Academic Listening Skills
The Listening section measures test takers’ ability to understand spoken English from North America and other English-speaking countries. In academic environments students need to listen to lectures and conversations. Below are three possible purposes for academic listening.
Listening purposes include:
- Listening for basic comprehension
- Listening for pragmatic understanding
- Connecting and synthesizing information
Listening Section Format
Listening materials in the new test include academic lectures and long conversations in which the speech sounds very natural. Test takers can take notes on any listening material throughout the entire test.
| Listening Material | Number of questions | Timing |
| 4–6 lectures, 3–5 minutes long each About 500 words |
6 questions per lecture | 60-90 minutes |
| 2–3 conversations ~3 minutes long About 12–25 exchanges |
Source: http://www.examenglish.com