Fifth-grade and college students in two experiments listened to tape-recorded sentences and completed tests of immediate recall. The first experiment investigated the effect of a listener's expectations upon his understanding of a sentence. Sometimes the "most probable" answer was not congruent with the "correct" answer, suggesting that the…

Claiming that the actual learning of basic language skills takes place in the language laboratory, the author states four requisites for effective use of the laboratory: (1) a clear statement of specific objectives, (2) instructions for the student, (3) realistic objectives, and (4) student rewards. Testing, learning theory, applied linguistics,…

A theoretical discussion of problems encountered in the measurement and evaluation of speaking skill in a second language is developed in this paper. The primary areas of interest to be evaluated are identified and discussed, including phonology, syntax, morphology, and vocabulary. A delimited and graduated method of evaluation using numerical…

The Reports of the Working Committees of the Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages of 1973 are devoted to the general topic of sensitivity in the foreign language classroom. They are divided into chapters on: (1) Interaction in the Foreign Language Classroom, (2) Teaching Spanish to the Native Spanish Speaker, and (3)…

This text of supplementary materials for the "Polish Basic Course" designed by the Foreign Service Institute emphasizes the development of aural comprehension. Twenty-eight lessons, each focusing on a subject related to Army procedures and interests, are included. Lessons require homework consisting largely of writing answers to questions on tape…

This text of supplementary materials for the "Polish Basic Course" designed by the Foreign Service Institute emphasizes the development of aural comprehension. Twenty-eight lessons, each focusing on a subject related to Navy procedures and interests, are included. Lessons require homework consisting largely of writing answers to questions on tape…

This guide suggests a number of activities for the development of listening and speaking skills. It contains learning activities for kindergarten through grade 12 in aural comprehension, listening participation, auditory discrimination, speaking participation, delivery in speaking, and content in speaking. The guide is one of several planned for a…

Two studies are discussed in this research report, which was presented at the 1973 American Educational Research Association meeting. The first study investigated whether black children would evaluate Black English selections more favorably than standard English selections and whether favorable evaluation would lead to greater comprehension of the…

This packet of instructional materials, intended for intermediate and advanced German students, contains a student's section and a teacher's guide focusing on calisthenics. The student section contains three illustrated transcriptions of radio programs on calisthenics for early morning listeners of "Der bayrische Rundfunk" in West Germany.…

This teaching guide provides instruction in the use of language laboratories and the administration of various types of exercises. The audio-active and audio-active-compare laboratories are described, and arguments for each are offered. After a brief discussion of the choice of material to be learned, an analysis of the following methods for…

The Primary Language Development Component, funded under Title I of the 1965 Elementary Secondary Education Act, served 3150 pupils, kindergarten through grade three. The purpose of the Columbus Public Schools in planning the language component was based on the assumption that the language of disadvantaged children prevents their dealing…

This workbook, designed for use with the Defense Language Institute's "Thai Basic Course," is oriented toward development of aural comprehension. Taped exercises focus on a variety of activities, including comprehension exercises based on dialogue study, paragraph analysis, translation, multiple choice, dictation, and narration. Exercises…

Human beings who have been forced to acquire language through non-auditory modalities characteristically display an impoverished syntactic system. I.M. Schlessinger (1970) has shown, for example, that users of sign language have difficulty in communicating syntactic relations such as "subject of main verb,""object of the verb," and "indirect…

This article outlines a plan for developing listening comprehension materials for advanced students of English as a second language, based on formal and informal speech samples of natural discourse. (CFM)

Since foreign language methodology has, in the past fifteen years, included aural-oral skills as well as reading and writing skills, achievement tests for foreign language courses should also include these skills. (Text is in French.) (MLA)