English listening test and answers: The British Museum is 255 years old

Today is the 255th anniversary of the opening of The British Museum. To celebrate we have some interesting information about the iconic London institution and an English listening test for you to practise your listening skills. Listen to the audio and answer the mutliple-choice questions to find out how good you are at listening for numbers. 

The British museum not far from SGI English school in London

The British Museum

The British Museum is very close to Saint George International and is a regular stop on our famous student social programme which visits London’s best things on offer. After English classes, it is a truly wonderful experience to walk around the incredible building to take a look at all the incredible objects from ancient history from all over the world. There is something for everyone to enjoy and all of the SGI students who visit always say that it is one of the best things to see and do in London during their study holiday. The best thing about the museum is that it is free to enter. Yes, that’s unbelievable, isn’t it? The museum doors are open to the public every day from 10am to 17:30. When you come to SGI to make your English perfect, do not miss out on visiting this great place. You won’t regret it!

English listening test

Here is a little audio with some interesting facts about the British museum. Use it as a listening test to see how good you are at recognising numbers. There are questions below the mp3 for you to answer. When you click on an answer, you will find out if you are right or wrong immediately. English listening test British Museum

Listening test full transcript

The British Museum opened to the public for the first time in 1759. Back then, only 75 people a day visited the museum. Things have changed a lot in the past 255 years. The busiest day for the museum in 2013 was Friday 16th August, when there were 33,848 visitors. And 2013’s busiest month was July with 747,036 visits. The most popular exhibition in 2013 was called, ‘Life and Death in Pompeii’. The original target that the museum hoped for was 250,000 people, but by the time the exhibition closed more than 471,000 people had seen the display. The most popular exhibition ever was in 1972, when approximately 1.6 million people paid to see ‘Tutankhamen’. Among the thousands of incredible items on display is the famous Rosetta Stone. This is an extremely important text written on a granite slab in 3 languages (Greek, hieroglyphs and Egyptian). The stone dates from 196 BC and arrived at the British museum in 1802. You can also see the controversial Elgin Marbles (bought by the museum in 1816 for £35,000), a statue from Easter Island carved around 1200 AD and a gigantic bust of the Egyptian, Amenohotep III who was Pharaoh from 1390 to 1325 BC. In total there were 6,701,036 visits last year, which was a record for the museum. The previous best ever figure was 2008, when there were 5.9m people who came through the British museum doors.

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