Tuesday 27 August 2013

Listening Module


IELTS
Information & Preparation Guidelines



Listening Module


Essentials of Listening Module:

1. Time Allowed: 30 minutes + 10 minutes as transfer time 
2. There are 4 sections, each carrying 10 questions making total 40 question
3. The first 2 sections are related to social needs. There is conversation between two speakers and then a monologue.
4. The last 2 sections are about situations related to educational or training context. There is a conversation between up to four people and then a monologue.

There are questions of various types i.e. multiple choice questions, short answer questions, sentence completion, notes/charts/table completion, labeling diagram, classification, matching.

Candidates hear recording only once and answer the question as they listen. Ten minutes are allowed at the end to transfer answers to answer-sheet

How to improve Listening Skills - Guidelines

Adequate listening skills involve hearing ideas carefully, picking up ideas and interpreting the ideas as you listen. Listening module requires your full attention because you hear recording only once and have to grasp its complete thought to answer the questions.
            The first and foremost thing that plays a vital role in improving listening skills is improving your familiarity with spoken English. It is easy to understand by reading a passage than listening to a passage, because in listening to a passage you have to deal (by listening to) with spoken English. Familiarity with spoken English is improved by learning correct pronunciation, learning accent of native speakers. Familiarity with spoken English depends on your exposure to spoken English. The more you practice by listening to correct pronunciation and accent of native speakers, the more you get familiarized with spoken English and so you improve you listening skills.
            Learning correct pronunciation carries prime importance. The recording which is played in the test has a Standard English and correct pronunciation of each word. If you don’t know the correct pronounce a particular word, you will not be able to recognize the same word when you listen to it. Use dictionary to improve pronunciation. It is better if you use “talking dictionary” for learning correct pronunciation because you learn by listening to correct pronunciation instead of reading its pronunciation by symbols in “text dictionary”.
Building a huge vocabulary (a great deal of words, their meanings and usage) is also helpful in improving your listening skills because you may come across some difficult words while listening to recording in the test. If you are ignorant of meaning of a word you can’t answer properly.
            Learning accent of native speaker and familiarizing yourself to it contribute a lot to improve your listening skills. The accent of learner of a language may be a bit different from that of native speaker. That is why it is a bit difficult for learners to communicate with native speakers in proper way. You may come across same situation while listening to recordings in test. So it is very important that you learn the accent of native speakers, the way they utter words. For improving this aspect you have a lot of options i.e listening to English songs, English News, Movies, Documentary programs, talking to natives or mutual discussion in friends.

English Songs

Listening to English songs can help in improving your listening skills. If you are a beginner, you may find it hard to understand the words of song while listening to it. But with the passage of time it will become easy for you which is the sign of improving of your listening skills. The best way for benefitting from listening to songs is that read its lyrics as you listen to the song. You can search for lyrics of a song on internet. Practicing by listening to songs with reading its lyrics improves your acquaintance with spoken English and ultimately improves your listening skills.


English News  

       Listening to English news on daily basis plays a vital role in improving your listening skills. News is read in an adequate way. Newscaster utters every word clearly and properly. Listening to news refines your listening skills. Try to listen to news on TV or radio daily. Initially you may find it difficult to understand words but don’t feel dishearten because with the passage of time you will gain command on it which is sign of improvement in your listening skills.


English Movies

       Watching English movies is also an opportunity to be availed for improving one’s listening skills. Listening to dialogues of movie is an effective way to improve your listening skills because you watch (listen to) movie with full heed and interest; and learn in informal way.

Mutual Discussions in English Language

            Participation in discussions helps in improving speaking as well as listening skills. It provides an opportunity to speak and listen to English language. You can discuss with your class fellows on different topics Try to engage in discussions in English language as more as possible if you want to groom your listening and speaking skills.       



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