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ECPE Sample Test, Form A

Listening Section Audio Script

Examination for the Certificate of Proficiency M: Well, I’d prefer to do the introduction. But I
in English, Sample Test guess we should wait till we see the others in
class today before we make those decisions.

Listening Section 2. M: Did you hear about what’s happening

This is a test of your ability to understand spoken English. downtown?
The listening section has three parts. There are fifty
F: Umm . . . I know they were going to build a
questions. Mark all your answers on the separate answer
new parking garage.
sheet. Do not make any stray marks on the answer sheet.
If you change your mind about an answer, erase your first M: Yeah, but it’ll mean the theater gets torn down.
answer completely. F: Oh, no! Then we’ll have to drive all the way out
to Edison to go to a movie!

Part One
3. F: So you must finally be getting settled in your
In this part, you will hear short conversations. From
new apartment. Everything working out ok
the three answer choices, select the answer which
there?
means about the same thing as what you hear, or is true
based upon what you hear. For example, listen to the M: It turns out the building caretaker is really
conversation: unreliable.
F: So what are you going to do?
M: Let’s go to the football game.
M: I’ve complained to his supervisor, so we’ll see
F: Good idea. I don’t want to stay home. what happens.

The correct answer is b.

4. M: Come in, Mary. What can I do for you?
For problems 1 through 15, mark your answers on the F: I was just wondering whether I could discuss
separate answer sheet. No problems can be repeated. the project report I’m preparing for you.
Please listen carefully. Do you have any questions? M: Of course. Is there some sort of problem?
F: I just wanted to make sure we’re on the
1. M: I think our presentation’s in good shape. same page.
F: Me too. All we need to do is decide who’s
going to handle which parts—and then 5. M: How’s Frank getting along on that project
practice it for the next few days. he’s been working on?
F: He seems to be going nowhere fast.

© 2014 Cambridge Michigan Language Assessments®

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ECPE Sample Test — Form A — Listening Section Audio Script   1

6. M: You know I really enjoyed Professor Smith’s 15. M: I’m thinking I should ask the professor for
lecture, but that last part about his dog an extension.
seemed totally irrelevant. F: That’d be better than just handing the paper
F: You know that’s funny, I thought so too. in late—or rushing through it and turning in
something that wasn’t well thought out.
7. M: I wonder what kind of changes might happen
when the new manager takes over. End of part one.

F: I’d rather not speculate about things I have no

control over. Listening Test, Part Two
In this part, you will hear a question. From the three
8. M: Professor Jenkins, would it be alright if I left answer choices given, choose the one which best
class a little early today? answers the question. For example, listen to the question:
F: Well, I suppose so.
M: When is your sister getting married?
M: Umm, I was kind of hoping I’d be able to
get my assignment back today. I don’t The correct answer is a.
suppose . . .
F: I have them right here. For problems 16 through 35, mark your answers on the
separate answer sheet. No problems can be repeated.
Please listen carefully. Do you have any questions?
9. F: How’s the soup?
M: Oh, I didn’t realize there’d be onions in it, and 16. F: How did your meeting with Professor Jones
I’m allergic to ‘em.
go? Did you show her your first draft?
F: Oh, that’s right. Why don’t you send it back?
M: That’s ok. I’ll just leave it. 17. M: How much longer do we have to endure this?

10. M: Sooo . . . you have your twenty-fifth high 18. M: If you’re free, I could sure use a hand with
school reunion coming up? getting these books put away.
F: Yeah, I’m really looking forward to it.
19. M: I’d like to start the meeting by getting all of
M: Do you keep in touch with many of your
your reactions to the director’s proposal.
old friends?
F: Yup. We have a reunion every five years, and I 20. F: What do you think made Bill show up at a
haven’t missed any. football game in a suit and tie?

11. M: Do you think you’re going to take that job in 21. F: Aren’t you going to get your hair colored
New York?
when you get it cut today?
F: Well, maybe. It sounds great, but I’m not sure I
can take the commute. 22. M: So Eric, have you tried out your new
sailboat yet?
12. M: Did you get hold of that book we need for
history class? 23. F: I think I was charged too much for that last
F: The bookstore was all out. But a guy in my item; could you please double-check?
dorm took the class last year and let me have
his old copy. 24. F: How soon does she need you to come up
M: Great! with that information?

13. M: What do you think of the used car I bought? 25. M: Does it make any sense for me to bring the
F: Have you considered a paint job? reports to the meeting?

14. M: What was Tom like when he worked for you? 26. F: Is there any way I can find out how much the
tax is going to be beforehand?
F: Well, he was always alienating people.
M: Sounds like the same Tom we knew. 27. F: What do you think about putting Jeff
in charge of supervising the student
employees?
ECPE Sample Test — Form A — Listening Section Audio Script   2
28. M: Would it be all right if I met you at the theater a team of conservationists has been monitoring
instead of picking you up at your apartment? different skyscrapers in the city and keeping track of
how many birds have died from flying into each of the
29. F: I wonder why they sent that memo about not buildings. This has led to an important discovery that
wearing too much perfume? could reduce the number of birds that smash into tall
buildings. Ecologist Peter Brown has been studying
30. M: If we were to stop to grab a bite to eat on what’s happening with the birds.
the way back, would you be interested in us
M2: To understand the problem, it helps to know a bit
bringing you anything?
about the migratory habits of birds and how they
navigate. Many species of birds—particularly those
31. F: You told Sarah we changed the deadline to
that are insect-eaters—migrate at night, and they
three o’clock, didn’t you?
use the stars and constellation patterns as a guide.
But the bright lights of tall city buildings can cause
32. M: Are you finished picking up? ’Cause Jim said
unusual behavior. Because they’re so bright, they
he’d be here soon . . .
actually obscure the starlight, which in turn throws the
birds off course. Then, the birds either fly right into lit
33. M: Is it advantageous to register in person?
windows or the building itself. In some cases, birds
become so disoriented that they fly around in circles
34. M: Did Jenny say the training was mandatory?
and eventually die from exhaustion.

35. F: Did you want to work on that assignment F: Brown and his colleagues have used the results
together soon? of their study to propose a solution to reduce
the number of birds that die. It incorporates their
End of part two. observation that different kinds of lighting have
different effects.
Listening Test, Part Three
M2: That’s right. There are two sources of building lights.
In this part, you will hear three short segments from a
One is the interior lighting that shines out through
radio program. The program is called “Learning from the
the windows and the other is exterior lighting.
Experts.” You will hear what three different radio guests
Many skyscrapers and other large buildings are
have to say about three different topics. Each talk lasts
illuminated at night with really bright floodlights.
about three minutes. As you listen, you may want to take
Both light sources are confusing to the birds, but
some notes to help you remember information given in the
we think it’s the second kind—the exterior lighting—
talk. Write your notes in this test booklet. After each talk,
that is especially lethal because it can completely
you will be asked some questions about what was said.
overpower natural starlight. It’s not realistic to expect
From the three answer choices given, you should choose
all building lighting to be turned off at night. After all,
the one that best answers the question according to the
a little lighting both inside and outside is needed for
information you heard.
security. But we have been able to get many building
Remember, no problems can be repeated. For problems managers to voluntarily turn down their bright exterior
36 through 50, mark all your answers on the separate floodlights during the migration seasons. This will
answer sheet. Do you have any questions? save tens of thousands of birds from dying.

M1: Building managers who volunteer to darken their

Now you will hear the first segment. buildings are taking responsibility for protecting
M1: Many species of birds that live during the summer wildlife. The efforts in Chicago have been duplicated
months in North America migrate south in the fall to in other large cities, including Toronto. If other cities
Central and South America where there is a more follow suit and eliminate their “killer lights,” more birds
plentiful food supply. Sadly, however, for many may safely get to where they need to go.
of these migratory birds, their flight is extremely 36. To try to solve the problem, what did the
dangerous—for a reason you may not have thought conservationists do at first?
of before. Tall, well-lit, city buildings can pose a big
problem for these birds. Susan Smith reports. 37. According to the report, in addition to flying into
buildings, what may happen to confused birds?
F: We’ve all heard of birds crashing into windows, but,
why is it so much worse during migration? In Chicago,

ECPE Sample Test — Form A — Listening Section Audio Script   3

38. Which source of lighting from buildings is most monkeys was given a grape without making it do
dangerous to birds? anything at all, but the other one still had to turn in
a stone to get a cucumber. This time, the cheated
39. According to the report, what is it unrealistic monkey would only continue to trade about 20
to expect? percent of the time, and it got very angry. Sometimes
it would refuse to eat the cucumber, and sometimes it
40. According to the report, why are many city buildings
would throw the food or the stone at the researcher!
lit up at night?
This is behavior that had never been observed before
in the wild. But what really surprised the research
Now you will hear the second segment. team was that the monkey that got the grape didn’t
behave any differently, and didn’t seem to care that its
M1: For years, scientists have been researching the
partner only got the cucumber.
evolutionary development of social skills in humans.
Recently, an unusual experiment provided an F: That’s a big difference from humans, who have a
important clue in this discovery process. Barbara great tendency to help others who have been cheated
Burton reports. or are otherwise less fortunate. Still, like humans,
monkeys want equal rewards for both parties, and
F: Our expert today is Dr. Joseph Oldman, and we will
aren’t inclined to keep working if this doesn’t happen.
be talking about monkey behavior. It seems that
This research into capuchin monkeys has shed
monkeys have a natural sense of fairness, just as
some light on the nature of cooperation and just how
humans do. Presumably, they developed this sense
important a skill it is for survival of a social species.
of fairness from a common ancestor shared by
early humans. Without it, probably neither humans 41. What do the speakers say helps monkeys and
nor monkeys would be able to survive in social humans survive in social groups?
groups because a sense of fairness is essential to
cooperation. Dr. Oldman, what can you tell us about 42. What did the researchers teach the monkeys?
this research?
43. What did the speaker mean by “a better deal”?
M2: Well Barb, the research team conducted these
experiments using a species of monkey known 44. What did the monkey who got the cucumber do
as capuchins, a kind that’s known to share food when it saw its partner get a grape in trade?
frequently in social groups. First, working with 45. Under what circumstances did the monkeys show
individual monkeys, the researchers gave each one the least amount of cooperation?
a stone, and taught them that they could exchange
the stone for a vegetable—a piece of cucumber.
Next, the monkeys were placed in groups of two, and Now you will hear the third segment.
showed that if both monkeys cooperated, and both
M1: You’ve probably listened to a recording of music
gave the researcher a stone, they would each receive
recently, maybe on a CD or even on your personal
a piece of cucumber. The monkeys cooperated
computer. But before these kinds of digital media
about 95 percent of the time. But the research team
were commonly used, audio recording was done on
wanted to find out if these monkeys thought this was
cassette tapes and vinyl records. And now, material
a fair process. So the next time, after the monkeys
recorded in these pre-digital formats is in danger of
each turned in a stone, one was given a piece of
disappearing forever. However, a recent collaboration
cucumber, as usual, but the other one was given a
between particle physicists and music archivists at
piece of fruit—a grape. The team knew from previous
the Library of Congress may change that. We go now
experience that monkeys really like grapes, a lot more
to our correspondent, Mary Brown, who is talking with
than cucumbers.
Dr. Peter Rasmussen.
F: And this experiment showed that it was really hard to
F: One day Dr. Rasmussen, a particle physicist, heard
get one monkey to cooperate once it saw the other
a news story on the radio about preserving valuable
monkey get what we’d call “a better deal.” After
old audio recordings, both music and spoken word
seeing its partner get a grape, the monkeys were only
recordings, from over a hundred years ago. Originally
willing to make trades about 60 percent of the time,
vinyl was thought to be a reliable, long lasting material
instead of 95 percent of the time, as they did when
for capturing sound, but it turns out that the material
both monkeys got the same thing.
deteriorates due to age.
M2: Mmm-hmm, that’s right. Then, the team made the
experiment even more unfair. This time, one of the
ECPE Sample Test — Form A — Listening Section Audio Script   4
 In addition, to play the old vinyl records, a needle 49. According to Dr. Rasmussen, what is a problem with
must move along the tiny grooves in the record to the new technology?
produce the sound. Each time an old recording is
played, the needle damages it even more. So Dr. 50. Why is the Library of Congress interested in audio
Rasmussen, how can your work as a particle physicist archiving?
help solve this problem? End of the listening test.
M2: Well, it occurred to me that if we could use a
computer to digitally map the grooves on the vinyl
records, we could preserve the sound material
indefinitely. In my work as a physicist, I use optical
scanners. I thought that by using an optical scanner,
we could create a two-dimensional digital map, or
image, of the tiny grooves in the vinyl record. Then,
using computer software, we can convert this image
into a digital sound file.

So we tried this on an old recording from a hundred

years ago, and found it not only preserved the audio
material, but allowed us to “clean it up” as well. Once
it was in digital format we could get rid of unwanted
background noises in the recording. It sounded even
better than the original recording!

F: This discovery will be of enormous benefit to the

Library of Congress archivists. They have over two
million recordings of music and spoken word, like
presidential speeches and debates that need to
be preserved. While the new technology has great
potential, it’s still a very slow process, isn’t it?

M2: Yes, it is. In our initial attempt to preserve a recording,

we found it took about an hour to scan in just one
second of sound. So obviously, we need to work on
speeding up the process. What we hope to develop
is something like a copy machine for old recordings.
Once the digital maps are made, they can be kept
forever. This is a particularly exciting thought for
archivists and researchers around the world.

F: That’s great! Audio material, both music and spoken

word, provides valuable insight into the cultural
heritage of a country. I’m sure that music historians
are also excited to see the potential for this new
technology to recover damaged or worn-out records.

46. According to the speakers, what is a problem with

vinyl records?

47. What is the main advantage of Dr. Rasmussen’s

process?

48. What is meant by the phrase “clean it up”?

ECPE Sample Test — Form A — Listening Section Audio Script   5