3 Tips for O-Level Listening Comprehension Success!

Hello, everyone! My name is Ms Umi, and I am a Specialist English Teacher at Lil’ but Mighty. Today, I’ll be sharing with you three simple tips to help you score for your O-Level Listening Comprehension paper!

For those of you who are not so familiar with the GCE O-Level format, Listening Comprehension makes up 10% of your final English grade and contains a score out of 30 marks in a 45-minute segment. There are also 2 sections in the paper, which are listed below:

Section A: Candidates listen to a number of audio recordings and complete a variety of questions that test their listening skills. The recordings will be played twice.

Section B: Candidates are required to complete a simple note-taking task based on a recording that will only be played once. The audio text you will listen to for this section is an informational one.

Therefore, from this you can gather that in order to score for your Listening Comprehension, you will need to be able to understand and process what you are listening to quickly and accurately. Not only that, you should familiarise yourself with a variety of audio texts since you will listen to texts that inform, describe, explain, recount etc. It would also be advantageous if you are familiar with the different question types as you will be asked to do a matching exercise, fill in a graphic organiser, or answer a multiple-choice question.

In order to help you score the highest marks you possibly can for this section, take a look at what you can do to tackle this component well:

Tip #1: Try to read the questions ahead

Upon receiving your question paper, quickly skim through the questions to get a sense of the questions asked so that you can look out for the answers while listening. Pay attention to the keywords in the question, so do underline or circle them so that it will help you to focus on what to look out for when the audio texts are played. Think of it as having a torchlight to help you see in the dark!

For instance if the question asks, ‘What made the artist different from the other members of her art club?’, you would probably underline/circle the phrase ‘artist different from the other members’ to remind yourself that you would need to listen out for the differences between the artist and the other members.

Tip #2: Jot down your answers at the first playing of the recording

During the first time the recording is being played for Section A, this is where it’s best you try to follow along with the recording as closely as possible and jot down your answers. Try to listen out for as many details as possible and answer as many questions as you can so that when the time comes for the recording to be played the second time, you only need to do a check that you have written the correct answers. This tip can also help to sharpen your skillsfor Section B, where the recording will only be played once and you will have to jot down your answers at the first playing anyway!

Also, if there are questions you have no idea how to answer, avoid getting stuck on them and move on to the other questions first. I know it can be frustrating when this happens but being fixated on questions you can’t answer means that you are not focusing on the next part of the recording and may miss other important information that will help you to answer the rest of the section. Instead, put a cross next to these unanswered questions and return to them during the second time the recording is played.

Tip #3: Check, check, check!

When the recording is being played a second time, once again, follow along closely to check that you have written the correct answers and that you didn’t misinterpret the questions or even made careless errors.

For Section B, since the recording will only be played once, you should read your filled-in notes on the question paper from start to finish to see if the answer fits, whether grammatically (tense, agreement etc.) or contextually (but be careful not to change the answer to a completely different word from the one you heard in the recording!).

You should also make good use of the musical interludes played between the sections to check your answers. Every minute counts!

Before I end, the most important thing to remember is to remain calm and focused during the paper. While it is easy to lose focus or become overwhelmed by the sheer number of audio recordings and questions, tell yourself that you’ve got this! I hope that the three tips I have shared will help you score for this section! Leave a comment below if there is anything you would like to clarify or if you would like to share other tips that have worked for you.

Happy studying!