The most pressing demand for phonetics courses in L2studies of English comes from potential or practicing teachers of the language. Since the Language Laboratory (LL) does not seem to have been adequately exploited for their requirements, this paper outlines an attempt at preparing a course to meet their needs. While presenting the dilemmas of reconciling the demands of students who are at an advanced stage of language learning, yet at the novitiate stage in phonetics, it suggests some of the ways in which LL practice can be integrated into their course. It discusses the value of ‘learning from mistakes’ in the LL, and tries to show why some methods seem to succeed and others seem to fail. While the methods used are clearly indebted to recent research into the processes of language learning, the approach is a pragmatic one, utilizing principles that challenge the intellect and encourage creativity, as far as this is feasible in the LL. Since the vital question in all LL work is the extent of transfer it achieves, the difficulties of assessing such transfer are raised. Practical material in applied phonetics (including stress and intonation) is described, but conclusions about its efficacy are inhibited by the number of variables involved in measuring practical attainment in the world “beyond the b