FACTORS AFFECTING THE STUDENTS OF CLASS 11a11 IN LISTENING SKILL AND SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT

SỞ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO THANH HÓA

TRƯỜNG THPT YÊN ĐỊNH I

SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM

FACTORS AFFECTING THE STUDENTS OF CLASS 11A11
IN LISTENING SKILL AND SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR
IMPROVEMENT

Người thực hiện: Trịnh Thị Hiền
Chức vụ: Giáo viên
SKKN thuộc môn: Tiếng Anh

THANH HOÁ, NĂM 2020
TABLE OF CONTENTS

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
I: ITRODUCTION................................................................................................1
1.1Rationale for the study
............................................................................1
1.2. Purpose of the study
............................................................................1
1.3 Scope of the study...........................................................................................1
1.4. Methods of the study......................................................................................1
1.5. Significance of the study................................................................................2
II: DEVELOPMENT
2. 1. Theoretical background of listening skills....................................................2

2.1.1.What is the listening skill?...........................................................................2
2.1.2. The importance and purposes of the listening skill in the language learning
process.....................................................................................................2
2.1.3Phrases in the listening learning process......................................................3
2.1.4. Potential problems in learning to the English learning
skill........................4
2.1.4.1. Speed of delivery......................................................................................4
2.1.4.2. Inability to get things repeated ................................................................4
2.1.4.3. Limited vocabulary...................................................................................4
2.1.4.4 Unrecognizing the signals.........................................................................5
2.1.4.5. Listeners’lack of contextual knowledge or background knowkedge.....5
2.1.4.6. Inability to concentrate.............................................................................5
2.1.4.7. Learning
habit...........................................................................................5
2.2. The setting of the study..................................................................................5
2.2.1. the setting of the school and objects............................................................5
2.2.2. The students’background and their english levels.......................................5
2.2.3. Listening text books....................................................................................6
2.3. Findings from the current situation................................................................6
2.4. Factors affected by the students of class 11A11 in the listening skill..........7
2.4.1. Sts’ attitude towards the importance of studying the listening skill..........7
2.4.2. Problems related to the listening
materials.................................................7
2.4.3. Problems related to the learners.................................................................7
2.4.4 Problems related to the environment...........................................................8
2.5. Suggestions for teaching and learning the listening skill...............................8
2.5.1. For the students...........................................................................................8
2.5.1.1. Positive attitude.......................................................................................8
2.5.1.2. Practice listening frequently outside class...............................................8
2.5.1.3. Practice using listening strategies. ..........................................................8

2.5.1.4. Considering signals..................................................................................8
2.5.2. For teachers ...............................................................................................8
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2.5.2.1. Activating the students’ Vocabulary........................................................9
2.5.2.2. Giving extracurricular activities ..............................................................9
2.5.2.3.
Pronunciation............................................................................................9
2.5.2.4. Encouraging the students to relate their background knowledge with the
topic they are going to listen.................................................................................9
2.5.2.5. Guiding the students which listening strategies should be used for each
task.........................................................................................................................
9
2.5.2.6. Using the tapes and radios with good quality.........................................10
2.5.2.7. Providing and trying to gain as much feedback as possible...................10
2.5.2.8. Improving the learning environment of the listening skill.....................10
2.6. Applying suggestions in teaching the listening skill for 11th fỏm sts ..........11
2.7. Results .........................................................................................................17
2.8. Findings…………………………………………………………………...18
III. Conclusions...................................................................................................18
REFERENCES

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I. INTRODUCTION
1.1. Rationale
Today English is considered one of the most important factors to the trend
of globalization in all fields of life all over the world. Thus, English as Second

Language has been taught in many countries and the demand to use English
fluently as well as to acquire four basic skills is becoming essential
among all students. However, to master a language is not easy at all. Of the
four language skills - Listening, Speaking, Reading, and Writing-that all
language learners are supposed to acquire, listening is believed to be the most
challenging due to the complex and subtle nature of listening comprehension in
the second language or foreign language. It takes much time and effort to make
progress in this skill.
At class 11A11, Yen Dinh1 secondary school, students often find it
dificult and feel nervous during listening lessons and they can hardly listen to
anything which causes the bad result in learning the listening skill. This is very
challenging for me, and I have tried my best to find out factors that make my
students unable to listen. However, I began to find some simple suggestions that
worked for them and we began to make some progress. That’s why I chose the
topic:“Factors affecting the students of class 11A11 in listening skill and some
suggestions for improvement” I hope this will help both teachers and students
to realize the factors obstacling the students in learning the English listening
skill, then find out solutions to this problem.
1.2. Purpose of the study
The main purpose of the study is to find out difficulties made by the
students of class 11A11 at Yen Dinh 1 secondary school in Thanh Hoa province
in learning the listening skill. This also offers some appropriate suggestions to
better the current context.
Research questions:
a. What are difficulties in English listening skill that the students of class 11A11
at Yen Dinh 1 secondary school often made?
b. what are guggestions for teachers to use in teaching to solve the problems?
1.3. Scope of the study
This study is conducted among the students of class 11A11 at Yen dinh 1
Secondary School during the school year 2019- 2020 in order to perceive

difficulties in learning the listening skill of the 11 th form Sts
1.4. Methodology of the study
- First of all, for the theoretical basis, a lot of reference materials on
listening skills have been collected, analyzed and synthesized carefully with the
due consideration for the students’ learning situations.
- Secondly, Tests and observing teaching listening lessons: To fulfill this
study, I observed class 11A11 in teaching and learning listening lessons in the
first semester in school year 2019- 2020 in order to find out the effectiveness of
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using some suggestions when applied in teaching and learning English listening
skill, then two tests were dilevered to students before and after experiment to
check the results of the techiques that I used in the experiment
1.5. Significance of the study
This study may provide insights into the process of learning the listening
skill for the students. It can help students understand why they have difficulties
in the listening skill. It also gives some suggestions to help students overcome
the difficulties. It may play a crucial role in enhancing the listening skill to the
students.
II. DEVELOPMENT
2.1. Theoretical background of the listening skill
This second chapter provides readers with an overview of the study by
introducing some key concepts necessary for the best understanding of this
research, as well as the review of previous studies related to the topic. There are
some most crucial concepts chosen to be clarified in this part such as definitions
of listening skill, the importance and purposes of the listening skill in the
language learning process, phrases in the listening learning process...
2.1.1. What is the listening skill?
There have been a variety of definitions of listening by different linguists

but one of the most popular ones is by Richards and Schmidt (2002). they stated
“Listening comprehension is the process of understanding speech in a first or
second language. The study of listening comprehension in second language
learning focuses on the role of individual linguistic units ( e.g., phonemes,
words, grammatical structures) as well as the role of the listener’s expectations,
the situation and context, background knowledge and topic”
2.1.2 The importance and purposes of the listening skill in the language
learning process
It can’t be denied that listening plays a vital role in our daily lives. People
listen for different purposes such as entertainment, academic purposes or
obtaining necessary information.
The importance of the listening skill can not be denied, however, different
scholars give their own views about how it is important.
Some practitioners believe that language learning is a linear process,
starting with the spoken language medium (listening and speaking) and then
moving to the written medium (reading and writing). Listening is the means to
initiate oral production, which tends to be an imitation of spoken texts. The
second view places listening along with the other three language modalities
(speaking, reading and writing) in an intersectative mode. All four modalities
should be thought simultaneously, so that practice in one area can reinforce and
develop the other forms of communication (Rivers, 1987).
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A third view emphasizes listening as the primary source of linguistic
input, which activates the language learning process. Rost (1994) claimed that
'Listening is vital in the language classroom because it provides input for the
learners. Without understanding input at the right level, any learning simply
cannot begin”. According to this scholar, without understanding input
appropriately, learning simply can not get any improvement. In addition, without

listening skill, no communication can be achieved.
Though different linguists give a number of views about the importance
of listening, they all claim that listening play a vital role in communication and
in learning a language. Listening is essential not only as receptive skill but also
to the development of spoken language prophecy
2.1.3. Phases in the listening learning process
The pre-listening stage: It is vitally important if we want our students to
get as much as possible out of listening. The choice of listening is the first thing.
Teachers shouldn't inflict on their students topics they believe will be of little or
no interest. In this stage called" introductory or preparatory", students are
required to bring their attitudes, previous knowledge about the topic… they are
going to tackle. They should be given a reason to listen, a chance to discuss and
predict what they are going to hear since the teacher can not let his student do a
listening blind of information and without any point of reference, in addition to
the pre-teaching of some vocabulary which may be problematic can also be a
useful part of this pre-listening stage. All these activities related to this phase are
well presented by Hedge (2000). "Predicting content from the little of a talk,
talking about a picture which relates to the listening text, discussing the topic,
answering a set of questions about the topic and agreeing or disagreeing with
opinions about the topic" .
The while listening stage: This phase refers to the time of listening in
classroom. Most teachers use tape recorders for their classroom listening
practice. During performing the listening activities, Students are denied all the
physical and visual clues that make face to face communication easier, and they
are left with only disembodied voice on what may be a technically poor piece of
equipment, sometimes video can cover these difficulties but still in other cases,
teachers when using tape recorders must be encouraged to offer visual clues to
help students (flashcards, white board…). While- listening, activities guide the
students to collect or catch the necessary information for an overall listening
comprehension, those activities ensure the active nature of the process in the fact

that grasping every word when listening is not necessary, as well as involving
the students to develop good listening habits, which consists in getting the
information and immediately performing something with it. Many activities are
suggested for teachers to use in this phase: - Comparing the listening passage
with the pre-listening stage. - Filling in gaps while listening to a conversation
where students are given the utterances of one part of the conversation and
asked to complete the missing one of the other. Or filling the blanks of a passage
with the appropriate missing words like in a song's lyrics. - Depicting the
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irrelevant information from a listening passage. - Sequencing, where students
are asked to give the right order of events like in a story for example. - Listening
for specific information or item .
The post listening stage: The feed back to a listening activity in general
is important. It is good for students to realise they have been doing something
useful and interesting. For that reason, post listening activities refer to all
activities which can be practiced after the second phase. Those listening
activities are used as a springboard onto other language skills such as reading,
speaking and writing. Post listening activities are considered to be a source of
motivating. Students are given the opportunity to get more information about the
topic (this interest is not confined only to the original passage but it tends to
include student's impressions, opinions, attitudes…) (Hedge, 2000). This phase
of post listening may include: - Multiple choices or true false questions to be
done by students to reflect their comprehension of the passage. Summarizing the
passage depending on student's notes which had been taken during the while
listening stage. - Check answers to any comprehension tasks in pairs or groups
which are less motivating for many students who find listening difficult, or push
different groups to listen to different passages might be linked together after
which they exchange information to complete the whole original text or passage

(a story for example). - Using debates, discussions, role plays…as means for
practicing speaking as well as writing messages and letters to practice the
writing skill.
2.1.4. Potential factors affecting in learning English listening skill
There are a lot of potential factors in learning a language skill. For the
listening skill, Underwood (1989) offers seven conceivable causes of obstacles
to efficient listening comprehension.
2.1.4.1. Speed of delivery
Sometimes, listeners cannot control the speed of delivery, especially for
beginners. Learners often feel that the utterances disappear before they can sort
them out or they can get the message. The reason is that speakers speak too fast,
learners can not keep up with the speed. They can not hear what is being spoken.
2.1.4.2. Inability to get things repeated
Secondly, listeners cannot always have words repeated. This is a serious
problem in learning situations. This problem happens not only in the classroom,
but outside it as well. Outside the classroom, listeners are not always able to ask
the speaker to repeat his utterance. This can lead their failure in listening.
2.1.4.3. Limited vocabulary
When listening, there are words or phrases that the listeners do not know.
In other words, listeners have a limited vocabulary. The listeners may wonder
about the meaning of new words, so they can not concentrate on listening the
next part of the listening.

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2.1.4.4. Unrecognizing the signals
Fourthly, listeners may fail to recognize the signals, which indicate that
the speaker is moving from one point to another, giving an example, or repeating
a point. In informal situations or spontaneous conversations, signals are more

vague as in pauses, gestures, increased loudness….These signals are not easy to
be recognized at all.
2.1.4.5. Listeners’ lack of contextual knowledge or background knowledge
Another problem is that listeners may lack contextual knowledge. That is
the knowledge that we possess previously about the context or passage (Ur,
1985) which can helps us make some predictions and understand the listening
passage more easily
2.1.4.6. Inability to concentrate
Sixthly, it can be difficult for listeners to concentrate in a foreign
language. This can be caused by a number of things such as : the bad quality of
machines, the poor quality of listening materials. Other reason for loss of
concentration is that the topic is not interesting or not familiar and learners find
it difficult to understand.
2.1.4.7. Learning habits
The last is students may have established some learning habits such as a
wish to understand every word. Therefore, students often feel nervous when they
can not hear some words. This leads to their lack of confidence in listening.
2.2. The setting of the study
2.2.1. The setting of the school and objectss
The study was conducted at Yen Dinh 1 Secondary School established in
1965 in Yen Dinh district, Thanh Hoa province.
There are 51 classes at Yen Dinh 1 Secondary School and it is
considered to be the most crowded one in Thanh Hoa. Classes at the school are
very crowded with from 35 to 48 students in each class. In addition, the desks
are often arranged traditionally with rows of four desks with a narrow isle in the
middle and two narrower on the sides. There is no other empty space left where
teachers and students can move to and from if they conduct different interaction
activities. Also, unavoidable noise in a big class usually has bad effects on
students’ concentration and sound quality.
Like in other schools, students at Yen Dinh 1 Secondary School are

taught all the subjects, one of which is English. English is taught in classrooms
with five parts: Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing and Grammar within 40
weeks.
2.2.2. The background of class 11A11 students and their English levels
The study was carried out to investigate the current situation of teaching
and learning English listening skill to class 11A11 at Yendinh 1 secondary
school. Class 11A11 has 46 students, includes 13 boys and 33 girls. All the
students in class have similar backgrounds such as come from villages in
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Yendinh district such as Dinh Hai, Dinh Tien, Dinh Hoa…. They have already
finished secondary school with four years of learning English. Although they
have had for over four years of learning English, their English proficiency has
been very low and they are very bad at English listening. Especially, English
listening skill is not often practiced in the class, except the Language focus
lessons. Furthermore, in English lessons, English is used much by teachers and
good students, the others are lazy or reluctant to practice and do exercises
because they have no effort and aim to learn. In addition, in their opinion, it is
not easy to master English and they do not pay much attention to it while the
most important ones are mathematics, physics and chemistry.
2.2.3. Listening text books
Like students at other secondary schools, students at Yen Dinh 1 use
English books published by Education publishing house, Grade 10 students use “
Tieng Anh 10”, Grade 11 students use “Tieng anh 11”, and “Tieng anh 12” is
used for grade 12. All of students here learn the Basic English level.
“Tieng Anh 11” is the sixth volume which continues a series of English
textbooks for grade 6 to grade 10. Unlike the old textbooks where language
input was presented in terms of linguistic structures which were then
mechanically practiced through a series of rule-focused exercises, “Tieng Anh

11” is underpinned by a theme-based approach to the introduction of language
input. Lessons are arranged according to topics which are true to life.
“Tieng Anh 11” consists of sixteen units; each unit presents a theme
which is relevant to many aspects of the daily life: friendship, birthday party,
hobbies, Tet holiday and so on. Those themes are represented via five sections:
reading, speaking, writing, listening and language focus respectively.
2.3. Findings from the current situation
To find out some current situations in using some suggestions in teaching
English listening skill in class 11A11 with 46 students at Yendinh 1 secondary
school, I survey the current situations by using tests of which the specific
content is shown and I found out some following results.
No

Mark

Result
Number of students
%
1
8 à 10
2
4.3
2
7 à 7.9
4
8.7
3
5 à 6.9
28
60.9

4
<5
12
26.1
Table 1. Result of the test before experiment
From the table 1 above, only two students got the very good marks
(8à10), account for 4.3%. 8.7% of the students (4 students) got 7à7.9 (good
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marks). Most of the students (28 students) got 5à6.9 (average marks), account
for 60.9%. 26.1% of the students (12 students) got under 5 (poor marks).
As we can see, the effectiveness of the lessons before experiment was not
good and the score for the test is not high. Only a few students got high marks
and a lot of students got poor marks. .
2.4. Factors affected by the students of class 11A11 in the listening skill
I have taught class A11 for two years so I had a chance to observe my
students during listening lessons. I took notes what they felt, what they did as
materials for this study and I found some common difficulties.
2.4.1. Students’ attitude towards the importance of studying the listening skill.
Most of the students from cass 11A11 at Yen Dinh 1 Secondary School
highly appreciate the importance of listening skill. Of four English skills,
however, listening seems to be the most difficult. Therefore, they are not
confident when learning this skill and self-rate their proficiency levels in
listening skills “average or bad”.
2.4.2. Problems related to the listening materials
The material itself may be one of main sources of listening comprehension
problems . A lot of students think that some types of listening tasks are difficult,
especially “Questions and answers”.
A large number of students from this class find that listening topics are

boring and not interesting and they often feel sleepy or do not pay attention to
the tape. few learners state that it is easy to understand the listening topics.
Most of the students think that the speed in listening texts is fast so they hardly
understand what the listening texts are about. This is not surprising at all
because students tend to work out the meaning of every utterance they hear in
the second language. They are so busy trying to work out the meaning of one
part that they miss the following one; consequently, they fail to grasp the overall
meaning of the listening text. Furthermore, a lot of students are not good enough
to comprehend what they are listening to. They often try to catch everything
they heard, so they feel panic when they fail to recognize a word or a structure.
The students say that pronunciation in the tape is strange to them and is
very different from what they often listen to in their class. This might be caused
by linking words, elision and the students often hear a word in isolation, with a
clear sound from their teacher so it is not easy to recognize a word when it is in
a long sentence.
2.4.3. Problems related to the learners
All the students of class 11A11 at Yen Dinh 1 Secondary School were
born in Yen Dinh. Most of their families live on agriculture so that they do not
have the best conditions to learn English. Although they practice listening
English at home, the main purpose is to relax by listening to English songs,
watching films with English subtitle. They do not really want to do the practice
to improve their listening skills.
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Many students take part in all the activities in class but they do not use
any listening strategies. Moreover, many of them do not do “ Before you listen”
or “ After you listen” activities which help them get ready for the topic and
widen their vocabulary as well as grammar, whereas their English background
on vocabulary, grammar, sound system is rather poor. They also do not pay

much attention to signals which are important in understanding a message.
2.4.4 Problems related to the environment
Not only do the difficulties come from the problems mentioned above, but
also come from the environment surrounding the students. It is too noisy for
them to concentrate on listening because there is not any listening room while
students learning physical education subject outside are talking so loudly. In
addition, 85% of the students think the difficulties in listening comprehension
were due to the poor- quality tapes or disks.
2.5. Suggestions for teachers and sts in teaching and learning the listening
skill
2.5.1. For the students
Although it is not easy to learn listening skills, students can follow the
suggestions below to overcome the difficulties in the process of their learning.
2.5.1.1. Positive attitude
Have a positive attitude and motivation towards learning listening skills.
The students need to have a clear goal in learning English and feel confident as
well as comfortable when listening to the tape.
2.5.1.2. Practice listening frequently outside class
Try to practice listening outside class. Besides listening to the listening
part in “Tieng Anh 11, the students should spend time watching English content
on TV, listening to the radio or watching online videos. Listen attentively to
develop sentence structures, sound system, and interpretation and so on. Hearing
the same word frequently can be the best way to develop their English
vocabulary. They will eventually be able to imitate what they hear and say it
with confidence
2.5.1.3. Practice using listening strategies.
The students must identify which strategies should be used for each
activity. They should create for themselves a habit of using listening strategies
instead of trying to catch the meaning of every word they hear.
2.5.1.4. Considering signals

Signals are important in defining the speaker’s ideas. Even when the learners
can not hear the tape except for the signals, they can guess the answer.
2.5.2. For teachers
Not all the problems described above can be overcome , for example,
listening material, “ Tieng Anh 11” textbook can not be changed because it is
issued by Bureau of Education and Training (Vietnam). But the teacher can do
something to help the students better learn English listening skills such as
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providing the students with suitable background and linguistic knowledge;
creating pleasant classroom conditions; and designing useful exercises to help
them discover effective listening strategies. Here are some helpful ideas:
2.5.2.1. Activating the students’ vocabulary
The teacher can activate students’ vocabulary by asking them to guess the
meaning of words used in the listening before explaining the meaning to them,
since whenever students are able to relate what they have already known to what
they are supposed to listen for, they are likely to listen better or more effectively.
2.5.2.2. Giving extracurricular activities
According to the students, the topics in the textbook are not interesting
enough for them but the material can not be changed. Therefore, the teacher
should give extracurricular activities with radio news, films, TV plays,
announcements, everyday conversation, interviews, storytelling, English songs,
and so on about the matters that the students are interested in. The students will
take part in the activities enthusiastically and get accustomed to the listening
skill gradually.
2.5.2.3. Pronunciation
The findings in the study show that incorrect pronunciation hinders at
least many students from listening comprehension, so teachers need to help
students expose themselves and get familiar with precise pronunciation of native

speakers. By doing that the students’ pronunciation capacity is much more
improved, which will help students find listening to native speakers effective
and efficient. As mentioned above, many teachers think that students’ accurate
pronunciation is of great help for them in listening acquisition. They also believe
that one of the ultimate results of listening acquisition is to train students to
produce accurate pronunciation.
2.5.2.4. Encouraging the students to relate their background knowledge
with the topic they are going to listen.
The teacher should encourage the learners to think about and discuss the
topic they are going to listen to. Teachers can also provide the background
information needed for them to understand the text, and it can help them pay
attention to what to listen for. Consequently, students begin to predict what they
might hear and make connections with what they already know, increasing the
relevance of the information.
2.5.2.5. Guiding the students which listening strategies should be used for
each task.
Listening strategies are necessary to do listening tasks. Different kinds of
tasks must be done with different strategies. For example, task 1 in part C, Unit
3: A party (Tieng Anh 11, page 36) asks the students to listen and decide whether
the statements are true) or false (F).
1. Mai’s birthday party was held at home in the evening.
2. Over twenty guests were at the birthday party.
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3. The birthday cake was cut at the beginning of the party
4. The birthday party lasted about three hours.
5. All the friends stayed after the party to tidy up the mess.
The purpose of this task is to decide which information is correct from the
speaker. The listeners should know that bottom up strategy (listening for specific

details) are appropriate for this task. They must pick out the key words in the
sentences and pay attention to these words while listening.
However, the students may not know which strategies to be used in doing
that task. That is why the teacher should guide the students how to do the task
and which strategies should be used.
2.5.2.6. Using the tapes and radios with good quality
It has been a common belief in the second language teaching that a slower
rate of speech would facilitate listening comprehension. Moreover, English
listening proficiency of the class 11A11 students is rather low so the teacher
should choose the tape with a slower rate of speech. It will be better if the
speaker in the tape is a native one so that the students can listen to accurate
pronunciation. Besides, radios used must have a good quality in order that the
students will be able to listen to clear sounds without noise from them
2.5.2.7. Providing and trying to gain as much feedback as possible.
During the course, the teacher should fill the gap between inputs and
students’ reply and between the teacher’s feedback and students’ reaction so as
to make listening purposeful. This not only promotes error correction but gives
encouragements as well. It can aid students to heighten their confidence in their
ability to tackle listening problems. Students’ feedback can assist the teacher to
judge where the class is going and how it should be instructed.
Moreover, when the teacher provides and tries to gain feedback from the
students, they gradually erase the distance between them and the students so that
their students can share difficulties in learning with them.
2.5.2.8. Improving the learning environment of the listening skill
Learning environment for listening skill, which is listening laboratory
besides Cassettes tapes, tape recorders and written listening texts, is a vital key
affecting the quality of both learning and teaching listening skill. However, the
findings of this study show that the students are not satisfied with the learning
environment. Students argue that it still lacks well-equipped listening laboratory;
consequently, the students find it hard and challenging to concentrate while

listening. It is, therefore, essential to upgrade the recent laboratory so that all of
the students have equal and much chance to study listening skill in such a
motivating environment for improving their listening skill.
In addition, the teacher should choose the tape with a high quality and a suitable
speed based on their students’ English listening proficiency.

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2.6. Applying suggestions in teaching the listening skill for students from
class 11A11.
From above suggestions, in the first term of this school year I myself
applied them in teaching the listening skill. Firstly, I held some extracurricular
activities recently in which my students could listen to English all the time. They
listened to the songs and guess what their nanes were, they also listened to
teachers’ questions to answer….Furthermore, I spent time explaining what
listening strategies to use for each task top-down or bottom-up. More
importantly, beside teaching pronunciation in the book, I taught my students
elision, linking words, tone, signals……
I also chose good tapes for my students and played twice or even many
times for difficult listening lessons. In general, most of the students made
progress gradually. However, there are still a few students who can not improve
their listening skill and I anticipate that weak students may need extra help, extra
explanations.
At the pre-listening stage: I have more time at the pre-listening stage by
shortening the post-listening stage. At this stage, we carefully prepare the lesson
reading the tapescripts and using The Teaching Listening Checklist. The
following activities can be used based on the content of each lesson:
- Revise and teach vocabulary.
- Revise and teach grammatical structure.

- Create a gap-filling task or other tasks based on the tapescript.
- Train listening skills.
- Train microskills for listening.
- Give some listening tips.
At the while-listening stage:
- Remember to tell the aim of listening before you let the students listen to
the tape.
- Write a very easy question so that the students can answer after the first
listening. (to encourage them to listen, to make them have a feeling of success).
- Write more additional questions to the listening tasks to make them easy
for the students.
- Ask the students to guess before they listen to the tape. (Do not say what
they guess is wrong or right, ask why they guess so if necessary).
- Be flexible when getting the students to listen to the tape. Read the
listening text if you find it helpful to your students.
- Instruct students how to make the answers while listening ( short answers
or main ideas)
Below is one of my lessons in which I have applied some ways to improve
the listening skill
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UNIT 2:

PERSONAL EXPERIENCES
C. LISTENING

I. Objectives
By the end of the lesson, Ss will be able to develop such listening microskills as listening for specific information and taking notes while
listening.

II/ Teaching aids: handouts, colored chalk, pictures, radio, cassette tape
III/ Methods: Mainly communicative approach
IV. Anticipated problems
Ss may not have sufficient vocabulary to talk about and relate to the
topic, so T should be ready to assist them. Ss may not also be familiar
with the note-taking task so T should provide them some tips to deal with
the task.
IV. Procedure

Teacher’s activities
WARM UP (5 mins)

Students’activities

Quiz
- T divides the class into two groups
- T tells them that there is a word in the T's mind. T - Take part in the game
will give them 4 pieces of information about the
word, one by one, and members of each group can - Listen to the game and
raise their hands at any time to guess what the word guess words
is. Each groups has only two chances to make a
guess
1. This word is a noun and it is very hot.
2. It destroys buildings, trees....
3. It can kill people and animals.
4. It gives out a lot of smoke
5. You need water to put it out
Key: A FIRE
- T declares the winner
Lead- in :

- Ss listen and answer the
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1. Have you ever seen a fire?
2. What is happening in the picture?
3. What is this woman doing?
4.How do you feel when you see a large fire?
5.What would you do if you saw a large fire?

questions
- A fire is burning and
someone is trying to put
it out
- She is carring her
daughter out of
the fire
- I feel very terrible
- I call the fire brigade

Now, you are going to listen to a passage about it.
First, I am going to help you with some new words
PRE-LISTENING (10 mins)
Pre-teaching vocabulary
1. Memorable (a) (synonym)

- Listen to T and take
note

Can you tell me a synonym of memorable?
. Expected answer: unforgettable
2. Terrified (a): ( translation)
3. Gas stove (n): (picture)
4. Embrace (v): ( picture, (synonym)
. Expected answer: hug
5. Protect (v):( translation)
- Before teaching these words, T helps Ss to
pronounce them correctly. T may want to play the
tape or model first and then ask Ss to repeat after
the tape or after him/her in chorus and individually.
Checking
- T gives handouts and asks students to complete - Do the exercise
the following sentences with the words just learnt
(so that they can remember new words)
a. The city is.............for its fantastic beaches
b. He felt it was his duty to..........the child
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c. They ............and promised to keep in touch
d. There is a.............in the kitchen of the house
e. He was.............that he would fall
Suggested answers
a. Memorable

b. protect

d. gas stove

e. terrified

c. embraced

- T gives corrective feedback.
WHILE - LISTENG(20 mins)
Activity 1
Instruction: You are going to listen to a girl telling - Read the instruction
about her most unforgetable experience. Listen and carefully
work in pairs to decide whether the statements are
True or False. Put a tick in the appropriate box.
- Ask them what listening strategies should be used.
(Top-down)
.- Before Ss listen and do the task, T gets them to
read through the statements to understand them and - Read through the
underline key words. For example, the key words statements to understand
in the first statements are “Christina” and
them and underline key
businesswoman”.
words.
- T checks with the whole class and asks them to - Make a guess
guess what the unforgetable experience the girl is
going to tell might be (a fire).
- T plays the tape once for Ss to listen and do the - Listen to the tape
rask.
- Then T gets Ss to find a partner to check their
- work in pairs checking
answers with.
the answers
- T checks the answers with the whole class. If - Listen to the tape and

many Ss can not answer the questions, T pays the get the right answer
tape one or two more times and pauses at the
answers for them to catch.
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- T calls on some Ss to give the answers

- Answer

- T gives feedbacks

- Listen to feedbacks

Suggested answers
1. T 2. F (13 years old) 3. F(in the kitchen) 4. F
(she was sleeping) 5. T
TASK 2
Instruction: You are going to listen to the story - Read the instruction
again and fill the gap with the information you
hear.
- - T ask Sts to look at the gap- fill test, ask them - Listen to T’s instruction
what listening strategies should be used. (bottomup)
- T asks Sts to guess part of speech and the - Guess part of speech
meaning the words based on the context

and the meaning the
words

based

on

the

context
- T checks if Ss can do the task without listening
one more time. If they can’t , T plays the tape
again. But before doing it, T asks Ss to study the
text carefully for the missing information they need
to fill and guess the answers. T might also want to
remind Ss that while listening they need to focus on
this information and write the answers down in
note forms, not full sentences.

- study the text and guess
the answers
- Listen to the tape and
answer

- After playing the tape, T gets Ss to give the - Answer
answers. T provides correct answers if necessary. If
many Ss can’t complete the task , T might want to
let Ss listen one more time and pause at the answers
fir them to catch.
Answers: 1. small 2. everything 3. family
4. replaced 5. took 6. appreciate
POST - LISTENG( 8 mins)
15

- T gives situation : Chritina says that family
is more important than any things .Do you agree or
disagree with her ? why? Exchange your ideas with
your partners
- T guides Sts what to do (you should use
information in activities 1 and 2)
- T goes around to check and offer help.

- Ss work in groups and
discuss about that
situation
- ss write the main ideas
on the poster
or sts report front of the
class

- After checking that all the groups have finished, T
calls on the representative of each group to report - Answer
their peer’s ideas. T checks if other groups would
have the same or different ideas.
- T listens and takes note of their errors. T provides
- Listen to teacher’s
corrective feedback after that.
feedback
+ suggest ideas
- Family is more impotant than anything else
because:
- It can not be replaced
- It gives me love, support

- We will feel warm and believe when live in happy
family

WRAPPING ( 2mins)
- T summarises the main points of the lesson.
- Assigns homework
Write a paragraph (for 100 words) about an
accident or a fire which you saw

Whole class
listen and take notes

Suggested questions
- when and where did you see it?
- How did you feel?
- What did it affect to you?
- What could you do at that time?

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2.7. Results
After I applied some methods to improve the listening skill, I asked my students to do a minilistening test. The result below shows that they have made great efforts. You can see the
effectiveness of my suggestions

No

Mark

1

Result
Students

%

8 à 10

8

17.4

2

7 à 7.9

17

36.9

3

5 à 6.9

16

34.9

4

<5

5

10.8

Table 2: Result of the test after experiment
From the table 2 above, 8 students got the very good marks from 8à10,
account for 17.4% while only two student got the same marks from 8à10
before experiment (4.3%). Obviously, a number of students got the very good
marks increased.
36.9% of the students (17 students) got 7à7.9 (good marks) while only 4
students got the mark 7à7.9 (8.7%) before experiment. A number of students
got the good marks increased.
34.9% of the students (16 students) got 5à6.9 (average marks) while 28
students got the average marks before experiment (60.9%). A number of
students got the average marks decreased.
10.8% of the students (5 students) got under 5 (poor marks) while 12
students got poor mark before experiment (26.1%). A number of students got the
poor mark decreased.
The comparison between pre test and post test is shown in the table below:

Results
Before experiment
After experiment
Marks
Number of
Number of
%
%

students
students
8 à 10
2
4.3
8
17.4
7 à 7.9
4
8.7
17
36.9
5 à 6.9
28
60.9
16
34.9
<5
12
26.1
5
10.8
Table 3: The comparison between pre-test and post-test

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As we can see, the effectiveness of the lessons after experiment was
improved. The number of the students got high marks increased and the number
of students got poor marks decreased.

2.8. Findings
From the results of students’ feedback post - test, I found out some
findings about the effectiveness of using suggestions in teaching English
listening skill to class 11A11 at Yendinh 1 secondary School after experiment.
Most of the students felt interested in listening lessons. The classroom’s
atmosphere is more relaxed and comfortable; it makes students are keen on the
lessons. They are more interested in listening to English than ever before. Many
students raised their hands to answer the questions and to practice. Especially,
nobody slept in the lesson.
III. CONCLUSIONS
To conclude, it can be said, without listening skills, language is
impossible. This is because there is no communication where there is no human
interaction. Also listening is crucial not only in a language learning but also for
learning other subjects. But even today, with all the technological advancements
in the field of education, learners have problems with listening. Teachers should
play an important role in teaching learners in teaching learners strategies and
how to apply them into the listening task. They can help students develop sound
strategies for comprehension though a process approach to teach listening. There
are some suggestions to overcome the challenges in listening as well as to
upgrade the listening skills of students.
1. Limitations of the study
Being a teacher of english I can see clearly the current situation of
learning English here. The listening skill is considered the most difficult to
achieve among the four skills. Therefore, I have conducted this with a view to
finding out difficulties encountered by the students of class 11A11
Although I have tried best to offer some insightful findings through the
study; however, the limitations are unavoidable. Suggestions I gave are quite
simple. I hope to receive ideas from my friends and colleges
2. Suggestions for further research
On the basis of the findings and the limitations of the study, several

suggestions for further research are made.
As indicated in the findings, the students have coped up with a number of
difficulties in learning listening skill. Therefore, more studies on techniques for
applying games to motivate students in listening lessons should be carried out.

18


Moreover, the participants of this study were only class 11A11 students; this makes the
effectiveness of the suggested solutions less persuasive. Therefore, other future studies should carry
out on a large scale to ensure their effectiveness.

Xác nhận của thủ trưởng đơn vị

Thanh Hoá, ngày 1 tháng 07 năm 2020
Tôi xin cam đoan đây là SKKN của
mình viết, không sao chép nội dung của
người khác.
Người thực hiện

Trịnh Thị Hiền

19


APPENDIX 1: REFERENCES

1.
Penny Ur. A Course in Language Teaching
2.

Adler, R., Rosenfeld, L. and Proctor, R.(2001) Interplay: the process of
interpersonal communicating. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt.
3.
Anderson, A. & Lynch, T. (1988). Listening. Oxford University Press.
4.
Wolvin and Coakley. (1988). Interpersonal Communication Through the
Life Span. Wm. C. Brown Publishers.
5.
Bacon, S. M. (1989). Listening for real in the foreign-language classroom.
Foreign Language Annals, 22, 543-551.
6.
Bentley, S., & Bacon, S. E. (1996). The all new, state-of-the-art ILA
definition of listening: Now that we have it, what do we do with it? Listening
Post.
7.
Burley-Allen, M. (1982). Listening: The forgotten skill. New York, John
Wiley and Sons.
8.
Chiang, C. S., & Dunkel, P. (1992). The effect of speech modification,
prior knowledge, and listening proficiency on EFL lecture learning. TESOL
Quarterly, 26, 345-374.
9.
Doff, A. 1988. Teach English. A training course for teachers. Trainer’s
handbook. Cambridge: Teacher Training and Development.
10. Dunkel, P. (1986). Developing listening fluency in L2: Theoretical
WEBSITES
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APPENDIX 2: PRE- TEST (BEFORE EXPERIMENT)
I. Listen and circle the best answer.
1. What is the woman’s name?
A. Julie
B. Jane
C. Jenny
2. Where is the woman from originally?
A. The United states
B. Chile
C. Agentina
3. How long did the man live in California before they moved overseas?
A. 7 years
B. 17 years
C. 10 years
4. what is the man studying?
A. Physics
B. Psychology
c. Biology
5. What is the woman’s job?
A. a sale representative
B. a computer programmer
C. A receptionist

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Answer keys:
1. C

2. B

3. A

4. B

5. A

TAPESCRIPT
I. Listen to the recording and circle the best answer.
Jenny: Hi, Tom. Nice to meet you. My name is Juanita, but everybody calls me
Jenny.
Tom: Nice to meet you, Jenny. So, where are you from?
Jenny: Well, originally I'm from Argentina, but we moved to the United States
when I was about five years old. My parents now live in Chile. That's where
they first met. How about you, Tom?
Tom: I was born in Fresno, California, and we lived there until I was seven.
Then, since my father worked for the military, we moved all over the place.
Jenny: Oh yeah? Where are some of the places you've lived?
Tom: Mostly, we were overseas. We spent ten years in Korea, Germany, and
Okinawa, Japan, and then, we were transferred back to the States three years
ago.
Jenny: Wow. It sounds like you've had an interesting life. So, what do you do
now?
Tom: I'm a university student.
Jenny: Oh really? What are you studying?
Tom: I'm majoring in psychology. How about you? What do you do?
Jenny: Well, I'm working as a sales representative for computer company called
CompTech downtown.
Tom: No kidding! My brother works there too.

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