6 Powerful Tips to Help You Improve English Listening Skills

The language focus today is on tips to improve your listening skills in English.

Below we share tips that could help you to improve English listening skills. Also, if you are interested in joining an English school in Sydney, you can consider Scots English College as one of your options. As everyone learns differently, we always try to use the method (way) that works best for you. We are committed to the highest quality of educational outcomes and the provision of quality student services evident through the delivery of our range of English language courses to international students.

1. Active listening 

When you actively listen to something, you listen to less information but have a much deeper way of thinking about it. That means you learn English through listening more efficiently and effectively.

For example, you may just listen to 3 minutes of the news instead of 30 minutes, but think about any new words or phrases you hear, guess their meaning and then note them down.

Important things you can think about when active listening are pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar and structure. You don’t need to think about all four at once. Instead, you can start by focusing on your weakest area.

2. Transcribing

Transcribing spoken English is the act of writing down the English words that have been spoken. When transcribing something, you can choose a news story, a song or a part of a movie that you like. Be sure you can find its transcript to check your work. This method can help you to improve English vocabulary and pronunciation.

You can start practising transcription by:

• Finding audio or video with a transcript. Do not look at the words.
• Listening to a short section of the audio/video many times. By so doing, the process sharpens your ‘ear’ for the target language sounds while urging you to search for new words.
• After that, try to write down what you hear.
• Compare what you wrote against the transcript.
• Think about where you had problems, what words or sounds you did not hear.

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3. Eaves-dropping

This interesting way helps you to hear natural conversations from native speakers in their natural habitat.

Listen to what people are saying around you on the bus, train, in a cafe or at the park. They are often small talks about daily life (what happened at the weekend, now or in the future). You will probably start listening in the middle of the conversation. This will make it more challenging to understand but also more fun. Try to see if you can catch what the conversation is about, pick up on repeated words and be ready for use when speaking.

4. Record class activities on your cell phone

If you have difficulty understanding spoken English during your classes, record them so that you can listen to class again later. Listen again to any of the words you might have missed. Listen for the tone and intonation of your teacher and classmates’ words. This helps you to pronounce difficult words more clearly and easily and find it easier to understand spoken words during classes. Also, using the recording, write words you hear most often in class, and then bring this list with you to class. Whenever you hear a word on the list, write an X or so beside the word. Listening for the context will help you understand when and why certain words are used. Once you are comfortable with the words you hear all the time, you can change your focus to the words with fewer check marks.

5. Ask your teacher, classmates for help

You can learn a lot from your teacher and classmates. Be sure to ask your teacher about anything you couldn’t understand. Scots’ experienced and dedicated teachers are always happy to do extra work with you. You can also find someone in your class who wants to learn with you. Just agree on a certain speech, song or other audio and listen together. Then quiz each other on what certain sentences or words mean. By so doing, your classmate will probably understand words you don’t, and vice versa. Also, this will let you know your classmates better, making you more comfortable in class.

6. Join a conversation group

Find a group of English learners so that you all can meet regularly and talk in English. This conversation group may include your classmates. As students at Scots are from all over the world, you have chances to listen to a variety of English accents and voices. Also, at Scots, students are faciliated to learn practical, applied English. ‘English Only on Campus’ reinforces English learning in a safe and proactive manner so that students can learn to speak English and think in English. In addition, you can look for English conversation groups on Meetup. This helps you to find a group near you.

Cr: How to Improve Listening Skills in English | Scots English College