Exploring ways to learn english stress at the university of technical education hcmc

Analyses of the data revealed that a the majority of English majors in their third year frequently used a wide variety of stress learning strategies in four phases of pronunciation acqui

VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY-HO CHI MINH CITY

UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES

FACULTY OF ENGLISH LINGUISTICS & LITERATURE



EXPLORING WAYS TO LEARN ENGLISH STRESS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TECHNICAL EDUCATION HCMC

A thesis submitted to the Faculty of English Linguistics and Literature

in partial fulfillment of the Master’s degree in TESOL

By TRUONG THI HOA

Supervised by

LE HOANG DUNG, PhD

HO CHI MINH CITY, JULY 2012

Acknowledgements

This thesis would have not been possible without the help and assistance in various forms and from different sources

First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest thanks and gratitude

to my advisor, Dr Le Hoang Dung, whose enthusiasm, advice, and encouragement have guided me through the stages of this study

My special thanks also extend to the coworkers, whose insightful recommendations have greatly helped me in making necessary adjustments on this research

I would also sincerely thank University of Technical Education-Ho Chi Minh City, who have so far sponsored my studying

This study could not have been completed without the very willing participation of all respondents from the Faculty of Foreign Languages, University

of Technical Education- Ho Chi Minh City To all of their great help am I in debt

Last but never least, my special love and thanks are also extended to my beloved family, including my parents, my husband and my little son, whose love, encouragement and expectation have nurtured my life in this work and without whom I could have not been able to complete this research

Certificate of originality

I hereby certify my authorship of the thesis submitted today entitled:

EXPLORING WAYS TO LEARN

ENGLISH STRESS AT THE

UNIVERSITY OF TECHNICAL EDUCATION HCMC

in terms of the statement of Requirements for Theses in Master’s Programs issued by Higher

Degree Committee

Ho Chi Minh City, July 2012

Truong Thi Hoa

Retention and use of the thesis

I hereby state that I, Truong Thi Hoa, being the candidate for the degree of Master in TESOL, accept the requirements of the University relating to the retention and use of Master’s theses deposited in the library

In terms of these conditions, I agree that the original of my thesis deposited

in the Library should be accessible for purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the Library for the care, loan

or reproduction of the thesis

Ho Chi Minh City, July 2012

Truong Thi Hoa

Table of contents

Acknowledgements i

Certificate of originality ii

Retention and use of the thesis iii

Table of contents iv

List of abbreviations viii

List of tables ix

List of figures xi

Abstract…… xii

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Background to the study 1

1.2 Rationale 1

1.2.1 Teaching and learning English stress at high school level 1

1.2.2 Teaching and learning English stress at tertiary 2

1.2.3 Teaching and learning English stress at HCMCUTE 3

1.3 Significance of the study 5

1.4 Purpose of the study 6

1.5 Research questions 8

1.6 Delimitations and limitations .8

1.7 Organization of the study 9

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 10

2.1 An overview of English stress 10

2.1.1 Definitions of English stress 10

2.1.2 A contrastive analysis between Vietnamese tones and English stress 12

2.1.3 Stress problems facing Vietnamese learners of English .13

2.1.4 Stress and communicative ability 15

2.2 An overview of stress learning strategies 18

2.2.1 Definition of stress learning strategies 18

2.2.2 Importance of stress learning strategies .20

2.2.3 Factors affecting learner strategy use 22

2.2.4 How to identify stress learning strategies 24

2.2.5 Related studies on stress learning strategies 26

2.2.6 Eckstein’s (2007) model .34

2.3 Conceptual framework .40

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY 45

3.1 Research method .45

3.2 Respondents of the study .45

3.3 Sources of data .48

3.3.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 48

3.3.2 Pronunciation scores 48

3.3.3 Structured interviews .51

3.4 Pilot study 51

3.5 Research instruments .52

3.5.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 52

3.5.2 Structured interviews .55

3.6 Research design 56

3.7 Collection and analysis of data .58

3.7.1 Collection of data .58

3.7.2 Analysis of data 58

CHAPTER 4 DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION OF RESULTS 60

4.1 Data analysis .60

4.1.1 Analysis of background information 60

4.1.2 Analysis of stress learning experience 62

4.1.2.1 Phase 1A: Input 4.1.2.1.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 63

4.1.2.1.2 Structured interviews 65

4.1.2.2 Phase 1B: Practice 4.1.2.2.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 66

4.1.2.2.2 Structured interviews 68

4.1.2.3 Phase 2: Noticing/ feedback 4.1.2.3.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 68

4.1.2.3.2 Structured interviews 70

4.1.2.4 Phase 3: Hypothesis forming 4.1.2.4.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 71

4.1.2.4.2 Structured interviews 73

4.1.2.5 Phase 4: Hypothesis testing 4.1.2.5.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 74

4.1.2.5.2 Structured interviews 76

4.1.3 A summary of SLSs found in first-year English majors 77

4.1.4 A summary of SLSs found in third-year English majors 79

4.1.5 Analysis of reference sources for stress learning strategies 83

4.1.5.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 83

4.1.5.2 Structured interviews 84

4.1.6.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 85

4.1.6.2 Structured interviews 86

4.1.7 Analysis of frequency of class instructions on stress learning 87

4.1.7.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 87

4.1.7.2 Structured interviews .87

4.1.8 Analysis of effectiveness of stress learning strategies 88

4.1.8.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 88

4.1.8.2 Structured interviews .88

4.1.9 Analysis of interest of an English stress class 88

4.1.9.1 Questionnaire to student respondents 88

4.1.9.2 Structured interviews .89

4.2 Discussion of results 89

4.3 Major findings 91

CHAPTER 5 SUGGESTIONS, RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION 95

5.1 Suggestions 95

5.2 Contributions of the study 98

5.3 Recommendations for further research .98

5.4 Conclusion 99

REFERENCES 101

APPENDICES 107

APPENDIX A – A summary of responses to the questionnaire 107

APPENDIX B - The questionnaire 110

APPENDIX C – Structured interviews 114

APPENDIX D - Speaking test guidelines 115

APPENDIX E – Speaking test scoring criteria 116

APPENDIX F – Student score sheet 117

List of abbreviations

HCMCUTE University of Technical Education- Ho Chi Minh City

MOET Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training PLSs Pronunciation learning strategies

SLSs Stress learning strategies

List of tables

Table

Page

1.1 The syllabus of Speech Training course at HCMCUTE 4

2.1 Pronunciation learning strategies in academic articles 31

2.2 Pronunciation learning strategies in pedagogy books and workbooks 33

2.3 Connection between Kolb’s (1984) construct, SLA and PLSs 35

2.4 Connection between Kolb’s (1984) construct, SLA and SLSs from academic articles, pedagogy books and workbooks 42

3.1 A summary of respondents 46

3.2 A summary of successful and unsuccessful learners of pronunciation 50

3.3 A summary of the questionnaire items 53

4.1 A summary of respondent profile 61

4.2 Opinions on perception strategies of English stress 63

4.3 Opinions on production strategies of English stress 66

4.4 Opinions on evaluation strategies of performing English stress 69

4.5 Opinions on the ways of encountering with English stress errors 72

4.6 Opinions on the ways of implementing changes in learning English stress……… 75

4.7 A summary of SLSs found in first-year English majors 77

4.8 A summary of SLSs found in third-year English majors 79

4.9 A summary of stress learning strategy use 81

4.10 A summary of stress learning strategies with high mean scores 82

4.11 Opinions on reference sources for stress learning strategies 84 4.12 Opinions on time for self-studying English stress out of the classroom 85 4.13 Opinions on frequency of class instructions on self-studying English stress 87 4.14 Opinions on the effectiveness of stress learning strategies 87 4.15 Opinions on the interest of an English stress class 88 4.16 A summary of major findings 92

List of figures

Figure

Page

2.1 Kolb’s (1980) learning cycle construct 37

2.2 Connection between Kolb’s (1984) learning cycle construct and SLA

38 3.1 Research procedure 57

4.1 Opinions on perception strategies of English stress 64

4.2 Opinions on production strategies of English stress 67

4.3 Opinions on evaluation strategies of performing English stress 70

4.4 Opinions on the ways of encountering with English stress errors 73

4.5 Opinions on the ways of implementing changes in learning English stress 76

4.6 A summary of stress learning strategy use 81

5.1 Relationship between major findings and suggestions 96

5.2 Suggestions on stress learning strategies 97

ABSTRACT

This research was conducted to analyze stress learning strategies of first- year and third-year English majors at University of Technical Education - Ho Chi Minh City The study reviews Eckstein’s (2007) idea of combining between Kolb’s (1984) learning cycle and pronunciation acquisition theory together with pronunciation learning strategies from academic studies, pedagogy books and workbooks on pronunciation and then comes up with the conceptual framework

For the collection of data, eighty-four English majors in their first year and sixty-six in their third year were surveyed and interviewed The data were statistically processed through mean scores of a five-point scale and frequency The study came up with three major findings on both stress learning strategies and factors affecting learner strategy use

Analyses of the data revealed that (a) the majority of English majors in their third year frequently used a wide variety of stress learning strategies in four phases

of pronunciation acquisition including strategies of perception and production, evaluation, prediction and self-correction, (b) the difference in the strategy use between the two groups of first-year and third-year English majors as well as between successful learners of pronunciation and unsuccessful learners of pronunciation lies in higher frequency and a wider variety of strategies being used, (c) the learner strategy use was mainly affected by their level of proficiency, motivation for improving pronunciation and instructions on stress learning strategies These three major findings led to three major suggestions of stress learning for improving learners’ pronunciation skill and enhancing communicative ability

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

According to Negrin-Cristiana (1997), English stress is a challenging part

for EFL learners to acquire This likely helps to explain why Joseph (2003) suggests that it should probably be learned as early as possible in second language (L2), as indeed it is in mother tongue (L1) He also claims that speakers of syllable-timed or tone languages have particular difficulty with stress patterns in English This means Vietnamese learners of English whose native language is a tonal language are not exclusive In fact, during the teaching at the Faculty of Foreign Languages, University of Technical Education - Ho Chi Minh City (abbreviated to FFL, HCMCUTE), the poor performance of English stress of some English majors has come to the researcher‘s attention For example, some of the students misplaced primary stress Besides, some stressed all words in an utterance more or less equally, without one prominent stress Some missed entirely performing stressing In addition to these stress problems, one of the most frequent

questions the researcher encountered in the classes of Speaking and Speech Training is ―How to learn English stress effectively?‖ It can be inferred that

learning English stress is one of the most challenging problems facing EFL learners in general and English majors at HCMCUTE in particular This problem will be presented in more detail in the next section

1.2 RATIONALE

1.2.1 Teaching and learning stress at high school level

In most of schools in Vietnam, English has been widely taught in recent years from grade six to grade twelve Attention given to the four macro-skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing is to some extent equal according to the new set of English textbooks first issued by Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) in 2002 However, there is unequal division of stress, looking at pronunciation section of English textbooks from grade 10 to 12 For example, the

section Pronunciation in English textbooks of both grade 10 and 11 focuses just on

sounds In English textbooks of grade 12, knowledge of English stress is presented just in four lessons It can be seen that English stress is almost ignored in English teaching and learning at high school There are some common reasons why stress seems to be skipped during teaching and learning English at high school

First of all, the main reason for this unequal distribution of attention is that all exams, which students are supposed to take during the semester and at the end

of each semester, as well as when finishing high school, are in written form As Nguyen Thi Nhan Hoa (1997) mentions in her MA thesis of listening strategies of Vietnamese EFL students that the assessment of the quality of teaching and learning a foreign language in general and English in particular at school consists

of the scores students get in written exams For instance, the most important exams

at school including final exams at the end of middle school and high school as well

as university entrance examination all are in written form It can be clear that neither teachers nor students have sufficient motivation to teach or learn pronunciation and so the need for improving English stress is also neglected

Other possible reasons for ignoring teaching English stress at school include large class-size (there are often more than forty students in a class), bad teaching aids (lack of labs or CD players) and the weak communicative competence of the teachers themselves (Vietnamese teachers at school are almost trained in Vietnam with no access to an English-speaking environment) Phan Khanh Van (2006) states that Vietnamese teachers confess a lack of real exposure to English-speaking communities In addition to these reasons, the lack of strategies to teach and learn stress effectively may be another reason for ignoring English stress Together with the dominant place of written exams, it can be logically concluded that all these causes contribute to the exclusion of stress from the English curriculum at the majority of schools in Vietnam

1.2.2 Teaching and learning stress at tertiary level

The rationale of teaching and learning stress at tertiary level is likely similar According to the study of intonation as a means to better English non-

majored students‘ oral skills by Ngu yen Thi Nguyet Anh (2009), intonation has been one of the most neglected areas not only in classroom but also in materials purposely designed for teaching and learning English Furthermore, a large number

of studies in Vietnam showed stress problems faced by university students For example, in the study of the role of basic pronunciation knowledge by Ha Thanh Bich Loan (2005), only 14 of 110 students declare that they are never confused in using word stress In another study of pronunciation problems faced by Vietnamese learners of English at Mekong University, Nguyen Thi Kim Ba (2009) shows that nearly 30 % of pronunciation errors is related to stress Besides, stress errors in reading aloud in Vietnamese learners of English were found in another study by Le Thuy Chi (2000) It seems that stress problems of university students were commonly found in a large number of the previous studies by different researchers, which means stress is also a challenge for Vietnamese students of English

1.2.3 Teaching and learning stress at HCMCUTE

For the case of this paper at the Faculty of Foreign Languages, HCMCUTE teaching focuses on all four skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing As there is distribution of attention given to each individual skill, the gap between these skills at HCMCUTE is not as big as that at high school Actually, there is definite time available for teaching each specific skill in the curriculum However,

in terms of time distribution, teaching reading and writing is always given top priority, while teaching pronunciation and particularly stress is likely to sit at the bottom of the list For instance, English majors at HCMCUTE take five three- credit-courses of speaking, six three-credit courses of writing, five three-credit courses of reading, two two-credit courses of translation but only a two-credit course of speech training and a two-credit course of phonetics and phonology which are directly related to stress

First, the course Speech Training is intended for the first semester of first- year English majors at HCMCUTE This course provides students with the English sound inventory and its pronunciation from a Received Pronunciation perspective

The course aims at developing the students‘ awareness of the nature of the English pronunciation through a systematic and thorough introduction to English sounds

On successful completion of this course, students are expected to be able to (i) differentiate between consonants and vowels, (ii) properly pronounce English sounds in isolation and in connected speech, (iii) get to know different types of stress and intonation in English The training course lasts fifteen weeks with two forty-five-minute periods each as shown in Table 1.1 (p.4)

Table 1.1 The outline of Speech Training course at FFL, HCMCUTE

(Source: Syllabus of Speech Training course at FFL, HCMCUTE, 2011)

As shown above, the very limited time (only two periods) is spent on teaching stress in comparison with time on segmental features (twenty-four periods) That partly explains why English majors at HCMCUTE, who have poor understanding of stress and its functions in communication at school level, are not still well-equipped with the knowledge of English stress at tertiary level, which negatively affects their oral performance and listening comprehension in English (Avery and Ehrlich,1995; Kenworthy, 1987; O‘ Connor, 1980) Besides, these

subjects take another course of pronunciation English Phonetics and Phonology in

their late second year, the content of which is directly related to segmentals and

supra-segmentals and presented in more detail than the previous course Speech

Training in their first year However, there is a big gap from the first course Speech Training in their early first year to the next course English Phonetics and Phonology in their late second year In addition to these courses, which are directly

related to stress, there are speaking courses which help students improve their oral skill including pronunciation However, stress is not the main focus of speaking courses

Nevertheless, it is likely impossible to suggest further time for training English majors‘ stress due to the time limits of the new curriculum that only consists of 150 credits as required by HCMCUTE in academic year 2012 and 2013 compared with the current curriculum which consists of 204 credits According to the design of the 2012-2013 curriculum, the time for studying outside the classroom is twice more than the time for studying in class This leads to the fact that developing self-learning strategies is in a big demand when time for training in class is not sufficient In addition, unlike most other learner characteristics (e.g aptitude, attitude, motivation, personality, general cognitive style), learning strategies are readily teachable (Brown, 1987) It is thought that if the strategies of successful language learners can be identified, it would be possible to teach them

to unsuccessful language learners and, thus, increase their learning outcomes That

is the reason why the study focuses on exploring stress learning strategies, correlation between strategy use and scores as well as factors affecting strategy use

in the hope of improving learners‘ English stress as well as their communicative ability, but not others although the researcher is fully aware of the important role of other factors such as teaching, materials or equipment

In brief, with the limited time of two periods on teaching English stress to subjects during their study, it can be clear that stress is largely neglected in the curriculum at FFL, HCMCUTE, which implies that a survey for stress learning strategies (abbreviated to SLSs) to help these subjects self-improve English stress

on their own is really necessary

1.3 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

Stress has been found to influence listeners‘ judgments of comprehensibility and accentedness of L2 speech (Anderson-Hsieh, Johnson, & Koehler, 1992), revealing their importance in L2 learning Because of the importance that stress plays in English learning, the study needs to be done in careful consideration in the hope of assisting the English majors at HCMCUTE to successfully achieve good pronunciation which requires accurate performance on stress as well as improving their communicative ability

Besides, the study has contributed enormously to our understanding of EFL learners‘ strategies in approaching English stress In the previous studies, pronunciation learning strategies have been investigated (Peterson, 2000) and stress teaching strategies have been suggested (Phan Thi Lan Anh, 2010), or English stress errors in Vietnamese students have been also analyzed for stress teaching (Le Thuy Chi, 2000), but it seems that few studies so far have critically surveyed strategies for English stress learning only Finally, the study helps EFL teachers gain a proper understanding of EFL learners‘ stress approaching, so it‘s easier to design appropriate activities for teaching For EFL learners, the study suggests SLSs of successful learners to unsuccessful learners in full consideration

of the correlation between strategy use and scores as well as factors affecting learner strategy use

1.4 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

Learning to perceive and produce English stress, and understand how English stress functions and how it is implemented in L2 is an important skill for adult language learners who want to maximize their L2 intelligibility and continue

to improve their oral skills following the completion of classroom instructions Improving language skills is an ongoing process and having access to strategies that allow language learners to take control of their own stress learning is considered essential for achieving academic and professional success in L2 contexts (Morley, 1991) Researchers have discovered that successful L2 learners, compared with their unsuccessful classmates, used more strategic mental processes (learning strategies) and employed them more frequently; As Ellis (2008)

comments in his latest overview of research in the field of second language acquisition (SLA), ―The study of learning strategies has been motivated by both the wish to contribute to SLA theory by specifying the contribution that learners can make to L2 learning and by the applied purpose of providing a research- informed basis for helping learners to learn more effectively through identifying strategies that ‗work‘ and training them to make use of those‖

Since learners cannot always find the chance to ask their language teacher for help in real life contexts, they should be stimulated to come to a stage where they can make their own decisions about their own stress learning Students can be actively involved in their own learning Thus, a primary motivator for this study was the desire to identify effective strategies for improving English stress that learners could use independently, without access to specialized resources and learning strategies; however, few recent studies have been done on stress learning strategies It can be clear that there is an urgent need to investigate stress learning strategies of L2 learners because this is still an unexplored area

This study is an attempt to partly give an in-depth insight into stress learning of English majors It aims to find out what strategies these students employ to learn English stress Many researchers have suggested that the conscious use of language learning strategies makes good language learners (Wenden, 1991; Oxford, 1990) Researchers also believe that strategies of successful language learners can provide a basis for aiding unsuccessful language learners O‘Malley & Chamot et.al (1985) assert that the learning strategies of good language learners, once identified and successfully taught to less proficient learners could have considerable effects on facilitating the development of L2 skills

It can be clear that if language teachers know more about effective strategies that successful learners use, they may be able to teach these effective strategies to unsuccessful learners to enhance their language skills With the desire

of searching for effective ways of learning English stress to help English majors at HCMCUTE in mind to improve their pronunciation and communicative ability, the study therefore aimed to (1) find out English stress learning strategies used by first- year and third-year English majors at HCMCUTE; (2) compare stress learning

strategies of successful learners of pronunciation and unsuccessful learners of pronunciation; (3) gain insights into factors affecting the use of stress learning strategies

1.5 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

With the purpose of improving English majors‘ stress and enhancing their communicative ability as mentioned above, the following research questions were addressed in this paper:

1 What are English stress learning strategies used by first-year and third-year English majors at HCMCUTE?

2 How different are English stress learning strategies of successful learners

of pronunciation from unsuccessful learners of pronunciation?

3 What factors affect the use of stress learning strategies of English majors at HCMCUTE?

1.6 DELIMITATIONS AND LIMITATIONS

It can be obvious that if learners construct their knowledge of L2 through active learning processes with appropriate language learning strategies, it will be easy for them to achieve good results However, the researcher was fully aware that no language learning strategies are appropriate for all kinds of learners Different learners have different ways of learning a foreign language Accordingly, the study only deals with full-time English majors at FFL, HCMCUTE Despite the fact that these students greatly differ among themselves, they still have a number

of things in common They all have passed the national university entrance examination at the grade which is higher than the minimum grade allowed by MOET They all have been taking the courses of the same curriculum and have the same desire of getting a good job as a teacher of English, a translator of English or other jobs that are directly related to English at high proficiency The generalization, therefore, specifically focuses on this group of learners, full-time first-year and third-year English majors at HCMCUTE It can be also inferred that the generalization of the findings may be limited to populations with similar

nature, but may not be applicable so well for other learner groups with different native languages, educational settings, or cultural backgrounds

1.7 ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY

The thesis is presented in five chapters To begin with, chapter 1 will provide the background to understand the problem, purpose and significance of the study as well as presenting research questions which help design the study Chapter

2, in turn, will be devoted to the discussion of the importance of stress to English learning and the potential contribution of language learning strategies to learning supra-segmental pronunciation features as well as providing a description of the proposed conceptual framework for exploring stress learning strategies Chapter 3 will describe the methodology of the study with the main focus on the research tools employed in the study After that, chapter 4 presents data analysis The presentation of differences in SLSs between first-year and third-year students, between the more successful and the less successful learners of pronunciation is followed by an overview of SLSs used by all participants Then the major findings

of the study with reference to what was stated in the previous studies on learning English stress are summarized Based on the major findings of the study, chapter 5 gives suggestions on teaching and learning English stress in Vietnamese context with an assumption that ―strategies can be teachable (Brown, 1987; Chamot &

O‘Malley, 1990) and learnable‖ (Chamot & O‘Malley, 1990) Finally, the study

will close with recommendations on the possible directions of future research addressing methodological considerations involved

CHAPTER 2

LITERATURE REVIEW

The following discussion provides a brief review of related literature on two main areas of the study relating to stress and language learning strategies, which lays a theoretical basis for this paper First, an overview on elements of stress including definitions of stress, stress problems facing EFL learners as well as its impact on EFL learners‘ communicative ability will be given Next, definitions for language learning strategies will be evaluated and a summary of currently available taxonomies for categorizing stress learning strategies will be combined

It is necessary to have an overall understanding of the term ―stress‖ which appears very often in the study and is directly related to the main purpose of the study- exploring stress learning strategies

2.1.1 Definitions of English stress

English stress, as defined by Roach (2000), is ―something that applies to syllables and is, therefore, part of the supra-segmental phonology of English.‖ Similarly, according to Hayes (1995), stress is a property of syllables The difference between stressed and unstressed syllables may be detected in a number

of phonetic measures However, Avery and Ehrlich (1995) makes it simpler by defining stress involving ―making vowels louder and louder.‖ Lin, Fan and Chen (1995) divides stress into two levels of word and sentence, named word stress and sentence stress respectively While sentence stress refers to the process whereby particular words are stressed within an overall sentence, word stress refers to the process whereby particular syllables (or parts of words) are stressed In general, sentence stress is more of a consideration for overall fluency while word stress tends to have more of phonological and morphemic importance In other words, sentence stress is actually the ―music‖ of English that gives the language its

particular ―beat‖ or ―rhythm‖ In brief, in any given English utterance, there are particular words that carry more ―weight‖ or ―volume‖ (stress) than others From a speaking perspective, sentence stress affects the degree to which an EFL learner sounds ―natural‖ In terms of listening, stress affects how well learners can understand the utterances they hear

Among different definitions of stress, Ladefoged‘s (1993) definition provides more details of features relating to stress in both speakers and listeners Ladefoged (1993) defines stress from a speaker‘s point of view as a supra- segmental feature of utterance It applies not to individual vowels and consonants but to whole syllables-whether they might be A stressed syllable is pronounced with a greater amount of energy than an unstressed syllable and produced by pushing more air out of the lungs in one syllable relative to others A stressed syllable, thus, has greater respiratory energy than neighboring unstressed syllables Besides, Ladefoged (1993) defines stress that can occur on words sometimes become modified when the words are parts of sentences It is, however, difficult to define stress from a listener‘s point of view A stressed syllable is often, but not always, louder than an unstressed syllable and it is usually, but not always, on a higher pitch The most reliable thing for a listener to detect is that a stressed syllable frequently has a longer vowel

To conclude, although there have been studies concerning stress in two levels of word and sentence stress, the definition of English stress by Ladefoged (1993) was chosen and used to help the researcher gain general insights into stress

of both levels Particularly, English stress is something in a stressed syllable which

is pronounced with a greater amount of energy than an unstressed syllable and produced by pushing more air out of the lungs in one syllable relative to others In other words, a stressed syllable is often, but not always, louder than an unstressed syllable and it is usually, but not always, on a higher pitch This definition of English stress generally covers two levels of stress and clearly helps the researcher

build the questionnaire items focusing on exploring learning strategies of stress, but not other features such as sounds

2.1.2 A contrastive analysis between Vietnamese tones and English stress

In addition to the discussion of stress definitions above, an apprehension of contrasts between English stress and Vietnamese tones appears essential to understanding difficulties of Vietnamese learners of English in learning English stress

According to Nguyen Thi Anh Thu et al (2005), Vietnamese and English, respectively, represent two broadly contrastive prosodic types: tone languages and stress languages English has a system of culminative word stress, but Vietnamese,

a tonal language, has no system of word stress; rather, it has a system of lexically distinctive tones Nguyen Thi Anh Thu et al (2005) also states that stress is different from tone in several ways First, stress is culminative (head-marking); that is, in stress languages, with few exceptions, every (content) word has at least one stressed syllable Second, because a prominence hierarchy may occur among multiple stresses (e.g., primary vs secondary stresses in English), stress is hierarchical Third, stress can mark edges or boundaries in some systems; for example, some languages prefer iambic feet (stress on the final syllable), but others prefer trochaic ones (stress on the initial syllable) Fourth, stress is rhythmic in systems where stressed and unstressed syllables alternate and where clashes (adjacent stresses) are avoided Fifth, stress contrasts tend to be enhanced segmentally: stressed syllables may be lengthened by vowel lengthening or by gemination, and unstressed syllables may be weakened by vowel reduction Vietnamese, as a tonal language, has no system of culminative word stress but a system of six lexical tones in which pitch is used to contrast individual lexical items or words

It can be seen that English and Vietnamese differ in terms of how they manipulate the acoustic correlates in word-level prosody This detailed analysis of Vietnamese tones and English stress by Nguyen Thi Anh Thu et al (2005) helps

the researcher of this paper understand some basic difficulties that Vietnamese learners of English may encounter in English stress learning which will be discussed in the following sections

2.1.3 Stress problems facing Vietnamese learners of English

The differences between English stress and Vietnamese tones found in the study by Nguyen Thi Anh Thu et al (2005) are also useful to understand difficulties Vietnamese learners of English often encounter while approaching English stress

Firth (1992) suggests the following questions to consider problems learners have: Can the students use loudness and length to differentiate between stressed and unstressed syllables? Are the students incorrectly stressing every word of a sentence equally? Are they able to produce appropriate strong and weak stresses? Are the students placing major sentence stress on the appropriate words? To begin with, Avery and Ehrlich (1995) states that Vietnamese speakers of English whose first language is monosyllabic and syllable-timed, may have difficulty in producing English, which is a multi-syllabic language and has a stress-timed rhythm, with appropriate stress patterns

In another study of stress errors, Le Thuy Chi (2000) also states that Vietnamese students, especially the beginners have two problems of producing stress: (i) primary and/ or secondary stress falls on the wrong syllable, and (ii) all the syllables are stressed; in other words, they tend to pronounce all the syllables with the same loudness, length and pitch – these called ―prominences‖ – and thus give the full stress to all syllables This characteristic should, consequently, be considered as a negative influence of their mother tongue It seems that the students‘ native language can be partly counted for the reasons why stress errors occur

Also, another problem EFL learners facing is function words in English are generally unstressed, reduced and almost unrecognizable to EFL learners

Particularly, they tend to produce all words, irrespective of their functions in an utterance, with the same pitch and time In addition, vowels in unstressed syllables also cause EFL learners problems As you know, English rhythm is closely bound with the correct pronunciation of stressed and unstressed syllables Vowels in unstressed syllables are reduced and vowels in stressed syllables are longer and spoken with greater volume It can be inferred that maintaining a regular beat from stressed element to stressed element and reducing the intervening unstressed syllables can be very difficult and Vietnamese learners of English tend to produce full vowels in unstressed syllables with the same length and equal weight

Besides the difficulty of producing stress with a variety of loudness, length and pitch, Nguyen Thi Anh Thu et.al (2005) show another stress problem, that is, beginners fail to differentiate English stressed and unstressed syllables in terms of duration although advanced speakers could produce native-like duration patterns between stressed and unstressed syllables This finding suggests a negative transfer effect: because duration does not function as an active cue in Vietnamese tonal distinctions, Vietnamese beginning learners of English fail to encode this cue in their L2 production Nevertheless, advanced speakers‘ ability to produce contrasting duration between stressed and unstressed syllables indicates that this feature is learnable

To sum up, differences between English stress and Vietnamese tones as shown by Nguyen Thi Anh Thu et al (2005) help the researcher understand the stress problems Vietnamese learners of English are facing: difficulties in identifying appropriate stress patterns (Avery and Ehrlich, 1995), misplacing primary and/ or secondary stress, or stressing all the syllables equally with the same loudness, length and pitch (Le Thuy Chi, 2000), or not differentiating stressed and unstressed syllables in terms of duration (Nguyen Thi Anh Thu et al, 2005) Again, the problems which EFL learners are encountering give the researcher a base to design the questionnaire and find out the effective stress learning strategies from successful learners of pronunciation in order to help unsuccessful learners of pronunciation overcome these obstacles and improve their

pronunciation skill and communicative ability It can be clear that the problems of stress which EFL learners often face should be an important part in the conceptual framework used as a guideline to build questionnaire items at the aim of exploring effective learning strategies to help learners overcome these stress problems

2.1.4 Stress and communicative ability

Regardless of the stress problems Vietnamese learners of English are facing,

it is advised that stress be learned as early as possible in L2 (Joseph, 2003) as there

is a considerable correlation between stress and communicative ability An emphasis on stress is also based on recent research, which has offered the importance of accurate use of suprasegmentals in promoting L2 intelligibility The use of too many pauses and inaccurately placed MU boundaries (Tyler et al., 1988, cited in Hahn, 1999); absent or incorrect primary phrase stress (Hahn, 2004); non- target-like intonation (Wennerstrom, 1998; Pickering, 2001); and word stress errors (Benrabah, 1997; Kawagoe, 2003; Guion, Harada, & Clark, 2004) all have been shown to negatively impact intelligibility in English However, what is important for intelligibility most likely depends on listener characteristics, the speaking context and its communicative demands, and the frequency of the L2 speaker‘s errors Generally speaking, stress performs a vast variety of functions in communication, but only some of the main functions mentioned in the study serve

as a base for understanding the role of stress in learning English in general and the relationship between stress and intelligibility in particular

In terms of L2 speakers, Kenworthy (1987) mentions that conversations are full of negotiation For example, speakers often want to assert a fact or an opinion quite strongly, deny what another speaker has said and offer a correction, or ask about alternatives and options in order to come to an agreement about what to do

To perform these tasks, English speakers very often resort to stress to achieve their ends For example, if a speaker has just made a statement with which you disagree, then you can assert the opposite by repeating their words almost exactly, but changing the verbs from positive to negative or vice versa, and moving the main stress in a sentence like in the example ―People are funny.‖ and ―People aren‘t

funny They are strange.‖ Beside the fact that stress is used to reach negotiations, it can also be used for contrastive emphasis, for example, ―I like a red pen, not a black one.‖ (Laderfoged, 1993) It may be noted that stress has to give emphasis to

a word or to contrast one word with another As we have seen, even a word such as

―and‖ can be given a contrastive stress The contrast can be implicit rather than explicit He also adds that another function of stress is conveying information about speakers‘ attitudes and emotional states

In terms of English native speakers, stress often conveys to them messages about the L2 speaker‘s intelligence, assertiveness, sincerity, and even his or her overall personality Native speakers of English themselves often do not recognize the importance prosody plays in their own communication It is pointed out that our early acquisition of prosody may actually impede our understanding of it The fact that we acquire prosody in our first language so early may account for our relative lack of awareness of it and how it functions in language For example, English native speakers are aware of the difficulties faced by non-native speakers

in areas such as grammar and pronunciation of individual sounds, and thus can make allowances for errors However, they seem unable to make such allowances for intonation and stress pattern errors It may be because we are so aware of errors

of L2 learners through our own educational experiences that things such as grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation of a foreign language often must be explicitly taught in order to be mastered that we are able to be more forgiving of a learner‘s mistakes in these areas The fact that such aspects of language as stress and intonation are not often discussed in the foreign language classroom may also lead us to believe that they are universally understood On the other hand, many non-native speakers of English complain that native speakers have difficulty understanding their speech even when their pronunciation is careful, and then repeat back to them exactly what the non-native speaker said when they finally do understand

In terms of L2 listeners, stress patterns play a crucial role in listeners‘ recognition of words When non-native speakers do not use a stress pattern that is a norm in the target language, vowels and consonants may also vary from the target

pattern, and this can result in a total misperception by listeners For instance,

diVIsions was sometimes pronounced DIvisions and was consequently misperceived by British listeners as REgions, and talking among themSELVES was sometimes pronounced as talking among THEMselves and was consequently misperceived as talking among DAMsels Because stress in English can be

phonemic at the phrase level, L2 speaker is presented with a nearly infinite number

of opportunities to be misunderstood and misjudged by native speakers of English

Also, according to Odlin (1989), stress patterns are crucial in pronunciation since they affect syllables and the segments that constitute syllables, as seen in the

stress alternation in English between certain nouns and verbs such as COMbine and comBINE Similarly, Kenworthy (1987) states that features like word and

sentence stress are very important in highlighting the important bits of a message

If the L2 speaker doesn‘t stress on syllable more than another, or stresses on wrong syllable, it may be very difficult for the listener to identify the word This is because the stress pattern of a word is an important part of its identity for the native speaker There is a great deal of evidence that native speakers rely very much on the stress pattern of word when they are listening In fact, experiments have demonstrated that only when a native speaker mishears a word, it‘s because the foreigner has put the stress in the wrong place, not because he or she mispronounced the sounds of the word For many other cases of misunderstanding reveal upon analysis that the listener is paying as much attention to stress pattern as

to the individual sounds

It can be seen that correct word stress patterns are essential for the speaker‘s production and listener‘s perception of English If a non-native speaker produces a word with the wrong stress pattern, an English listener may have great difficulty in understanding the word, even if most of the individual sounds have been well pronounced In listening, if learners of English expect a word to have a particular stress pattern, they may not recognize it when a native speaker says it In other words, what they hear doesn‘t match what they have in their mental dictionary If you stress the wrong syllable, it spoils the shape of the word for an English hearer

and he may have difficulty in recognizing the word (O‘ Connor, 1980) It can be clear that one of the most important things for language teachers to recognize about English stress is that it creates patterns that are essential for effective communication while many of other languages do not use stress for this purpose- that is the case of Vietnamese, the mother tongue of participants in this study

In summary, the definition of English stress (Ladefoged, 1993) as well as the contrastive analysis between English stress and Vietnamese tones by Nguyen Thi Anh Thu et al (2005) brings a fuller understanding of the difference between two languages, that is, stress language with a system of culminative word stress and tone language with no system of word stress, respectively This results in challenges Vietnamese learners of English face when performing stress Instead of stressing on content words or vowels in stressed positions and reducing on function words or vowels in unstressed positions, Vietnamese learners of English tend to produce function words or unstressed vowels with the same length and equal weight It can be inferred that poor performance of English stress can cause Vietnamese learners of English trouble in performing communicative tasks of negotiating, contrasting or expressing attitudes and emotions as well as understanding native speakers‘ implications It can be also logically concluded that

an overview of stress with contrast analysis between Vietnamese tone and English stress together with stress problems facing learners as well as the correlation between stress and communicative ability will be an important part of exploring stress learning strategies and should be put in the guideline of building the conceptual framework

2.2 AN OVERVIEW OF STRESS LEARNING STRATEGIES

It is also useful to have an overall understanding of not only the term

―stress‖ but also the term ―stress learning strategies‖, which appears in every stage

of the whole study

2.2.1 Definition of stress learning strategies

Oxford (1990: 8) describes language learning strategies as ―specific actions taken by the learner to make learning easier, faster, more enjoyable, more self- directed, more effective, and more transferable to new situations‖ She also mentions learning strategies as operations and routines used by the learner to facilitate the obtaining, storage, retrieval, and use of information This definition covers much ground by defining learning strategies as seemingly anything— cognitive or behavioral—that helps a learner figure language out

According to O‘Malley & Chamot (1990), language learning strategies (LLSs) are defined as special thoughts or behaviors that individuals use to help them comprehend, learn, or retain new information LLSs are the conscious thoughts and actions that learners take in order to achieve a learning goal Strategic learners have meta-cognitive knowledge about their own thinking and learning approaches, a good understanding of what a task entails, and the ability to orchestrate the strategies that best meet both the task demands and their own learning strengths

Richards & Platt, J & Platt, H (1993) define LLSs in SLA as international behaviors and thoughts that learners make use of during their learning in order to better, help them understand, learn or remember new information These LLSs may include focusing on certain aspects of new information, analyzing, and organizing information during the learning to increase comprehension, evaluating learning when it is completed to see if further action is needed LLSs may be applied to simple tasks such as learning a list of new words or more complex tasks involving language comprehension and production The effectiveness of SLA is thought to be improved by teaching learners more effective LLSs

Ellis (1994) has come to a definition that a LLS is a device or a procedure used by learners to develop their inter-languages LLSs account for how learners acquire and automatize L2 knowledge LLSs are also used to refer to how they develop specific skills It is possible, therefore, to talk of both ―language learning strategies‖ and ―skill-learning strategies‖ LLSs contrast with communication and production strategies, both of which account for how learners use rather than

acquire L2 competence He also adds that a LLS is ―an attempt to develop linguistic and sociolinguistic competence in the target language‖ It can be clear that LLSs are something changeable in different language tasks It‘s an opportunity for teachers to guide their students effective ways to encounter in difficult situations of language learning

Briefly, as defined by Richards et.al (1993), LLSs are considered as international behaviors and thoughts while Ellis (1994) looked at LLSs as the development of inter-languages In general, these researchers agree that effective employment of LLSs not only helps learners in improving their language use, but also empowers them in activating their learning processes However, Chamot et.al (1990) and Oxford (1990) define ―element and purpose‖ in more detail than other studies did The definition from O‘Malley and Chamot (1990) contains ―special thoughts or behaviors‖ while Oxford (1990) considers it as

―specific actions‖ As for the purpose of using LLSs, it is to be able to

―facilitate the learning‖ (Chamot, 1987); ―help them to comprehend‖ (O‘Malley & Chamot, 1990); ―make learning easier, faster, more enjoyable, more self-directed, more effective, and more transferable‖ (Oxford, 1990) Therefore, all learners can profit from learning how to use meta-cognitive strategies to plan, monitor, and evaluate themselves throughout their learning efforts Oxford‘s (1990) definition includes everything that L2 learners need to be good learners Thus, SLSs will carry the definition applied by Oxford (1990), that

is, specific actions taken by the learner to make stress learning easier, faster, more enjoyable, more self-directed, more effective, and more transferable to new situations This definition of SLSs will guide the researcher of this paper in building the questionnaire items aimed at exploring SLSs which help learners feel easier and more effective in English stress learning

2.2.2 Importance of stress learning strategies

Recently there has been a notion that ―special learner techniques or strategies might assist L2 acquisition‖ (O‘Malley and Chamot, 1990: 2) As a

result, the interest in studying LLSs in general, and SLSs in particular, has also increased

Oxford (1990), one of the leading teachers and researchers in the field of LLSs, concludes that strategies are important for two reasons In the first place, strategies ―are tools for active, self-directed involvement, which are essential for developing communicative competence‖ Secondly, learners who have developed appropriate learning strategies have greater self-confidence and learn more effectively‖ In other words, LLSs are important to students because the research suggests that training students to use LLSs can help them become better language learners Early research on good language learners by Naiman et al (1978) and Rubin (1975) suggests a number of positive strategies that such students employ

A study by O‘Malley & Chamot (1990) also suggests that effective language learners are aware of the LLSs they use and why they use them According to Fedderholdt (1997), the language learner who is capable of using a wide variety of LLSs appropriately can improve his language skills in a better way For example, cognitive strategies include using previous knowledge to help solve new problems and socio-affective strategies include asking native speakers to correct their pronunciation, or asking a classmate to work together on a particular language problem Consequently, LLSs are good indicators of how learners approach tasks

or problems encountered during the process of language learning

There are, perhaps, five major aspects of successful language learning: (1) a concern for language form, (2) a concern for communication (functional practice), (3) an active task approach, (4) an awareness of the learning process, and (5) a capacity to use strategies flexibly in accordance with task requirements In most of the studies, the learners appeared to benefit from attending to both form and meaning For example, Gerardo, the more successful learner in Abraham and Vann‘s (1987) study, paid attention to both, while Pedro, the less successful, paid attention only to meaning Furthermore, successful learners are thoughtful and aware of themselves in relation to the learning process They take conscious decisions and they follow their own preferred learning style What set the

―effective students apart‖ was their use of a greater range of strategies and, in

particular, their ability to choose strategies that were appropriate for particular tasks

Research into the good language learners revealed a large number of positive strategies so that such strategies could also be used by bad language learners trying to become more successful in language learning However, there is always the possibility that bad language learners can also use the same good LLSs while becoming unsuccessful owing to some other reasons At this point, it should

be strongly stressed that using the same good LLSs does not always guarantee that bad learners will also become successful in language learning since other factors may also play role in success

In addition, a number of benefits are claimed to result from learner training: (1) "Strategy training can be used to help learners achieve learner autonomy as well as linguistic autonomy" (Weaver & Cohen, 1997); (2) learning can be more effective when learners take control of their own learning because they learn what they are ready to learn (Ellis & Sinclair, 1989); (3) those learners who are responsible for their own learning can carry on learning outside the classroom (Ellis & Sinclair, 1989); (4) learners who know about learning can transfer learning strategies to other subjects (Weaver & Cohen, 1997); (5) strategies help students to handle different task types and learning situations efficiently and with confidence (Ellis & Sinclair, 1989); (6) use of appropriate learning strategies enables students

to take responsibility for their own learning by enhancing learner autonomy, independence and self-direction (Oxford & Nyikos, 1989); (7) " cognitive psychology shows that learning strategies help learners to assimilate new information into their own existing mental structures of schemata, thus creating increasingly rich and complex schemata" (Oxford & Nyikos, 1993); (8) unlike most other learner characteristics (e.g aptitude, attitude, motivation, personality, general cognitive style), learning strategies are readily teachable (Brown, 1987)

The discussion so far emphasizes the importance of LLSs in learning stress and provides the researcher of this paper a strong motivation for exploring SLLs with the aim of enhancing learners‘ pronunciation and communicative ability

2.2.3 Factors affecting learner strategy use

It is also necessary to understand factors that affect learners‘ use of SLSs so that the researcher can use as a guideline to answer one of the three important research questions of what affects learner strategy use

When learners choose a way to encounter in different learning tasks, their use is often affected by many factors from learners themselves or learning setting For example, young children are observed to employ strategies in a task-specific manner, while older children and adults make use of generalized strategies, which they employ more flexibly (Ellis, 1994) or these factors affect each other Over the years consistent relationships have been demonstrated between language attitudes, motivation, and L2 achievement; Gardner accepted that these relationships are complex; however, the factors interact and influence each other (Mitchell & Myles, 2004) Also, Oxford & Nyikos (1993) observe that researchers have identified a number of factors related to use of LLSs These include: i) the language being learned; ii) the level of language learning, proficiency, or the course; iii) the degree

of metacognitive awareness; iv) gender; v) affective variables such as attitudes, motivation, and language learning goals; vi) specific personality traits; vii) overall personality type; viii) learning style; ix) career orientation or field of specialization; x) national origin; xi) aptitude; xii) language teaching methods; xiii) task requirements; and xiv) type of strategy training These results have shown that effective L2 learners use a variety of appropriate metacognitive, cognitive, and social-affective strategies for both receptive and productive tasks, while less effective students not only use strategies less frequently, but have a smaller repertoire of strategies and often do not choose appropriate strategies for the task

In another research, Gardner (1985) cited many studies which suggest that language anxiety has a negative relationship with learning success In addition, to consider the way learners learn a language, it is argued that learning power is also important to mention Learning power is about how learners perceive themselves

as learners over time and how they can apply that awareness to learning Based on the background information of the study‘s subjects, learning strategies will be analyzed in consideration of following factors First, age and sex are not mentioned

because most of the subjects in the study are at the same age (86% at the age of 19 for freshmen and 79% at the age of 21 for juniors) and most of them are female (83%) Second, it is impossible to know about the subjects‘ language aptitude and intelligence, which requires special tests by experts However, all the subjects have passed a challenging national university entrance examination by MOET and so their level is considered to be not considerably different It can be concluded that the data are analyzed in consideration of both internal factors like motivation, and proficiency and external factors like teachers‘ instructions

2.2.4 How to identify stress learning strategies

Despite the fact that there have been a large number of studies on LLSs, methods used to collect them have still been a controversy Researchers have asked language learners to describe their learning processes and strategies through a variety of different ways with their own advantages and disadvantages

One of these ways is identifying LLSs through self-reports Although self- reports may be inaccurate if the learner does not report truthfully, it is still the only way to identify learners‘ mental processing As Grenfell & Harris (1999: 54) have

so aptly stated: ―[…] it is not easy to get inside the ‗black box‘ of the human brain and find out what is going on there We work with what we can get, which, despite the limitations, provides food for thought […]‖ Diaries and journals have also been used to collect information about LLSs In these, learners write personal observations about their own learning experiences and the ways in which they have solved or attempted to solve language problems (Carson & Longhini, 2002) Diaries of learner strategy have also been used to collect data about pronunciation strategies (Peterson, 2000) As with other verbal reports, learners may not necessarily provide accurate descriptions of their learning strategies Rubin (2003) suggests using diaries for instructional purposes as a way to help students develop metacognitive awareness of their own learning processes and strategies

However, these methods are difficult for the researcher to conduct if learners are not good at writing down what they do and think Learning strategies are for the most part unobservable, though some may be associated with an

observable behavior For example, a learner could use selective attention (unobservable) to focus on the main ideas while listening to a newscast and could then decide to take notes (observable) in order to remember the information

In almost all learning contexts, another way to find out whether students are using learning strategies while engaged in a language task is to ask them Then verbal reports are used to identify LLSs because observation does not capture mental processes (O‘Malley & Chamot, 1990; Cohen, 1998) Besides, another popular way to identify LLSs is retrospective interviews, in which learners are asked to describe what they were thinking or doing during a recently completed learning task (O‘Malley & Chamot, 1990) The limitation is that students may forget some of the details of their thought processes or may describe what they perceive as the ―right‖ answer

A stimulated recall interview is more likely to accurately reveal students‘ actual learning strategies during a task because the student is videotaped while performing the task, and the interviewer then plays back the videotape, pausing as necessary, and asking the student to describe his or her thoughts at that specific moment during the learning task This methodology is quite impressive, yet it failed to give learners extended time to think of pronunciation strategies in the same way that self-report diaries do Similarly, students may not have the accuracy or fluency required to give a spur-of-the moment response to their moderator on what corrective measures they took

Last but not least, the most frequent and efficient method for identifying students‘ learning strategies is through questionnaires The limitations are that students may not remember the strategies they have used in the past, may claim to use strategies that in fact they do not use, or may not understand the strategy descriptions in the questionnaire items For these reasons, some studies have developed questionnaires based on tasks that students have just completed, reasoning that students will be more likely to remember and to report accurately if little time has elapsed (O‘Malley & Chamot, 1990) The limitations of this approach are that there has been no standardization of either tasks or follow-up questionnaires so that it is impossible to make comparisons across studies, to date,

it‘s still one of the best way to identify LLSs in corporation with interviews which help the researcher verify confusing items in the questionnaire and gain insights into the learners

To sum up, each of these methods has limitations, but each provides important insights into unobservable mental learning strategies Self- reports, diaries or journals are effective in collecting unobservable learning strategies but learners may be reluctant to spend a lot of time on writing, or learners are not good writers and then they don‘t like these forms of writing Besides, verbal reports and interviews can help the researcher overcome this disadvantage of written forms, but they may fail to make learners tell the truth because they are being observed or recorded, and they may think that they make bad impression on the researcher if they tell the truth or they may be shy in face-to-face communication It is logical to conclude that the questionnaire with a majority of close questions which are easy

to answer by a tick and follow-up interviews to examine the accuracy of answers and help the researcher gain further insights into is the best way ever to investigate LLSs and so the questionnaire and follow-up interviews are also used in the study

to identify strategies to learn English stress of English majors at HCMCUTE

2.2.5 Related studies on stress learning strategies

As studying stress learning strategies has still been an unexplored area, a review of PLSs which includes SLSs is generally useful in designing the questionnaire on SLSs as well as analyzing the data collected from the respondents

in this study

Based on Oxford‘s (1990) definition of LLSs, pronunciation learning strategies can be taught as steps taken by learners to improve their own pronunciation learning According to Oxford‘s (1990) strategy classification which includes direct and indirect strategies, the PLSs and tactics that learners used

in learning pronunciation were categorized and documented In what should undoubtedly be regarded as a very welcome development, the growth of interest in PLSs has found its reflection in the studies conducted by Polish researchers, with some of them clearly constituting valuable contributions to this important line of

inquiry In one such empirical investigation, Bukowski (2004), taking as a point

in reference to Oxford‘s (1990) taxonomy, demonstrates that training first-year college students in the use of metacognitive, social and affective PLSs results in improved quality of their pronunciation, greater awareness and more positive attitudes

Later, Peterson (2000) investigates Oxford‘s study and condensed it into twelve basic PLSs through the use of self-diaries and interviews with the number

of eleven participants which provide a wider range of specific PLSs than those had been previously conducted They were instructed to write meta-cognitive remarks about their pronunciation learning experiences in their diaries After a two -to - three- week period, an exit interview was administered in order to clarify any remarks in the diaries about pronunciation learning that were confusing to the researcher A new group of participants were then interviewed and asked to identify any strategies that they currently used or had previously used to learn Spanish The strategies from the diaries were used to exemplify PLSs Unlike the studies that followed hers, Peterson focused her work on native English speakers learning Spanish in a foreign language context rather than non-native English speakers learning that language in an ESL context Soliciting strategies from the participants whose L1 is English has some clear advantages Because the participants and researcher all spoke English fluently, students would be more likely to share their strategies and explain them more clearly Peterson‘s methods were clear and well-designed The broad approach to collecting PLSs from diaries and interviews allowed her to produce the largest and most comprehensive taxonomy of pronunciation strategies yet collected, amounting to twelve PLSs and

43 tactics, or subsets of those strategies A summary of PLSs by Peterson (2000) is shown in Table 2.1 (p.31)

Two years after Peterson‘s study, Vitanova & Miller (2002) designs a pilot study to investigate what PLSs students thought of from the pronunciation instruction they were receiving The participants were ESL graduate students who were being taught various PLSs they could use on their own without the aid of a teacher The assumption of the researchers was that by teaching PLSs to students,