The more I teach, the more I value the importance of listening to a language. Perhaps you have used a phrase book or checked for simple expressions in a particular language on the Internet and then, after having arrived in the country, found that the language in fact sounds quite different from what you expected. Listening gives us so much information about a language that is difficult to get in any other way. You’ll come across key and high-frequency words and expressions and hear how they should be pronounced, including intonation and stress patterns.

If you want to give your learning a boost, spend as many hours as you can listening to English before starting a language course or coming to the UK. It’s not important to understand everything – that takes years. The important thing is to build up your ‘store’ of English little by little. You will be amazed at how much you can learn this way over a period of a few months.

Listening to podcasts is something you can do as you walk, jog or drive so why not click on the link and start downloading?