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I DO NOT talk to fast
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dulouz



Joined: 04 Feb 2003
Location: Uranus
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 2:53 am    Post subject: I DO NOT talk to fast Reply with quote
I hear this alot when I teach older people. I don't like hearing it because I do take critical comments and try to improve my job performance. But... I make listening exercises on the computer with famous speeches. That is I run an mp3/.wav file of a famous speech and the students have to transcribe it. Today we had this speech fragment...

Quote:

Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, "This was their finest hour."


and it threw them for an absolute loop. The best students only had 4 or 5 words. Churchill is a famous orator, the speech was rehearsed several times. English speaking ability can hardly get better than recorded Churchill.

If Churchill and his ilk cause this manner of listening haplessness and I'm willing to wager classicaly trained thespians will do the same, what hope do I have? I just have to rely. Next time they make a comment about the speed, I'll get a nice haircut or buy a new suit.
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Ody



Joined: 27 Jan 2003
Location: over here
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 3:05 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
I DO NOT talk too fast

Embarassed
(sorry)
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dulouz



Joined: 04 Feb 2003
Location: Uranus
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 3:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Whatever, hey its a typo.
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the_beaver



Joined: 15 Jan 2003
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 3:20 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
That used to drive me insane but, to be fair, I was going to quickly.

It took a whole bunch of years but eventually I modified my speed to match the level. I used to write "slow down" on my lesson plans in bold letters and occasionally I'd recruit a student to give me visual signals to slow down. Now it's automatic for me to adjust my speed.
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Manner of Speaking



Joined: 09 Jan 2003
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 4:15 am    Post subject: Re: I DO NOT talk to fast Reply with quote
dulouz wrote:
I hear this alot when I teach older people. I don't like hearing it because I do take critical comments and try to improve my job performance. But... I make listening exercises on the computer with famous speeches. That is I run an mp3/.wav file of a famous speech and the students have to transcribe it. Today we had this speech fragment...

Quote:

Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, "This was their finest hour."


and it threw them for an absolute loop. The best students only had 4 or 5 words. Churchill is a famous orator, the speech was rehearsed several times. English speaking ability can hardly get better than recorded Churchill.

If Churchill and his ilk cause this manner of listening haplessness and I'm willing to wager classicaly trained thespians will do the same, what hope do I have? I just have to rely. Next time they make a comment about the speed, I'll get a nice haircut or buy a new suit.

Well no wonder.

First of all, Churchill was speaking in 1930s English. The recording probably sucked, because I remember once hearing the speech he gave where he said "we shall never surrender...". I could barely make out half the recording. He had a deep, gruff voice not at all like a modern professional radio or TV announcer, and just look at some of the UNCOMMON expressions in that paragraph:

"brace ourselves"
"so bear ourselves"
"duties"
"commonwealth"
"finest hour" (just imagine Churchill pronouncing this: "fienest howah" in that jowly deep voice of his)

Where do you see rhetoric like this in your average ESL classroom text in Korea?

The recording is culturally loaded...WE know half of what it means because we know the context. How the hell would you expect a Korean to know the context? Playing this to a class of Korean adults is like having a Korean teacher play a speech by Rhee Syngman or Kim Gu to a group of students learning Korean, and expecting them to "get it" right off the bat.

If this is how you're teaching your adult students, I feel sorry for them. You don't know what you're doing.
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whatthefunk



Joined: 21 Apr 2003
Location: Dont have a clue
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 5:07 am    Post subject: Re: I DO NOT talk to fast Reply with quote
dulouz wrote:
I hear this alot when I teach older people. I don't like hearing it because I do take critical comments and try to improve my job performance. But... I make listening exercises on the computer with famous speeches. That is I run an mp3/.wav file of a famous speech and the students have to transcribe it. Today we had this speech fragment...

Quote:

Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, "This was their finest hour."


and it threw them for an absolute loop. The best students only had 4 or 5 words. Churchill is a famous orator, the speech was rehearsed several times. English speaking ability can hardly get better than recorded Churchill.

If Churchill and his ilk cause this manner of listening haplessness and I'm willing to wager classicaly trained thespians will do the same, what hope do I have? I just have to rely. Next time they make a comment about the speed, I'll get a nice haircut or buy a new suit.


Dude, I have no idea what you just said. Could ya type a little slower next time?
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dulouz



Joined: 04 Feb 2003
Location: Uranus
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 5:20 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
I disagree. This stuff is all easy. Word by word its easy, if they can't understand "commonwealth" they can give me "common well" or "there four". "Thousand years" is easy, "brace" can equal "race" "ourselves" is easy "bear" is easy. I went through this stuff, if you don't know all of it, they can give me they can't understand. Its a famous well known speech heard by millions. Its a good piece.
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Ekuboko



Joined: 22 Dec 2004
Location: ex-Gyeonggi
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 5:50 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
dulouz wrote:
I disagree. This stuff is all easy. Word by word its easy, if they can't understand "commonwealth" they can give me "common well" or "there four". "Thousand years" is easy, "brace" can equal "race" "ourselves" is easy "bear" is easy. I went through this stuff, if you don't know all of it, they can give me they can't understand. Its a famous well known speech heard by millions. Its a good piece.


I disagree!
It is not 'all easy' (maybe for Advance/Post-Advanced students...)
You set them a dictation - but if they are trying to blindly write down what they hear (e.g. 'common well') , then they are just going to get frustrated and give up, because what they have written down is probably all mumbo-jumbo.

Did you set a context?
Did you pre-teach any words?
What were the aims of this exercise? Did the students know the aims?

You might like to try a different technique called a DICTOGLOSS. This kind of task will ease you and your students' frustration and improve their listening confidence.
Another idea is to give them a gapped dictation to take the pressure off them - blank out the key words/phrases so they can at least follow the speech using the 'grammar' words.
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Manner of Speaking



Joined: 09 Jan 2003
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 6:22 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
dulouz wrote:
I disagree. This stuff is all easy. Word by word its easy, if they can't understand "commonwealth" they can give me "common well" or "there four". "Thousand years" is easy, "brace" can equal "race" "ourselves" is easy "bear" is easy. I went through this stuff, if you don't know all of it, they can give me they can't understand. Its a famous well known speech heard by millions. Its a good piece.

I was right the first time. Rolling Eyes

If it was so easy, then why didn't they get it, genius?

Who did you sleep with to get this job? My God...
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Manner of Speaking



Joined: 09 Jan 2003
PostPosted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 6:35 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
"commonwealth" is not a common word. They're going to be listening for words that they know. If they don't know the word, they're not going to be able to tell you what it is. And if they don't know "commonwealth", they're not going to be able to tell you "common well".

"brace oursel