Abstract
To assess the influence of amount and quality of elementary school English classes on listening comprehension when entering junior high school, three cohorts, 2015, 2016, and 2017 entrants, were tested. Each year entrants came from the attached elementary school or from regular elementary schools. Students from the attached elementary school had English activities that increased in frequency and evolved into regular courses during their tenure at the school, and increased for subsequent cohorts as “the new course of study” was implemented. Students at the regular elementary schools only had English as an activity. Listening comprehension test data showed that scores were significantly higher for the 2017 attached group (who had taken English classes twice a week from the 5th grade) than the 2015 attached group (who had taken English activities once a week in the 5th grade and English classes once a week in 6th grade) and the 2017 regular group. The data also showed there was no difference in the scores for the students from regular elementary schools over the three entrance years. We conclude that having more and better English classes in elementary school was effective in raising listening ability for students entering junior high school.
