Using note-taking techniques to improve 9th grade students’ listening skill at Sao Vang secondary school . M.A. Thesis Linguistics: 60 14 01 11

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYỄN THỊ PHƯƠNG

USING NOTE-TAKING TECHNIQUES TO IMPROVE 9TH GRADE
STUDENTS’ LISTENING SKILL AT SAO VANG SECONDARY
SCHOOL

Sử dụng các kỹ thuật tốc ký để phát triển kỹ năng nghe cho học sinh
khối 9 trường THCS Sao Vàng

M.A. Minor Programme Thesis

Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60.140.111

Hanoi - 2014


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYỄN THỊ PHƯƠNG

USING NOTE-TAKING TECHNIQUES TO IMPROVE 9TH GRADE
STUDENTS’ LISTENING SKILL AT SAO VANG SECONDARY
SCHOOL

Sử dụng các kỹ thuật tốc ký để phát triển kỹ năng nghe cho học sinh
khối 9 trường THCS Sao Vàng

M.A. Minor Programme Thesis

Field

: English Teaching Methodology

Code

: 60.140.111

Supervisor: Dr. Mai Thị Loan

Hanoi - 2014


DECLARATION
I, Nguyen Thi Phuong, certify that this thesis is the result of my own
study and the substance of this research has not been submitted for degree to
any other university or institution.
Hanoi, November 2014

Student

Nguyen Thi Phuong

i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First and foremost, I would like to send my sincere thanks to my
supervisor, Dr. Mai Thi Loan, for her valuable guidance, helpful advice,
recommendation, and encouragement during the time I tried to complete this
minor thesis. Without her supervision, this work would never have been
possible.
My deepest thanks also go to my colleagues at Sao Vang secondary
school who are willing to help me during three months of conducting my
research.
I would like to thank all the teachers of Post-Graduate Department for
their valuable lectures, whose knowledge is the foundation for my thesis.
Finally, I would like to express my biggest love and thanks to my
family for their unconditional contributions during the time I conducted my
research. It was my parents and my husband who gave me the will to
complete this challenging work.

ii


ABSTRACT

This study aimed at investigating the exploitation of note-taking
techniques on enhancing students’ listening skill. The participants consisted
of thirty 9th grade students and two teachers of English at Sao Vang
secondary school. The questionnaire and the interview were designed to
figure out the benefits of teaching listening through note-taking techniques,
possible difficulties students encounter and teacher’s strategies in teaching
listening with the use of note-taking techniques. Findings from

questionnaires and interview revealed that the teachers and students well
perceived major benefits of note-taking techniques. Besides, they
encountered several challenges in taking notes. Some suggestions for
improving students listening competence have also been given. Hopefully,
the study would contribute a small part to the improvement of English
teaching and learning with the use of note-taking techniques.

iii


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

EFL

English as Foreign Language

ULIS

University of Languages and International Studies

VNU

Vietnam National University

iv


LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Students’ opinions toward effectiveness of the application of

note-taking techniques ................................................................ 21
Figure 2: Students’ perceptions of the benefits of note-taking skills ........... 22
Figure 3: Students’ perceptions toward difficulties in applying note-taking
techniques in learning listening .................................................... 23
Figure 4: Students’ evaluation on teacher’s strategies of teaching listening
using note- taking techniques ....................................................... 24
Figure 5: Students’ preference of note-taking techniques ............................ 25
Figure 6: Students’ opinions on activities to improve their note-taking skill in
listening lessons .......................................................................... 26
Figure 7: Students’ expectations about teacher’s instructions to take notes . 27

v


TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION .......................................................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................ iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ...................................................................... iv
LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................... v
TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................ vi
PART I: INTRODUCTION.......................................................................... 1
1. Rationale of the study ............................................................................... 1
2. Aim and objectives of the study ................................................................ 2
3. Research questions ................................................................................... 2
4. Scope of the study .................................................................................... 2
5. Methodology of the study ......................................................................... 2
6. Significance of the study .......................................................................... 3
7. Design of the study ................................................................................... 3
PART II: DEVELOPMENT ......................................................................... 5

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW....................................................... 5
1.1. Listening theory .................................................................................... 5
1. 1.1. Definitions of listening ...................................................................... 5
1.1.2. Listening classification ....................................................................... 6
1.1.3. Listening comprehension process........................................................ 7
1.1.4. Language learners’ difficulties in listening comprehension ................. 9
1. 2. Note-taking techniques ....................................................................... 10
1.2.1. Definitions of note-taking ................................................................ 10
1.2.2. Techniques of note-taking ................................................................. 11
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1.3. Review of related studies ..................................................................... 12
1.4. Summary ............................................................................................. 14
CHAPTER 2: Methodology........................................................................ 16
2.1. The setting of the study ........................................................................ 16
2.1.1. The school ........................................................................................ 16
2.1.2. Curriculum and textbook .................................................................. 16
2.2. Research design ................................................................................... 17
2.2.1. Participants ....................................................................................... 17
2.2.1.1. Students ......................................................................................... 17
2.2.1.2. Teachers ........................................................................................ 17
2. 2.2. Restatements of research questions .................................................. 18
2.2.3. Data collection .................................................................................. 18
2.2.3.1. Instruments .................................................................................... 18
2.2.3.1.1. Questionnaire for students ........................................................... 18
2.2.3.1.2. Interview for teachers.................................................................. 19
2.2.3.2. Data collection and analysis procedure .......................................... 19
2.3. Summary ............................................................................................. 19
CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS ................................. 21

3.1. Data analysis
3.1.1. Questionnaire for students.......................................................................................... 21
3.1.1.1. Aims ........................................................................................................................ 21
3.1.1.2. Participants .............................................................................................................. 21
3.1.1.3. Results ..................................................................................................................... 21

3.1.1.3.1. Students’ opinions toward the effectiveness of the application of
note-taking techniques ................................................................................ 21
3.1.1.3.2. Students’ perceptions of the benefits of note-taking techniques ... 22

vii


3.1.1.3.3. Possible difficulties in applying note-taking techniques inlistening
lessons ................................................................................. 23
3.1.1.3.4. Students’ evaluation on teacher’s strategies of teaching listening
using note-taking techniques ...................................................................... 24
3.1.1.3.5. Students’ preference of note-taking techniques ........................... 25
3.1.1.3.6. Students’ opinions on activities to improve their note-taking in
listening lessons.......................................................................................... 26
3.1.1.3.7. Students’ expectations about teacher’s instruction to take notes .. 27
3.1.2. Interview for teachers ....................................................................... 28
3.1.2.1. Aims .............................................................................................. 28
3.1.2.2. Participants .................................................................................... 29
3.1.2.3. Results ........................................................................................... 29
3.1.2.3. 1. The benefits of note-taking techniques in teaching listening ....... 29
3.1.2.3.2. Teacher’ perceptions toward the possible difficulties .................. 29
3.1.2.3.3. Strategies to improve students’ listening competence through
note-taking techniques ................................................................................ 30
3.2. Findings ............................................................................................... 31

3.3. Summary ............................................................................................. 34
Part III. Conclusion .................................................................................... 35
1. Recapitulation ....................................................................................... 35
2. Implications .......................................................................................... 36
3. Limitation of the research...................................................................... 37
4. Suggestion for further studies ................................................................ 38
REFERENCES ........................................................................................... 39
viii


APPENDICES
APPENDIX 1: Questionnaire for students (Vietnamese version) ................... I
APPENDIX 2: Questionnaire for students (English version) ...................... IV
APPENDIX 3: Interview for teachers (Vietnamese version) ...................... VII
APPENDIX 4: Interview for teachers (English version) ...............................V
APPENDIX 5: Transcript of the interview......................................................
APPENDIX 5: Samples of notes ....................................................................

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PART I. INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale of the study
Listening is an important part as well as an essential means of language
acquisition. In the mid twentieth century, Bloomfield (1942: 2) ever declares that:
“One learns to understand and speak a language primarily by hearing and imitating
native-speakers”. Although this saying a little looks down on the written language,
it is true to assume the indispensable role of listening skills in learning English.
Lundsteen (1979: 3) also affirms that listening is the first language skill to appear.
In chronologic order, children listen before they speak, speak before they read, and

read before they write. From this point of view, the importance of teaching listening
can well be seen and it is now regarded the first and foremost skill to be acquired in
learning a new language.
For being a complex phenomenon, teaching listening has caught the attention
of many researchers (Brown (2007), Hayati and Mohmedi (2009), Hinkel (2006),
Vandergrift (2007)) and teachers in pursuit of finding ways for classroom
instruction, especially in learning strategies exploiting listening. Referring to
language learning strategies, Chamot (2005: 21) believes that learning strategies are
procedures that facilitate learning and are conscious and goal-driven. Less
successful students can be taught strategies to help them become better language
learners. Among various learning strategies, note-taking is a cognitive strategy
which students use to write down key words and concepts in abbreviated verbal,
graphic or numeral forms to assist performance of language tasks (Chamot (1989:
16)). Spires and Stone (1989: 39) hold one opinion that note-taking is an important
skill that helps learners rehearse the lecture content and can serve as a memory
device that can help them to remember parts of the contents that were not included
in the notes themselves. Note-taking is also the master key to manage many kinds of
English listening tasks.
All the aforementioned conditions drive the author to carry out the research
“Using note-taking techniques to improve 9th grade students’ listening skill at Sao
1


Vang secondary school”. Hopefully, this study will make a small contribution to
improving listening skills for grade 9th students at Sao Vang secondary school.
2. Aim and objectives of the study
The aim of this study is to explore the exploitation of using note-taking
techniques to enhance students’ listening skill. In order to achieve the aim, the
writer focuses on:
 finding out the benefits of applying note-taking techniques in listening lessons

for grade 9th students;
 identifying the possible difficulties encountered by students at Sao Vang
secondary school in learning listening with the use of note-taking techniques;
 proposing strategies to teach listening skill using note-taking techniques.
3. Research questions
In order to achieve the aim, the study was carried out to address the
following research questions:
1. What are the benefits of applying note-taking techniques in listening lessons?
2. What are the difficulties encountered by the students at Sao Vang secondary
school in learning listening with the use of note-taking techniques?
3. What should teachers do to improve students’ English listening skill with the
use of note-taking techniques?
4. Scope of the study
Acquiring listening skill is a vast issue in language learning. However, due to
the limit of time, experiences and knowledge, this study touches upon only some
note-taking techniques which are used in teaching listening skill and cannot cover
all the listening techniques in teaching and learning.
5. Methodology of the study
In order to achieve the aim of the study, the study was carried out by some
steps as follows:
Firstly, a survey questionnaire was delivered to students to:

2


 find out the benefits of using note-taking in teaching and learning English
listening skill;
 identify difficulties encountered by students in learning listening lessons using
note-taking techniques;
 survey students’ expectation toward teacher’s strategies in teaching listening

with the use of note-taking techniques.
Secondly, personal interviews with two teachers were conducted in order to:
 survey teachers’ perception on applying note-taking techniques in teaching
listening;
 find out teacher’s difficulties in applying note-taking techniques in teaching
listening;
 study teachers’ strategies in teaching listening skill with the use of note-taking
techniques.
After the data were collected, they were categorized and analyzed
quantitatively and qualitatively to obtain the realistic results.
To end with, based on analysis of survey results and references, some
pedagogical implications and suggestions in order to improve teaching and learning
English listening using note-taking techniques will be proposed.
6. Significance of the study
This study points out the benefits and difficulties in applying note-taking
in listening lessons. More importantly, it offers some suggestions for teachers to
enhance students’ English listening competence through the use of note-taking
techniques. Hopefully, the findings and recommendations of this study will be of
some help to the improvement of the teaching and learning listening skill at Sao
Vang secondary school.
7. Design of the study
This paper is organized into three main parts as follows:

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Part I: Introduction: This part presents the rationale of the study, aims and
objectives of the study, research questions, scope of the study, methodology of the
study, significance of the study and design of the study
Part II: Development: This part is divided into three chapters. Chapter 1

serves as the theoretical background for the study, presenting the concepts and
relevant theories. Chapter 2 deals with the methodology of the study. Chapter 3
presents the findings and analysis of the data collected.
Part III: Conclusion: This last part of the study recaps the major findings of
the study and deals with some suggestions for improving students’ listening
competence with the use of note-taking techniques. In addition, it also poses several
directions for future research.

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PART II: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter will provide the theoretical background for the study. Firstly,
the definition of listening, listening classification, the listening comprehension
process and language learners’ difficulties in listening comprehension were given.
Then, the definition of note-taking, methods of note-taking and its benefits were
provided in the following part. Finally, some related studies are reviewed as the
background for the research.
1.1. Listening theory
1.1.1. Definitions of listening
Listening plays a crucial role in our daily life in general and in acquiring a
language in particular. For being an ambiguous term, there have been a variety of
definitions of listening in broad meaning and those of listening comprehension in
specific angle.
In the first place, listening is the process by which spoken language is
converted to meaning in the mind (Lundsteen (1971: 9)). Underwood (1989: 1)
shares the same view when she defines that listening is an activity of paying
attention to and trying to get meaning from something we hear. She emphasizes the
importance of working out what speakers mean when they use particular words in

special ways on particular occasions, not simply to understand the words
themselves. Additionally, Yagang (1993: 16), also affirms that listening is the
ability to identify and understand what others are saying. This involves
understanding a speaker's accent orpronunciation, his grammar and his vocabulary,
and grasping his meaning. An able listeneris capable of doing these four things
simultaneously.
Looking closer to the term listening comprehension, Richards and Schmidt
(2002: 313) point out that 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.
5


phonemes, words, grammatical structures) as well as the role of listener's
expectations, the situation and context, background knowledge and topic.
Littlewood (1981: 66) shares this view when saying that listening requires active
involvement from listeners. The nature of listening comprehension is that the
listeners should be encouraged to be engaged in an active process of listening for
meaning, using not only the linguistic cues but non linguistic knowledge as well.
Listening comprehension can be facilitated when the listeners can understand what
the native speakers say at a normal speed in natural situations.
Chastain (1976: 23) suggests that to understand what native speakers say,
the listeners do not need to pay attention to every word and all of the details in the
text but they should focus on the content of the message in a natural situation. They
should try to predict the meaning of unfamiliar words from the context of the
spoken text. To do so, they should make the best use of their background
knowledge and relate their prior knowledge to the new information in the spoken
text.
Synthesizing the definitions above, the researcher concludes that listening is
not a passive but active process of constructing a message from a stream of sound

with what the listener knows of the phonological, semantic and syntactic
potentialities of the language, of receiving, attending and understanding auditory
messages.
1.1.2. Listening classification
There are many different kinds of listening or different situations in which
we use listening. Each situation is different and each may require a different kind of
listening.
According to Helgesenand Brown(2007: 5), listening can be divided into
reciprocal listening and non-reciprocal listening. Reciprocal listening happens when
both listener and speaker are in the interaction alternately listening and speaking.
Listeners have chances to ask for clarification, repetition, or slower speech from a
conversation partner. Non-reciprocal listening is the kind of listening where the
6


listener listens passively to a monologue or speech. Some non-interactive listening
situations are listening to the radio, film, etc. People have no opportunity to ask for
clarification, slower speech or repetition.
According to Anderson (1995: 37), there are two ways in which people listen
in real-life which are casual and focused listening. Casual listening refers to the
listening with no purpose and often without much concentration. Focused listening,
on the other hand, refers to listening with particular purpose to get information the
hearer needs. In this case, he/she often listens attentively, but not to everything with
equal concentration.
Harmer (2007: 273) divided listening into intensive listening and extensive
listening. Extensive listening refers to listening which students often do away
from the classroom, for pleasure or some other reasons. Students can use tapes and
CDs to listen to their course book dialogues again after they have studied them in
class. Intensive listening is listening in order to study the way in which English is
spoken. It usually takes place in classrooms or language laboratories, and typically

occurs when teachers are present to guide students through any listening
difficulties, and point them to areas of interest.
All in all, there are many different types of listening which can be used in
various situations, each situation is different and each may require a different kind
of listening.
1.1.3. Listening comprehension process
Listening comprehension is regarded theoretically as a complex and active
skill involving many processes. There two main points of views on listening
comprehension process, and each view represents a different perspective.
From the cognitive perspective, Anderson (1985: 37) elaborates that
comprehension consists of perception, parsing and utilization. Perceptual
processing is the encoding of the acoustic or written message. In listening,
this covers chunking phonemes from the continuous speech stream. During this
stage, an individual pays close attention to input and the sounds are stored in
7


echoic memory. While the input is still in echoic memory, some initial analysis
of the language code may start, and encoding processes may transform
some of the input into meaningful representations. In the parsing listening
comprehension process, words are converted into a mental representation of
the

combined

meaning

of

these

words.

The basic unit of listening

comprehension is a proposition (Anderson (1985: 38)). Complex propositions
may be differentiated into simpler propositions that can be regrouped by the
listener to produce new sentences whose basic meaning does not alter.
Perception, parsing and utilization stand for different levels of processing. Of the
three levels of processing, perception is the lowest. All three phases are recursive
and connected closely, and can occur simultaneously during a single listening
event.
Gilakjani and Ahmadi (2011: 980, 981) see that listening process falls into
three types. The first one is bottom-up processing. This process is activated by
the new incoming data. It acknowledges that listening is a process of decoding
the sounds, from the smallest meaningful units (phonemes) to complete texts. It
is closely associated with the listener‘s linguistic knowledge. The second one is
top-down processing. In this process, background knowledge is employed in
comprehending meaning of a message. The listener actively constructs (or
reconstructs) the original meaning of the speaker employing new input as clues.
In this reconstruction process, the listener employs prior knowledge of the
context and situation within which the listening occurs to understand what he/she
hears. Interactive processing, the last one, overcomes the disadvantages of
bottom-up processing and top-down processing to augment the comprehension.
Complex and simultaneous processing of background knowledge information,
contextual information and linguistic information make comprehension and
interpretation become easy. When the content of the material is familiar to
the listener, he will employ his background knowledge at the same time to
make predictions which will be proved by the new input.
8

By and large, it is generally agreed that interactive process is the one that
listeners should employ to enhance listening comprehension. In this process, the
listeners constantly shuttle between bottom-up and top-down processes.
Successful listening requires skill in both top-down and bottom-up processing.
1.1.4. Language learners’ difficulties in listening comprehension
Underwood (1990: 16) identifies seven potential problems learners often
encounterin their learning listening.
 Inability to control the speed of the speaker: The learners are so busy working
out the meaning of one part of what they hear that they miss the next part.
 Inability to get things repeated: The learners not always in a position to get the
speaker to repeat an utterance.
 Vocabulary limitation:A new word can be a barrier which makes them stop and
think about the meaning of the word and thus makes them miss the next part of
speech.
 Failure to recognize the signals: To move from one point to another, or give an
example, or repeat a point, speakers use many different signals. For foreign
listening, these signals can easily be missed.
 Problems of interpretation: Students who are unfamiliar with the context may
have difficulty in interpreting the words they hear.
 Inability to concentrate: Even the shortest break in listening can seriously affect
comprehension. Therefore, lack of concentration is a major problem.
 Establish learning habits: Students can form the habit of listening word by word
from this teaching method of teachers. So when they fail to understand a particular
word or phrase, they will be worried and become discouraged by their lack of
success.
Within this light, Brown(2007: 252-254) points out eight following
characteristics of spoken language whichmake listening difficult:
 Clustering: clusters play important roles in helping students to get the idea of the

whole utterance.
9


 Redundancy: Redundant utterances may take the form of rephrasing, repetition,
elaboration, self-correction, and apparently meaningless additions.
 Reduced forms: reduced forms like morphological contractions; syntactic; or
pragmatics cause significant difficulties, especially for classroom learners who may
have initially been exposed to the full forms of the English language.
 Performance variables: Hesitations, false starts, pauses and correction are
variables that prevent learners from getting the correct idea.
 Colloquial language: Learners sometimes find it surprising and difficult to deal
with colloquial language such as idioms or slang.
 Rate of delivery: Virtually, language learner initially thinks that native speakers
speak too fast.
 Stress, rhythm and intonation: Because English is a stress-timed language,
English speech can be a terror for some learners as mouthfuls of syllables come
spilling out between stress points
 Interaction: interaction plays a large role in listening comprehension.
Conversation is especially subject to all the rules of interaction: negotiation,
clarification, attending signals, turn taking, and topic nomination, maintenance, and
termination.
In short, despite the fact that listening is one of the most challenging skills
for learners to develop, it is one of the most important skills. By developing ability
to listen well, learners will develop their ability to become more independent in
learning process.
1.2. Note-taking techniques
1.2.1. Definitions of note-taking
Taking notes is the most fundamental training approach for listeners to listen
actively and effectively. According to Carrieret al (1988: 223), note-taking is a

process of recording information captured from a transient source, such as
reading, oral discussion, and a lecture. Notes are used mostly to record events,
capture information, and for several learning purposes. Note-taking is a process of
10


summarizing information in short sentences which allow large amount of
information to be shorthanded on the paper quickly.
Above definition is about general note-taking for four skills including
writing, reading, speaking and listening. This broad definition is then narrowed and
specified into listening skill by Peckand Hannafin (1983: 100) as they define notetaking as a process involving listening, information encoding, cognitive processing,
and recording information in written form. Note-taking takes place at the third stage
of listening, where listeners have to get the relationships of sounds words into some
forms meaningful to them.
Sharing the view point that note-taking is the kind of recording spoken
information, Nguyen Thi Thu Hien (2007) supplements that note-taking is not
simply an activity. Notes should be a summary and not an exact copy of what was
said. It means that the note taker selects and evaluates rather than simply reproduces
the information.
From above definitions, it can be concluded that note-taking in listening is a
process of recording information captured from oral sources. Therefore, listeners
are likely to be under pressure due to the speed at which speakers present
information. However, taking notes does not mean writing down every word that is
heard. Listeners need to actively decide what is important and how it is related to
what they have already written.
1.2.2. Techniques of note-taking
Four popular methods applied in taking notes include Cornell method,
Outline method, Mapping method and Sentences method.
Cornell method: In this method, the users usually divide the page into three
sections by drawing two lines. One is along the length of the paper, about five

centimes from the right hand edge of the sheet and about a quarter of the way from
the bottom. The other is perpendicular to the former. The largest section is for what
you get while listening to the lecture. On the right column the users write whatever

11


they want to add after hearing the lecture. In the bottom section is a short summary
of the material the users have covered by themselves (Pauk (2005: 207)).
Outline method: Using this method, the information is written in an
organized pattern based on space indention. To show the level of importance, notetakers use the distance from the major point and space relationship indicate major
point or minor points. This is well-organized system which records the content as
well as the relationship. It is more effective when note-taking skills are good
(Macdonald (2014: 6)).
Mapping method: The note begins in the middle of the page and the ideas are
added by radiating branches from the centre idea of previous branches. All the ideas
are expressed in key words. To show the link between parts of the map, note-takers
use arrows and words. This format helps learners to visually track the information
they hear regardless of conditions. Little thinking is needed and relationships can
easily be seen. It is also easy to edit notes by adding numbers, marks, and color
coding (Macdonald (2014: 10)).
Sentence method: In this method, students record every new thought, fact or
topic on a separate line. All information is recorded, but it lacks clarification of
major and minor topics. Immediate review and editing is required to determine how
information should be organized. Using this method learners record everything,
moving to a new line every time something new is covered. They should use their
own shorthand to save time and space and leave space for information that is missed
and go back later to fill in ( Macdonald (2014: 7)).
1.3. Review of related studies
A number of previous studies looked at the generated debates whether notetaking improves students listening competence or not.

In the first place, there are many studies pointing out the evidence that notetaking has positive effects on improving learners’ listening skills. Lin (2005) found
in her study that taking notes can help students effectively improve their listening
comprehension because students can pay more attention during note-taking process.
12


The participants of this research project were 70 Taiwanese junior high school
students. Based on the comparison of pretests and posttests, the mean scores of the
pretests and posttests and the analysis of the feedback questionnaires, the finding
shows that note-taking is an effective strategy for students to promote their listening
comprehension because they can concentrate more on the content.
Carrier (2003) also came up with the assumption that students could
remember the content easily from the key word notes. The participants of this study
were 21 senior high school students, and these students were all non-native English
speakers. Based on the comparison of participants’ pretest and posttest scores, the
mean scores are 34.71 and 40.43 respectively which show that students make their
improvement in the posttest. In addition, through the analysis of the feedback
questionnaires, note-taking can help students recall the content easily.
Hui-Fang Shang and I-Ching Ko (2007) also carried out a research to explore
students’ perceptions of note-taking and analyze the impact of note-taking on
students’ foreign language listening comprehension. Fifteen university EFL students
were interviewed individually by using the semi-standardized technique. The major
finding indicates that taking notes did not distract students from their listening
process; instead, they even paid more attention to the text and note-taking helps
them recall the content of the listening passages. Hui-Fang Shang and I-Ching Ko
came to an end that the advantages of note-taking outweigh its disadvantages, so it
can be concluded that note-taking is an effective strategy for students to improve
their listening comprehension.
In Viet Nam, Phi thi Bich (2013) investigated the application of note-taking
strategies in listening lessons for high school students. Her quasi-experimental

research revealed the differences in students’ listening performance after using
note-taking strategies in three months and students’ opinion and attitude towards the
application of note-taking in listening lessons. She concluded that by taking notes,
students can remember the information as well as personally evaluate the
importance of the information.
13


Phan Thi Kim Lien (2011) conducted her study to survey students’
perceptions of the benefits of note-taking and difficulties in taking notes. She also
studied students’ perceptions of note-taking strategies to prepare for the TOEFL
iBT test. Participants were 50 students who are currently studying for the TOEFL
iBT at EQuest English Center, Hanoi. Findings from questionnaire revealed that
most of the students hold positive attitudes toward the major benefits of note-taking
skills. Besides, they encountered some challenges in taking notes like listening to
the talks and at the same time taking notes, missing important information while
taking notes.
However, some studies regarded that students cannot enhance their listening
comprehension when they employ note-taking in listening process. Aminifard{a}and
Aminifard{b}(2012) conducted an experimental study aiming at investigating the
effect of note-taking strategy on listening comprehension of conversations and
mini-lectures. The results showed no statistically significant mean differences
between the two groups.In Vietnam, Nguyen Thi Thu Huyen (2011) carried out a
study on note-taking strategies employed by students at International School,
Vietnam National University, Hanoi. There is no difference in listening score
between note-takers and non note takers.
From the research findings, one can come to the point that, in general,
the majority of the research findings provide support for the effectiveness of
using note-taking techniques in teaching and learning a foreign language. Many
researchers and educationalists have been sharing the same idea that note-taking has

positive impacts in the field of teaching and learning listening comprehension.
1.4.Summary
In a nutshell, this chapter focuses on the useful concepts for the
accomplishment of the study. To begin with, prominent definition of listening is
introduced and then come the kinds of listening and the process of listening
comprehension followed by language learners’ difficulties in listening
comprehension. Besides that, some background knowledge of note-taking is
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