Complement the comprehension (testing) model with a process model that teaches learners to decode the sound stream. Field’s eight priorities put word recognition, ‘islands of reliability’, first.
Field’s eight priorities (as Smith summarises them)
- Make process central.
- Focus on decoding.
- Word recognition first: “islands of reliability”.
- Build meaning from general context more than co-text. “Co-text cannot [be] assumed to be available until a certain level of decoding ability has been achieved.”
- Strategy instruction early.
- Integrate processes and strategies.
- A diagnostic approach.
- Authentic speech from early on, with level-appropriate tasks.
Procedures
Transcription of short segments; intensive sound-to-spelling decoding before comprehension; strategy training (redundancy, hypothesising from context and cognates); gap-fill scaffolds where transcription fails. Smith’s own sequence: macro → micro → macro (understand a little → decode everything → understand everything).
Limits
Smith: transcription is “a bit dull” for adolescents, so use it in moderation. Communication is still “the go-to way”, supplemented by micro-listening. Field’s book is dated 2009 here and 2008 elsewhere: it’s 2008 (CUP).
Connections
Process listening vs the comprehension approach · Bottom-up listening instruction alone is not enough · Scaffolding dictation for beginners · Learners decode far less than teachers think (fuzzy lexical representations)