A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University

A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University

When you learn any language, listening is one of the most difficult skills tolearn Listening is different from hearing It is a process which asks thelisteners to understand and respond in the right manner I would like to

conduct my graduation paper with a study titled “A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen of English Faculty at Thuongmai University”.

The purpose of this study is to find out suitable solutions to solve thedifficulties that freshmen have to face From the difficulties, the research findsout the solutions to solve those problems for both teachers and students inteaching and learning the listening skills Therefore, the researcher applied thequalitative and quantitative methods to do the research The data collectinginstruments like questionnaires, depth interviews were used in the study Theresults of the research are expected to facilitate the students to study Englishwell and have effective studying methods With the hope of improving students'listening competence, especially English-major freshmen at ThuongmaiUniversity, I have made an effort to do this study by my own knowledge

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During the process of doing this study, I have received much necessaryassistance, previous ideas and timely encouragement from my teacher andfriends This research could not have been finished without the help,encouragement, and support from them

First of all, I would like to show my deepest gratitude towards mysupervisors – Mrs Pham Thuy Giang, the English teacher of English Faculty,who has always been willing to instruct me carefully and enthusiastically ineach step, gives me helpful advice and suggestions as well as encourages meevery time I need in order that I can complete this study successfully

Although only my name is written on this research paper, I know I myselfwould be impossible to make it without the help of contributors

I also wish to take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks toEnglish Faculty at Thuongmai University, who have created this chance for me

to work on this study, learn and gain many valuable experiences to do the nextstudy

I am so thankful to English-major freshmen at Thuongmai University whospend their time and effort to take part in the survey of this research

Finally, I would like to acknowledge my thanks to all the authors of thebooks, magazines, documents and the other materials listed in the referencepart for their ideas that have been reflected and developed in the study

Hanoi, April 20 th 2020

Student Nguyen Thi Hong Thom

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

Communication

2 IELTS International English Language Testing System

LIST OF CHARTS, TABLES AND FIGURES

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CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY

However, using English competently is still a difficult problem for manystudents One of the four language skills: Listening, Speaking, Reading, andWriting that all language learners are supposed to acquire - Listening isbelieved to be one of the biggest barriers due to the complex and subtle nature

of listening comprehension in a second or foreign language that students have

to overcome when studying English This is the problem all freshmen of EnglishFaculty at Thuongmai University must face When the writer was a first yearstudent, I found learning listening skills so difficult, especially Business Englishwith many jargon that are difficult to learn and remember That makes students

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not interested in it, find listening classes so boring and feel stressed whilelistening.

There are many kinds of research about improving the listening skill butthere isn’t any research which is carried out at Thuongmai University For those

reasons, I would like to present the thesis titled “A study on how to improve listening skills for freshmen at English Faculty of Thuongmai University”.

1.2 Previous studies

1.2.1 International studies on listening skills

The first study is “Improving listening and speaking skills in mixed level groups” (on the material of New English File) by Idrissova, Smagulova, and

Tussupbekova The study investigates works of scholars about the problems oflistening and speaking in learning foreign languages and analyzes thedifficulties in doing listening and speaking exercises in mixed-level groups.According to the writer, students in mixed level groups have difficulties inspeed of delivery during listening and speaking, face problems withmisunderstanding of new words and phrases, have problems in pronunciation

of English words, and have difficulties in composing sentences using correctgrammatical structure

The second study is “Improving high school English language learners’ second language listening through strategy instruction” by Karen A Carrier on

22 November 2010 This study tests the hypothesis that targeted listeningstrategy instruction in the ESL (English as a second language) classroom,results in improving listening comprehension that can be useful in Englishlanguage learners' academic content classes This study suggests that targetedlistening strategy instruction in discrete listening, video listening, and notetaking can improve students’ listening comprehension of oral academic contentmaterial that they will most likely encounter in their academic content classes.The results of this study serve as a starting point for research into the kinds oflistening students do in different academic content classrooms, and thestrategies that they need to be effective listeners

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The third study is “Using digital stories to improve listening comprehension with Spanish young learners of English”, written by Dolores Ramirez Verdugo

and Isabel Alonso Belmonte This study analyzes whether Internet-basedtechnology could improve listening comprehension in English as a foreignlanguage The researchers believe that there is an urgent need to develop newmaterials and resources adapted to both native and non-native young learners

If the existing materials are to be used in the foreign language classroom, andjust to mention some of the paths to explore, they need to include higherquality sound and slower story-telling pace

1.2.2 Vietnamese studies on listening skills

In “Tìm hi u các y u t nh h ể ế ố ả ưở ng đ n kh năng Nghe c a sinh viên ế ả ủ chuyên ngành t i Hutech ạ ”, Do Thi Song Tuyen researches the English levels ofstudents and the influence on their listening skills From there, the writer givesthe factors that affect students' listening skills

In “Nghiên c u đánh giá năng l c Nghe ti ng Anh c a sinh viên kh i ngành ứ ự ế ủ ố không chuyên Anh c a tr ủ ườ ng đ i h c Ph ạ ọ ươ ng Đông”, Duong Thi Anhresearches the listening ability of non-English majored students

“Khung trình đ chung Châu Âu (Common European Framework) và vi c ộ ệ nâng cao hi u qu đào t o ti ng Anh tr ệ ả ạ ế ở ườ ng đ i h c qu c gia-H Chí Minh” – ạ ọ ố ồ

“Journal of Science and Technology Development” is conducted by Vu Thi

Phuong Anh This study investigates about the Common European Frameworkand use it in Vietnam that helps students improve their English

This topic is absolutely essential and meaningful There are many kinds ofresearch on improving listening skills but there isn’t any research which iscarried out in Thuongmai University Therefore, I decided to choose this topic

1.3 Aims of the study

The main purpose of this study is to explore problems and difficulties inlistening to English Besides, the researcher wants to find out solutions toimprove English listening skills for students

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1.4 Research subjects

For this research, the researcher chose the study on how to improvelistening skills for freshmen at English Faculty of Thuongmai University as aresearch subject After finding out the difficulties that freshmen often facewhen listening English, the author will suggest some solutions to improve theirlistening skills

1.5 Scope of the study

The participants of the research are 100 freshmen who are studying atEnglish Faculty, Thuongmai University They come from all parts of the country,both countryside and cities Besides, they were divided into different classes tostudy every subject together This practice formed multi-level classes InEnglish classes, while some students were good at English, others had lowerEnglish proficiency

The study was completed to understand the current state of listeningskills of English Faculty freshman listening skills and to come up with anumber of techniques to help them improve their English listening skills.Because of the limitation of time and knowledge, the shortage of referencematerials, the study just can be surveyed in 2021

The sample size determined by the survey was 100 samples, equivalent to

100 questionnaires, including online surveys After the investigation process,the group collected 100 raw replies 100 questionnaires were sent to thefreshmen in each of the different classrooms at English Faculty After thesurveyor gives interviewee the information, the votes are collected by the

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surveyors The survey forms are centralized and sent to the informationhandler.

After getting the results, the researcher uses tables and charts forpresenting the collected data

1.7 Organization of the study

The study consists of four chapters, including:

Chapter 1: Overview of the study

The overview of the study includes rationale, aims of the study, scope of

the study, research methodology and organization of the study.

Chapter 2: Literature review

Theoretical background supplies the readers with necessary knowledge

It focuses on the concepts of listening skills, difficulties in English listeningskills, factors affecting listening skills as well as solutions to improve listeningskills

Chapter 3: Research findings

In the third chapter, the study shows the research findings of the studyincluding the analysis results, discussion about the current situation of Englishlistening skills of freshmen at English Faculty at Thuongmai University

Chapter 4: Recommendations and suggestions

This is also an important part It summarizes and recommends solutions

to improve listening skills for freshmen, then gives some suggestions forfurther studies

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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Theoretical background

2.1.1 Definition of listening

Listening is one of the four skills of a language (listening, speaking,reading, and writing) It involves the active involvement of an individual.Listening involves a sender, a message, and a receiver It is the psychologicalprocess of receiving, attending to constructing meaning from, and responding

to spoken and/or non-verbal messages There are some definitions of listening

by different authors such as Howatt and Dankin (1974), Thomlison (1984),Ronald and Roskelly (1985), Gorden (1985), Hirsch (1986), Bentley andBacon(1996), Gary Buck(2001), Scott Shelton(2008), ect

According to Howatt and Dakin (1974), listening is the ability to identifyand understand what others are saying This process involves understanding aspeaker's accent or pronunciation, the speaker’s grammar and vocabulary, andcomprehension of meaning An able listener is capable of doing these fourthings simultaneously

Thomlison (1984), thought that listening which includes "active listening,"which goes beyond comprehension as understanding the message content, tocomprehension as an act of empathetic understanding of the speaker

Ronald and Roskelly (1985), defined listening as an active processrequiring the same skills of prediction, hypothesizing, checking, revising, andgeneralizing that writing and reading demand; and these authors presentspecific exercises to make students active listeners who are aware of the "innervoice" one hears when writing

Gordon (1985) argued that empathy is essential to listening and contendsthat it is more than a polite attempt to identify a speaker's perspectives Rather,more importantly, empathetic understanding expands to "egocentric prosocialbehavior" Thus, the listener altruistically acknowledges concern for thespeaker's welfare and interests

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Hirsch (1986), gave another definition: “Listening as an aspect of skills:involves neurological response and interpretations of sounds to understandand to give meaning by reacting, selecting meaning, remembering, attending,analyzing and including previous experience”.

Bentley and Bacon (1996), stated that listening, an important part of thesecond language learning process, has also been defined as an active processduring which the listener constructs meaning from oral input

Gary Buck (2001), pointed out that “listening comprehension is an activeprocess of constructing meaning and this is done by applying knowledge to theincoming sound” in which “several different types of knowledge are involved:both linguistic knowledge and non-linguistic knowledge”

According to Shelton (2008), listening effectively is a demanding andinvolved process One must be able to deal with different accents orpronunciation, unfamiliar lexical items, and syntactic structures, competing forbackground noise, and also make a conscious effort not to switch off or becomedistracted while listening All must be achieved and dealt with more or lesssimultaneously to identify and understand the meaning in any given message

In conclusion, listening is receiving language through the ears Listeninginvolves identifying the sounds of speech and processing them into words andsentences When we listen, we use our ears to receive individual sounds(letters, stress, rhythm, and pauses) and we use our brain to convert these intomessages that mean something to us All of the definitions are given to clarifythe nature of the listening skills which are necessary for the process ofacquiring a native or foreign language

2.1.2 Definitions of skill

A skill is a learned ability to carry out pre-determined results often withthe minimum outlay of time, energy, or both Skills can often be divided intodomain-general and domain-specific skills For example, in the domain of work,some general skills would include time management, teamwork andleadership, self-motivation, and others, whereas domain-specific skills would

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be useful only for a certain job Skill usually requires certain environmentalstimuli and situations to assess the level of skill being shown and used Peopleneed a broad range of skills to contribute to a modern economy.

2.1.3 Definition of listening skills

Listening is one of the necessary life skills which are defined as skillswhich can provide you with a better perspective on life, allow you to maintain ahigher awareness of both yourself and the world around you It is one of themost vital ways that human beings feel life and live

2.2.2 Understanding

This step helps to understand symbols you have seen and heard, you mustanalyze the meaning of the stimuli you have perceived; symbolic stimuli are notonly words but also sounds like applause and sights like blue uniform that havesymbolic meanings as well; the meanings attached to these symbols are afunction of our past associations and of the context in which the symbols occur.For successful interpersonal communication, the listener must understand theintended meaning and the context assumed by the sender

it to the mind’s storage bank Listening to our attention is selective, so too isour memory- what is remembered may be quite different from what wasoriginally seen or heard.

2.2.4 Evaluating

Only active listeners participate at this stage in the listening process Atthis point the active listener weighs evidence, sorts fact from opinion, anddetermines the presence or absence of bias or prejudice in a message; theeffective listeners make sure that they do not begin this activity too soon;beginning this stage of the process before a message is completed requires thatyou no longer hear and attend to the incoming message as a result, thelistening process ceases Evaluations of the same message can vary widely fromone listener to another

2.2.5 Responding

This stage requires that the receiver complete the process through verbaland/or nonverbal feedback; because the speaker has no other way todetermine if a message has been received, this stage becomes the only overtmeans by which the sender may determine the degree of success intransmitting the message

2.3 Factors affecting listening skills

2.3.1 Pronunciation

It is quite common for non-native speakers of English to mispronounceEnglish words If you mispronounce any word while the person who speaks toyou says the right word, you will not know what it is even though you maylearn and memorize it very well Therefore, the result of your listening will below There are a number of pronunciation factors that affect listening skills,such as word stress and sentence stress, peaker’s intonation and dialect, thedifferent pronunciation basing on part of the speech, homophone

And obviously, having a large vocabulary also helps students increase theirlistening skills Lack of vocabulary will make it difficult for students to learnEnglish, especially when listening to English There are some vocabularyfactors that affect listening skills such as jargon, vocabulary restriction, and theforgotten of word meaning.

2.3.3 Studying methods

Studying methods, in other words, are the ways students use and arrangetheir time suitably, effectively to have enough time to practice their listeningskills Practicing frequency is essential to improve your listening level Unlessstudents study it hard for a long time, their listening will be worse Somefactors can be listed are practice time per day, source of listening material,frequency of practice

2.3.4 Concentration and ability to grasp the main ideas

To complete any listening task, the first thing that students need isconcentration Students are not allowed to neglect it It is important for them topay attention to and grasp the main ideas in their listening to get primaryinformation which helps them be able to understand its content Some factorsthat affect students’s listening skills are listening experience of capturing keywords, the reasonable rest when listening and health status

2.4 Listening strategies

2.4.1 Prepare new words

Our knowledge of the world helps us anticipate the kind of information

we are likely to hear We can usually predict what the speaker is going to talkabout if we read the conference program or presentation abstracts Suchbackground knowledge will help you tune to the topic, as well as activate yoursubject knowledge and related vocabulary, which is stored in the brain Suchpreparation will improve your comprehension even if you do not understandevery single word

Some tips that could help you are: Learn as much information as possibleabout the topic of the presentation and the speaker; read presentation

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abstracts and underline the keywords; check them in the dictionary, ifnecessary; read the handouts and any other supplemental materials; evaluatewhat you already know and what might be new; compare and contrast ideasdiscussed in your community.

This strategy partly helps us to solve problems with vocabulary andpronunciation

2.4.2 Re-listen/find a fix

When you get bored or when ideas are hard, you need to find a way to getback on track The best way to fix things is to re-listen You do not have to waituntil the end to re-listen Sometimes quick backtracking and re-listening to aline or two can quickly clear up confusion This is especially important at thebeginning of an audio assignment If you cannot re-listen, shift to a differentlistening strategy that helps you regain your focus For instance, if you havebeen taking notes, and you are becoming confused, figure out what isconfusing Do you need to look up the meaning of some words, can you writedown your questions, or should you try to summarize what you haveunderstood so far?

2.4.3 Take notes

Writing notes helps you remember ideas, avoid distracted listening.Outlining and layering information is always a good idea, but try otherimaginative ways of taking notes: Use connected circles and shapes, create achart, or draw a map Use abbreviations and symbols that help you keep upwith the speaker’s rate of speech; for instance, if the words memory andcommunication are used a lot, just use an “M” and “C” in your notes and add areminder that explains this after you finish listening Speakers also conveyideas in nonverbal ways Pay attention to intonation, and if applicable, facialexpressions, to take notes on a speaker’s opinions and outlooks To avoidlengthy lines wasting time, leading to missing information, focus on note-takingkeywords only

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CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH FINDINGS

This chapter deals with the quantitative and qualitative researchapproaches The research findings will be explained through descriptivesentences

The researcher collect 110/120 responses after the survey However, inthe process of encrypting information, I found that there were questions thatlacked information or had unreasonable answers Through the whole process

of preliminary treatment, data cleaning, calibration, I removed thequestionnaires that lacked the information and data needed for statisticalanalysis Finally, I collected 100 responses

3.1 Research findings

3.1.1 General information about the students

Chart 3.1 Student’s English study time

As we know, English is an international language and is widely used inmany countries For question 1, the survey results show that most students atThuongmai University, especially freshmen belonging to English Faculty, haveapproached this language very soon Meanwhile, the number of students whohave studied this language for 2 years, 5 years, 8 years and 8 years accountsfor 1%, 3%, 23%, and 73%

Students living in cities tend to learn English earlier than those who grow

up in the countryside That is the reason why there is a difference in thestarting time for each student to learn English

For question 2, the author asked about the level of consensus on theimportance of English Listening skills, the author got an almost "yes" answer

Chart 3.2 Students’ assessment of the importance of English Listening

skills

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When learning English or any language, listening skill is also one of themost important and difficult skills for each student who is studying thislanguage And through the survey, 99% of the students agree with thisperspective and only 1% disagree This means that listening is an essential skillwhen learning English.

When asked about the listening self-assessment, only 1 student identifiedhimself with very good English listening ability.There are up to 22 studentswho think that their ability to hear English is very poor

Chart 3.3 Listening skills self-assessment

That chart shows the listening skills self-assessment of the students Thestudents who have very good listening skills only account for 1%, 6% at a goodlevel, 71% at a normal level, and 22% at a poor level It shows that the majority ofstudents' listening skills are only at a normal level There are still a part ofstudents who are not confident in their English listening ability They are mainlystudents from small provinces, they only focus on learning grammar when theyare in high school

When asking about the time spent on listening practice in 1 day, theauthor gives 4 answers: "No practicing", "15 minutes", "30 minutes" and "1hours" , but only "No practicing" and "30 minutes" are selected

Chart 3.4 Time for listening practice per day

This chart shows the time for listening practice per day Most studentsonly spend 30 minutes a day to develop listening skills (occupying 89%) Thereare 11% of the students who do not spend time practicing With specializedstudents, the time spent on listening practice is too little

3.1.2 The causes affecting English listening skills

3.1.2.1 Pronunciation of the speakers

Chart 3.5 Pronunciation

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Looking at chart 3.5, we see that 55% of students think that "Word stressand sentence stress" greatly affects English listening, followed by "Speaker'sintonation and dialect" (occupying 34%) and "Liaison and elision" (constitute32%) Besides, the homophone also has a huge effect on the listening process.

It reaches to 75% of students who think that it is influential We can see that allfactors of pronunciation are rated in the equivalent, almost equally in terms ofthe “influential” result, freshman found they have to face all of thepronunciation factors when listening to English

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