Topic – Differences between Reading and Listening
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Before you continue, spend five to ten minutes reflecting on how you think reading and listening are different, and what problems may students have with listening skills.
Share your ideas with other people by posting them in the discussion thread below.
Remember to read one or two other posts and comment on them.
Reading is something you do, while listening is something that happens to you.
Some students find listening difficult because they try to understand every word or they get left behind trying to work out what a previous word meant. They show a lack of vocabulary or don’t recognise the words that they already know. They may have problems with different accents or are distracted by background noise.I agree with the reasons you provide as for why learners find listening difficult, lack of vocabulary or not identifying certain words are big obstacles when practicing this skill.
However, I don’t agree with your idea that ‘reading is something we do while listening is something which happens to us’. To my mind, both are receptive skills because we are not the producers of the text/words, but this doesn’t necessarily imply that ‘it happens to us’. Identifying the type of text, the purpose of us reading/listening to it, and being able to use the right sub-skill to complete the task all require us (or whoever is doing the task) to be active and prepared. Therefore, I wouldn’t describe it as something which ‘happens to us’.I agree with you, I also see reading as an act of engagement, unlike listening though both are receptive skills.
Hi Elizabetta, I agree with you that listening may be difficult to some students because they may not understant every word or they get left behind trying to work what a previous word meant. Different language accents also may cause difficulty in listening. In practicing reading reading skills students can return to the text as many times as they need whereas Listening presumes that you get the main idea from the first time.
Listening is my weakest skill, and is probably the most important for me to develop in my L2. Until this course, I did not consider it as something that I could actively improve on. I give presentations in my L2 and dread getting to the end when I have to ask for questions.
I think that each person faces the problems that are similar to yours. We should do our best to improv our listening skills.
For most students listening is much more difficult than reading. I think the reason for it is that they are not exposed to much of listening in English in real life. Moreover, while listening to the text, you have to concentrate on the content as well as deal with different aspects of speech (accent, fluency, etc.) which may be quite challenging.
As I see it, reading and listening are different in the following aspects:
1) In a written text, you can go back and forth at your own pace, whereas when listening to someone speaking, it’s not possible to stop them or the audio being played, so one needs to wait to the end either to ask (if talking to a person) or to listen to it again (in a listening exercise).
2) In a written text, one can see the words and it’s easier to identify words even if we don’t know their pronunciation. Instead, when a person is speaking, it’s harder to match every word to its pronunciation while taking part in a conversation or when listening to an audio being played for a task.
3) The visual distribution of written texts in paragraphs is helpful to get an overall idea of the text at first sight, whereas when listening to a person or to an audio, it’s more difficult to predict how long they are going to talk for, when they are going to paraphrase their ideas or when they are going to add new information. This uncertainty can be overwhelming for everybody, and especially for language learners who don’t feel confident in the language that is being used.
I agree, it is easier to read back through a text to check information or understanding. It can be embarrassing when having a conversation to keep asking people to repeat what they said, so there is more pressure. With listening you have to process information more quickly.
I do agree with your submission
To me, listening in real life is dependent on your skills level, since you do not always have the opportunity of going back to the text for comprehension like you do with reading.
After a year of teaching and 7 months since getting a TEFL certificate from Gallery Teachers, I have found myself asking students to practice speaking as a way to improve their ability to understand native speakers with a variety of nationalities, accents and speech patterns. I look forward to being contradicted when I say that accent has *not* proven to be a significant obstacle to understanding. I´ll come back after another year and see if I still feel the same then.
This is a really valid point, Michel…and also one that is often overlooked by EFL teachers. I doubt you will ever be contradicted on this point;=) Accent is a significant obstacle to understanding, both native speaker accent variations and L2 accents. Students not only need to make themselves understood but also be prepared to understand a huge variety of accents they will encounter in the real world outside the classroom (English as the Lingua Franca). Incorporating different accents into English teaching and learning is therefore crucial. Is there any particular way that you do it in your teaching?
Hi Gabi, I love your contribution to the webinars, thank you.
I follow an almost regular pattern for the class. Pre-teach the vocabulary, idioms and phrasal verbs before the students listen to the audio or watch the video. Over time, I teach connected speech, dropped vowels and plead with students to not get stressed by what they don´t understand but to relax and let the meaning become clear from context and because they already have an idea of the subject before we start. Students can get quite annoyed when they don´t understand and think it´s accent that blocked their understanding rather than other barriers.
There are many differences in reading and listening, I find that when reading if you do not know the lexis it can be difficult to understand the text, however you can go your own pace and try to understand the gist of a text before you can then understand comprehensively. When you are listening to a text, an accent or pace of the text may mean you miss words, and if you are stuck trying to understand a specific word, you may miss more of the text. With listening however you can distinguish attitudes, moods, and again follow a gist before trying to establish meaning of all spoken words.
There are so many accents which may be a problem in the listening unlike reading.
most of the time, the listening context tends to be easier than the reading one, but we find listening is more difficult. the reason may be that while listening, we become passive, because we need to follow the speed of recording, so for the people who lack practice, they can’t identify the words or understand complicated sentences which involve grammar that they are not familiar with. However, while reading, we tend to be more active, we can read as slow as we want, and as many times as we want until we understand the meaning of the sentences, which can make us feel that reading session is easier.
I agree the fluency of the speech can be a problem for students
The differebce between reading and listening is that, first it is sometimes difficult for students to recognise a word through the speaker’s pronunciation unlike in reading, they can actually see the word written. And also the fluency of the speaker can be a problem in the listening, how fast is the speech?
I would say listening is a lot more difficult than reading because sometimes you might miss some key words and may have to ask people to repeat what they are saying. People also have different accents and pronounce things differently
Thanks for sharing, I think you got it ;-)!
What sounds strange to me, though, is the fact that each of us has much more chances today to listen to English (in plenty of different forms) but it’s still difficult when it comes to listening tasks … ;-)!
You have no control over the person who is speaking, whereas you do have some control over the speed you read. The accent may prevent you understanding words which you would recognise if they are written down. The noise level of a room will prevent you from hearing every word, in contrast the words are already written down.
You will be able to pick up of body language and visual clues when a person is speaking to get a general feel for the mood and feelings of the speaker, whereas on the written text this may be more challenging.I have no experience in teaching English, but I do have experience in training people, young and adults. The problem I see, in this Internet society, which brings many positive things, interferes with reading and writing skills and generates a lot of noise when it comes to concentrating on active listening. The resulting effect of the era in which we live is that we are losing these skills and this, I think, is independent of the language we speak.
I believe the difference is more than evident — it goes without saying! However, as we’re studying, learning and teaching a language, it’s fundamental to train us and our students as far as all the necessary skills are concerned. Listening is definitely very challenging (for me, too!) and it may need a bit more practice (guided one at school) and more focus on how/what to concentrate on.
I believe the difference is more than evident — it goes without saying! However, as we’re studying, learning and teaching a language, it’s fundamental to train us and our students as far as all the necessary skills are concerned. Listening is definitely very challenging (for me, too!) and it may need a bit more practice (guided one at school) and more focus on how/what to concentrate on.
I think the main difference is that when you read a passage you have more time to reread the text more than once to complete your understanding. and even in case there are some new words, you can look them up in dictionaries or guess their meanings based on the surrounding words. this doesn’t happen while you listen to something. you need to complete your understanding as you listen and normally the listening is played only once. I can summarize that in this regard, listening is kind of more challenging than reading.
I think the main differences between reading and listening are in various language accents that may occur to the students. Also if the students not recognize some word from the speech or they try to work out the prevous word to get the idea of what has been said, that may take longer time for them to communicate.
Understanding when listening probably varies dependent on the context more than understanding when reading. Things like accents and background noise may impede students’ ability to understand people’s voices, and it can be difficult to understand in contexts where you can’t see the speaker’s mouth- on the phone, for example.
Reading level is more consistent, you likely have the opportunity to re-read the text and to read it at a pace that allows you to process it. You don’t have that same control in a conversation.
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