Testing is not equivalent to teaching
After collecting data to diagnose students’ needs, the teachers realised that there is a range of issues to address in order to help students improve their listening skills.  The traditional way of doing listening practices alone only amounts to a form of continuous testing and may not be effective in teaching students the listening skills they need.  A more holistic approach to teaching listening skills in integrated units of work is more preferable as it can prepare students for listening through language, vocabulary, and skills input. Explicit skills like making predictions, listening for key words and note-taking skills can help students understand and record spoken language more effectively.

Independent learning starts with habit forming
Many teachers of the school believe that independent learning is one of the ways to cope with the increased demands of the new academic structure.  To nurture students into reflective and autonomous learners, teachers should not start by asking them to learn on their own because changes usually do not happen overnight.  Teachers should provide support and guidance to help students reflect on their strengths and weaknesses and decide on what to do next.  When students are ready, we can give them more opportunities for self-learning and self-reflections with less teacher interference.

Using appropriate resources
Launching a listening project may be intimidating as there may not be enough listening materials ready for use.  While it is useful to tailormake listening resources, teachers should not forget about the existing resources they have.  They should first review their existing materials to make effective use of resources.  The teachers of this school tried to make use of existing resources like NET, listening materials from textbooks and skills books, and English activities like musical plays.  They also resorted to student helpers and outside organisations as their resources.  All these have helped the teachers overcome the challenge of insufficient resources.