TOEFL Listening - Key Points
Listening is a skill that dominates the TOEFL iBT. This section takes 60-90 minutes and has two conversations (3-5 minutes long) and four lectures (3 minutes), with 34-51 questions measuring your ability to understand what was heard. Additionally, the last four speaking tasks require you to (3) to read, listen, and speak in relation to a campus-related topic; (4) to read, listen, and speak in relation to an academic-related topic; (5) to listen and speak in relation to a campus-related topic; and finally (6) to listen and speak in relation to an academic-related topic.
Finally, the second writing task will require you to read and listen, and then, in 20 minutes, write an essay in response to the two academic sources. Are you starting to get the picture? Without good listening comprehension, you will not do well on the listening, speaking, and writing sections of the TOEFL iBT.
There are three key points to helping you become a better listener: listening for rhetorical cues, paying attention to focus words, and listening for pauses. Paying attention to the three areas will help you to be a better note-taker and listener of TOEFL iBT listening passages.
Rhetorical Cues
The first key point to good listening is that you should listen for signal words and phrases that create a coherent flow of information: to introduce new information, to connect ideas, and to emphasize important points.
Focus Words
The second key point to good listening is that you should listen for focus words, important stressed words within speakers’ ideas. Speakers typically organize speech into thought groups, a meaningfully related thought of five or six stressed syllables. Within each thought group, there is a focus word(s) more prominently stressed than other content words such as nouns, adjectives, adverbs, or verbs. The focus word represents new information, which is why it is more prominently stressed. Paying attention to focus words help you to get the most important ideas of a lecture.
You will now read and then listen to a lecture that has been divided into thought groups, each separated by slash marks [/]. The bolded word in each thought group is the focus word.
Pausing
The third key point to good listening is that you pay attention to pausing. At the end of a final thought group, there is a sharp drop in pitch, which indicates that the speaker is done with his statement, at which time another speaker may begin speaking, or, in the case of a lecture, the speaker begins a new idea.
If a thought group is not the final thought group, there is a half-pitch fall, which means the speaker is not done with his turn. Listen to the two examples: In the first example, the speaker is not done speaking; in the second example, the speaker is done speaking.
Rhetorical Cues
The first key point to good listening is that you should listen for signal words and phrases that create a coherent flow of information: to introduce new information, to connect ideas, and to emphasize important points.
Focus Words
The second key point to good listening is that you should listen for focus words, important stressed words within speakers’ ideas. Speakers typically organize speech into thought groups, a meaningfully related thought of five or six stressed syllables. Within each thought group, there is a focus word(s) more prominently stressed than other content words such as nouns, adjectives, adverbs, or verbs. The focus word represents new information, which is why it is more prominently stressed. Paying attention to focus words help you to get the most important ideas of a lecture.
You will now read and then listen to a lecture that has been divided into thought groups, each separated by slash marks [/]. The bolded word in each thought group is the focus word.
Pausing
The third key point to good listening is that you pay attention to pausing. At the end of a final thought group, there is a sharp drop in pitch, which indicates that the speaker is done with his statement, at which time another speaker may begin speaking, or, in the case of a lecture, the speaker begins a new idea.
If a thought group is not the final thought group, there is a half-pitch fall, which means the speaker is not done with his turn. Listen to the two examples: In the first example, the speaker is not done speaking; in the second example, the speaker is done speaking.
