Những khó khăn trong việc học kỹ năng nghe của sinh viên năm thứ nhất trường Đại học Hàng hải Việt Nam và một số giải pháp khắc phục

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES LÊ THỊ HỒNG LOAN DIFFICULTIES IN LEARNING LISTENING SKILLS EXPERIE

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

LÊ THỊ HỒNG LOAN

DIFFICULTIES IN LEARNING LISTENING SKILLS EXPERIENCED BY FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT VIETNAM MARITIME UNIVERSITY AND

SOME SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS

(NHỮNG KHÓ KHĂN TRONG VIỆC HỌC KỸ NĂNG NGHE CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ NHẤT TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC HÀNG HẢI VIỆT NAM VÀ

MỘT SỐ GIẢI PHÁP KHẮC PHỤC)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60.14.10

HANOI - 2012

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

LÊ THỊ HỒNG LOAN

DIFFICULTIES IN LEARNING LISTENING SKILLS EXPERIENCED BY FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT VIETNAM MARITIME UNIVERSITY AND

SOME SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS

(NHỮNG KHÓ KHĂN TRONG VIỆC HỌC KỸ NĂNG NGHE CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ NHẤT TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC HÀNG HẢI VIỆT NAM VÀ

MỘT SỐ GIẢI PHÁP KHẮC PHỤC)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60.14.10

Supervisor: Phạm Thị Thanh Thủy, M.A

HANOI - 2012

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Declaration……… ……… i

Acknowledgements……… ii

Abstract……… iii

Table of contents….……… iv

List of charts… ……….……… ix

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Statement of the problem and rationale of the study……… 1

1.2 Aims of the study……… 1

1.3 Scope of the study……… 2

1.4 Significance of the study……… 2

1.5 Design of the study……… 2

CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Listening comprehension……… 4

2.2 Component skills of listening……… 4

2.3 Potential problems in learning listening……… 6

2.3.1 Sounds……… 6

2.3.2 Stress and intonation……… 7

2.3.3 Vocabulary……… 8

2.3.4 Speech rate……… 9

2.3.5 Accent……… 9

2.3.6 Redundancy……… 10

2.3.7 Speech organization……… 10

2.3.8 Informal language……… 10

2.3.9 Background knowledge……… 11

2.3.10 Fatigue and concentration……….……… 11

2.3.11 Psychological problems……….………… 11

2.3.12 Number of speakers……… 12

2.3.13 Familiarity of topic……… 12

2.3.14 Confidence……… 12

2.3.15 Interest and motivation……… 12

2.4 Three stages in teaching listening……… 13

2.4.1 Pre-listening……… 13

2.4.2 While-listening……… 13

2.4.3 Post-listening……… 14

2.5 Previous study on listening difficulties………

2.6 Summary………

14

15

CHAPTER THREE: THE STUDY

3.1 The setting of the study……… 16

3.2 Participants……… 16

3.2.1 Students……… 16

3.2.2 Teachers……… 16

3.3 Research methods……… 17

3.3.1 Data collection instruments……… 17

3.3.2 Data analysis methods……… 17

3.4 Data analysis… ……… 17

3.4.1 Learners and teachers‟ perceptions of linguistic difficulties in learning listening……… 17

3.4.2 Learners and teachers‟ perceptions of listening difficulties related to the listening text……… 19

3.4.3 Learners and teachers‟ perceptions of listening difficulties related to the speakers……… 21

3.4.4 Learners and teachers‟ perceptions of listening difficulties related to the listener……… 23

3.4.5 Learners‟ expectations towards their teachers and teachers‟ opinions about how they can help their students……… 25

3.5 Summary……… 27

CHAPTER FOUR: DISCUSSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 4.1 Difficulties in learning listening encountered by first-year students at Vietnam Maritime University and possibles sources of these difficulties……… 28

4.2 Recommendations to help students overcome difficulties in learning listening……… 29

4.2.1 Helping students with vocabulary……… 29

4.2.2 Dealing with sounds, stress and intonation……… 30

4.2.3 Helping students get familiar with different accents………… 31

4.2.4 Creating expectations……… 31

4.2.5 Overcoming psychological problems……… 31

4.2.6 Using visuals……… 32

4.2.7 Giving clear instruction……… 33

4.2.8 Utilizing the internet……… 33

4.2.9 Using music……… 35

4.2.10 Providing task variety and text variety……… 35

4.2.11 Encouraging self-study……… 37

4.3 Summary……… 37

CHAPTER FIVE: CONCLUSION

5.1 Conclusions……… ……… 38

5.2 Limitations and suggestions for further study……… 39

REFERENCES……… 40

LIST OF CHARTS

Chart 1: Learners‟ perceptions of their linguistic difficulties in learning listening

Chart 2: Teachers‟ perceptions of students‟ linguistic difficulties in learning listening Chart 3: Learners‟ perceptions of their listening difficulties related to the listening text Chart 4: Teachers‟ perceptions of their students‟ listening difficulties related to the listening text

Chart 5: Learners‟ perceptions of their listening difficulties related to the speakers

Chart 6: Teachers‟ perceptions of their students‟ listening difficulties related to the speakers

Chart 7: Learners‟ perceptions of their listening difficulties related to the listener

Chart 8: Teachers‟ perceptions of their students‟ listening difficulties related to the listener

Chart 9: Students and teachers‟ opinions about solutions to overcome difficulties in listening

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Statement of the problem and rationale of the study

It cannot be denied that English has now become the most popular language in the world In the past, learning a foreign language mainly means learning the vocabulary and practicing the system of grammar However, in recent years, more attention has been paid

to listening and speaking skills since they play important roles in communication At Vietnam Maritime University (VMU), as most other universities in Vietnam, English has been taught as a compulsory subject for all majors Among four skills of English, listening is often considered the most difficult one for students First-year students at VMU have various difficulties with this skill because not many of them are familiar with listening at high school Moreover, not many researchers have studied the difficulties of first-year students in learning listening skills at VMU Therefore, it is urgent to carry out the research on “Difficulties in learning listening skills experienced by first-year students

at Vietnam Maritime University and some suggested solutions”

1.2 Aims of the study

The aims of the study are:

 To investigate the difficulties that first-year students at Vietnam Maritime University encounter in learning listening skill

 To find out factors that cause the students‟ difficulties in learning listening skill

 To provide some suggested solutions to help students overcome these difficulties

In order to achieve these aims, the study has three research questions as follows:

 What difficulties do first-year students at Vietnam Maritime University encounter

in learning listening skills as perceived by themselves and by their teachers?

 What are the factors causing these difficulties to the students?

 What can teachers do to help students overcome these difficulties?

1.3 Scope of the study

The study is conducted at Vietnam Maritime University to find out the difficulties

in learning listening skill of first-year students The study focuses on describing the linguistic factors, factors related to the listening text, factors related to the speakers and factors related to the listener The study also offers some recommendations to improve the current situation

1.4 Significance of the study

Many students find listening difficult, so it is essential for the researcher to investigate the difficulties and give some possible solutions to help students be more confident when learning listening to English

1.5 Design of the study

This study is divided into five main chapters in order to get insights into different aspects of the problem Besides, there are parts of References and Appendices

Chapter 1 presents reasons for choosing the topic, aims, scope, significance and the design of the study

Chapter 2 deals with theories related to the study including definitions of listening comprehension, component skills of listening, possible sources of difficulties in learning listening and three stages in teaching listening

Chapter 3 shows the procedure of carrying on the research such as the participants, data collection instruments and methods of data analysis

Chapter 4 reports and discusses the findings obtained from the data Some suggested solutions are also provided to help students overcome their difficulties in learning listening skill

Chapter 5 summarizes the whole study

CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Listening comprehension

Underwood (1989) considers listening as the activity of paying attention to get the meaning from what we hear She also explained that only a part of what the speaker wants to convey lies on the words; in order to interpret the whole meaning of the discourse, the listener has to recognize other factors such as the speaker‟s mood, the speaker‟s choice of vocabulary, and his or her tone of voice

From another angle, Rubin (1995) conceives listening as an active process in which listeners interpret information which comes from auditory and visual cues in order

to define what is going on and what the speakers are trying to express

Vandergrift (1999) has a more detailed definition of listening comprehension According to him, listening comprehension is an active process in which the listener must discriminate between sounds, understand vocabulary and grammatical structures, interpret stress and intonation, retain what was gathered in all of the above, and interpret

it within the socio-cultural context of the utterance

To summarize, each definition reflects its author‟s own point of view However, all definitions share the same idea is that listening comprehension is a complex process; it requires a number of sub-skills that the listeners must have in order to acquire the overall understanding of the listening text Moreover, the definition of Vandergrift seems to be the most notable

2.2 Component skills of listening

White (1998, p 8) indicates five sub-skills that make up the overall skill of listening as below:

Perception skills

- Recognizing individual sounds

- Discriminating between sounds

- Indentifying reduced forms in fast speech (for example, elision and assimilation)

- Identifying stressed syllables

- Identifying stressed words in utterances

- Recognizing intonation patterns

Language skills

- Identifying individual words and groups and building up possible meanings for them

- Identifying discourse markers which organize what is being said, for example,

then, as I was saying, as a matter of fact, to start with

Using knowledge of the world

- Connecting groups of words to non-linguistic features such as expressions, gestures, or objects in order to get clues to meaning

- Using knowledge of a topic to guess what the speaker might be saying about it

- Using knowledge about the patterns that certain oral interactions typically take in order to predict what is being said, for example, ordering in a restaurant, making a telephone call

Dealing with information

- Understanding gist meaning (the overall idea of what you hear)

- Understanding the main points

- Understanding details, for example, train times

- Inferring information which is not explicitly stated, or which has been missed

Interacting with a speaker

- Coping with variations among speakers, for example, differences in speed of talking and accent

- Recognizing the speaker‟s intention

- Identifying the speaker‟s mood/attitude

- Recognizing the speaker‟s cues about things such as when to take a turn at speaking or when there is a change of topic

- Predicting what the speaker will say next

Good listeners need to be able to use a combination of sub-skills simultaneously when processing a language

2.3 Potential problems in learning listening

2.3.1 Sounds

In order to understand spoken language, the sounds must be learned However, there are some English sounds which do not exist in Vietnamese and this fact can creates difficulties to learners Moreover, it is not only the sounds which cause comprehension problems but also the way they vary in speech In English, the most important phonological changes are: assimilation (changing sounds), elision (losing sounds), and intrusion (adding or joining sounds) Listeners‟ lack of phonological knowledge might lead to reduced comprehension (Buck, 2001)

According to Rixon (1986, p.37), “one of the most obvious sources of difficulty for learners of English is the way in which it is pronounced” He pointed out that many learners can recognize English words quite well in written form, but they fail to understand them in spoken form as they are used to hearing a clear and careful pronunciation of the words; thus when there are some types of changes in sounds such as assimilation or elision, the learner find it difficult to recognize

These above opinions all show that the sounds and changes in sounds in spoken language can cause many difficulties to second language learners

2.3.2 Stress and intonation

According to Buck (2001), stress and intonation can also carry a great deal of communicative information

Stress

There are two types of stress: word stress and sentence stress Word stress is the relative emphasis of the syllables within a word A word can be misunderstood if its stress of the syllables is incorrect Sentence stress is the relative emphasis of the words within an utterance Words are stressed to indicate the point the speaker is making For

example, if a speaker says: my SISTER returned yesterday, the stress is on the word sister, indicating that the topic of the utterance is the person, rather than what she did However, if the stress changes to: my sister RETURNED yesterday, the topic is what she

did, rather than who did it

Intonation

Intonation is the variation in pitch that takes place within an utterance Generally, statements end with a falling intonation and questions with a rising intonation The intonation can also make a considerable difference to the meaning Rixon (1986) mentions three main intonation patterns as follows:

 Recognizing given and new information

Given information is what the speaker thinks he can take for granted that his listener is already aware of New information is what the speaker thinks is not

currently in the minds of his audience Speakers tend to play down given information and highlight new information

 Changing the subject

Speakers also use intonation to indicate a change in subject For example, in a radio news bulletin, when the newsreader starts a new story, he raises the overall pitch of his voice The same thing happens in conversation

 Finished and unfinished topics

Speakers tend to keep their voices up in volume and pitch until they have finished what they want to say Here are two examples:

You could have tea↑ or coffee↑ or coke↓

You could have tea↑ or coffee↑ or coke↑

In the first example, that is all there is to offer In the second one, the speaker has not come to the end of the things he has to offer

The English systems of stress and intonation can interfere with the foreign learner‟s proper understanding of spoken English Especially, intonation often has a significant influence on the meaning of an utterance (Ur, 1984) Stress and intonation are typical features of spoken English Lack of understanding about these features can lead to the listener‟s misunderstanding of what is heard

2.3.3 Vocabulary

According to Underwood (1989), sometimes the listener can guess the meaning of

a word from the context, this skill is actually easy when listening in mother-tongue; however, for foreign language learners, an unknown word can be a barrier causing them

to stop and think about the meaning of the word and making them miss the next part of the speech

2.3.4 Speech rate

Foreign language listeners often have the experience of listening to something and not quite understanding it because it seems too fast Listener perceptions that speech is too fast are often due to the lack of processing automaticity However, the actual speech rate does affect comprehension (Buck, 2001)

A fast speaker is usually a fear of the foreign listener as they cannot keep up with him or her; they feel that the utterances disappear before they can sort them out (Underwood, 1989) She analyzes the listener‟s failure in more detail that they are so busy working out the meaning of one part that they miss the next part or they simply ignore a whole chunk because they cannot sort it out quickly enough

2.3.5 Accent

It is normal for different groups of language users to pronounce language in different ways, and everyone has an accent The most common accents are related to geography For example, Australians pronounce English differently from Americans, even the pronunciation in the north of England is very different from the south When listeners hear an unfamiliar accent, this can cause problems and may disrupt the whole comprehension process (Buck, 2001)

Discussing about how different accents of the speakers can cause difficulties for the listener, Ur (1984) points out that the foreign language learner who is used to their own teacher‟s accent will find that they have difficulty in understanding different voices

on the tape Moreover, if students usually listen to American or British accents, for example, they may have difficulties in understanding when listening to Indian or Pakistani accents

2.3.6 Redundancy

Redundancy may take the form of repetitions, false starts, re-phrasings, corrections, and meaningless addition such as “I mean” or “you know” (Ur, 1984) A study has been conducted by Chaudron (1983) with L2 learners, and “it seems that the L2 listener has to reach a certain minimum level of proficiency before he can take advantage

self-of the redundancy that a well-meaning native speaker may build into spoken languages” (as cited in Anderson and Lynch, 1984, p.51)

According to Helsegen and Brown (2007), redundancy may make listening easier but it may also make listening more difficult if the listener think it‟s just more to hear

2.3.7 Speech organization

According to Underwood (1989, p.11), “Speakers are almost in the position of formulating what they are saying as they go along and adjusting what they are saying as a result of the behavior of their listeners or as a result of added thoughts of their own.” Therefore, there is no certain way of knowing how the speaker organizes his or her speech

The organization of information can make it easier or more difficult for the listener to gain comprehension of the listening text Underwood (1989, p.12) claims that,

“A really disorganized speaker is hard to follow even in one‟s mother tongue For the foreign listener, it can be a nightmare”

2.3.8 Informal language

Many language learners have limited experience of English language in informal situations because in their lessons they tend to use formal language Consequently, they have difficulty in understanding informal spoken discourse (Underwood, 1989)

2.3.9 Background knowledge

Background knowledge plays an important role in listening comprehension According to Anderson and Lynch (1988), when we learn a foreign language, we acquire some degree of familiarity with the foreign culture Language is the means used by a community to express its culture So gaps in our knowledge of the L2 culture can present obstacles to comprehension

2.3.10 Fatigue and concentration

Concentration is important in listening comprehension, “even the shortest break in attention can seriously impair comprehension” (Underwood, 1989, p.19) However, foreign language learners often find it difficult to concentrate in a long time as the listening work is too tiring According to Ur (1984), reading, writing and speaking are also tiring, but at least the learner can set his own pace and makes breaks when he wants;

in listening, the pace is set by the speaker and the breaks may not occur when the listener needs them Even when the topic is interesting, students still find listening tiring as they have to try hard to follow what they hear

2.3.11 Psychological problems

A typical psychological problem of foreign language learner is that they often try

to understand every word in the listening text These listeners “tend to get confused and will probably be less successful than listeners who seek the meaning without focusing overmuch on the language” (Underwood, 1989, p.13)

Another author, Ur (1984) shares the same idea She writes that many foreign language learners have a kind of compulsion to understand everything, even things that are totally unimportant She explains more that when learning a foreign language in classrooms, the listener usually listens to carefully prepared listening text, he is supposed

to understand every words and sentences; therefore, he may get nervous when coming across any word which is “incomprehensible”

2.3.12 Number of speakers

Listening passages in which there is more than one speaker often cause more difficulties than monologues The listeners have to relate each speaker‟s new contribution

to what the other speakers have said and to the development of the argument as a whole

In addition, the listeners may find it difficult to distinguish one speaker‟s voice from another (Rixon, 1986)

2.3.13 Familiarity of topic

Even someone with a minimal grasp of a foreign language can follow a conversation or a talk on a subject that is familiar to him as he has familiar concepts and ideas about that topic in his mind already, so he can fill in any gaps in comprehension In contrary, someone with a good command of a language may experience difficulty when listening to something that is new or strange to him Even native speakers can suffer from this (Rixon, 1986)

2.3.14 Confidence

Sometimes a lack of success in previous classes makes learners give up It‟s hard for the listeners to listen effectively if they have no confidence (Helgesen and Brown, 2007)

2.3.15 Interest and motivation

According to Jafari, S M (2009), without having an interest and a motivation for learning, students get bored with taking part in listening classes and such feeling leads them to acquire passive attitude towards listening skill and making less progress in listening comprehension

In English class, each listening lesson often includes three stages In order to have

a better understanding of the learners‟ difficulties in learning listening, these stages in teaching listening are discussed in the next section

2.4 Three stages in teaching listening

2.4.1 Pre-listening

Like we need to stress our muscles before exercising, students need to warm up their non-native language skills before doing an exercise (Helgesen & Brown, 2007) It is helpful to provide considerable pre-listening support so that students can become more confident and they can listen effectively This stage is to prepare the learners for what they are going to hear Davies (2000, p 78) suggests some pre-listening activities as follows:

- Discuss a relevant picture

- Discuss relevant experiences

- Associate ideas with the topic

- Associate vocabulary with the topic

- Predict information about the topic

- Write questions about the topic

2.4.2 While-listening

While-listening activities are what students are asked to do during the time they are listening to the text The purpose of these activities is to help learners develop the skill of eliciting messages from spoken language (Underwood, 1989)

Some possible while-listening activities are:

- Identify the exact topic, or an aspect of it

- Note two to four pieces of information

- Answer questions

- Complete sentences

- Complete a table, map, or picture

(Davies, 2000, p.78)

2.4.3 Post-listening

This stage is to help the learners connect what they have heard with their own ideas and experience Davies (2000, p.78) provides some ideas for post-listening stage as below:

- Give opinions

- Relate similar experiences

- Role-play a similar interaction

- Write a brief report

- Write a similar text

- Debate the topic

2.5 Previous study on listening difficulties

There have been a number of researchers paying attention to students‟ problems in learning listening to English Elkhafaifi (2005) examined the effect of foreign language learning anxiety on students‟ listening comprehension The result indicates that foreign language learning anxiety and listening anxiety both correlated negatively with achievement The study suggested that reducing students‟ anxiety and providing a less stressful classroom environment might help students improve their listening comprehension proficiency as well as their overall course performance

Noro (2006) clarifies the nature of listening anxiety by the qualitative analysis of the data obtained by questionnaires and interviews with Japanese college students He finds the main sources of listening difficulties are rate of speech, vocabulary and pronunciation He suggests some coping strategies including asking for help, guessing, grasping the outline and changing attitudes to pay attention to the next word or phrase

Another study by Field (2008) revealed that English function words are identified less accurately by second language listeners than content words From the results, he argued that neither the learner‟s unfamiliarity with English phonology nor the

characteristics of the first language might be the main cause He concluded that it might depend on the way in which the listener chooses to distribute his or her attention

The previous studies mentioned above investigated some certain problems in learning listening regarding to vocabulary, pronunciation, speech rate and learners‟ anxiety Some solutions have been given including providing a less stressful classroom environment and using coping strategies in listening This study focuses on more factors causing difficulties to students in learning listening related to the listeners‟ linguistic competence, the listening text, the speakers and the listeners themselves

2.6 Summary

In this chapter, the theoretical framework for the study is presented in five main parts

Firstly, an overview of listening comprehension is given

Secondly, the component skills of listening have been discussed

Thirdly, some possible sources of difficulties in learning listening of learners have been presented

Fourthly, three stages of teaching listening are described

Lastly, some previous studies related to listening problems are presented

In short, chapter two has provided a necessary background for the present study to investigate the VMU first-year students‟ listening difficulties so that some treatments can

be adopted to help them become better listeners in English

CHAPTER THREE: THE STUDY

3.1 The setting of the study

The study was carried out at Vietnam Maritime University which was founded in

1956 The main function of this university is to train seamen and engineers specialized in sea economic and other majors Students at VMU have finished high school and joined the course after passing the compulsory entrance examination in mathematics, physics and chemistry to VMU They may have learnt English for either three or seven years at high school before entering university However, there are some students who studied French at their high school and English is a completely new subject to them at university

The teaching of English at VMU is divided into two phases In the first phase, students acquire General English with the four language skills through New Headway Elementary and Pre-Intermediate books In the second phase, students acquire English for Specific Purposes depending on their major Students at VMU have to learn English from the first term The time allocated to English is five 45-minute periods per week in 15 weeks for each semester

3.2 Participants

3.2.1 Students

The study was carried out with the participation of 128 non-English major first year students These students were chosen randomly from about 3000 first year students The study was conducted when they were in their second term of the first year at VMU

In this term, they had to finish unit 4 of New Headway Pre-Intermediate book

3.2.2 Teachers

This study was carried out with the participation of 28 teachers These teachers are

in charge of teaching English to first-year students, among which 25 are female and 3 are male All teachers at English Group of VMU officially graduated from Hanoi University

or Vietnam National University, English Department 16 teachers out of 28 have Master

degrees, 5 teachers are doing a Master course for the time being and the 7 other teachers have University Bachelor‟s Degrees The time length of teaching English is from 3 years

to 30 years They are all enthusiastic teachers and willing to help their students to overcome their listening comprehension problems

3.3 Research methods

3.3.1 Data collection instruments

This study employed mainly the quantitative method in form of two survey questionnaires to find out listening comprehension problems experienced by first-year students at Vietnam Maritime University and factors causing their listening comprehension problems

This instrument was applied to both students and teachers

3.3.2 Data analysis methods

Data gathered from responses of students and teachers in the two given questionnaires were sorted and analyzed statistically to get the answers for the research questions

3.4 Data analysis

3.4.1 Learners and teachers’ perceptions of linguistic difficulties in learning listening

Chart 1: Learners’ perceptions of their linguistic difficulties in learning listening

Chart 2: Teachers’ perceptions of students’ linguistic difficulties in learning listening

Charts 1 and 2 reveal the perceptions of students and teachers about students‟ linguistic difficulties in learning listening

We can see from the charts that most of the students admitted that they had troubles with vocabulary in listening (41% often, 24% always) A large number of teachers (32% often, 43% always) also agreed that their students had difficulty in listening when they met unfamiliar words

In terms of sounds, the charts show that 43% of the students often could not recognize familiar words when they were in spoken form 39% teachers also agreed that their students often had this kind of problem in listening

As for the ability to recognize key words in an utterance, more than half of the students found it difficult to recognize key words in the listening texts Similarly, the percentage of teachers who thought that their students could not recognize important words in speech is the same

As regards the ability to understand the meaning of intonation, 56% students said that they often could not, whereas 43% teachers shared the same idea

In general, vocabulary, sounds, stress and intonation all have a big influence on students‟ listening comprehension process

3.4.2 Learners and teachers’ perceptions of listening difficulties related to the listening text

Chart 3: Learners’ perceptions of their listening difficulties related to the listening text

Chart 4: Teachers’ perceptions of their students’ listening difficulties related to the listening text

Charts 3 and 4 show some factors related to the listening text that can cause difficulty to students

The most important factor is the familiarity of the topic As shown in the charts above, 45% students indicated that they had difficulty when listening to a spoken discourse with unfamiliar topic 57% teachers thought their students often had this kind

of problem

The second factor related to the listening text is the information organization It seems that text organization does not cause much difficulty to students as there are no big differences between the percentages of all the options in the students‟ and teachers‟ questionnaires

The third characteristic of the listening text that may cause troubles to students is informal language According to the collected data, the majority of students reported that they found it difficult to understand informal language in the listening text (28% often, 30% always) Most of the teachers (36% often, 32% always) indicated that their students had troubles with informal language

In short, for the factors related to the listening text, the topic is the factor that most influence the students in their listening The informal language ranks the second

3.4.3 Learners and teachers’ perceptions of listening difficulties related to the speakers

Chart 5: Learners’ perceptions of their listening difficulties related to the speakers

Chart 6: Teachers’ perceptions of their students’ listening difficulties related to the speakers

Charts 5 and 6 show students‟ difficulties in learning listening cause by factors related to the speakers

The data indicate that speech rate is the most troublesome speaker-related factor to students 53% of the students often felt that they cannot catch up with the speakers‟ speed and 57% teachers agreed that their students often have difficulty in listening to fast speakers

A large number of students (38% often, 20% always) said that they had difficulty

in listening to different accents in the listening texts Similar percentages of teachers (36% often, 21% always) agreed that their students did not listen effectively when the accent in the recording was not familiar to them

The matter of number of speakers is not a big problem to students 23% of the students seldom have difficulties in listening to the recordings which contain many speakers Only 12% of the students always found it difficult to listen to many speakers The percentage of teachers who thought the number of speakers causes listening troubles

to their students is also small (29% seldom, 14% always)

To summarize, the speech rate is the biggest factor that causes difficulty to students as regards to the factors related to the speakers Besides, different accents also cause difficulties to students

3.4.4 Learners’ and teachers’ perceptions of listening difficulties related to the listener