ELT Task 3

A.
Listening to follow multistep oral directions is a listening strategy that could easily be incorporated into any lesson plan. Being able to listen and then follow multistep oral instructions is an important strategy for students to learn because it is a skill they will utilize their whole lives. They will use it do complete homework assignments, their bosses when they’re older and have jobs will give them multistep oral directions to follow, an IT person for their cable company will give them oral directions to help get their cable working again. It is a skill that is important for their future. Teachers give oral directions multiple times a day during school, and incorporating this strategy into lessons will help students be more successful at school as well.
Listening to follow multistep oral directions reinforces the use of other listening skills. Listening requires a person to think about they are listening to in order to respond properly. This type of listening requires students to receive information, construct meaning from the information, and then use the information to respond. Listening to follow multistep oral directions is just an extension

B. To learn how to listening to follow multistep oral directions, I would introduce this activity.

Discuss with students what it means to listen.
Explain that you are going to practice listening to following directions.
To follow directions that I tell you verbally, that I told to you out loud instead of writing it down, you have to do a few things. First you have to think about what I asked you to do, then you have to remember it, and finally you have to do it. Let’s all say those steps together! I’ll say the step, and then you say it. Have students say all three steps.
Let’s practice here at the carpet. I’m going to give you three directions to follow, don’t do anything until you’ve heard all three directions. First I want you to put your arms straight up in the air, then I want you to stand up, and then I want you to turn in a circle. Repeat the instructions one more time, and then ask students to follow the directions. Ask students how well they think they did, did anyone have trouble remembering the directions?
Ask students to go back to their seats, and pass out a following the directions worksheet. The worksheet would have 5 problems. The 1st problem would have a picture of a deer, a bear, and a rabbit. Tell students not to do anything until they’ve been given all 3 directions. Ask students to draw an x on the rabbit, a circle around the deer, and a square around the bear. The rest of the problems would be similar. Each problem would have 3 pictures, and you would ask students to do three things involving those pictures.

C.
The first way to help support the development of listening and oral communications skills for all students is to teach them strategies to help with these skills. Children aren’t born with these skills, they are skills that have to be taught and learned. Students need to be taught how to be good active listeners, how to listen for information, and that they shouldn’t interrupt someone else while they’re talking. They have to be taught how to communicate with adults and classmates. How to speak in complete sentences, how to use the vocabulary they learn in everyday speech, how to ask and answer questions in different types of situations, how to take turns when talking, and how to speak at an appropriate rate. Students need to be taught these things starting at an early age so that they become experts at listening and oral communications.
Another way to support the development of listening and oral communications skills is to have students practice their strategies and skills with classmates. This gives students a chance to practice both listening and speaking skills. Provide students with opportunities to use their skills in a variety of situations. Have students practice listening for information as well as taking turns talking by having them pair share about what they ate for dinner last night, or what they did over the summer. Then ask each student to tell the rest of the class their partners’ response. Having students role play the different strategies they’ve learned to practice them in a controlled situation will also support the development of listening and oral communication skills.

D.

Listening and oral communication skills are essential to the development of language because listening and oral communication (speaking) skills are they themselves language skills. There are four basic language skills and they include: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. (CGCC) Listening and speaking skills support reading and writing skills as well as vice versa. As babies children listen to their parents, which is why adults speaking to babies, toddlers, and children is so important. By listening to parents babies begin to imitate speech by babbling. Eventually by listening to adults and other children speak; toddlers begin to speak as well. Listening leads to the development of oral communication skills. The development of beginning oral communication skills leads to the ability to learn listening skills needed for social and later academic situations. Language continues to develop by speaking to others. Adults can help the development of speaking skills by modeling them for children. Adults, including parents, relatives, and teachers can demonstrate speaking for children by describing what they are doing (self-talk), describing what the child is doing (parallel talk), and by introducing new words as is appropriate. An adult can also help by restating what a child has said in the proper format. (Education.com) Children use their listening skills to learn from adult speech, and later apply it to their own speech. The speech skills they learn by listening help develop their overall language skills. Listening and speaking skills lead into learning to read (reading skills), and writing skills. Reading skills are also important to the development of language as reading helps support speaking skills by introducing proper grammar, sentence format, and vocabulary. All of the previously mentioned language skills support the development of writing skills. Writing skills are improved by listening, speaking, and reading skills. Each language skill helps support the others, and because listening and speaking skills are the first learned they are vitally important to the development of language.

Cites

The Four Basic Language Skills | Gorge Literacy | Columbia Gorge Community College. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.cgcc.edu/literacy/resources/four-basic-language-skills

Strategies to Encourage Language Learning, Strategies to Support Language Development and Learning | Education.com. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.education.com/reference/article/strategies-language-learning/