Design of the While Listening Activities in Interactive Multimedia Listening Software

Background

The objective of interactive multimedia listening software (MLS) is to develop and practice language learners' listening skills and to improve their listening development as a part of second/foreign language learning (SLL/FLL). Although this can be achieved in a wide range of ways such as through instructions (Turel & McKenna, 2015a), feedback (Türel, 2012), captions (Perez, Peters & Desmet, 2014; Yang & Chang, 2014; Leveridge & Yang, 2013; Lwo & Lin, 2012; Trinder, 2002), tasks (Turel, 2014; Turel & Kiliç, 2014; Turel, 2015), annotations (Jones, 2015), glossaries (Turel & McKenna, 2015b), and other ways, this can also be achieved with a wide variety of activities which can give language learners the opportunities to practice and develop their acoustic and visual channels, and receptive and productive skills. Since the focus of this chapter is the priority and the number of the while-listening activities/questions (i.e. ‘Clickable’, ‘Drag & Drop’, ‘Typing a letter’, ‘Typing a word’) on screen at one time while designing and developing interactive MLS, we firstly focus on the pedagogical aspects of the while-listening activities in SLL/FLL and later look at the design of the while-listening activities in interactive MLS as a part of SLL/FLL.