Practice English Listening Tests for B1 – Listening Test 03

8 A   9 B   10 C   11 A   12 A   13 B

Audioscript

8

Boy:   Hey, what happened to you? You just disappeared from the theatre yesterday.

Girl:   Erm, well, I did tell the teacher I wanted to leave.

Boy:   What was wrong? I didn’t think the play was that terrible?

Girl:   It was nothing to do with that. You know what it’s like when you get toothache, though – you can’t concentrate on anything. The teacher phoned my mum who contacted the dentist, but they couldn’t see me yesterday, even though it was a bit of an emergency. So I had to go this morning.

Boy:   It seems you’ll do anything to avoid going to the theatre!

9

Girl:   The party was fun, wasn’t it?

Boy:   It was. It was a bit of a shame that everyone was told to bring anything they wanted, rather than making a list of who should bring what.

Girl:   Yes, it certainly meant that lots of people brought the same thing.

Boy:   Not having lots of stuff to choose from doesn’t bother me as long as you like what’s there, which I did.

Girl:   Me too. I didn’t see anyone eating what I brought – apart from us of course.

Boy:   No, but that meant there was more for us.

10

Girl:   Did you see the soccer match last night?

Boy:   Sure did, and although I can’t say I was unhappy at the result, it wasn’t the most interesting game I’ve ever seen.

Girl:   They’ve played better, I agree, but I didn’t think they did that badly, especially that guy you really like.

Boy:   He did well, but he was the only one who did. Imagine if he got injured and couldn’t play for a few weeks – they’d lose every game.

Girl:   Let’s hope that never happens. Anyway, I thought it was a pretty entertaining game.

Boy:   I’ve seen our school team play more interesting soccer.

11

Boy:   Have you been in the new science building yet?

Girl:   I had a class in there this morning. It’s a shame they’ve used all the stuff for experiments from the old building.

Boy:   Yes, it’d be nice to have new things like that as well as a new building. What do you think of it inside?

Girl:   The colours are nice and those paintings make it look really modern.

Boy:   I don’t think we share the same taste in colours and paintings, but I’m really impressed with the design of the outside.

Girl:   I can’t think of a building I like the look of more.

12

Boy:   Have you started your blog yet?

Girl:   I’ve already written five entries and have had nice comments from some readers. That really makes it seem like it was worth doing, despite all the issues I had when I was getting it ready. The website used said it was easy to create a blog – and maybe it is for someone who’s a bit more familiar with IT than I am.

Boy:   Have you put pictures in, too?

Girl:   A few. I think I need more, though, to get it looking as good as some of the other blogs I’ve seen.

13

Boy:   Are you still enjoying your Chinese lessons?

Girl:   I am, but we always focus on reading and writing. I know they’re important, but I want to learn other skills, too.

Boy:   There’s loads of stuff online for improving reading and writing, but less for speaking, I guess. It’s the same problem with coursebooks – they’re good for exercises on grammar and things, but you obviously can’t talk to a book!

Girl:   No …

Boy:   But lots of people learn Chinese these days, so there must be groups that meet just to practise talking to each other. Why not search for one of those?

Girl:   Hmm, maybe.

20 B   21 C   22 A   23 C   24 B   25 A

Audioscript

Woman:   Erik, you’ve recently returned from a cycle trip with your dad across the USA. Why did you want to do this ride?

Erik:   I suppose the usual reason for doing something as mad as cycling five thousand kilometres in just two months is to make thousands of pounds for various charities. We certainly did that, and spent large amounts of time with each other too, which was wonderful. We decided to go, though, because we fancied doing something really different during the summer holidays.

Woman:   What made you choose to go across the USA and not other countries?

Erik:   We’d thought about going through Central Asia, but you need lots of different visas, all of which take ages to arrange. With the USA, there was none of that – one country means one visa. It’s a shame that I didn’t get to practise speaking any other languages, though. I’d wondered about how safe some of the cities would be, but they were fine.

Woman:   How did you feel as you set off?

Erik:   I was expecting to be so keen to set off that I wouldn’t be able to sit still. When the time arrived, though, my Dad and I both felt pretty calm, which I found quite amazing. I don’t think either of us had any worries about not finishing the ride – we were very confident.

Woman:   What was a typical day like?

Erik:   Every day was different. Some were good and some were quite difficult, but all were good experience. It wasn’t actually how far we rode that made a day good or bad, it was more what happened. Having a long conversation with some of the local people seemed to make us even happier than feeling the sun on our faces.

Woman:   And how did you and your dad get along?

Erik:   We’re always got on really well, so although we didn’t agree about everything on the trip, we were always able to deal with any arguments, which didn’t happen often. And although we spoke about a few of the things that are important to us, over the two months we learned it was OK to spend a few hours saying absolutely nothing, too.

Woman:   And have you got plans for doing more cycling?

Erik:   I’m in my final year at school now, and I need to do well to get to university, so it wouldn’t be the best time for me to go cycling across Australia, or wherever. Rather than just going out on weekend rides, though, I’d much prefer to enter some competitions – over shorter distances of course! I’ve never tried that before.

Woman:   Good luck, Erik!