2.1 Four Pictures Basics: Action Verbs & Present Continuous Forms
Key Takeaways
Listening Part 1 has 6 items: for each one you see a set of four pictures, (A) to (D), and hear one short phrase or sentence that is not printed.
Prompts can be full sentences (She's cutting up fruit.) or phrases (A man wearing headphones); an -ing phrase describes what is true now.
Contracted auxiliaries carry information: she's points to one woman, they're to more than one person.
Wearing is a state, while putting on and taking off are movements; holding differs from picking up, putting down, and carrying.
When the person and object are the same in all four pictures, the verb or its particle (cut up, turn on) is the deciding word.
2.1 Action Verbs & Present Continuous Forms
Quick Answer: Listening Part 1 (Four Pictures) has 6 questions. For each one you see a set of four pictures labeled (A) to (D) in your test book and hear one short phrase or sentence, spoken once and not printed. You choose the picture that the phrase or sentence best describes. Many prompts describe an action with the present continuous (She's cutting up fruit.) or with a short -ing phrase (A man wearing headphones), so the verb is often the word that separates the four pictures.
How Part 1 (Four Pictures) Works
Listening Part 1 opens the test with 6 questions (Questions 1–6 on the ETS sample test). For each question you see a set of four pictures in your test book and you hear one short phrase or sentence. The ETS directions say: look at the set of pictures, choose the picture that the phrase or sentence best describes, and mark the letter (A), (B), (C) or (D) on your answer sheet. The spoken prompt is not printed, and the pictures carry no words.
This is the reverse of Part 1 on the standard TOEIC Listening and Reading test, where you see one photograph and hear four statements about it. On TOEIC Bridge there is one piece of language and four images. Your job is to find the single picture in which every word you heard is true.
The ETS examinee handbook gives three model prompts. Each shows a different kind of language you must be ready for:
| Heard in the ETS sample | Language type | What the four pictures are compared on |
|---|---|---|
| "A man wearing headphones" | Noun phrase + -ing participle | Which man has headphones on |
| "She's cutting up fruit." | Present continuous sentence | What the woman is doing with the fruit |
| "The tallest man is wearing a cap." | Superlative + present continuous | Which picture shows the tallest man with a cap |
The first prompt is not even a full sentence. Part 1 uses short phrases as well as sentences, so train yourself to hear a noun followed by a describing phrase (a woman carrying a bag, children playing in a park) as a complete prompt. It means a woman who is carrying a bag.
Why the Present Continuous Is So Common
A picture freezes one moment. When a prompt says what someone is doing at that moment, English uses the present continuous (also called the present progressive):
In natural speech the auxiliary verb is usually contracted, and this is where beginners lose information:
- She's cutting up fruit. (She is)
- They're waiting for a bus. (They are)
- He's opening a window. (He is)
Hearing she's tells you to look for one woman; they're tells you to look for more than one person. Before the prompt plays, count the people in each picture. If two pictures show one person and two pictures show a group, the pronoun alone removes half the choices.
In phrase prompts the auxiliary disappears completely: A man wearing headphones has no is. The -ing word still describes what is true of the man right now.
Action Contrasts to Expect
All four pictures must look possible, so they often share the same person, objects or place and differ in the action. Practice these common contrasts:
| Heard | Picture that matches | Pictures that do not match |
|---|---|---|
| She's putting on a jacket. | An arm going into a sleeve | Jacket already on (wearing), jacket on a hook, jacket being folded |
| He's picking up a box. | A box moving up from the floor | Holding a box, carrying a box across a room, opening a box |
| They're sitting down. | People lowering themselves onto chairs | Already seated, standing up, walking past chairs |
| She's cutting up fruit. | A knife and fruit in pieces | Washing fruit, buying fruit, eating fruit |
Two pairs need special practice:
- wearing vs. putting on / taking off. Wearing is a state: the item is already on the body. Putting on and taking off are movements.
- holding vs. picking up / putting down / carrying. Holding means the object is in the hand. The other verbs describe movement up, down or across a place.
Phrasal Verbs: Listen for the Small Word
Many everyday actions are phrasal verbs, and the particle changes the picture: cut up (into pieces), pick up (lift), put down (place), turn on (start a light or machine), turn off, fill up (make full), clean up, look at, look for. In She's cutting up fruit, the word up tells you the fruit is being cut into pieces. Particles such as up, on, off and at are short and unstressed in fast speech, so practice hearing them inside a sentence rather than alone.
Sound-Alike Verbs
You hear the prompt only once, so a misheard verb sends you to the wrong picture. These pairs are common problems for learners:
| Heard verb | Easily confused with | The difference |
|---|---|---|
| walking | working | Walking is moving on foot; working is doing a job. |
| washing | watching | Washing uses water; watching uses the eyes. |
| painting | planting | Painting adds color; planting puts plants in soil. |
| sweeping | sleeping | Sweeping uses a broom; sleeping is resting. |
| pouring | pulling | Pouring moves liquid; pulling moves an object toward you. |
Listen to the whole verb, especially the vowel and the consonants around it, and then look for that action.
Worked Example
You see: (A) A woman slicing an apple on a cutting board. (B) A woman washing apples in a sink. (C) A woman paying for apples at a market stall. (D) A woman eating an apple at a table.
You hear: "She's cutting up an apple."
- (A) matches. Cutting up matches slicing on a board.
- (B) The woman and the apples match, but washing is not cutting.
- (C) Paying is a shopping action; there is no knife.
- (D) Eating is a different action, even if the apple is already in pieces.
The subject (she) and the object (an apple) appear in every picture, so the verb is the only deciding word. That is typical of Part 1: find what is different across the four pictures before the prompt plays, and you will know which word to listen for.
Practice Routine
- Collect everyday photos and group them in sets of four that show the same person or place doing different things.
- Say one present continuous sentence for one photo, then check that it is false for the other three.
- Record yourself and listen back for contractions (she's, they're) and particles (up, on, off).
You see four pictures of the same man in a hallway. You hear: "He's putting on a jacket." Which picture does the sentence describe?
The man walking down the hall with a jacket already on
The man hanging a jacket on a hook
The man folding a jacket on a chair
The man pushing one arm into a jacket sleeve
In Listening Part 1 you hear only the phrase "A woman carrying a bag." How should you understand it?
It is incomplete, so no picture can match and you should guess
It describes a bag with no person in the picture
It means a woman who is carrying a bag now, so choose the picture where a woman is moving with a bag
It means the woman carried a bag earlier in the day
Four pictures show two people and a table with chairs. You hear: "They're sitting down." Which picture matches?
Two people lowering themselves onto chairs
Two people already seated and eating
Two people standing and talking beside the chairs
Two people pushing the chairs under the table
Sections you finish are checked off in the contents.