What while – listening activities would you do before playing the story to the learners?

While-listening activities are designed to engage learners actively during the storytelling process, helping them develop listening skills and comprehension. Here are some while-listening activities that can be implemented before playing the story to the learners:

1. Guided Listening: Provide learners with a set of questions or statements related to the story. Instruct them to listen carefully and mark their answers or choose the correct options as they hear the story. This encourages focused listening and helps develop comprehension skills.
2. Fill in the Blanks: Create a cloze exercise by removing certain words or phrases from the story and leaving blank spaces. As the learners listen to the story, they need to fill in the missing words or phrases. This activity enhances listening accuracy and vocabulary acquisition.
3. Story Sequencing: Prepare a set of picture cards or sentence strips that represent key events or scenes from the story. Shuffle the cards or strips and distribute them to the learners before playing the story. Instruct them to listen attentively and arrange the cards or strips in the correct story sequence as they hear the events unfold.
4. True or False: Provide a series of statements about the story, some of which are true and others false. Instruct the learners to listen carefully and determine whether each statement is true or false. This activity develops listening discrimination and critical thinking skills.
5. Multiple Choice: Create a set of multiple-choice questions based on the story. Each question should have several options, and learners need to listen attentively to select the correct answer. This activity enhances listening comprehension and decision-making abilities.
6. Dictation: Choose specific sentences or short passages from the story and dictate them to the learners. Instruct them to write down what they hear. This activity focuses on listening accuracy, spelling, and retention of information.
7. Story Retelling: After playing the story, ask learners to work in pairs or small groups to retell the story in their own words. This activity promotes listening comprehension, speaking skills, and collaboration among learners.
8. Discussion Questions: Prepare a set of open-ended discussion questions related to the story. After listening to the story, encourage learners to share their thoughts, opinions, and interpretations in a group or whole-class discussion. This activity stimulates critical thinking, oral communication, and engagement with the story's content.
9. Role Play: Assign different roles or characters from the story to individual learners or groups. Instruct them to act out a particular scene or dialogue from the story. This activity enhances listening skills, creativity, and oral expression.
10. Reflection and Response: Ask learners to reflect on the story and respond to it by writing a short paragraph or drawing a picture. Encourage them to express their emotions, thoughts, or connections they made with the story. This activity promotes personal engagement, creativity, and self-expression