Before doing our latest activity I had a vague idea of what a podcast is, now I even know how to use it in order to improve my English! I spent a couple of hour navigating and I found many interesting site that provide these files, some were of no interest to me, because the level was for beginner, or the topics were not interesting...
There are several thing you can improve in your language-learning thanks to podcasts, first of all your pronounciation, but you can also enlarge your vocabolary. In one of the sites I visited I found some everyday-life dialogue that could teach me many words of common use in English.
Once you found what you're interested in you can easily download these audio-files, and then it is quite easy to bring them with you wherever you want!
The podcasts I chose are:
Englishblog
Introduction to podcast
Free English Lessons
I chose these because they provide example of everyday life in their dialogue, and also some explanation of particular terms used.
I must confess there is something I don't like that much in all this technology... When you listen to them you suddenly realize that they are somehow "fake", if you see what I mean... The way people speak, it is slowly and clearly, which obviously help you to understand every single words, but which does not resemble a real situation! I mean, nobody speak so slowly! Anyway, to solve this problem, you just might look for an intermediate level podcast, or for something that is not created for learners, but the thing then is to find something interesting...
7 comments:
hi claudia! thanks for stopping by my blog. i really liked your ideas in this post, as i am a struggling student of italian. i have uploaded most of my language cd's onto my ipod & that does help, but the fakeness is still there. you are very correct about the advanced stuff though...it is much more realistic.
Hi Claudia!
I chose to explore the last site you suggested (Free English Lessons). This website is really cool! These two guys talk about different subjects about everyday life... I liked the podcast about "having problems with you girlfriend": we can learn how to communicate our feelings better in English... It can be very useful! Moreover, this website is easy to understand and well done because it offers a list of words and phrases which are discussed in the podcast! You made a good choice!
C u!
Laura
Hi Claudia,
I was curios to visit the site about Free English Lesson and it's was funny to see how simple could be follow a discussion in English only by using your computer. This site is easy to visit and the material it's contain is well organized. The only problem that I had was about the download of some files because sometimes my broadband doesn't work properly. I have found a similar site that I want to recommend to you: www.speakingenglishpodcast.com
It's really funny!!!!
Try it!!
See you
Hi Claudia!
I visited your second web site. There was a sort of introduction to English learning podcasts. Then I found interesting listening exercises for learners of different levels. I tried one listening comprehension exercise for advanced learners. It was an extract taken from Jack London. Then I found questions to test my comprehension. This site is really well organized. It's easy to use because activities are clear and well explained. Thank you!
Bye
Hi Claudia!
I visited the first site you suggested and I think it has some interesting things: for example it helps you to learn some words concerning holidays and trips..I confess that I didn't remember all this vocabulary!!!
The second site explains in a very detailed way what a podcast is and here you can find some listenings, and, as you said, they are for beginners, intermediate and advanced learners.
The last one is the best because you can find some interesting podcasts which help you to improve your listening skills.
Hi Claudia!
I clicked on your first proposal and...I disagree. Yes, you're right, nobody in the real world speaks so slowly, but these types of conversation are surely useful to improve beginners' listening skills. It's obviously just the first step and a motivated student should try to strive to understand something more complicated in the future.
Starting from something accessible, people feel encouraged to go on with studying, in my opinion.
Anyway, good job: I liked it.
See you!
Hi Claudia, thanks a lot for the corrections that you made on my post. They are really useful. I perfectly know that I do a lot of mistakes when I write in English and, on the other hand, I haven't the good practice to check what I wrote. So, Thank you again.
See you in class.
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