TubeQuizard Help Boost TOEFL learners' Listening Skills

Hi, 😀Beijing colleagues. As TOEFL teachers, we treasure the limited time in class and desire to equip students with more power over TOEFL test. But we all know that language improvement derives from daily input and output largely on the part of students themselves. So, we commit ourselves to creating conditions for individualized learning and learning autonomy. Today I want to bring you an English learning tool that can boost our students’ listening skills, which is TubeQuizard (http://tubequizard.com/).

(you can choose videos that suit you fine)

TubeQuizard can make interactive listening quizzes for any subtitled YouTube video. The quizzes that TubeQuizard creates are aimed at top frequency expressions and grammar. These highly effective listening quizzes will train students to understand real life pronunciation of high frequency language. Students could choose videos of different levels, language focuses, topics, and accent varieties on the platform. For instance, I choose videos focusing on pronunciation for listeners at C1 level. Then I click on a video of the Ellen Show that I am interested in. Every quiz has its own objectives. The one that I choose is to practice recognizing sounds /t/ and /d/ that often get dropped in fast speech. While listening to the interview with Billie EIllish, I am to fill in the given blanks with phrases and words that I hear. And then I can check my answers and listen to the video again for comprehending more details. Besides, I can go to all quizzes based on the same video and learn more from it.

(a TubeQuizard quiz focusing on pronunciation for listeners)

TubeQuizard is an excellent tool for TOEFL learners. Students could choose their own proficiency level and nurture their listening skills by finishing the dictation quizzes specifically designed for a language focus. We always complain about the lack of listening exercise materials. This platform provides plentiful authentic materials for students to enhance their listening capability. Students could freely choose videos that they are interested in, such as celebrity, fashion, etc.

(a TubeQuizard quiz focusing on grammar for listeners)

However, the quizzes on TubeQuizard only have one to two words to fill within every blank, leaving the task not challenging enough for our students. Thus, some students on relatively higher level may not want to spend time on them. But from teachers’ perspective, the listening materials on TubeQuizard have more to explore. If we additionally design some challenging tasks for capable students, such as dictation, repeating after the video, etc., they could be motivated by the challenge and exert themselves.

🙋Beijing colleagues😀If you want to explore more about strategies of improving listening ability, please watch this video which could show you valuable tips for daily listening practice.