TOEFL, the abbreviated form of Test of English as a Foreign Language is an English language testing system. This test evaluates the language proficiency of students in various sections. Reading, Listening, Speaking and Writing are the four sections to have appeared in the test. The total test takes 3 hours for completion with a 10-minute break after the Reading and Listening section. The scoring range for each section is 0-30. The overall score range in TOEFL is 0 to 120.
Reading Section
This section is designed to evaluate the reading and understanding ability of the students. Students get 3 to 4 reading passages to attempt in this section. They get 54 to 72 minutes time to complete 10 questions of each of the passages.
Listening
This is an important section of the test that is taken to determine the competence of the students regarding the understanding of conversation and lectures in English. Lectures and conversations are the listening items that are to be attended by the students. 3 to 4 lectures each of 3-5 minutes long are played for attempting 6 questions per lecture. And 2-3 conversations of length 3 minutes each involving two speakers are played. 5 questions are asked to attempt for each conversation.
Students can take notes during the hearing and have 41 to 57 minutes to complete them.
Speaking
This section measures the speaking ability of the test givers. The test includes 4 tasks that are associated with real-life situations that could be found both in and outside the classroom. Among the four speaking tasks, the first is called the independent speaking task which requires personal ideas, opinions and experiences to present. The second, third and fourth questions called integrated speaking tasks require combined language skills of listening and speaking or listening, reading and speaking as required in and out of the classroom. Students get 15-30 seconds for preparation and are given 45-60 seconds to respond to each task.
Writing
This section evaluates the writing capability of the students. Two writing tasks are involved in this test: An integrated writing task and the Independent writing task. The prior is required to be completed in 20 minutes while 30 minutes is the allocated time to complete the latter one.
In Integrated writing, students are required to read a short passage and listen to a short lecture. Students should write responding to the read and listened to materials.
While in independent writing, students should write an essay on a given topic relating to one’s personal experience or opinion.