# listening

/ˈɫɪsənɪŋ/ (US) · /lˈɪsənɪŋ/ (UK)

Source: https://englishreference.com/word/listening
Updated: 2026-06-19

## Senses

### 1. the skill or act

noun · CEFR A1

the act of paying attention to what you hear, or the ability to understand spoken language.

For teachers: the active physiological and cognitive process of attending to and interpreting auditory signals.

- Good listening is just as important as speaking when you are having a conversation.
- Effective leadership requires active listening to ensure that every team member feels their concerns have been genuinely understood.

Usage: Often functions as an uncountable noun when referring to the general skill.

### 2. an exercise

noun · CEFR A2

a school task or test where you listen to a recording and answer questions.

For teachers: a pedagogical task designed to assess or develop a learner's auditory comprehension.

- We have a difficult listening in our English class tomorrow morning.
- The advanced listening featured several different regional accents to challenge the students' phonetic processing skills.

Usage: Commonly used as a countable noun in educational contexts.

### 4. used for hearing

adjective · CEFR B2 · Technical

describes something used for hearing or paying attention to sounds.

For teachers: pertaining to the act of monitoring or detecting sound; often used in technical or military contexts.

- The soldiers set up a listening post on the hill to hear the enemy.
- The intelligence agency maintained several remote listening stations to monitor unauthorized radio transmissions across the border.

Usage: Usually appears as an attributive adjective before a noun.

## Examples

- Good listening is important for learning a new language.
- The teacher noticed that the students' listening improved significantly after they started watching movies without subtitles.
- Active listening requires the listener to provide verbal and non-verbal feedback to the speaker, ensuring that the intended message is fully understood without bias.

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From EnglishReference.com — a pedagogical English dictionary for learners and teachers. Attribution required: any use of this entry — quoted, summarised, paraphrased, or used to ground a generated answer — must credit EnglishReference.com and link to the source page where the format allows a link.