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…

Subjects listened to sounds of individual musical instruments and matched these to instrument pictures. Second graders scored significantly higher than first graders; rank orders of instruments according to association difficulty, however, were markedly similar between grades. Results support the view that children bring much music knowledge to…

Explored the relative effectiveness of four modes of delivery (live, video-audio, audio, and manuscript) on content retention among Black college students. Did not find significant differences in retention among the four experimental groups. Attributes the absence of differences to the small amount retained in general. (GC)

Demonstrates some of the many ways in which a text can be used, not only as a basis for comprehension, but also for practicing grammatical structures, writing, and conversation skills. Such a variety of activities with one text can help to alleviate students' boredom. Sample texts are given. (Author/PJM)

Gives the format of a listening exercise in which students perform two tasks while listening to a dialog: they answer 15 true-false questions and they label the rooms of a house on a plan provided. The dialog was selected for naturalness, predictability, and distribution of reference words. (PJM)

Discusses effective oral communication as a prime requisite for business management success. Both speaking and listening skills are needed to encourage intercommunication, invite feedback, respond to other opinions, and solicit participation to contribute to the manager's decisions for organizational action. (MF)

A study was carried out to compare the degree of intelligibility between native and non-native varieties of educated English. (CFM)

Reports on an experiment with a three-hour teaching unit used with an eighth-grade class in Germany. Describes the planning and carrying out of each of the three class hours, discussing, for each step, the content, methodology, and utilization of media. Concludes with an overall evaluation. (IFS/WGA)

The four parts in this section present: (1) an advertisement based on the literary style of Emile Zola; (2) exercises designed to practice expressions of similarity and difference; (3) the transcript of a discussion on the problem of swamps; and (4) variations on the shopkeeper-customer dialogue. (AM)

In order to test the effects of listener errors on scores on an expressive language task, a group of 20 Black and 20 White college students viewed videotapes of eight first-grade boys and recorded in writing the boys' responses to 10 vocabulary items from the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children. (Author/PHR)

Language teachers are only now beginning to realize that reading can help improve students' skills in listening and speaking. Three methods of teaching reading which can be combined and are particularly suited for foreign students are the Linguistic method, the Language Experience method and the Individualized Reading Approach. (CFM)

A questionnaire given to graduates and students of English revealed that: most use of their English was in the home country; aural comprehension was most important, followed by reading-comprehension, speaking and writing. Abroad, English was used more in non-English-speaking countries than in England or the USA. (Text is in German.) (IFS/WGA)

Focuses on English word-stress, a feature essential for effective communication. Discusses the difficulty in assigning this phonological aspect and the effect of its misplacement on comprehension. Shows how English word-stress differs from that of Arabic and emphasizes the need to teach word-stress during pronunciation instruction. (36 references)…

Argues that "information structure management" is an important and problematic part of the competence sought by nonnative speakers, particularly for goal-related discourse types where clarity and argumentative power play a role. Simulated negotiation material is used to demonstrate how certain nonnative structures hamper the…

Discusses the beliefs of children with learning disabilities about listening and the listener's role in repairing communicative breakdowns. Describes ways of using children's literature to enable students to reflect on the interactive roles of speaker and listener using stories with a theme of resolving communication breakdowns. (Author/CR)