Raw score
0/40
Estimated band
–
By section
–
Estimated with the standard Listening conversion. Every question below now shows the correct answer and what confirmed it — and the full transcript is open at the bottom so you can trace anything you missed.
Try another test
Your browser has no English speech voices available, so the audio cannot play. Try Chrome or Edge on desktop, or check your system's text-to-speech settings.

IELTS Listening — Practice Test 17

0/40 answered
40:00
Section 1 A book club organiser books group theatre tickets by phone · Box office clerk, Caller
Questions 1-7

Complete the form below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

1Surname: ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
2Mobile number: 07811 402 ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
3Performance: Saturday ______ October, 7.30 pm
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
4Number of seats: ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
5Seating area: ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
6Group discount: ______ %
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
7Total cost: £ ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
Questions 8-10

Answer the questions below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

8At what time does the pre-show talk begin?
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
9Where in the theatre is the talk held?
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
10What must be quoted when the tickets are collected?
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
Section 2 A sports centre manager gives new students an orientation talk · Sports centre manager
Questions 11-13

Choose the correct letter, A, B or C.

11What does Gareth say about the swimming pool?
12How do students now register for fitness classes?
13Which of the following is free for members?
Questions 14-17

Where are the following facilities? Choose the correct letter, A–F, from the plan description below.

Plan of the sports centre site — you enter by the main entrance on College Road; the footpath runs north through the site.

A = just inside the main entrance   B = left of the footpath, opposite the car park   C = at the far north end, behind the tennis courts   D = on the east side, beside the lake   E = between the sports hall and the running track   F = in the basement of the sports hall

  • A just inside the main entrance
  • B left of the footpath, opposite the car park
  • C at the far north end, behind the tennis courts
  • D on the east side, beside the lake
  • E between the sports hall and the running track
  • F in the basement of the sports hall
14fitness suite
15climbing wall
16boathouse
17physiotherapy clinic
Questions 18-20

Complete the sentences below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

18The swimming pool will reopen on ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
19During the closure, members can swim free at the ______ pool.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
20To book classes online, students log in with their ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
Section 3 Two students and their tutor plan a short documentary assignment · Dr Fielding, Zoe, Marcus
Questions 21-24

Choose the correct letter, A, B or C.

21Why did the students choose the night market as their subject?
22Why is the publicity manager rejected as an interviewee?
23What does Zoe say about the filming permit?
24What is finally decided about the drone?
Questions 25-27

Who makes each suggestion? Choose A, B or C. NB You may use any letter more than once.

  • A Zoe
  • B Marcus
  • C Dr Fielding
25interviewing the stallholders
26filming the market being set up
27adding subtitles to the interviews
Questions 28-30

Complete the sentences below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.

28The permit application takes ten ______ days to process.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
29The rough cut is now due on ______ November.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
30The tutor has reserved the ______ for the students every Wednesday.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
Section 4 A lecture on playground design and its effects on child development · Lecturer
Questions 31-40

Complete the notes below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer.

31A danger that a child is unable to see for themselves is called a ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
32From the 1980s, councils installed ______ beneath playground equipment.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
33Instead of playing safely, bored children go looking for extra ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
34Most playground injuries actually occur while children are ______ on level ground.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
35Movable materials such as tyres, planks and crates are known as ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
36With loose parts, staff observed longer play and more ______ between children.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
37Many councils now use ______ assessment in place of the old safety checklist.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
38In most studies, children in challenging playgrounds are more physically ______ all day.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
39Adventurous play is linked with improvements in balance and in ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
40A good playground should be 'as safe as ______', not as safe as possible.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS

Audio script / transcript

Trace every answer back to the exact words. Distractors — changes of mind, corrections, rejected options — are part of the recording, so read the whole exchange, not just one line.

Section 1 — A book club organiser books group theatre tickets by phone

Box office clerk:Good morning, Regency Theatre box office, Sam speaking.
Caller:Oh, hello. I'd like to book a block of seats for The Glass Orchard, please. I run a book club and there are quite a few of us coming.
Box office clerk:Lovely — that one's selling fast. Can I take your surname first?
Caller:It's Pallister.
Box office clerk:Is that P-A-L-I-S-T-E-R?
Caller:Nearly — there's a double L in the middle. P-A-double L-I-S-T-E-R.
Box office clerk:P-A-L-L-I-S-T-E-R, got it. And a daytime phone number?
Caller:My mobile: oh-seven-eight-double-one, four-oh-two, five-six-three.
Box office clerk:Four-oh-two, six-five-three—
Caller:No, sorry — five-six-three. Five, six, three.
Box office clerk:Five-six-three, my mistake. Right, which performance were you hoping for?
Caller:The Friday evening — that's the seventeenth of October.
Box office clerk:Ah. The seventeenth sold out last week, I'm afraid — the reviews have been very kind to us. But I've got good availability for Saturday the eighteenth, the evening show at seven thirty.
Caller:Saturday the eighteenth... let me think... yes, that should suit most of us. Let's book that.
Box office clerk:And how many in the group?
Caller:Twelve. It was going to be fourteen, but two people have dropped out.
Box office clerk:Twelve it is. Now, seating. Stalls are thirty pounds, the circle is twenty-five, and the balcony is sixteen.
Caller:Ooh, the balcony's tempting at that price...
Box office clerk:I should be honest with you — the front rows of the balcony have a safety rail running right across the view. That's why they're cheap. For a special night out, I really wouldn't.
Caller:No, nobody wants to spend the evening peering round a rail. We'll take the circle, then.
Box office clerk:Circle, twelve seats together. Now, since it's a group — do you know about our discount scheme?
Caller:I read on your website that it's ten per cent for groups of eight or more?
Box office clerk:That page is out of date, I'm afraid — the website's being rebuilt. The current scheme is actually fifteen per cent, but it starts at ten people rather than eight. With twelve of you, you qualify comfortably.
Caller:Even better. So what does that come to?
Box office clerk:Twelve seats at twenty-five is three hundred pounds; take off fifteen per cent, that's forty-five off — so two hundred and fifty-five pounds altogether.
Caller:Two fifty-five. Fine.
Box office clerk:And one thing you might enjoy: on the Saturday there's a free pre-show talk with the director. It starts at quarter to seven and it's held in the studio — that's the smaller space to the left of the main foyer. Lasts about half an hour. I can reserve talk places for your group at no charge.
Caller:Oh, the club would love that — yes, add all twelve of us, please.
Box office clerk:Done. Last thing — tickets. We don't post them out any more. They'll be waiting at the box office window from an hour before the show, and whoever collects them just needs to quote the booking reference. I'll text that reference to the mobile number you gave me.
Caller:The booking reference — not a bank card?
Box office clerk:The reference on its own is fine. I'll send you a secure payment link today, and once that's paid you're all set.
Caller:Wonderful. Thanks so much, Sam.
Box office clerk:A pleasure. Enjoy the show on the eighteenth, Ms Pallister.

Section 2 — A sports centre manager gives new students an orientation talk

Sports centre manager:Morning, everyone, and welcome to the university sports centre. I'm Gareth, the centre manager, and in the next few minutes I'll point you round the site, flag one temporary problem, and explain how booking works this year — because it's changed.
Sports centre manager:First, the geography. You all came in through the main entrance on College Road, and the footpath runs north from there right through the middle of the site. The membership desk is just inside that main entrance — cards, queries, lost property, all handled there.
Sports centre manager:Walking up the path, on your left opposite the car park you'll see the outdoor gym — a dozen weatherproof machines, free to use, no booking needed. The main sports hall is the big grey building further along on the right, and the fitness suite — that's the indoor gym, treadmills, weights, the serious toys — is in the basement of the sports hall. Take the stairs down by the hall's front doors.
Sports centre manager:Right at the far north end of the site, behind the tennis courts, is the new climbing wall. Twelve metres, forty routes, and yes, all the equipment's provided. On the east side of the site, beside the lake, there's the boathouse — the rowing and kayaking clubs live there, and beginners' taster sessions run every Saturday morning in term time.
Sports centre manager:One more spot worth knowing: the physiotherapy clinic sits between the sports hall and the running track. Students get a discounted rate, and honestly, see them early — a niggle in week two is cheaper than an injury in week ten.
Sports centre manager:Now, the bad news, and I'd rather you heard it from me. The swimming pool closes from this Monday for two weeks while we replace the entire filtration system. It's twenty years old and it owes us nothing. The pool reopens on the ninth of October. In the meantime we've arranged free swimming for all members at the Riverside pool in town — normally four pounds fifty a visit, but free for you; just show your campus card at their reception.
Sports centre manager:Next, fitness classes — yoga, spinning, circuits, all of it. In previous years you had to queue at the reception desk at eight in the morning to sign up, and frankly it was chaos, people were queuing in their pyjamas. From this term, registration has moved online. You go to the sports centre website, log in with your student number, and bookings open at six each evening for the following day. No more queues, no more pyjamas.
Sports centre manager:A quick word on money, because I get asked every year. Your membership includes the gym induction — that's the one-hour session where we show you the machines, and you can't use the fitness suite until you've done it, so book it this week. Classes are extra, three pounds each, and towel hire is a pound. The induction, though — completely free.
Sports centre manager:Last thing: lockers. Bring your own padlock, don't leave anything overnight, and anything that is left overnight ends up at the membership desk looking embarrassed. Right — questions, anyone?

Section 3 — Two students and their tutor plan a short documentary assignment

Dr Fielding:Come in, both of you. So — the five-minute documentary. Have you settled on a subject yet?
Marcus:We had two on the shortlist: the university bee project, and the night market on Canal Street.
Zoe:And we've gone for the night market. The bee project is worthy, but visually it's... hives in a field. The market gives us lanterns, steam, crowds, faces — it's a far stronger film before anyone says a word.
Marcus:I agree, for once. You can't light a beehive.
Dr Fielding:Good — pick the subject your camera loves, not the one your conscience does. Now, interviews. Who's on your list?
Marcus:My first thought was the market's publicity manager. I emailed her and she offered straight away.
Zoe:And that's exactly what worried me. Anything she says will sound like an advert — rehearsed lines about a vibrant community hub.
Dr Fielding:I'm with Zoe on this one. Publicity people give you polished answers, and polish is dull on film. Who would you use instead?
Zoe:The stallholders themselves. There's a woman who's run the same noodle stand for twenty years — she remembers when the whole street was warehouses. That's your history.
Marcus:Fair enough. The manager's out, the stallholders are in.
Dr Fielding:Now the practical side, and this matters: you're filming on a public street, so you'll need a filming permit from the city council. Anything with a tripod counts as filming, in their eyes.
Zoe:I looked into that yesterday. The good news is it's free for students. The catch is the processing time — it takes ten days... sorry, ten working days, so realistically two full weeks. I'll submit the form tomorrow morning.
Dr Fielding:Do. And one suggestion from me: don't just film the market in full swing. Get there in the late afternoon and film the setting-up — empty street, stalls going up, lights coming on one by one. That transformation could open the whole film.
Zoe:Oh, that's much better than opening on crowd shots. We'll do that.
Marcus:Can I raise one more idea? My cousin has a drone. Aerial shots of the whole market at night would look incredible—
Zoe:Marcus, no. A drone over a crowded street at night? That needs a separate licence, and the buzzing would wreck every piece of audio we record.
Dr Fielding:Zoe's right, I'm afraid. Flying over crowds is illegal without an operator's certificate, and none of you holds one. Keep the camera on the ground.
Marcus:All right, all right — the drone stays at home. It would have looked great, though.
Dr Fielding:Now, deadlines, and you won't like this. You'll have seen my email — the screening room is being rewired in the last week of November, so I've had to bring the rough cut forward. It was due on the twenty-eighth; it's now due on the twenty-first of November.
Marcus:A whole week less. That's tight with two market shoots.
Dr Fielding:It is, which is why I've booked the editing suite for you every Wednesday between now and then. Use it — don't leave the edit for the final weekend.
Zoe:Wednesdays in the editing suite, rough cut on the twenty-first. One last thing from me: the market's loud, so whatever we record, I think we subtitle all the interviews.
Dr Fielding:Sensible. Plan for subtitles now and you won't be rescuing sound at midnight later. Right — permit form tomorrow, and I'll see you both on Wednesday.

Section 4 — A lecture on playground design and its effects on child development

Lecturer:Today's lecture is about playgrounds — what forty years of safety-driven design has actually done to children, and why the research now points somewhere uncomfortable.
Lecturer:Let me begin with a distinction the whole field rests on. A risk is a challenge that a child can recognise and choose for themselves — a high ladder, a fast slide, a wobbly log. The child sees it, weighs it, and decides. A danger that a child cannot see for themselves is called a hazard — a rotten plank, a rusted bolt, broken glass under the sand. The two deserve opposite treatments: hazards should be removed ruthlessly, but risk, the research suggests, is something children actually need.
Lecturer:From the nineteen-eighties onwards, though, driven partly by lawsuits, playgrounds across the developed world were systematically flattened. Equipment got lower and slower, and beneath it, councils installed rubber surfacing — that springy, brightly coloured ground you now see everywhere. The assumption was straightforward: softer landings and lower platforms would mean fewer injuries.
Lecturer:Here is the paradox: injury rates barely moved. Study after study found the totals stubbornly flat, and to understand why, watch the children rather than the equipment. A bored child does not stop taking risks; a bored child goes looking for extra stimulation — climbing onto the roof of the low slide, using equipment in ways no designer intended. Take the challenge out of the playground and children simply reintroduce it themselves.
Lecturer:And the popular explanation for playground injuries turns out to be wrong as well. Ask the public and they will blame falls from high equipment. But when researchers actually analysed accident records, most playground injuries happen when children are running on level ground — collisions, trips, twisted ankles — not falling from height at all.
Lecturer:So what does better look like? One answer arrived from an unexpected direction: junk. Several schools began providing movable materials with no fixed purpose — tyres, planks, crates, ropes — known in the literature as loose parts. Children combine them, negotiate over them, build and rebuild with them. In trials where schools introduced loose parts at playtime, staff recorded children playing for longer, and noticeably more cooperation between children, because a plank across two crates is a bridge only if somebody agrees to hold it steady.
Lecturer:Regulation has begun to catch up. Many councils have replaced the standard safety checklist with what's called risk-benefit assessment: instead of asking only 'what could go wrong here?', assessors weigh the dangers of a feature against the developmental gains it offers. A climbing boulder might bruise a knee; it also teaches grip, judgement and nerve — and under risk-benefit assessment, it usually passes.
Lecturer:Does any of this show up in the children themselves? The observation studies say yes, with the usual caveats about sample sizes. Children in more challenging playgrounds are, in most studies, more physically active across the whole day, not just at playtime. And adventurous play is consistently linked with gains in balance and, more strikingly, in confidence — children trusted with manageable risk become more willing to attempt new tasks of every kind.
Lecturer:Designers now put the goal in a single sentence, and it's the one I'd like you to leave with. A good playground should be as safe as necessary — not as safe as possible. Remove every hazard; keep the risk. Next week, we'll look at how the same thinking is reshaping school sports.