The real thing?: authenticity and academic listening

In this article we explore the usefulness of the criterion of authenticity for the selection and evaluation of EAP materials. These materials were specialised listening texts used on a first year undergraduate programme at a U.K. university. Using a student questionnaire and techniques of discourse analysis based on Halliday's concepts of field, tenor and mode, we investigated the levels of difficulty and relevance of materials using four media: published audio tapes, audio recordings of a live lecture, video materials and a short, simulated lecture by the teacher. We found that the texts which related to the students experience and permitted learner interaction appeared to have more potential for language learning than those which merely replicated the discourse of the target situation.

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