THE ROLE OF AUTHENTICITY IN IMPROVING LISTENING SKILLS

Аннотация

This article is focused on trying to improving listening skills through authentic materials and to discover how to facilitate learners’ language learning process regarding through authentic materials at secondary schools. The findings revealed that incorporating authentic materials can significantly improve students' listening proficiency and foster a deeper understanding ofa language. Keywords: Authentic Materials, Listening Skills, Improvement, EFL Classes, Integration, Communicate, Motivation. First, it is necessary to explain what vocabulary is. Listening is not only the single words in a language, but it also includes phrases. When learners are learning EFL listening they learn single words such as cat, table, classroom, etc., as well as phrases such as greetings, idioms, collocations, etc. Secondly, it is important to remember that a word does not have only one meaning, but several meanings that pupils need to know. In the words of Thornbury” …at the most basic level, knowing a word involves knowing its form and its meaning. Knowing the meaning of the word is not just knowing its dictionary meaning, it also means knowing the words commonly associated with it, as well as its connotations, including its register and its cultural accretions”.[Thornbury 2002:15] As Cameron gives a similar definition, “in language teaching terms, the development of words, their meaning and the links between them will be covered under the term Listening”.[Cameron 2001;18] Authentic material is any material written in English that was not created for intentional use in the English classroom. Using this content for teaching English can make the teaching experience even more engaging, imaginative and motivating for students. [Salikhova 2025:10] Most of the young learners of this age (16-17) are restless and sometimes they do not pay much attention and sometimesthey donot want to participate. For this reason, teachers need to be patient. Moreover, creativity is another matter of vital importance. A teacher of young learners needs to be able to create or adapt colorful and original material in order to prevent young learners from getting distracted. Furthermore, teachers need to be responsible with their lessons. If teachers work with young learners, they must not arrive at the classroom unprepared because young learners of this age always expect something fun to do in the English lesson. Another aspect related to responsibilityis that teachers always have tobe available to young learners, evenif they are illor do not feel well they have to come to all their classes with a happy face. It is important because young learners are sensitive and the mood of the teacher during the class affects their learning. For example, if a teacher comes to class happy, young learners will be motivated to learn; but if theteacherhas a bad attitude, young learners willfeel stressed. A teacher also needs to consider the things that young learners are able to do according to their age. This is vital when planning the lesson because a teacher has to take into account the young learners’ abilities to choose the appropriate material and activities. If teachers investigate and read more about their pupils’ characteristics, they could achieve better results with their lessons. It will be easy for teachers to understand young learners’ needs and interests if they try to see the world in the same way young learners do. In many cases, young learners give importance to page343 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE ISSN:2692-5206,ImpactFactor:12,23 AmericanAcademicpublishers,volume05,issue03,2025 Journal: https://www.academicpublishers.org/journals/index.php/ijai small details and teachers need to be aware of this and be willing to deal with it in a calm way. Sometimes a child gets depressed because his/her friends do not want to share their lunch or because he/she does not have the same toys, his friends do. As a result, the teacher has to change her role from teacher to friend or peacemaker and even try to make the situation humorous to makeyoung learners feel better. TEFL listening for young learners does not comprehend all these aspects of a word because they are more difficult for young learners and have to be learnt over much more time. However, it is essential that young learners learn many words. According to Kwiatkowska’s argument: …teaching listening at this level is a very important element of teaching English, because young learners, knowing more and more words, can better communicate with other young learners. [Kwiatkowska2007:2] Moreover, “without grammar very little can be conveyed, without listening nothing can be conveyed. That is, without grammar, young learners can try to communicate with others and to express their opinions, but without listening, they cannot say anything. Teachers of EFL need to take into account that young learners have already learnt a first language and that it enables them to relate meanings of words of both