Strategies for listening

(continued from the last issue on March 27)

2. Make accurate inferences

Sometimes, people want to hide their meaning a little bit in communication, either out of politeness or for the sake of emphasis. This can also be seen in the CET listening test, in which speakers do not give a straightforward answer to a question. In this case, to pick up the correct answer, a student needs to guess the true intention of the speaker from the utterance. Let's look at a dialogue:

M: Let's see if the basketball game has started yet.

W: Started? It must be clear who is winning by now.

Q: What does the woman mean? A) She is sure who is going to win. B) Now is a good time to start the game. C) The game has been going on for a long time. D) The same team always wins. (Question 8, CET-4 for June 1996.)

The implied meaning of the woman's statement is: "The game will soon come to an end and it is clear by now who will win." Therefore, the correct answer is "C". But about two-thirds of the test takers that year got it wrong.

3. Make generalizations

The ability of make proper generalization is also important in English listening. When making generalization, students summarize the details and attribute them to a larger category. Let's look at the following example:

M: Mary's in charge of the art and music section, and Charles the sports page. What about you?

W: I'm responsible for editorials. Q: Where does the woman work? A) At a bookstore. B) At an art museum. C) At a newspaper. D) At a gymnasium. (Question 7, CET-4 for June 2000.)

All the jobs mentioned in the dialogue are related to newspaper work. Therefore the correct answer is "C". But 62 per cent of the test takers that year chose the wrong answer. It shows that they need to practise more in order to acquire the skill of making generalizations from a number of facts.

By Dong Yafen

Coming up: Test taking skills for CET listening

The author is a retired professor at FudanUniversity. She is also a consultant for the CET National Committee, producer and organizer of CET tests.