Een Onderzoek Naar De Effecten Van Luister- En Leesvaardigheids-Training

This article discusses the final written results of a research project carried out in a number of first-year forms in three Dutch schools for secondary education. In each of the three schools the research project offered a light-weight extra listening programme in class A, and a light-weight extra reading programme in class B, while the regular programme for French was carried out in class C, which served as a control group. At the end of the school year the pupils' reading and listening ability, grammatical knowledge and vocabulary (receptive as well as productive) were evaluated in classes, and C. The general conclusion is that at the elementary level a light-weight extra listening programme does indeed lead to a high degree of listening ability when compared with the other groups. This holds good to an even slightly greater extent for the light-weight extra reading programme. Moreover, it appears that the extra reading programme also leads to a high degree of listening ability. The control groups who had the greatest amount of grammatical training, do indeed score highest in grammar tests, but this knowledge does not become apparent at all in the ability tests /reading and listening). The results of the vocabulary tests are hardly clear. It is probable that at this level reading promotes the acquisition of a productive vocabulary. In the ability test girls generally score higher than boys.