Literacy Main Page

Differentiating Literacy Instruction for Culturally, Linguistically and Ability Diverse Students

Case Study

References

Oral Language: Domains of Oral Language: Listening

Listening involves attending to and processing what is heard. A student's disability can affect one or more of the following types of listening: attentive listening, analytical listening, appreciative listening, marginal listening, and selective listening, as defined below^*:

• Attentive Listening
• Analytical Listening
• Appreciative Listening
• Marginal Listening
• Selective Listening

A guide for assessing listening skills

There are a number of types of listening skills, each one slightly different from the next. Here are some questions to consider when discerning the different types of listening. Does the child change behavior by the presence or absence of sound? (Startle reaction) This is one of the first clues that a child has sound awareness.Can the child interpret different sounds to have different meanings? (The sound of a dog barking, doorbell ringing). This indicates auditory attending. A more sophisticated skill is auditory memory, that a child can store and recall a series of sounds. There are also skills of auditory sequencing, that a child can remember the order of items named in a sequence, auditory projection, that a child can attend to and interpret sounds at a distance, and auditory closure, that a child can complete a word when only a part is presented.

When a child is having difficulty with listening, he or she might:

• be unable to follow oral directions
• be unable to match letters with their correct sounds
• have a limited vocabulary
• show poor concept formation
• have difficulty conversing with people or expressing needs

Children exhibiting these difficulties should be tested to rule out hearing problems before attributing the child's difficulties to a learning disability or behavioral issue. The listening skills discussed in this section are distinct from the physical ability to hear. (For information regarding literacy instruction for children who are deaf or hard of hearing, please see the EMSTAC Deaf Literacy Product.)

Back to Top

Continue to Next Page (Speaking)