Second Language). We have also taken into consideration the fact that hearing rate is very important [
18]. The listening material should be perceived fully and easily, as success in this regard can motivate students to work further with podcasts.
The differences in speech and hearing rates between the Russian and English languages have led to the conclusion that listening would be more effective if there are the same audio materials but with two different rates of the speaker’s speech (
Table 2). We analysed internet resources from different educational sites; the results are in
Table 3.
There is no doubt that it is rational to choose short recordings for listening during auditorium classes. But as far as self-studies are concerned, more continuous recordings are more effective. That is why, for example, our students are given a month or a month and a half to be ready with the podcasts they do at home.
All these requirements were satisfied by the educational site,
www.eslpod.com [
19]. We were looking for materials there to help our students avoid various difficulties in listening.
One of the advantages of these podcasts was their strict structure—as any podcast, it has an introduction, a main part and a conclusion. The main part consists of three similar parts of about the same duration. At the beginning of the main part of the podcast, the authors—Dr Jeff McQuillan and Dr Lucy Tse—present a training dialogue or text on the subject, spoken at a slow rate of speech. Then, at the same speech speed, Dr Jeff McQuillan gives explanations of the words and expressions from the recording, i.e., what they mean and how to use them. At the end of this main part, there is again the same training dialogue or text, but now at a normal rate of speech. The introduction is given at the slower speed, while the conclusion is recorded at the rapid rate of speech. Different recording speeds allow students to adjust to the English language phonation and improve their skills to perceive audio materials and sequentially move on to perceive English speech in everyday life [
10].
As the podcasts have been chosen as the basis for student self-studies outside the classrooms to increase effectiveness, we worked out an educational supply for students’ “Guide to Listening”, including a detailed pattern on how to work with the podcast, a workbook with comprehension tasks, instructions, a reference guide with key answers, and a student’s guide list [
20].
In 2012, we started our project involving about 800 first-year bachelors students, and in 2014, we already accumulated some experience in m-learning [
16]. At the beginning of the project, we faced an unexpected problem: it occurred that the majority of the students (63%) used only their home PC’s to listen to podcasts. When we analysed the reason for this phenomenon, we realised that it was because they do their homework at home, and so they need their PCs. Answering the question of why they didn’t use the mobile device that they have at their disposal, our students gave a very simple answer: that they don’t know how to use them to listen to podcasts. This answer led to the following conclusion: yes, practically all first-year students have been using different mobile devices since their childhood, but only for entertainment; mostly watching films and cartoons, playing games. But nobody had taught them how to use these devices for self-study. We appeared to be the first to do this.
High-speed mobile Internet has revived podcast technology. It has become possible to listen to podcasts not only by means of audio players, but also on mobile phones and tablets based either on iOS, Android, and Windows. Modern life makes youths adjust to its new rhythm. Students have a lot of opportunities to study outside: they can listen to podcasts anywhere and at any time they want, sometimes using even one headphone (as stereo is not so important in podcasts).
In 2016, our students from the Master programme began to record their own podcasts in English. It was these students who have been working with podcasts at our Department of Foreign Languages since 2012. The fact that to master spoken patterns in Business English is given too little time in the curricula (
Table 1) urged us to include this task in Masters-level podcasts. So, using a strict structure of the pattern podcast (
Table 4) and reproducing authentic materials from eslpod.com podcasts allowed our students to realize their skills in successful communication, recording their own podcasts on the following topics: “Cross-Cultural Differences in Communication”, “Telephoning in Business”, “Business Presentations”, “Meetings in Companies”, “Business Negotiations” and others from the Business English Language course.
We have found one more advantage of this work: many of our students had difficulties with public speaking. Now they have a chance to overcome these obstacles by recording their public presentations in MP3 format and sending them to their language teacher using a mobile phone. In return, the teacher sends a student his/her comments to correct mistakes. Such an approach facilitates monitoring the progress in speaking, and building up a sound-recording portfolio for each student.