Purpose:

To provide peer help with listening for specific information

Preparation time:

15 minutes

Materials:

Listening material; a fill-in-the-blanks activity that goes with the listening; index cards

Preparation:

Choose appropriate listening material. If the listening material has a corresponding fill-in-the-blanks exercise, make sure that the blanks are numbered. If the listening doesn’t have a fill-in-the-blanks activity, make one.  Number your index cards so that each card has a number that corresponds to a blank. If you have 10 blanks on the exercise, number your cards from 1 to 10. Make enough cards so that there is one for each student. Numbers can be repeated.

Procedure:

1. Play the listening material once. Learners should try to fill in as many of the blanks as they can.
2. Give out cards to students.
3. When the tape is played again, learners should hold up their card when they know that the answer is coming up. Learners who are missing information can look for their classmates to hold up the cards as cues.
4. Play the listening material a third time.
5. Check answers with learners.

Variation:

Assign the learners the information they should listen for and give them the appropriate card before they have listened to the material. When they hear their information the first time the tape is played, they should hold their card up and not write. When the tape is played again, they can write the missing information.