This is another Sean Banfield site and, like his Breaking News English, you wonder how such a huge and well-designed bank of resources can be free. As the title says, the listening texts are all short, though he must have forgotten about the one minute bit when he went on to develop all the gapped texts, word order, spelling and discussion tasks. You print off the writing tasks (pdf) and download the listening file. The listening titles cover a vast range of subjects and are arranged alphabetically, which makes them very user friendly. He reads and writes the texts himself, so they all have a personal and slightly quirky spin - not your standard course book fare. The printable format and the pair work speaking tasks mean they work for well for classrooms. However, there is also a nice, on-line interactive 'dictogloss' type activity with each recording which is very satisfying to do and would encourage students to do some intensive listening and language processing at home.
However...
Being read by the same 'sympathetic' reader, these recordings don't pretend to be 'authentic' conversations: they don't challenge students with a variety of accents, situations and speakers or with natural speed.
They are all roughly the same kind of level too, so perhaps not challenging enough for advanced learners. Still, we teachers can get too hung up on levels: the more exposure learners get to spoken English the better. So, if they find his topics and 'voice' attractive enough to seek him out at home, they are away!
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