The TOEFL listening section tests your ability to listen to and understand spoken English. This lesson gives you a summary of this section. You can see a video lesson below and a written lesson under that.
Here’s the video lesson:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2U7P8iUPZXs&feature=youtu.be
There are two types of listening exercises:
- Lectures (4-6)
- Conversations (2-3)
Lectures are one speaker, usually a professor, talking about a single academic topic. An example might be a professor discussing the impact of mobile phone on marketing.
Conversations are two or more people talking about a campus situation. An example could be a student talking to a librarian about a missing book.
Question Types
You will be asked different question types for each listening. You have three possibilities:
- Multiple Choice (1 answer)
- Multiple Choice (2 answers)
- Organizing Ideas (Tables)
Comprehension Questions
These are the standard questions about the content of the listening. You will find three different types.
Main Idea questions check your understanding of the main idea.
- What is the woman’s problem?
- What are the speakers discussing?
- What is the topic of the lecture?
- What is the lecture mainly about?
Detail questions check your understanding of key details.
- What percentage of the population had a cell phone?
- What happened to Abraham Lincoln after the war?
- According to the professor, why do so many people believe the theory of evolution?
Watch out for numbers here, such as dates, amounts, prices, percentages, etc.
Purpose questions check you understand the reason someone says or does something.
- Why does the student visit the professor?
- Why does the student visit the computer lab?
- Why did the professor invite the student to her office?
- Why does the professor discuss the Great Depression?
Pragmatic Understanding Questions
Pragmatic understanding questions come in two forms:
- Function
- Attitude
Function questions check if you understand the purpose of what someone says. These are also called inference questions, and they use words like “imply” and “infer”.
- What does the professor imply when she says _______?
- What can be inferred from the student’s response?
- What is the purpose of the man’s response?
These question types will replay part of the lecture or conversation.
The function of what is said is not identical to the words. You must make inferences or discover implied meanings.
Attitude questions check if you understand how people feel about a topic. Sometimes these questions will replay part of the listening passage.
- How does the student feel about _____?
- What is the professor’s opinion of ______?
Connecting Information Questions
Organization questions check if you understand how a professor organizes information.
- How does the professor compare the two animals?
Connecting Content questions check if you can see the relationship between ideas.
Inferences questions check if you can make inferences about implied information.
- What does the professor imply about the product?
2-Answer Questions
Some multiple-choice questions ask for two answers. You can recognize these quickly because of two features:
- They ask for two answers with the phrase Choose 2 answers.
- The brackets for the options are square.
These are detail questions, with two correct and two incorrect options. Use the same strategy as the detail questions.
Table Questions
These questions ask you to fill in a table with information or checks. They are often yes/no tables or tables with two options. These are some simplified examples:
Which classes did Mary take?
| Yes | No | |
| Chemistry | ||
| Marketing | ||
| Economics | ||
| Physics | ||
| Anatomy |
Classify the foods.
| Fruit | Vegetable | |
| Apple | ||
| Potato | ||
| Carrot | ||
| Banana | ||
| Peach |
More TOEFL Listening Lessons
Ready for more practice for the TOEFL listening section? Increase your score with these lessons:
TOEFL Listening Overview
TOEFL Listening Lectures
TOEFL Listening Conversations
TOEFL Listening Strategies