this research is a study on indicators of listening instruction in iranian english as a foreign language (efl) curriculum at guidance school and high school educational levels. this thesis aims at determining: a) the indicators of listening instruction at guidance school and high school efl curriculum. b) the indicators of listening instruction in irans guidance school and high school efl curriculum. c) the weak and strong points of irans guidance school and high school efl curriculum according to the indicators of listening instruction. to fulfill the mentioned aims, through a qualitative method (grounded theory) efl curriculum of finland (2004), canada (2001, 2007), lebanon (1995) and efl curriculum of iran’s guidance school and high school (actually the related efl textbooks) have been analyzed and investigated. finland and canadas curriculum were selected due to their success in international literacy competitions such as pirls (2011). also, lebanon was considered as one rather successful country in efl instruction at schools. by studying iran’s guidance school and high school efl curriculum, especially those parts on listening instruction, it can be understood that in this curriculum, efl listening is taken for granted, because no clear definition has been presented for it and its sub-skills have not been introduced explicitly. the curriculum developers directly deal with efl listening instructional objectives before determining its conceptual framework in advance. the lack of such conceptual framework leads to considering general and ambiguous efl listening instructional objectives. the pedagogical implications of the findings would be discussed.