A study on the effectiveness of using video in teaching listening for non-major English students at Phuong Dong University = Nghiên cứu tính hiệu quả của việc s

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HANOI
COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE
POST GRADUATE STUDIES
***


BẠCH THỊ HOÀNG YẾN

A STUDY ON THE EFFECTIVENESS OF USING VIDEO
IN TEACHING LISTENING FOR NON-MAJOR ENGLISH STUDENTS
AT PHUONG DONG UNIVERSITY

NGHIÊN CỨU TÍNH HIỆU QUẢ CỦA VIỆC SỬ DỤNG VIDEO
TRONG DẠY NGHE CHO SINH VIÊN TIẾNG ANH KHÔNG CHUYÊN
TẠI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC PHƯƠNG ĐÔNG


M.A. Minor Programme Thesis

Field: English Methodology
Code: 601410



HANOI, APRIL 2009
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HANOI
COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE
POST GRADUATE STUDIES
*****

BẠCH THỊ HOÀNG YẾN

A STUDY ON THE EFFECTIVENESS OF USING VIDEO
IN TEACHING LISTENING FOR NON-MAJOR ENGLISH STUDENTS
AT PHUONG DONG UNIVERSITY

NGHIÊN CỨU TÍNH HIỆU QUẢ CỦA VIỆC SỬ DỤNG VIDEO
TRONG DẠY NGHE CHO SINH VIÊN TIẾNG ANH KHÔNG CHUYÊN
TẠI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC PHƯƠNG ĐÔNG


M.A. Minor Programme Thesis

Field: English Methodology
Code: 601410
Supervisor: Mr. Lê Thế Nghiệp, MA.


HANOI, APRIL 2009
vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CANDIDATE’S STATEMENT i
ACKNOWLEGDEMENTS ii
ABSTRACT iii
LIST OF ABREVIATIONS iv
LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES v
TABLE OF CONTENTS vi
PART A: INTRODUCTION 1
1. Rationale of the study 1
2. Hypothesis 2

3. Aims of the study 2
4. Scope of the study 2
5. Methods of the study 3
6. Design of the study 3
PART B: DEVELOPMENT 4
Chapter one Literature review 4
1.1. Listening Comprehension 4
1.1.1. What is Listening Comprehension? 4
1.1.2. Listening Comprehension Process 4
1.2. The Roles of Listening in Language Teaching and Learning 6
1.2.1. To Acquire Language 6
1.2.2. To Develop Speaking Skill 6
1.2.3. To be the final goal of learning a language 8
1.3. The Benefits of Using Video in Teaching Listening 9
1.3.1. Video Generating Interest, Motivation and Concentration in Listening 9
1.3.2. Video Lowering Anxiety in Listening 10
1.3.3. Video Helping Learners Study Non-verbal Aspects of Communication 11
1.3.4. Video Providing the Background of Communication 11
1.4. Aspects of Video That Can Be Improved Through Video 12
1.4.1. Pronunciation 12
1.4.2. Vocabulary 12
1.4.3. Comprehension 13
Chapter two The Survey 15
2.1. The Context of The Study 15
2.2. The Subjects 15
2.3. The Data Collection Procedures 16
2.4. The Use of Video in the English Lessons 17
2.5. The Questionnaire and the Tests 17
2.6. Data Analysis and Discussion 18
2.6.1. Factors That Cause Difficulties in Learning Listening 18

2.6.2. Students’ Attitude towards Video Lessons 19
2.6.3. Students’ Manner of Watching Video Films 19
2.6.4. Students’ Favorite Activities While Watching Video Films 20
2.6.5. Students’ Attitude towards the Effectiveness of Video in Listening Lessons 21
2.6.6. Some Negative Results of Using Video in Teaching Listening 23
2.7. Tests’ Result Analysis 24
2.7.1. Analysis of the Pre-Test 24
2.7.2. Analysis of the Post-Test 26
2.8. Discussion of the Findings 28
2.8.1. Successes 28
2.8.2. Problems 29
Chapter three Implications in Using Video in Teaching Listening 31
3.1. Techniques of Teaching Listening Skill with Video 31
3.1.1. Selecting Video Materials 31
3.1.1.1. Choosing video materials carefully 31
3.1.1.2. Choosing video materials according to the linguistic content of
students’ course book. 32
3.1.2. Some Techniques for Using Video 32
3.2. Activities designed From Video 34
3.2.1. Diagram Labeling 34
3.2.2. Bubble-Filling and Event- Linking 34
3.2.3. Dictation 34
3.2.4. Spotting Activities 35
3.2.5. Gist Listening 35
3.2.6. Note-taking 35
3.2.7. Predicting Language 36
3.2.8. Who Said What? 36
PART C: CONCLUSION 37
1. Summary of the Study 37
2. Limitations and Suggestions for Further Study 37

REFERENCES
APPENDICES I
APPENDIX 1 : Survey Questionnaire for Teachers I
APPENDIX 2 : Survey Questionnaire for Students II


iv
LIST OF ABREVIATIONS

ESP : English for Specific Purposes
GE : General English
IT : Information Technology
N : Number
PDU : Phuong Dong University
SD : Standard Deviation
T/F : True/ False
v
LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS

Tables:
Table 1: Students’ favorite activities while watching video films 17
Table 2: The effectiveness of video in teaching listening skill 18
Table 3: Some negative results of using video in teaching listening 19

Charts:
Chart 1: Students’ difficulties in learning listening 15
Chart 2: Students’ attitude towards video lessons 16
Chart 3: Students’ manner of watching video films 16
Chart 4: Raw marks in listening pre-test 21
Chart 5: Raw marks in listening post-test 23

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1. RATIONALE OF THE STUDY
In Vietnam in recent year English has been widely used as a means of communication in
many fields of life as in economy, science, education, culture and so on. The number of English
learners who wish to use English to communicate successfully has been increasing rapidly. As a
result, teaching and learning English has been paid more attention to and English becomes a
compulsory subject in colleges and universities. Being aware of the importance of the language
many students want to be successful listeners and speakers.
Having been a teacher of English at Phuong Dong University (PDU) for nearly six years,
I have found out that among the four skills listening, speaking, reading and writing, listening and
speaking seem to be the most challenging to students. In many listening and speaking classes
beside the students who manage to understand the recorded materials or try to express their ideas,
I also see tired faces of those who struggle to follow the lesson. Some students even said:
“Teacher, I feel sleepy with the listening” or “Teacher, I‟m tired of listening, ”. I felt really sad
and showed this situation to other experienced teachers and found out that this is a common
problem among non-major students of English. This also puzzled many other teachers. Most of
them advised me that I should be patient and let students get used to with the subject themselves
gradually. However, in my opinion, it is the role of teachers who should make a great deal of
effort to create and maintain the students‟ interest in the lessons and avoid boredom. It is also
because as teachers “we want, and indeed we are expected, to produce students who can
comprehend accurately and speak with confidence” (Hill, B. 1989: 1).
From that point of view, I think it is so important to help students have the feeling of
interest and enjoyment in the process of listening. To hold student‟s interest, there are some
ways such as: using games, songs, stories, flash cards, pictures, overhead projector transparency,
films, video, television and so on. Among these, I think video seems to be the most effective and
helpful in developing aural skill as Stemplesky, S & Tomalin, B (1990: 3) argue: “Children and
adults feel their interest quicker when language is experienced in a lively way through television

and video. This combination of moving pictures and sound can present language more
comprehensively than any other teaching medium.”. That is the reason why I chose video as the
means to do an experimental research on how to interest students in listening lessons. The thesis
goes as:
“A study on the effectiveness of using video in teaching listening for non-major English
students at Phuong Dong University”

2. HYPOTHESIS
This study was designed to test the following hypothesis:
Video can be used as a motivator to generate students‟ interest and maintain their
concentration in listening to English as well as to improve both their top-down skills (clarifying
context, inferring ideas, identifying topics) and bottom-up listening skills (recognizing
vocabulary, identifying sentence stress and intonation), thus enhancing their listening
comprehension.

3. AIMS OF THE STUDY
The purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of using video in teaching
listening to non-major students so that some suggestions of how to use video in teaching listening
skills in the classroom can be given to help students improve these skills.
The specific aims are as follows:
 investigating the students‟ attitudes towards listening through video.
 finding out the effectiveness of using video in teaching listening
 suggesting some techniques of using video in teaching listening in the classroom.

4. SCOPE OF THE STUDY
In this study, at first the researcher intended to examine how effective video is to listening
and speaking skills. However, due to the limitation of time and page number of a minor thesis,
the researcher could only conduct a survey on the using of video in teaching listening to find out
how to improve students‟ listening skills through video.
The survey was conducted on first-year students and the students are from two classes at the

same level. The video lessons were experimented for the period of 15 weeks (one term) with the
purpose of practicing the listening skills for students through video. They were used at the end of
the lesson as an extra activity.
Finally, the study focused on the use of video language teaching materials made for the
classroom without taking care of other kinds of categories such as television programs, specialist
films or self-made video films. The video materials were taken from the Oxford English Video –
Lifetime, Level 1 by Tom Hutchinson (1999) and from the website

5. METHODS OF THE STUDY
In order to achieve the above aims, the qualitative method was used and the data for
analysis in the study were collected from the different resources:
 Survey questionnaires were designed for collecting data for analysis from 50 students of
two elementary level classes at PDU (these students had access to video in class).
 Interviews: the researcher also interviewed some students to double check the information
gained from the questionnaires. However, the interviews were sometimes applied if the
author find that the answers of respondents were not clear enough.
 Tests for students: the aim of the tests is to find out what progress videos help students to
make in their listening skills. The tests were delivered to students at the beginning and at
the end of the second term.

6. DESIGN OF THE STUDY
The paper is designed with three parts as follows:
Part A, “Introduction”, presents the rationale of choosing the topic, the aim of the study,
the scope of the study and the methods for the fulfillment of the study.
Part B, “Development”, is divided into three chapters:
 Chapter one presents some theoretical backgrounds that are relevant to the research topic
such as the listening processes, the role of listening, the benefits of using video in
language classes, aspects of listening that can be improved through video.
 Chapter two investigates the situation of using video at PDU. This chapter also focuses on
the data collection, findings and discussion to find out the students‟ point of view about

using video in listening lessons.

 Chapter three emphasizes the implication of the study as well as some suggestions for
using video to improve listening skills to the students at PDU.
Part C, “Conclusion”, summarizes the key issues in the study, points out the limitations
and provides some suggestions for further study.






















PART B: DEVELOPEMENT
CHAPTER ONE: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1. Listening Comprehension
1.1.1. What is listening comprehension?
It is widely believed that listening is a major component in language learning and
teaching and in recent year the language teaching profession has placed a great emphasis on
listening comprehension. There have been numerous definitions of listening, which present
different views of scholars towards the concept.
According to Gary Buck (2001), “listening comprehension is an active process of
constructing meaning and this is done by applying knowledge to incoming sound.” Listening is
also defined “as an active process during which the listener constructs meaning from oral input”
(Bentley & Bacon, 1996: 3 ). That is to say in order to be successful listener, the first thing
anyone must have is the ability to absorb the pieces of information from the speaker by listening.
Brown and Yule (1983) list the four degrees of comprehension on which listening
exercises can be constructed:
 The listener can repeat the text.
 The student should have heard and understood the meaning of particular
vocabulary items as that are used in that text.
 The students should be able to resolve anaphoric reference and to determine which
was referred to
 The student should be able to work out not only what is directly asserted in the
text, but also what is implied.
That is to say, the word comprehension would come to mean differently in different
contexts. However, understanding an oral speech does not only mean “to understand the verbal
message” but also “to understand it in the contexts in which it occurs.”
In short, in order to be successful in listening, we should remember that listening
comprehension is not a skill which can be mastered once and for all and then ignored while other
skills are developed. There must be regular practice with increasingly difficult material. (Rivers
Wilga, M. 1986).
1.1.2. Listening comprehension process
Based on the ways listeners process and comprehend what is heard, there are two

underlying modes of language processes in listening, namely top-down and bottom-up processes
(o).
 Top-down process: In this reconstruction process, the listener uses prior knowledge of the
context and situation within which the listening takes place to construct the orginal
meaning of the speaker. Context and situation include such things as knowledge of the
topic at hand, the speaker and the relationship to the situation, as well as the relationship
between the speakers and prior events.
 Bottom-up process: This model assumes that listening is a process of decoding the sound
that one hears in a linear fashion, from the smallest meaningful units (phonemes) to
complete texts. According to this view, phonemic units are decoded and linked together to
form words, words are linked together to form phrases, phrases are linked together to
form utterances, and utterances are linked together to form complete, meaningful texts. In
other words, the process is a linear one, in which meaning itself is derived as the last step
in the process.
Imagine the following situations:
 Over lunch, your friend tells you a story about a recent holiday, which was a disaster.
You listen with interest and interject at appropriate moments, maybe to express
surprise or sympathy.
 That evening, another friend calls to invite you to a party at her house the following
Saturday. As you’ve never been to her house before, she gives you directions. You
listen carefully and make notes.
How do you listen in each case? Are there any differences? With the holiday anecdote,
your main concern was probably understanding the general idea and knowing when some
response was expected. In contrast, when listening to the directions to a party, understanding the
exact words is likely to be more important – if you want to get there without incident, that is! The
way you listened to the holiday anecdote could be characterized as top-down listening. This
refers to the use of background knowledge in understanding the meaning of the message.
Background knowledge consists of context, that is, the situation and topic, and co-text, in other
words, what came before and after (Morley, C. 2007). The context of chatting to a friend in a
casual environment itself narrows down the range of possible topics. Once the topic of a holiday

has been established, our knowledge of the kind of things that can happen on holiday comes into
play and helps us to „match‟ the incoming sound signal against our expectations of what we
might hear and to fill out specific details.
In contrast, when listening to directions to a friend‟s house, comprehension is achieved by
dividing and decoding the sound signal bit by bit. The ability to separate the stream of speech
into individual words becomes more important here, if we are to recognise, for example, the
name of a street or an instruction to take a particular bus.
The two underlying modes of language processing act as the basis on which the above
mentioned stages of comprehension take place so that a complete understanding of the oral
message is achieved. Therefore, it is advisable to the teacher to help their students understand the
importance of those listening processes, from which they would utilize suitable listening
strategies for comprehension.

1.2. The Roles of Listening in Language Teaching and Learning
1.2.1. To acquire language
In his book, Teach English- A Training Course for Teachers, Adrian Doff (1996) states
that listening to spoken English is an important way of picking up the structures and vocabulary.
It is undeniable that listening can help learners build their knowledge of grammar and vocabulary
that is the reason why learners who are living in an English spoken country acquire the language
much more easily than the others because they hear it all the time.
According to Harmer, J (1999), one of the major reasons for teaching listening is because
it helps students to acquire language subconsciously even if teachers do not draw attention to its
special features. In learning a language, exposure to the language is a fundamental requirement
for anyone wanting to learn it. Listening to appropriate tapes provides such exposure and students
get vital information not only about grammar and vocabulary but also about pronunciation,
rhythm, intonation, pitch and stress.

1.2.2. To develop speaking skill
According to Anne Anderson & Tony Lynch (1988), effective speaking depends on
successful listening. To be a proficient partner in conversation, a learner needs to be skilled as

both speaker and listener. To prove this point, they conducted communication experiments in
which a speaker had to instruct a listener in drawing a diagram or in arranging a set of objects,
and they found that the most effective spoken performances came from speakers who had
previously been listeners on a similar task. Experience as a listener was more beneficial than
practice in the speaking role, as it seemed to highlight the needs of the listener for clear and
explicit instructions. Many of the speakers failed to produce „listener- friendly‟ messages without
prior listening practice (Anderson, Brown, & Yule, 1984). In a word, listening and speaking are
interdependent with each other.

1.2.3. To be the final goal of learning a language
According to Donoghue (1985), listening occupies the basic portion in the context of the
language arts and the progress in reading, speaking and writing is directly governed by listening
ability. It is the most important of the four arts since nearly half of the adult‟s working day and
more than half of the child‟s classroom activity time is spent in listening. Apart from
communication interaction, much of the enjoyment in second or foreign language comes from
listening activities like watching films and plays or watching TV or listening to songs. In class
students learn a lot from their teacher. They also learn from the tape or from each other through
the act of listening.
Moreover, students can gain a lot of experiences of listening to a wide variety of samples
of spoken English. It also helps the students know different varieties of language such as standard
or regional, formal or informal language. As a result, the amount of language contact through
communication increases.
Listening is, therefore, regarded to be among the most important educational goals. It
increases an individual‟s level of vocational skills and it results in great emotional response
changes in attitude. It also provides students a stimulus for other activities such as discussion,
reading and writing, which are the main language skills.

1.3. The Benefits of Using Video in Teaching Listening
The process of listening involves the ability to understand a speaker‟s accent or
pronunciation, his grammar and his vocabulary, and grasp his meaning (Howwatt & Dakin,

1998). This, therefore, requires the listener to have a high sensibility and discerning ability in
pronunciation and its connection with word meanings. Especially when listening to a foreign
language, it is very hard for the listener to have an immediate response to the information and
catch the meaning if s/he does not process enough linguistic and other relevant knowledge of the
language. That is the reason why freshmen feel anxious and confused in listening lessons. They
also worry about how to avoid making mistakes in the listening tasks in order to save face. They
even get nervous, which slows down their normal thinking speed and distracts their
concentration.
It stands to reason that a tense classroom climate can undermine learning and demotivate
learners ( MacIntyre & Young, 1999). On the other hand, learner motivation will reach its peak in
a safe classroom climate in which students can express their opinions and feel that they do not
run the risk of being ridiculed.
This brings to the thought that motivating students to learn is, therefore, of paramount
importance. To be motivated to learn, students need both ample opportunities to learn and steady
encouragement and support of their learning efforts. Because such motivation is unlikely to
develop in a chaotic classroom, it is important that the teacher organize and manage the
classroom as an effective learning environment. Furthermore, because anxious or alienated
students are unlikely to develop motivation to learn, it is important that learning occurs within a
relaxed and supportive atmosphere (Good and Brophy, 1994: 215). For this sake, video seems to
do very well.

1.3.1 Video generating interest, motivation and concentration in listening
Video can help maintain the interest and concentration in listening. Balatova (1994)
suggests that unlike a student, who listened in sound only conditions, the use of video and sound
conditions were more consistent in their perception of the story. She notes that scenes where
utterances were backed up by an action and/or body language, were considered easier to be
understood by students. Whereas, less lively scenes, which involves relatively long stretches of
conversation, were labeled as more difficult. It can be concluded that visual cues are often
intrinsically interesting and attractive as many people are more familiar with watching television
and video than listening to audio material.

According to Susan Stempleski & Barry Tomalin (1990), the outstanding feature of video
films is their ability to capture the interest of viewers and stimulate their motivation in listening.
In other words, students feel their interest faster when language is experienced in a lively way
through video. The combination of moving pictures and sound can present language more
comprehensively than any other teaching medium and more realistically too.
Similarly, Balatova (1994) also states that video maintains students‟ interest and
concentration better than sound only learning environment. Therefore, using a video in class is
one best thing for experiencing the listening sequence in real life.
In addition, video can take students into the lives and experiences of others. Lonergan, J
(1984) adds the point,
“…at their best, video presentations will be intrinsically interesting to language learners.
The learner will want to watch, even if comprehension is limited. The learner will want to
see more, to ask questions, to follow up ideas and suggestions if the material is
motivating”.
In this way, by generating interest and motivation, the video films can create a climate for
successful listening.

1.3.2 Video lowering anxiety in listening
Video can lower anxiety when practicing the skill of listening (Arthur, 1999). In order to
reduce classroom anxiety, it is necessary to make the learning context less stressful. In fact the
use of video is considered the most useful to deal with body language and help students to
interpret it before they listen through silent viewing.
Getting students to focus on these factors can help to raise awareness of what will come in
the listening. They will at least have developed a conceptual framework for what they need to
understand and will build up some expectations of what they will hear. Video, therefore, can
make the listening easier and more enjoyable.

1.3.3 Video helping learners study non-verbal aspects of communication
According to Susan Stempleski & Barry Tomalin (1990), our gestures, expression,
posture, dress and surroundings are as eloquent as what we actually say. Video allows us to see

this in action and to freeze any moment to study the non-verbal communication in detail.
The American psychologist, Robert Merabian, estimated that as much as 80 percent of
our communication is non-verbal. Lonergan, J (1984) seems to share this point as he states:
“paralinguistic information, such as facial expressions or hand gestures, is available to
accompany aural clues of intonation”. The reason is that the speakers in dialogues can be seen
and heard, and other participants in the situation can be seen as well. The language learner can
readily see the ages of the participants, their sex, perhaps their relationships one to another, their
dress, social status, and what they are doing, and perhaps their mood or feelings.
Tomalin, B (1986) adds the point that the learner can also concentrate in detail on visual
clues to meaning such as facial expression, dress, gesture and posture of the character of the
people seen „frozen‟ on the screen. Even without hearing the language spoken, clues to the
meaning can be picked up from the vision itself.

1.3.4. Video providing the background of communication
The use of video is also beneficial to language learners in the way that it makes the setting
of communication clear. According to Jack Lonergan (1984), through video films “the language
learner can see on the screen where the action is taking place. This information may help to
clarify whether the situation is very formal, or perhaps informal”. He also argues that these
audio-visual features of video films, of course, are found in cinema films and television
broadcasts too. But these other media do not offer the same facilities for classroom exploitation
of the material and content that video recorders do. In the same way, video, as a moving picture
book, gives access to things, places, people, events and behavior, regardless of the language used.
Canning & Wilson (2000) state that video provides stimuli such as environment and this can lead
to and generate prediction of the listening and a chance to activate background schemata. To this
extent, the use of video helps students predict information, infer ideas and analyze the world
brought into the classroom.
In short, video offers foreign and second language learners a chance to improve their
ability to understand comprehensible input. Videos also allow teachers to ask both display and
referential questions. However, video tasks should be multi-layered in order to exploit all
information and elements contained in the aural and visual texts. Additionally, it is essential that

video tasks and lessons be perceived by the language learners as a challenging and requiring
effort. Teachers should make sure that their students are able to answer questions based on their
ability to comprehend aural input so that the use of video in teaching listening is more beneficial.

1.4. Aspects of Listening Comprehension That Can Be Improved Through Video
1.4.1 Pronunciation
Video provides a good source of authentic listening for the practice of pronunciation
(McKinnon, 2005). When students are viewing, it is easier for them to notice how new words are
pronounced. This activity can also be done with audio, but imitation is improved with video,
since the students can see how mouth and movements fit with voice. This makes students depend
upon their ears and more importantly, realize how important to do so.
Moreover, video is also a great source for designing recognition exercises to deal with
sentence stress. English is a stressed-timed language: certain syllables in a sentence have stress,
therefore create a beat, while other syllables tend to be said quickly making it difficult for
students to hear. Stress, which is the speaker‟s choice, is used to convey meaning. In this
exercise, students hear and recognize the parts of the sentences which are prominent and practice
sentence stress in context.

1.4.2 Vocabulary
Video can help learners use the right vocabulary in the right situation (Lonergan, 1984).
In fact different social situations require different language. Many language learners are able to
achieve reasonable fluency and accuracy in the target language, in the context of the classroom.
The same learners then go on to make mistakes in personal dialogue with native speakers. There
may be no errors of syntax or concord, but in terms of the situation in which the language is used,
the learner is saying something which is inappropriate. In the native language, the normal
language learner has enough competence to understand why certain utterances are too polite, too
vulgar, too formal, or too full of slang expressions to meet certain situations. The parameters
which determine the appropriateness of a remark are more than linguistic. They involve the full
range of paralinguistic features and inter-personal relationships. These can be presented to the
learner using the flexibility of the video recorder in class.

According to Canning &Wilson (2000), visual cues found in videos are informative and
enhance students‟ vocabulary recognition. We know that deficiencies in vocabulary can make
even a simple task very difficult for our students. Video makes meaning clearer by illustrating
relationships in a way that is not possible with words, which proves a well-known saying that a
picture is worth thousand words.

1.4.3 Comprehension
Lonergan (1984) states that the learner‟s potential for comprehension is greatly increased
if an audio-visual recording with moving pictures such as video is included in the presentation.
To illustrate this, he gives an example taken from ESP Business. It is from a short sequence
between native speakers who are discussing the cash flow in a large organization. The dialogue
between the speakers is quite difficult to be heard on an audio tape because the level of language
competence required of the learners for comprehension would be far higher than that required
when watching it on video tape. This is because the difficult syntax spoken by the native speakers
is marked and aided by various paralinguistic features. In general, visual cues can aid
comprehension. They are often most meaningful as indicators of mood, emotions, or
temperament.
Similarly, in his book Teaching Listening (1990), Underwood indicates that the use of
video recording enables teachers to point out the many visual clues which listeners use to help
them understand what they hear. Students will see whether the speakers are young or old, happy
or angry, requesting or complaining. They will see the physical context in which the speakers are
speaking. They will see the facial expressions and gestures and, in some instances, the reactions
of those whom the speaker is addressing. All of these factors are important not only because they
contribute to the immediate act of comprehension, but because they help the students to build up
the kind of knowledge of context which is important for successful listening.
Video can be also used to help learners improve comprehension and aid in the retention of
information (Heron,1995). Heron, Hanley and Cole (1995) also hypothesize that the more
meaningful educational videos are, the more impact it can have on comprehension and retention.
The findings from their studies show that video offer contextual support and helps learners to
visualize words as well as meaning. It can be argued that language found in videos could help

nonnative speakers understand stress patterns and allow learners to see body rhythm and speech
rhythm in second language discourse through the use of authentic language and speed of speech
in various situations.
Summary
In short, this chapter is aimed at providing the theoretical background useful for the study.
First comes an overview on listening comprehension and listening comprehension process and
then the roles of listening in language teaching and learning are discussed. Moreover, the benefits
of using video in teaching listening are also referred to. Finally, some aspects of listening
comprehension that video can help to improved are examined so as to help bring about useful
ideas for the study.


















CHAPTER TWO
THE SURVEY

2.1. The Context of the Study
The study was conducted at the non-major English Faculty of Information Technology
(IT). The students at the faculty have to take a five-year training course in which English is
considered a compulsory subject. Like many other subjects, English is taught in a formal setting,
namely a classroom. The teaching and learning of English is divided into two main stages -
General English (GE) and English for Specific Purposes (ESP).
At the beginning of term in the first year, before being divided into a suitable class, the
students take part in a placement test then the students of the same level of English proficiency
will be placed in a class. However, through informal interview with some teachers and students
they said that the placement test is not effective because it is an optional test so those who do not
take the test are placed in A classes (classes for students of elementary level) though their English
competence is not at elementary level. That causes uneven level among students in the English
classes. This uneven level posed great problems on the one hand for the teachers of English
because they had to find the suitable way to cater for the needs of the entire class and, on the
other hand, for the students themselves to deal with an English listening lesson. Thus, there is a
need for effective listening lessons to enhance students‟ English listening level in general in order
to benefit both the strong and the weak students.

2.2. The Subject
In order to serve the purposes of the study and, at the same time, to facilitate data
collection and analysis, a sample of 50 first year students were randomly selected at Faculty of
Information Technology(IT). There are some reasons for the selection.
First of all, the author chose 1
st
year non-major English students at PDU because she
thinks elementary students will benefit most from the application of video. It is also easier for her
to get more information from the students (because she is teaching English at Faculty of IT ), so
she will have more clues to judge the validity and the reliability of the research data. In addition,
the male and female students under investigation aged from 19 to 21 have at least one term
learning General English (GE) at the Faculty. Thus, the students will have enough knowledge of

English to answer the questions given and the data collected from the survey would surely be
reliable.
Finally, being technical students, English to them was really an challenging subject. As a
result, when listening to the boring recorded tape, many of them felt asleep or did private things
during the listening lessons. That state often led to low results or even failure in the listening
exams. That was the reason why the researcher would like to carry out the research of using
video as an aid in teaching listening skill in order to erase the students‟ prejudice against this
skill, draw their interest to this very communicative skill and then help them improve their
listening ability.

2.3. Data Collection Procedures
The researcher used questionnaire and interview, along with the tests as the main sources
to collect data. According to Burnes (1999:25), “triangulation involves gathering data from
different sources so that the research finding or insights can be tested out against each other”. As
a result, the reliability and validity of the research are better ensured.
Using questionnaire and tests, the researcher could obtain data quantitatively, which later
on would assist in her study with persuasive figures concerning issues investigated.
Using interviews to find out students‟ opinion on listening skill, the researcher could have
more in-depth information on certain aspects that could not be unveiled from the questionnaire.
This helps prove that data collection was not only quantitatively but also qualitatively valuable.
In her study she intended to investigate the process of using video in teaching listening
skill, so these characteristics of a quantitative and qualitative study are particularly suitable for
the research as what she wanted to gain was deep understanding of students‟ reaction to video
and the effects that video can bring into a listening class. The steps of the study were as follows:
1. The researcher taught 2 classes of 50 students for a week and then gave them a
listening test as a pre-test and got their opinion on listening skill.
2. Then she taught them listening for the whole term. During that time, one class was
taught listening skill with the use of video along with lessons from the students‟ book
whereas the other class had lessons from the book only.
3. A survey was done in the former class about their opinion on using video in listening

lessons. And the same test (post-test) was given to both classes as a means to measure the
effect of using video in teaching listening skill.

2.4. The Use of Video in the English Lessons
In this study, videos were mainly designed in the form of tasks for students to solve at the
end of the lesson as an extra activity. They were commonly taught in about five to ten minutes at
the end of each lesson via three steps as follows:
Firstly, the teacher planned for viewing by explaining the vocabulary, reviewing the
worksheet handed to the student and reviewing the information about the content of the video.
Secondly, after the students viewed the video without sound and they made a list of
predictions about the content, the video was divided into sections for intensive viewing.
Finally, the teacher played the video section by section and asked students to jot down
key words they understand. After playing the video twice, teacher asked students to answer the
worksheet questions pertaining to the section.

2.5. The Questionnaire and the Tests
In order to obtain the above objective, the questionnaire was designed with seven
questions which focused on seven main aspects that the researcher would like to investigated as
follows:
Question 1 investigated the students‟ difficulties in learning listening.
Question 2 worked out the students‟ attitude towards video lessons.
Question 3 and 4 clarified the favorite activities that students often do while they watch
video films.
Question 5 examined students‟ attitude towards the effectiveness of video in listening
lessons.
Question 6 brought about some negative results of using video in teaching listening.
Along with the questionnaire, two tests of listening (pre-test and post-test) were designed
by the author in the model of achievement test which is being used to assess students‟ listening
skill every term. The time for the tests was fifteen minutes. During the test, the teacher worked as
a cassette player and examiner. The marking of the test for the two classes was done by the

author in the same way of assessment and then it was analyzed in detail. The tests were
conducted in class A-the class which was taught with video, and class B- the one without video.
For doing the tests, the author played the cassette twice. After each time the cassette was
played, students had two minutes to choose the answers before author moved on to the next part.
Students were instructed to circle the correct answer for the listening task 1 and to mark the
sentences true or false for the listening task 2 on the test sheets. The total score was 10, with the
main results of the pre-test and the post-test being the students mean scores. The pre-test was
conducted in week two of the second term and at the end of term (after 15 weeks), the post-test
was given as a means to assess the effect of video on students‟ listening skill.

2.6. Data Analysis and Discussion
2.6.1 Factors that cause difficulties in learning listening (Question 1 – Appendix 1)









Chart 1: Students’ difficulties in learning listening
According to the figures in chart 1, the most difficult thing facing most of the students
was the speaking speed of the speakers (32%). A smaller figure of the students (28%) said
limited vocabulary hindered them from listen comprehensively. Stress and intonation caused
difficulty for 20% of the students meanwhile 16% of them had problem in understanding the
accent. There are only a few students (4%) saying that grammatical structures caused them fewer
difficulties in learning listening.
It can be drawn from the above figures that in order to help students better their listening
skills, it is important for the teacher to take these difficulties into consideration when applying