Using compensation strategies in listening for 10th form students a case study at the high school for gifted students of vinh university

Ministry of education and trainingVINH UNIVERSITY ------LÊ THỊ HIỀN ANH FORM STUDENTS: A CASE STUDY AT THE HIGH SCHOOL FOR GIFTED STUDENTS OF VINH UNIVERSITY Sử dụng chiến lược bù

Ministry of education and training

VINH UNIVERSITY

- -LÊ THỊ HIỀN ANH

FORM STUDENTS: A CASE STUDY AT THE HIGH SCHOOL

FOR GIFTED STUDENTS OF VINH UNIVERSITY

(Sử dụng chiến lược bù trong kĩ năng nghe cho học sinh lớp 10: Một trường hợp ở trường THPT Chuyên - Đại học Vinh )

Field: Theory and Methodology of English Language Teaching

Vinh, 2011

Ministry of education and training

VINH UNIVERSITY

- -LÊ THỊ HIỀN ANH

FORM STUDENTS: A CASE STUDY AT THE HIGH SCHOOL

FOR GIFTED STUDENTS OF VINH UNIVERSITY

(Sử dụng chiến lược bù trong kĩ năng nghe cho học sinh lớp 10: Một trường hợp ở trường THPT Chuyên - Đại học Vinh )

Field: Theory and Methodology of English Language Teaching

Code: 60.14.10 Master thesis in Education

Supervisor : Assoc.Prof.Dr NGÔ ĐÌNH PHƯƠNG

Vinh, 2011

I certificate that the thesis entitled “Using compensation strategies in

of Vinh University” is submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

Master of Arts is the result of my own work This thesis or any part of this one has

not been submitted for a higher degree to any other university or institution

Vinh, December 2011

I am greatly indebted to the members of my thesis committee whosecontributions and guidance without them this research could not have been carriedout successfully

First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to mysupervisor, Assoc Prof Dr Ngo Dinh Phuong for his valuable and enormouslysupport and comments, guidance and timely, encouragement while I was doing thisresearch Without his guidance, comment, and suggestions during all phases of thework, my thesis would still be far from completed

I would like to express my gratitude to all my lecturers at Faculty of Graduate Studies, Vinh University for their valuable lectures and guidance fromwhich I have benefited greatly in the writing of this report

Post-I am also indebted to my friends, colleagues and students at the high schoolfor gifted students of Vinh University for their kindness and assistance to me in datacollection, for their support and encouragement they provided during the course

Finally, I wish to give my special thanks to all my family members for theirwarm support and encouragement during the time I conducted this thesis

students of Vinh University Once, problems have been identified, suggestions forteachers and students to improve the situation of teaching and learning listeningEnglish to 10th form students at the high school for gifted students of VinhUniversity would be made

The thesis consists of five chapters Chapter 1, the introduction - givesrationale for the study and sets up the aims, scopes, research questions, significanceand organization of the study Chapter 2 provides theoretical background about thenature of listening comprehension, language learning strategies and compensationstrategies in listening And this part will also provide a review in key conceptsrelating to the research topic as well as the literature in the field Chapter 3 is aboutmethodology, the current situation of teaching and learning listening The researchmethods which cover interviews (for teachers), survey questionnaires (for students)and class observations, the setting of the study, participants, instruments, andprocedures of the research are presented in this chapter Chapter 4 deals with thedata results The results obtained are also analyzed and interpreted in this part, sothat major findings are revealed and discussed The last chapter, chapter 5 presents asummary of the study, gives recommendations based on the results to make themore effectiveness in using compensation strategies in listening at this case andprovides limitations and suggestions for further studies

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS 1

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 4

1.1 Rationale 4

1.2 Aim of the study 6

1.3 Research questions 7

1.4 Scope of the study 7

1.5 Significance of the study 7

1.6 Organization of the study 8

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 10

2.1 The nature of listening comprehension 10

2.1.1 The concept of listening comprehension 10

2.1.2 The process of listening comprehension 12

2.1.3 Potential listening comprehension problems 14

2.1.4 The importance of listening comprehension 16

2.1.5 Principle for teaching listening skill 17

2.2 Language learning strategies 18

2.2.1 The concept of language learning strategies 19

2.2.2 Oxford's (1990) Classification of Language Learning Strategies 20

2.2.3 The importance of strategies in learning process 23

2.3 Compensation strategies in listening 25

2.3.1 Definition of compensation strategies 25

2.3.2 The Classification of Compensation Strategies 26

2.3.3 Compensation strategies in listening 28

2.3.4 Related studies of using compensation strategies 29

2.4 Summary 30

CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 32

3.1 Participants 32

3.1.1 Students 32

3.1.2 Teachers 33

3.2 Setting of the study 34

3.3 Research methods 35

3.3.1 Research questions 35

3.3.2 Data collection instrument 35

3.3.2.1 Questionnaires 35

3.3.2.2 Interviews 36

3.3.2.3 Class observations 37

3.3.3 Data analysis method 37

CHAPTER 4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 39

4.1 The attitudes of teachers and students toward using compensation strategies in listening 39

4.1.1 Teachers’ attitudes toward using compensation strategies in listening 39

4.1.2 Students’ attitudes toward using compensation strategies in listening 41

4.1.2.1 Students’ attitudes of compensation strategies 41

4.1.2.2 Students' attitudes toward class-compensation strategies practice 43

4.2 Students’ challenges in using compensation strategies in listening 50

4.3 The expectations of the students towards teachers in using compensation strategies in listening 54

CHAPTER 5 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 59

5.1 Conclusions 59

5.2 Recommendations for improvement of the efficiency of using compensation strategies in listening for teaching and learning at the gifted high school of

Vinh University 61

5.2.1 Raising awareness of compensation strategies in listening 61

5.2.2 Raising awereness of top-down and bottom-up strategies 63

5.2.3 Activating or building students’ background knowledge 63

5.2.4 Teaching basic grammatical rules 65

5.2.5 Teaching phonological rules 66

5.2.6 Providing many visual aids and contextual clues 67

5.2.7 Providing certain key words and ideas related to the listening 68

5.2.8 Raising confidence and interest by giving encouragement 69

5.2.9 Encouraging cooperative listening 69

5.2.10 Providing a variety of listening tasks 70

5.2.11 Providing discourse markers and cohesive devices 71

5.2.12 Helping students to make inference from speakers’ attitude or intention 72

5.3 Limitations and suggestions for further study 73

REFERENCES 75 APPENDICES

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Rationale

Nowadays, English is widely used as an international language in mostcountries around the world in different fields of life such as economics, politics,tourism, electronics, telecommunication, culture, science and technology, etc…With the trend of development of life, Vietnamese people use English as a tool tointegrate with other countries all over the world A large number of students arebeing required to learn it through compulsory programs in schools and universities.English, therefore, is considered to play a crucial role on the path ofindustrialization and modernization of the country as well as in the process ofintegration and globalization in the world

In order to meet the demands of modern society, English teachers need topay attention to help their students find and apply appropriate learning strategies tolearn better According to Cohen (1998), O’Malley and Chamot (1990) and Oxford(1990), learning strategies are among the factors that can help students how to learnwell a second or foreign language As a result, an important duty of the languageteachers is teaching students learning strategies because learning strategies can helpstudents monitor and take charge of their own learning The appreciatedcharacteristics of a good language teacher can be considered as helping studentsunderstand language learning strategies and training them to develop and use goodlearning strategies (Lessard-Clouston, 1997)

It has also been an obligatory subject in the final exam, along with Mathematics andLiterature We know that in order to learn a foreign language successfully, studentsshould be helped to develop four skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing.These four skills are closely related to one another and they all are necessary Of thefour skills, listening is regarded as a prerequisite to understand what is being saidand to pick up the general idea of what is being discussed In our life, there will be

situations where we will hear and have to absorb a lot of details, facts and figuresand then extract some points from them We may wish to listen to talks aboutsubjects we are interested in and wish to consolidate what we have learnt in order toprogress to other and more difficult areas Thus, it is possible to give students thechance to practise what they have learnt in the way listening to spoken English Tolisten successfully to spoken English language need understand what speakers meanwhen they use particular words in particular ways on particular occasion and not tosimply understand the words themselves In the acknowledgement of theimportance of this subject, specialists in language teaching have paid muchattention to discovering and applying new methods for teaching English as a foreignlanguage with the hope of helping learners acquire and learn English moreeffectively The new series of English textbooks, which cover all four skillsnamely reading, speaking, listening and writing, have been used in schools inVietnam for some recent years At the high school for gifted students of VinhUniversity, listening is treated equally as other skills in terms of time allocation Infact, it has not drawn much attention of both teachers and learners, they aregenerally less aware of its importance And teaching and learning listening is areally new challenging job It seems that listening is the most difficult skill forstudents to master For teachers, listening is also the skill that makes a lot ofdifficulties to prepare and carry out the lessons Finding suitable ways to teachtheir students to listen effectively is not easy Because the old textbooks are notdivided into different skills in each lesson Most of the teachers have beeninexperienced in teaching listening methodology and approaches They often taketime to prepare a listening period for their students Besides, another problem isstudents’ low level of proficiency in term of vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation,skills and so forth The students using the new kind of English textbooks find thatit’s difficult to catch up with the information from the listening texts and they fail

to understand what is spoken They are not confident enough to do listening tasksuccessfully Moreover, learning habits do not help much to improve theirlistening in classroom They do not have suitable methods to learn listening

Throughout years of teaching English in the period of general educationrenovation, the researcher thinks that it is necessary to equip students withlistening strategies to help them develop their listening skill at high schools Theteacher’s employment of different techniques and methodology has impacts onsuccessful listening lessons

Many strategies can be applied in teaching and learning listening skill such

as memory strategies, cognitive strategies, compensation strategies, metacognitivestrategies, affective strategies and social strategies (Oxford, 1990) However, withsome experiences of teaching, the researcher thinks that compensation strategies,the ability of guessing intelligently from linguistic clues and other clues, are of greathelp to weak students in listening lessons These strategies help them to overcomesome limitations to guess what they hear from listening texts The facts stated alsoshow that there is a necessity of improving students’ autonomy in language learning

so that they can control their learning themselves, which can help them master thelanguage better Compensation strategies training will be recommended in thissituation with the belief that teaching learners strategies will give students a gooddirection on their future learning It is necessary to train students these skillsbecause they can help them get better results and manage well with such a difficultsubject like English

In Vietnam, there has so far been some research on listening strategies.However, research on listening strategies employed by students at the high schoolfor gifted students of Vinh University has not been done yet

The above reasons have inspired the researcher to choose the subject entitled:

the high school for gifted students of Vinh University” It is hoped that this study

would have some help for teachers and students to improve the effectiveness ofteaching and learning listening lessons at the researcher’s school

1.2 Aim of the study

My research paper aims:

- To investigate the attitudes of compensation strategies in listening byteachers and 10th form students at the high school for gifted students of VinhUniversity.

- To investigate the students’ challenges of using compensation strategies inlistening and their frequency of using these strategies in class

- To propose some recommendations when using compensations strategies inlistening for English teachers and students at the high school for gifted students ofVinh University effectively

1.3 Research questions:

1 What are the teachers and students’ attitudes toward using compensationstrategies in listening at the high school for gifted students of Vinh University?

gifted students of Vinh University encounter when using compensation strategies inlistening?

in order to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning compensationstrategies in listening lessons?

1.4 Scope of the study

There are a lot of English language learning strategies that teachers canemploy, and the new kind of English textbook covers four skills namely reading,speaking, listening and writing This study, however, focuses on usingcompensation strategies in listening for high school students Besides, the research

teachers at the high school for gifted students of Vinh University due to the timelimitation and some purposes

1.5 Significance of the study

In this study, both teachers and students have benefited from the strategiestraining On the students’ part, learning strategies have helped students becomebetter English learners Skills in using learning strategies assist them in becoming

independent and confident learners Besides, they become more motivated as theybegin to understand the relationship between their use of strategies and success inlearning languages On the teacher’s part, the researcher herself finds that whenusing strategy training often, she becomes more enthusiastic about her roles as thefacilitator of classroom learning Strategy training also makes the teacher morelearner-oriented and more aware of her students’ needs This study will make an

the high school for gifted students of Vinh University Hopefully, the study couldpropose some suggestions to help teachers at the gifted high school have a newsense of teaching listening and help the researcher’s high school students gain betterresults in their learning

1.6 Organization of the study

This thesis is composed of the following five chapters:

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: Literature Review

Chapter 3: Methodology

Chapter 4: Data analysis and discussions

Chapter 5: Recommendations and Conclusions

study, research questions, scope, and organization of the study

In the second chapter, the theoretical background of the study will bepresented in the thesis And this part will also provide a review in key conceptsrelating to the research topic as well as the literature in the field

Chapter 3 is about methodology, the current situation of teaching andlearning listening The research methods which cover interviews (for teachers),survey questionnaires (for students) and class observations, the setting of the study,participants, instruments, and procedures of the research are presented in thischapter

Chapter 4 deals with the data results The results obtained are analyzed andinterpreted in this part, so that major findings are revealed and discussed.

The last chapter, chapter 5 presents a summary of the study, givesrecommendations based on the results to make the more effectiveness in usingcompensation strategies in listening at this case and provides limitations andsuggestions for further studies

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 The nature of listening comprehension

2.1.1 The concept of listening comprehension

Language skills are often integrated with each other in language use.Listening is not merely hearing words In learning English as a foreign language,students cannot develop speaking skills unless they develop listening skills To have

a successful conversation, they must understand what is said to them So, the ability

to understand or comprehension is considered to be the first- order goal of listeningand the highest priority of the listener

There are a large number of definitions of listening comprehension withdifferent views of scholars towards the concept

According to O’Malley and Chamot (1989: 420), “Listening comprehension

is an active and conscious process in which the listener constructs meaning by usingcues from contextual information and existing knowledge, while relying uponmultiple strategic resources to fulfill the task requirement” Relevant to this view,Emmert, (1994) considers listening as an active process by which students receive,construct meaning from, and respond to spoken and or nonverbal messages

From the point of view of Littlewood (1981), listening demands activeinvolvement from the listener In order to construct the message that the speakerintends, the listener must actively contribute knowledge from both linguistic andnonlinguistic sources The listener can divide the continuous stream of sound intomeaningful units by applying the knowledge of the language and by comparingthese units with the shared knowledge between himself and the speaker, the listenercan interpret the meaning The nature of listening comprehension means that thelistener should be encouraged to take part in an active process of listening formeanings, using not only the linguistic clues but also nonlinguistic knowledge

Rubin (1995: 7) emphasized the role of the listener, who is seen as an activeparticipant in listening He sees listening as an “active process in which listeners

select and interpret information which comes from auditory and visual cues in order

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

traditional view and alternative view They thought that traditional view wasinappropriate and inadequate because the listener was regarded as a tape-recorderand the listener took in and stored aural messages in much the same way as a tape-recorder While the listener was considered as an active model builder inalternative view Anderson and Lynch agreed with the second view In this view,listener could combine the new information with his previous knowledge andexperience to reach full comprehension of what had been heard It emphasized theactive interpretation and integration of incoming information with priorknowledge and experience

Vandergrift (1999:168) considered listening as a complex, active process.The listener must discriminate between sounds, understand vocabulary andgrammatical structures, interpret stress and intonation, retain what was gathered inall of the above, and interpret it within the immediate as well as the larger socio-cultural context of the utterance

Rost (2002) defined listening as a process of receiving what the speakeractually says (receptive orientation); constructing and representing meaning(constructive orientation); negotiating meaning with the speaker and responding(collaborative orientation); and, creating meaning through involvement, imaginationand empathy (transformative orientation)

Howatt and Dakin (1974) suggested that listening is the ability to identifyand understand what others are saying This involves understanding a speaker'saccent or pronunciation, his grammar and his vocabulary, and grasping his meaning

An able listener is a person who is capable of doing these four thingssimultaneously

In Nunan’s point of view, listening is a fundamental and vital skill in theacquisition of languages (Nunan, 2002)

From the different views above, listening is not a passive but a complex,active process of interpretation in which listeners must construct and conveymeaning by using the linguistic knowledge such as phonology, lexis, syntax,semantics, discourse structure and using their non-linguistic knowledge as thecontext, background knowledge

2.1.2 The process of listening comprehension

Listening is considered as an active skill that involves many processes

According to Brown (2000), listening comprehension is not only the process

of sending and receiving sounds but also the conscious process to send and transmitthe message to the brain which will influence the process of communication

Anderson (1983, cited in Fang, 2008) elaborated that listeningcomprehension process consisted of three stages: the perceptual, parsing, andutilization In the perceptional process, listeners focused their attention on the oraltext and stored the sound in echoic memory Unfortunately, the sounds remain inthe echoic memory for a very short time Listeners do not have very long in which

to sort out what is heard and might make errors They transferred quickly theselective information in echoic memory to short-term memory to process the soundsfor meaning In the parsing process, listeners used words and messages to constructmeaningful mental representations They reorganized the information into ameaningful unit that could be preserved in short-term memory In the final process,listeners used long-term memory to link the incoming message to their originalknowledge Comprehension occurred when the new information could link withexisting knowledge

Fischer and Farris (1995) viewed listening comprehension as a process bywhich students actively form a mental representation of an aural text according toprior knowledge of the topic and information found within

There has been much debate about the listening comprehension processthough, the two most important views that are widely agreed by many researcherssuch as Rumelhart (1977), Brown (1994), Nunan (2001), Flowerder and Miller(2005), etc are bottom-up and top-down processing

Bottom-up processing considers listening comprehension as a process ofacquiring the meaning of the message based on the incoming language data fromsounds, to words, to grammatical relationships, and ultimately to the meaning.Schemata are hierarchically formed This acknowledges listening is the process ofdecoding the sounds, from the smallest meaningful units (phonemes) to completetexts In other words, listeners use their linguistic knowledge (sound, words,intonation, grammatical relationships, lexical meaning) to form final message.However, this processing has its weak points Bottom-up processing fails to see thatunderstanding a text is an interactive process between the listener’s previousknowledge and the text And efficient comprehension does not only depend onone’s linguistic knowledge

Top-down processing, on the other hand, refers to utilizing schemata whichlisteners use their background knowledge and global understanding to comprehendthe meaning of a message As Nauman (2002: 25) sees that top-down process

“focus on the overall meaning of a passage and the application of schemata.Schemata are metal frameworks based on past experiences which can be applied toand help us interpret the current situation.” Inferring ideas, guessing words’meaning and identify topics are all examples of top-down processing However, iflisteners are unfamiliar to the incoming information, top-down processing cannotevoke listener’s schemata and they can only depend on their linguistic knowledge inlistening comprehension Moreover, though listeners can trigger a schema, theymight not have appropriate schema expected by the speaker Thus, if listeners onlydepend on top-down process, they may get the failure of comprehension

Both bottom-up and top-down processing are insufficient for comprehension.The first view bases on linguistic knowledge whereas the second focuses onbackground knowledge From previous remarks one general point becomes veryclear: listening is an interactive and interpretive process because listeners do not justpassively receive the information but clarify the messages, identify the input andorganize the meanings The accurate listening comprehension is possibly gained

From these ideas, it is helpful for listeners to recognize the importance ofboth these types of processing to enhance listening comprehension and for teacher

to arrange opportunities to work on both aspects

2.1.3 Potential listening comprehension problems

It can be seen that second language learners regard listening skill as the mostdifficult one to master in second language acquisition From the point of view oflisteners, there are some difficulties with different aspects

First, listeners cannot control the speed at which speakers speak She makes

it clear that “they are so busy working out the meaning of one part of what they hearthat they miss the next part Or they simply ignore a whole chunk because they fail

to sort it all out quickly enough.”(1989:16)

Second, they are not able to get thing repeated When student practicelistening in the class they may ask the teacher to repeat the recording.Unfortunately, in many cases it is in the teacher’s hands and on his decision and not

in hands of the learner whether or not to play the recording again Despite the factthat it is almost impossible for the teacher to judge whether or not the students haveunderstood any particular section of what they have heard

The next problem is the listeners’ limited vocabulary The unknown word inlistening comprehension might be a barrier causing students of foreign language tostop and think about the meaning of the word and thus making them miss the nextpart of the speech This often happens when listeners focus on accuracy than fluency

Another problem is about listeners’ interpretation Students who areunfamiliar with the context may get difficulty in interpreting the words even if theycan understand the surface meaning

Underwood also indicates listeners’ inability to concentrate when listening.This can be caused by a number of things Students may find the listening workuninteresting, tiring or too demanding In addition, the poor quality of recording and

a bad acoustics of the classroom may as well cause the concentration to drop

And listeners’ established learning habit is the last problem Teachers aim toteach their students to understand everything in the lesson This can make students

become worried if they fail to understand a particular word while listening

In addition, Rubin (1994) attributes five factors which affect listeningcomprehension: text characteristics such as speech rate, pause phenomena andhesitation, level of perception, stress and rhythmic patterning perception, nativelanguage/second language difference, syntactic modifications, redundancy,morphological complexity, word order, discourse markers, and visual support fortexts; interlocutor characteristics such as gender and language proficiency; taskcharacteristics such as task type; listener characteristics such as languageproficiency level, memory, attention, affect, age, gender, learning disability innative language, and background knowledge; and process characteristics such astop-down, bottom-up, and parallel processing, listening strategies, and negotiation

of comprehensible input

A number of other potential difficulties are also identified by differentauthors Yagang (1994) states that the difficulties of listening comprehension wereaccompanied with the four factors: the message, the speaker, the listener and thephysical setting As for Higgins (1995), the speech rate, vocabulary andpronunciation caused major problems in listening Similarly, Flowerdew & Miller(1996) also assumed that the problems of the students were for the speed ofdelivery, new terminology and concept, difficulty in focusing and the physicalenvironment

It is a common fact that research available on second language listeningcomprehension is insufficient although problems in listening comprehension arevarious Comparing with other skills, Goh (1997:161) said that “there are fewerinsights about the process of listening and the way it is learnt” Richards (1985:189)also stated that: “there is little direct research on second language listeningcomprehension” As for that, I am doing this research not only to help students inour school to find out appropriate language learning strategies with better listening

but also to contribute a small part to enrich the listening research which has beendone so far.

2.1.4 The importance of listening comprehension

expect to listen twice as much as we speak, four times more than we read, and fivetimes more than we write.” ( Morley, 1991:82) Quite a few efforts have been made

to reinforce the significance of listening in everyday communication More than40% of people are devoted to listening in daily communication, approximately 35%

to speaking, 16% to reading and only 9% on writing (Byrnes H., 1984) In the era ofmass communication, it is of great importance that listening skill is taught inteaching process and students are trained to become effective and critical listeners

children, young people and adults gain a large portion of their education, theirinformation, their understanding of the world and of human affairs, their ideals,senses of values and their appreciation” Seeing the importance of listening in real-life interaction, Nunan and Miller (1995) emphasized that “listening skill is one ofthe basic skills in language teaching and learning” Listening is also important forobtaining comprehensible input that is necessary for language development Someresearchers argue that listening skill is at the core of second language acquisitionand therefore it demands greater emphasis and concern from both teachers andstudents It is now widely accepted that oral communication can not take placewithout listening and listening plays a central and possibly predominant part in thewhole process of language learning Listening, speaking, reading and writing areinterrelated and interdependent When someone wants to take part in conversation,the first thing they have to do is to absorb the pieces of information from thespeakers by listening When listeners do not understand the message,communication is considered unsuccessful The importance of listening in languagelearning is worth considering because, when you do not listen you will never learnanything new Besides, listening is an important way of acquiring the language or

“picking up” vocabulary and structures Thus, teaching listening is of primary

importance Listening is a continuous complex process which we can not mastereasily, language teachers, therefore, should give the learners many chances to listen

to spoken foreign language as well as necessary strategies to help them becomeeffective and critical listeners

2.1.5 Principle for teaching listening skill

Listening to English is more difficult for students who are not Englishmajors Many students think that listening lessons are boring and often complainthat they benefit little from listening lessons Therefore, it is necessary for Englishteachers to find out the basic principles with specific strategies for teachinglistening skill in order to motivate students and help them to develop their listeningability That is also the writers’ purpose in this paper to make somerecommendations for teaching listening skill when using compensation strategies

77) has highlighted seven principles which are dealt with in Forseth et al (1996:72) These principles can be directly applied to the mainstream classroom They areimportant for all students, but are of particular importance to English languagelearners

possible Authentic texts might be texts from radio broad casts or interview such asthe VOA or the BBC Real language texts are important because they allowbackground noise or interruptions, which are normal, using different voice typesand accents and avoiding out-of-context words

- Using various types of texts such as conversations, dialogues, jokes,lectures, news broadcasts, song, narratives, etc Each type has its owncharacteristics to transfer information to listeners dissimilarly Based on this,listeners have opportunity to discriminate voices and accents, since then they canimprove their listening ability

- Using primarily meaning-based tasks In the practice phase of a lesson,especially at the lower levels, some tasks may not be meaning-based but the longer-

term goal is to use language for communication as it relates to meaning The teachershould make students remember to emphasize understanding above repetition andmeaning over form.

- Stating a specific purpose for the listening task The task should bedesigned to practice one more of the different sub skills If the students areskimming for the main idea, they may miss some specific information.Alternatively, if they are listening for total comprehension, they may miss the mainidea Before a task begins, the teacher should tell the students what the purpose is,when they have a specific purpose in listening, they will be able to listen morecarefully

- Introducing the listening task It is necessary for teacher to prepare whathis/her students will hear This can be done by asking questions, introducing one ortwo important words, having a brief discussion about the topic or asking thestudents to talk about their experiences Whenever presenting a listening text,teacher needs to inform the students of the topics or the setting of the text All ofthis will help the students to focus their attention

- Generally, it is best to avoid pre-teaching vocabulary unless necessary Thiswill help the students to guess the meaning from the context Previewing lists ofwords does not happen in real life Students should have practice in understandingthe meaning of a text without knowing the meaning of all the words The onlywords that should be pre-taught are the ones necessary for understanding the mainidea of the text

- Letting students listen to the text more than once Often the listeners willnot catch the full meaning the first time However, if the text is repeated, each timewith a different focus, this will help the students to understand more fully

2.2 Language learning strategies

This section will provide readers with the definitions, Oxford's (1990)classification of language learning strategies, the importance of strategies inlearning process

2.2.1 The concept of language learning strategies

The concept of language learning strategies has become predominant and

influential in education in recent years There is no general consensus of opinion inthe field of second language acquisition with respect to the appropriate way ofdefining language learning strategies There have been several definitions oflanguage learning strategies developed until now by many researchers

" any sets of operations, steps, plans, routines used by the learner to facilitate theobtaining, storage, retrieval, and use of information."

behaviour and thought’ that a learner engages in during learning that are intended toinfluence the learner's encoding process” Similarly, Richards and Platt (1992:209)also considered that language learning strategies are "intentional behavior andthoughts used by learners during learning so as to better help them understand,learn, or remember new information."

Chamot (1987) put language-learning strategies as techniques, approaches ordeliberate actions that students take in order to facilitate the learning and recall ofboth linguistic and content area information

steps by students to enhance their own learning” and they are “especially importantfor language learning because they are tools for active, self-directed involvement”.Besides, they help learners to make learning become easier, faster, more enjoyable,more self-directed, more effective and more transferable to new situations

their level of proficiency, their own cognitive styles, and type of task they meet

the assumption that learners consciously engage in activities to achieve certain goalsand learning strategies can be regarded as broadly conceived intentional directionsand learning techniques." All language learning strategies are used either

consciously or unconsciously by language learners when processing newinformation and performing tasks in the language classroom In languageclassroom, learners always attempt to find the quickest or easiest way to do what arerequired by their instructors, thus, using language learning strategies is inescapable.

or behaviors that individuals use to help them comprehend, learn, or retain newinformation (O’Malley and Chamot’, 1990: 1)

In 1998, Cohen offered another definition According to him, languagelearning strategies are “the conscious moves made by second-language speakersintended to be useful in either learning or using the second language” Languagelearning strategies, when taken together, constitute the steps or actions consciouslyselected by learners either for the learning of a second language, the use of it, orboth (Cohen, 1998)

great help for learners to improve their language skills There are various definitionsstated and after Cohen’s (1998), some more definitions on language learningstrategies have been developed The researcher intended to use the theory proposed

by Oxford (1990) as the base for the present study because of her concrete and cleardefinition and apllicable classification

2.2.2 Oxford's (1990) Classification of Language Learning Strategies

Oxford’s (1990) classification of language learning strategies is known and has been referenced in many studies She classifies language learningstrategies into six major categories: memory strategies, cognitive strategies,compensation strategies, metacognitive strategies, affective strategies, and socialstrategies

well-Direct strategies include memory, cognitive, and compensation strategieswhich “involve direct learning and use if subject matter, in this case a newlanguage” (p 11) whereas indirect strategies include metacognitive, affective, andsocial strategies, which are indirectly related to learning

DIRECT STRATEGIES INDIRECT STRATEGIES

1 Creating mental linkages

2 Applying images and

3 Analyzing and reasoning

4 Creating structures for

2 Cooperating with others

3 Empathizing with others

Table 2.1: Classification of language learning strategies

(adapted from Oxford, 1990)

The direct strategies are useful and beneficial to the students because they

help to store and recover information If there is a gap in knowledge, thesestrategies can help learners to understand and produce language

Memory strategies help learners to link one second language item or conceptwith another but do not necessarily involve deep understanding Many memorystrategies help learners learn and retrieve information in an orderly string (e.g.,acronyms), while other techniques create learning and retrieval via sounds (e.g.,rhyming), images (e.g., a mental picture of the word itself or the meaning of theword), a combination of sounds and images (e.g., the keyword method), bodymovement (e.g., total physical response), mechanical means (e.g., flashcards), orlocation (e.g., on a page or blackboard) (Oxford, 2003: 13) She also emphasizesthat the use of memory strategies are most frequently applied in the beginningprocess of language learning but that learners need such strategies much less whentheir arsenal of vocabulary and structures has become larger

Cognitive strategies enable the learner to manipulate the language material indirect ways, e.g., through reasoning, analysis, note-taking, summarizing,synthesizing, outlining, reorganizing information to develop stronger schemas(knowledge structures), practicing in naturalistic settings, and practicing structuresand sounds formally

Compensatory strategies (e.g., guessing from the context in listening andreading; using synonyms and “talking around” the missing word to aid speakingand writing; and strictly for speaking, using gestures or pause words) help thelearner make up for missing knowledge

The indirect strategies contribute powerfully to learning especially help

supporting and managing language learning Like direct strategies, indirectstrategies are applicable to all for language skills: listening, reading, writing,speaking and writing Besides, it is also helpful in practically all language learningsituation These strategies are divided into metacognitive, affective and socialstrategies

Metacognitive strategies (e.g., identifying one’s own learning stylepreferences and needs, planning for an L2 task, gathering and organizing materials,arranging a study space and a schedule, monitoring mistakes, and evaluating tasksuccess, and evaluating the success of any type of learning strategy) are employedfor managing the learning process overall.

The word “affective” refers to emotions, attitudes, motivations, andvalues (Oxford, 1990) Therefore, affective strategies, such as identifying one’smood and anxiety level, talking about feelings, rewarding oneself for goodperformance, and using deep breathing or positive self-talk, have been shown to besignificantly related to second language proficiency

Social strategies (e.g., asking questions to get verification, asking forclarification of a confusing point, asking for help in doing a language task, talkingwith a native-speaking conversation partner, and exploring cultural and socialnorms) help the learner work with others and understand the target culture as well

as the language As a language is used as a means of communication, the socialstrategies are needed There are sets of social strategies are asking questions toget verification of a confusing point, asking for help in doing a language task,talking with native speaking conversation partner, and exploring cultural andsocial norms (Murcia, 2001) The social strategies help the learner work withothers and understand the target culture as well as the language

2.2.3 The importance of strategies in learning process

It is important to have knowledge of strategies because if learners are aware

of the processes underlying of the learning that they are involved in, the learningwill be more effective Language learning strategies can allow learners who areequipped language learning strategies to become more independent, autonomousand more motivated than those who are not However, not all learners automaticallyknow which strategies will suit with them It is clear that if people combinestrategies training, the ways how one thinks about learning with experimentingdifferent strategies can lead to more effective learning

In O’Malley and Chamot’s view (1990), the use of proper language learningstrategies can lead to the improvement of overall achievements.

First, if learners use appropriate learning strategies, their learning may become moreefficient and effective Learners takes certain actions which have been referred to aslearning strategies to help learning smother, faster and more effective Second, theuse of language learning strategies is to fulfill the goal of facilitating learner’sautonomy Since language learning is a lifelong task and the language only throughteachers’ instruction in classroom is not enough Thus students should develop theirautonomous ability for learning outside the school Third, language learningstrategies are a supplementary means to solve the difficulties learners encountered

in second language learning In this way, the process of language learning will befacilitated and improved with the higher frequency of using appropriate learningstrategies

Oxford (1990) indicated that learners’ strategy use changes with thedevelopment of their competence She also showed that to enhance learners’abilities, proper strategies play an important role In addition, language learningstrategies are the techniques and tricks which can help learners master the language

important (1990) Firstly, strategies “… are tools for active, self-directedinvolvement, which is essential for developing communicative competence”.Secondly, learners will be greater self-confidence and more effective in theirlearning if they have appropriate learning strategies In addition, Oxford (1990:9)identifies twelve key features of strategies such as: contribute to the main goal,communicative competence; allow learners to become more self-directed; expandthe role of teachers; support learning both directly and indirectly; are problemoriented; are specific actions taken by the learner; involve many aspects of learner,not just the cognitive but affective and social aspects as well; are not alwaysobservable; are often conscious; can be taught; are flexible; are influenced by avariety of factors such as stage of learning, task requirements, age, sex, nationality,

general learning style, personality, motivation, and purpose for learning thelanguage (1990:9).

In short, language learning strategies are the causes and outcomes ofsuccessful language learning Language learning strategies not only help learners todevelop autonomy but also enable them to become good language learners andmake language learning faster but effective To be a good language learner, the use

of appropriate language learning strategies optimally is essential in learning thetarget language

2.3 Compensation strategies in listening

2.3.1 Definition of compensation strategies

In this part, the researcher only discuss compensation strategies which arethe purposes of the study

According to Oxford’s (1990) classification of language learning strategies,compensation strategies are one type of the direct strategies “Compensatorystrategies (e.g., guessing from the context in listening and reading; using synonymsand “talking around” the missing word to aid speaking and writing; and strictly forspeaking, using gestures or pause words) help the learner make up for missing

new language for comprehending and producing in spite of limitation in theirknowledge If learners lack knowledge about the language such as grammar,vocabulary, using compensation strategies can help them overcome these obstacles

In other words, learners can guess the meaning by using their life experience tointerpret data There are ten compensation strategies, clustered into two sets:Guessing intelligently in listening and reading, and overcoming limitation inspeaking and writing

Guessing strategies, sometimes called “inference” involve using a widevariety of clues linguistic and nonlinguistic to guess the meaning when the learnerdoes not know all the words Good language learners, when confronted withunknown expression, make educated guesses Beginners are not the only ones who

employ guessing Advanced learners and even native speaker use guessing whenthey haven’t heard something well enough, when they don’t know a new word, orwhen the meaning is hidden between the lines Guessing is actually just a specialcase of the way people typically process new information that is interpreting thedata by their own life experience and the present context

Compensation occurs not just in understanding the new language but also inproducing it Using compensation strategies will allow learners to produce spoken

or written expression in the new language in spite of having incomplete knowledge.Many compensation strategies are used to compensate for a lack of appropriatevocabulary, but these strategies can also be used to make up for a lack ofgrammatical knowledge Compensation strategies for production help learners tokeep on using the language, thus obtaining more practice In addition, some of thesestrategies, such as adjusting or approximating the message, help learner strategies,like getting help and coining words, may lead learners to gain new informationabout what is appropriate or permissible in the target language Learners who haveskill in such strategies sometimes communicate better than learners who knowmany more target language words and structure

2.3.2 The Classification of Compensation Strategies

Oxford (1990) classified compensation strategies into two sets: Guessing

intelligently in listening and reading and overcoming limitation in speaking andwriting

Guessing intelligently in listening and reading

The two strategies, which contribute to guessing intelligently, refer to twodifferent kinds of clues: linguistic and nonlinguistic:

a Using linguistic clues

Seeking and using language-based clues in order to guess the meaning ofwhat is heard or read in the target language, in the absence of complete knowledge

of vocabulary, grammar, or other target language elements Language based clues

may come from aspect of the target language that the learner already knows, fromthe learners’ own language, or from another language

b Using other clues

Seeking and using clues that is not language-based in order to guess themeaning of what is heard or read in the target language, in the absence of completeknowledge of vocabulary, grammar, or other target language elements No languageclues may come from a wide variety of source: knowledge of context, situation, textstructure, personal relationship, and topic or “general world knowledge”

Overcoming limitation in speaking and writing

of these are dedicated solely to speaking, but some can be used for writing as well

a Switching to the mother tongue

Using for the mother tongue for an expression without translating it Thesestrategies may also include adding word endings from the new language onto wordsfrom the mother tongue

b Getting help

Asking someone for help by hesitating or explicitly asking for the person toprovide the missing expression in the target language

c Using mime or gesture

Using physical motion, such as mime or gesture, in place of an expression toindicate the meaning

d Avoiding Communication partially or totally

Partially or totally avoiding communication when difficulties are anticipated.This strategy may involve avoiding communication in general, avoiding certaintopics, avoiding specific expression, or abandoning communication in mid-utterance

e Selecting topic

Choosing the topic of conversation in order to direct the communication toone’s own interests and make sure the topic is one in which the learner hassufficient vocabulary and grammar to converse.

f Adjusting or approximating the message

Altering the message by omitting some items of information, making ideassimpler or less precise, or saying something slightly different that means almost thesame thing pencil or pen

g Coining Words

Making up news word to communicate the desired idea, such as paper holderfor notebook

h Using a Circumlocution or synonym

Getting the meaning across by describing the concept (circumlocution) or using or word that means the something (synonym)

h Adjusting/ Approximating the message

Speaking, Writing

j Using a circumlocution or synonym

Speaking, Writing

Table 2.2: Classification of compensation strategies (adapted from Oxford, 1990)

2.3.3 Compensation strategies in listening

The table 2 has shown that compensation strategies in listening come withguessing intelligently Learners can use both linguistic clues and other clues tounderstand what they hear Linguistic clues may include: grammatical clues(prefixes, suffixes …), phonological clues (stress, intonation…), discourse markers(markers of addition/ cause and effect/ sequences …), titles, subtitles, word order….Listeners can use these clues to get the meaning of the listening It means thatlisteners must have sufficient knowledge of the target language Besides, listenerscan use other clues such as visual clues, situational context, background knowledge,text structure, clues from body language of speakers, clues from background noises,etc to guess about what they hear

In this paper, the researcher only focuses on using linguistic clues and otherclues of compensation strategies in listening These strategies are the combination

of bottom-up and top-down processing It means that listeners can employ allinformation they have to comprehend what they hear

2.3.4 Related studies of using compensation strategies

Many studies have been done to investigate about strategies in listening.According to Nunan, “learners who are aware of a range of strategies, and who areable to match their strategies to their listening purposes, will be better listeners andbetter learners” (Nunan as cited in Helgesen & Brown, 2007: 147) LearningEnglish is not an easy task, it is a laborious task Students and teachers haveencountered a lot of problems while learning and teaching English language.Compensation strategies help smoothen this laborious task

Compensation strategies are among the listening strategies that have beenused frequently so far Together with other listening strategies, compensationstrategies are considered as effective tools for listeners in listening comprehensionprocess Guessing intelligently when having limitation in knowledge especiallyvocabulary can be a great help for students in general

In the study of Margolis (2001), he investigated “compensation strategies byKorean Students” He said that compensation strategies are active, conscious

techniques that students can adopt and teachers can teach, to compensate for gaps inlinguistic and lexical knowledge in the target language In his study, “the mostutilized and second most utilized strategies were found to be seeking help andguessing” It means that compensation strategies were employed most.

Teng (1998) pointed out in his study on listening comprehension strategies ofTaiwan students that compensation strategies were most often used by subjectsamong the six strategy categories

In other study of Chen “The learning strategies of Taiwanese universitystudents: English majors versus non- English majors and males versus females”, healso indicated that in the six categories of learning strategies, all participants, bothEnglish majors and non- English majors, employed compensation strategies mostfrequently

Monolingual Korean students are reported to use compensation strategiesmost in a study by Leavell & Hong-nam (2007)

In the context of Vietnam, Vu (2004) studied listening strategies of thestudents at the Militiary Technical Academy in Vietnam and concluded thatcompensation strategies were most highly employed There has been a recentunpublished M.A thesis entitled: “Developing compensation strategies in listeningfor 10th form students at Nguyen Van Cu upper-secondary school, Gialam, Hanoi”

by Le Her research studied students’ difficulties and preferences in applyingcompensation strategies in listening at her school However, her study shown thatthe students did not apply these strategies frequently They had inadequateknowledge of compensation strategies in listening

In short, there have been some studies on compensation strategies inlistening so far And seeing that compensation strategies are very helpful forstudents, the researcher wants to apply these strategies in her teaching, contributing

to the situation of using compensation strategies in listening in another place withdifferent students

2.4 Summary

In this chapter, the relevant literature which is needed to form the theoreticalframework for the present study has been presented The major issues beingreviewed include the nature of listening comprehension, language strategies andcompensation strategies Besides, it deals with the process of listening, Oxford’sclassification of language learning strategies and compensation strategies inlistening Also, a number of related studies on compensation strategies were brieflyintroduced According to many ideals from a lot of researchers, Oxford’s strategiesinventory of language learning, Ngo Dinh Phuong and Nguyen Thi Van Lam (2007)with some principles for teaching listening, the researcher wants to make aninvestigation into listening using linguistic clues and other clues to guess themeaning of the listening with some guidelines as the following: using grammaticalclues (part of speech, prefixes, suffixes, sentences patterns, etc…; usingphonological clues (intonation, stress…); using discourse markers and cohesivewords (markers of addition/ cause and effect/ sequences…) ; using backgroundknowledge; using titles, visual aids, (pictures, chart,); using clues from bodylanguage of speakers; using noises of the listening lessons; using the meaning of thewords or phrases they already know to guess the unknown words; using inferred

the subject to help one understand

CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The previous chapter has presented a literature review on the theory oflistening comprehension, potential listening comprehension problems, languagelearning strategies, and provided a necessary theoretical background aboutcompensation strategies in listening for the present study This chapter presents theresearch methods used for data collection and analysis in the study It starts with adescription of the participants, then describes the setting of the study and researchmethods

3.1 Participants

3.1.1 Students

University, the researcher chose randomly 150 students to carry out the research inthe school year 2010 - 2011 Their ages ranged from 15-16 They are all non-English major students They are gifted students specializing at nature subjects such

as mathematics, physics, chemistry and informatics Many students came fromNghe An with different districts such as Nghi Loc, Que phong , Tuong Duong, QuyChau, Hung Nguyen, Nam Dan, Thanh Chuong, etc; some others came fromdifferent provinces such as Ninh Binh, Thanh Hoa, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh etc Itmeans that some of them may be good at English but some may be not In Vietnam,the curriculum of textbook and reformation of language teaching are all prescribedand administered by the Ministry of Education and Training English, now, has beenpopularized at every secondary and high school in Vietnam, but students’ Englishcompetence is very low This may be due the lack of actual native learningenvironment Students have no chance to interact with English speakers at schools,except for English major students So, they have neither motivation nor experience

in communicating or using English in actual situation Another reason is thatstudents pay much attention to their specializing subjects such as mathematics,physics, chemistry but not to learn English As the result, students are merely able

to acquire a limited basic knowledge of English in terms of vocabulary andgrammar structures, except for pronunciation, intonation or communicative skillslike speaking or listening Despite the fact that most of them have learnt English

the high school These are among the problems concerning non-major students ofEnglish as Brown (1994; p101) indicates: “Teaching beginners is considered bymany to be the most challenging level of language instruction Since students at thislevel have little or no prior knowledge of English on which to build, the teacher andaccompanying techniques and materials become a central determiner in whether ornot students accomplish their goals” And all of them are unfamiliar with the newseries of English textbooks, which cover all four skills namely reading, speaking,listening and writing and have been used in high schools all over the country forsome recent years

of the study Firstly, both the authority and teachers at the high school for giftedstudents of Vinh University both have a great concern about the quality of Englishteaching and learning Students who are good at English will have betteropportunities for them in the future, especially students who get prizes in their field.Secondly, listening seems to be the weakest among all the four skills learnt atschool Using compensation strategies in listening are useful and effective forstudents to overcome knowledge limitations

3.1.2 Teachers

Vinh University participating in this study Their ages range from 28 to 40 All ofthem are female They are all married and have children All of them come fromVinh city One of them has finished an M.A course at Vietnam NationalUniversity, Hanoi One was doing Master course in methodology for the timebeing and the rest had the University Bachelor’s Degree The time length ofteaching English is different, from 5 years to nearly 20 years In fact, teachers of

speakers at school Noticeably, many teachers have hardly attended trainingprogrammes or professional workshops given by the national or provincialtrainers However, they are suitable participants for the study because they hadsome experience in teaching listening skill and they are all in charge of 10th

classes at the high school for gifted students of Vinh University And all theteachers were enthusiastic and willing to help their students to overcome theirlistening comprehension problems

3.2 Setting of the study

This study was carried out at the high school for gifted students of Vinh

district, Vinh city, Nghe An province, the school has had a history of 44-yeardevelopment since its foundation in 1966 This school is considered as onedepartment of Vinh University Unlike other high schools in Vinh city, its studentscome from Vinh city and different districts in Nghe An province as well; some evencome from other provinces Most of the students have been learning English since

secondary schools The objectives of the secondary school curriculum state that bythe end of secondary school, students are expected to obtain general knowledge ofgrammar and an active vocabulary which they can use mostly in written form.Observing my students I realized that most of them are from the countryside whereEnglish has not been paid much attention, accordingly, their background knowledge

is limited and not the same Besides, they focus on grammar when learning English.Thus, their abilities to speak and listen in English are weak In addition, they learnEnglish in normal classrooms with a cassette It is not easy for them to listen withfrom 35 to 45 classmates in a class The other factor that may affect their listeningcomprehension is their lack of effective learning strategies Consequently, students

at the high school for gifted students of Vinh University face a variety of problems

in learning listening comprehension English is now a compulsory subject in highschools It takes three periods per week The new textbook of English 10 consists of

16 units and each unit is divided into five parts: Reading, Speaking, Listening,

Writing and Language focus Listening skill is considered the most difficult one forstudents As for that, I want to find suitable learning strategies in listening for the

3.3 Research methods

To assure the reliability and validity of the research, both qualitative andquantitative methods were exploited In this research, survey questionnaire,interviews, and class observation were utilized as the main research tools

3.3.1 Research questions

This study attempts to investigate attitudes and challenges of usingcompensation strategies in listening by teachers and students at the high school forgifted students of Vinh University To achieve this aim, the following researchquestions are proposed:

1 What are the teachers and students’ attitudes toward using compensationstrategies in listening at the high school for gifted students of Vinh University?

gifted students of Vinh University encounter when using compensation strategies inlistening?

to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning compensation strategies inlistening lessons?

3.3.2 Data collection instrument

3.3.2.1 Questionnaires

Questionnaires are considered as a common research tool to collect data inmany fields with certain advantages Seilinger and Shohany (1989) pointed thatquestionnaires do not take much time to administer as other procedures Also, sincethe same questionnaire is given to all the subjects at the same time, the data aremore uniform, standard and accurate Besides, questionnaires can be easilyquantified because multiple-choice questions are used As a result, questionnaires