Listening Test 1 – Scripts & Audio
Practice Test (Version One)
Instructions :
You will hear a number of different recordings and you will have to answer questions on what you hear. There will be time for you to read the instructions and questions , and you will have a chance to check your work. All the recordings will be played once only. The test is in four sections . Write all your answers in the listening question booklet. At the end of the test you will be given ten minutes to transfer your answers to an answer sheet.
Now turn to Section 1.
Section 1
You are going to listen to a talk about library system. Look at questions 1-12.
Now, listen to the talk and answer questions 1-12.
Right, every one. My name is Kathy Smith, I ’ d like to give you a brief introduction about the library system. Every good student should learn how to use the library. If you have to do a research project, the library is the place to go to for information. Libraries contain books and periodicals, magazines and newspapers on many different subjects. To find the information you need, you must know how to use the library. All libraries are organized in much the same way.
Every library houses a collection of books. Many libraries also have periodicals, films and records. All the books in a library can be classified under two main categories-ffction and nonfiction. Books of fiction contain stories that were made up by the author. Books of nonfiction contain factual material. When doing research, you use nonfiction books, because you are looking for factual information.
All the fictional books in a library are grouped in one section. They are arranged alphabetically by the last name of the author. Many libraries also label the spines of all books of fiction with the letters Fic or F.
All libraries have a system for organizing and classifying nonfiction books. The most widely used system is The Dewey decimal system. It was designed by an American librarian named Melvil Dewey. It is called a decimal system because it divides all nonfiction books into ten major categories. These are further divided into subdivisions. For example, all science books are numbered from 500 through 599. Each different field of science has a number within the 500 category. For example, astronomy is 520, and chemistry is 540. The Dewey decimal system provides a category for every type of nonfiction book.
The best way to locate a book in the library is to use the card catalog. The card catalog is an index of all the books in the library. Information about a book is listed on cards. All the cards are filed alphabetically and stored in drawers in large cabinets. The card catalog can help you locate a particular book, a book on a certain subject, or a book by a particular author.
In the card catalog, each book has three cards, an author card, a title card and a subject card. The Author card is alphabetized under the author’s name. The title card is filed alphabetically according to the title of the book. The subject card is filed alphabetically under the name of the subject of the book.
In many university libraries, they use their own Biblitas cataloguing system or the Micro-fiche system. Both of them list publications under author and title and both are very easy to use. Now, let us see the reference books. We all know that reference books make up important part of a library ’ s nonfiction books collection. They contain facts and information about any subject you can think of. Reference books are not meant to be read from cover to cover. You should use them when you want important facts and information about a particular subject.
Let’s see some major types of reference books. First dictionaries. Dictionaries are books that list and give the meanings of the words in a language. They also give the pronunciation of words in a dictionary which are listed alphabetically. Second is encyclopedias. Encyclopedias are reference books that provide factual information about people, events, places and subjects of lasting interest. Each article is written by a specialist on the topic being discussed. An encyclopedia usually consists of a number of books arranged in a set. The volumes are arranged in alphabetical order according to the topic of each article. Letters are stamped on the spine of each volume to indicate the alphabetical rang of the topics in each volume. For instance, if you wanted to find information about the
moon, you would look in volume 8 of the encyclopedia pictured here.
Next is Atlases, an atlas is a book of maps. It may contain many different kinds of maps. The maps in an atlas are often arranged alphabetically by country or continent. Almanacs are also a type of reference books. An almanac is a book that contains recent statistics and summaries of information on a wide variety of topics. It is published annually. Information is listed alphabetically by subject.
Indexes are alphabetical lists of names, tides and subjects that tell where information about each can be found in other publications. For example, the Reader ’ s Guide to Periodical Literature can help you Find magazine articles that have been published about a particular subject. It will give you the names of publications that have carried articles about the subject, the dates and volume numbers of the particular issue in which the articles appeared.
You should be aware that reference books may not be taken out of the library under any circumstances. They are used only in the library.
That is the end of Section 1. You will have half a minute to check your answers.
Now turn to Section 2.
Section 2
Margaret goes to talk to her personal tutor. They talk about memory and how it works. You will hear an extract from their discussion. Look at questions 13-19 .
Now listen to the discussion , and answer questions 13-19.
Margaret : White : Margaret ;
White : Margaret : White :
Margaret : White :
Good morning, Mr. White.
Good morning, Margaret. Take a seat. How are your studies?
OK. But I Find I have a lot of things to learn by heart.
Yes, English is not easy to learn. Well, do you have a good memory?
Yes, I think I do.
Most people do have a good memory but many of them do not really know how to use their memories to remember the things they want to.
That’s interesting.
Yes, that may seem funny, but it is true. With a better understanding of how
to use your memory, you will be able to remember more things and retain them for a longer time. There are three things to do to prepare your memory.
Margaret: What three things?
White: First is understanding. Before you can remember something, you must have a good understanding of it. It is very difficult to remember something you do not understand completely.
Margaret: Yes, I agree with this.
White: And the next is to associate.
Margaret: What does associate mean?
White: To associate means “to go together.” When you associate, you think of some way in which the things you want to remember go together. It is easier to remember a set of facts if you can associate them in some way.
Margaret: It is very helpful to learn this way.
White: The last thing is to visualize. Visualizing is seeing something in your mind.
Margaret: I see. To visualize means to close our eyes and try to picture the things we want to remember.
White: Yes, try to picture how they go together. When you visualize the facts it will help you remember them.
Margaret: That’s very interesting. I haven’ t done this before. I’ 11 try it next time and see how it goes.
White: Now we have gone through the three steps to prepare your memory. There are the three steps you should follow to memorize any set of facts.
Margaret: Tell me more about these steps.
White: You know that to memorize means to fix something firmly in your memory. One way is to recite the facts over and over again, until you can recall them all easily. Do you recite the things you want to memorize?
Margaret: Yes, I often read the new vocabularies out loud and try to memorize them.
White: That’s a good way to remember things. Tell me how do you recite things?
Margaret: Well, first I write the facts in a list, then I begin to say the facts over and over again till I can remember them. The one thing I find most difficult for me is to remember either the beginning or the end of the list.
White: So how do you solve this problem?
Margaret: I place the easier facts to remember near the middle of my list, then recite the facts. I ’ ve found that when I do this it ’ s much easier to memorize the complete list without forgetting a single fact.
White: Oh, that ’ s good. The second step is to overleam.
Margaret; What does overleam mean?
White: To overlearn something is to learn it so thoroughly that you can recall it as quickly as you can recall your own name. If you cannot recall the facts that quickly and easily, you have not reached the overlearning stage.
Margaret: I see. To overlearn is to learn something so well that you can recall it very easily whenever you want to.
White; Yes, to overlearn something, you must recite it many times, even after you think you know it very well. The last step is to review.
Margaret; I often review my lessons.
White: That’s good. You know if you want to keep something in your memory for a long time, you must review it. To review is to go back over things you have learned. At first you may want to review every day. In short time, every second or third day should be enough. If you can still recall the information easily, you can cut your review time to only once a week. As long as you can still recall the facts, you can make the time between reviews longer and longer. Margaret: These three steps are very helpful ways to remember things. Thank you very much, Mr. White, I have learned a lot from today’s talk.
That is the end of Section 2. You will now have half a minute to check your answers.
Now turn to Section 3.
Section 3
You are going to hear a lecture about writing skills — how to help you to write better. Look at questions 20-32.
Now listen to the lecture and answer questions 20-32.
Good morning and welcome to this writing course. My name is Kevin Mayhew. This morning I ’ d like to talk about the skills of essay writing.
As a student, you may often use writing as a way of expressing your thoughts and feelings. Our writing reflects our thinking. If you are having trouble writing, it may be that you haven ’ t got your thoughts together. So if you want to write clearly, your thinking
must be clear. Again your purposes for writing are important. You can use writing as a way of getting your thoughts clearer. That’s fine and can be very productive. But if you are using writing to tell someone something, for example in an essay or examination answer, then you will probably need to have many of your thoughts clear before you write the actual answer.
Writing can help you to get your thoughts clear, to explore some of your ideas and to remind yourself of important points. When you are writing an essay, a project or an exam answer, you are usually expected to write in a certain way. It helps to learn as much as you can about what is expected.
You have to learn, for example, what the person who marks or assesses your work wants. What does he or she give marks for? How long should your work be? Can you find any examples of what the work should look like? Should there be any comments like ‘ I think’ in what you produce? Are notes acceptable at times? Do you need to show you have researched other things? You can find the answer to such questions by asking and by looking at clues available in work you have already finished and had marked.
If you can, ask whoever assesses or marks your work. They may not be able to give you a simple answer and they may say it has a lot to do with the way you arrange what you have to say. This brings us on to a second point about writing.
One of the more difficult things to do when you are writing as part of your studying is to make your work ‘hang together’ . You should choose an order for your ideas when you write. There usually has to be some order in the way you put your thoughts together when you write as a student. Your writing should usually follow some pattern, although you can vary that pattern quite a lot.
When writing essays you should have a selection of information and the subject or topic that holds the information together. You should have ways of making statements or creating an impression by changing slightly the words you use and the ways you use them.
Keep one eye on the order you have chosen and the other on how you fasten things together. There are always different ways in which your ideas can be arranged, but once you have chosen an order, keep to it. Choose the order according to your purpose and your knowledge of what your reader expects.
Make sure your order:
1. Fits in with your purpose, so that you are fairly clear what you want to do;
2. Fits in with what you have been asked to do;
3. Makes sense to your reader ;
4. Fits around all of what you want to include.
Essay-writing is central to success in your studies. The essay should demonstrate not simply knowledge about a particular issue but a capacity to think critically and to argue in an objective, rational and informed way. To write a good essay, it is first necessary to choose with great care the question. Be sure that you are sufficiently informed on the topic you select, and then, you should read the questions carefully. Many mistakes are made at this stage. You will be marked according to how well you address the issues raised in the question. Read and reread the question and be absolutely sure of what it is dealing with. Do not assume anything. Underline the main words and phrases in the question to ensure that your answer will be relevant to what is asked. Then, plan your answer. Many students launch themselves into essays without planning. This usually results in generalized nonsense. You should list all the points you feel are related to the answer you wish to give. Go through this list and pick three or four points you think are important to your position and about which you can write in an informed way.
That ’ s the end of Section 3. You now have half a minute to check your answers .
Now turn to Section 4.
Section 4
You are going to listen to a local radio program that is broadcast daily and gives out information about job vacancies . Listen to the recording and complete the chart below. Look at questions 33-41.
Now listen to the recording and complete the chart below.
David: Hi! You’re listening to Radio South West. The best in the south west for music and up-to-the-minute news. Sue’s here. Hello, Sue.
Sue: Hello, David.
David : And we ’ ve got the Jobspot for you today. So, if you ’ re unemployed or looking for a new job, this could be the spot for you. So, let ’ s have a look, see what we ’ ve got today. How about an engineer ? You must be experienced for this job, at least two years experience in this field and the pay will be agreed. So that will depend on experience. The hours are 8:30 a. m. to 5:00 p.m. , Monday to Friday, and Saturday 8:45 a.m. to 4 p.m. So that ’ s hours 8:30 a.m. to 5:00p.m.
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Monday to Friday, and Saturday 8:45 a. m. to 4 p.m. an engineer. How about you, Sue, what have you got?
Sue: Right, David. Well, the first one we ’ ve got is a cook. That * s in a large, busy restaurant, so it’s very useful to have had experience in large-scale cooking. The age is around twenty-five or so and the pay is £ 5 an hour. So that’s not bad, is it? The hours are good too. That ’ s Monday to Friday ,3:00 till 6:30.
David: Great, thanks, Sue. So that’s an air stewardess . Now, how do you fancy travelling around world? IIow do you fancy being an stewardess? There’re age restrictions on this job. You should be between 18 to 25, and you need to speak two foreign languages for this job. And if you ’ re keen on travelling this could be a great job. The pay is reasonable. You may have two months holiday a year. Sue, what else have you got?
Sue: Right, Dave. We’ve got a telephone operator here, that’s in an office. And this job might suit a girl who is school-leaver, It’s, er, requires no experience at all, but training will be given on the job. And the pay is £ 67 a week. So, there you go. That ’ s a nice job in an office.
Sue* Great, here’s another job for a school-leaver. Well, it s a shop assistant in a busy supermarket. It’s a full-time job, but the big thing is, you don t need any experience. So, if you’re just leaving school and fancy working in a supermarket, try that. You get one day off during the week and you must work one late evening till 10:30 p.m. And the pay is £ 76 a week, OK? So that’s a shop assistant. Well, if you fancy any of those jobs, give us a ring here on Jobspot at Radio South West. And now back to the music.
That is the end of section 4. Now you have half a minute to check your answers .
This is the end of the listening test.
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