Diversification of pre listening activities to improve students’ listening skill

Therefore, it is extremely necessary to conduct an action research with the aim of improving students‟ listening comprehension by diversifying pre-listening activities.. For those reason

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES

và Kinh tế Công nghiệp.)

M.A MINOR PROGRAM THESIS

Field : English Teaching Methodology Code : 8140231.01

HANOI – 2019

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES

và Kinh tế Công nghiệp.)

M.A MINOR PROGRAM THESIS

Field : English Teaching Methodology Code : 8140231.01

Supervisor : Assoc Prof Dr LÂM QUANG ĐÔNG

HANOI – 2019

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to my supervisor, Assoc.Prof.Dr Lam Quang Dong for his patient guidance, stimulating suggestions and encouragement throughout my research

I wish to thank all the staff members of the Faculty of Post-Graduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies for providing me the best

environment to fulfill my graduate program

My sincere gratitude also goes to my colleague Mrs Nguyen Mai Linh The support that she gave me truly helped with my progress and completion of the research project Especially, I would like to express my special thanks to my family who offered me their love, care, support and encouragement so that I could accomplish

my study

Last but not least, I would like to express appreciation to my students in Industrial Economics Technology College who were very enthusiastic to support me by participating in the research and providing me with the needed data without which the study could not have been completed

ABSTRACT

Although listening skill, one of the four core language competences fostered in Industrial Economics Technology College (IETC)‟s English curriculum, has always been promoted, students‟ performance in this aspect of proficiency still remains low Through practice, the researcher realized that the main reason for this problem

is the lack of good preparation for students from the pre-listening stage Therefore,

it is extremely necessary to conduct an action research with the aim of improving students‟ listening comprehension by diversifying pre-listening activities In the study, a pre-test and post-test were employed to check the students‟ listening comprehension and the questionnaires to gauge students‟ attitudes when the teacher used varied pre-listening activities The findings of this study suggest that students‟ listening skill was much boosted after they were exposed to various pre-listening activities The results also showed that the students had improved attitudes towards learning listening skill after the introduction of varied pre-listening activities

Hopefully, the thesis can be considered a practical contribution to more effective teaching practices at IETC and the ongoing process of renovation for teaching and learning listening

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i

ABSTRACT ii

LIST OF TABLES i

LIST OF FIGURES ii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Rationale of the study 1

1.2 Aims and scope of the study 3

1.2.1 Research Aims 3

1.2.2 Scope of the study 3

1.3 Research questions 4

1.4 Summary of Chapter 1 4

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

2.1 Theoretical background of listening skill 5

2.1.1 A brief overview of listening 5

2.1.2 Listening comprehension in language learning and teaching process 6

2.2 Factors affecting students‟ listening comprehension 7

2.2.1 Unfamiliar topics 7

2.2.2 Cultural Differences 8

2.2.3 Pronunciation, stress, rhythm and intonation 8

2.2.4 Listeners‟ limited vocabularies 9

2.2.5 Length and Speed of Listening 9

2.2.6 Inability to concentrate 9

2.3 Listening Comprehension in EFL Classrooms 9

2.3.1 Pre-listening stage 9

2.3.2 While-listening stage and post-listening stage 10

2.3.3 The roles of pre-listening activities 11

2.3.4 Pre-listening activities 12

2.4 Previous research 14

2.8 Summary of chapter 2 17

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 19

3.1 Research methodology 19

3.1.1 Definition of action research 19

3.1.2 Characteristic of action research 20

3.1.3 Process of action research 20

3.1.4 Benefits of Action Research 23

3.2 The research questions restated 23

3.3 The participants 23

3.3.1 Students 24

3.3.2 Observers 24

3.4 Data collection instruments 24

3.4.1 Detailed description of tests 24

3.4.2 Questionnaires 25

3.5 Action research procedures 25

3.5.1 Identifying a problem 25

3.5.2 Collecting the data 26

3.5.3 Analyzing data and generating hypothesis 26

3.5.4 Planning action 26

3.5.5 Implementing the action plan 27

3.5.6 Collecting data to monitor change 28

3.5.7 Analyzing data and evaluating the change 28

3.6 Summary of chapter 3 28

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 29

4.1 Results from the pre-test 29

4.2 Results from the post-tesst 29

4.3 Comparison of the pre-test and the post-test 30

4.4 Data collected by questionnaire part 1 32

4.5 Data collected by questionnaire part 2 33

4.6 Data collected by observation 34

4.7 Discussion 36

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 38

5.1 Summary of the Result of the Study 38

5.2 Limitations of the Study 39

5.3 Implications for Further Research 40

5.4 Implications for Teaching and Learning Practice 41

5.4.1 Implications for Teachers 41

5.4.2 Implications for Students 42

5.5 Final remarks 42

REFERENCES 44 APPENDICES I

Appendix 1: The pre-test I Appendix 2: The post-test VI Appendix 4: Observation sheet XIII Appendix 5: Result from the pre-test and post-test XVI Appendix 6: Result from observation sheet XIX Appendix 7: Results from learner questionnaire XX Appendix 8: Action plan implementation of varying pre-listening activities during the experiment XXI Appendix 9: a lesson plan of implementation of varying pre-listening activities during the experiment XXII

LIST OF TABLES

Table 4.1 The pre-test result 29

Table 4.2 The post-test results 29

Table 4.3 Comparison of the pre-test and post-test 30

Table 4.4 Students‟ comments about pre-listening activities 32

Table 4.5 Students‟ comments on the diversification of pre-listening activities that the teacher applied 33

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 3.1 Simple Action Research Model adapted from MacIsaac (1995) 21

Figure 3.2 Detailed Action Research Model adapted from Susman (1983) 22

Figure 4.1 29

Figure 4.2 The post-test results 30

Figure 4.3 Comparison of the pre-test and post-test 31

Figure 4 4 Students‟ comments on the varying pre-listening that the teacher applied 32

Figure 4 5 Students‟ comment on the varying pre-listening that the teacher applied 33

Figure 4 6 Students‟ on-task behavior 34

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Rationale of the study

Listening is an important skill in acquiring a language and it can be defined as the process of understanding speech in a second or foreign language Listening is the most frequently used in communication It is stated that during conversations, people spend 50 percent of time on listening, 25 percent on speaking, 15 percent on reading, and 10 percent on writing (Richards, 2008) Moreover, according to Morley (1984), listening is the key to all effective communication Indeed, without the interlocutors‟ ability to listen effectively, messages are easily misunderstood However, generally, students are fearful of listening, and can be disheartened when they listen to something they understand very little It is also harder for them to concentrate on listening if little or no interest in a topic or situation is developed before The initial pre-listening phase should prepare students by helping them activate their background knowledge and clarify their expectations and assumptions about the listening text by, for example, initiating some discussion about a picture involved in the listening text or discussion of some questions related to the listening passages An ideal pre-listening task is the one in which the teacher, through carefully constructed questions, helps students activate their background knowledge and language components needed to comprehend the text In general, pre-listening activities play a critical role and the main aim of this stage is to make learners focus their attention on the following while-listening stage, to build confidence and to facilitate comprehension

As cited in Medley (1977), pre-listening activities can be divided into readiness activities and guidance activities Readiness activities focus on motivating students‟ preliminary knowledge through asking students to read the title, make predictions or guesses what they are going to hear, explore new and/or key words that may appear

in the listening text, look at accompanied pictures, interpret the listening tasks, and providing them with scaffolding support before listening Guidance activities

concentrate on letting students know what they are going to do with the tasks or what they want to do with the tasks

Ur (1984) proposes that listening is an active and complex process and he believes that pre-listening activities activate student‟s background knowledge and provide them with the bases for forming hypotheses, predictions and inference With diverse pre-listening activities, student feel less anxious, so they will become more confident in the listening lesson From this perspective, students will be more motivated to listen, and as a consequence, and ultimately gain a higher level of comprehension, success and become effective learners

In my college, many students are from northern midland and mountainous areas of Vietnam whose background knowledge is poor, so it is difficult to help students there improve their listening competence Moreover, most teachers of English in Industrial Economics Technology College, to my knowledge and in my experience, tend to prepare little for the pre-listening stage due to several reasons: insufficient teaching time, or even their misconception that it is unnecessary to conduct this stage That may be the reason why students are not motivated to participate in the lessons Some even feel exhausted and inactive in class, and often complain that listening is the most challenging skill

As previously discussed, the pre-listening stage is very essential in the process of teaching listening Do teachers and students at my own college understand much about pre-listening tasks? If sufficient understanding has been secured, how do they deal with pre-listening tasks? What kind of activities do they apply and how effective are these activities? Are these activities sufficiently diverse to attract students and maintain their concentration? If not, how to diversify them? These questions require a careful study to seek their answers

For those reasons, the researcher conducted this research under the title

“Diversification of pre-listening activities to improve students' listening skill: an action research at Industrial Economics Technology College”

1.2 Aims and scope of the study

1.2.1 Research Aims

The long-term goal of the research is to develop a series of appropriate pre-listening activities that help my college‟s students in listening comprehension However, within the scope of this action research, the author first tried out a variety of pre-listening activities for diversification and see how they work, which works well and which not Based on that, a useful framework or guiding principles can then be built for developing appropriate pre-listening activities for the particular kind of students Therefore, the objective of this action research is merely to examine whether diversification of pre-listening activities in the pre-listening stage improves my college‟s students‟ listening comprehension; In passing, the study also made some investigation on students‟ reflection towards diversification of pre-listening tasks, because feedbacks from students are highly useful to teachers who always have to design teaching-learning materials, or at least design good lesson plans to deliver the intended objectives of each lesson, especially listening lessons

1.2.2 Scope of the study

The study concentrated on the effects of alternating pre-listening activities on improvement of students‟ listening skill in Industrial Economics Technology College

Participating in the study were 40 second-year students in class K9 at IETC who have studied English for 3 semesters with six 45-minutes lessons per week After studying 2 semesters of English they are now at pre-intermediate level The

textbook was adapted from Market Leader, which is an extensive business English

course designed to bring the real world of international business into the classroom

It has been developed in association with the Financial Times, one of the leading sources of professional information, to ensure the maximum range and authenticity

of international business content The purpose of adaptation is to make it suitable to local students and the instructional curriculum In the adapted version, English teachers in the Industrial Economics Technology College (IETC) added a wide

range of Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) activities such

as reading comprehension, photo choosing listening, listening comprehension, and

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter will review the literature on listening comprehension The first section provides basic theories about listening comprehension while the second part discusses the factors that affect students‟ listening comprehension Next, the stages

of the listening lesson are reviewed, especially the pre-listening stage Naturally, what has been studied concerning pre-listening activities in previous research is briefly described and commented

2.1 Theoretical background of listening skill

2.1.1 A brief overview of listening

Goh (2002) referred to listening as the most frequently used language skill, which accounts for as much as fifty per cent of human‟s everyday communication time Sharing this opinion, Rubin (1994) stated that listening is used far more than any other single language skill in our daily lives, twice as much as we speak, four times more than we read and five times more than we write Good listening, therefore, significantly contributes to the success of communicating process Understanding spoken English is much more challenging to language learners than figuring out meanings of a written text Thus, the teaching of listening comprehension is of great importance

Rost (1994) stated that listening is a crucial element of communication and it is also

an important factor for interaction A learner can express himself orally but is never able to communicate with speakers of English if he is unable to understand what is said to him In general, listening is used far more than any other single language skill in our daily lives We can expect to listen twice as much as we speak, four times than we read, and five times more than we write

Underwood (1989) states that the listening skill includes everything from learning particular sounds to comprehending complicated messages Without this skill, communication can break down Therefore, successful communication really depends on listeners or receivers of messages Listening is defined as the activity of

paying attention to and trying to get meaning from something we hear It is different from hearing which is simply the process of recognizing the sound system of spoken words Similarly, Emmert, Brandt, Watson, and Barker (1994) stated that listening is an active process Listening skill is composed of everything from learning particular sounds to comprehending complicated messages More specifically, listening involves understanding a speaker‟s accent, pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary to grasp his or her meaning (Underwood, 1989) He also believes that listening to spoken language also requires the ability to understand the implicature in a conversation

2.1.2 Listening comprehension in language learning and teaching process

It is believed that listening is a significant and essential area of development in a native or second language; therefore there have been numerous definitions of listening comprehension which present different views towards this concept

For instance, Buck (2001) defines listening comprehension as an active process of construction of meanings, done by applying knowledge to the incoming sound, involving both linguistic and non-linguistic knowledge In order to construct meanings from what one hears, other researchers agree that context plays an important role and should be taken into appropriate consideration Garrod (1986) and McDonough and Shaw (1993) share the same idea that listening comprehension requires the activation of contextual information and background knowledge

Meanwhile, Lynch (1995) gives a more detailed description of listening comprehension, which is a process in which listeners interact with the text Their level of interest, emotional reaction to the content and motivation can either facilitate or interfere with comprehension Successful listening seems to involve a comparison and integration of new information with established knowledge structures Similarly, Mendelsohn and Rubin (1995) believe that listeners not only passively understand the text, but also actively construct their own knowledge and then monitor the incoming information in order to keep developing it

The concept of listening and listening comprehension is also defined as everything that impinges on the human processing which mediates between sounds and the construction of meaning (Underwood, 1989) This definition once again emphasizes the activeness of listeners in processing the information heard Generally, listening

is agreed to comprise both top-down and bottom-up processes, with top-down meaning the listener activates his/her previous knowledge to decipher what he/she gets from the listening passages in the „bottom-up‟ process

2.2 Factors affecting students’ listening comprehension

A great number of factors affecting listening have been reported so far According

to Brown and Yule (1983), there are four groups of factors including the speakers (e.g the number of speakers, speakers‟ speed, accents); the listeners (e.g the role of listeners, the listeners‟ interest in the subject); the content (e.g vocabulary, grammar, background knowledge) and the support (e.g pictures, diagrams, visual aids, etc)

Anderson and Lynch (1988) divide the influential factors into three different categories including the type of language, the purpose in listening and the context in which the listening takes place Their experiments showed a number of factors that may impede students‟ listening performance: the organization of information, the familiarity of the topic, the explicitness and sufficiency of the information, and the type of referring expressions used and the relationships described in the text (dynamic or static relationships)

Regarding influential factors affecting listening comprehension results, Helgesen, Brown, and Brown (1994) Dunkel (1991), and Ur (1984) introduced a list of characteristics of spoken language, which are also troubling to listeners Those factors include clustering, redundancy, reduced form, performance variable, colloquial language, rate of delivery, stress, rhythm and intonation, and interaction

In conclusion, factors affecting listening comprehension could be listed as follows:

2.2.1 Unfamiliar topics

Unfamiliar topics have remained one of the most challenging problems to listeners According to Ur (1984) and Rixon (1986), as we rarely know exactly what we are

going to hear although we may have already had some general expectations, it is much easier to process a familiar topic than a strange one Nunan (1988) also confirms that listening to unfamiliar topics which are not addressed to listeners is much more difficult to comprehend than listening on familiar topics which are addressed to them

Similarly, Rost and Candlin (2014) state that listening to unfamiliar topics which are not addressed to listeners is more problematic than listening to popular ones As listeners comprehend better with a common topic, it is suggested that teachers‟ selection of input in the early stage should surround themes that frequently occur in real life conversations This not only facilitates students at the beginning of the course but also helps ease the learning and teaching process (Anderson and Lynch, 1988)

2.2.2 Cultural Differences

Learners should be familiar with the cultural knowledge of language that has a significant effect on the learners‟ understanding If the listening task involves completely different cultural materials then the learners may have critical problems in their comprehension It is the responsibility of teachers to give background knowledge about the listening activities in advance (Azmi, Celik, Yidliz, & Tugrul, 2014)

2.2.3 Pronunciation, stress, rhythm and intonation

Rost (1994) states that pronunciation is one of the major sources of difficulties students encounter in the listening process Sharing the same idea, Rixon (1986) claims that word stress, strong form and weak form in natural spoken utterances make listening comprehension far more challenging than reading a written text Assimilation and elision are other sources of complication, as Helgesen et al (1994) added These features of spoken English can be a terror to a number of learners Rhythm and intonation also contribute to making listening more troublesome The unfamiliarity with rhythm and intonation patterns makes listening become more difficult Brown (1977) sees rhythm as part of general look of how the speakers of their language speak it With its own characteristics, the rhythm of English is worth much attention since it is also the guide to the structure of information in the spoken message

2.2.4 Listeners’ limited vocabularies

According to Azmi Bingol, Celik, Yidliz, and Tugrul Mart (2014), when listening texts contain known words it would be very easy for students to them If students know the meaning of words this can arouse their interest and motivation and can have a positive impact on the students‟ listening comprehension ability A lot of words have more than one meaning and if they are not used appropriately in their appropriate contexts students will get confused Students may sometimes try to guess the meaning of the word from the context but this strategy isn‟t very helpful when the speed of speaking is fast

2.2.5 Length and Speed of Listening

Azmi Bingol, Celik, Yidliz, and Tugrul Mart (2014) stated that the level of students can have a significant role when they listen to long parts and keep all information in their mind It is very difficult for lower-level students to listen more than three minutes long and complete the listening tasks Short listening passages make easy listening comprehension for learners and reduce their tiredness According to Underwood (1989), speed can make listening passage difficult If the speakers speak too fast students may have serious problems to understand L2 words In this situation, listeners are not able to control the speed of speakers and this can create critical problems with listening comprehension

2.3 Listening Comprehension in EFL Classrooms

2.3.1 Pre-listening stage

Normally the listening lesson is divided into three stages which are pre-listening, while-listening and post-listening Each stage has its own characteristics and time allocation

Pre-listening stage involves the activities that are often carried out in a short period

of time (seven to fifteen minutes) aiming at preparing necessary background for learners to understand the spoken text They may also elicit students‟ previous knowledge about the topic of listening, making them aware of the vocabulary items, related experience and consequently capture their interest As summarized by Baker and Westrup (2000) as well as Lewis and Hill (1992), the pre-listening stage contains purposeful activities which can help arouse interest in the topic, provide certain linguistic preparation for the text, then promote and activate a flexible learning environment Through giving learners a reason for listening, this stage undoubtedly initiates willingness for listening Before listening, students need assistance to activate what they already know about the ideas they are going to hear Simply being told the topic is not enough Teachers must help them to build up prior knowledge, pre-teach some key words or structures and establish purposes for listening

Lewis and Hill (1992) emphasizes that pre-listening stage plays an important role in teaching listening to students Pre-listening is a preparation of the listening class In this stage, teachers tend to arouse learners‟ expectation and interest of the language text they are going to listen They can also motivate learners by providing background knowledge of the text; organizing learners to discuss a picture or a related topic which involves in the text; asking some related questions to the text In general, pre-listening plays a role of warming-up and the main aim of this stage is to make learners focus their attention on the following while-listening stage and decrease the difficulties of the text These activities can also promote an active and flexible learning environment, help increase learners‟ motivation for learning, motivate learners by giving a reason for listening and provide them with some language for the listening

2.3.2 While-listening stage and post-listening stage

These are the main stages of the listening process According to Rost and Candlin (2014), the purpose of while-listening activities is what students are asked to do

during the time they are listening to the text As far as listening comprehension (for example listening for meaning) is concerned, the purpose of while-listening activities is to help learners develop the skill of eliciting messages from spoken language The nature of while-listening activities should be interesting, so that the students feel they want to listen and carry out the activities Part of the interest can stem from the topic and the content of what is said, and the listening text should be chosen with the interest of the students in mind

After pure listening process, post activities are usually carried out to provide students with opportunities to practice using the language items acquired Post-listening activities often fall on information transfer tasks, or summary writing and similar activities

In this research, the writer will investigate the activities which are often made use of

in the first stage of listening, the Pre-listening activities

2.3.3 The roles of pre-listening activities

It is obvious that students may find the listening lessons difficult when they do not know what they are going to listen Although the words are familiar, they may not understand the speaker because they may be lack of basic knowledge, the context of the speaker

Thus, the listeners‟ expectation and purposes should be taken into account These make listeners feel as in real-life listening situation in their native language Teachers can help their students to arouse their expectations and see the purpose before a listening lesson This kind of work is described as “pre-listening activities” The two main aims of pre-listening is to help to activate students‟ background knowledge, guess the topic of what they are going to hear and provide certain context for the listening task The teacher should vary the activities such as two people having a conversation about their daily life and ask students to complete the true or false questions or vocabulary building for student before the listening task (Nunan, 2002)

According to Sheerin (1987), pre-listening activities significantly help arouse students‟ interest in listening A good pre-listening stage should provide students with linguistic items necessary to understand the listening text and make them feel more interested in the recordings With the acknowledged significance of the stage,

a variety of pre-listening activities have been introduced and recommended for use

by various researchers namely Baker and Westrup (2000), Doff (1988), (Lingzhu, 2003), Rost (1994), Underwood (1989) and Ur (1984) In the following part of the study, the researcher will provide a list of different activities for pre-listening stage

2.3.4 Pre-listening activities

According to Berne (1995), pre-listening activities also help students prepare for what they are going to hear, and help mitigate the anxiety which comes from listening in a foreign language, by providing a clear context Moreover, pre-listening activities can offer opportunities for class discussion and more interaction among students There are certain pre-listening activities which can be adapted easily for different classes and levels, as well as for general English and listening lessons

Brainstorming

The prediction of information surrounding a topic before listening about it encourages learners to focus on a topic and conceivably develop a relatively high sense of self-esteem while conducting the task To make use of this activity, the teacher may begin by posing a question word and idea, then ask students to brainstorm the plot and share ideas with their friends The activity can intensify student‟s attention on the content of the upcoming recording and expand their knowledge during the process of exchanging ideas with other students

Class discussion

This is a very common form of pre-listening activity, principally when students are going to hear a recorded text This activity can be started by the teacher‟s instruction to students about the topic of listening text The teachers generally give their students some background information, begin to talk about the topic and

indicate what the students should expect to hear Pair and group discussions before listening are essential for students They engage students in the sharing of ideas and render them concentrate more on their job Lingzhu (2003) Generally, teachers raise guiding questions and discussing topics When organizing groups, teachers should gather students of different levels so that they can help themselves in expressing ideas as well as prepare students with some background of the topic and get them more willing to listen

Pictures

According to Greher (2002), in some pre-listening activities, pictures can be exploited as a useful teaching aid Listeners are often asked to match pictures with given words, or guess words from pictures or activities of the sort which aim at eliciting the topic-related vocabulary as well as maintaining learners‟ focus on the theme of the listening

It is suggested that when carrying out such activities, teachers should avoid using a plethora of unknown words and long explanations as they may distract listeners and sometimes even demotivate them from continuing the task

Prediction of content

The activity helps activate students‟ background knowledge Once listeners have had some ideas about the context of the listening, they usually become more inquisitive about the listening and the comprehension of the spoken text will likely

be more accurate One way to encourage the prediction of content is asking students

to anticipate the context and content of the listening through the title or illustrating pictures

The prediction of the listening can also be done by asking students read through the questions of the listening tasks, which prepare them for the content of the listening and facilitate their process of comprehension

Another predicting activity is through True or False statements Teachers provide a variety of statements which are based on the general or detailed information of the listening The principle is that teachers let students discuss among themselves, make

prediction but do not reveal their decision of true or false statements until they finish the listening task

Pre-teaching of new words and difficult key words

The presence of new words and difficult key words in the listening text is a big problem to many listeners To make the listening more accessible to students, teachers may present new vocabulary by making use of visual aids, games, definition, explanation and translation

Pre-questions

Pre-questions are sometimes employed as a useful pre-listening activity Teachers often raise some questions with each of them asking about the main point of the listening text This activity aims at drawing students‟ attention to the recordings Teachers will let students give the answers after their first time of listening, Vandergrift (2004)

In summary, pre-listening activities are occasionally employed to supply students with prior information about the listening task, prepare them for the task and make them more focused on listening and therefore comprehend better However, in application of a diversity of pre-listing activities, there are some concerns that teachers should take into account

Pre-teaching new words or difficult key words

For students, a large number of unknown words may hinder listening, and certainly lower confidence Therefore, it is crucial to present the new words, especially items

of great difficulty to the students‟ comprehension, prior to ask them to listen There are many ways to present the new words such as: using visual aids, using games, definitions or explanation and translation Among them, visual aids might be the most useful technique they help to make the language in class more real and alive Moreover, using visual aids is a quick way to reduce anxiety, stimulate self-confidence and improve language competence, Buck (2001)

2.4 Previous research

Ash Pekin, Janset Muge Altay, Didem Baytan (2001) carried out an interesting study about listening activities He found out contrast between effective and

ineffective listening habits to become effective listeners He said that instructors should provide various chances for students to practice listening skill and to become actively engaged in the listening process He emphasized that there are three stages

in listening process: pre-listening, during listening and after listening He defined pre-listening help students with cultural background, build prior knowledge, and stimulate students‟ interest in the listening lesson However, in his study, he suggested that instructors should let students watch movies than listen to the tapes because it can help students pay more attention to the listening Students can both practice listening and see manner and culture visually It may be good to apply in teaching but depending on the modern technology condition

Being one of the most challenging language skills, listening comprehension has caught attention of a number of pedagogy specialists Berne (1995) has shown the impact of listening habits on listening comprehension The researchers suggested teachers to provide students with numerous listening opportunities, thus help them become actively engaged in listening As defined by those researchers, listening process has three inevitable phases including pre-listening, during listening and after listening, among which the purpose of the first phase is to prepare students for cultural and lexical background knowledge, review necessary listening skills and stimulate students‟ interest in the listening task As concluded by the group of researchers, good habits of listening make effective listeners, and according to them, listening to movies is much better than to tapes due to the fact that movies are more attractive to listeners They explained that when watching movies, students have opportunities to both listen and observe the speakers‟ manner Although the suggestions of this researcher group appear compelling and can be beneficial to their teaching environment, the application of them in Vietnamese teaching context may be a big challenge due to a shortage of necessary facilities

Hui Sui Yuehua Wang (2002) also concluded that a number of pre-listening activities not only motivate students, help change them from passive to active listeners, but also effectively increase the language input According to these

researchers, it is necessary for teachers to make good effort to design and apply listening activities in their teaching process for the sake of their students

pre-Another proponent of varying pre-listening activities, Nguyen Van Trao (2002) indicated that pre-listening activities are useful as they make students feel well-prepared, thus minimize the fear of listening The study was successful in showing the influence of pre-listening activities on listeners‟ effectiveness of listening comprehension However, it is suggested that the results of pre-test and post-test should be analyzed for more details such as the changes in each section of the listening test Moreover, the research result would be more reliable if the experiment were carried out in a longer timeframe rather than only one month

In an M.A thesis, Duong Thi Bich Thuy (2005) made an experimental research to investigate whether pre-listening activities motivate students before the listening and therefore improve their listening comprehension The experiment group was provided with numerous pre-listening activities while only new vocabulary and structures were given to the control group students in the first phase of listening While and post-listening activities were the same for both groups The effectiveness of pre-listening activities was evaluated by comparing the difference between the results of a pre-test and post-test The result showed that the application of various pre-listening activities has positive influence on the test results of the experiment group

Besides, there are some articles, which research the effect of the use of video on listening comprehension tests Londe (2009) examined two video formats (close-

up view of the head of the lecturer, and full body view of lecturer) and compared theses to 28 the audio only format in a listening comprehension test setting A stimulated classroom lecture is videotaped and used, and one hundred took the test The aim of the research is to explore whether there are any performance differences when students take these tests in the different formats The results of the present study show that the addition of the visual channel does not contribute to or take away from the performance in English as a second language listening comprehension test

Moreover, Farrokhi (2012) carried out a study on the effects of two pre-task activities (glossary of unknown vocabulary items and content related support) on improvement of Arian EFL learners‟ listening comprehension The study showed that offered pre-task activities for listening tasks improved learners‟ listening performance It is concluded that pre-task activities had different supportive roles

on low and high proficient learners‟ performance

Vu Thi Thanh Ha (2006) carried out an experiment to examine the effects of pair and group pre-listening activities on Dong Do university first year English major students‟ attitudes, their motivation and her listening comprehension in comparison with the whole class pre-listening activities The results of the study showed that pair and group pre-listening activities were better at helping students increase their motivation and improve their listening comprehension better than in whole class pre-listening activities This study makes a contribution to teaching and learning English at Dong Do University If there were more efforts and contribution, the study has been more successful

Moreover, Duong Thi Ngoc Tu (2012) explored the effects of the use of video in pre-listening stage on grade 10 students‟ motivation in English listening lessons at Tran Hung Dao School She emphasized that the students also showed great interests in listening activities They were willing to share knowledge and opinion

as well as positively discuss the listening topic before listening to the tape script or doing the comprehension tasks when the teacher used video in the pre-listening stage

A lot of studies have been done on pre-listening activities and one common conclusion that can be drawn is that pre-listening activities play an important role in helping language learners to understand the listening task better However, none of those studies have showed how it helps when pre-listening activities are diversified

2.8 Summary of chapter 2

In conclusion, listening is an important skill which is frequently used skills and plays an important role in having a successful conversation Listening

comprehension requires both linguistic knowledge such as understanding of sound systems, grammar and non-linguistic knowledge such topic-related knowledge There are a lot of factors which can affect listening comprehensions, some of which could be listed such as unfamiliar topics, cultural differences, pronunciation, speed

of speaking, etc The impact of such factors can be reduced by applying different pre-listening activities, and pre-listening activities have been proven to a good approach to help language learners to have better comprehension In this study, the researcher explored how effective it was when the teacher uses diverse pre-listening activities in listening lessons

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY

This chapter is organized into five main sections The first section provides a general overview of action research which is chosen as an appropriate approach to provide answers to the research question The second section re-states the research question and the third section describes the participants in the research The fourth section discusses data collection instruments The fifth section presents the action research procedure and data analysis procedures and techniques respectively

3.1 Research methodology

3.1.1 Definition of action research

There are many different definitions of action research that have been presented as follows:

According to Cohen, Manion, and Morrison (2004, p.186) “Action research is a small-scale intervention in functioning of the real world and a close examination of the effects of such intervention” In the 1940s, Kurt Lewin, a German-American social psychologist who is widely considered to be the founder of his field coined

the term action research Those basic principles of action research that were

described by Lewin are still in use to this day

According to O'Brien (1993), action research is known by many other names, including participatory research, collaborative inquiry, emancipatory research, action learning, and contextual action research, but all are variations on a theme Put simply, action research is “learning by doing” - a group of people identify a problem, do something to resolve it, see how successful their efforts were, and if not satisfied, try again While this is the essence of the approach, there are other key attributes of action research that differentiate it from common problem-solving activities that we all engage in every day

According to Gay, Mills, and Airasian (2011), action research are procedures which are done by teachers to obtain information about what should be improved in school

or organization about teaching or learning process The general goal is to create a

simple, practical, repeatable process of iterative learning, evaluation, and improvement that leads to increasingly better results for schools, teachers, or programs

Abbott and Mayes (2014) also state that action research involves a self-reflective, semantic and critical approach to enquiry by people who are simultaneously members of the context in which the research takes place The objective of action research is to improve the current state of affairs within the educational context in which the research is carried out

3.1.2 Characteristic of action research

According to Creswell (2002), action research design has the following features: practical focus, the educator-researcher‟s own practices, collaboration, a dynamic process, a plan of action, and sharing research

It is clear that action research‟s target is to approach an actual problem in education environment It means that action research focuses on practical issues which can bring advantages to education The problem might be a concern either from a teacher or many educational institutions In this research design, it is common that the researcher may be interested in producing their own practice rather than studying other studies According to Schein (1995), within all the definitions of action research, there are four basic themes: empowerment of participants, collaboration through participation, acquisition of knowledge, and social change In conducting action research, we structure routines for continuous confrontation with data on the health of a school community These routines are loosely guided by movement through five phases of inquiry action research cycle: identification of problem area, collection and organization of data, interpretation of data, action based on data and reflection

3.1.3 Process of action research

Action research has been analyzed in many ways MacIsaac (1995) has created a simple model of the cyclical nature of the typical action research process (figure 1) There are four steps in each cycle: plan, act, observe, and reflect

Simple Action Research Model

Figure 1 Simple Action Research Model adapted from MacIsaac (1995)

To this model, Burns (2009) added a fifth step: dissemination, where the result of the research is made known through presentations and publications to a larger audience The essentials of action research design are considered by Elliott in Rudduck and Hopkins (1985) as per the following characteristic cycle: Initially an exploratory stance is adopted, where an understanding of a problem is developed

and plans are made for some form of interventional strategy (The Reconnaissance

and General Plan) Then the intervention is carried out (The Action in Action

Research) During and around the time of the intervention, pertinent observations

are collected in various forms (Monitoring the implementation by Observation)

The new interventional strategies are carried out, and the cyclic process repeats, continuing until a sufficient understanding of (or implement able solution for) the

problem is achieved (Reflection and Revision) The protocol is iterative or cyclical

in nature and is intended to foster deeper understanding of a given situation, starting with conceptualizing and particularizing the problem and moving through several interventions and evaluations

Additional, Susman (1983) emphasizes that action research have five steps and it is presented in a cycle as below:

Figure 2 Detailed Action Research Model adapted from Susman (1983)

As can be seen from figure 2, firstly, a problem is identified This is followed by a collective postulation of several possible solutions, from which a single plan of action emerges and is implemented Data on the results of the intervention are collected and analyzed, and the findings are interpreted in light of how successful the action has been At this point, the problem is re-assessed and the process begins another cycle This process continues until the problem is resolved McKay (1992)

In his study Burns (2009) emphasized action research process is a sequence of cycles which consists of eleven phases: Exploring, identifying; planning; collecting dada, analyzing/reflecting; hypothesizing; intervening; observing, reporting; writing and presenting

Based on diverse definitions of action research, with the aim of my study, the process of my action research will follow seven steps: identifying a problem; collecting data; Analyzing data and generating hypothesis; planning action; implementing the action plan; collecting dada monitor change; analyzing dada and evaluating the change

DIAGNOSING Identifying or defining a problem

of action

3.1.4 Benefits of Action Research

Action research can be a worthwhile pursuit for educators for a number of reasons

Foremost among these is simply the desire to know more According to Schein

(1995), action research focuses on school issue, problem, or area of collective interest The participants of action research are normally students and teachers Moreover, action research is seen as disconnected from the daily lives of educators And it is also comforting for parents, or education administrators outside of the school, to know that a teacher is not just blindly following what the latest study seems to suggest, but is transforming the knowledge into something meaningful

In addition, action research allows teachers to grow and gain confidence in their work Action research projects influence thinking skills, sense of efficacy, willingness to share and communicate, and attitudes toward the process of change Through action research, teachers learn about themselves, their students, their colleagues, and can determine ways to continually improve The other important advantage is it potential to impact school change He also emphasizes that action research can serve as a chance to really take a look at one‟s own teaching in a structured manner While the focus of action research is usually the students, educators can also investigate what effect their teaching is having on their students, how they could work better with other teachers, or ways of changing the whole school for the better

3.2 The research questions restated

To what extent do diversification of pre-listening tasks help students improve their

listening comprehension?

3.3 The participants

The participants involved in this research were students in Industrial Economics Technology College and two experienced teachers in IETC that were specified in the following table:

Participants Population Age Means of collecting data

3.3.2 Observers

Two-experienced teachers were asked to observe the class They were trained how

to do the observation After being familiar with the observation worksheet and being introduced about the way to do the observation, they were invited to observe the class during the time when the researcher implemented the action plan

3.4 Data collection instruments

In order to answer the research question of this study, the researcher chose three kinds of data collection instruments including tests, learners‟ questionnaires and observation to collect information about students‟ listening comprehension

3.4.1 Detailed description of tests

So far, a number of methods to evaluate students‟ listening comprehension ability have been suggested In this study, listening comprehension is measured by students‟ performance on their listening tests

Brown (1977) argues that tests are one of good tools to collect both quantitative and qualitative information Moreover, tests can provide information about general level

of students, detailed problems that students may have with the language and their achievement in previous programs In this study, two major tests were constructed

by the researcher to meet the aims of the current study which discovered the participants‟ progress during, and achievement after, the intervention The first test was administered at the beginning in order to investigate students‟ listening

comprehension Then, the researcher used the second at the end using varying listening activities to check whether students‟ listening comprehension is improved The pre-test and post-tests are in form of the TOIEC listening test because most of the listening tests in the text book follow the TOEIC test structure so students are familiar with this kind of test The two tests were collected from Longman preparation series for the new TOEIC test In twenty minutes, students were required to complete twenty listening questions The level of difficulty of the two tests is equal so that the author can easily recognize the student‟s changes across the tests There are four parts in each test which consists of 20 multiple choice questions Part 1 is picture description, part 2 is questions and responses, part 3 is conversations and part 4 is talks

an immediate response, respondents‟ anonymity (Gillham, 2000)

3.5 Action research procedures

3.5.1 Identifying a problem

After teaching class K9 for the first term, the researcher realized that students‟

listening comprehension was weak They were unable to understand most of what the speaker said in the recordings Students also did not have positive attitude towards improving their listening skill They could not enhance their listening competence to their fullest potential mostly because the teacher used the same pre-listening activities in the textbook Moreover, the author seldom designed various pre-listening activities for students The main contents of the lesson were quite lengthy so chances are that she was afraid of running out of time She used merely

1 or 2 pre-questions for the listening task The students‟ background was not

sufficiently built to answer the questions so they were actually demotivated in further listening activities Because students were not well-prepared for the listening tasks, their lexical resources remain significantly low for listening comprehension

In the long run, the ultimate result was that their listening competence show little improvement after a course It could be concluded that the teachers‟ pedagogy in pre-listening stage was inadequately effective to facilitate students‟ listening skill It

is suggested the author modify their teaching method and add more pre-listening activities into the lesson in order to improve the students‟ listening comprehension, and therefore listening skill An action plan based on the theory is mentioned in chapter 2

3.5.2 Collecting the data

The main cause for the students‟ low listening comprehension were discussed in chapter I Therefore, the pre-test and post-test, learner questionnaire and the observation were conducted for the experiment time

3.5.3 Analyzing data and generating hypothesis

After teaching students in IETC for 3 years, the teacher recognized that the cause of students‟ low listening comprehension was that they were not well-prepared for the pre-listening stage Therefore, the researcher planed to check the assumption that if the students were better prepared for their listening in the first stage of listening lesson their listening comprehension was expected to increase

3.5.4 Planning action

Because students‟ listening comprehension was low, an action plan was applied The researcher developed an action plan to diversify pre-listening activities to increase students‟ listening skill based on the theoretical background of the role of pre-listening activities and the factors that affect student listening skill It is expected that carefully designed pre-listening activities could help them improve listening skill In the action plan, teacher implemented diverse pre-listening activities which students find useful and interested in to help them better understand the listening lesson The pre-listening activities were selected depending on schools‟ curriculum, the textbook, students‟ level, and interest

3.5.5 Implementing the action plan

Because the problem was students‟ low listening skill, an action plan of varying some pre-listening activities was developed to increase students‟ listening comprehension based on the theoretical background of the role of pre-listening stage It was expected that various kinds of pre-listening activities were implemented to help student well-prepared for the listening tasks

The action plan was applied for the eight weeks after a month of the second term The participants were the students in class K9 at IETC The teacher was the researcher of the study In addition, the observers were the two English teachers in IETC During the eight weeks of experiment, the students were provided with an array of pre-listening activities closely linked to the listening texts Through these activities and the tests, the researcher could identify whether students‟ comprehension increased or not

Some pre-listening activities which the researcher used in her lessons included:

 Guess what the listening is about? Show students images, maps, or

diagrams and ask students to guess the theme of the listening Students can write pre-listening comprehension questions, then listen to see if their questions are answered

 Brainstorming & Word webs: Provide students with the topic of the

listening and ask students brainstorm words related to the topic With students‟ help draw semantic maps on the board with the words, focusing on the relationships between the words, the topic, and sub-topics that might come up in the listening

 Teach me: Give each student a couple of words and/or expressions Ask

them to explain the words/expressions to one another in pairs They may refer to the dictionary if they need to Help students with pronunciation of the words or phrases Quickly check with the whole group, and students then predict if the words/phrases will occur in the listening itself Students can listen and tick the ones they hear

 Chinese whispers: Have students queue in two lines, whisper a

word/expression to the first in the line This one whispers it on to the next in line, and so on until the last student in the line shouts out the word/expression they hear or writes the word/expression on the board Score points for correct words The line with more points is the winner Use a sentence or expression related to the theme of the listening

 Sing along: Teach students a short song, a rhyme, or a jazz chant on a topic

related to the text they are going to listen to

 Graphic organizers: Give students a blank graphic organizer which

summarizes the information in the text under headings Students listen and fill-in key words that they hear in the correct places

3.5.6 Collecting data to monitor change

The action plan was implemented in 8 weeks They had an observation sheet for their observation including the way the teacher taught, the pre-listening activities the teacher applied and the students‟ attitudes towards the teachers‟ activities

3.5.7 Analyzing data and evaluating the change

The action research was evaluated based on the collected data

3.6 Summary of chapter 3

In this chapter, action research was presented as the research method because this method can help researcher identify problems, solve the problems and suggest some solutions to improve learning and teaching English Moreover, the data collection instrument, the reasons for the method selection was also discussed The implementation of the action plan and the post data collection ways were implied to clarify the difference before and after applying the new method in teaching listening

in IETC

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

4.1 Results from the pre-test

Table 4.1 The result

Level of

mark Low Average Good Excellent Number of

participants Mean

Standard deviation marks 2-4 5-6 7-8 9-10

21 (54.5%)

16 (38%)

3 (7.5%)

0 (0%) 40 (100%) 4.25 1.62

Figure 4.1

It is clear that the students‟ score ranged from 2 to 8 The mean score was 4.25 and

it standard deviation was 1.62 In detail, 21 students achieved from 2 to 4 points, accounting for 54.5% which correlated to weak students 16 out of 40 (38%) students scored from 5 to 6 points (i.e average level) Only 3 students (7.5%) were

at 7 to 8 (i.e good level) None scored 9 to 10, which means no student in the class was at excellent level

4.2 Results from the post-tesst

Table 4.2 The post-test results

Level of

mark

Low average good Excellent Number

of participants

Mean Standard

deviation marks 2-4 5-6 7-8 9-10

12 (30%)

19 (47.5%)

8 (20%)

1 (2.5%)

40 (100%)

5.40 1.35

Level

Figure 4.2 The post-test results

The researcher gave the students the post-test after the eight weeks of experiment The test was designed for 40 students after the treatment to assess students‟ listening proficiency at the end of the experiment Generally, marks are calculated from 1 to 10; however, in this test, students generally got from 2 to 9 The mean score of students‟ marks increases from 4.25 in the pre-test to 5.40 in the post-test and its standard deviation was 1.37 The number of students receiving low grade were 12 which accounted for 30% 19 out of 40 (47.5%) students got marks 5 to 6 (i.e “average” level); 8 students had good mark (from 7 to 8) and one student (2.5%) got 9 point (“excellent” student)

4.3 Comparison of the pre-test and the post-test

Table 4.3 Comparison of the pre-test and post-test

3 (7.5%)

0 (0%)

8 (20%)

1 (2.5%)

40 (100%)

5.40 1.35 0.00

Level

Figure 4.3 Comparison of the pre-test and post-test

As can be seen from the table, the results of the pre-test and the post-test had different mean scores It is clear that at the beginning, the number of low points at the pre-test were 21 which accounted for 54.5% After 8 weeks of the experiment, the students were required to do the post-test and there was a decrease of 24.5% in the number of students who received low scores The medium scores in the post-test were also higher than in the pre-test In other words, the number was 37.5% from the pre-test and it went up to 47.5% in the post-test In the next level, the students receiving good points were at 13%, an increase from the pre-test, and there was one student who obtained 9 points Consequently, the mean of experiment test (the post-test) was also greater than that of the conventional test (the pre-test) The p-value is 0.00 it means that the difference between the two methods applied with the one class is significant

In conclusion, after the treatment, the student could understand and comprehend better than the first term in the listening lesson It means that using a variety of pre-listening activities, students have a better comprehension of listening tasks