Position paper 1

Jahirton Mazo Jiménez (000128771)

Communicative Competence VI

The effect of the speaker’s accent in the listening comprehension: a test taker
experience about IELTS listening section

My name is Jahirton Mazo Jiménez, I am in the English and Spanish teaching programme,

VII semester at UPB College. The course Communicative Competence VI has as the

formative purpose, the preparation of international exams (TOEFL1 y IELTS2) for the

certification of the English (as a second language) level of proficiency in the

communicative skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing, but in this case I would like

to focus on the speaker’s accent effect in the listening comprehension of the test taker. In

this order of ideas the listening comprehension section of the IELTS presented in class was

assessed with four recordings according to the following skills: understanding of main ideas

(1), understanding of specific factual information recognising opinions (2), attitudes and

purpose of a speaker (3) and following the development of an argument (4).

Following this what I mentioned before, the speaker’s accent plays an essential role for the

listening comprehension, because in the 3 and 4 skills proposed by the IELTS listening

section, it requires that the listener recognise the accents and the particularities of using that

specific accent, such as: the context of the message, the vocabulary and the communicative

intention of the speaker. According to Bloomfield et al (2010) comprehending spoken

language involves adapting to the idiosyncrasies of a particular speaker (e.g., speaking rate

or the pitch of voice), it means that the speaker’s accent speech includes a specific context,

vocabulary and communicative intention. In addition there are other factors, the dialect and

colloquialisms that can affect in one way or another the listener and his general

1
Test of English as a foreign language.
2
International English language testing system.
comprehension of the discourse (Bloomfield et al, 2010). Other element that we should

consider is the listening comprehension capacity of the test taker, it means the capacity of

understanding the message and its communicative intention, it could be specific

expressions or the meaning of the word in a certain context (Bloomfield, 2010), thus, the

emotions and words in diverse contexts whether is an academic topic or an informal talk

will influence the test taker performance in the listening section.

When the test taker listen an accent in listening comprehension section he/she should take

into account the existing characteristics of the speaker, like the possibility of listening a

British accent that IELTS exam offers, the vocabulary used by the speaker (Sung, 2015)

and the extension of the message offered in the four recordings of the test. In that case the

speaker accent could affect in positive or a negative way the test taker because the

characteristics of the speaker (mentioned before) and the ones of the listener according to

his/her language proficiency (Sung, 2015), the physical capacity of listen and contextualize

the message will impact the performance presenting the test (Sung, 2015). Another

important condition that could benefit or disadvantage the listening comprehension is the

physical space where the test is going to be developed because there are some conditions as

the acoustic of the place, the audio volume, and the kind of advice that will reproduce the

sound will be decisive at the time to present the listening section of the test (Bloomfield et

al, 2010).

From my point of view as a preservice teacher the listening comprehension activities

should be promoted permanently in English learning, because it helps the student to

recognize the listening skill as an integral aspect of the acquisition process of a second
 Position paper 3
Jahirton Mazo Jiménez (000128771)
Communicative Competence VI

language. Moreover the listening activities foster the cognitive and metacognitive

development processes that facilitate the comprehension of messages, different discourses

and its intentionality. According to the guideline #223 of the National Ministry of

Education (NME) an element to consider for the promotion of listening and listening

comprehension in the classroom is the meaningful input of “learn to listen” as a

fundamental part of the second language acquisition process (MEN, 2006), that is

composed by comprehension skills (listening-reading) and the meaningful contribution to

the production skills (speaking-writing). I consider that practicing activities inside the

classroom in relation with the listening skill helps test takers to identify the different

English accents and the possibility to create recording where it could be possible to

recognize the Colombian English as an alternative to learn the diversity of the accents in

the different contexts.

My experience presenting the IELTS listening section was meaningful because I could

interact with the diversity of accents and linguistic records that are used in a listening exam,

despite of my low scores in the tests, but in the development of the test taking simulation,

test taking first and second, and in the listening exercises inside and outside the classroom I

had meaningful advances because I comprehend the diversity of accents, contexts and

communicative internationalities, that could help me to look for listening strategies

according to my needs and weakest aspects of my listening comprehension. Finally, the

actions that could improve my listening competence after the scores of the test taking were:

to be in the conversation club, listen to different music genres, watch movies, to interact

3
Estándares básicos de competencias en lenguas extranjeras en Colombia: lengua inglesa.
with people with different English accents and to articulate the speaking and listening

competences to improve my comprehension skills in English as a L2.

References
 Bloomfield et al (2010). What makes listening dificult? Factors affecting second
language listening comprehension. University of Maryland Center for advanced
study language. 4(1). 1-92. April 2010.
 IELTS support (2016). Cambridge, UK. Tercera edición.
 Estándares básicos de competencias en lenguas : Inglés (2006). Ministerio de
educación Nacional. Bogotá, D.C. Primera edición.
 Richards, J. Richards, S. (2010). Longman dictionary of language teaching and
applied linguistics. Pearson education. Edimburg, UK. Fourth edition.
 Sung, P Lin y Hung, P. (2015) Factors Affecting Item Difficulty in English
Listening Comprehension Tests. Universal Journal of Educational Research 3(7)
p. 451-459.