Listening Links

NPR and its subdivisions

http://www.npr.org/
NPR's main site. Tons of great listening here.

http://www.npr.org/programs/morning/
Morning news and world update.

http://freshair.npr.org/
Interesting talk show with various guests.

http://www.thislife.org/
Great nearly hour-long shows of several stories around a special theme, such as "Living Without", "Valentine's Day", "The Cruelty of Children". Very interesting and extremely well done shows, with lots of "real" American English, like you would hear on the streets as well as in discussions.

BBC and its subdivisions

http://www.bbc.co.uk/
The BBC's main site. Tons of great listening here.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3701351.stm
Morning news and world update: the U.K. edition. Reading and listening.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/index.shtml
The BBC's guide to learning English.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/1/hi/entertainment/tv_and_radio/4723477.stm
BBC's first online soap opera to help listeners learn English.

The History Channel Speech Archive

http://www.historychannel.com/speeches/
Fascinating authentic speeches by important historical figures.

The Naked Scientists

http://www.thenakedscientists.com/
Very interesting unusual science stuff. Interesting and understandable for most proficiency levels and ages.

Inside the Actor's Studio

http://www.bravotv.com/Inside_the_Actors_Studio/videos/
This link takes you to the video segment of The Actor's Studio.

Online Listening Exercises

http://www.esl-lab.com/index.htm
Great page with over a hundred audio and video clips with exercises to go with them. You can really improve your listening here!

Phonetics: The Sounds of American English

http://www.uiowa.edu/~acadtech/phonetics/english/frameset.html
Level: Beginner through advance.
Description: This site is an outstanding pronunciation reference. It shows a native speaker making the sound (which you can hear at the same time) and a diagram of what your mouth should be doing while making the sound. Great!

Randall's ESL Cyber Listening Lab

http://www.esl-lab.com/index.htm
Great page with over a hundred audio and video clips with exercises to go with them. You can really improve your listening here!

Harvard@Home Online Lectures

http://athome.harvard.edu/
This is Harvard University's public-access multimedia learning page, with select high-quality lecturers given at the university and other interesting listening materials.