Tips to Improve your English Listening Skill
Listening is among the four essential skills you acquire while learning English or any other language. Many people believe that studying words and vocabulary in English will allow learners to hear English and comprehend it. But this isn’t the case! It is essential to listen to yourself in order to increase your English listening abilities. Like learning the piano the more you are listening to English and the more you improve your ability to discern the various intonations, rhythms, and word stress. The more proficient you’ll become in understanding the language.
Here are seven top suggestions that will assist you to enhance your English listening abilities:
Be sure to do your English listening exercises at the correct stage!
Don’t create a burden for yourself! Listening to music aimed at high-level students, or even native English users when you’re an intermediate student will do nothing other than stress you out. Find the right materials that are appropriate for your students and concentrate on them instead. You can look online to find “pre-intermediate audio for English learners” to find the right resources. For example, this website, which has podcasts, https://www.podcastsinenglish.com/ is a good starting point.
Relax in the company of English
Learning happens without conscious thought in the subconscious mind, therefore constantly having English audio playing throughout your day will help enhance your listening skills and comprehension in English. Even if you don’t pay attention to music it is likely to surprise you by how much your subconscious is absorbing.
Finding resources for listening in English is straightforward because there is a continuous flow of news and media from English-spoken countries, including Britain as well as the US. Here are a few of the primary sources that students are using to develop their English listening abilities:
YouTube to watch videos that are in English about everything!
YouTube or Spotify to play songs or listen to podcasts English.
Netflix as well as Amazon Prime to watch movies in English
Audible: Select an audiobook on Audible and listen to the book in English
You can practice English by listening to music podcasts while you wash or run to work. You could replace your evening television watching by watching an English series or movie. It is crucial to select to listen in English on subjects you’re interested in, and which you naturally hear in your native language.
Utilize resources with transcripts
While you can master many aspects of English through listening, having access to transcripts that allow you to read the content you’re listening can be beneficial in a variety of ways:
You can confirm whether you have understood what you were told.
Reading and listening together can help to develop two crucial skills.
It is possible to feeling for the changes in sound and the music of the language
You can also check the spelling of new vocabulary words
A great way to learn to read and listen simultaneously is to watch the latest TV show or movie in English with subtitles or listen to your favorite music while you read the lyrics. Be cautious when you are watching Youtube videos that have English subtitles, as a lot of them have automatic subtitles that are usually not accurate and do not make any sense.
Repetition
It’s crucial that you listen to the information at least once! When you first hear something new, you’ll probably get a general idea that the discussion is. After that, you’ll discern subtleties in the dialogue, pronunciation, and connected sounds, learn new words, and acquire new vocabulary. Repeating the same audio again trains your ears to hear the typical sound that native speakers use every day.
Therefore, you must continue to practice your English listening exercises using the same audio until you feel the audio is too easy until you are able to comprehend it completely.
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Do not try to translate when you’re listening
If you’re thinking about something or another in your head it’s not listening well. Allow images and thoughts to occur to you while your listening. However, do not actively translate everything. When the audio stops it is advisable to sit down for a few minutes to think about what you’ve just heard. You may translate the sentence during this period if you have to. It is also advisable to search for any word you’re not familiar with or if you’re not sure about the meaning of the entire sentence.
Note non-verbal cues: Body language
There’s a wealth of information on what people say through the way they express it and how they appear when they’re speaking. The facial expressions of people can give you plenty of information. In the event that you are looking at someone and hearing, “I’m…upset”, you should be aware that what your eyes are receiving is not the same as the information your ears receive. It is best to insist on repeating the words or clarifying. It’s more likely they’ve said “I’m not upset” if they’re smiling.
It is important to remember that different body languages are utilized in various cultures. It is important to study body language used in English-spoken countries since they may have a different body language from your own.
Practice makes perfect
Being able to listen in English is a talent. It’s something that you can learn to improve at. Make time to practice English listening exercises each day, and you’ll observe the improvement. Of course, practicing conversation is the best since it can kill the two birds that strike (speaking as well as listening) However, it’s not the only method to improve your listening skills. In the event that you do not have anyone willing to chat with, remember it’s still possible to work by listening to your own audio.
In conclusion, it is possible to mix improving the quality of your English listening skills along with other enjoyable and fun tasks. As long as you keep it enjoyable and engaging, it’ll soon become a routine! Many students do not perform enough English listening exercises and are prone to focusing too much on grammar. While Grammar is essential however when you can improve your listening and comprehension of the language, your other English abilities will improve quickly and you’re on your road to becoming fluent in English speaking. We’re sure that if you implement one of these strategies for a few weeks, you will notice a huge improvement in your proficiency.
