Listen to a conversation somewhere in a public place and be prepared to answer, in the target language, some general questions about what was said. The exercise puts students in a real-world listening situation where they must report information overheard. Most likely they have an opinion of the topic, and a class discussion could follow, in the target language, about their experiences and viewpoints. Communicative exercises such as this motivate the students by treating topics of their choice, at an appropriately challenging level. Another exercise taken from the same source is for beginning students of Spanish.
Students listen to a passage to get general understanding of the topic or message.
Have students listen to the following announcement to decide what the speaker is promoting. Gunter Gerngross, an English teacher in Austria, gives an example of how he makes his lessons more communicative. He cites a widely used textbook that shows English children having a pet show. There are no quick, set recipes. The observation by Gerngross on the role of the teacher as one of listener rather than speaker brings up several points to be discussed in the next portion of this digest.