听说法

The Role of the Receptive Skills on the Second Language Development

Listening and reading are not the driving force behind the first language development only. These skills also play a key role in second language acquisition. Accordingly, a number of studies have been done to test the effect of receptive skills on second language development.

Listening-based Studies

Asher, Kusudo and Torre (1983) compared the efficacy of TPR over traditional college foreign language instruction. The subjects taking listening-based TPR instruction were between the ages of 30 and 60. The treatment lasted for only 32 hours. At the end, they were compared to younger, adolescent college students who were assumed to be better acquirers. Then, the control group underwent 75 hours of systematic instruction in reading and writing. Although the listening group had not received any su ch instruction, the results showed that in terms of grammar knowledge and reading performance, they scored as high as the other despite of the differences in the length of instruction and age range. The results clearly showed that listening experience positively affected the development of reading ability . The same researchers replicated the research for Spanish learners and found similar results.

Similarly, Feyten(1991) examined the effects of listening-based instruction on the second language development of 90 students of English as a second language attending an intensive language program in the United States. The results indicated that there is a high correlation between listening and general language development. One of the rarely found non-North American listening-based study was carried out by Damhuis(1993) in Netherlands. The results strengthened the view that comprehension-based activities along with communicative oriented ones facilitates second language acquisition