Improving listening comprehension of grade 11 students at dong anh high school through reading based listening skill development

LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Comparison of mean scores between the pre and post-test 21 Figure 2: Comparison of results in English before and after the intervention 23 Figure 3: Students’ a

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

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ĐỖ THỊ HỒNG DUNG

IMPROVING LISTENING COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 11 STUDENTS AT DONG ANH HIGH SCHOOL THROUGH READING-BASED LISTENING SKILL DEVELOPMENT (Nâng cao khả năng nghe hiểu của học sinh khối 11 trường THPT Đông Anh thông qua việc kết hợp dạy kỹ năng nghe và đọc)

M.A Minor Thesis

Field: English Teaching Methodology

Code: 601410

Hanoi, 2010

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

-oo0oo -

ĐỖ THỊ HỒNG DUNG

IMPROVING LISTENING COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 11 STUDENTS AT DONG ANH HIGH SCHOOL THROUGH READING-BASED LISTENING SKILL DEVELOPMENT (Nâng cao khả năng nghe hiểu của học sinh khối 11 trường THPT Đông Anh thông qua việc kết hợp dạy kỹ năng nghe và đọc)

M.A Minor Thesis

TABLE OF CONTENTS Page

Declaration iii

Acknowledgements iv

Abstract v

List of figures vi

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rational for the study 1

2 Objectives and significance of the study 2

3 Scope of the study 2

4 Methods of the study 2

5 Organization of the study 3

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1.1 Definition of listening and listening comprehension 4

1.1.1 Definition of listening 4

1.1.2 Definition of listening comprehension 4

1.2 Significance of listening 5

1.3 Nature of listening 6

1.4 Strategies of listening comprehension 7

1.5 Factors affecting listening comprehension 8

1.6 Approaches to teaching listening comprehension 10

1.7 Stages in teaching listening 11

1.7.1 Pre-listening stage 11

1.7.2 While listening stage 12

1.7.3 Post-listening stage 12

1.8 Relationship between teaching listening comprehension and reading Comprehension 13

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 15

2.1 Background of the study 15

2.1.1 The syllabus 15

2.1.2 Participants 17

2.1.3 The teaching and learning conditions 17

2.2 Data collecting instruments 18

2.2.1 Pre and post-tests 18

2.2.2 Pre and post-questionnaire 18

2.2.3 Class observation 19

2.2.4 Interviewing 19

2.3 Procedure 20

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND DICSUSSION 21

3.1 Analysis of the pre, post-test and interview 21

3.2 Analysis of the pre, post-questionnaire and interviews 22

3.3 Analysis of the class observations 33

PART C: CONCLUSION .35

1 Conclusions 35

2 Teaching implications 36

2.1 Combining listening with reading and other skills 36

2.2 Providing background knowledge particularly the cultural knowledge in language teaching 36

2.3 Developing students’ micro skills 36

2.4 Textbook-based learning and other listening contexts 37

2.5 Combining “intensive listening" with “extensive listening” 37

3 Limitations and suggestions for further study 38

3.1 Limitations of the study 38

3.2 Suggestions for further study 38

REFERENCES 40 APPENDICES I

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Comparison of mean scores between the pre and post-test 21 Figure 2: Comparison of results in English before and after the intervention 23 Figure 3: Students’ assessment towards learning the listening skills in compared 24 with other skills before and after the intervention

Figure 4: Student’s assessment of the importance of learning the listening 25 comprehension before and after the intervention

Figure 5: Students’ evaluation of learning the listening comprehension before 26 and after the intervention

Figure 6: Factors affecting students’ listening comprehension 26 Figure 7: Students’ attitudes towards the necessity of using reading-based 27 listening strategies to improve listening comprehension before and

after the intervention

Figure 8: Students’ understanding in the listening lessons before and after 28 the intervention

Figure 9: Students’ feelings in the listening lessons before and after the 29 Intervention

Figure 10: Students’ confidence in the listening lessons before and after the 30 Intervention

Figure 11: Students’ behavior to improve their listening comprehension before 31 and after the intervention

Figure 12: Students’ involvement in the listening lessons before and after the 33

intervention

PART A: INTRODUCTION

This part is comprised of five sections including the rationale for the study, the objectives of the study, the scope of the study, the methods used in the study and the organization of the thesis

1 Rationale for the study

It is widely accepted that English has become an international language Until

now “it is listed as the official or co-official language of over 45 countries and it is spoken extensively in other countries where it has no official status.” (Krysstal.com)

Therefore, mastering English will help people enrich their knowledge about the world

For its great importance, English has now a mandatory subject in all schools in Vietnam in general and at High schools in particular In recent years, with the development of the communicative approach, students’ communicative competence has been stressed In other words, English must be taught as a tool for communication In this communicative process, listening comprehension plays an important role Obviously, communication does not take place when listeners do not understand what is said Wilt (1950) argues that listening takes up about 45% of time spent in communicating in real life Therefore, it can be said that teaching listening comprehension must be at the core of teaching practice, and it is the area in which teachers need to concentrate their own efforts to improve their teaching

Unfortunately, among the four language skills, listening comprehension seems to

be the most challenging for many students This is also a big problem that most students

in the researcher’s school are encountering As a teacher of English for over five years, the researcher has found out that many students in the researcher’s school suppose the listening skill to be the most difficult one This leads to the fact that listening lessons are often said to be boring and tedious

As a matter of fact, there have been many studies on how to teach listening comprehension effectively However, with a glance into the existing literature, it is felt that there is a shortage of studies with respect to integrating reading comprehension into teaching listening comprehension in EFL contexts It seems that the EFL field is in need

of further studies investigating the issue of teaching listening comprehension in integration with teaching reading comprehension

For all the things mentioned above, the researcher finds it necessary to carry out the study on “Strategies to improve listening comprehension of grade 11 students at Dong Anh high school through reading-based listening skill development.” It is hoped that the results of this study will cast some light on this issue and pave the way for a better teaching of listening

2 Objectives of the study

The first and foremost aim of the study is to find out the difficulties facing grade

11 students in Dong Anh High school in leaning listening comprehension The second one is to discover the factors that cause trouble for students in listening comprehension The next purpose is to study the development of the students’ listening skills after the intervention including students’ readiness, interests and confidence in learning listening skill in particular and learning English in general Last but not least important, some effective ways for teaching listening comprehension are recommended with a view to improve students’ listening comprehension

The study is done in a hope that it will help better the situation of teaching and learning English listening comprehension at Dong Anh high school Thus, it will help enhance students’ English competence

3 Scope of the study

With regard to the scale of this undertaking, this study only focuses on the mater within the group of grade 11 students at Dong Anh High school Furthermore, for the purpose of going deeply into the subjects’ matter, the researcher only concentrates on teaching English listening comprehension

4 Methods of the study

To realize the objectives of the study, both qualitative and quantitative methods

were used The data for the study were obtained through the following instruments:

 Pre and post-tests were designed by the researcher to find out the students’ ability

in listening comprehension

 A pre and post-questionnaire was designed by the researcher to find out the students’ readiness, interests, confidence and behavior in learning listening comprehension and learning English in general

 Classroom observation was conducted four times to investigate students’ readiness, interests and confidence in learning listening comprehension and learning English in general

 Informal interviews were carried out to discover students’ attitudes towards learning listening comprehension

5 Organization of the study

The thesis consists of three main parts:

 Part A is the introduction, which gives the rationale, the objectives of the study, methods used in this study and the organization of the thesis

 Part B is the development, which includes three chapters as follows:

 Chapter 1 is the Literature review This chapter presents all the related theoretical background that precedes and necessitates the information of the research

 Chapter 2 presents the methods of the study

 Chapter 3 is the data analysis and discussion In this chapter, the data collected are analyzed both qualitatively and quantitatively Afterwards, some teaching implications are drawn to improve the situation of teaching and learning listening comprehension at the researcher’s school

 Part C is the conclusion which presents the study conclusions and teaching implications Besides, it also offers the limitations and suggestions for further study

PART B: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1 LITERATURE REVIEW

In this chapter, all the related theoretical background that precedes and necessitates the information of the research is presented They are: definition of listening and listening comprehension, significance of teaching listening, nature of listening, listening strategies factors affecting listening comprehension, approaches to teaching listening comprehension, stages in teaching listening and relationship between teaching listening comprehension and teaching reading comprehension

1.1 Definition of listening and listening comprehension

Since the early 70's, listening has been paid attention as a tool for understanding and as a key factor in facilitating language learning Thus, listening has emerged as an important component in the process of second language acquisition

1.1.1 Definition of listening

There have been various ways to define listening

In Field’s viewpoints, “listening is an invisible mental process, making it difficult

to describe Listeners must discriminate between sounds, understand vocabulary and grammar structures, interpret stress and intention, retain and interpret this within the immediate as well as the large socio-cultural context of the utterance (Field, 1989:38)

Rost had another way to define listening by emphasizing the vital role of listening

in second language learning In his opinion, “listening is vital in the classroom because it provides the input for students Without understanding the input at the right level, any learning simply can’t begin.” (Rost, 1991:141)

1.1.2 Definition of listening comprehension

Researchers have different views on the definition of listening comprehension:

“Listening comprehension is defined as the process of understanding speech in a second or foreign language When comprehending something, we can understand what is

said It is assumed that speaking and writing are the process of encoding messages while listening and reading decode them Listening comprehension, therefore, is a perceptive skill involving identifying and retaining information orally perceived.” (Boyle, 1981:13)

For Buck, “ Listening comprehension is an active process of constructing meaning and this is done by applying knowledge to the incoming sound “in which” number of different types of knowledge are involved; both linguistic knowledge and nonlinguistic knowledge.” (Buck, 1984:31)

Anderson and Lynch also share the shame ideas with Buck They believe that listening comprehension requires not only the linguistic knowledge but also the non-linguistic knowledge in order to reach the final message of the speaker in communication

“Listening comprehension means to understand what a speaker says: the listener has a crucial part to play in the process by activating various types of knowledge, by applying what he knows to what he hears and trying to understand what the speaker means”

(Anderson & Lynch, 1988:21)

Listening is an invisible mental process, making it difficult to describe However,

it is recognized by Wipf (1984) that listeners must discriminate between sounds, understand vocabulary and grammatical structures, interpret stress and intonation, understand intention and retain and interpret this within the immediate as well as the larger socio-cultural context of the utterance Rost (2002) defines listening, in its broadest sense, as a process of receiving what the speaker actually says (receptive orientation); constructing and representing meaning (constructive orientation); negotiating meaning with the speaker and responding (collaborative orientation); and creating meaning through involvement, imagination and empathy (transformative orientation)

In short, listening comprehension involves multiple skills It is a complex and active process of interpretation in which listeners match what they hear with what they already know

1.2 Significance of listening

Language learning depends on listening since it provides the aural input that serves as the basis for language acquisition and enables learners to interact in spoken communication Listening provides the foundation for all aspects of language and cognitive development, and it plays a life-long role in the process of communication A

study by Wilt (1950), found that people listen 45 % of the time they spend communicating Listening is the medium through which people gain a large portion of their education, their information, their understanding of the world and of human affairs, their ideals, sense of values, and their appreciation

In this day of mass oral communication, it is of vital importance that students are taught to listen effectively and critically According to second language acquisition theory, language input is the most essential condition of language acquisition As an input skill, listening plays a crucial role in students’ language development Krashen (1985) argues that people acquire language by understanding the linguistic information they hear Thus language acquisition is achieved mainly through receiving understandable input and listening ability is the critical component in achieving understandable language input Given the importance of listening in language teaching and learning, it is essential for language teachers to help students become effective listeners

1.3 Nature of listening comprehension

According to Wang Shouyuan (2003), listening is the most important component

in the five aspects of overall English competence He suggests among the five aspects (listening, speaking, reading, writing and translation), listening deserves particular attention Educators must actively explore the nature and process of listening comprehension and study the theory and methodology of listening comprehension in order to improve listening and make students recognize that listening comprehension is the crucial aspect of English learning

From the point of view of constructivist linguistics, foreign language teaching should focus on language form and structure, thus, teaching listening is undertaken in each of the four aspects of language form When students are taught to understand a passage of text, teachers first let them discriminate between the pronunciation of vowels and consonants, then understand vocabulary, sentences and discourses The goals of this listening teaching model from the “bottom-up” is to help students understand the meaning of vocabulary by discriminating sounds, to understand sentence meaning, and to monitor and control the meaning of discourses by understanding sentence meaning

Since the 1970s, with the development of functional language theory, there has been an emphasis on the research of language function in society Functional linguistic

experts recognize language as a communicative tool, but not an isolated structure system Consequently the teaching of listening is not simply intended to make students hear a sound, a word or a sentence, rather, the goal is to cultivate students’ abilities to understand speakers’ intentions accurately and communicate with each other effectively

1.4 Strategies of listening comprehension

Listening strategies are techniques or activities that contribute directly to the comprehension and recall of listening input Listening strategies can be classified by how the listener processes the input

Two views of listening have dominated language pedagogy over the last twenty years They are the “bottom-up” and “top-down” processing They are simultaneous and complementary

In the view of Nunan, D (1999:200), “bottom-up processing is a process of decoding the sounds that one hears in a linear fashion, from the smallest meaningful units or phonemes) to complete texts According to this view, phonemic units are decoded and linked together to form utterances and utterances are linked together to form complete meaningful texts.”

Hedge, T (2000:230) argues that “In the bottom part of the listening process, we use our knowledge of language and our ability to process acoustic signals to make sense

of the sounds that speech presents to us In other words, we use information in the speech itself to try to comprehend the meaning We segment speech into identifiable sounds and impose a structure on these in terms of words, phrases, clauses, sentences and intonation patterns At the same time, we use whatever clues are available to infer meaning from the developing speech”

Bottom-up strategies are text-based in which the listener relies on the language in the message, that is, the combination of sounds, words, and grammar that creates meaning Bottom-up strategies include:

 listening for specific details

 recognizing cognates

 recognizing word-order patterns

Alternatively, top-down process infers meaning from contextual clues and from making links between the spoken message and various types of prior knowledge which

listeners hold inside their head Contextual clues to meaning come from knowledge of the particular situation, i.e the speaker, the setting, the topic and the purpose of the spoken text, and from knowledge of what has been said earlier Prior knowledge has been termed schematic knowledge

Top-down strategies are listener-based; the listener taps into background knowledge of the topic, the situation or context, the type of text, and the language This background knowledge activates a set of expectations that help the listener to interpret what is heard and anticipate what will come next

Top-down strategies include:

 listening for the main idea

 predicting

 drawing inferences

 summarizing

In summary, in the bottom-up process, learners rely on their linguistic knowledge

to comprehend the message whereas in top-down process, they must use their prior

knowledge in order to arrive at the final message Nevertheless, “it would be a mistake to see top-down and bottom-up strategies as somehow in opposition It is generally accepted that both function simultaneously and are mutually dependent.”(Hedge.T, 2000:

18)

1.5 Factors affecting listening comprehension

It can be said that listening skill often causes much trouble for language learners With five-year-teaching experience, the researcher has discovered that many of her students are often afraid of listening comprehension skill Her students often complain that they are in short of vocabulary, they lack the background knowledge or they are not familiar with the speed of the speaker or the different accent, etc So, what makes listening difficult?

There have been different views about factors that affect listening comprehension: According to Brown and Yule (1983:74), there are four main groups of factors that cause difficulty in listening comprehension They are in turns the speaker, the

listener, the content and support “ there are four main groups of factors that cause difficulty in listening comprehension These are the speaker (that includes the numbers of

speakers, the speaker’s speed, and the speaker’s accents); the listeners (this consists of the roles of the listeners, the level of response required and the listener’s interest in the subject): the content (vocabulary, grammar, information structure and background knowledge); and support (whether there are pictures, diagrams and visual aids….)

Sharing the shame ideas, Boyle suggests three major factors that affect the listening process They include the listener factors; the speaker factors; factors in the material and medium

4.2 Home background, size of family

4.3 Educational background and type of school

4.4 Physical health and alertness

5.3 Knowledge of the specific topic or subject

5.4 Memory (short term and long term)

6 Psychological

6.1 Motivation and sense of purpose while listening

6.2 Attitude of the listener to the speaker

6.3 Attitude of the listener to the message: level of interest

6.4 Listener’s powers of attention and concentration

B Speaker factors

1 Language ability of the speaker; native speaker- beginner-level, non-native speaker

2 Speaker production: pronunciation, accent, variation, voice etc

3 Speed of delivery

4 Prestige and personality of the speaker

C Factors in the material and medium

1 Language used to convey the message: phonological features, including stress, intonation, weak forms (especially in conversation), lexis, syntax, cohesion, etc

2 Difficulty of content and concepts, especially if the material is abstract, abstruse, highly specialized or technical, esoteric, or poorly organized

3 Acoustic environment: noise and interference

4 Amount of support provided by gestures, visuals, etc

(Boyle, 1984:35)

In short, the teacher should take into considerations the factors mentioned above

in order to assist the students to overcome the difficulties in listening comprehension and gain success in their listening

1.6 Approaches to teaching listening comprehension

Underwood (1989, 90-109) presents some approaches to teaching listening such

as grammar-translation method, grammar method, audio-lingual method and task-based method

 Grammar translation method: learners listen to a description of rules of the

second language in the first language As a result, when the second language is used, the focus of any listening is on translation of lexical items or grammar structures

 Grammar method: in this method, the teacher requires students to look at a

written text while they listen to a recording They are forced to do several things: identify words by their position in the sentences, work out the relationship between words and phrases, use forward and backward cues, and make intelligent guesses based on textual cues

 Audio-lingual method: this method was started by American linguist This

method emphasizes first listening to pronunciation and grammatical forms then

imitating those forms by way of drills and exercises Dialogues and drills are the basic of classroom practice with this method Students are encouraged to listen carefully either to a recording of, or a teacher reading out, a dialogue, or a drill Basically, the more the students repeat a correct phrase or sentence, the stronger

of their memory of the structures will be

 Task-based method: this method places stress on activities or tasks that learners

do in class in order to develop their communicative competence A task-based syllabus should be constructed according to the difficulty of the tasks required of the learners at different stages in a course

In conclusion, the four methods of teaching listening are not mutually exclusive and in reality they may be mixed in any particular course or classroom However, with the development of the Communicative Language Teaching (CLT), teaching listening seems to be more important as they enable to develop listening skills and other skills as well

1.7 Stages in teaching listening

The teaching of a listening lesson is usually divided into three main stages: listening, while-listening and post-listening Each stage has its own purposes, activities and time allocation

“before to introduce and arouse interest in the topic

- to promote an active and flexible learning environment

- to help increase learners’ motivation for learning

- to motivate learners by giving a reason for listening

- to provide some language preparations for the text

(Baker & Westrup, 2000:233; Lewis & Hill, 1992; 195)

During this phase, teachers may use some activities such as: teachers giving background information, students read something relevant, brainstorming, questioning, group discussing, predicting and so on The choice of which activities to be used should depend on the time, the material available, the interest of the class and the teacher, the place in which the work is being carried out, the nature and the content of the listening text itself If one of these forgotten, the whole process of activity can be failed

Activities in while-listening stage relate directly to engagement with text, and students do them during or immediately after the time they are listening These points are kept in mind when planning while-listening activities:

 Decide what is and is not important to understand

 Use predicting to encourage students to monitor their comprehension as they listen

 Use questions to focus students' attention on the elements of the text crucial to comprehension of the whole

 Organize activities to guide listeners through the text (combine global activities such as getting the main idea, topic, etc.)

 Give an immediate feedback whenever possible (encourage students to examine how or why their responses were incorrect.)

1.7.3 Post-listening stage

It is the final step of a listening lesson Therefore, it is the time for students’ production The activities at this stage are aimed at helping learners to use what they have had from the listening text The teacher should make up and vary the activities for learners to do depending on their level of English competence This stage often last for

ten or fifteen minutes Hedge (2000:24) argues that “post listening activities can take

students into a more intensive phase study in which aspects of bottom-up listening are practiced.”

Post-listening work can be more effective if they are integrated with other skills like reading, writing or speaking skills

The followings are some activities that teacher can make use of for the listening stage

post- Write questions on the board and ask students to answer them Students are also stimulated to talk and actively participate in the task

 Tell students to compare their notes and discuss what they understood in pairs or small groups

 Encourage students to respond to what they have heard For example, where possible ask questions like “Do you agree?” And encourage debate

 Tell pairs to write a summary of the main points Then have them compare their summaries and check if they covered all the main points

 Evaluate comprehension in a particular task or area

 Decide if the strategies used were appropriate for the purpose and for the task, modify strategies if necessary

1.8 The relationship between teaching listening comprehension and teaching reading comprehension

Wang, Miao (2005:1) in “Teaching EFL Listening: From Theory to Practice” suggests that one of the best way to improve the teaching of listening comprehension

is to integrate listening with other language skills such as reading, speaking and writing skills Within the objectives of this paper, the researcher would only focus on teaching listening comprehension in integration with teaching reading comprehension There have been many studies about teaching listening integrated with other skills such as studies of Cambourne (1981), Nagel and Sanders (1986), and Smith (1990 1975), Murphy (1999), Dow (2006) Teaching listening comprehension in integration with reading comprehension brings about the following benefits:

 According to Brown and Yule (1983:74), Boyle (1984:35), vocabulary and grammar are important factors that hinder the process of listening Consequently,

it is essential to provide vocabulary, grammar in advance in order to understand

the listening texts Thus, teaching reading comprehension can provide vocabulary and grammar which are necessary for listening comprehension

 Furthermore, it is widely accepted that listening comprehension involves not only the linguistic knowledge but also the non-linguistic one (Buck, 1984: 31;

Anderson & lynch, 1988: 13) As Chen (2006:1) has asserted “…the lack of cross-cultural knowledge and inadequate mastery of the target language often resulted in incomplete listening comprehension.”

Thus, it can be said that background knowledge is an important factor that contributes to the success of listening As a result, reading comprehension should be taught in advance to provide the background knowledge necessary for the listening

comprehension

CHAPTER 2 METHODS OF THE STUDY

In this chapter, the methods applied to gain the data for the research is described

First of all, the researcher finds it necessary to give the context or back ground in which the study took place The background of the study includes the syllabus, the participants, the teaching and learning conditions The second part of this chapter deals with the data collecting instruments They are: pre and post –test, pre and post-questionnaire, class observation and interviewing

2.1 Background of the study

The researcher is working at a High school in the suburb of Hanoi for over five years The following gives some descriptions of the context where she is working

2.1.1 The syllabus

In the author’s school, the new English textbooks have been in use for four years Before 2002, like other schools in Vietnam, her school used the old English textbooks which mostly laid the emphasis on language items, particularly, grammar Therefore, the majority of students could have a good command of English grammar but they were incapable of communicating in the target language Since 2002, the new English textbooks have been introduced into the teaching curriculum These give the main focus

on skills Each textbook contains sixteen units Each unit consists of five sections They are, in turns, reading, speaking, listening, writing and language focus It seems that the new textbooks are more suitable for the purpose of teaching English at present With the focus on skills, students are required to be able to communicate in the target language

However, this purpose also has caused many difficulties for teachers and students in learning English, particularly in learning the listening skill

In the textbook 11, there are twenty listening periods with different topics They are arranged as follows:

Unit 1: Friendship

Unit 2: Personal experience

Unit 3: A party

Test yourself A: Friendship

Unit 4: Volunteer work (Activities at Spring school)

Unit 5: A survey of students’ attitude in Perth

Unit 6: Boston marathon competition

Test yourself B: The history of Olympic Games

Unit 7: World population

Unit 8: Tet holiday in Japan

Unit 9: The development of telecommunication in Vietnam

Test yourself C: Ordering a conversation

Unit 10: National parks

Unit 11: Renewable & non-renewable sources of energy

Test yourself D: Water conservation

Unit 12: The Asian Games

Uni1 13: Hobbies

Unit 14: Holidays

Test yourself E: Benefits of watching television

Unit 15: The first human moon landing

Unit 16: The Great Wall of China

Test yourself F: Man in Space

2.1.2 Participants

The subjects of the study are two hundred grade 11 students at Dong Anh High school They come from class 11A2, 11A5, 11A6 and 11A9 Their pre-supposed level in English is pre-intermediate; however, the majority of them can not reach this level In fact, they are not very good at English This can be proved by their results in this subject English results in the class and in examinations are usually the lowest in compared with other subjects’ In short, it can be said that the majority of the subjects possess low English competence

This study can not be done without the help of other teachers at Dong Anh High school There are seven teachers in the writer’s school All of them have at least five-year-teaching experience Before 2002, the majority of teachers in the author’s school followed the traditional way of teaching (grammar translation method) However, with the application of the new English textbook, most of them come to realize that they should vary the way of teaching to suit the new goal of teaching They highly appreciate the communicative teaching approach, though they sometimes still employ traditional way as a result of the students’ low English competence

2.1.3 The teaching and learning conditions

In recent years, computer has been used in her school A multi-functional room equipped with a computer and a projector was built in 2004 This has made the application of information technology into language teaching feasible Teachers can design electronic lesson plans and use them to teach their students The lessons become more interesting and easier to understand with visual illustrations and audio aids Students appear to be more enthusiastic with these kinds of electronic lessons Moreover

in each listening lesson, students no longer have to listen to the teacher’ voice They have chance to listen to tape recorder This helps them to get familiar with the native accent

2.2 Data collecting instruments

The study employed four instruments to obtain the data They are pre and tests, pre and post-questionnaire, interviewing and class observation The combination of different instruments will increase the preciseness and reliability of the data collected because the data obtained from one method will help to inform and refine the other

post-2.2.1 Pre and post-tests

First of all, pre and post listening tests were designed by the researcher to find out the student’s ability in listening comprehension The pre and post tests were carefully designed in terms of the following quality:

 The tests were designed for students of pre-intermediate level

 The tasks in both pre and post test must be equal in terms of the difficulty

 The task types in the pre and post test are similar Each listening test has three tasks including gap-filling, true or false and question-answering

 The topic for each listening task in both pre and both test is similar Task

1 is about people introducing themselves Task 2 is about people talking about their countries Task 3 is about people talking about their neighbor These similarities between the two tests help ensure the reliability and validity of the research The test had been piloted with two hundred students in four different classes Then, the results obtained were analyzed by mean The mean scores from the pre

test and post test was compared to see the changes in their ability in listening comprehension

2.2.2 Pre and post -questionnaire

Secondly, a pre and post questionnaire was designed by the researcher to find out the students’ attitudes, interests, confidence and behavior in learning listening comprehension Questionnaires were provided “to learn about the characteristics, attitudes, or beliefs” (Marshall & Rossman, 1999:1995) of the participants

The questionnaire also required students to give their previous background of language learning such as their grades they had got in English in the first semester The main questions in the questionnaire were grouped into four main parts

 The first part aimed at finding how students could see the importance, necessity of learning listening skill

 The second part discovered the factors affecting listening comprehension

 The third one involved the affective and cognitive elements in learning listening comprehension such as how they understood and felt about learning listening skill and learning English

 The last part asked about how they behaved in learning listening comprehension

In other words, it aimed at finding how students think, do about learning listening skill

The questionnaire was piloted with the same students who had taken part in the pre and post tests

2.2.3 Class observation

“Observation is an effective research technique to directly elicit the data in the context being investigated” (Merriam, 1998:88) In this study, the researcher was able to directly observe listening task interaction Selinker (1974:35) claims that “[from] the only observable data in meaningful performance situations can we establish legitimate judgment’’ In this study, the purpose of class observation is to check the reliability of the

data collected from the questionnaire and hopefully clarify what has not been done through questionnaire For each class, she observed in forty five minutes Class

observation was conducted four times in four different classes The checklist for listening class observation includes the teacher’s activities; students’ activities

2.2.4 Interviewing

Interviews enabled the researcher to gain more in-depth understanding of the

participants’ perspectives, which other methods could not identify “The purpose of interviewing, then, is to allow us to enter into the other person’s perspective” (Patton,

1990:196) In this study, informal interviews were carried out to discover students’ attitudes towards learning English listening comprehension

2.3 Procedure

The intervention was carried out in ten listening lessons during the second term Before each listening lesson, students were given the reading texts which were relevant to the topics of the listening lessons This aimed at equipping students with necessary vocabulary, grammar structures and background knowledge before listening Therefore, it can facilitate students to listen better in the listening lessons Due to the lack of time in class, they were required to do the reading texts at home

CHAPTER 3 DATA ANLYSIS AND DISCUSSION

In this chapter, the data collected were analyzed in terms of the methods to gather the data The data were analyzed both qualitatively and quantitatively Then, some teaching implications were drawn under each finding from the data analysis Findings from interviews were analyzed in combination with other ones collected from pre and post tests, pre and post questionnaires

3.1 Analysis of the pre, post- tests and interviews

The results from the pre and post test were analyzed by mean Then, the two mean scores were compared to see the changes in students’ listening ability Detailed scores of the pre and post tests can be seen in appendix 4 The following figure gives the outcomes for these tests

It can be seen in figure 1 that there is a significant development in the students’ capacity in listening comprehension The mean scores increased noticeably from 5.1 to 6.2

 This implies that the intervention was fairly effective in enhancing students’ listening comprehension

Another thing that should be noted in both pre and post tests is that students could perform quite well at task 1 (gap-filling) and task 2 (true or false) However, the majority

of them could not write the full answers for task 3 or even could not give any reply The interview was implemented to explore the reasons for this issue According Mr Nguyen

The Hue (a teacher at the researcher’s school), “This often happens in my listening class, students seem to do the gap filling or true false exercises more easily than question- answering exercises Few of them can give the correct answers” This is another opinion from a student, “I find question-answering exercises difficult because I can not catch up with word and write down immediately at the same time Sometimes, as I am writing down the answer for the question, the tape is going to an end So, I can give few answers

or even nothing” (Tran Thi Hai Hong-class 11A2)

 It can be concluded that the students’ performance is affected by types of tasks Therefore, it is advisable for teacher to equip students with necessary strategies or tips as they listen For example, when dealing with question-answering tasks, students should be trained just listen and write down the key words Afterwards, they will write a full reply Furthermore, they should be taught to predict the types of reply to each question For instance, if the question begins with “ How many…”, students will pay

Figure 1: Comparison of mean scores between the pre and post-test

Samples

attention to the number Or if the question begins with “ Where….”, students can predict the answer will be about place etc

3.2 Analysis of the pre, post-questionnaire and interviews

At the beginning of the pre and post-questionnaire, students were required to give their grades in English in the first and second semester In other words, students had to inform their results in English before and after the intervention Detailed grades in English are displayed in appendix 4 The average results are shown in figure 2 below Happily, there was a considerable increase in their English competence The students’ average grade in English went up by 0.7 points (from 5.5 to 6.2) As a result, it could be said that there is a strong connection between teaching the listening skill in particular and teaching English in general When students’ ability in listening comprehension improves, this will better their English in general

Figure 2: Comparison of results in English before and after the intervention

Students’ attitudes towards the listening skill in comparison with other ones are shown in question 1 The results were illustrated in figure 3 As can be seen, above one third of the students (35%) agreed that listening comprehension is the most challenging However, after the intervention, listening was no longer the most difficult skill Only 18 percent of the students thought it was the most difficult one Undoubtedly, the intervention facilitated students to listen more effectively Therefore, listening skill was not considered to be the most difficult one as it used to be

Concerning the importance of learning listening comprehension, there is a lucky sign that many of the students realized the necessity of learning listening comprehension The majority of them knew that it was important or very important No one supposed it to

be not important at all Even though, the intervention made a dramatic change in

students’ cognition Before the study took place, only 32 percent of the students believed listening comprehension was very important Surprisingly, after the study, the number of students thought it was very important reached 83 percent The number of the subjects assumed listening comprehension to be not very important declined sharply from 23 percent to 4 percent Detail of the results for question 2 is reflected in figure 4 In order to understand more about the changes in students’ attitudes towards the importance of learning the listening skill, an interview was administered The results were shown

below:

“Frankly, I generally pay less attention to develop listening comprehension because I recognize it gains a lower percentage of marks in examinations, while reading and writing are highly rewarded I understand I will gain high scores only if I can master the grammar and writing well.” (Tran Ngoc Anh-class 11 A9)

 Obviously, these psychological factors had a direct impact on students’ willingness and commitment to listening instruction Consequently, the ways to assess students’ learning should be changed in order to encourage students to pay more attention

A very important

B important

C not very important

D not important

Figure 4: Student’s assessment of the importance of learning the listening

comprehension before and after the intervention

Question 3 investigated students’ evaluation of learning listening comprehension

The answers for this question were presented in figure 5 As can be seen in figure 5,

listening comprehension was not easy at all as nobody chose option D Observably, the

number of the subjects thought that listening was very difficult declined sharply by 31

percent On the other hand, the number of students supposed listening skill to be not very

difficult boosted considerably by 25 percent

 These results proved for the fact that the intervention was quite helpful in

enhancing students’ listening comprehensive competence

0 10

Question 4 aimed at searching the reasons that made listening compression

difficult for lots of students The answers for this question were disclosed in figure 6

A very difficult

B difficult

C not very difficult

D easy

Figure 5: Students’ evaluation of learning the listening comprehension before

and after the intervention

It can be seen that, the core factors that caused many difficulties for students in

listening comprehension before the intervention were the lack of vocabulary, grammar

and the lack of background knowledge These two factors made up 74 percent

Nevertheless, after the study, these two factors only accounted for 48 percent Other

factors included the lack of strategies in listening, lack of time for listening and the speed

of the speakers

 This means that providing reading texts before listening was really necessary

and efficient It could solve the problems that the majority of students were encountering

in listening comprehension Hence, it facilitated students to listen better

Even though, the lack of vocabulary and grammar still caused much trouble for

many students in comprehending the listening tasks As a result, it is necessary for

teachers to provide students with techniques of guessing meaning in contexts in order to

cope with the new words or new grammatical structures

The aim of question 5 was to investigate students’ attitude towards doing relevant

reading assignments before listening The results are expressed in figure 7 below

A lack of vocabulary and grammar

B lack of background knowledge

C different accent

D others

Figure 6: Factors affecting students’ listening comprehension

comprehension

As can be seen in figure 7, the intervention made a significant change in students’ attitudes towards using reading-based strategies to improve listening comprehension This can be proved by the fact that before the intervention nearly 70% of the students thought that doing related reading assignments before listening was not very necessary However, after the study, many students came to realize the necessity of doing the related reading assignments Thus, over 70% of them supposed doing related reading tasks before listening to be necessary The number of students believed reading comprehension

to be very necessary for listening increased from 6% to 16% It is happy that after the study no one thought doing related reading assignments before listening was not necessary at all The interviews with some students enabled to clarify these findings

“Before the study, I didn’t think that there is a strong connection between reading and listening comprehension But now I have realized the necessity of doing reading assignments before listening It is really effective in that it can help develop vocabulary, grammar structures and it also provides background knowledge related to the topic of the listening.” (Nguyễn Thị Yến- clas 11A9)

A very necessary

B necessary

C not very necessary

D not necessary at all

Figure 7: Students’ attitudes towards the necessity of using reading-based

listening strategies to improve listening comprehension before and after the intervention

Figure 8 describes the outcomes for question 6 which aimed at investigating students’ understanding in the listening lessons before and after the intervention

No one said that they did not understand at all and more students admitted understanding very well or quite well the listening texts The proportion of students who could perform quite well in listening comprehension increased rapidly from 21% to 53%

Question 7 and 8 are raised in order to evaluate students’ affective elements in listening comprehension such as their confidence and feelings in listening comprehension The data obtained from these 2 questions are in turns revealed in figure 9 and 10 as follow:

A very well

B quite well

C not very well

D not understand at all

Figure 8: Students’ understanding in the listening lessons before and after the intervention

20 percent It could be easily explained by the fact that when students could comprehend the listening activities, they would be more interested in the lessons The outcomes from

interview helped clarify these findings “Before, I wasn’t able to understand very well the listening texts So, to be honest, I am not interested in the listening very much Sometimes,

I felt it is boring But, now I can understand more, I can do the listening tasks quite well

I can listen more It is great! Now, listening lessons are really interesting for me ” (Tran

Anh Tuan- class 11A6)

Figure 10 describes the students’ confidence in the listening lessons Due to the fact that students could understand more in the listening lessons, they would become more confident in their lessons They were no longer afraid of the listening tasks The proportions of students who were confident in their listening lessons boosted sharply from 21 to 53 percent Meanwhile, the percentages of the students who were not very

confident with their listening comprehension reduced quickly from 67 to 32 percent Fortunately, no one was afraid of the listening lessons after having participated in the research

The results from the interviews made clear for this improvement “Before the study, I wasn’t very good at listening To tell the truth, it is the worst skill for me, I was often unconfident I am afraid of being called because I was not sure about the answers

to each listening activities Sometimes, there were so many new words in the listening tasks that I couldn’t understand After taking part in the study, I found that my listening has been improved I can listen more, I can understand more I can give more answers to the listening activities So, I feel more confident in the listening lessons It’s wonderful!”

(Student: Le Thi Thom-class 11A5)

“From my own teaching experience for eight years, I’ve found that many of my students often lack confidence in their listening lessons In the listening classroom, teachers need students’ active participation but, having so many students who lack confidence and who feel nervous and anxious Students are reluctant to answer questions and will not risk being laughed at by their peers or criticized by the teachers Thus, it is unsurprising that students who are under pressure for a considerable period of time are often stressed and depressed; which compounds their efforts to improve their English proficiency (Teacher: Tran Thanh Hai )

It can not be denied that “success breeds success.” When students can understand the lessons, they will continue positive approach to the class

The two final questions aimed at seeking how students thought and behaved in order to improve their listening comprehension Question 9 is targeted at searching what students often do to improve their listening comprehension

As can be seen in figure 11, the study formulated a significant alteration in students’ behaviors in learning the listening skill It appears that more students were aware of the importance of learning listening comprehension Hence, they were likely to

be more active in order to improve their listening competence It is noticeable in figure 11 that nearly half of the students did nothing to improve their listening comprehension before the intervention Nevertheless, after taking part in the research, no one chose option D This means that students had a great change in their behavior to advance their listening Another thing to be noticed in figure 12 is that the number of the subjects chose option B increased strikingly from 0 percent to nearly 30 percent This is strong evidence for the good impact of the study on students’ behaviors The in-depth interview helped

explain this point “I wasn’t able to see the effect of reading the related material before

A listen to tape recorder regularly

B search and read the material related to the topic of the listening in advance

C listen to the native speakers

D do nothing

Figure 11: Students’ behavior to improve their listening comprehension before and after the intervention

listening until I joined the study So, I never searched and read the related material before listening However, the study has changed my mind After the study I have had the habit of reading the material related to the topic of the listening And I find it is quite effective It helps provide me with vocabulary and structures that appears in the up- coming listening texts Sometimes, it can provide me with background knowledge related

to the topic of the listening that I’ve never known So, it makes me understand the listening tasks better.” (Student: Nguyen Thanh Thuy-class 11A2)

“Before, I just listened to the tape in class I did almost nothing at home However, the study has made me realize the importance of practicing listening regularly Now, I am used to listening to English more often I usually listen to the tape at home or listen to English news on TV This makes me listen better” (Le Anh Tuan – class 11 A5)

 It can be concluded that, practicing listening regularly can facilitate listening better Hence, students should be advised to listen to English more regularly

Question 10 is given with the intention of exploring the degree of students’ involvement in the listening activities in class Students’ responses to this question are displayed in figure 12 As can be seen in figure 12, it is remarkable that the majority of students were not very active in the listening lessons before the intervention Most of them (47%) sometimes took part in the listening activities with enthusiasm There were even sixty four students who rarely took part in the listening the lessons with enthusiasm Fortunately, the study changed the unexpected situation 73 percent of the students always and often involved in the listening lessons enthusiastically after the study The outcome from interview made clear this finding

“Before, I rarely took part in the listening lessons with enthusiasm as I didn’t

understand the listening texts very well So, I am afraid of being called by the teacher I

am not confident to give my ideas or my understanding of the listening texts But now, I

can understand more about the listening texts So, I can do more in the listening tasks I

am no longer scared and I am more confident in giving the answers for most of the

listening tasks Not only has my listening comprehension but also my reading

comprehension been improved” (Bui Thanh Xuan-class 11A6)

 In short, the answers for question 10 showed that students participated in the

lessons more actively Besides, the intervention helped pave the way for bettering not

only the students’ listening comprehension but also their reading comprehension Hence,

it is better for teacher to integrate teaching listening with other skills since this way of

teaching not only helps improve students’ listening comprehension but also other skills

3.3 Analysis of the class observation

Classroom observation was conducted four times in four different listening

lessons and in different classes The observer set the aims to focus on aspects of teaching

A always participate in all activities with enthusiasm

B often participate in all activities with enthusiasm

C sometimes participate in all activities with enthusiasm

D rarely participate in all activities with enthusiasm

Figure 12: Students’ involvement in the listening lessons before and after the intervention

procedure, namely: the teacher-student interaction, the student-student interaction, and the classroom general atmosphere The data was analyzed based on the notes given under each aspect and then descriptively summarized

The observer found that:

 The teacher could develop a good rapport with students Because more students volunteered in the listening lessons, teacher could remember almost every students and showed intimacy by calling them their names

 The students themselves were quite interested in the lessons

 The students tried to co-operate and help each other to learn They participated in pair work and group work quite satisfactorily There were even some students who developed the courage to ask questions when the lessons seemed unclear to them These kinds of behavior rarely existed in their classes before

 The class atmosphere was quite desirable and everyone became active participants