Well, just like I mentioned from my previous article “Ways to improve your speaking skills", if you really want to improve your English (Listening, Speaking, Writing, or Reading skills, whichever you are in needs), you have to put in the time and efforts. If you don't make the commitment to put in the time and efforts, there's no way you can improve your English skills.
So if you already make the resolution and commitment to improve your English, then you can keep on reading. Below are three suggestions I have for you to take note of regarding improving listening skills. To start, I recommend that you choose one of the items to begin with, pick one that's most suitable for you:
(1) Listen to VOA (Voice of America); you can download some audio clips onto your phone so you can listen to it while you are on your way to work or vice versa. Personally this is my favorite because you don't have to take the extra time to study, just do it while you are sitting on the bus or walking to or from the office. Convenient, efficient and effective. Some websites you can consider to go on to download the audio clips are http://www.putclub.com or http://www.bigear.cn.(2) Watch American television series, such as "Modern Family, Baby Daddy", “Friends” etc. You can watch 1 episode per night, it's about 20 minutes, so you can relax after a long day of work while improving your English, how good a deal is that, huh?Here how it works, this is what I called the “Four Steps Listening Cycle Techniques”:(I) You first start without the subtitles, try your best to understand them. The first time you do this, you probably couldn't understand 95% of what the actors are saying, don't be disappointed, that's completely normal, this means that you will have a larger room for improvement in the future :>)(II) The second time you watch it with the subtitles, pay close attention to what the actors are saying and concentrate on the scripts.(III)The third time you watch it again with no subtitles and I assure you that this time you can understand more than that of the first time.(IV) And for the fourth time and so forth you can start imitating the pronunciation of the actors and read aloud with them at the same time. Finally after step four then you can cycle back to step 1 and start over again, this process goes in cycle.(3) Listen to music, choose some music you enjoy listening to and download onto your phone. You can also use the “Four Steps Listening Cycle Techniques” that I mentioned above to practice. You can sing along as well if you want to :>)
Above are just some suggestions on how to improve listening for your reference, thanks for taking the time reading it. If you have any other good suggestions or techniques on how to improve listening skills, you're welcome to share them with me. Let's improve together!
In the end, I wish you all the best of luck in your English learning journey.
