I spend a lot of time thinking about how to be a good listener. Not so much listening to better understand language but listening to better understand people. We need to practice listening to a new language too. This is one way to do it. Or should I say two and three ways to do it.

This is a way to practice at home. You can do it on your own but it is better to do it with a friend so that you can share ideas and learn from each other.
We are going to listen to something three times. We will pause each time think about what we heard and give ourselves context to listen more carefully the next time.

Listen one time to just the audio. When the story is done write down the key words you heard. Write down what you think the main idea of the story is.
Ideally, you can compare what you heard with what your friend heard.
All of this gives you context and the context helps you hear everything better.

Listen a second time. This time you will also see what is happening while you are listening to the story. The visual cues will make it easier to hear what is being said. When the story is done check if your first ideas were correct. Did you hear the key words again? Are they important to the story? Are you right about the main idea?
Did seeing the story help you realize any other key words or ideas? Write down a summary of the story. Are there any things that you need to listen for to be sure you understand everything?

Listen a third time. This time you will also see the text of what is being said. This will let you confirm the key words and pick out anything that was too unfamiliar or too hard to hear.

If you do this with a friend you can also teach each other as you go along. Each of you will hear different details and one of you will know a word the other doesn’t. Talking about the story between each listening lets you use the vocabulary and ideas which helps you become a better listener.

Keyboard Village Stories Listening Practice

X’s Story

LISTENING 1: AUDIO ONLY

LISTENING 2: VISUAL CUES

LISTENING 3: AUDIO, VISUAL, SUBTITLES

QUIZ TIME

Quizzes can be useful. I find them a little tricky because often there is more than one right answer. It is frustrating but can also be the best way to learn. Disagreeing about what the correct answer really focuses our attention. Explaining why each answer might be correct makes us speakers of English and better thinkers.

Here are two different quizzes about X’s story to try out and see what questions are helpful for you. The answer choices are explained and will show why I think one answer is correct and the others are not.

There is one more quiz I made for a self-introduction video. Did I answer all the questions? Did I answer them well?

Which of the quizzes is most helpful for you?

This is X’s Story

Listening to X’s Story

My Self Introduction