The Listening Brain: Filling in the Blanks
February 7, 2025
Episode Notes
Hey, good morning.
You look pretty happy today.
I am. I am ecstatic.
Oh, really? What's up?
Um, I just wanted to say thank you to you actually for this week's uh um your blog in this week's uh weekly newsletter, The Mail Magazine.
Oh, yeah. Tell me about it.
Yeah. Um students are really enjoying it and we're really enjoying talking about it in class. as it's uh quite fascinating.
Okay. Now, I I've written a lot of blogs. Which one are you talking about?
This is a blog uh about listening and I that probably doesn't clarify it because a lot of your blogs are about listening, but uh it's about um a common problem that a lot of people have when listening, which is filling in the blanks with assumptions.
Okay. Okay.
And so, you hear something, you miss part of it.
Yeah.
Your brain automatically fills it in with what you assume from your experience that word was or or would be,
right?
And then the pro the problem being when you interpret it incorrectly or when you assume incorrectly and and then you make a mistake.
Okay.
And and you talk about how the brain automatically fills in the blanks. Cool.
You just inspired me. I got some good ideas from you there. About what? Good ideas about what?
Motivational speeches for my students.
Oh, okay. Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah. Well, I mean,
yeah.
Go ahead.
Your brain can fill in the gaps with your experience, but if your experience is this big, it's not going to be very good at filling in gaps. If you
Yeah.
listening practice and you get this much experience, it's much easier to fill in the gaps. It's a numbers game.
So, we we were talking about it this week in class with students and uh one of the little little game I played with them was
I I started a they had to finish it.
Okay.
So, for example, I'd say, "Good morning, Les. How are
you?"
You that's right. Okay. Yeah. It's very nice to talk with you today.
I was going to say meet you, but different ass about how that sentence would end. And that's the point is that how you fill it in is would be different. Um I I play basketball from time to
time.
From time to time. That's right. And that's again shared experience. That's a common phrase people use from time to time. So most people would fill it in. But then the the one where I I sort of tricked students intentionally to show how there could be different answers is that I play basketball from time to time, but I play table tennis. Table tennis once in a
while.
No, blue moon. Once in a blue moon.
Good. That that one works, too. I know.
Hey,
so just showing.
Yeah.
Yep. I Now this I'm going to take it to a new level. Okay.
Yeah.
Are you ready for this?
Okay. I don't know.
Japanese has a certain rhythm pattern.
English has a different rhythm pattern. As a result of that,
the Japanese attention has difficulty picking up words, small the low stress words. And those no stress words tend to be very important for English like prepositions. So
many of my students when they use the word look as a verb, they'll say look look a book or look over look um look table
and they need that The problem is even if they listen to stories with at, they may not hear the word at. So that doesn't become part of their experience
because it's a low stress word and the rhythm patterns of English and Japanese are different
and they don't hear it. So it doesn't register in the brain and they don't pick up look at as a unit.
It's look.
Yeah. Likewise with listen to
any of the prepositions prep positions are almost almost universally low stress.
Yeah. And and so that again that's where your blog was very very helpful this week. Students enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. We enjoyed talking about it. It was very helpful about how the brain interprets automatically.
Thank you. I'm I'm really glad for the feedback. I'll try and get some more of that out there.
Excellent, sir. All right. See you later.
Thanks. Take care.
Bye. Got it.
You look pretty happy today.
I am. I am ecstatic.
Oh, really? What's up?
Um, I just wanted to say thank you to you actually for this week's uh um your blog in this week's uh weekly newsletter, The Mail Magazine.
Oh, yeah. Tell me about it.
Yeah. Um students are really enjoying it and we're really enjoying talking about it in class. as it's uh quite fascinating.
Okay. Now, I I've written a lot of blogs. Which one are you talking about?
This is a blog uh about listening and I that probably doesn't clarify it because a lot of your blogs are about listening, but uh it's about um a common problem that a lot of people have when listening, which is filling in the blanks with assumptions.
Okay. Okay.
And so, you hear something, you miss part of it.
Yeah.
Your brain automatically fills it in with what you assume from your experience that word was or or would be,
right?
And then the pro the problem being when you interpret it incorrectly or when you assume incorrectly and and then you make a mistake.
Okay.
And and you talk about how the brain automatically fills in the blanks. Cool.
You just inspired me. I got some good ideas from you there. About what? Good ideas about what?
Motivational speeches for my students.
Oh, okay. Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah. Well, I mean,
yeah.
Go ahead.
Your brain can fill in the gaps with your experience, but if your experience is this big, it's not going to be very good at filling in gaps. If you
Yeah.
listening practice and you get this much experience, it's much easier to fill in the gaps. It's a numbers game.
So, we we were talking about it this week in class with students and uh one of the little little game I played with them was
I I started a they had to finish it.
Okay.
So, for example, I'd say, "Good morning, Les. How are
you?"
You that's right. Okay. Yeah. It's very nice to talk with you today.
I was going to say meet you, but different ass about how that sentence would end. And that's the point is that how you fill it in is would be different. Um I I play basketball from time to
time.
From time to time. That's right. And that's again shared experience. That's a common phrase people use from time to time. So most people would fill it in. But then the the one where I I sort of tricked students intentionally to show how there could be different answers is that I play basketball from time to time, but I play table tennis. Table tennis once in a
while.
No, blue moon. Once in a blue moon.
Good. That that one works, too. I know.
Hey,
so just showing.
Yeah.
Yep. I Now this I'm going to take it to a new level. Okay.
Yeah.
Are you ready for this?
Okay. I don't know.
Japanese has a certain rhythm pattern.
English has a different rhythm pattern. As a result of that,
the Japanese attention has difficulty picking up words, small the low stress words. And those no stress words tend to be very important for English like prepositions. So
many of my students when they use the word look as a verb, they'll say look look a book or look over look um look table
and they need that The problem is even if they listen to stories with at, they may not hear the word at. So that doesn't become part of their experience
because it's a low stress word and the rhythm patterns of English and Japanese are different
and they don't hear it. So it doesn't register in the brain and they don't pick up look at as a unit.
It's look.
Yeah. Likewise with listen to
any of the prepositions prep positions are almost almost universally low stress.
Yeah. And and so that again that's where your blog was very very helpful this week. Students enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. We enjoyed talking about it. It was very helpful about how the brain interprets automatically.
Thank you. I'm I'm really glad for the feedback. I'll try and get some more of that out there.
Excellent, sir. All right. See you later.
Thanks. Take care.
Bye. Got it.