Recording the students
As we saw in the last activity, the cassette player can be used not only for listening but also for recording. Students, like
most people, can feel embarrassed or self-conscious when recording themselves. However, it is an excellent way to build
students’ confidence and help their pronunciation. It is often difficult for students to know how to improve their pronunciation.
If they are able to listen to themselves, then they can have a clearer idea as to what they need to do.
If the students are able to assess their own progress by listening to themselves, by perhaps having a check list of
things they have been working on ... and if they do this regularly over a period of time and they can see that there is
improvement, that helps.
Kenny Graham, teacher and teacher trainer at the Bell School in Cambridge - Teaching With Technology, Programme 3
Students can record themselves as part of activities such as ‘news room’ above, or when doing specific pronunciation
exercises. This kind of work is made easier if there is access to a language laboratory where the teacher can monitor and
give feedback to students individually.
Some practical considerations when using a tape recorder:
• Listen to any material fully before you use it in class. Is the quality good enough? Do you know the answers to the
questions?
• Make sure you know how to operate the cassette player. Play the tape in the class before the lesson and adjust and
position the player so that it is clearly audible even at the back of the room.
• Cue the tape. This means find the place on the tape where you want the listening to start. Some tape recorders have a
counter. If yours has, zero it. This means that even after you have played the tape you should be able to find the
starting point again without difficulty.
• Check that everything works before the lesson. Remember, technology can always fail. If you lose power or the tape
recorder doesn’t work, what are you going to do? You should at least have a transcript of the material which you can
read out if necessary.
For details on how to stage a listening activity, see Exploiting listening and reading texts on page
As we saw in the last activity, the cassette player can be used not only for listening but also for recording. Students, like
most people, can feel embarrassed or self-conscious when recording themselves. However, it is an excellent way to build
students’ confidence and help their pronunciation. It is often difficult for students to know how to improve their pronunciation.
If they are able to listen to themselves, then they can have a clearer idea as to what they need to do.
If the students are able to assess their own progress by listening to themselves, by perhaps having a check list of
things they have been working on ... and if they do this regularly over a period of time and they can see that there is
improvement, that helps.
Kenny Graham, teacher and teacher trainer at the Bell School in Cambridge - Teaching With Technology, Programme 3
Students can record themselves as part of activities such as ‘news room’ above, or when doing specific pronunciation
exercises. This kind of work is made easier if there is access to a language laboratory where the teacher can monitor and
give feedback to students individually.
Some practical considerations when using a tape recorder:
• Listen to any material fully before you use it in class. Is the quality good enough? Do you know the answers to the
questions?
• Make sure you know how to operate the cassette player. Play the tape in the class before the lesson and adjust and
position the player so that it is clearly audible even at the back of the room.
• Cue the tape. This means find the place on the tape where you want the listening to start. Some tape recorders have a
counter. If yours has, zero it. This means that even after you have played the tape you should be able to find the
starting point again without difficulty.
• Check that everything works before the lesson. Remember, technology can always fail. If you lose power or the tape
recorder doesn’t work, what are you going to do? You should at least have a transcript of the material which you can
read out if necessary.
For details on how to stage a listening activity, see Exploiting listening and reading texts on page
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