| Body | The purpose of this activity is to engage learners in consideration of pauses during turn-taking in the target language.
Learning Outcomes:
Learners will be able to:
- Evaluate the context surrounding pauses between turns in a conversation in the target language
Materials: pay attention to pauses video
Procedure:
- Introduce the language learning strategy of paying attention to pauses by showing learners this video.
- Ask learners to reflect on their experiences in conversations in the target language. As a class, make a list of the instances in which pauses between turns were surprising.
- Next, provide learners with an audio recording of a conversation. Ask that they mark how long the pauses are between turns the first time that they listen. Please note that they do not have to actually time the pauses, but rather make some denotation of whether pauses feel short or long.
- Next, listen to the recording again. Ask learners to take notes about the context surrounding communication. Ask them to pay attention to tone, excitement, and other contextual factors that would increase their understanding of the length of pauses between turns.
- As a class, analyze learners' observations. Work together to make generalizations of when pauses seem relatively short or long between turns in conversations in the target language.
Notes:
- During Step 2, it may be important to help learners differentiate between pauses due to the relative speed of processing and comprehension and pauses that are more typical of expert speakers communicating in the targeted language.
- The length of the audio sample should correspond to the proficiency level of learners. For Novice, you may want to select a one-minute sample, and for Advanced, a longer sample (three to five minutes) may be more appropriate.
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