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Teaching Receptive Skills Learning the two receptive language skills, listening and reading, can be a very frustrating experience for students studying English as a foreign or second language. To become an effective English reader and listener, the student must develop a number of specialized skills that do not often come naturally. As a teacher and a native english speaker, you need to be aware of this potential for frustration. You must be able to mitigate it through a combination of lesson plan preparation, exposing the students to a variety of texts and audio, and patience.
When preparing lessons centered around teaching the receptive language skills, you need to touch on all of the specialized skills required for their development. These receptive skills include the ability to predict what is coming next from the context of a text or piece of audio, the ability to scan or skim a text at a general level for a basic understanding of the material, as well as the ability to go deeper and assess the detailed meaning that are not always deduced at first glance. When planning a lesson, it is important to choose a text or audio that will interest the students. Depending on their level, they may need to go over the material a number of times to determine its meaning or look for a specific piece of information, so it helps if they have an interest in the topic to begin with. Choosing a topic that interests the class can be a difficult task when the class has a lot of students, so it is important to keep track of their interests, perhaps through taking notes during the Engage section of previous lessons.
When teaching receptive skills, it is also important to expose the students to a variety of sources, both authentic and non-authentic. Authentic language texts and audio are not designed to be used as instructive material to non-English speakers, while non-authentic materials are created with the student in mind. Non-authentic materials are easier to find and put into an educational context, so it can be tempting for a teacher to rely on them when teaching receptive skills, but it is important to include authentic materials as well. Without inclusion of authentic materials, from a variety of sources, students might not get exposure to different English dialects, and they could end up confused by the differences between U.K. English and American English. They might also not be able to predict what is coming next outside the classroom if the non-authentic materials constantly presented to them in the classroom do not change up their timing and ordering. Finally, adding authentic materials to the lesson add to students' confidence that their receptive language skills are improving, and can encourage them to seek out and expose themselves to authentic materials outside of the classroom.
Finally, receptive language skills require great amounts of patience on the part of both the teacher and student. Short of immersion in an English speaking country, there is no quick way to get enough exposure to English speech and text to build good receptive skills. As a teacher, it is important to always use English when speaking in the classroom, and to include reading comprehension into the Study and Activate stages of your lessons as often as possible. students may complain of frustration and of not being able to understand the material, but as a teacher you must reassure them that reading and listening take time to master.
Effective lesson planning, exposure to authentic and non-authentic material and patience are all essential skills for teaching receptive skills to English students. They do not have the benefit of constant exposure to English in their everyday lives, so it is important to make sure that you as the teacher, give them as much exposure to English in the classroom as possible. If done correctly, students will gain a basic understanding of all the receptive skills needed, as well as an interest in seeking out English texts and audio on their own outside of class. From there, they will be on their way to fluency listening to and reading the English language.
