¢Introduction to listening papers
¢Both papers consists
of three parts and involve listening to six short texts and four long passages.
¢Paper 3 (Core)- lasts
approximately 30 minutes
¢Paper 4 (Extended) –
lasts approximately 45 minutres
¢General Advice
¢You
write your answers in a question paper booklet
¢You
must answer in pen.
¢You
can write down anything you like, at any time during the exam.
¢There are blank pages
at the back of the question paper, and you should use these for rough work.
¢
¢Any rough notes you
make should be crossed through with one diagonal line at the end of the exam.
¢Spelling
mistakes are not penalised, unless the mistake produces a word with a different
meaning which is not appropriate.
¢Make
sure you read the introduction to each question, as this often provides clues
as to what will happen in the exercise.
¢•Anticipate (predict)
who’s going to speak; where they are; what they’re going to talk about.
¢
¢
•Remember,
part of the skill of listening is to be able to predict what might be said next
( ‘pre-listening’)
•You hear everything twice – concentrate all the time and make
notes or underline words to help you.
•Be careful with numbers – if you write a number in your
answer, you should describe it – is it kilos, $, metres, tonnes?
•Notice any question that needs two answers to get one mark or
two marks, and make sure you separate the answers clearly.
¢
¢In
Exercises 7 and 8, use your knowledge of grammar to help you work out what kind
of word could fit in the gaps (could it be a noun, verb, adverb?)
•For longer answers, make sure you have communicated the idea
clearly. If you don’t know a word, try to write exactly what you hear.
¢
¢If a
question is concerned with the cost of an item, the answer is expected to be
given in the original currency. A numerical amount alone is not enough.
• You should spend
some time practicing listening to numbers,
particularly numbers which sound alike – e.g. fourteen and forty.
• It’s probably more
important on the Listening Papers to make sure you supply the exact number of
answers required. Each question will state clearly how many points are needed –
e.g. Give three items which … - you
should check to make sure that you have given the right number. Examiners often
say that many students fail to get this right.
¢
¢Bear
in mind that for many questions on the Paper, you will need to produce more
than one point/answer to get a single mark. If you give only one point where
two are required (for one mark), the Examiner will not be able to give you the
mark.
¢Watch
out for plurals. Millions, is not the same as million.
• Remember, you will
hear everything twice. There is a chance, therefore, to try and work some
answers out. You are allowed to make some notes, and you can use the blank
areas on the exam paper to do this.
¢
¢By all means, have a
guess as a last resort, but be aware that Examiners are looking to see that you
really do know the words you are writing down. This means that you can make
spelling mistakes, but you will only usually get the mark if your word is close
to the correct word, and if it does not form another recognized
English word. For example, if you answer ‘chance’ when
the correct answer is ‘chants’, you will not get the mark. However, if you
really do know the word ‘chant’, but you spell it incorrectly as ‘chante’, you
will get the mark.
¢
¢For answers which
require longer (sentence-length) responses, try to make sure that you have
communicated the point/idea clearly. You can use some of your own words to do
this, but remember, the Listening Exam is a test mainly of your ability to write
down what you have heard. In
other words, all the details (evidence) you need will have been given by the
speakers on the tape. An example of using your own words to convey an answer
would be, “Peter said that he liked to go
swimming …”, in response to a question which asked what Peter did
after school almost every day.
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