A selection of English ESL listening exercises printables

A Disney based lesson meant to be used as a listening and vocabulary exercise.



This activity would work nicely for a class on movies / music / entertainment etc.



The task consists of gap fills and MCQs. It is suitable for a wide variety of levels and ages. Gaps can be added and/or removed to make the activity more difficult or easier depending on the learners’ ability. Another option, for low level classes, is to remove the gap fills and only have students select answers for every second song (with MCQs)



Find the video with the audio, answers and vocabulary here: https://youtu.be/DoO8ML5VB2I

Disney worksheet - Listening practice and new vocabulary / idioms

There are seven tasks that are based on the video "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" by Insider Science. There are speaking tasks, vocabulary from the video offered, there is once 'fill in the gaps' exercise with the vocabulary from the video. There are questions to check comprehension and a 'true-false' exercise, too. 

Environmental Problems: Garbage in the Ocean Listening Skills

This is one exercise to develop listening skills by completing a short dialog while watching an excerpt of an American TV show. Time 10-15 min 

Listening - Games of Thrones - Int/Adv

This word document comes with a ready-made listening lesson plan along with some additional activities. Pre-listening activity includes various questions which you can use as a warm-up, to get the students to speak about the subject in question; but most importantly to contextualize the subject before you play the recording. That way, I believe the students will be more engaged and immersed in the listening text, which would benefit you, as a teacher, to have a more productive listening exercise compared to listening immediately without no context whatsoever. I've put the source of the listening text inside the document. I also have two post-listening activities. These entail one collocation activity, collocations which took place in the listening text; and one simple past (mainly) irregular verb activity, irregular verbs which, again, were used in the listening text given. I also gave some advice for a follow-up speaking activity.



To supplement the listening activity, you can use ''Martin's Vacation'' as a reading activity, which you can also find on this website.

Listening Test - What Did You Do Last Summer + Exercises

It is a listening exercise for the song of Sia, Snowman. It is easy and nice. Children can do it eaisly. There are different types of exercises in it. Good for Christmas listening.

Snowman listening

katy perry song hot n cold to listen and complete different exercises. pre while and post listening

song hot and cold by katy perry

A gap fill exercise using the song Fireflies by Owl City. Some grammar is verb plus infinitive, and other vocabulary to check listening skills of the students. The song is slow and the singer has good pronunciation. Play the song on Youtube or download it and let the students listen a minimum of two times, but if they need to listen more let them, it´s more important that they get most correct even if they need to listen three or four times.

Fireflies by Owl City

You will need recording of Harry Potter and Philosopher's Stone audio book Chapter 10 in order to do this activity. Listening gap fill followed by writing exercise with answers.

Quidditch Listening Activity

This worksheet is a Listening exercise about weather vocabulary. It's a song by Bruno Mars called "It will rain" and is for intermediate students. The students have to fill in the blanks with the words they listen.

Weather Listening activity

Easy listening comprehension exercise with 6 questions based off a video on the different climate zones in the Earth by Doctor Binocles, an educative science channel for kids.

Climate Zones Listening Comprehension

Listening and Speaking. Current topic: new school year and student opinion. Students learn about the US high school students’ opinion about the new rules and the (virtual) school year. Tasks are followed by the discussion of students’ own views on the new school year in their country/region.  There is lead-in, a vocabulary matching exercise, gap fill (listening for details), comprehension check, and speaking assignment. The tasks can be used in a listening and speaking lesson or be a warm-up exercise for a speaking class.  The tasks can be used for independent studies or distance-learning classes.

LISTENING. U.S. STUDENTS SPEAK ABOUT RETURNING TO SCHOOL

This is a free B2 upper-intermediate level English listening lesson about Halloween, generated using Cathoven AI tools. It includes listening exercises in various formats, along with the answer keys and explanations.

True/False questions
Multiple choice questions
Short answer questions

Listening / Reading - A Halloween Story

Culture, intercultural communication, cross-cultural communication

Adjectives to describe feelings, emotions

Adjectives to describe personality and character

Adjectives: Gradable / Non-gradable adjectives

Articles: Definite or indefinite article (a, an or the)

BE + infinitive structures (e.g. he was to become famous)

Clauses of contrast (e.g.  although, while)

Clauses of purpose (e.g. in order to, so that, so as to)

Clauses of reason (e.g. because, because of, due to, as, since)

Cleft sentences (e.g. It's Joey we're looking for)

Comparison: Comparative adjectives and structures

Comparison: Superlative adjectives and structures

Conditional 2 (second conditional) - would

Conditionals: Conditional phrases (e.g. unless, provided that, as long as)

Conjunctions (aka connectives, e.g. and, but, or, so, then)

Contractions (shortened forms, e.g. don't, aren't, etc.)

Determiners (words that can come before nouns)

Formal and informal English (politeness or colloquial language)

Future perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Future perfect simple and continuous (progressive) tense

Future phrases (e.g. be about to, bound to, likely to, due to, set to + INF)

Homonyms (two words with the same pronunciation - homophones and homographs)

It as preparatory subject (e.g. it's raining, it's nice of you to)

Linking verbs (aka copulas, e.g. I am a student)

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how to accuse somebody of something in English

how to apologize, say sorry, forgive and express regret in English

how to ask for information and make inquiries in English

how to ask for something, make requests in English

how to blame somebody for something in English

how to defend yourself from criticism in English

how to deny or admit something in English

how to describe things or people in English

how to emphasize important things in English

how to encourage or discourage people in English

how to evaluate people or progress in English

how to express agreement /disagreement in English

how to express approval and disapproval  in English

how to express cause and effect in English

how to express interest in something in English

how to express likelihood, probability in English

how to express likes and dislikes in English

how to express sequence and chronology in English

how to express shock and disbelief in English

how to express sympathy and condolences in English

how to give permission, authorization in English

how to inform somebody about some news in English

how to interpret what was said in English

how to keep a conversation going in English

how to make guesses about something in English

how to make, accept and refuse offers in English

how to order or make a booking in English

how to persuade, convince people in English

how to praise people and express appreciation in English

how to reassure somebody of something in English

how to refuse and object to something in English

how to remind people of something in English

how to rephrase, paraphrase what was said in English

how to say thank you, express gratitude in English

Nouns: Collective nouns (team, class, family, committee)

Nouns: Proper nouns (names of people, cities, companies)

Oxymorons (phrases with words of contradictory meaning, e.g. living dead)

Participles: Past participle (e.g. HAVING DONE)

Participles: Present participle (e.g. DOING)

Parts of Speech (aka word classes, e.g. nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs)

Past perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Phonetics (pronunciation, IPA, phonetic symbols)

Plural nouns: regular plurals with S ending

Prefixes (e.g. A, UN, IM, DIS, MIS, EN, etc. )

Prepositions vs adverbs (e.g. before me, saw him before.)

Prepositions: Double prepositions (e.g. out of)

Prepositions: Participle prepositions (e.g. pending, concerning)

Prepositions: Phrase prepositions (e.g. by means of)

Present perfect continuous (progressive) tense

Present perfect simple or present continuous tense

Present simple tense: S for third person singular verbs

Present simple vs continuous (progressive) tense

Pronouns: EACH OTHER, ONE ANOTHER (reciprocal pronouns)

Pronouns: Possessive pronouns (e.g. my, mine)

Pronouns: Reflexive pronouns (e.g. myself, yourself))

Pronouns: SOMEBODY, ANYBODY, EVERYBODY, NO ONE, NOTHING, etc.

Pronouns: THIS, THAT, THESE, THOSE (demonstratives)

Pronouns: YOU and THEY to talk about people in general

Quantifiers (e.g. some, many, much, any, few, little)

Questions: WH questions (open-ended questions)

Reported speech: reported questions (indirect questions)

There is / there are / there was / there were / there will be, etc.

Verbs: Transitive or intransitive verbs (words that can or cannot stand with objects)

Working with Paragraphs: ordering, titling

Role play, miming, drama activity or improv game

Pictionary (picture dictionary) or picture matching

Writing an opinion essay (persuasive essay)

Learners who are Pre-A1 have just begun learning English and will first learn how to:<ul><li>Say the letters in the alphabet and numbers</li><li>Say hello, talk about names and age</li><li>Name the colors and dates, express likes and dislikes</li></ul>

Absolute beginners who have begun to learn the letters and numbers

Learners taking the A1 Elementary exam should be able to:<ul><li>Introduce themselves and ask and answer questions about personal details such as where he/she lives, things he/she has, people he/she knows.</li><li>Communicate using very basic phrases as long as the other person talks slowly and clearly and is prepared to help.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: common adjectives & adverbs of frequency, going to, how much/how many, imperatives, I'd like, 's – possessive, common prepositions of place and time, present simple & continuous, there is/are</li></ul>

A very basic tourist level, which is enough for buying food and a bus ticket

Learners taking the A2 Pre-intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand sentences and frequently used expressions (e.g. very basic personal and family information, shopping, local geography, employment).</li><li>Complete tasks that are routine and exchange information about familiar matters.</li><li>Describe matters of immediate need in simple terms.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: countable/uncountable nouns, adverbs of frequency, future will/going to, much/many, present perfect, past simple, past continuous, common phrasal verbs, common modals: can/should</li></ul>

A tourist who can do basic conversations about the past, present and future

Learners taking the B1 Intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand points regarding family, work, school or leisure-related topics.</li><li>Deal with most travel situations in areas where the language is spoken.</li><li>Create simple texts on topics of personal interest.</li><li>Describe experiences, events, dreams, and ambitions, as well as opinions or plans in brief.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: question tags, intensifiers: too/enough, future tenses, past tenses, modals, conditionals, wh-questions in the past</li></ul>

Learners who can deal with both familiar and routine situations, in friendly and work contexts

Learners taking the B2 Upper-intermediate exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and abstract topics, including technical discussions in his/her field of specialization.</li><li>Interact with fluency and spontaneity that makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without difficulty for either party.</li><li>Produce clear, detailed text on a wide range of subjects and explain an opinion on a topical issue giving the advantages and disadvantages of various options.</li><li>Main grammar points to know: perfect tenses, mixed conditionals, modals in the present, phrasal verbs, reported speech, wish, relative clauses</li></ul>

The level where you can be a tour guide for your foreign friends and talk about a lot of topics, even abstract ones, with ease and fluency

Learners taking the C1 Advanced exam should be able to: Express ideas fluently and spontaneously without much obvious searching for expressions. Use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes. Understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts. Produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects, using linking phrases (=words that connect ideas between sentences). Main grammar points to know: inversion, mixed conditionals, modals in the past, all passive forms, phrasal verbs (all patterns), wish/if only for regrets

Learners who can smoothly communicate in every walk of life, read long texts and write well

Learners taking the C2 Proficient exam should be able to:<ul><li>Understand almost everything read or heard with ease.</li><li>Summarize information from a variety of sources into a coherent presentation.</li><li>Express themselves using precise meaning in complex scenarios.</li><li>Can express him/herself spontaneously, very fluently and precisely, differentiating finer shades of meaning even in the most complex situations</li></ul>

Get here and you are ready to study in English at university

321 Listening exercises English ESL worksheets pdf & doc