Today I decided to write about some of my favourite podcasts which I’m using for improving my English level (listening comprehension). All of these resources are specialized ESL (English as a Second Language) podcasts hosted by English professionals and native speakers.

First of all, I want to introduce EslPod.com site. This site and its podcasts are created by the Center for Educational Development, in Los Angeles, California. Dr. Lucy Tse writes scripts and records many of the dialogs and stories. Dr. Jeff McQuillan is the host of the podcasts. Both were university professors of applied linguistics and education for many years, and have taught English as a Second Language at several colleges and universities.

I think, this is one of the best ESL resources in podcasting world. The main idea of ESL Podcast is that every issue of this podcast lasts 10-20 minutes, and has three parts:

  1. An dialog or story read a bit slower than normal speech.
  2. An explanation of some of the expressions and phrases used in Part 1.
  3. A repetition of the dialog or story at a native rate of speech.

This podcast structure helps listeners to improve their English by listening to native speakers talk and discuss topics of interest to you.

Next podcast I want to describe is TOEFL Podcast by the Center for Educational Development and Dr. Jeff McQuillan. This podcast has a similiar structure to ESL podcast:

  1. A dialog or conversation at a somewhat slower speed
  2. An explanation of some of the expressions and phrases used in Part 1
  3. A repetition of the dialog or conversation at native speed
  4. A comprehension question similar to those found on the exams

In this podcast native speakers talk and discuss topics similar to those that will appear on the TOEFL or IELTS exams.

Very different from previous podcasts is English Idioms and Slang podcast, which is set of really short issues about english idioms.

And last introduction for today: English Teacher John Show Podcast. This resource is hosted by John Koons, English teacher from Philadelphia, which currently works in Matsumoto, Japan. In this podcast Teacher John uses many different studying techniques such as: listening to english speakers dialogs and describing new idioms and new words, listening and describing songs, speaking about world news, etc.

Thats all for today and I hope this information will be interesting and useful for you in your way to fluent English. :-)

In one of my future posts I will describe my favourite and very interesting IT podcasts which I’m using for improving my English listening comprehension.

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