Russian Listening Course

Russian is an East Slavic language native to the Russians in Eastern Europe. It is an official language in Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and is used widely throughout the Caucasus, Central Asia, and to some extent in the Baltic states. In March 2013, it was announced that Russian is now the second-most used language on the Internet after English. People use the Russian language on 5.9% of all websites, slightly ahead of German and far behind English (54.7%). Russian is used not only on 89.8% of .ru sites but also on 88.7% of sites with the former Soviet Union domain .su. The websites of former Soviet Union nations also use high levels of Russian: 79.0% in Ukraine, 86.9% in Belarus, 84.0% in Kazakhstan, 79.6% in Uzbekistan, 75.9% in Kyrgyzstan and 81.8% in Tajikistan. However, Russian is the sixth-most used language on the top 1,000 sites, behind English, Chinese, French, German, and Japanese. It is the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages, with over 258 million total speakers worldwide.

The listening method is great for auditory learners: Different people learn in different ways; some of us are visual learners who learn better by visually looking at something, but then there are those who learn better through hearing the relevant content. So, if you’re an auditory learner, you’ll understand and retain material better when you hear it for the first time rather than read it.

What do you get from audio resources?

You get to hear and learn the usual, regular pronunciations used in day to day life: It’s worth mentioning that the Russian language is not a child’s play. Having said that, listening to words and phrases before articulating them yourself is a great approach to learning to speak like a native.

Audio resources are available almost everywhere! Language learners could choose from podcasts, audiobooks, music and audio courses.

Flexibility to listen anytime, from anywhere: 

A great thing about audio sources is that you can listen to them anytime, anywhere. While making best use of your spare time such as en route work or home, jogging, walking the dog, washing the car, watering plants, relaxing in a bath, or running errands, learners can listen to podcasts, audiobooks, YouTube or Spotify playlists, Russian music or even a repeat of a Russian audio course. 

Listening helps the mind to register things better especially with repetition 

Hearing something repeatedly stores the repeated content in our long term memory and helps you retain that information longer. So play those audio sources over and over again, to improve your Russian listening skills!

It’s truly impossible to accurately estimate the importance of listening when learning a language. Being able to understand others is the key to effective communication and that’s what most language learners must aim for.

YouTube videos: Watching videos helps a learner pick on and understand the body language used by natives while talking and provides valuable visual cues for listening practice, that furthers their cultural learning. You can have a look at 100500voprosov, Ugrant Show, This is хорошо and many more.

Live online chat. Having a conversation partner to speak and listen to adds immense value to a learner’s learning. You could either find one in and around your neighbourhood or look for one online at Italki, Languagepartners, Tandem, Speaky, MyLanguageExchange, Conversationpartners, Hello Talk, besides Google hangouts, Skype, Viber etcetera. Speaking every day for 15 mins is a great way to start!

Media Resources: Russian media resources such as TV and Radio give a learner a feel of the full immersion into the Russian speaking world. A few good examples are Streema, Moscow Club TV, wwiTV, IVI, Vizeozal, Reddit, RussianFM, ListenLive, Tunein etcetera (learners residing out of Russia, must use a VPN (Virtual Private Network) to access some of these TV channels and radio shows).

Online Recorded Lessons: Learning Russian with a structured methodology, is both necessary and beneficial to first-timers. And lessons and courses provide this adequately. Learners can look at RussianPod101, Easy Russian, Weekly Russian, Learning Russian from the Streets, Mini-Videos for Learners of Intermediate Russian to start with.

Online Live Classes: Live classes provide Russian to a learner from the perspective of a formal, standard use of Russian, combined with an opportunity to learn Russian religiously. Universarium(MOOCs), Lektorium, Nowchpok and many more could prove way more useful.

Russian Music: Listening to Russian music helps a learner to get introduced to the artistic facet of Russian language and culture. Lyrics Gaps(Helps you practice by listening to a song and filling the gaps in the song lyrics) Sing-along Songs with Lyrics and Translation, listen to Disney Songs with Russian and English subtitles from Disney playlist, and Popular Russian Songs with Lyrics are all extremely good resources to learn with!

Podcasts: These are the best way to learn on the go and make use of some spare time. Learners can benefit from A Spoonful of Russian, Learn Russian Step by Step, A Beginner Course of Spoken Russian, Ochen po russki, Speaking Russian, Russian Made Easy, Survival Phrases, RussianPod101, Russian Podcast, A taste of Russian, Russificate Podcasts, Business Russian Podcast, Shkola zhizni Podcast, Airing Pods etcetera.

News: Russian learners are able to delve deep in the language and listen to formal spoken Russian. News in Slow Russian, Echo of Moscow, Radio Potok are a few must consider resources.

Audio Books: Audiobooks are a great resource to learn multiple aspects of the Russian language.

Loyal Books, Auguo, Listening Gallery, My Chekhov, Anna Ahmatova, Asbook are a few must explore resources!

Whatever your Russian level is – beginner, intermediate or advanced – you’ll find Russian listening resources for you.

How do you choose from such a massive resource list? I’d say choose the tools that best suit your preferences and level of proficiency. If you listen to Russian on a daily basis, you’ll start to gain interest in listening to spoken Russian over time.

Start learning with an audio course, dance to Russian music or be entertained with an interesting story?

Here are a few audio resources to help you learn Russian 

Podcasts and Audio Courses

The FSI’s Russian 101 is a free Russian course offered by the US Foreign Service Institute (FSI). It has a lot of audio choices and a lot of knowledge for learning Russian. Listen to the audio courses on the web or save them to your computer to listen to at your leisure. The Russian alphabet, pronunciations of consonant and vowel groupings, Russian geography, how to present yourself, and more are all covered in these lessons.

RussianPod101 is a podcast that extends access to over 1,000 audio lessons to help a learner understand Russian, after a sign up for a free lifetime account. The hosts of these podcasts are informative and enthusiastic, and they make the experience enjoyable. To learn on the go, use the vocabulary learning resources, informative PDF lesson notes, and spaced repetition flashcards. Join community forums to discuss lessons and ask questions with other Russian students.

ielanguages.com is an excellent resource for learning Russian, as it includes Russian pronunciations, Russian spellings, English translations, and a pronunciation guide. Before moving on to Russian nouns and pronouns, verb tenses, numbers, conjunctions, and more, learn the alphabet, simple greetings, common sounds in Russian words, stress, consonant and vowel pronunciations, spelling rules, and inflection.

The Russian Rocket Languages course is a self-paced, interactive audio course with a strong community and support component. A learner can use their phone or any computer to learn audio lessons, practise with flashcards, practise pronunciation, monitor progress, and gain access to a members’ forum where they can meet and talk with other learners.

The Pimsleur course is designed for pronunciation enthusiasts whose primary aim is to speak good Russian and who prefer to learn through audio. The curriculum focuses on widely used words, which you can hear in context, understand, repeat, and recreate in a situation that is suitable for you. With Pimsleur, you’ll be driven to begin speaking with a near-native accent right away. Learners can choose from three levels of Russian on Pimsleur, with the first level beginning with the fundamentals and the last level bringing a learner all the way to a high-intermediate level.

In Russian, pa russki means “in Russian.” A list of Russian songs with lyrics can be found on this website. This is a perfect way to brush up on your Russian language skills when learning about Russian culture and popular Russian songs. The platform suggests that you listen to the songs a few times before reading the lyrics and attempting to sing along!

LibriVox has a Russian audiobook library with a wide range of topics and genres. Choose from Russian fables, poems, short stories, biographies, and historical texts to download. This is an excellent choice for students of all levels; beginners can begin with the simpler fables, while advanced Russian students can take on the challenge of Russian poetry.

There are a multitude of ways to learn Russian, whole as a language. Here are a few of them:

Duolingo

Duolingo’s program broken into “skills, that contains simple yet comprehensive, brief-five-minute lessons that are formatted like a quiz and learners are asked to fill answers, is a terrific option for beginners through intermediate students. They start with the alphabet to go on to more advanced skills such as the case system and more abstract vocabulary.

Loecsen

Loecsen offers free basic Russian lessons that provide vocabulary words or phrases (in a fun illustration, along with their respective transliteration, English meaning and Russian audio), on basic topics like a conversation, family, colours and more. 

Peace Corps Russian Courses with Live Lingua

Live Lingua offers access to six different sets of Russian learning materials online or as a download, including some regional variations, like Kyrgyz and Kazakh Russian, covering beginner through intermediate-level Russian lessons. While some lessons focus exclusively on text, others maintain a strong focus on the audio. Learners are also provided with the workbook to practice.

RussianLessons.Net

RussianLessons.Net offers a wide variety of free materials for Russian learners, with leveled lessons, grammar guides, vocabulary lists and access to additional tools, and quizzes ideal for beginner through advanced level students.

Learn Russian

Learn Russian offers some great materials, both for beginner and intermediate Russian students, with over 100 lessons to help learn the basics, along with regular tests to assess learning, vocabulary and grammar tables(quick, easy reference tools)

Russian for Everyone

Russian for Everyone is the most simplistic of the sites that offers some introductory lessons, several phrasebooks and dozens of grammar lessons appropriate for beginner through intermediate students, with quizzes and tests that are staggered throughout to make it easy to see how much a learner has learned. Russian for Everyone offers a number of games that use the Russian language.

Russian belongs to the family of Indo-European languages, one of the four living members of the East Slavic languages alongside, and part of the larger Balto-Slavic branch. It was the de facto language of the Soviet Union until its dissolution on 26 December 1991. Russian is the seventh-most spoken language in the world by a number of native speakers and the eighth-most spoken language in the world by a total number of speakers. The language is one of the six official languages of the United Nations. Russian is also the second-most widespread language on the Internet, after English. Russian is used in an official capacity or in public life in all the post-Soviet nation-states.

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