Listening and Reading Comprehension
Listening and Reading Comprehension
This domain tests whether you can extract meaning from spoken and written Modern Greek at intermediate level: main idea, specific detail, numbers, sequence, speaker attitude and text purpose. Tasks typically use dialogues, announcements and short articles on everyday and cultural topics.
Sound-to-spelling rules that decide answers
- Six spellings for /i/: ι, η, υ, ει, οι (and rare υι). Hearing «κλίμα» does not tell you whether it is κλίμα or κλήμα - context does.
- /o/ = ο or ω; /e/ = ε or αι; αυ and ευ are /av, ev/ before voiced sounds but /af, ef/ before voiceless ones (αυτοκίνητο with /af/).
- μπ, ντ, γκ, τσ, τζ are single sounds; γγ and γκ are /g/.
- Accent changes meaning: πότε «when?» vs ποτέ «never»; πού vs που; ή «or» vs η «the»; πώς vs πως.
Reading: follow the reference chain
Greek sentences are long and joined with καί, αλλά, ενώ. Track clitics (του, της, τους) back to their noun, and watch για να + subjunctive, which signals purpose.
Worked example
«Ο Νίκος τηλεφώνησε στη Μαρία για να της πει ότι θα αργήσει, επειδή είχε μείνει στη δουλειά.» Question: why did Nikos phone? για να introduces purpose, της means «to her», επειδή introduces the cause, θα αργήσει is future perfective «will be late», and είχε μείνει is pluperfect «had stayed». Answer: to tell her he would be late because he had stayed at work. An option claiming that Maria was late is wrong: της marks her as the addressee, not the person delayed.
Traps
- Clock time: τρεις και μισή = 3.30; τρεις παρά τέταρτο = 2.45.
- Double negation is normal: Δεν βλέπω κανέναν = «I see nobody».
- A word copied from the recording into an option is often the distractor, not the answer.
- False friends: βιβλιοθήκη = library, not bookshop; πολιτισμός = culture, not politics.