Difficulties encountered in the toeic listening test by the second year students at university of economics and business administration thai nguyen university

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ***************** DƯƠNG THANH HẢO DIFFICULTIES ENCOUNTERED IN TH

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

*****************

DƯƠNG THANH HẢO

DIFFICULTIES ENCOUNTERED IN THE TOEIC LISTENING TEST

BY THE SECOND-YEAR STUDENTS AT UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION -

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY

NHỮNG KHÓ KHĂN KHI LÀM BÀI THI NGHE TOEIC

CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ 2 TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC KINH TẾ VÀ

QUẢN TRỊ KINH DOANH THÁI NGUYÊN

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field : English Teaching Methodology Code : 60140111

Hanoi – 2016

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

*****************

DƯƠNG THANH HẢO

DIFFICULTIES ENCOUNTERED IN THE TOEIC LISTENING TEST

BY THE SECOND-YEAR STUDENTS AT UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION -

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY

NHỮNG KHÓ KHĂN KHI LÀM BÀI THI NGHE TOEIC

CỦA SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ 2 TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC KINH TẾ VÀ

QUẢN TRỊ KINH DOANH THÁI NGUYÊN

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field : English Teaching Methodology Code : 60140111

Supervisor : Assoc.Prof Dr Lâm Quang Đông

Hanoi – 2016

DECLARATION

I declare that this minor thesis entitled “Difficulties encountered in the TOEIC listening test by the second-year students at University of Economics and Business Administration, Thai Nguyen University” submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts is the results of my own work and that is thesis does not contain material which has been accepted for the award of any degree or diploma in any university, nor does it contain material previously published or written by any other person, except where due reference is made in the text of the thesis

Hanoi, 2016

Duong Thanh Hao

Secondly, my graduation subject now is completed successfully thanks to all teachers‟ support at University of Economics and Business Administration, Thai Nguyen University (TUEBA) who did their best to help me gather data from students‟ questionnaires

Besides, my sincere thanks are also extended to all the students who helped me fulfill the survey questions and interviews Finally, I am grateful to my family and friends who have given me much encouragement throughout

ABSTRACT

The study investigates difficulties in TOEIC listening comprehension encountered by a group of sophomore students of TUEBA 50 sophomores at TUEBA were selected for the study

The data were gathered by means of students‟ listening test papers, questionnaires and semi-structured interviews The results of the study showed that general linguistic ability, background knowledge and facilities were the major TOEIC listening comprehension difficulties encountered by second-year students at TUEBA While doing the TOEIC test, the study‟s participants normally applied such strategies as guessing or predicting, identifying types of question in part 2, and listening for gist and details On that basis, suggestions and recommendations were provided so as to deal with the problems

This work hopes to be useful for those who are interested in this subject and to pave the way for future studies in this field

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION I ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS II ABSTRACT III TABLE OF CONTENTS IV LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS VII

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

1.RATIONALE OF THE STUDY 1

2.OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY 1

3.SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY 2

4.SCOPE OF THE STUDY 2

5.METHODS OF THE STUDY 2

6.ORGANIZATION OF THE THESIS 2

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER 1- LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1.1.THEORETICAL BACKGROUND TO LISTENING COMPREHENSION 4

1.1.1 Listening strategies 4

1.1.2 Processes of listening comprehension 6

1.1.3 Potential problems in listening comprehension 7

1.2.TOEIC TEST 7

1.2.1 Overview of the TOEIC test 7

1.2.2 TOEIC listening 9

1.2.3 TOEIC listening strategies 13

1.3.RELATED STUDIES OF LISTENING COMPREHENSION AND TOEIC LISTENING 14 CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 16

2.1SELECTION OF PARTICIPANTS 16

2.2RESEARCH INSTRUMENTS 16

2.2.1 Students’ listening test papers 16

2.2.2 Questionnaires 17

2.2.3 Semi-structured interviews 18

2.3.DATA COLLECTION PROCEDURES 18

2.4.DATA ANALYSIS PROCEDURE 19

CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 21

3.1 WHAT DIFFICULTIES DO THE SECOND-YEAR STUDENTS AT TUEBA FACE IN THE TOEIC LISTENING TEST? 21

3.1.1 Students’ opinions of TOEIC listening test 21

3.1.2 Students’ opinions of TOEIC listening difficulties related to background knowledge and linguistic ability 22

3.1.3 Students’ opinions of listening difficulties related to listener or non-linguistic factors 25

3.1.4 Types of difficulties of each part in TOEIC listening test through analyzing TOEIC listening test papers 27

3.2WHAT CAUSES SUCH DIFFICULTIES? 31

3.3WHAT STRATEGIES DO THESE STUDENTS OFTEN APPLY WHEN TAKING TOEIC LISTENING TEST? 34

3.5SUMMARY 36

PART C: CONCLUSION 37

1.SUMMARY OF THE STUDY 37

2 PEDAGOGICAL RECOMMENDATIONS TO IMPROVE STUDENTS‟ TOEIC LISTENING RESULTS 38

2.1 To the students 38

2.2 To the teachers 38

3.LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY 39

4.SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDIES 39

REFERENCES 41 APPENDIX 1 I APPENDIX 2: INTERVIEWS IX

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES

Chart 1: students‟ opinions about the difficult level of toeic listening test 21 Chart 2: students‟ opinions of the most difficult part of toeic listening test 22

Chart 3: students‟ opinions of toeic listening difficulties related to background

knowledge 23 Chart 4: types of difficulties in toeic listening test and their percentage 28

Chart 5: tueba second-year students‟ suggestions for handling such difficulties

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Table 1: students‟ opinions of toeic listening difficulties related to linguistic

ability 24

Table 2: students‟ opinions of listening difficulties related to listener (non-

linguistic factors) 26 Table 3: causes of toeic listening difficulties 31 Table 4: strategies applied by students when taking toeic listening test 34

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

TUEBA: University of Economics and Business Administration,

Thai Nguyen University TOEIC: Test of English for International Communication ETS:

ESL

Educational Testing Service English as a Second Language L2 learners: Second Language learners

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

As an international language, English obviously plays a crucial role in the age of global economic integration The scores of worldwide standardized English tests such as the Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC), the Test

of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) are widely used as recognized evidence of one‟s English proficiency, especially the TOEIC test Most companies require TOEIC certificates as one of their employees‟ qualifications

Many colleges and universities like TUEBA have used the TOEIC test to classify students‟ English proficiency, place them into the right classes and use their test‟s results at the end of each course to calculate credits Moreover, the minimum TOEIC score of 450 is a compelling requisite for students to meet the requirement of graduation Among all the skills tested, listening is always the hardest to second, or foreign, language learners, and my students at TUEBA are

no exception

Being an English teacher at TUEBA, through my teaching experience, I notice that comparing to other skills, students find listening most difficult and stressful and their TOEIC listening scores tend to be lower than those of other skills For all of the above mentioned reasons, I would like to carry out a small study entitled “Difficulties encountered in the TOEIC listening test by the second-year students at university of Economics and Business Administration, Thai Nguyen University “in order to help solve out the problems

2 Objectives of the study

The purpose of the study is to investigate the TOEIC listening comprehension difficulties encountered by the second-year students at University of Economics and Business Administration, Thai Nguyen University, identify the factors that lead to such difficulties and suggest solutions to help students overcome these

problems To that end, the study seeks answers to the following research questions:

1 What difficulties do the second-year students at TUEBA face in the TOEIC listening test?

2 What causes such difficulties?

3 What strategies do these students often apply when taking TOEIC listening test?

3 Significance of the study

This study explores the real difficulties encountered by sophomores as well as their strategies to improve their scores in TOEIC listening test Also, the study hopes to offer some help to TUEBA teachers in their choice of appropriate techniques to teach TOEIC listening effectively

4 Scope of the study

The study focuses mainly on the analysis of the data collected from the students‟ TOEIC listening test papers and the survey questionnaire distributed to TOEIC students at the University of Economics and Business Administration- Thai Nguyen University

5 Methods of the study

Both quantitative and qualitative approaches were employed but the major method used is the quantitative method The analysis of students‟ TOEIC listening test papers was done to identify the current situation as well as difficult aspects of the TOEIC listening test Then, additional data were also collected through survey questionnaires, informal interviews and discussions with TOEIC learners at TUEBA

6 Organization of the thesis

This thesis consists of three parts:

Part A: Introduction This part supplies an overview of the study with specific reference to the rationale, the aims, the methodology and the structure of the thesis Part B: Development In this part, four chapters are presented

Chapter 1 – Literature Review establishes the theoretical background of the

research It is concerned with the issues relevant to the topic of the research, i.e listening comprehension and an overview of TOEIC listening comprehension tests Chapter 2 – Methodology presents the background information of the participants in the study, the instrument used to collect the data, and the procedure of data collection

Chapter 3 – Findings and Discussion provides the data analysis in detail and a thorough discussion of the findings of the study Explanations and interpretations

of the findings are also presented in this chapter

Part C: Conclusion In this part, the limitations and some recommendations for further research are provided

The Appendices lie on the last part of the study, following the References

PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1- LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Theoretical background to listening comprehension

1.1.1 Listening strategies

1.1.1.1 Definition of listening comprehension strategy

Listening strategies are techniques or activities that contribute directly to the comprehension and recall of listening input (Rubin, 1981)

Listening strategies can be classified on the basis of how the listener processes the input

For learners, one of the methods learners can become actively involved in controlling their own learning is by using strategies Vandergrift (1999) showed

“Strategy development is important for listening training because strategies are conscious means by which learners can guide and evaluate their own comprehension and responses.” In O'Malley, Chamot, Stewner-Manzanares, Kupper, and Russo‟s (1985) study, high school ESL students were randomly assigned to receive learning strategy training on vocabulary, listening, and speaking tasks and the result indicated strategy training can be effective for integrative language tasks Nakata (1999) studied the influence of listening strategy training on Japanese EFL learners‟ listening competence, and it showed that the effect of listening strategy training was more discernible on perception than on comprehension

Among all the strategies for listening, O‟Malley and Chamot (1990) claimed three main types of strategies: metacognitive, cognitive and social strategies The metacognitive strategy was a kind of self-regulated learning It included the attempt to plan, check, monitor, select, revise, and evaluate, etc For example, for metacognitive planning strategies, learners would clarify the objectives of an anticipated listening task, and attend to specific aspects of language input or situational details that assisted in understanding the task (Vandergrift, 1999)

The cognitive strategies are related to comprehending and storing input in working memory or long-term memory for later retrieval They are investigated from the aspects of bottom-up strategies, top-down strategies For bottom-up processing, it refers to using the incoming input as the basis for understanding the message Comprehension begins with the received data that are analyzed as successive levels of organization-sounds, words, as a process of decoding For bottom-up strategies, Henner-Stanchina (1987) engaged in a similar study and pointed out that effective listeners were good at using their previous knowledge and experience to raise hypotheses about a text, integrating new information into their ongoing interpretations, making influences to bridge gaps, assessing their interpretations, and modifying their hypotheses, if necessary On the other hand, top-down processing goes from meaning to language (Richards, 2008) Learners can try to predict what will be uttered by the signal However, Chiu (2006) claimed that listening comprehension was neither only top-down nor bottom-up processing Simultaneously, Lu (2008) summed up that the scholars believed the listeners not only utilized bottom-up but also top-down processing models In sum, Thompson & Rubin (1996) indicated the effects of metacognitive and cognitive strategy instruction on the listening comprehension performance of American university students learning Russian They found that the subjects who received strategy instruction in listening to video-recorded texts improved significantly over those who had received no instruction

For social/ affective strategies, Vandergrift (2003) defined the strategies as the techniques listeners used to collaborate with others, to verify understanding or to lower anxiety Habte-Gabr (2006) stated that socio-affective strategies were those which were non-academic in nature and involve stimulating learning through establishing a level of empathy between the instructor and student They included considering factors such as emotions and attitudes (Oxford, 1990) It was essential for listeners to know how to reduce the anxiety, feel confident in

doing listening tasks, and promote personal motivation in improving listening competence (Vandergrift, 1997) According to O‟Malley &Chamot (2001), among the four strategies of management strategies, social strategies, cognitive strategies, affective strategies in listening comprehension, both social and affective strategies influenced the learning situation immediately

1.1.1.2 Classification of listening strategies

As stated by Hedge, 2000; listening strategies include top-down and bottom-up strategies First, top-down strategies are listener based, which means that the listener uses background knowledge of the topic, the context, the type of text, and the language with a set of expectations to make sense of what is hear and anticipate what will come next Top-down strategies consist of listening for the main idea, predicting, drawing inferences, summarizing

Second, bottom-up strategies are text-based– that is, the listener relies on his/her knowledge of the language in the message, for example, the combination of sounds, words, and grammar to construct meaning Bottom-up strategies include listening for specific details, recognizing cognates, recognizing word-order patterns

1.1.2 Processes of listening comprehension

As reported by Rost (2002), the processes of listening comprehension have often been viewed in a two-level view: bottom-up and top-down processing In bottom-up processing, listeners first pay attention to individual phonological units, then decode a large unit of input in hierarchical order, from vocabulary to structures, for the meaning of the discourse In top-down processing, listeners draw upon the background information, contextual information and expectation for comprehension Listening comprehension is considered as an interactive process of bottom-up processing and top-down processing by using linguistic and real world information (Rost, 1994, p 32; Nunan, 1999, p.221)

1.1.3 Potential problems in listening comprehension

Underwood (1989) suggests seven potential problems that could hinder listening comprehension

First, “many language learners believe that the greatest difficulty with listening comprehension, as opposed to remind comprehension, is that listener cannot control how quickly a speaker speaks” (Underwood, 1989, p.16)

Second, it is not always possible for learners to have words repeated It is “hard for the teacher to judge whether or not the students have understood any particular section of what they have heard” (Underwood, 1989, p.17)

Third, the small size of the learner vocabulary often impacts on listening comprehension When listeners encounter a new word, they pause to find out the meaning of that word so they miss the next part of the speech

Fourth, listeners may not recognize the signals that the speaker is using to move from one point to another, give an example, or repeat a point

Fifth, it can be very challenging for listeners to focus on a foreign language When the topic of the listening passage is interesting, listeners easily concentrate on the passage; however, if listeners have to make real efforts to figure out the meaning intended by the speaker, they also feel that listening is very challenging

Sixth, learning habits emphasized in the classroom include a desire to understand the meaning of every word Students tend to feel worried when they fail to recognize what

a particular word means and may further be discouraged by the failure

Last, comprehension problems arise when students lack contextual knowledge Listeners from different cultural backgrounds can also misinterpret nonverbal cues like tone of voice

1.2 TOEIC test

1.2.1 Overview of the TOEIC test

The TOEIC (Test of English for International Communication) test is an English language proficiency test for people whose native language is not English It

measures the everyday English skills of people working in an international environment

TOEIC test scores indicate how well people can communicate in English with others in the global workplace The test does not require specialized knowledge or vocabulary; it measures only the kind of English used in everyday work activities

The TOEIC test is the world‟s leading test of English-language proficiency in a workplace context Thousands of corporations throughout the world use the TOEIC test and more than 5 million people take the test every year

Traditionally, TOEIC is a two-hour paper-and-pencil test It consists of 200 multiple choice questions which are divided into two sections: Listening and Reading Separate scaled scores are provided for each section, the part score scales ranging from 5 to 495 and the total score scales ranging from 10 to 990 The Listening section tests how well the test taker understands spoken English and the Reading section written English The overall structure of the test is summarized below

Listening Comprehension: 100 items Listening Comprehension: 100 items Photographs: 20 questions Photographs: 10 questions

Question-Response: 30 questions Question-Response: 30 questions

Short Conversations: 30 questions; 30

conversations with 1 question each

Conversations: 30 questions; 10 conversations with 3 questions each Talks: 20 questions Talks: 30 questions; 10 talks with 3

questions each

Reading Comprehension: 100 items Reading Comprehension: 100 items Incomplete sentences: 40 questions Incomplete sentences: 40 questions Error Recognition: 20 questions Text Completion: 12 questions

Reading Comprehension: 40 questions

Single Passages: 28 questions; 7-10 reading texts with 2-5 questions each Double passages: 20 questions; 4 pairs of reading texts with 5 questions per pair

The primary purpose of the test is to determine the proficiency levels of employees for human resource planning and development in the contexts of business, industry, and commerce In addition, the test designers focus neither on

“American English” nor “British English,” but rather on “International English”, i.e the language used by non-native speakers of English communicating in English both with native speakers and with other nonnative speakers of English

1.2.2 TOEIC listening

The entire listening test, which lasts approximately 45 minutes, is broken up into four main parts with various lengths and structures

Part 1: Photographs (approximately 5 minutes)

In part 1, for each of the ten questions, the candidate will see a photograph either about people or things and hear four descriptive statements related to the photograph Examinees are asked to select the one statement that best describes the picture The difficulty in this part may come from (1) words that sound like the correct answer; (2) words related to the correct answer; (3) incorrect inferences ; (4) out of text words ; (5) incorrect details

For example:

A There is a telephone on the woman‟s desk

B The woman is sitting behind the computer

C The woman is inside a store

D There are a lot of papers on the desk

(Example taken from Ann Taylor, TOEIC Analysis, P.9)

Part 2: Question- Response (approximately 15 minutes)

In part 2, the candidate will hear 30 questions or statements that may ask about time, people, an opinion, a choice, a suggestion, a reason, or a location For each

of the questions or statements there are three possible responses The candidate‟s job is to select the best response to the question or statement Generally, the questions in part 2 are informative questions belonging to one of the following types: (1) Interrogative questions (using Who, Whom, Which, Where, When, Why, How); (2) Non-interrogative questions (using Be/ Do, auxiliary verbs); and (3) other question types like tag questions, Alternative questions or Suggestions The choice in this part may be difficult and confusing due to (1) incorrect verb tense, (2) inappropriate response to the type of questions, (3) similar-sounding words but different in meaning, (4) repeated words, (5) words used in a different context, (6) homophones

For example: Where‟s the best place to take a client for lunch?

A I usually go to the café on the corner (Correct answer)

B I never eat lunch (Words used in different context, repeated words)

C Yes, but I have no clients this week (Inappropriate response to the type of question, words used in different context, repeated words)

(Example taken from Ann Taylor, TOEIC Analysis, P.35)

Part 3: Conversation (approximately 10 minutes)

Part 3 of the TOEIC tests the ability to understand and interpret spoken English well enough to recognize both general and specific information in short conversations Examinees will hear 10 conversations between two people at the office After each conversation, they are asked to answer three questions about what the speakers say The questions often ask about the general idea of the conversation and students will be asked to identify an activity, a relationship, a location or an opinion of the speakers Similar to part 2, some signals should be considered, including:

● Similar-sounding words

● Implicit answers

● Idioms and phrasal verbs

● Incorrect details provided

● Words in a different context or a different meaning

● Unrelated time

● Paraphrases of time

For example:

Man: Has the copier at the reception desk been fixed yet?

Woman: No I called the technician, but he can‟t make it out here until next Monday at the earliest

Man: We have a meeting on Friday, though We can‟t do our presentation unless everyone has copies of our work

Woman: We‟ll have to get them done by a professional I‟ll run to the copy shop tomorrow

It‟ll cost a little extra money, but we won‟t have to delay our presentation

1 What problem are

(A) This afternoon (B) Tomorrow (C) This Friday (D) Next Monday

3 What will the speakers probably do next?

(A) Call a different technician

(B) Delay the presentation

(C) Pay for a new printer

(D) Go to a professional printer

(Extracted from Skills for the TOEIC test listening and reading, p 44)

Part 4: Talks (30 questions - approximately 15 minutes)

The TOEIC talks generally range from 35 to 150 words Part 4 of the TOEIC tests your ability to understand extended spoken material in English The talks in part 4

of the TOEIC consist mainly of commercial advertisements, public service advertisements and announcements, new stories, and the language used in business settings

Four types of questions in this part can be Main Idea Questions, Fact and Detail Questions, Cause and Effect Questions and Inference Question The tactics of this part are the same as part 3

For example:

“Man: Good morning and welcome to Flight 83 to Los Angeles Our trip today should take just under four hours, and we‟ll be arriving at Los Angeles International Airport at eleven o‟ clock local time We have clear skies today and should be able to have a good view of the Rocky Mountains I‟ll point them out,

as well as other sights of interest, as we approach them For your entertainment, we‟ll be showing an in-flight movie in about an hour In a minute, the flight attendants will begin the beverage service, so sit back, relax, and enjoy your trip.”

(C) A little more than four hours

(C) The plane will be serviced

(D) Drinks will be served

1.2.3 TOEIC listening strategies

Listening in the TOEIC Test has four parts which are Photographs, Question and Response, Conversations and Talks And every part has its own strategy Lougheed (2009:3-52) states that three are important strategies that need to be used in TOEIC Listening Comprehension Test The strategies in Photographs are

1 Analyzing the Photo,

2 Distinguishing Similar Sounds, and

3 Making Inferences

The strategies in Question and Response are

1 Distinguishing Wh- and Yes/No Questions,

2 Identifying Homophones, and

3 Recognizing Negative Meaning

The Strategies in Conversations are

1 Listening for the Main Idea,

2 Understanding Wh-Questions, and

3 Understanding Modal Verbs

The strategies in Talks are

1 Listening for Answer to Wh-Questions,

2 Following the Questions Chronologically and

3 Making Inferences

Arbogast (2001:47-92) also states some strategies in TOEIC Listening Comprehension The strategies in Photographs are

1 Take a quick look at the photograph before you hear the four statements,

2 Pay attention to similar-sounding words with different meanings, and

3 Listen carefully to each complete statement about the photograph

The strategies in Question and Response are

1 Focus on the purpose of the question,

2 Listen for question words,

3 Pay close attention to words that sound alike

The Strategies in Conversations are

1 Read the question first,

2 Try to imagine the setting of the conversation and who is speaking,

3 Look at all four choices carefully before answering

The strategies in Talk are

1 Read the question first,

2 Listen to the whole talk before trying to answer the questions,

3 Pay special attention to the introduction and the first part of the talk

1.3 Related studies of listening comprehension and TOEIC listening

More and more countries are choosing TOEIC as a foreign language certificate which demonstrates language skills in an international work environment Therefore, many studies over the world related to TOEIC teaching and learning are conducted On the scientific magazine JLTA13, Xizuka researched the impact of the different listening strategies when answering TOEIC listening section of the test With the aims of enhancing students‟ English proficiency and Test-taking skills through TOEIC preparatory materials, Yi-Ching Pan (2010) in the study named “Enhancing Student's Communicative Competency and Test Taking Skills Through TOEIC Preparatory Materials” offered teachers a variety

of activities dealing with how both to teach the TOEIC listening and reading test interactively and to prepare their students for success at the same time

Nguyen (2010) conducted a study on the existing problems in teaching and learning English at a high school in Hanoi Researchers pointed out the difficulties of the listening skill which grade 10 student encountered The researcher come to conclusions that (1) the assessment methodology only focuses on grammar and vocabulary (2) the poor listening tactics such as trying

to listen and understand every single word but do not keep up with the listening speech (3) Beside, psychology is not good during the test

Nhu (2012) studied commons errors made by pre-intermediate students in the TOEIC listening test and some suggested solutions There are three most frequent errors were pointed out from the results of research (1) homophones; (2) the different voice, accent and intonation; (3) restrictions on language and background knowledge

In short, those above studies were very helpful in providing the researcher with general views of TOEIC test taking in general and TOEIC listening in particular Nevertheless, there were still many limitations existed in those studies For example, subjects of the studies focused on ESL learners or learners from Haiphong Foreign Language Center as in Phuong‟s study (2012), who are totally different from students at university in terms of research objects, classroom setting, linguistic competence, as well as the official study materials and methodology exploited by teachers Therefore, it is opportunity for the researcher to conduct this research

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

The aim of Chapter 2 is to report details of the study, including participant profiles, methods of data collection and analysis and procedures of collecting and analyzing data Justification for each step in the whole procedure will also be given

2.1 Selection of participants

One group included 50 students chosen at random from three TOEIC classes at TUEBA They are all second-year students who have finished two terms of learning English at TUEBA The ration of male and female were 10/40 Their ages are more than 18 years old, of whom the number of females and males are nearly equal They have similar background and finished two terms of learning English at the TUEBA Last semester, they acquired the most Basic English language skills at elementary and pre-intermediate English level All of them had already learnt the TOEIC listening strategies in class However it is clear that the class time might not be enough for the students to practice multiple strategies of all parts in TOEIC tests in general and of the listening comprehension part in particular Observing my students I realized that four fifths of them lack of listening comprehension skill such as knowledge and strategies to achieve good TOEIC scores In other words, the second-year students at TUEBA face a variety

of difficulties in the listening TOEIC test

2.2 Research instruments

Both quantitative and qualitative approaches with (1) Students‟ listening test papers, (2) Questionnaires and (3) Semi-structured interviews were utilized in the study in order to meet the targets These will be presented at the end of the thesis in the appendix

2.2.1 Students’ listening test papers

The study includes a modest number of fifty students‟ TOEIC listening test

papers Using this instrument is supposed to bring the researcher a closer look into the current situation because this data collection instrument is “considered a research technique that provides objective, systematic and qualitative data” (Verma and Mallick, 1999)

2.2.2 Questionnaires

There are many ways of collecting data such as: mail survey, telephone survey, interview, questionnaire, and so on but questionnaire is one of the instruments which is often used to collect data by most researchers in social sciences Gillham (2000: 6) points out those questionnaires have a number of significant advantages such as:

 Low cost in time and money

 Easy to get information from a lot of people very quickly

 Respondents can complete the questionnaire when it suits them

 Analysis of answers to closed questions is straightforward

 Less pressure for an immediate response

 Respondents‟ anonymity

 Lack of interviewer bias

 Standardization of questions (but true of structured interview)

 Can provide suggestive data for testing a hypothesis

It can be seen that questionnaire is a cheap and time-saving technique to collect information from a large number of people at the same time In consideration of advantages of using questionnaires in the study, the author decided to use questionnaire as one of the main data collection instruments since this study was conducted to collect the students‟ opinion about the difficulties which they encounter in the test

The questionnaire consists of four main parts To be more specific, part 1 of the questionnaire included two first questions aiming to find out the TUEBA sophomore‟s attitude towards TOEIC listening test Part 2 including question 3

to question 11 were to know common difficulties of students in TOEIC listening test Part 3 had only question 12 to investigate what cause difficulties for students when taking the TOEIC listening test Part 4 contained question 13 to question 22 with a purpose to find out the strategies that students employed

2.2.3 Semi-structured interviews

Semi-structured interview was carried out because the semi-structured interview approach allows depth to be achieved by providing the opportunity on the part of the interviewer to expand on the interviewee‟s responses Researchers, in particular, who work within an interpretive research tradition, are in favor of the semi-structured interview because of its flexibility (Nunan, 1992)

The semi-structured interviews were conducted with 2 boys and 2 girls The researcher interviewed one-by-one to create a friendly atmosphere for the respondents to share comfortably their idea as well as attitudes Each interview has the length approximately from 8 to 10 minutes Besides, all the interviews were tape-recorded to be transcribed at the following stage

In terms of structure, the interview for students includes four parts To be more precise, opinions and attitudes towards TOEIC listening, what have made difficulties to their performances on TOEIC listening test, strategies they apply when taking TOEIC listening test, and lastly, their suggestions for improvement (Please see appendix) The interviews provided the validity for the data of questionnaires

In short, for a collection of reliable and valid data for the study, students‟ listening test papers, questionnaire and interviews were employed

2.3 Data collection procedures

The procedures of data collection went through three main phrases in chronological order: analyzing the students‟ listening test papers, delivering questionnaires and holding semi-structured interviews

Firstly, the researcher collected students‟ TOEIC listening test papers Then, she

classified the frequency of each problem

Basing on the students‟ listening test papers analysis, the researcher designed the questionnaire to find out more about difficulties and causes of the difficulties The questionnaire was given to five relevant respondents to get their feedback such as which questions or expressions were ambiguous or complex, then, the questionnaire was adjusted

Next, the questionnaire was randomly distributed to 50 students of three classes

On the day of giving questionnaire, the researcher asked for the help of the teachers teaching those periods to deliver the papers to the students after the researcher introduced the purposes and explained essential information The data collected from the questionnaires were classified on the basis of the research questions After that, they were analyzed carefully The results were then displayed in forms of tables and charts

Lastly, one-by-one interviews for the students were done in quiet coffee shops Tape-recording interviews were permitted to use A part from the use of tape-recording, the researcher took notes on some important information through the interviews for the later transcription Furthermore, the tape‟s quality and loudness of the tape from the interview were also rechecked in case they needed to be done again

2.4 Data analysis procedure

After having collected the data through Students‟ listening test papers, Questionnaires and Semi-structured interviews; we started to analyze the data collected based on grounded theory codifying, grouping, categorizing and drawing conclusions; with the intention of answering the research questions and reporting consistent findings

The students‟ listening test papers were calculated, summarized and categorized Then tables were employed to analyze and compare figures For example, the percentage of participants who get the same average rating will be calculated and

illustrated by the tables

After being fulfilled and collected, the questionnaires for students were analyzed carefully The questions of the questionnaires was separated and computed by Microsoft Office Excel to find out the percentage of students‟ opinions about questioned items Those data were presented in tables and charts which are shown clearly in chapter three

The most quotations from the interview were also used to support the analysis of the data

CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

This part aims to present and discuss the study’s finding with regard to the following research questions:

1 What difficulties do the second-year students at TUEBA face in the TOEIC listening test?

2 What causes such difficulties?

3 What strategies do these students often apply when taking TOEIC listening test?

3.1 What difficulties do the second-year students at TUEBA face in the TOEIC listening test?

3.1.1 Students’ opinions of TOEIC listening test

Very difficult 42%

Difficult

52%

Suitable 6%

Easy 0% Very easy 0%

Chart 1: Students’ opinions about the difficult level of TOEIC listening test

The highest percentage of students at 52% considers the TOEIC listening test difficult 42% think that the test is very difficult Explaining for this scare, one of the interviewees say that “a lot of things constitute to good listening such as good pronunciation, large vocabulary, good skills and so on” (S2- Q1)

6% of the students thought that listening is suitable to their English level Surprisingly, there were no students who dared to say confidently that listening

is very easy or easy

In conclusion, TOEIC listening was considered difficult; therefore, teachers should consider the level of tests while designing them

Chart 2: Students’ opinions of the most difficult part of TOEIC listening test

None of students considered part 1 and 2 as the most difficult part With 14% agreed that part 3-conversations was seen as another difficulty An interviewee shared that he could not choose correct answers “because the options for many questions are often stated indirectly” (S2, Question 2) Among the four parts, most students (86%) voted part 4 as the most difficult part It is understandable that non-experienced students cannot do well in this part with the following reasons "not have enough rich vocabularies to understand most details” and “the information of two questions includes in only one statement” (S1- Q2)

3.1.2 Students’ opinions of TOEIC listening difficulties related to background knowledge and linguistic ability

In this section, the students were asked to point out the difficulties in some aspects of knowledge and linguistic ability and the results are presented in Chart

3 and Table 3 In particular, unfamiliar vocabulary and topics, difficult grammatical structures, the length of the spoken text, pronunciation, speech rate,

and variety of accents may present students with TOEIC listening problems

Chart 3: Students’ opinions of TOEIC listening difficulties related to

background knowledge

Chart 3 demonstrates whether unfamiliar words interfere with the learners‟ listening comprehension The great majority of the students (90% including 44% often, 32% always, 14% sometimes) have responded that unfamiliar words interfered with their listening comprehension This finding shows that the major problem hindering listening comprehension was that the students‟ vocabulary was too limited to understand the message Therefore, lack of vocabulary is a big obstacle to most students in TOEIC listening comprehension Similarly, the TOEIC listening material may contain a variety of fields in life or society For instance, it is likely a business report, a daily conversation or a political issue which confuse the listener These conversations may include words, phrases or terms unfamiliar to listeners The solution is to ask the students to practice as much as they can on these various materials Therefore, they can get used to listening to the variety of topics without any difficulties