Listen Carefully book - A basic listening practice book suitable for newbies

Choosing IELTS preparation materials to enhance IELTS Listening skills is a concern for many learners nowadays, as there are numerous resources available in the market to support listening skill development. Therefore, making the right decision can be extremely challenging. Today, PREP will introduce you to the details of the Listen Carefully book, one of the effective books for beginners to practice IELTS listening skills. Let's find out more!

I. Overview of Listen Carefully book

1. General introduction to Listen Carefully book

The author of Listen Carefully book is Professor Dr. Jack C. Richards. He is the creator of several widely used English language textbooks by students in the United Kingdom and the author of many in-depth books for teachers, thanks to his decades of experience in teaching foreign languages and linguistics.

Oxford University Press first published the Listen Carefully book in 1990. According to the author, the goal of this book is to provide readers with an English listening practice experience. According to Professor Dr. Richards, learners can easily use the Listen Carefully book as a self-study tool at home or as a textbook in the classroom with the guidance of a teacher.

There are a total of 15 chapters in the Listen Carefully book, each addressing a separate topic. These topics are quite common and deal with everyday issues such as Leisure Activities, Jobs, Health, etc. The answers to Listen Carefully book are provided at the end of the book. The audio recordings in the Listen Carefully book are mainly in British English, but some dialogues are spoken in American English, Australian English, etc.

2. Suitable users for Listen Carefully book

Readers can immediately recognize from the cover that Listen Carefully book is an IELTS preparation book designed for learners at the elementary level of English proficiency. The elementary level (A2) is equivalent to IELTS 3.5 on the IELTS scale of the British Council. At this level, most readers can understand:

• Basic personal language and vocabulary related to family and work.

• Short and simple articles on popular topics.

• Slow and clear spoken dialogues.

Beginner IELTS learners (as well as general English learners) who want to improve their listening comprehension skills should use the Listen Carefully book.

II. The main contents of the Listen Carefully book

According to what was mentioned earlier, the Listen Carefully book consists of 15 topics corresponding to 15 chapters (units). The difficulty level of the chapters increases from Chapter 1 to Chapter 15, although students can choose any chapter to practice with.

Depending on the type of lesson, the Listen Carefully book PDF book provides many listening exercises in each section, including both monologues and dialogues. True to its name, the author emphasizes the importance of attentive listening to complete exercises that range in difficulty from simple to complex. The chapters in the book will include specific content as follows:

III. Pros and cons of Listen Carefully book

1. Pros of Listen Carefully book

• The materials in the Listen Carefully book are divided into categories based on common and fundamental topics closely related to exams. For example, Chapter 2 focuses on teaching readers how to listen to names of people and places, greetings, and introductions. Readers will practice listening to the pronunciation of names, and distinguishing different locations and places. These are common questions in the IELTS Listening Part 1.

• The organization of Listen Carefully book by topic (chapter) will help users study systematically and in a more structured manner compared to test formats. To facilitate easy navigation to desired content, the book's table of contents is provided clearly, presenting each topic (chapter) and its sub-sections.

• Different exercise formats and topics are arranged from simple to complex according to difficulty levels. This layout arrangement will prevent learners from feeling overwhelmed by difficult exercises right from the beginning.

• The majority of listening exercises in the book focus on topics closely related to daily life. Listen Carefully book does not contain excessively academic or scientific content. Learners can practice listening daily without feeling dry or tedious.

2. Cons of Listen Carefully book

Listen Carefully book was first published in 1990, which was a long time ago. As of now, it may be challenging to find physical copies of the book and CD in Vietnam as they are no longer available on websites like Tiki.com or Fahasa.com. For those who prefer physical books and want to have a separate CD, this can be a disadvantage.

IV. Effective ways to study Listen Carefully book

To strengthen your Listening skills and succeed in the Listening section, here are some tips from PREP on how to make the most of the Listen Carefully book:

• Dedicate ample time to practice listening exercises:

  • When you purchase Listen Carefully book, it comes with a CD containing audio files that help you practice listening to authentic materials. Additionally, you can learn pronunciation by listening to dialogues or speeches included in the audio. 

  • It is recommended to spend at least 30 minutes each day practicing listening. With perseverance and regular practice, your listening skills will improve rapidly.

• Update and take notes on useful vocabulary applicable to different situations:

  • While practicing listening, pay attention to unfamiliar, interesting, or challenging vocabulary to avoid mistakes in subsequent listening sessions and to learn new words. To facilitate memorization, you can jot down notes in a notebook or directly write in the book. Each person may have their preferred learning method to remember difficult words. The most effective strategy is still to write down and memorize difficult terms.

  • In addition, you can save vocabulary on Notion - one of the versatile websites that allows you to create various user-friendly and visually appealing tables, providing motivation for daily learning.

• Listen to each exercise only twice and check the answers:

  • During each listening exercise, we often have the habit of replaying a sentence multiple times until we understand it. However, this creates an unfavorable habit and affects the speed of completing the exam. It is advisable to train yourself to listen only 1-2 times, and if you cannot catch the information, you can skip it and move on to the next question to avoid missing out on other questions.

  • For the questions you couldn't hear, you can listen to them again after completing the entire listening section and refer to the audio transcript at the end of the book to find the answers and understand why you got them wrong.

V. Effective and free intensive listening practice with PREP

To further enhance your Listening skills, you can experience practicing with IELTS exercises. Not only will you deepen your Listening practice, but you will also acquire vocabulary and strategies for the Reading and Listening sections, which can be flexibly applied to the Speaking and Writing sections.

To facilitate your search for different sets of exercises from various books, PREP has compiled all the IELTS test exercises for the four skills on the Test Practice page. This page contains comprehensive and in-depth exercises for each skill, allowing you to refer to and choose suitable materials to achieve your high-scoring IELTS goals.

The above are the insights shared by PREP regarding the Listen Carefully book. PREP hopes that the knowledge provided by this book will be beneficial in helping you achieve your desired IELTS score.