A study on pre listening activities of the second year english major students at hung yen university of technology and education

Trang 1 HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES --- GRADUATION PAPER FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS A STUDY ON PRE-LISTENING ACTIVITIES OF THE SECOND-YE

HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION

FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES -

GRADUATION PAPER FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS

A STUDY ON PRE-LISTENING ACTIVITIES OF THE SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT HUNGYEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND

EDUCATION (NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG TIỀN NGHE HIỂU CỦA SINH VIÊN CHUYÊN NGỮ NĂM HAI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC SƯ PHẠM KỸ THUẬT HƯNG YÊN)

Supervisor: M.A Nguyen Thi Nam Student: Vuong Thi Thom Student number: 11317119

Hung Yen – 2021

HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION

FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES -

GRADUATION PAPER FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS

A STUDY ON PRE-LISTENING ACTIVITIES OF THE SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT HUNGYEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND

EDUCATION (NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG TIỀN NGHE HIỂU CỦA SINH VIÊN CHUYÊN NGỮ NĂM HAI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC SƯ PHẠM KỸ THUẬT HƯNG YÊN)

Supervisor: M.A Nguyen Thi Nam Student: Vuong Thi Thom Student number: 11317119

Hung Yen – 2021

I certify that this thesis is the result of my own research and the substance of this thesis has not been submitted for a degree to any other universities or institutions and that if this declaration

is found to be false, disciplinary measures and penalties can be taken and imposed in accordance with university policies and rules

Signature

The completion of this paper could not have been possible without the participation and assistance of so many people whose names may not all be enumerated.Their contributions are sincerely appreciated and gratefuly acknowedged

First and foremost, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Mrs NGUYEN THI NAM, lecturer of the Foreign Languages Department, Hung Yen University of Technology and Education who has always been willing to give me valuable advice and suggestions in order that I can complete successfully this study

I moreover would like to require this opportunity to appear my true much appreciated to all

of lecturers in the Foreign Languages Department of Hung Yen University of Technology and Education of Innovation and Instruction for failingly giving time and endeavors to enhance, broaden and develop my information over the past four a long time

I am also thanks to all second-year students of the Faculty of Foreign languages for their whole-hearted participation in the study

Besides, my words of much obliged are moreover sent to all the creators of the books, magazines, and other materials recorded within the reference portion for their thoughts that have been reflected and created within the think about

Final but not slightest, my most profound appreciation and appreciation go to my family,

my companions and my classmates Their adore, back and steady support gave me an incredible bargain of quality and assurance that offer assistance me amid the upsetting time of composing this paper

Listening may be a exceptionally vital ability in learning English particularly, pre-listening exercises Be that as it may, for the second-year English major students at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education (UTEHY), they still get numerous troubles in listening Therefore, the researcher decided to conduct a study to investigate the status of using pre-listening activities for listening performances, the difficulties faced by students and offer some solutions to improve students' listening skills To attain the specified points of the current think about, the researcher combined both qualitative and quantitative methods, counting study survey questionnaire and interview

The subjects of the ponder are 57 second-year English major students and 5 lecturers of English at Faculty of Foreign Dipartment, Hung Yen University of Technology and Education These lecturers and students are welcomed to reply surveys

With the desire of improving the reality situation, the researcher recommended some suggestions to improve listening skill for both teachers and students to help them in teaching and learning this difficult skill better

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS vi

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES vii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Rationale for the study 1

1.2 Aims of the study 1

1.3 Research questions 2

1.4 Scope of the study 2

1.5 Methodology 2

1.5.1 Questionnaires 2

1.5.2 Interview 2

1.6 Significance of the study 2

1.7 Structure of the study 3

CHAPTER 2: REVIEW OF LITERATURE 4

2.1 Overview of listening 4

2.1.1 Definition of listening 4

2.1.2 Listening processes 5

2.1.3 The stages in listening comprehension 6

2.2 The concept of pre-listening ativities 9

2.2.1 Pre-listening stage 9

2.2.2 Definitions of pre-listening activities 9

2.2.3 Types of pre-listening activities 10

2.3 EFL Learner's Difficulties 12

CHAPTER 3: THE STUDY 15

3.1 The overview of situation of teaching and learning English listening at UTEHY 15

3.2 Methodology 15

3.3 Participants of the study 16

3.3.1 Teachers 16

3.3.2 Students 16

3.4 Data analysis and discussion 16

3.4.1 The questionnaire of teachers 16

3.4.2 The questionnaire of students 22

3.4.3 The interview for students 29

3.5 Discussion 30

3.6 Summary 31

CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSION 32

4.1 Summary of the study 32

4.2 Limitations of the study 32

4.3 Suggestions for further study 33

REFERENCES 32 APPENDICES I

APPENDIX 1 I APPENDIX 2 V INTERVIEWS QUESTIONS FOR STUDENTS VIII

UTEHY: Hung Yen University of Technology and Education MA: Master of Art

FFL: Faculty of Foreign Languages

EFL: English as a foreign language

Chart 3.1: Teachers’ opinion about the importance of listening skill 17

Chart 3.2: Teachers’ opinion about the difficulty of listening skill 17

Chart 3.3: Teachers’ opinion about the importance of pre-listening activities 18

Chart 3.4: The frequency of pre-listening activities organized by teachers 18

Chart 3.5: The frequency of students having difficulty using pre-listening activities 20

Chart 3.6: The students’ opinion about the importance of listening skill 22

Chart 3.7: Students’ opinion about the difficulty of listening skill 23

Chart 3.8: Students’ feeling about learning listening skill 23

Chart 3.9: The students’ opinion about the importance of pre-listening activities 24

Chart 3.10: The frequency of teachers organizes pre-listening activities for students 24

Chart 3.11: The difficulties of students 25

Chart 3.12: The students’ frequency of doing pre-listening activities 28

Table 3.1: Teachers’ reasons for using pre-listening activities ··· 19

Table 3.2: Teachers’ dificulties when teaching listening skill ··· 20

Table 3.3: Teachers’ opinion about solution to improve listening skill ··· 21

Table 3.4: The factors that cause difficulties for students in listening ··· 26

Table 3.5: Students’ favorite genres of pre-listening activities ··· 27

Table 3.6: Benefits of pre-listening activities ··· 29

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale for the study

It can be affirmed that listening is one of the most essential and necessary skills to help English learners communicate in real life as well as in the learning and teaching process When you are learning foreign language, listening skill become more and more important Among four skills, listening is considered the most difficult Like other skills, listening is closely related to store of vocabulary that carries most meanings of the passage but learners have to get it aurally, which is very difficult because of the speed, the accent, the intonation

of the speakers and even the external factors that interrupt the sound

Moreover, Vietnamese learners do not have many opportunities to communicate or speak to native speakers, especially high school students They only learn language through materials

or Vietnamese teachers that do not provide them so good pronunciation as native speakers Last but not least, learners' motivation, one of the most important factors to study language well, is discouraged by all of the factors mentioned above If they cannot hear anything or little, they cannot communicate in the language they are listening to As a result, to help students improve listening skills, teachers first have to find out teaching techniques to attract them to the listening lesson, then to help them enlarge store of vocabulary, be familiar with the pronunciation of native speakers

As a English leaner, I think interesting and suitable pre-listening activities can raise students' motivation and have other positive effects on learning procedures Hence, I choose the topic

"A Study on the Pre-listening Activities of second-year English major students at UTEHY” with the hope, to some extent, to discover the dificulties of listening skill and benefits that pre-listening activities bring to students

1.2 Aims of the study

The study has three main aims as follows:

- Find out the current situation of using pre-listening activities of the second-year English major students at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education

- Find out the difficulties of the second-year English major students at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education in using pre-listening activities

- Give some pre-listening activities and solutions to these problems

1.3 Research questions

The study is conducted to answer the following questions:

• What is the current situation of using pre-listening activities of the second-year English major students at UTEHY?

• What are the difficulties of the second-year English major students at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education in learning English listening skills?

• What pre-listening activities should be used to help the second-year English major students at UTEHY overcome their difficulties?

1.4 Scope of the study

This study cannot cover the whole issue of pre-listening activities because of the framework

of a minor thesis Therefore, it only focuses on pre-listening activities when listening to English of the second-year English majors at UTEHY, particularly working out the students’ towards listening, their difficulties in listening and giving some pre-listening activities for improving their listening skill

1.5 Methodology

1.5.1 Questionnaires

A survey research with quantitative method is used and considered the most suitable

to obtain the aims of the study The study targets at analyzing the outcome with numbers and figures The data were collected by means of questionnaires which were designed and handled to a defined population The subjects were asked to answer the questions and the questionnaires were collected right away The answers are completely objective, not controlled by the researcher

1.5.2 Interview

The semi-structured interviews were applied with five students and two teachers to find out clearer results The interview questions and the questionnaire were designed basing

on the main aims of the study

1.6 Significance of the study

The findings of this study will be directed to society's benefit that English plays an important role in today's life Greater demand for graduates with an English background leads to a need for more effective teaching methods Hence, schools that apply the

recommendations drawn from the results of this study will be able to train better students

Teachers can inspire students and help them improve their listening skills

1.7 Structure of the study

The study consists of four parts, organize as follows:

Part 1: Introduction

Gives information about the topic of this paper, background to the study, the reasons

for choosing topic, the aims of the study, the significance of the study, the scope of the study,

methods of the study and an outline of the thesis in this paper

Part 2: Literature review

- Discusses the relevant theories related to listening and pre-listening activities

Part 3: The study

Consist of three parts below:

- Methodology and data: Mentions to the methods of the study, the participants of the study,

data collection instruments and procedures of data collection

- Data analysis, main findings and discussions: Analyses the data collected in order to find

out the students' attitudes towards listening and pre-listening activities and their difficulties

in listening

- Recommendations for improving listening skill: Some pre-listening activities are suggested

with the hope that students can try and have positive feelings to leaming listening skill And

then these activities can improve their listening skill

Part 4: Conclusion

- Summaries all the key issues as well as the limitations and suggestions for the further study

CHAPTER 2: REVIEW OF LITERATURE 2.1 Overview of listening.

Listening is a process that allows listeners to understand a message, engage them in conversation and succeed in communication Without listening skills, people engaged in communication will not receive the message, and as a result, they cannot respond quickly and effectively Many researchers agree that in foreign language learning, Listening plays

an important role in the process of acquiring a language

In recent decades, listening comprehension skills have attracted more and more attention of researchers in teaching and learning foreign languages in general and learning English as a foreign language (EFL) in particular Many scholars believe that the most important step in starting to learn a language other than your first language is trying to hear that language Rubin & Thompson (1994) affirms: “Listening, quite possibly, is the most important of language skills since people spend approximately 60% of their time listening…” Rost (1994) also emphasizes that Listening can be seen as an essential skill in the training of a foreign language learner and can even be seen as a predictor of language successful of learners

Thus, it can be seen that listening skills play an important role in the process of learning foreign languages

2.1.1 Definition of listening

According to Hasan (2000), "listening" and "understanding" are two separate processes, in which "listening" is a process by which the listener receives the information, and this process takes place one way, completely not demanding ask for any interpretations

or interactions with the audible text And listening comprehension is a process of two-way interaction between the listener and the listening text, and this interaction helps the listener have a general understanding of the listening text This process of "listening" and

"understanding" is done when the listener selects and explains the information received by the hearing organs and other visual cues (if any) in order to understand the message of the speaker

This view of listening comprehension is also consistent with the second hypothesis

of language supported by Richards (1983) and O'Malley & Chamot (1990) This assumption assumes that listening to spoken language is a complex activity and process, in which the

listener focuses on the aspects selected for listening From the sounds they hear, they find out the meaning of the message they hear, and relate what they hear to their current knowledge Brett (1995) states that “Listening is a key second language skill, it has a vital role in the language acquisition process, and its development is of prime concern to language teachers” When comparing listening with other language skills, Morley (2001) also points out that on average each of us hears “twice as much as what we say, four times what we read and five times what we write.”

Researchers distinguish between Listening and Hearing Listening is an active process, which involves analyzing sound, as opposed to Hearing, which only passively receives sound In the same way, Harmer (2001) says that Listening is a “receptive skill” when students receive the main idea through what they hear Listeners receive messages from speakers through understanding the accent, pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary used

by speakers and understanding the meaning of their messages

According to Helgesen (2003), listening is an active and purposeful skill During the listening process, listeners not only capture what they are listening to, but also can relate the listening content with information they already know to understand the listening lesson In addition, Helgesen also said that when listening, the listener not merely hears the words but needs to understand the implications behind those words

Brown (2001) also shares this point of view and argues that the "top-down" process occurs when learners use the background knowledge and available vocabulary to capture the content of the listening, while the “bottom- up” means using the context of the listening text

to predict the meaning of a new word

Underwood (1989) explains that the top-down and bottom-up processing are two ways of processing a listening text Top-down processing refers to utilizing background knowledge and global understanding as to derive meaning from and interpret the message Bottom-up processing refers to deriving the meaning of the message based on the incoming language data, from sounds, to words, to grammatical relationships, to meaning

The bottom-up process encourages students to use their knowledge of vocabulary, grammar and sounds to make sense of what they hear while the top-down one enables them

to use their background knowledge or what they have already known from life experience and situational routines to predict the meaning However, all the factors like vocabulary, grammar, sounds and background knowledge are very necessary to understand spoken language In an English listening lesson, hence, teachers can use the most suitable process

or make a good combination of two processes in certain tasks Of course, students need to

be approached with both of them in order that they can well activate their knowledge of all listening factors involved and finally improve their listening skills

2.1.3 The stages in listening comprehension

According to the Mary Underwood (1989), there are three stage of listening comprehension They are pre-listening, while-listening and post-listening

Pre-listening

The first stage of the three stages of listening comprehension is the pre-listening stage, which contains things or activities that students are required to do before listening It should help students make the most of their work This stage is usually used before students listen

to the text (Rixon, 1993) The pre-listening stage is used to activate prior knowledge It can also be used to help students prepare for the listening process (Underwood, 1989) As Rixon (1993) pointed out, in the pre-listening stage, it is helpful to avoid pre-listening the language

of the auditory language, or to tell students as much as possible about the subject or the instructions in it, because it eliminates the problem Challenges and interests Pre-listening work needs to be done in a certain way, and it should come naturally as listening becomes part of the comprehensive skill course When planning a conference, it is necessary to dedicate time to pre-listening activities, which should not be attacked (Underwood, 1989)

In the pre-listening stage, it is important to give students clear instructions on what

to do while listening Students need to know what is required of them This is a necessary part of the pre-listening stage Before the teacher starts to play, speak or read listening articles, all students must understand the work they must complete (Underwood 1989) As Rixon (1993) claims, teachers must ensure that students understand the meaning of listening tasks

In addition, please check that everyone understands and is ready, and add other instructions that may be needed The teacher may decide to break the activity into smaller steps, which then need to be told in the classroom (Underwood, 1989) In other words, each student must know what to do in the pre-listening stage, and the teacher must ensure that the student understands what to do To sum up, the pre-listening stage is the main and necessary part of listening comprehension, which can help students adjust to listening

While-listening

The second necessary part of the listening process is the while- listening stage, which includes exercises used when students listen to passages This stage belongs to the pre-listening stage Rixon (1993) pointed out that “the sort of exercise that is often used during the while-listening phase helps students by indicating the overall structure of the argument.”

In the simultaneous listening stage, students must listen to the text at least twice Sometimes, students need three to four times to understand The first listening should give the student a general imagination of the text In summary, the listening while stage is the next important part of the listening process In this process, the teacher checks the listening activities and the students focus on the listening paragraph

During the while-listening stage learners do the while-listening exercises during or proximately after the time they are listening, so it is important to choose appropriate exercises While-listening activities are what learners are requested to do during listening to the passage The aim of while-listening activities is to help students develop the skill of eliciting notices from spoken language (Underwood, 1989)

There are other reasons why students need to listen to other languages The main goal

is to learn to recognize sounds so that they can use what they hear as their own speech model (Underwood, 1989) According to Rixon (1993), the necessary goal of listening practice is

to capture the important notes contained in the listening text Underwood (1989) believes

that “when developing the skills of listening for comprehension is the aim, while-listening activities must be chosen carefully.” On the other hand, activities, such as generating correct

or incorrect answers, may delay everyone except the most enthusiastic students Underwood (1989) pointed out that “to help non-native listeners learn to apply these skills, which they have and use when listening in their own languages, we must have listening activities which give practice in prediction, interpretation and matching.”

While-listening activities, which are good, help students find their way through the listening passage and construct on the expectations raised by pre-listening activities (Underwood, 1989) Hence, in the while-listening stage students are asked to do the while-listening activities during or directly after the time they are listening, due to it is considerable

to prefer suitable activities

Post-listening

The post-listening stage is the last stage of listening comprehension, it follows the first two stages and is reached after listening to the passage According to Underwood's (1989) research, activities in the post-listening stage cover all the work described in a special listening text They finished it after listening Rixon (1993) stated that at this stage, students mastered the information they got from textbooks to listen to They improved it for another purpose This means that students who take notes on paragraphs can rewrite their notes into written descriptions, and they can summarize information verbally (Rixon, 1993) In other words, this final listening stage, attending previous two stages, is completed directly after listening to the text

The post-listening stage is the last stage of listening comprehension, in which the post-listening work must be done immediately after learners finished a listening activity Underwood (1989) argues that ‘the most common form of post-listening activity has, in the past, been the answering of multiple-choice questions or open questions based on a spoken text.’ On the other hand it is quite difficult activity and depends not only on listening skill but also on reading abilities, writing skills and memory (Underwood, 1989)

2.2 The concept of pre-listening ativities

2.2.1 Pre-listening stage

This stage is considered as preparatory work because through suitable activities, it helps students to focus their minds on the topic by narrowing down the things that the students expect to hear and activating relevant knowledge and already known language (Underwood, 1989) She also affirms the importance of this stage: “It is unfair to plunge students straight into the listening text, even when testing rather than teaching listening comprehension." Rost (2002) also emphasizes that "Effective listening tasks often involve

an explicit pre-listening step, some activities that the learner does prior to listening to the main input in order to increase readiness" This stage helps students to get ready for the listening tasks It is designed to activate what the learner already knows, provide an "advance organizer" to help the learner predict ideas and "pre-structure" information (Joyce et al., 1992), cited by Rost (2002)

In conclusion, the pre-listening stage is essential because it helps provide basic information, activate students' knowledge as well as some skills (e.g., guessing the topic) that are necessary to complete listening tasks effectively

2.2.2 Definitions of pre-listening activities

As mentioned above, the pre-listening stage plays a very important role when teaching listening, so do the activities in this stage Ur (1984) states that teaching listening has been suggested including pre-task period to benefit from tasks The period prior to act

on listening tasks, pre-listening phase, is associated to preparation stage in which learners are provided by some activities as a kind of support to help them act on tasks Also defining pre-listening activities as preparation stage, Underwood (1989) says before listening, students should be "tuned in" so that they know what to expect, both in general and for particular tasks This kind of preparatory work is generally described as "pre-listening work"

or just "pre-listening." Chastain (1988) considers pre-listening activities as the most crucial aspects in listening process because other activities depend on the extent to which the teacher has been successful in activating students' background and directing them to reach the goal

of activity

In short, pre-listening activities give students time to get confident and interested in the lesson thanks to the given knowledge as well as the new one When planning lessons,

time must be allocated for pre-listening activities and these activities should not be rushed (Underwood, 1989)

2.2.3 Types of pre-listening activities

Underwood (1989: 31) declares that pre-listening tasks can consist of a variety of activities, which can help the teacher to focus the students' minds on the topic by narrowing down the things that the learners anticipate to hear and stimulating relevant previous knowledge and already known language, including:

- the teacher giving background information;

- the students reading something relevant;

- the students looking at pictures;

- discussion of the topic or situation;

- a question and answer session;

- written exercises;

- following the instructions relevant for the while-listening activity;

- consideration of how the while-listening activity will be done;

Underwood also states other important roles of these activities: For students without sufficient prior knowledge of the topic, such activities provide a chance to gain some (even

if limited) knowledge which will help them to follow the listening text In addition, it is likely that in this kind of pre-listening activity, students will actually use the words which they will shortly hear in the text This "bringing to the forefront" of known lexis and syntax will assist them when they come to match what they hear with the store of knowledge In my study, all pre-listening activities listed by Underwood will be used to survey among students

as well as teachers in order to discover their effects on listening comprehension tasks

2.2.4 Aims of pre-listening activities

• Setting the context

This is perhaps the most important thing to do - even most exams give an idea about who is speaking, where and why In normal life we normally have some idea of the context of something we are listening to

Pre-listening activities studies carried out in EFL (English as a foreign language) and ESL (English as a second language) contexts take a variety of forms, including textual/contextual cues (Dixon, 1991), aural descriptions (Dixon, 1991) (Herron, 1994), picture (Herron et al., 1995), vocabulary (Chung and Huang, 1998) and question preview (Chung, 2002), and written descriptions (Wilberschied and Berman, 2004) In a study, Herron (1994) studied the effect of a single pre-task on the listening comprehension of 38 beginning-level French learners In the experimental condition, the teacher read aloud six sentences describing major scenes in a video before viewing this In the control condition, participants just viewed the video without any teacher intervention Results showed that participants who had access to the pre-listening activities prior to viewing the video scored significantly better than those who were not provided with any advance introduction of relevant concepts

• Generating interest

Motivating our students is a key task for us If they are to do a listening about sports, looking at some dramatic pictures of sports players or events will raise their interest or remind them of why they (hopefully) like sports Personalization activities are very important here A pair-work discussion about the sports they play or watch, and why, will bring them into the topic, and make them more willing to listen

• Acquiring knowledge

Students may have limited general knowledge about a topic Providing knowledge input will build their confidence for dealing with a listening This could be done by giving a related text to read, or, a little more fun, a quiz

• Activating vocabulary / language

Just as activating topic knowledge is important, so is activating the language that may

be used in the listening Knowledge-based activities can serve this purpose, but there are other things that can be done If students are going to listen to a dialogue between a parent

and a teenager who wants to stay overnight at a friend's, why not get your students to role play the situation before listening They can brainstorm language beforehand, and then perform the scene By having the time to think about the language needs of a situation, they will be excellently prepared to cope with the listening

• Checking / understanding the listening tasks

By giving your students plenty of time to read and understand the main listening comprehension tasks, you allow them to get some idea of the content of the listening They may even try to predict answers before listening

https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/pre-listening-activities

2.3 EFL Learner's Difficulties

According to Underwood (1989), learners of English as a foreign language often face

the following seven potential difficulties: (1) lack of control over the speed at which speakers

speak; (2) not being able to get things repeated; (3) the listener's limited vocabulary; (4) failure to recognize the “signals”; (5) problems of interpretation; (6) inability to concentrate; and (7) established learning habits

Rubin and Thompson (1994) also identified three problems and suggested solutions First, the speaker speaks too quickly If the listener is unable to keep up with the speaker's speed, they can ask the speaker to repeat, speak louder, louder, or express the same idea, but

in a different way that is easier to understand Second, the listener does not understand the target language on television or in movies Listeners need to guess, or predict what they'll hear next based on the teacher's visual cues, questions, initiation activities, and their background knowledge Third, the listener tends to stop listening, when hearing a new word,

or phrase As a result, they lose pieces of information that might help explain unfamiliar words or phrases Listeners need to focus on familiar parts and continue listening to get complete information

According to Hasan (2000), learners sometimes fail to realize that they are mistaken

in identifying the causes of their problems They often (i) use ineffective listening strategies and (ii) try to listen and try to understand every word, every detail of the text It is wrong to try to listen and try to understand every word in the audio, since even native speakers do not listen this way Good listeners often only listen to keywords to understand the main idea of the listening message and always try to guess the meaning of the new word in the context of the listening article

Rubin (1994) points out five factors that can affect listening comprehension These are (i) Characteristics of the listening text such as speech speed, pause, stress and rhyme, difference between first language and second language etc.; (ii) Characteristics of the person talking like gender and language proficiency; (iii) Characteristics of the exercise such as type

of exercise; (iv) Listener's characteristics such as language proficiency, memory, concentration, age, gender, ability to use first language, background knowledge and (v) Characteristics of listening information processing like using top-down, bottom-up, parallel processing, listening strategies etc

Yagang (1994) evaluates listening comprehension difficulty based on four factors: (1) the listening messages, (2) the speaker, (3) the listener and (4) the listening context Rubin (1994) also shared this view When learning a foreign language, it is very tiring to hear and understand the meaning of unfamiliar sounds over a long period of time Although successful listeners don't try to understand every word they hear (in fact, they only hear keywords), they still find it difficult to separate keywords from a long, word-dense listening Additionally, if the message contains too much information that cannot be easily stored in short-term memory, then listening strategies may not be viable Short listening sessions are often more effective, as it reduces the complexity of the content, while at the same time helping the listener reduce fatigue and shorten the time to focus intensely When discussing the thickness

of the listening text, many researchers, including Ur (1984) and Underwood (1989), have shown that information in spoken language needs to be presented sparsely than in spoken language written language

According to Rubin (1994), background knowledge has a lot to do with understanding listening topics Learners build meaning of the listening text by breaking what they hear (or read) into meaningful units, then put them together, based on their available social and linguistic knowledge, and then use Logical speculation fills in the blanks Learners with varying degrees of background knowledge on a topic understand and interpret new information in different ways as they decode new information Using their existing knowledge and strategies, learners try to interpret new information by linking to familiar information Boyle (1984) sees " Knowledge of the specific topic or subject" as a factor influencing foreign language listening and understanding Learners find it easier to listen to

a song on a familiar topic than it is to listen to a new topic To help learners familiarize themselves with the topic of the listening lesson, teachers should initiate learners' background knowledge before performing a listening task, helping them to use what they already know about the topic, facilitating the process of listening comprehension took place effectively

CHAPTER 3: THE STUDY

This chapter is consisted of two sections of findings and discussion It shows an attempt to answer the three research questions posed at the beginning of the study

3.1 The overview of situation of teaching and learning English listening at UTEHY

Hung Yen University of Technology and Education (UTEHY) has been established for over 50 years Ten years ago, there did not have a Faculty of Foreign Languages as there was only English: English for communication and English for specific purposes (ESP), which had been teaching for a long time But thanks to the opening of a course for students

of English major, the section of English was developed into the Faculty of Foreign Languages Like other language major universities, the English major students at UTEHY have to study 4 years as eight terms with different subjects in English Right from the first

semester onwards the four English skills are taught as isolate subjects

The objectives of the English course are clear; after finishing the course, students can obtain:

- The general knowledge of English grammar and an active vocabulary of about 5,000 words

- The ability to communicate with foreigners in English fluently

- The ability to understand and use the professional terms and structures

3.2 Methodology

To collect the data for researching, the author used both quantitative and qualitative methodology including survey questionnaires for teachers and students, interview questions for students and class observation According to Minichiello (1990) "qualitative research was concerned with understanding human behavior from the informants' perspective" Qualitative research is useful for studies at the individual level and to find out, in depth the ways in which people think or feel Moreover, the collected data can be more valid and reliable Regarding quantitative rescarch, according to Minichiello (1990) "quantitative research was concerned with discovering facts about social phenomena" Quantitative research gathers data in numerical form which can be put into categories, or in rank order,

or measured in units of measurement The collected data can be less in-depth but more breadth of information across a large number of cases Hence, with the aims of this study, the author employed survey questionnaire to collect quantitative data and the interview and observation for qualitative data

3.3 Participants of the study

3.3.1 Teachers

At FFL of UTEHY, there are 27 teachers in which there are 2 teachers of Chinese, one teacher of Vietnamese and 24 teachers of English In FFL, the English teachers are very young and mainly females In this study, the researcher invited 5 of them to answer the questionnaire Some of them have attended a lot of advanced training courses held by the American and English council In spite of being busy in teaching and learning, they are always active an energetic with students

3.3.2 Students

This study was carried out with the participation of 57 second-year English major students at UTEHY They were all in the second term and from two different classes Their age ranged from 19-21 Most of them have learnt English for 11 years (3 years at primary school, 4 years at secondary school, 3 years at high school and 1 year at UTEHY) However, their English backgrounds are quite similar because most of them come from different rural areas in the North and under being influence of curriculum of English for high school students in the past, students did not have many chances to practice English skills Thus, when entering UTEHY, their English levels were limited and they have to face up with many difficulties in studying

3.4 Data analysis and discussion

The 57 copies of the questionnaire were delivered to the students, and the 5 ones from teachers that all of them were responded and gathered The collected data is analyzed

in this part in below tables and charts which present the responses for the questions in the

questionnaire

3.4.1 The questionnaire of teachers

The questionnaire for 5 teachers includes 9 questions with the following information The first six questions are used to collect the teachers’ attitudes towards listening skill and using pre-listening activities in learning listening skill In the next two questions, it refers to popular difficulties in learning listening skill The last question aims at giving the techniques

to improve listening skill when doing pre-listening activities

3.4.1.1 The teachers’ attitudes towards listening skill and using pre-listening activities in learning listening skill

Question 1: How important do you think listening skill is?

Chart 3.1: Teachers’ opinion about the importance of listening skill

The pie chart 3.1 shows the teachers’ attitudes towards the importance of listening skill in English The majority of them who take up to 80% think that listening skill is very important The other 20% find it important No one of them chooses “Normal or Not

important” in their answer In short, according to the teachers’ opinion, listening skill is considered an indispensable skill when learning English

Question 2: How difficult is it to learn English listening skill?

Chart 3.2: Teachers’ opinion about the difficulty of listening skill

The pie chart 3.2 shows that most of teachers (60%) think that listening skill is very difficult The number of teachers who think that the listening skill is difficult and the

number of teachers who think this skill is not too difficult is equal in number and both

accounted for 20% No one of them chooses “Easy or Very easy” in their answer

Hence able to see that all teachers confirmed that their students are having

a parcel of troubles in learning English listening skill

Question 3: How important do you think pre-listening activities are?