Tackling TOEFL Listening: Conversations
On-MBA Education - TOEFL Mini-series – Listening Section - Conversations
Hello everyone!
In today’s piece, I want to talk about the Listening Section of the TOEFL test.
“God, I hate the TOEFL Listening Section!”
Do you often find yourself saying the same thing?
If you are struggling with the Listening section, you are by no means alone!
Many students taking the TOEFL test consider the Listening part of the exam to be one of the most difficult sections of the test.
I have been teaching the TOEFL test for 19 years now, and the good news is that with some clear guidance on what to listen for in the listening recordings and a lot of practice, I am 100% confident you can raise your score in this section! The bad news is, it takes a lot of effort and practiceJ!
The first thing you need to know about the TOEFL Listening section is what you are dealing with.
What can I expect in the TOEFL Listening Section?
For those of you who are just starting your TOEFL exam preparations, here are some of key points of the TOEFL Speaking section:
Approximately 33-36 questions
6-9 listening passages
2-3 conversations with 5 questions each
4-6 short lectures with 6 questions each
60-90 minutes to listen to the audio files and answer the questions
All multiple choice questions; you will hear the recordings while pictures are being displayed on the screen
You will not see the questions until after the recording is finished so good note-keeping is important!
As mentioned above, there are two main types of questions in the Listening Section, Conversations and Lectures.
Today I will focus on how to tackle the Conversation-type questions then we will go through an example together the video mini-lecture below.
TOEFL Listening Section Conversations – Format
Now for some more good news!
The TOEFL Speaking Section Conversation questions always follow the same format. The conversations will always be between two people with some common examples of speaker combinations being a student and a professor, or two students, or a student and a university staff member (librarian, computer center worker, registrar’s office worker, etc.). Once you know how the information will be presented, this will help you focus your listening efforts to make sure you take away the key information from the conversation that you need to answer the questions.
Greeting
All TOEFL Speaking Section Conversation questions start with some sort of greeting. The greeting is normally where the two speakers in the conversation say hello. This is important, because the greeting will tell you the relationship between the two speakers. For example, a student may say “Good morning Professor Jones.” This will clearly let you know that the conversation is between a student and a professor.
Statement of Problem or Issue
Conversations in the TOEFL Listening Section are typically based around a problem that one of the speakers is having. After the greeting, the two speakers will talk about this issue. For example, the student may explain to the professor that she is having trouble finishing her term paper by next Friday and would like to ask for an extension to turn in her work later.
Response
After the problem or issue has been raised, one of the speakers (usually the professor, or the university staff member) will make some suggestions about how to solve the problem. For example, the professor may tell the student she can turn in the paper a week later, but that he will have to lower her grade by 10 points to be fair to the other students.
Resolution
The conversation then usually ends with some sort of resolution or decision by the person with the problem on what he or she will do.
Ok! So now you know how the information will be presented to you in TOEFL Listening Section Conversations, great job!
This order may seem like common sense, but you have just learned an extremely important point that will help you focus your listening and, ultimately, get the questions right in this section!
If you look back up to where I told you what to expect in the TOEFL Listening section you will see that the last point I mentioned I put in bold text. I told you:
You will not see the questions until after the recording is finished so good note-keeping is important!
There is a reason why I put this point in bold text, and that is because it is so important!
While you listen to the Conversation recordings you will only see a silly photo on your screen like the one below!
You may get a little information from the photo, this one perhaps looks like a student and professor, but, generally speaking the pictures will not help you very much in answering the questions.
The conversations are at least a couple of minutes long and, oftentimes, cover a lot of specific information. Also, you do not see the questions before the recording ends, so you have to listen to the whole 2 or 3-minute conversation straight through before you know what questions the test-maker is going to ask you.
So what do you?
Panic?
Cry?
Gather your things and go home?
No! Of course not! Your job is to get a good score on this test, so you have to fight until the bitter end:-)!
Don’t worry, I will now give you some strategies to help tackle these Conversations.
TOEFL Listening Section – Strategies for Conversation Questions
First, you must take notes!
Many of my students tell me, “Oh, no David, I can’t possibly take notes and listen at the same time! I write down one word and then miss the next 30 seconds of the conversation!”
At the beginning taking good notes is difficult for everyone! Start with baby steps, just take one word notes when you hear something you think is important, and slowly take more detailed notes as your note-taking skill becomes more developed
The notes don’t have to be beautiful, they don’t have to be in full sentences, they don’t even have to be able to be understood by someone else! If they can remind you about enough information that was said in the conversation for you to answer the questions correctly, you have done a great job!
As you practice more and more problems, you will improve in your note taking, I promise:-)!
And remember, once you get to your program in the US, you will have to take real notes all day, every day in English, so, as painful as it is now, this is excellent practice for your real studies later!
The good news is, that if you take good notes, answering the Conversation questions will be very easy!
Second, know what to listen for in when you take your notes!
Above I told you that know the format of the Conversations would be very helpful in picking out the right information to answer the questions. Now I will tell you what to listen for in your notes:
Answer the 3 “W” Questions: Who?, Where?, Why?
Who is talking? A student and a professor? Two students? A student and a staff member?
Where are the talking? At the professor’s office? At the library? At the computer lab?
Why are they talking? What is the reason for this conversation
Identify what the problem is.
What trouble is the student having? Class schedule conflict? Late homework assignment?
Identify the solutions
Normally, the professor or university staff will give some suggestions on how the student can fix the problem. Get these down in your notes.
Note down and lists of information or series of examples
Sometimes the person giving advice may give a list of examples or options to help the student solve the problem; in this case, make sure to try and write down any lists of items or options you hear mentioned in the conversation.
It is very likely one of the questions will ask you something like, “The professor mentioned all the following, EXCEPT…”, so you will need the listed information
Identify which solution the person having the problem will choose
Most of the time, the student will choose one of the options the professor (or staff member, or friend) has mentioned in the conversation to help solve his or her problem
Make sure you get this information down in your notes
Listen for what the speakers will do next
Oftentimes, the final question for the Conversations will be something like, “What will the woman probably do next?”
Listen carefully to the last few lines of the conversation as this will give you the answer to this type of question, and note down what the speakers might do after the question
An example would be if the speakers discussed that the student must fill in a form to gain permission to change his or her roommate. The student will likely go print out the correct form, fill it out and return it to the appropriate office.
Write down any other details you think might be important
When you are just starting to practice these questions, simply focus on getting the key information for the bullet points above written down in your notes
As you get more comfortable answering these questions and as your TOEFL Vocabulary (See my post on how to improve your TOEFL vocabulary here!) base increases, you will slowly be able to write down more notes as you listen to the recordings; the more detail you can get down the better!
Just remember, it is about balance, take as many and detailed notes as you can while still being able to listen to and comprehend the content of the Conversation
Third, answer the questions using the information in your notes!
Use POE when you answer the actual questions
What is POE?! POE stands for Process of Elimination
POE is a very powerful tool that can be used on any multiple choice test. What it means as you go through the answer choices, you can use the information in your notes to eliminate any clearly wrong answers and make an educated guess from the remaining answer choices
POE can help you dramatically increase your probability of getting the correct answer, even when you are not a 100% confident of the right answer
Let’s take a look at an example together below (or click here to open the video mini-lecture in a new Youtube window if the picture is not as clear as you would like!):
In mainland China? Click here to see the video on Youku:
Now you know what to expect for the TOEFL Listening Section Conversation questions, what to listen for and how to take good notes, try to do as many practice problems as you can before test day.
If you follow my advice, and keep fighting, even though it is very difficult at first, your scores in the Listening section will get better and better!
Good luck with your TOEFL preparations and on the exam!
And always remember, “Life is short, so study hard!”
Still have more questions? Interested in detailed explanations for how to prepare for the all the TOEFL Listening Section Questions? Click here to check out the full On-MBA Education TOEFL course!
