Academic Listening Skills

Listening is a skill needed at ali levels of learning. We have therefore designed this book to supplement your classes, regardless of your language level. We start with quick and easy 5 minute listening tasks and take you through to the level of listening to lectures and notetaking. We focus on setting achievable goals for the listener and introduce useful tools that you can use as you make sense of vvhat you are hearing. First, we help you and your classmates to tüne in to the sound of English vvith short announcements, messages and dialogues on familiar topics. You learn new words, predict and try to follow basic instructions in authentic spoken English. As you become more familiar with listening, you can take on longer, more challenging tasks. We introduce you to practical tools for identifying the main idea and then, listen for the details of vvhat is being said. At this stage you stili vvant to benefit from listening again, as if you were asking somebody to repeat something for you so that you can better understand. This helps you to grow your vocabulary, make informed guesses, and listen out for key words and phrases. These you can use to better respond to vvhat you hear, both verbally and in vvriting. As more active listeners, we can be more productive in class. VVe find vve are comfort-able vvith longer passages and vve can learn from what we hear. Vve practice techniques that help us to concentrate on both the main idea and important details at the same time. As our confîdence grovvs vve focus on academic skills like notetaking. Finally, vve are able to listen to sample lectures and intervievvs, and engage in project vvork that calls for creative thinking and debate. Academic Listening is written for Turkish students and their teachers, engaging you with proven techniques, contemporary language and interesting topics. We hope you enjoy the experience. Lets break the sound barrier!