About the Capstone lessons

Capstone RAILS lessons are different from all of the other RAILS lessons. They consist solely of several clips from video- or audio-taped interviews, providing students with an opportunity to demonstrate the increased listening proficiency they have acquired while working with the other RAILS lessons. The listening you must do in these lessons mimics real-world listening contexts, without the learning tools and aids embedded throughout all the other RAILS lessons. The Capstone Lessons offer no Listening Assistant help and no interactive activities with answers; these lessons also offer no scaffolding or learning tips.

The first lesson in the Capstone series, based on an interview with Sergei Khrushchev, is a transitional one that provides some listening support in the form of model answers to short answer-type learning activities. The remaining capstone lessons require you to work with challenging video-based input, without the aid of instructional scaffolding such as learning activities with feedback, or extensive help resources.