Describes a technique that uses the materials of the language laboratory to develop fluency at the advanced level of Russian. Each week students receive a picture and a vocabulary list that relates to a story that they then listen to on a cassette. A conversation class completely in Russian follows. (SED)

Discusses the reasons for growing disenchantment with the language laboratory and introduces a novel approach to advanced listening comprehension exercises based on recordings of professional entertainers. Analyzes the sketches as examples of authentic discourse, as illustrations of different speech registers and regional variants, and as vehicles…