A study on pre listening activities of the second year english major students at hung yen university of technology and education

HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION
FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

---------------------------------------

GRADUATION PAPER
FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS

A STUDY ON PRE-LISTENING ACTIVITIES OF THE
SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT
HUNGYEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND
EDUCATION
(NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG TIỀN NGHE
HIỂU CỦA SINH VIÊN CHUYÊN NGỮ NĂM HAI
TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC SƯ PHẠM KỸ THUẬT HƯNG YÊN)

Supervisor: M.A Nguyen Thi Nam
Student: Vuong Thi Thom
Student number: 11317119

Hung Yen – 2021


HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION
FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

---------------------------------------

GRADUATION PAPER
FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS

A STUDY ON PRE-LISTENING ACTIVITIES OF THE
SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT
HUNGYEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND
EDUCATION
(NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG TIỀN NGHE
HIỂU CỦA SINH VIÊN CHUYÊN NGỮ NĂM HAI
TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC SƯ PHẠM KỸ THUẬT HƯNG YÊN)

Supervisor: M.A Nguyen Thi Nam
Student: Vuong Thi Thom
Student number: 11317119

Hung Yen – 2021


i

DECLARATION

I certify that this thesis is the result of my own research and the substance of this thesis has
not been submitted for a degree to any other universities or institutions and that if this declaration
is found to be false, disciplinary measures and penalties can be taken and imposed in accordance
with university policies and rules.

Signature

Vuong Thi Thom


ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The completion of this paper could not have been possible without the participation and
assistance of so many people whose names may not all be enumerated.Their contributions are
sincerely appreciated and gratefuly acknowedged.
First and foremost, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Mrs. NGUYEN
THI NAM, lecturer of the Foreign Languages Department, Hung Yen University of Technology
and Education who has always been willing to give me valuable advice and suggestions in order
that I can complete successfully this study.
I moreover would like to require this opportunity to appear my true much appreciated to all
of lecturers in the Foreign Languages Department of Hung Yen University of Technology and
Education of Innovation and Instruction for

failingly giving

time

and endeavors to enhance,

broaden and develop my information over the past four a long time.
I am also thanks to all second-year students of the Faculty of Foreign languages for their
whole-hearted participation in the study.
Besides, my words of much obliged are moreover sent to all the creators of the books,
magazines, and other materials recorded within the reference portion for their thoughts that have
been reflected and created within the think about.
Final but not slightest, my most profound appreciation and appreciation go to my family,
my companions and my classmates. Their adore, back and steady support gave me an incredible
bargain of quality and assurance that offer assistance me amid the upsetting time of composing
this paper.

iii

ABSTRACT
Listening may be a exceptionally vital ability in learning English particularly, pre-listening
exercises. Be that as it may, for the second-year English major students at Hung Yen University of
Technology and Education (UTEHY), they still get numerous troubles in listening. Therefore, the
researcher decided to conduct a study to investigate the status of using pre-listening activities for
listening performances, the difficulties faced by students and offer some solutions to improve
students' listening skills. To attain the specified points of the current think about, the researcher
combined both qualitative and quantitative methods, counting study survey questionnaire and
interview.
The subjects of the ponder are 57 second-year English major students and 5 lecturers of
English at Faculty of Foreign Dipartment, Hung Yen University of Technology and Education.
These lecturers and students are welcomed to reply surveys.
With the desire of improving the reality situation, the researcher recommended some
suggestions to improve listening skill for both teachers and students to help them in teaching and
learning this difficult skill better.


iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION............................................................................................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................................ ii
ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................................................... iii
TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................................... iv
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................................................ vi
LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES .............................................................................................. vii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................... 1
1.1. Rationale for the study ................................................................................................................ 1
1.2. Aims of the study ........................................................................................................................ 1
1.3. Research questions ...................................................................................................................... 2
1.4. Scope of the study ....................................................................................................................... 2
1.5. Methodology ............................................................................................................................... 2
1.5.1. Questionnaires.......................................................................................................................... 2
1.5.2. Interview .................................................................................................................................. 2
1.6. Significance of the study ............................................................................................................. 2
1.7. Structure of the study .................................................................................................................. 3
CHAPTER 2: REVIEW OF LITERATURE ................................................................................ 4
2.1. Overview of listening. ................................................................................................................. 4
2.1.1. Definition of listening. ............................................................................................................. 4
2.1.2. Listening processes .................................................................................................................. 5
2.1.3. The stages in listening comprehension .................................................................................... 6
2.2. The concept of pre-listening ativities .......................................................................................... 9
2.2.1. Pre-listening stage .................................................................................................................... 9
2.2.2. Definitions of pre-listening activities....................................................................................... 9
2.2.3. Types of pre-listening activities ............................................................................................. 10


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2.2.4. Aims of pre-listening activities .............................................................................................. 10
2.3. EFL Learner's Difficulties ........................................................................................................ 12
CHAPTER 3: THE STUDY .......................................................................................................... 15
3.1. The overview of situation of teaching and learning English listening at UTEHY ................... 15
3.2. Methodology ............................................................................................................................. 15
3.3. Participants of the study ............................................................................................................ 16
3.3.1. Teachers ................................................................................................................................. 16

3.3.2. Students .................................................................................................................................. 16
3.4. Data analysis and discussion ..................................................................................................... 16
3.4.1. The questionnaire of teachers ................................................................................................ 16
3.4.2. The questionnaire of students ................................................................................................ 22
3.4.3. The interview for students ..................................................................................................... 29
3.5. Discussion ................................................................................................................................. 30
3.6. Summary ................................................................................................................................... 31
CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSION...................................................................................................... 32
4.1. Summary of the study ............................................................................................................... 32
4.2. Limitations of the study ............................................................................................................ 32
4.3. Suggestions for further study .................................................................................................... 33
REFERENCES............................................................................................................................... 32
APPENDICES ................................................................................................................................... I
APPENDIX 1 ...................................................................................................................................... I
APPENDIX 2 .................................................................................................................................... V
INTERVIEWS QUESTIONS FOR STUDENTS ......................................................................... VIII


vi

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
UTEHY: Hung Yen University of Technology and Education
MA: Master of Art
FFL: Faculty of Foreign Languages
EFL: English as a foreign language


vii

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES

Chart 3.1: Teachers’ opinion about the importance of listening skill .............................................. 17
Chart 3.2: Teachers’ opinion about the difficulty of listening skill ................................................. 17
Chart 3.3: Teachers’ opinion about the importance of pre-listening activities ................................ 18
Chart 3.4: The frequency of pre-listening activities organized by teachers .................................... 18
Chart 3.5: The frequency of students having difficulty using pre-listening activities ..................... 20
Chart 3.6: The students’ opinion about the importance of listening skill ........................................ 22
Chart 3.7: Students’ opinion about the difficulty of listening skill.................................................. 23
Chart 3.8: Students’ feeling about learning listening skill ............................................................... 23
Chart 3.9: The students’ opinion about the importance of pre-listening activities .......................... 24
Chart 3.10: The frequency of teachers organizes pre-listening activities for students .................... 24
Chart 3.11: The difficulties of students............................................................................................ 25
Chart 3.12: The students’ frequency of doing pre-listening activities ............................................. 28

Table 3.1: Teachers’ reasons for using pre-listening activities ·········································· 19
Table 3.2: Teachers’ dificulties when teaching listening skill ··········································· 20
Table 3.3: Teachers’ opinion about solution to improve listening skill ································ 21
Table 3.4: The factors that cause difficulties for students in listening ·································· 26
Table 3.5: Students’ favorite genres of pre-listening activities ·········································· 27
Table 3.6: Benefits of pre-listening activities ······························································ 29


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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1. Rationale for the study
It can be affirmed that listening is one of the most essential and necessary skills to
help English learners communicate in real life as well as in the learning and teaching process.
When you are learning foreign language, listening skill become more and more important.
Among four skills, listening is considered the most difficult. Like other skills, listening is
closely related to store of vocabulary that carries most meanings of the passage but learners

have to get it aurally, which is very difficult because of the speed, the accent, the intonation
of the speakers and even the external factors that interrupt the sound.
Moreover, Vietnamese learners do not have many opportunities to communicate or speak to
native speakers, especially high school students. They only learn language through materials
or Vietnamese teachers that do not provide them so good pronunciation as native speakers.
Last but not least, learners' motivation, one of the most important factors to study language
well, is discouraged by all of the factors mentioned above. If they cannot hear anything or
little, they cannot communicate in the language they are listening to. As a result, to help
students improve listening skills, teachers first have to find out teaching techniques to attract
them to the listening lesson, then to help them enlarge store of vocabulary, be familiar with
the pronunciation of native speakers.
As a English leaner, I think interesting and suitable pre-listening activities can raise students'
motivation and have other positive effects on learning procedures. Hence, I choose the topic
"A Study on the Pre-listening Activities of second-year English major students at UTEHY”
with the hope, to some extent, to discover the dificulties of listening skill and benefits that
pre-listening activities bring to students.
1.2. Aims of the study
The study has three main aims as follows:
-

Find out the current situation of using pre-listening activities of the second-year

English major students at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education.
-

Find out the difficulties of the second-year English major students at Hung Yen

University of Technology and Education in using pre-listening activities.
-

Give some pre-listening activities and solutions to these problems.


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1.3. Research questions
The study is conducted to answer the following questions:
•

What is the current situation of using pre-listening activities of the second-year

English major students at UTEHY?
•

What are the difficulties of the second-year English major students at Hung Yen

University of Technology and Education in learning English listening skills?
•

What pre-listening activities should be used to help the second-year English major

students at UTEHY overcome their difficulties?
1.4. Scope of the study
This study cannot cover the whole issue of pre-listening activities because of the framework
of a minor thesis. Therefore, it only focuses on pre-listening activities when listening to
English of the second-year English majors at UTEHY, particularly working out the students’
towards listening, their difficulties in listening and giving some pre-listening activities for
improving their listening skill.
1.5. Methodology
1.5.1. Questionnaires

A survey research with quantitative method is used and considered the most suitable
to obtain the aims of the study. The study targets at analyzing the outcome with numbers and
figures. The data were collected by means of questionnaires which were designed and
handled to a defined population. The subjects were asked to answer the questions and the
questionnaires were collected right away. The answers are completely objective, not
controlled by the researcher.
1.5.2. Interview
The semi-structured interviews were applied with five students and two teachers to
find out clearer results. The interview questions and the questionnaire were designed basing
on the main aims of the study.
1.6. Significance of the study
The findings of this study will be directed to society's benefit that English plays an
important role in today's life. Greater demand for graduates with an English background
leads to a need for more effective teaching methods. Hence, schools that apply the


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recommendations drawn from the results of this study will be able to train better students.
Teachers can inspire students and help them improve their listening skills.
1.7. Structure of the study
The study consists of four parts, organize as follows:
Part 1: Introduction
Gives information about the topic of this paper, background to the study, the reasons
for choosing topic, the aims of the study, the significance of the study, the scope of the study,
methods of the study and an outline of the thesis in this paper.
Part 2: Literature review
- Discusses the relevant theories related to listening and pre-listening activities.
Part 3: The study
Consist of three parts below:

- Methodology and data: Mentions to the methods of the study, the participants of the study,
data collection instruments and procedures of data collection
- Data analysis, main findings and discussions: Analyses the data collected in order to find
out the students' attitudes towards listening and pre-listening activities and their difficulties
in listening.
- Recommendations for improving listening skill: Some pre-listening activities are suggested
with the hope that students can try and have positive feelings to leaming listening skill. And
then these activities can improve their listening skill.
Part 4: Conclusion
- Summaries all the key issues as well as the limitations and suggestions for the further study.


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CHAPTER 2: REVIEW OF LITERATURE
2.1. Overview of listening.
Listening is a process that allows listeners to understand a message, engage them in
conversation and succeed in communication. Without listening skills, people engaged in
communication will not receive the message, and as a result, they cannot respond quickly
and effectively. Many researchers agree that in foreign language learning, Listening plays
an important role in the process of acquiring a language.
In recent decades, listening comprehension skills have attracted more and more
attention of researchers in teaching and learning foreign languages in general and learning
English as a foreign language (EFL) in particular. Many scholars believe that the most
important step in starting to learn a language other than your first language is trying to hear
that language. Rubin & Thompson (1994) affirms: “Listening, quite possibly, is the most
important of language skills since people spend approximately 60% of their time
listening…”. Rost (1994) also emphasizes that Listening can be seen as an essential skill in
the training of a foreign language learner and can even be seen as a predictor of language
successful of learners.

Thus, it can be seen that listening skills play an important role in the process of
learning foreign languages.
2.1.1. Definition of listening.
According to Hasan (2000), "listening" and "understanding" are two separate
processes, in which "listening" is a process by which the listener receives the information,
and this process takes place one way, completely not demanding. ask for any interpretations
or interactions with the audible text. And listening comprehension is a process of two-way
interaction between the listener and the listening text, and this interaction helps the listener
have a general understanding of the listening text.

This process of "listening" and

"understanding" is done when the listener selects and explains the information received by
the hearing organs and other visual cues (if any) in order to understand the message. of the
speaker.
This view of listening comprehension is also consistent with the second hypothesis
of language supported by Richards (1983) and O'Malley & Chamot (1990). This assumption
assumes that listening to spoken language is a complex activity and process, in which the


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listener focuses on the aspects selected for listening. From the sounds they hear, they find
out the meaning of the message they hear, and relate what they hear to their current
knowledge. Brett (1995) states that “Listening is a key second language skill, it has a vital
role in the language acquisition process, and its development is of prime concern to language
teachers”. When comparing listening with other language skills, Morley (2001) also points
out that on average each of us hears “twice as much as what we say, four times what we read
and five times what we write.”
Researchers distinguish between Listening and Hearing. Listening is an active

process, which involves analyzing sound, as opposed to Hearing, which only passively
receives sound. In the same way, Harmer (2001) says that Listening is a “receptive skill”
when students receive the main idea through what they hear. Listeners receive messages
from speakers through understanding the accent, pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary used
by speakers and understanding the meaning of their messages.
According to Helgesen (2003), listening is an active and purposeful skill. During the
listening process, listeners not only capture what they are listening to, but also can relate the
listening content with information they already know to understand the listening lesson. In
addition, Helgesen also said that when listening, the listener not merely hears the words but
needs to understand the implications behind those words.
2.1.2. Listening processes
According to Peterson (1991), Listening skills are often divided into two groups:
bottom-up processes and top-down processes.
Richards & Schmidt (2002) describes listening comprehension as the process of
understanding speech in the first or second language, and listening comprehension in a
second language involves both the Top-down and Bottom-up processes.
Brown (2001) also shares this point of view and argues that the "top-down" process
occurs when learners use the background knowledge and available vocabulary to capture the
content of the listening, while the “bottom- up” means using the context of the listening text
to predict the meaning of a new word.


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Underwood (1989) explains that the top-down and bottom-up processing are two
ways of processing a listening text. Top-down processing refers to utilizing background
knowledge and global understanding as to derive meaning from and interpret the message.
Bottom-up processing refers to deriving the meaning of the message based on the incoming
language data, from sounds, to words, to grammatical relationships, to meaning.
The bottom-up process encourages students to use their knowledge of vocabulary,

grammar and sounds to make sense of what they hear while the top-down one enables them
to use their background knowledge or what they have already known from life experience
and situational routines to predict the meaning. However, all the factors like vocabulary,
grammar, sounds and background knowledge are very necessary to understand spoken
language. In an English listening lesson, hence, teachers can use the most suitable process
or make a good combination of two processes in certain tasks. Of course, students need to
be approached with both of them in order that they can well activate their knowledge of all
listening factors involved and finally improve their listening skills.
2.1.3. The stages in listening comprehension
According to the Mary Underwood (1989), there are three stage of listening
comprehension. They are pre-listening, while-listening and post-listening.
Pre-listening
The first stage of the three stages of listening comprehension is the pre-listening stage,
which contains things or activities that students are required to do before listening. It should
help students make the most of their work. This stage is usually used before students listen
to the text (Rixon, 1993). The pre-listening stage is used to activate prior knowledge. It can
also be used to help students prepare for the listening process (Underwood, 1989). As Rixon
(1993) pointed out, in the pre-listening stage, it is helpful to avoid pre-listening the language
of the auditory language, or to tell students as much as possible about the subject or the
instructions in it, because it eliminates the problem. Challenges and interests. Pre-listening
work needs to be done in a certain way, and it should come naturally as listening becomes
part of the comprehensive skill course. When planning a conference, it is necessary to
dedicate time to pre-listening activities, which should not be attacked (Underwood, 1989).


7

In the pre-listening stage, it is important to give students clear instructions on what
to do while listening. Students need to know what is required of them. This is a necessary
part of the pre-listening stage. Before the teacher starts to play, speak or read listening articles,

all students must understand the work they must complete (Underwood 1989). As Rixon
(1993) claims, teachers must ensure that students understand the meaning of listening tasks.
In addition, please check that everyone understands and is ready, and add other instructions
that may be needed. The teacher may decide to break the activity into smaller steps, which
then need to be told in the classroom (Underwood, 1989). In other words, each student must
know what to do in the pre-listening stage, and the teacher must ensure that the student
understands what to do. To sum up, the pre-listening stage is the main and necessary part of
listening comprehension, which can help students adjust to listening.
While-listening
The second necessary part of the listening process is the while- listening stage, which
includes exercises used when students listen to passages. This stage belongs to the prelistening stage. Rixon (1993) pointed out that “the sort of exercise that is often used during
the while-listening phase helps students by indicating the overall structure of the argument.”
In the simultaneous listening stage, students must listen to the text at least twice. Sometimes,
students need three to four times to understand. The first listening should give the student a
general imagination of the text. In summary, the listening while stage is the next important
part of the listening process. In this process, the teacher checks the listening activities and
the students focus on the listening paragraph.
During the while-listening stage learners do the while-listening exercises during or
proximately after the time they are listening, so it is important to choose appropriate
exercises. While-listening activities are what learners are requested to do during listening to
the passage. The aim of while-listening activities is to help students develop the skill of
eliciting notices from spoken language (Underwood, 1989).
There are other reasons why students need to listen to other languages. The main goal
is to learn to recognize sounds so that they can use what they hear as their own speech model
(Underwood, 1989). According to Rixon (1993), the necessary goal of listening practice is
to capture the important notes contained in the listening text. Underwood (1989) believes


8

that “when developing the skills of listening for comprehension is the aim, while-listening
activities must be chosen carefully.” On the other hand, activities, such as generating correct
or incorrect answers, may delay everyone except the most enthusiastic students. Underwood
(1989) pointed out that “to help non-native listeners learn to apply these skills, which they
have and use when listening in their own languages, we must have listening activities which
give practice in prediction, interpretation and matching.”
While-listening activities, which are good, help students find their way through the
listening passage and construct on the expectations raised by pre-listening activities
(Underwood, 1989). Hence, in the while-listening stage students are asked to do the whilelistening activities during or directly after the time they are listening, due to it is considerable
to prefer suitable activities.
Post-listening
The post-listening stage is the last stage of listening comprehension, it follows the
first two stages and is reached after listening to the passage. According to Underwood's
(1989) research, activities in the post-listening stage cover all the work described in a special
listening text. They finished it after listening. Rixon (1993) stated that at this stage, students
mastered the information they got from textbooks to listen to. They improved it for another
purpose. This means that students who take notes on paragraphs can rewrite their notes into
written descriptions, and they can summarize information verbally (Rixon, 1993). In other
words, this final listening stage, attending previous two stages, is completed directly after
listening to the text.
The post-listening stage is the last stage of listening comprehension, in which the
post-listening work must be done immediately after learners finished a listening activity.
Underwood (1989) argues that ‘the most common form of post-listening activity has, in the
past, been the answering of multiple-choice questions or open questions based on a spoken
text.’ On the other hand it is quite difficult activity and depends not only on listening skill
but also on reading abilities, writing skills and memory (Underwood, 1989).


9

2.2. The concept of pre-listening ativities
2.2.1. Pre-listening stage
This stage is considered as preparatory work because through suitable activities, it
helps students to focus their minds on the topic by narrowing down the things that the
students expect to hear and activating relevant knowledge and already known language
(Underwood, 1989). She also affirms the importance of this stage: “It is unfair to plunge
students straight into the listening text, even when testing rather than teaching listening
comprehension." Rost (2002) also emphasizes that "Effective listening tasks often involve
an explicit pre-listening step, some activities that the learner does prior to listening to the
main input in order to increase readiness". This stage helps students to get ready for the
listening tasks. It is designed to activate what the learner already knows, provide an "advance
organizer" to help the learner predict ideas and "pre-structure" information (Joyce et al.,
1992), cited by Rost (2002).
In conclusion, the pre-listening stage is essential because it helps provide basic
information, activate students' knowledge as well as some skills (e.g., guessing the topic)
that are necessary to complete listening tasks effectively.
2.2.2. Definitions of pre-listening activities
As mentioned above, the pre-listening stage plays a very important role when
teaching listening, so do the activities in this stage. Ur (1984) states that teaching listening
has been suggested including pre-task period to benefit from tasks. The period prior to act
on listening tasks, pre-listening phase, is associated to preparation stage in which learners
are provided by some activities as a kind of support to help them act on tasks. Also defining
pre-listening activities as preparation stage, Underwood (1989) says before listening,
students should be "tuned in" so that they know what to expect, both in general and for
particular tasks. This kind of preparatory work is generally described as "pre-listening work"
or just "pre-listening." Chastain (1988) considers pre-listening activities as the most crucial
aspects in listening process because other activities depend on the extent to which the teacher
has been successful in activating students' background and directing them to reach the goal
of activity.
In short, pre-listening activities give students time to get confident and interested in

the lesson thanks to the given knowledge as well as the new one. When planning lessons,


10

time must be allocated for pre-listening activities and these activities should not be rushed
(Underwood, 1989).
2.2.3. Types of pre-listening activities
Underwood (1989: 31) declares that pre-listening tasks can consist of a variety of
activities, which can help the teacher to focus the students' minds on the topic by narrowing
down the things that the learners anticipate to hear and stimulating relevant previous
knowledge and already known language, including:
- the teacher giving background information;
- the students reading something relevant;
- the students looking at pictures;
- discussion of the topic or situation;
- a question and answer session;
- written exercises;
- following the instructions relevant for the while-listening activity;
- consideration of how the while-listening activity will be done;
Underwood also states other important roles of these activities: For students without
sufficient prior knowledge of the topic, such activities provide a chance to gain some (even
if limited) knowledge which will help them to follow the listening text. In addition, it is
likely that in this kind of pre-listening activity, students will actually use the words which
they will shortly hear in the text. This "bringing to the forefront" of known lexis and syntax
will assist them when they come to match what they hear with the store of knowledge. In my
study, all pre-listening activities listed by Underwood will be used to survey among students
as well as teachers in order to discover their effects on listening comprehension tasks.
2.2.4. Aims of pre-listening activities
•

Setting the context


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This is perhaps the most important thing to do - even most exams give an idea about who is
speaking, where and why. In normal life we normally have some idea of the context of
something we are listening to.
Pre-listening activities studies carried out in EFL (English as a foreign language) and
ESL (English as a second language) contexts take a variety of forms, including
textual/contextual cues (Dixon, 1991), aural descriptions (Dixon, 1991) (Herron, 1994),
picture (Herron et al., 1995), vocabulary (Chung and Huang, 1998) and question preview
(Chung, 2002), and written descriptions (Wilberschied and Berman, 2004). In a study,
Herron (1994) studied the effect of a single pre-task on the listening comprehension of 38
beginning-level French learners. In the experimental condition, the teacher read aloud six
sentences describing major scenes in a video before viewing this. In the control condition,
participants just viewed the video without any teacher intervention. Results showed that
participants who had access to the pre-listening activities prior to viewing the video scored
significantly better than those who were not provided with any advance introduction of
relevant concepts.
•

Generating interest
Motivating our students is a key task for us. If they are to do a listening about sports,

looking at some dramatic pictures of sports players or events will raise their interest or
remind them of why they (hopefully) like sports. Personalization activities are very
important here. A pair-work discussion about the sports they play or watch, and why, will
bring them into the topic, and make them more willing to listen.
•

Acquiring knowledge
Students may have limited general knowledge about a topic. Providing knowledge

input will build their confidence for dealing with a listening. This could be done by giving a
related text to read, or, a little more fun, a quiz.
•

Activating vocabulary / language
Just as activating topic knowledge is important, so is activating the language that may

be used in the listening. Knowledge-based activities can serve this purpose, but there are
other things that can be done. If students are going to listen to a dialogue between a parent


12

and a teenager who wants to stay overnight at a friend's, why not get your students to role
play the situation before listening. They can brainstorm language beforehand, and then
perform the scene. By having the time to think about the language needs of a situation, they
will be excellently prepared to cope with the listening.
•

Predicting content
Once we know the context for something, we are able to predict possible content.

Try giving students a choice of things that they may or may not expect to hear, and ask them
to choose those they think will be mentioned.
•

Pre-learning vocabulary
When we listen in our first language we can usually concentrate on the overall

meaning because we know the meaning of the vocabulary. For students, large numbers of
unknown words will often hinder listening, and certainly lower confidence. Select some
vocabulary for the students to study before listening, perhaps matching words to definitions,
followed by a simple practice activity such as filling the gaps in sentences.
•

Checking / understanding the listening tasks
By giving your students plenty of time to read and understand the main listening

comprehension tasks, you allow them to get some idea of the content of the listening. They
may even try to predict answers before listening.
/>2.3. EFL Learner's Difficulties
According to Underwood (1989), learners of English as a foreign language often face
the following seven potential difficulties: (1) lack of control over the speed at which speakers
speak; (2) not being able to get things repeated; (3) the listener's limited vocabulary; (4)
failure to recognize the “signals”; (5) problems of interpretation; (6) inability to
concentrate; and (7) established learning habits.
Rubin and Thompson (1994) also identified three problems and suggested solutions.
First, the speaker speaks too quickly. If the listener is unable to keep up with the speaker's
speed, they can ask the speaker to repeat, speak louder, louder, or express the same idea, but


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in a different way that is easier to understand. Second, the listener does not understand the
target language on television or in movies. Listeners need to guess, or predict what they'll
hear next based on the teacher's visual cues, questions, initiation activities, and their

background knowledge. Third, the listener tends to stop listening, when hearing a new word,
or phrase. As a result, they lose pieces of information that might help explain unfamiliar
words or phrases. Listeners need to focus on familiar parts and continue listening to get
complete information.
According to Hasan (2000), learners sometimes fail to realize that they are mistaken
in identifying the causes of their problems. They often (i) use ineffective listening strategies
and (ii) try to listen and try to understand every word, every detail of the text. It is wrong to
try to listen and try to understand every word in the audio, since even native speakers do not
listen this way. Good listeners often only listen to keywords to understand the main idea of
the listening message and always try to guess the meaning of the new word in the context of
the listening article.
Rubin (1994) points out five factors that can affect listening comprehension. These
are (i) Characteristics of the listening text such as speech speed, pause, stress and rhyme,
difference between first language and second language etc.; (ii) Characteristics of the person
talking like gender and language proficiency; (iii) Characteristics of the exercise such as type
of exercise; (iv) Listener's characteristics such as language proficiency, memory,
concentration, age, gender, ability to use first language, background knowledge and (v)
Characteristics of listening information processing like using top-down, bottom-up, parallel
processing, listening strategies etc.
Yagang (1994) evaluates listening comprehension difficulty based on four factors:
(1) the listening messages, (2) the speaker, (3) the listener and (4) the listening context. Rubin
(1994) also shared this view. When learning a foreign language, it is very tiring to hear and
understand the meaning of unfamiliar sounds over a long period of time. Although successful
listeners don't try to understand every word they hear (in fact, they only hear keywords), they
still find it difficult to separate keywords from a long, word-dense listening. Additionally, if
the message contains too much information that cannot be easily stored in short-term
memory, then listening strategies may not be viable. Short listening sessions are often more
effective, as it reduces the complexity of the content, while at the same time helping the
listener reduce fatigue and shorten the time to focus intensely. When discussing the thickness

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of the listening text, many researchers, including Ur (1984) and Underwood (1989), have
shown that information in spoken language needs to be presented sparsely than in spoken
language. written language.
According to Rubin (1994), background knowledge has a lot to do with
understanding listening topics. Learners build meaning of the listening text by breaking what
they hear (or read) into meaningful units, then put them together, based on their available
social and linguistic knowledge, and then use Logical speculation fills in the blanks. Learners
with varying degrees of background knowledge on a topic understand and interpret new
information in different ways as they decode new information. Using their existing
knowledge and strategies, learners try to interpret new information by linking to familiar
information. Boyle (1984) sees " Knowledge of the specific topic or subject" as a factor
influencing foreign language listening and understanding. Learners find it easier to listen to
a song on a familiar topic than it is to listen to a new topic. To help learners familiarize
themselves with the topic of the listening lesson, teachers should initiate learners'
background knowledge before performing a listening task, helping them to use what they
already know about the topic, facilitating the process of listening comprehension took place
effectively.


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CHAPTER 3: THE STUDY
This chapter is consisted of two sections of findings and discussion. It shows an
attempt to answer the three research questions posed at the beginning of the study.
3.1. The overview of situation of teaching and learning English listening at UTEHY
Hung Yen University of Technology and Education (UTEHY) has been established
for over 50 years. Ten years ago, there did not have a Faculty of Foreign Languages as there

was only English: English for communication and English for specific purposes (ESP),
which had been teaching for a long time. But thanks to the opening of a course for students
of English major, the section of English was developed into the Faculty of Foreign
Languages. Like other language major universities, the English major students at UTEHY
have to study 4 years as eight terms with different subjects in English. Right from the first
semester onwards the four English skills are taught as isolate subjects.
The objectives of the English course are clear; after finishing the course, students can
obtain:
-

The general knowledge of English grammar and an active vocabulary of about 5,000

words.
-

The ability to communicate with foreigners in English fluently.

-

The ability to understand and use the professional terms and structures.

3.2. Methodology
To collect the data for researching, the author used both quantitative and qualitative
methodology including survey questionnaires for teachers and students, interview questions
for students and class observation. According to Minichiello (1990) "qualitative research
was concerned with understanding human behavior from the informants' perspective".
Qualitative research is useful for studies at the individual level and to find out, in depth the
ways in which people think or feel. Moreover, the collected data can be more valid and
reliable. Regarding quantitative rescarch, according to Minichiello (1990) "quantitative
research was concerned with discovering facts about social phenomena". Quantitative

research gathers data in numerical form which can be put into categories, or in rank order,
or measured in units of measurement. The collected data can be less in-depth but more
breadth of information across a large number of cases. Hence, with the aims of this study,
the author employed survey questionnaire to collect quantitative data and the interview and
observation for qualitative data.


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3.3. Participants of the study
3.3.1. Teachers
At FFL of UTEHY, there are 27 teachers in which there are 2 teachers of Chinese,
one teacher of Vietnamese and 24 teachers of English. In FFL, the English teachers are very
young and mainly females. In this study, the researcher invited 5 of them to answer the
questionnaire. Some of them have attended a lot of advanced training courses held by the
American and English council. In spite of being busy in teaching and learning, they are
always active an energetic with students.
3.3.2. Students
This study was carried out with the participation of 57 second-year English major
students at UTEHY. They were all in the second term and from two different classes. Their
age ranged from 19-21. Most of them have learnt English for 11 years (3 years at primary
school, 4 years at secondary school, 3 years at high school and 1 year at UTEHY). However,
their English backgrounds are quite similar because most of them come from different rural
areas in the North and under being influence of curriculum of English for high school
students in the past, students did not have many chances to practice English skills. Thus,
when entering UTEHY, their English levels were limited and they have to face up with many
difficulties in studying.
3.4. Data analysis and discussion
The 57 copies of the questionnaire were delivered to the students, and the 5 ones
from teachers that all of them were responded and gathered. The collected data is analyzed

in this part in below tables and charts which present the responses for the questions in the
questionnaire.
3.4.1. The questionnaire of teachers
The questionnaire for 5 teachers includes 9 questions with the following information.
The first six questions are used to collect the teachers’ attitudes towards listening skill and
using pre-listening activities in learning listening skill. In the next two questions, it refers to
popular difficulties in learning listening skill. The last question aims at giving the techniques
to improve listening skill when doing pre-listening activities.
3.4.1.1. The teachers’ attitudes towards listening skill and using pre-listening activities in
learning listening skill.
Question 1: How important do you think listening skill is?