Using a Dictogloss

Yesterday we learned the English language with using a dictogloss. I trayed to find the definition of "DICTOGLOSS" on the Internet and, finally, this one seems to me to be the best:

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Using a Dictogloss
Dictogloss is an activity in which short pieces of language are read out at normal speed to students, who take down the key words and then attempt to reconstruct the passage using their short term memory, their general understanding of the text, and notes they take while listening. A dictogloss commonly uses the following procedure:

• Preparation: introduce the topic and key vocabulary.
• Dictation: Read the text aloud at normal or near-normal speed, allowing students to orally reconstruct in small groups afterwards. On the second reading, students note down key words.
• Analysis: Students attempt to reconstruct the text in their own words, first in pairs and subsequently in larger groups. The students will be utilizing their existing grammatical and lexical knowledge, practising their ability to record and extract the main ideas in a text, working collaboratively to produce a legible written record, proof-reading and revising work, and as a by-product justifying their opinions and asking questions to check and clarify information.
• Feedback / Correction / Evaluation: The completed texts are checked for meaning and accuracy.

As befitting its origins as a grammar teaching methodology, one of the primary benefits of a dictogloss is to reveal gaps in the students’ prior-knowledge and inter-language – hence its popularity as a diagnostic tool. Increasingly, however, the technique is being used as a more learner-centred form of dictation, leading in to work on areas such as pronunciation, lexis, functional exponents and spelling. Unlike traditional dictation exercises, in a dictogloss the emphasis is on the students’ ability to communicate in order to re-convey the meaning of the text, as opposed to re-producing it word for word. Tasks can be graded by giving ‘skeleton texts’ (the key nouns, for example) to the students before the first reading, by variations in the reading speed, or by decreasing the length of the text to be reconstructed (with the caveat that all texts should be of sufficient length that the students are not able to store it word-for-word in their short-term memory).

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