The Numbers That Decide the Answer
A Beginners listening passage (played twice) is a phone message from a student, Xiaoming, to his friend Anna. The transcript reads:
安娜，这个星期六我不能跟你去看电影了。我妈妈让我跟她去奶奶家。我们早上八点出发，晚上七点回来。电影是下午三点的，我赶不上。下个星期六我有空，你有没有时间？我们可以看四点半的那场。
Anna's notes say: "Can't come Saturday - going to grandma's. Free next Saturday. Movie at 4:30." Her answer to the question "Why can't Xiaoming go to the movie this Saturday?" is: "Because he has to visit his grandmother and won't be back until 7 pm."
Her teacher marks the reason answer as only partly right and says Anna lost marks she could have kept.
1. Explain what Anna got right and what she missed, and write the answer she should have given.
Read the worked answer
What Anna got right
- The core reason: 我妈妈让我跟她去奶奶家 - he is going to his grandmother's.
- The new time: 四点半 next Saturday.
What she missed
Anna has merged the reason with the timing evidence. The passage gives two separate facts:
- Reason he can't go: the family visit to grandma's.
- Why the 3 pm session specifically fails: 我们早上八点出发，晚上七点回来 … 电影是下午三点的，我赶不上 - he is away 8 am to 7 pm, so a 3 pm film is impossible.
Anna's answer adds "won't be back until 7 pm" as if it were part of the reason. It is supporting detail, not the cause. On a "why" question, Beginners markers want the stated cause, kept separate from the numbers.
Model answer: 因为他要跟妈妈去奶奶家。他们早上八点出发，晚上七点回来，所以他赶不上下午三点的电影。
Listening lesson: phone messages in this course are built from a small set of moves - apology, reason, alternative time. Anna should have sorted what she heard into those slots rather than writing one blended sentence. She also correctly caught 四点半, which many students mishear as 三点半; that part of her notes is sound.
2. The passage is played twice. Describe how Anna should use the first and second playings differently to avoid this kind of error.
Read the worked answer
First playing - get the shape, not the details
- Identify who is speaking to whom and what kind of message it is (here: a change of plan).
- Catch the key move: 这个星期六我不能… = a cancellation. Write that down first.
- Do not try to write times and dates yet. Chasing 八点/七点/三点/四点半 on the first pass is exactly how students end up with numbers attached to the wrong event.
Second playing - fill the slots
- Reason: 妈妈让我去奶奶家.
- Departure/return: 八点出发，七点回来.
- Original plan: 三点电影，赶不上.
- New plan: 下个星期六，四点半.
After listening - check the numbers against their labels
Anna's mistake was not mishearing; it was attaching 七点 to the reason. A quick check - "does 7 pm explain why he can't go, or explain why the 3 pm film fails?" - fixes it. In Beginners listening, numbers are almost always given to support a statement, so each number should be tied to the sentence it belongs to.
Also: write the answer in Chinese where the task allows it, since the reason 跟妈妈去奶奶家 is short and the marker can see the exact words she heard.