IT MADE ME THINK
Differences in auditory
processing
Lesley Lanir discusses whether students have problems with hearing or listening.
P
reviously, we established that about
a quarter of our class members
probably have learning difficulties;
some may be able to compensate
for their weaknesses and others
will be slower at learning and need
intervention. Along with the weaker
learners in our classrooms, there are
also those with learning disturbances
who have to deal with attention control
weaknesses that can adversely affect
their behaviour, performance and, in
particular, information processing. This
article begins the focus on the language
learning differences that we may meet
that not only directly affect our teaching
methods but also the way we approach
our students. An overview is presented
of the main difficulties that may occur if
the primary learning disability is in the
area of language, after which the skill
area of listening is discussed. Reading,
writing, and speaking will be dealt with
separately.
Along with the sensory system, we use
language to aid long-term memory
storage; so, when language difficulties
are the primary disorder, acquiring
a second one becomes a little more
complicated. Language weaknesses can
surface in listening abilities, reading
and writing, processing and retaining
information or in verbal expression.
Since language proficiency involves
many layers of synchronised processes,
a great number of dysfunctions and
combinations thereof can occur.
(Levine, 2002)
For instance, 14 year-old Mira cannot
follow simple verbal directions, multi-
step instructions or copy quickly from
the board. She diligently pours over
her word lists and yet never receives
full marks in any vocabulary quiz
Volume 20 No. 1 www.onlineMET.com
unless a word bank is provided. Alex
sitting behind her enjoys showing off
his newly acquired verbal skills, yet
struggles when he meets unfamiliar
words while reading. He seems to invest
so much time and effort in decoding
that he loses the main thread of a
passage and reaches the end with little
understanding of its content. When
it comes to writing, Olga, aged 17,
who excels at reading comprehension
and verbal tasks, sits with a blank
expression. The little writing she does
produce is unclear and its level of
content and organisation does not
reflect her aptitude in other English
language skills. Or in the same group,
Nadia, if called upon for the simplest
of spoken tasks, looks terrified and
cannot produce one correct sentence
without stuttering and mixing up words;
behaviour you wouldn’t expect if you
read her well-written essays.
Correct assessment of the source
of each of the above problems is
complicated since depending upon their
manifestations, weaknesses could be
located in any of the following areas:
auditory (verbal)/semantic
memory
leading to difficulties in: memorising
words, recalling sentences and passages,
word retrieval, remembering verbal
sequences
the phonological system
leading to difficulties in:language
sounds (phoneme) discrimination,
phonological awareness (identifying
rhymes, syllables, beginnings and
ending sounds of words), grapheme and
phoneme associations (linking letters to
their sounds)
morphology and semantics
leadin to difficulti
leading difficulties iin: vocabulary
abul
acquisition, understanding word
meanings, building a semantic network
syntax
leading to difficulties in: sentence
comprehension, interpreting word
order and grammar, recollection or
recognition of grammar rules
discourse
leading to difficulties in: producing
extended language orally and in writing,
starting, ordering, and developing
concluding thoughts, overall language
comprehension
(adapted from Levine, 2001)
In addition to these linguistic factors,
our students’ ability to process and
produce language is affected by a range
of neuro-cognitive areas, including
attention, long term and working
memory, motor and grapho-motor
skills and spatial and sequencing
abilities. The latter have a huge
impact on language production and
comprehension, since, phonemes,
graphemes, morphemes and syntax
have specific sequences that facilitate
comprehension.
In addition to any dysfunctions that
directly affect language, students may
have processing deficits that reduce the
rate they can receive, store and retrieve
information, inhibiting their overall
performance.
Whatever the problems may be, we
have to take into consideration that
different levels and types of parallel
processing are occurring at all times
during learning and for the weaker
student there can be glitches at any
73
 IT MADE ME THINK

point and at any stage depending on

“
where the cognitive or neurological On the surface, listening appears to be a
variations are located.

Listening
passive activity and seemingly gives students the
In general, although students busy
themselves in speaking, reading or
perfect opportunity to tune out. Nevertheless,
writing they actually spend much more
lesson time using their listening skills. comprehending spoken language is a rather
On the surface, listening appears to be
a passive activity and seemingly gives complex feat that involves many mental
students the perfect opportunity to
tune out. Nevertheless, comprehending
spoken language is a rather complex
feat that involves many mental
processes.
For instance, initially, selective and
directive attention are needed in
processes.
”
Association, the ‘hearing impairment’
that some of our students seem to
memory;
s REDUCEDVERBALORSEQUENTIAL
order to perceive language sounds. suffer from is rarely a loss of acuity in
memory.
Cognitively, the language sound the ear itself if common ear infections
information then has to be retained in and medical reasons have been ruled (adapted from Levine, 2001)
short term working memory, parsed and out, but instead is usually caused by Resulting in:
transformed into meaningful, mental problems in the neural pathways of
representations using phonological, the brain which link the ear with the s NOTHEARINGDUETOINATTENTION
semantic, syntactic and pragmatic highest intellectual centres through the being distracted, mind somewhere
linguistic skills; processes that demand central auditory nervous system. else
considerable amounts of mental
activity, energy and memory space.
What happens when the
hearing system doesn’t
seem to work properly?
There may be students who consistently
tune out or perform unexpectedly badly
on all listening tasks. Poor behaviour
or performance may occur if a student
has an auditory processing disorder
since this interferes with an individual’s
ability to analyse or make sense of
information taken in through the ears.
This is not a hearing problem; auditory
processing difficulties do not affect
what is heard, but do affect how this
information is perceived by the brain.
When instruction in your classrooms is
primarily spoken, the student with an
auditory processing disorder may have
serious difficulty making sense of the
lesson and any instructions given.
Causes of poor listening
skills
According to audiologist Judith Paton,
who specialises in auditory processing
disorders and works regularly with
the American Learning Disabilities
74 Modern English Teacher
Essentially, the ear is a vehicle for
sounds and transports them en bloc
to the lower regions of the brain. The
auditory system must then convey the
individual speech sounds (phonemes)
accurately up to the cerebral cortex
– a coating of neural tissue on the
outermost layer of the brain. Here, in
the language areas of the temporal
lobe, the sound data is analysed and
restructured into words, messages
and information which are directed
to other areas in the brain that deal
with thoughts, actions, etc. For this
process to be successful, plenty of
healthy brain cells, nerve fibres and
neurotransmitters need to be available
in order to distribute the incoming data
at an appropriate speed. (adapted from
Paton, 1999)
However, for some students, smooth
processing of auditory information does
not take place and they have trouble
sustaining their listening skills. One of
or a combination of the following may
be interrupting the transmission of
auditory information:
s POORATTENTIONCONTROLS
s AWEAKPHONOLOGICALSYSTEM
s LIMITATIONSINAUDITORYWORKING
s PERCEIVINGDISTORTEDOMITTEDOR
substituted sounds
s PROBLEMSHOLDINGANDUSINGSHORT
term verbal information
s DIFlCULTIESSTORINGVERBAL
information over time
s TROUBLEREMEMBERINGSEQUENCED
auditory input (phone numbers,
order of the alphabet)
s POOROVERALLROTEMEMORY
s INABILITYTODISTINGUISHTARGET
message from background sounds
How does it feel to have an auditory
processing disorder? The following are
a few examples of what some of our
students might be experiencing.
1. Regarding distorted speech
sounds, imagine you are listening
to someone who mumbles or
has a very strong dialect that
you are unaccustomed to. You
would perform a series of mental
adjustments to deduce what is being
said by using the topic and context
to guess which English words fit
logically. Eventually, you wouldn’t
have to try very hard because your
language system would adjust itself
to the new sounds. This, however,
Volume 20 No. 1

would be a rather tiring and
frustrating exercise if your language
system cannot fine tune itself to the
new sounds and, in addition, your
vocabulary or general knowledge
in the target language are not
developed enough to help fill in
using the available linguistic clues.
2. Some students will have a
hard time connecting sound
combinations (words) together,
How will you notice poor
listening skills in class?
Difficulties in some or all of the
following will be apparent:
s FOLLOWINGDIRECTIONS
s UNDERSTANDINGVERBALINSTRUCTIONS
s FOCUSINGANDCONCENTRATINGINVERBAL
settings;
IT MADE ME THINK
and although some of the points seem
obvious, for students with learning
difficulties or attention deficits they are
not. After teaching these populations for
nearly 20 years, my best piece of advice
is – never assume, presume or suppose
– tabula rasa is the most effective
starting point.
Metacognitive strategies
These are used to teach the student
awareness of which strategy to use
remembering them and attaching
them to their meanings or uses.
Imagine receiving a number of
complex directions to someone’s
house. You may have heard every
word yet have not been able to
visualise the route, and therefore
you decide to draw a map. For
those who have auditory processing
problems even the simplest two
step instructions are our equivalent
of receiving full verbal instructions
of how to assemble a cupboard
from IKEA.
be done to successfully accomplish
3. When you find difficulty following a
conversation that’s taking place by
a busy road, interrupted by police
car sirens, horns beeping and music
blaring, you are experiencing the
effects of receiving extraneous
sounds that you are unable to
ignore. If you persist, you can focus
and suppress some of the incoming
interference. However, those with
weak inhibitory mechanisms,
such as in ADD (Attention Deficit
Disorder) cannot since they have
difficulty suppressing some of
the incoming sounds from other
locations; thus they miss essential
auditory input, cannot stay on task,
make mistakes and do not finish
their assignments.
(adapted from Paton, 1997)
As can be seen by the few examples
given above the demands of listening
over time can burden those with
auditory processing disturbances;
some may even ‘shut down’ from
overload. These students may be ‘poor
listeners’ but they do not have hearing
problems; their auditory system or
neural system weaknesses prevent them
from comprehending by impeding
their ability to efficiently deal with the
incoming verbal information.
Volume 20 No. 1 www.onlineMET.com
s INTERPRETINGSPOKENLANGUAGE
possibly resulting in unexpected
behaviours and responses;
s SUCCEEDINGINLISTENING
comprehension exercises;
s KEEPINGUPWITHANDOR
participating in conversations in a
noisy environment.
s UNUSUALSENSITIVITYTOORCOMPLAINTS
about noise;
s DIFlCULTYTELLINGTHEDIRECTIONFROM their wobbly chair, etc.)
which the noise is coming;
s TENDENCYTOCONFUSESIMILAR
sounding words.
In addition they may:
s TENDTOIGNOREASPEAKERWHEN
immersed in something else;
s DIVULGETHEIRIDEASANDINTERRUPT
s CLAIMYOUSAIDSOMETHINGDIFFERENT s 7HICHCONTINGENCIESWILLHELP
s SEEMTOAGREEANDUNDERSTANDBUT example, if I miss one point, not to
have actually tuned out;
s TAKEALONGTIMETOFORMULATEA the next)
reply;
s MISARTICULATESOUNDSANDWORDS Students need to know:
Methodology
Listening strategies
In reality, many students, both learning-
and non-learning-disabled, are unaware
that listening is an active process and
there are ways of improving their
performance.
It’s well known that those students
that use effective listening strategies
comprehend more successfully. Using
strategies decreases the reliance on the
need to understand every word spoken
and students with difficulties as well as
those without will benefit from strategy
use in all aspects of learning a foreign
language. Below are a few examples
when and why in order to help them
plan, monitor and evaluate their
performance.
Planning
Students need to know:
s 7HATCONDITIONSARENECESSARYFOR
accomplishing the task (sit near to
equipment, move away from the
noisy heater, and the annoying foot-
tapping student behind, change
s (OWTOATTENDANDWHATNEEDSTO
a particular listening task (listen to
instructions, pre read questions,
prepare to listen etc.)
s 7HATMATERIALSARENEEDED
(headphones, MP3, transcript,
questions, pen, note paper etc.)
overcome any problems (for
panic just concentrate and wait for
Monitoring
s (OWTOCHECKTHEYAREONTRACK
This is why to begin with listening
exercises have to be broken down into
tiny chunks and if necessary, transcripts
provided. This will enable teachers
to check their students’ monitoring
abilities. If they have missed necessary
details, which, why and how and what
preventative strategies can be used next
time.
Evaluation
Students need to know:
s )FTHEYHAVEREALLYlNISHEDTHETASK
s $OTHEYNEEDTOLISTENAGAIN
s $OTHEYNEEDTOGOOVERTHEIRANSWERS
75
 IT MADE ME THINK

s !RETHEREQUESTIONSTHEYCANANSWER Further help and the gap’), ‘Sat Nav’ information, song
without listening again? lyrics, popular TV shows (e.g. Top Gear,
intervention Come Dine With Me, X Factor, etc.). It’s
s (OWACCURATEARETHEIRANSWERS important to enter the students’ world,
Help and interventions need to be
s (AVETHEYGIVENITTHEIRBESTSHOTOR aimed at the specific needs of the understand their interests and boost
have they burned out? student with listening difficulties. No their motivation in order to provide a
two class members have the same strong enough incentive to force them
Problem recognition strengths or are challenged by the to get beyond the barriers that prevent
Students need to know: same areas of weaknesses. Effective them from comprehending.
intervention exploits the strengths of
s (OWTOIDENTIFYWHERETHEIR the individual in order to build on the Suggested listening
difficulties lie within a task and specific areas in need of development. comprehension formats
evaluate which aspects of the task Consequently, they need to be reviewed s VOICEMESSAGES
are problematic. from time to time as the student
progresses. Finding successful methods s TELEPHONEINFORMATIONSERVICES
Cognitive strategies that help becomes easier with time s ANNOUNCEMENTS
Cognitive strategies are used to interact since the individual’s learning approach,
style, and abilities will become more s ADVERTISEMENTS
with and mentally manipulate the
apparent. s INTERVIEWS
material in order to understand and
remember it. Besides note taking and Overall classroom management s NEWSITEMS
summarising: s 2EDUCETHELEVELOFDISTRACTIONINTHE s INFORMALCONVERSATIONS
room – visual and auditory;
Predicting s NEWSBROADCASTS
s 3EATWEAKERSTUDENTSCLOSETOTHE
Gather information using general
speaker, away from other noise s 46CHATPOPULARSHOWS
knowledge, experience, pre-task
sources;
exercises, knowledge of task format etc. Films, TV, DVD, MP4, and ‘books with
s 5SEMOREADVANCEDCLASSMEMBERS tape’ are easier formats to use initially
Inferencing as buddies; because they provide multisensory
s USEKNOWNWORDSPHRASESOR information. CDs, tapes, MP3 and
s #HECKTHEACOUSTICQUALITYOFTHE
contexts to guess; equipment and the room. radio focus only on the weak auditory
system. So take the medium used into
s EXPLOITTONEOFVOICEPARA
Notice when a student has tuned out
linguistics, background noises;
s ACTIVATEPRIORPERSONALEXPERIENCE
Imagery
Invoke mental pictures to represent
key information or envisage the overall
scene.
Translation
Directly translate into L1.
Repetition
Mentally repeat important points.
Checklists can be provided so students
can mark off the strategies used during
activities. To increase meta-cognition
and demonstrate the importance of
strategy use, it is important to ask
students how they attained their
answers because many are unaware
that they are already applying strategies
and their responses may give insight
into how they are succeeding or not in
their listening tasks.
76 Modern English Teacher
consideration when planning and later
and ‘re-engage’ by tapping their desk
– or use other subtle prompts; avoid
sarcastic comments, eye rolling and
other para-lingusitic methods.
Materials
Listening tasks have to be set at
the appropriate level; anything too
advanced will cause immediate ‘switch
off’ not only for any learning disabled
students. All content has to be useful
and intrinsically motivating, employing
authentic language, genuine situations
and personalised subject matter that
takes into consideration students’
cultures, experiences, goals, abilities
and interests. It is essential that learners
can relate to the task. For example, a
weather report could be connected to
tomorrow’s football game, barbecue,
outdoor rock concert, surfing, hang
gliding, etc. Or a listening activity that
involves filling in information may be
about a celebrity, a current newsworthy
event, a favourite film, TV program, a
new model of cell phone, chat service,
flight/rail/bus/underground (‘mind
evaluating student success.
Take into consideration:
s 3PEAKERDYNAMICS
s SPEEDOFDELIVERY
s ARTICULATIONnCLARITYANDACCENT
dialect;
s THENUMBEROFPAUSESAND
redundancies;
s PRESTIGEVALUEnUSECELEBRITIESOR
speakers who are well known or
relevant.
(adapted from Boyle, 1984)
Length:
between 2 to 5 minutes to begin with,
broken down into 1 minute chunks.
Always stop the tape/disk/TV program,
etc. at the end of each short stage and
check that the students are on track.
Method:
Allow time for preparation and
activation of prior knowledge by:
Volume 20 No. 1

s 0RESENTINGBACKGROUNDINFORMATION
and relating the upcoming task
to past classroom or personal
experiences.
s 0ROVIDINGDETAILSOFTHECONSTRUCT
and conventions involved for the
INSNUMBERSONEWORDANSWERS
particular format being presented.
CHOICE
s ,ISTINGAPPROPRIATEVOCABULARY
s 0RE
TEACHINGCOMMONSPOKEN 2. “Find section A”
phrases and using them to
demonstrate how to recognise
ENDEDQUESTIONS
sounds, syllables and words that
disappear or mix together.
s 5SINGEXERCISESTHATHELPIDENTIFY
stress and intonation so students can
spot new, important or contrasting
information.
Instructing students how to identify the
speaker by recognising the tone of voice
to:
s DISCRIMINATEBETWEENEMOTIONS
s DETERMINETHERELATIONSHIPBETWEEN
speakers;
s RECOGNISETHETOPICTHROUGH
background sounds.
Make use of the board – chronologically
post:
s IMPORTANTVOCABULARYITEMS
s VISUALSASPROMPTSASSOCIATEDWITH
the task;
s THEPOINTSTHEYARELISTENINGFOR
Presentation
Instructions/information:
s ,ISTNUMERICALLYONTHEBOARDORON “In a minute, you are going to listen
handouts in L1 if necessary;
IT MADE ME THINK
A. When you’ve finished reading them speaking who is an actor. You know,
we’ll listen to the tape and then you’ll things like his name when he was born
write the answers to the first two in and where.”
your notebooks. The rest we’ll discuss
Suggested listening comprehension
in class.”
tasks from easy to difficult:
Use and point at the board but do not
s lLL
turn your face away from the class:
s MULTIPLE
1. “Open your books at page 53.”
s TRUEFALSE
s SENTENCECOMPLETION
3. “Read quietly questions 1, 2, 3, 4, and
5” s OPEN
After each instruction pause and check
that everyone is with you. Don’t ask “Do
Assessing Progress
Students with learning difficulties
you understand?” Find out if they do
are used to failing and usually have
by asking for a summary, paraphrase,
or translation etc. of what you have difficulty assessing whether they
presented up to that moment. are progressing or not. It might be
worthwhile preparing individual
When the class has finished reading the
rubrics for the weakest students to
five questions, then give out the rest of
show them at which level or point they
the instructions in the same fashion.
are positioned, where they need to
More advanced students can follow the
reach and in what time frame. Rubrics
full instructions provided on the board.
also help those students displaying
Or use, for example, instructions in the behavioural problems since this type of
following format: monitoring demonstrates that an adult
1. You will listen to a man talking. He is has identified with and taken a personal
an actor. (Point at radio, TV, tape etc.) interest in their needs.
2. You will hear: Below is an example of a set of rubrics
that can be adapted to suit different
a) His name; requirements, levels and skills; A
b) When he was born; mixture of Column 1 and 2 may be
where the student begins. Column 5
c) Where he was born; is the goal that has to be reached by
a certain date. Every two weeks or
3. Write these three things down.
more, for example, the squares can
Avoid – instructions in the following
be coloured to highlight the student’s
format:
progress (or not).
This article illustrates how giving
to an interview for a few minutes and
instructions or performing a seemingly
you need to write down some personal
s "REAKINTOSHORTSIMPLEWELL straightforward listening exercise can
information about the person who is
articulated sentences; cause havoc for those members of
s "ECONCRETECLEARCONCISEAND
repetitive;
s 7HENREPEATINGUSETHESAME
construct or a slower, clearer, more
simplified version;
s 'ETSTRONGERPUPILSTOREPEAT
s 3HOWRATHERTHANEXPLAINORDO
both.
“ These students … may simply be unable to
receive, decipher, reorganise, store and retrieve
language sounds in the same way or rate that we
Avoid:
“Open your books at page 53 and go
over the first five questions of section

Volume 20 No. 1 www.onlineMET.com

do.
” 77
 IT MADE ME THINK

Level: Listening Comprehension Name:

Length:
Criteria Progress / Goals
Achieve by: 1 Date: 2 Date: 3 Date: 4 Date: 5 Date:
Listening inattentive guided listening guided listening listens fully attentive
together with using the attentively to without script
teacher transcript as short sections
visual support without script
Task unable to approach partially approaches task reads task jointly reads task
approach task approaches task if teacher reads with teacher independently
content
Task performance unable to perform chooses not to chooses to chooses to completes task
task perform task but verbalise answers complete task as requested
demonstrates to task partially verbally
understanding. partially as
requested
Comprehension shows no shows some understands shows general exhibits full
understanding understanding of main idea understanding understanding
the topic and can
extract specific
information

our classes with auditory processing REFERENCES Lesley Lanir

difficulties. These students may appear
Birsh, J. R. (1999). Multisensory Teaching
less capable because they do not seem
of Basic Language Skills. Baltimore: Paul
to be able to comprehend effectively.
H. Brookes
However, in some cases they may
simply be unable to receive, decipher, Boyle, J. (1984). Factors affecting
reorganise, store and retrieve language listening comprehension. ELT Journal,
sounds in the same way or rate that 38,34-38
we do and just require an observant
Levine , M. (2002). A Mind at a Time.
teacher and a slightly different set of
methods. New York: Simon and Shuster

To appreciate the amount of effort Levine, M. (2001). Developmental

needed to succeed, it is important to
remind ourselves that these problems
rarely occur in isolation and individuals
with learning challenges often have
difficulties in other academic subjects
due to variances in other sensory,
cognitive or neurological functioning.
The student that cannot suppress
background noises may not be able
to control his pen properly and be
behind in mathematics. The weaknesses
and their permutations are endless;
however, our approach, interaction
and intervention determine whether
a difference in learning turns into a
learning disability.
Variation and Learning Disorders.
Cambridge and Toronto: Educators
Publishing Service
Paton, Judith W., (1997). Living and
Working with a Central Auditory
Processing Disorder at LD online http://
www.ldonline.org
Paton, Judith W., (1999). Californian
Learning Disabilities Association
Lesley Lanir, a freelance writer,
lecturer and teacher trainer, has been
involved in TEFL for over 15 years
specialising in learning disabilities
and foreign language learning. She
has a BA in English and Education,
CTEFLA/RSA and an MA in Learning
Disabilities.
Email: lesleylanir@gmail.com

78 Modern English Teacher Volume 20 No. 1