Listening is a crucial language learning skill. Many Plain English members want to improve their listening to advance in their careers, connect with family and friends, and enjoy music and movies in the original English.
Plain English has several ways to improve your listening skills:
Listen to our audio lesson and follow along with the transcripts
Switch between the learning-speed and full-speed audio
Do the dictation exercise to sharpen your skills
Participate in a live call to practice real-time conversational listening
Listen and read along
Plain English Stories and Expressions are audio lessons with transcripts.
✅ Audio and transcripts are available to any registered user of Plain English.
Improve your listening with Stories and Expressions by listening to the learning-speed audio and reading the transcript at the same time.
When you listen and read at the same time, you teach your brain to associate the sound with the written words. This will help you in real-world situations where a transcript isn't available.
After a while, you'll start to understand the learning-speed audio without needing the transcript. When that happens, try listening to the lessons without the transcript. Then, check the transcript afterward for the words you may have missed.
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Learn about Plain English Stories and Expressions
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Two speed audio
After some time listening to Plain English at learning speed, you may be ready to advance to full-speed audio.
✅ The full-speed audio is available to members at the Plus+ level
The learning speed audio is a little slower than native speed. Difficult words are pronounced more slowly and there is more space between each word to help you understand.
The full speed audio goes at the same speed as a native speaker, with more authentic pronunciation and intonation. It's about 25% faster than learning speed.
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Dictation exercise
Alongside every lesson, find an interactive exercise that tests your listening.
In the Dictation exercise, you listen to a short audio clip, write what you hear, and check your work to see if you heard the sentence correctly.
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Live calls
Audio lessons and activities are a good way to build your listening skills. But being in a live call gives you the experience you need to understand English real-world English conversation.
✅ Live conversation calls are available to members at the Plus+ level
At Plain English, you can join a live, small-group conversation call on Zoom to practice speaking and listening.
Listening is different on live calls because you can practice listening to the back-and-forth, interruptions, and imperfections of a real conversation.
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