G'day, you mob.
How's it going? Pete here, from Aussie English, the number one place for anyone and everyone
wanting to learn Australian English.
Today I have a very special episode for you guys where Charlie from the British English
podcast and myself are going to be breaking down our seven top tips
for improving listening comprehension in English and any other foreign language, for that
matter. Let's get after it.
All right, guys. Number one, choosing content that is at your level.
Ideally from the research that I've read, when you're reading or listening to
content, whether it is a book, a podcast, an audio book, a TV show or
movie, you should aim to be consuming content where you understand
90% or more, ideally 98% of the words and
phrases being said.
That means that between 1 in 10 to 1 in 50 words should be unknown.
Now, why is that? The more words that you do understand when consuming content, the easier it's
going to be for you to absorb these new words and phrases that come up and the context in which
they come up so that you don't need to look them up.
You can just absorb them; you'll probably get the meaning and you can move on.
The lower the proportion of words that you understand, the more difficulty
you're going to have understanding and consuming the content, you're going to have to look up a lot
of things and it's going to be less enjoyable.
So, number one is try and find content at your level, 90% to
98% of words on the page that you understand and make sure as you're improving that
you keep moving this bar ahead.
Okay. Don't just keep consuming the same level.
You've got to keep making it harder and harder for yourself progressively.
So, stay out of your comfort zone.
Keep moving forward.
So, going on from that point, Pete.
Finding content that is exactly 98% understandable is
obviously going to be quite challenging.
Pete just recommended anything that is between 90% to 98% understandable,
which opens things up a bit more, doesn't it?
But still, if you're not understanding one out of every ten words, this could
be quite frustrating.
So, we recommend using a five-step method to improve your listening
practise that will allow you to use content in an enjoyable way that is
around 90% understandable to begin with.
After each step, it should be coming closer and closer to 98% understandable.
And this will give you more flexibility and options when it comes to materials to
learn from, but you do need to do the five steps if you choose
something that is harder than 90% understandable.
So, we highly recommend that you get used to using this method.
And for that reason, I've made an eBook for you to download for free that you can find
on the screen right now.
If not, it will be in the description box below called the five-step method
to improve your listening skills.
This is especially useful when listening to podcasts and audio
books that come with transcripts to read along with.
Alright, guys.
Point number three, find content that you can consume and study where you have multiple
speakers speaking together at the same time.
Why is this so important?
Obviously, a large part of learning English and speaking English happens with multiple people
around. Right. It's very rare that you're just going to be speaking by yourself and not have
someone else around you.
After all, English and any language is about communication, one to one or one to many.
So, find real life conversations between multiple people.
They're not going to finish their phrases.
They're going to be thinking spontaneously and creating sentences that are long and
convoluted. People are going to fill in the blanks.
People aren't going to finish what they say.
There's a big difference between spontaneous spoken English in conversations and
say reading out what's been written on a page.
So, use things like podcast interviews or podcast discussions, reality
TV shows or dramas or movies that are filled with a lot of
conversations as opposed to, you know, 'I am legend'.
That's a very bad movie for learning English.
Sorry, Will Smith. They're also a really good way of improving your fluency as you can
mine this content for natural phrases that are used by people when interacting and having
conversations with one another.
If you want to learn more about this, make sure that you check out our video on building fluency in
English. The next tip we have for you came to mind after doing reading
exercises with my students and often I'd ask them to paraphrase the passage
we just read.
And they will often look a bit stumped because
they've been really focussed on reading the content out loud with
good pronunciation, which is totally understandable.
And I actually find that when I'm really listening for their pronunciation, I don't take in the
message or meaning of the content as much.
And this links to the idea that when learning something new, especially as
an adult, we have this tendency to consciously focus on things at a
more microscopic level.
You could say we get the blinkers on, meaning we have a narrow
attention span, and this is good for developing certain skills quickly.
But it makes it harder to do things like understanding the general meaning of what
somebody says. And that is really how natives learn their language.
As I assume you did with your native language, most of your learning was
through absorption, and with that you gain a better understanding
of words and their meaning through context.
And the downsides of focussing on things at a microscopic level is that we really
notice the words or parts of communication that we don't understand,
whereas a native, they would just skim over the word they don't know.
But through context they would get the meaning of the sentence and whole passage
because they're not focussed on that one word that they still don't understand.
And that's what I seem to remember doing when I was a kid.
I don't know about you, but when I heard older people using phrases I didn't
understand or talking about things that were beyond me at the time,
I wouldn't get a dictionary out and look at all the synonyms before I tune
back into the conversation.
But gradually, through repetitive exposure and staying receptive to the
meaning of the content, you build this gut feeling
about the usage of the phrases you didn't know.
Admittedly, in school, I did have those exercises in class where we were made to
focus on things consciously from time to time, but generally I'd
say I learnt my native language through absorption.
And so, focussing on understanding the message of what you're reading or listening to
as a non-native learner will help you understand the language more
naturally and more effectively than trying to hear each
individual phrase and getting worked up about the idea that you don't understand
that one word in the sentence.
You're basically turning the language learning journey from being a half empty
glass to being half full.
If you'll allow my philo- My philo- My phililililililil-
Philosophical approach there.
So, focus on what you do understand, generally speaking and not what you don't.
All right. Number five, increase your awareness and listening comprehension
abilities with a diverse range of accents and dialects in
English. A lot of students that I have asked me, Pete, I've arrived in Australia
and I have so much trouble with the Australian accent or accents.
What can I do to improve this?
Or why is it that I have this trouble?
And I often ask them, how much Australian content have you been consuming or studying in the past?
And they'll say, not much.
There's your problem. If your goal is to understand a specific dialect or
accent, obviously focus on that.
But I would still highly recommend focussing on a broad range of
accents in English because you are undoubtedly going to come across many different
accents, many different dialects, whether in TV shows, podcasts, in
person with people that you meet.
It's really important to be able to understand a wide variety of accents, in
English or any other language.
So, make sure that you consume content from a diverse range of accents and
dialects in English.
Doing this is also going to help boost your confidence when speaking or listening in
English, because you're going to be able to understand a great deal more people that you come
across in day-to-day life.
Don't forget to check out our video on how to speak English confidently and how to build English
confidence. It'll be linked above and below.
And the penultimate tip for you today, penultimate meaning the second to
last tip is one that I've been saying for years and one that many
learners nod along to, but most of my students don't actually
fully integrate it into their lives.
Those that do, however, have seen a drastic improvement, and that is to
connect your English studies with a passion of yours.
And I think the reason a lot of students don't use this tip properly is because they've probably
been told it before, and it sometimes seems like a bit of effort to get it
going. So, yes, you can simply read articles, watch documentaries and
listen to music that interests you in English.
But going beyond that, which is where some of my students have really found progress, is
taking part in a hobby they like in English, starting a new interest
altogether in English.
Remember a new language very often brings about a very different version of
you, you might enjoy things in English that you don't in your language.
I've had students go on cooking courses in English, sports camps in English,
and in this day and age, dive deep into a gaming culture online
or sign up to an online course on photography and join a
forum of English speakers who are passionate about taking beautiful pictures
in this case. And they want to converse with you because you share
a passion of theirs.
You'll get a lot more authentic practise with native speakers if you go about your studies with
this mindset. So, what passion is the English version of your personality
going to truly connect with, I wonder?
Hmm. I don't know.
What do you think? And I don't need to tell you this, but when you are
passionate about something, you don't think, oh, I haven't done my
hour of language learning today.
Often you won't even realise you've been practising it all day if you connect it to
passion. So, there we go.
This tip is all about connecting your language learning journey with a passion that
is old or new.
All right, guys. The last point, number seven, which ties in with point number five about
different accents and dialects in English.
Continuing with this sort of theme of exposing yourself to
diversity in a language, it is incredibly important to speak with both
non-native speakers of a language and native speakers at the same time.
In reality, there are actually more non-native speakers of English in the world than there are
native speakers.
So, it is very, very likely that you're going to come into contact with a
huge number of non-native speakers of English, and it's going to be important for you to
be able to understand what they're saying and the different accents that are out there.
So, how can you improve your listening comprehension of accents from native speakers and
non-native speakers alike?
Again, consume content that is diverse, that is from many different
countries, many different topics, many different dialects, that is made by
native and non-native speakers alike.
Go to language meet ups where you can meet people that are both non-native and native
speakers of English, and you can socialise and get to know them and make friends as well.
In the end, I think this is one of the most fun parts about learning any language, whether or not
it's English. Just make sure that you keep meeting different people and using your language skills
and building that listening comprehension over time.
So anyway, guys. I hope you got a lot out of this video.
Did we miss any points or tips that you have for improving your listening
comprehension? What do you do on a regular basis to level up your listening comprehension?
Leave a comment below and we can talk about it there and until next time.
I'm Pete. This is Aussie English.
And I wish you the best.
All the best. See ya.