"The common-core knowledge in this series is the next big step for ELT to take in the 21st century."

"Extremely well-planned and constructed and very impressive."

"At last a course that truly prepares students for IELTS by developing the necessary skills from the pre-intermediate level."

"I would thoroughly recommend this series to any centre running academic English courses."

"We have finally found a textbook which caters for international students at tertiary level."

"A very useful addition to the EAP tutor toolkit, which has received positive feedback from students too."

"Attractively presented, with interesting topics and a number of language tasks which engage the students' interest and enhance the four language skills."

"The topics are very interesting because they reflect today's world and what surrounds our students."

"Very appropriate for mixed-ability groups having different degrees of confidence in their English abilities."

"We are now using this series very successfully."

"The single most useful tool you could buy, if you are going to invest in a resource for embedding ESOL into a mainstream Science or other study curriculum, or is you are resourcing a Language Support provision."

"The topics and tasks are appropriate for all learners and the course is preparing them well for future university study."

"This set is part of the Starting Skills in English series that includes Reading and Writing, Vocabulary and Grammar in addition to Starting Skills in English: Listening and Speaking. Listening and Speaking is designed as a 300 hour course divided into Part A (150 hours) and Part B (150 hours). For both parts there is a course book, a teacher's book, an audio cassette, a CD and a test package. The Part B course book and teacher's book are reviewed here.

The declared target group is false beginners and remedial learners who want to study in an English-medium environment. The author suggests that the text is suitable for use with learners who have an IELTS score of 3. The topics and language are carefully chosen to fit this target group.

The content selected is divided into ten themes based on the Encyclopedia Britannica's organisation of human knowledge so that the knowledge and language gained is broad, useful and transferable. These themes are Education, Daily Life, Work and Business, Science and Nature, The Physical World, Culture and Civilization, They Made Our World (transport and travel), Art and Literature, Sports and Leisure, Nutrition and Health.

The teacher's book points out that the target group are not learners who simply need 'more' teaching but are learners who have not succeeded thus far and therefore need a different and more holistic approach. The text aims to cater to a range of learning styles providing both inductive (method to rule) and deductive (rule to example). The techniques used to achieve this are predominantly activities (inductive) and skills check box (deductive).

The book follows an informal 'test, teach, test' approach that aims to identify learners who know some information as well as provide sufficient practice for learners who are encountering topics or language items for the first time. The teacher's book provides ample guidance on how to use the course book to identify prior knowledge and what to do about gaps. In both Parts A and B, 200 new word items are introduced and both the vocabulary and topics build on those taught in Part A although Part B has a greater focus on multi-syllable words.

Vocabulary is taught both in isolation and in context and the text deals with lexical, grammatical, orthographic and phonological points as they arise. The author aims to control sentence structure by focusing on S V (C) (A) (O) sentence structure. Each topic is divided into four lessons with a one page per lesson format. Lessons 1 and 2 focus on listening activities. Lesson 1 involves receptive listening that allows teachers to identify gaps in learners knowledge and words are introduced in isolation whilst Lesson 2 involves listening in context and follow up activities. Lessons 3 and 4 are speaking focussed with lesson 3 allowing teachers to identify gaps and to focus on words in isolation with activities such as minimal pairs and Lesson 4 providing opportunities to use words in context. The British origins of the text sometimes come to the forefront in the content, for example Henry VIII makes an appearance and school subjects include Religious Education, although the author makes it possible to omit the latter. Some of the tapescripts introduce unfamiliar vocabulary that is not pre-taught. The tapescripts also use more complicated sentence structures than the target learners might be expected to deal with and perhaps fail to provide sufficient modelling of sentences the learners are expected to produce. Whilst teachers would want to supplement and expand on some activities, the book covers content, skills and pedagogy in a comprehensive manner.

Starting Skills in English: Listening and Speaking is a good match to the learning needs of a significant number of students following ESOL courses in New Zealand high schools. However the number of hours the course is designed for falls well outside the time available to most ESOL teachers in high schools and, for that reason, is more suited to a full-time ESOL course. This is a pity as the book provides an excellent starting point and tool for teachers."