I am working on some experimental listening materials with Sheila Thorn of ‘The Listening Business’. We have just had a very interesting disagreement about a recording, involving Randy from Montana USA. Is he saying [1] or [2] below? You will hear both the original and a slowed down version. [1] And he was like ‘Oh […]
Mark said If the idea is that students should learn to ignore bits that don’t matter, is there a case for focusing on them first? For example, “actually” used as a filler, and radically reduced, may become a “noise” like ahiy. We could focus on lots of examples of this word in context, with the […]
Had a very exciting meeting at Firsty Group yesterday looking at the latest drafts of the forthcoming iPad app Cool Speech: Listening Hotspots and Cool Pronunciation. Above is a screenshot of one of the images. There’s loads of work to do, and not much time to do it in, but they are utterly (scarily) confident […]
Image from http://handmadebymother.blogspot.com/ I have just finished the final draft of my iPad app Cool Speech which I am developing with Firsty group. We had a fair bit of discussion about the name of the app. But one private indulgence which I did not share with them was a brief consideration of using ‘Yak’ (=chat) […]
Image from naturesecretlarder here. Sometimes titles pop into your head, and they are of such a nature that they make writing very easy. One such title for me was ‘Faith, Hope and Charity – the Three Vices of Listening Comprehension.’ (I have a Catholic background). As the title had arrived before the ideas, I had […]
The abbreviations ELF and EIL stand for English as a Lingua Franca, and English as an International Language. These abbreviations are used in discussions about pronunciation standards. Around the world, there are more non-native speakers using English (EIL) than native speakers. When groups of speakers from different language backgrounds communicate in English, there is evidence […]
Scripts of source recordings in lower case. These are scripts of the recordings from which the short extracts in Cool Speech are taken. Help Click on the image to the Help file from Cool Speech. It is also available on the app itself. Guide: Hotspots – Explore. This is a guide on what to notice […]
One of the teacher-trainers that I most admire is Adrian Underhill. I like the way he encourages learners and teacher trainees to explore. He encourages people to mouth (maʊð) a full range of sounds, not simply the ‘correct’ ones – and he encourages people to dance around, using their whole body to get the feel […]
At The British Council’s annual awards ceremony the ELTons, Professor Ron Carter was given the lifetime achievement award. Unfortunately, because of illness, he was not able to attend in person, but his friend and longtime colleague Chris Kennedy read his acceptance speech (beautifully). Below is an extract from the acceptance speech, which I find particularly […]
Last summer (2016) I was invited to IH London to give a two-hour seminar to teachers of English from the Basque country. They were amazingly enthusiastic and very receptive. I had given (as I usually do) a talk/workshop on how to prepare students for their listening encounters with normal everyday speech, focussing on examples of fast speech. […]
This is the fortieth post of this Listening Cherry series, and it is appropriate to mark this milestone moment with a major publication: A Syllabus for Listening – Decoding. This book was published on 2nd March, and aims to provide specific items for the listening syllabus. There is no preface (although there is an introduction) […]
Like all children, I asked my parents ‘Where did I come from?’ In my case they replied ‘Oh, we found you under a gooseberry bush.’ This answer was convenient for them, because it helped them avoid explaining what was for them an embarrassing aspect of human life (strong Catholic influence on their education) and for […]
Some listening lessons are like standing under a waterfall – you centre the student under the main flow of the water so that it is directed at the centre of their head. Sometimes the flow of water is a gentle trickle and they wonder what the value of standing there is. Suddenly torrents hit them […]
May 2013 – Speech in Action
Richard (right) and Charlie with the award. On Thursday 22nd May, Richard Cauldwell and Charlie Warburton (Firsty Group) received a prestigious award – the British Council ELTon for Digital Innovation. Judge’s comment: I thought this was great. I can listen at different speeds, build up, try dictation. Record my own voice trying to speak faster […]