The Effect of Frequent Dictation on the Listening Comprehension Ability of Elementary EFL Learners

This study investigated the effects of frequent dictation on the listening comprehension (LC) ability of elementary EFL learners. Two homogeneous groups of elementary EFL learners at the Kish Language Institute in Tehran, Iran were chosen. Each group consisted of30 male elementary EFL students, 20 to 35 years of age. All the participants had had the same amount of exposure to listening materials before the experiment, and all had studied English for three terms (each term consisting of 20 sessions of 100 minutes each) at the Kish Language Institute. One of the groups was chosen as the experimental group, and the other as the control group. For one term, consisting of 20 sessions, the students in the control group were given the listening exercises in their textbook, Headway Elementary (Soars & Soars, 1993). The experimental group, in addition to the listening exercises in the textbook, were given dictation 11 times during the term. At the end of the term the Le ability of both groups was posttested by a battery of 40-item NCTE Elementary Listening Tests (National Council of Teachers of English, 1972)/ which was also used as the listening pretest. The results showed that dictation had a significant effect on the listening comprehension ability of the participants in the experimental group. The mean gain scores of the experimental group were significantly higher than those of the control group.