INPUT

What does research tell us about the importance of input (listening and reading)? How can input be planned to maximise acquisition? What specific issues arise with regard to listening, reading and how students process the input they receive? What does cognitive science tell us about how to present input?

Reading

Larry Vandergrift’s article about acquiring strategies for listening (Time: 12 minutes)

Suzanne Graham writes about listening strategies in classroom settings (Time: 25 minutes)

Gianfranco Conti describes how the brain processes aural input and what this suggests for classroom practice (Time: 10 minutes)

Catherine Walter looks at some key issues regarding the teaching of reading (Time: 10 minutes)

William Grabe covers lots of ground in this introductory article about key issues in reading (25 minutes)

This blog article by Gianfranco Conti looks at various issues, theoretical and practical, surrounding the teaching of reading (Time: 10 minutes)

In his influential 1982 book Stephen Krashen explains the Input Hypothesis and the importance of input being comprehensible (pages 20-30) (Time: 15 minutes)

Ali Hasan examines how teachers can make input comprehensible. The article covers useful general ground too (Time: 25 minutes)

Can learners pay attention to both the meaning and the form of the input they receive? This article by Bill VanPatten suggests that it’s hard (Time: 15 minutes)

Memory scholar Nelson Cowan (2010) writes about the limited capacity of working memory in this easy to read, open access article (Time: 10 minutes)

Patsy Lightbown explains the significance of the TAP (Transfer Appropriate Processing) from cognitive psychology in second language learning (Time: 25 minutes)

This 2016 article by Alessandro Benati considers the theory and research into Input Processing - how manipulating the input learners receive may accelerate acquisition (Time: 25 minutes)

This is the text of a 2010 talk given by Richard Schmidt about his Noticing Hypothesis (1990, 2001) - the idea that for learning to take place students have to notice something in the form of the input (Time: 20 minutes)

An article from 2019 by Pauline Degrave on the use of music in second language teaching (Time: 10 minutes)

Gianfranco Conto outlines the research on why input needs to be 95-98% comprehensible (Time: 5 minutes) NEW 25.5.25

From my own blog (Steve Smith), a research-informed post about making input comprehensible (Time: 5 minutes) NEW 25.5.25

Video

Beth Sheppard delivers a webinar about a “balanced approach to listening instruction” (Time: 94 minutes)

David Hendricks produced this short video to explain Cognitive Load Theory (Time: 4 minutes)

Carol Yue’s video from the Khan Academy explains clearly the Information Processing model, along with the notions of sensory, working and long term memory (Time: 8 minutes)

This video from Osmosis explains the importance of spaced repetition for learning (Time: 4 minutes)

Oliver Caviglioli explains the importance of dual coding when processing sensory input (Time: 6 minutes)

How do we process input we hear? Paul Merritt gives a slide presentation about the Phonological Loop, part of a standard model of working memory (Time: 11 minutes)

How do we process input we see? Paul Merritt explains the concept of the Visuospatial Sketchpad in working memory (Time: 10 minutes)

This fascinating illustrated lecture by neuroscientist Karen Froud is all about what brain imaging can tell us about what is going on in the brain when we process language (Time: 1 hour - begin at 3m 50)

Stansislas Dehaene explains the neuroscience of reading (Time: 42 minutes)