Correcting learners has always been a debated issue among ESL/EFL teachers. There's no perfect way to correct students, but it is fact that interventions must be done in order to lead students headway.
There are several ways in which teachers can make such corrections. When it comes to listening, corrections are inevitable and needed. While teaching (mainly beginners), one of my sequence of techniques is to:
1. let students read the text first so that they can recognize what's coming next;
2. let students know that every time (and forever) they hear something (a voice, an audio of any sort) it's common to get nervous by not understanding a word. That's why it's extremely important to listen as many times as necessary till you feel comfortable. This applies perfectly when studying songs' lyrics;
3. play the listening but make clear students must not complete the task (fell the gaps, for instance). The first time is just to get familiar with the given audio;
4. [before repeating the audio to complete the task] check on meanings (in case students didn't get a word or sentence - in English, mostly) and sometimes, in this moment, I ask few basic and broaden comprehension questions (Who the participants are, what they are taking about, etc.) . I believe this is interesting once it focus on general meaning, and not only on the proposed task;
5. repeat the audio through, without any interruption, so that the students (who are now more familiar with the whole proposal) can complete the task;
6. [depending on how long or difficult the audio is] repeat the audio breaking it into pieces. In this moment task correction will occur. At the same time, students are having a third opportunity to hear what they couldn't before, and then complete the task. At this point, anxiety is very low, what makes the listening and context comprehension way easier.
7. ask students to record themselves reading the audio on their mobiles or any recording devices (most of the times as a homework). I explain that this is a very significant way to work reading, listening, and speaking, besides exercising pronunciation (I encourage them to look for meanings and pronunciation on online dictionaries) and building up their vocabulary.
It takes some time until they get used to this. Furthermore, exercises that follow this sequence tends to last longer than simply playing the audio, completing the task, and correcting it on the board.
What about you? How do you work? What techniques do you apply? What do you think about the aforementioned suggestion?
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