In response to the 1978 amendment to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, many states have developed curriculum and assessment procedures for listening skills. A review of several states' listening objectives, however, indicates a lack of any universally accepted definition of listening. One model of communication that divides a person's communicative ability into information acquisition, processing, generation, and dissemination also suggests that listening is a complicated set of intersecting and overlapping skills. Although separation of skills is difficult, it is necessary for instructional and testing purposes. Educators interested in developing effective procedures for listening assessment must realize that no one test is going to evaluate all listening skills and that instructional objectives must be congruent with test coverage if the testing process is to have any validity. (MM)