SOLUTIONS TO REDUCE LEARNERS’ DIFFICULTIES IN LEARNING LISTENING COMPREHENSION SKILLS Duong Thi Minh Man1 Abstract: Listening has a significant role both in daily life and in academic context as it is crucial for people to sustain effective communication Listening and Speaking are now both taught because they are very important parts of being able to use English to communicate Listening to other speakers helps learners to develop their pronunciation and fluency in English They would like to be successful in communicating English but they cannot recognize the importance of practicing listening skills with oriented techniques Efficient listening skills are acquired over time and with lots of practice Learners not all have opportunities to learn listening comprehension as a separated subject until the choose English as their major at university Therefore, they face a lot of difficulties in improving Listening comprehension and need some useful guides from teachers This paper aims at suggesting some solutions to reduce learners’ problems in learning listening comprehension Key words: Listening comprehension, Difficulties, Solutions Introduction Listening comprehension is an important language skill needed to develop because language learners always want to understand target language of speakers Listening is not an easy skill to acquire because it requires listeners to make meaning from the oral input by drawing upon their background knowledge and produce information in their long term memory and make their own interpretations of spoken passages In other words, listeners need to be active processors of information If learners want to learn to speak, they should first learn to understand the spoken language they hear If learners want to communicate with native speakers, they should first learn to understand in real language situations to comprehend the main pint of what native speakers are telling Therefore, listening is very important to which teachers and learners should pay enough attention to obtain communication aims Listening is very important in language learning because it provides input for learners and it has also an important role in the development of learners’ language knowledge The development of listening comprehension skill helps learners to succeed in language learning and increase their comprehensible input Since learners’ self-confidence in listening comprehension can be increased, they are motivated to have access to spoken English like conversations with native speakers Teachers are aware of students’ learning difficulties they can help them develop effective listening strategies and finally solve their difficulties in listening and improve their listening comprehension abilities There are different definitions of the term “listening comprehension” Listening comprehension is the different processes of understanding the spoken language These include knowing speech sounds, comprehending the meaning of individual words, and MA., Quang Nam University 74 DUONG THI MINH MAN understanding the syntax of sentences (Nadig, 2013 as cited in Pourhosein Gilakjani & Sabouri, 2016) According to Hamouda (2013), listening comprehension refers to the understanding of what the listener has heard and it is his/her ability to repeat the text despite the fact that the listener may repeat the sounds without real comprehension O‘Malley, Chamot, and Kupper (1989 as cited in Pourhossein Gilakjani & Ahmadi, 2011) said that listening comprehension is an active process in which the listener constructs meaning through using cues from contextual information and from existing knowledge, while relying upon numerous strategic resources to perform the task requirement Therefore learning listening skills with right methods will reduce learners’ difficulites Literature review and framework background In EFL classroom, listening tasks mostly are designed as listening for comprehension which focus on understanding what was said rather than how it was said Therefore, Listening Comprehension is aimed at recognizing and acting on speakers’ intentions and identifying information from spoken text and is usually included some basic listening types: 2.1 Listening for Details: the purpose is to train learners to grasp specific information, details that are relevant, important or necessary The goal is to help learners obtain the detailed information they may need like hours, dates, names, etc… 2.2 Listening for Gist: is when learners try to understand what is happening even if he or she cannot understand every phrase or sentence The learner is trying to pick key words, intonation, and other clues to make a guess at the meaning 2.3 Listening and Making Inferences (Listening for Attitude and Opinions): learners have to listen for what someone is really saying, not what they are literally saying, but what they actually mean Attitudes, opinions and feelings can all be conveyed in vary degrees from strong disagreement to mild criticism Advanced learners should be able to discern different attitudes and positions, as well as identify how the speaker feels 2.4 Listening for Functional Language: very often, teachers teach functional language in the ESL classroom, expressions learners can use to accept/ decline invitations, give suggestions, give advice… The purpose is to show learners how these expressions are used in a conversation 2.5 Listening for Cultural Interest: with a carefully selected activity, teachers also have the opportunity to teach learners about a special holiday or tradition that is popular with another culture The purpose is to expose the class to this cultural aspect through a listening activity Learners’ difficulties in learning Listening Comprehension There are a lot of difficulties that learners may encounter in the listening comprehension processes and the purpose is to be aware of these problems and try to solve them Some of these problems are as follows 3.1 “Quality of Recorded Materials: the quality of sound system can impact the comprehending of learners’ listening.” (Strategies for teaching listening, www TESS75 SOLUTIONS TO REDUCE LEARNERS’ DIFFICULTIES India.edu.in.)[3] 3.2 Cultural Differences: “learners should be familiar with the cultural knowledge of language that has a significant effect on the learners’ understanding If the listening task involves completely different cultural materials then the learners may have critical problems in their comprehension.” (Strategies for teaching listening, www TESS- India edu.in.) [[3] 3.3 Accent: “some researches expressed that too many accented speech can lead to an important reduction in comprehension Speakers’ accents play as one of the most significant factors that affect listener comprehension Unfamiliar accents both native and non-native can cause serious problems in listening comprehension and familiarity with an accent helps learners’ listening comprehension When listeners hear an unfamiliar accent such as Indian English for the first time after studying only American English will encounter critical difficulties in listening” (Strategies for teaching listening, www TESSIndia.edu.in.)[[3] 3.4 Unfamiliar Vocabulary: “when listening texts contain known words it would be very easy for learners to them If learners know the meaning of words this can arouse their interest and motivation and can have a positive impact on the learners’ listening comprehension ability A lot of words have more than one meaning and if they are not used appropriately in their appropriate contexts students will get confused” (Strategies for teaching listening, www TESS- India.edu.in.)[ [3] 3.5 Length and Speed of Listening: “the level of learners can have a significant role when they listen to long parts and keep all information in their mind It is very difficult for lower level learners to listen more than three minutes long and complete the listening tasks Short listening passages make easy listening comprehension for learners and reduce their tiredness (Strategies for teaching listening, www TESS- India.edu.in.)” [3] Speed can make listening passage difficult If the speakers speak too fast learners may have serious problems to understand words In this situation, listeners are not able to control the speed of speakers and this can create critical problems with listening comprehension These difficulties were found in a research paper called “ Strategies for teaching listening, www TESS- India.edu.in.” Solutions in reducing Learners’ difficulties Although many aspects of the traditional listening classroom remain the same as in the past, the current view of listening as a many-sided interactive process necessitates a more comprehensive approach to teaching listening to help learners meet the challenge of real-life listening These are some suggested solutions that are beneficial to students to overcome some of their listening comprehension problems First of all, teachers need to design listening lessons with main stages 4.1 Pre-listening 76 DUONG THI MINH MAN The pre-listening stage helps learners to prepare for what they are going to hear, and this gives them a greater chance of success in any given task The first stage of Pre-listening usually involves some short activities in order to help learners to predict the content of the listening passage Depending on the kinds of listening tasks, teachers can use efficient ways as Brainstorming words, phrases or expressions from the given topic on the board of prepared posters Figure An illustrated diagram for teaching vocabulary Besides, Visuals (Pictures- Videos- Diagrams), Reality (Magazines- MenusCalendars- Maps- Brochures), Opinions and Ideas… are some other activities that teachers can easily use in classroom to make learners focus on the lesson Figure Visuals, Realities in teaching Listening 4.2 While-listening 4.2 Steps for teaching listening The first encounter with a passage in listening lesson is listening for gist- listen to get the main idea A simple gist exercise is to ask for basic information under the headings What? Who? Why? When? Then learners continue with listening for details or selective listening, they have to try to work on the different kinds of given listening tasks While learners are listening for the second time, teachers instruct them with Note-taking technique that requires learners to write down key words, phrases, expressions helping them to explain 77 SOLUTIONS TO REDUCE LEARNERS’ DIFFICULTIES for their answers Teachers remind learners not have a habit of listening for single words because words must match with others in creating the meaning of the context Learners should calm enough to listen for the whole sentences before making their choices 4.3 Post- listening The Whole class checks answers, discusses difficulties such as unknown vocabulary, and responds to the content of the passage, usually orally, sometimes in writing This may be done as a whole class, pairs or groups The post- listening stage is where learners can reflect on their listening experience without the pressure of having to process real-time Figure Steps for teaching post -listening speech or a task Steve Jobs said : “ The only way to great work is to love what you do”[5] As Listening comprehension seems difficult for learners at first due to some provided reasons, listening activities should be provided based on the learners’ needs and teachers should supply authentic listening materials for learners that help them understand better the natural speech uttered by native speakers Teachers should also choose different types of input like lectures, radio news, films, TV plays, announcements, everyday conversation, and interviews that arouse learners’ interest and help them learn listening skills and strategies These tasks not only test the learners’ listening comprehension but also motivate them to use various types of listening strategies in order to gain the maximum benefits in doing their activities In order to help learners to be familiar with different accents of different native speakers, Teachers should familiarize their students with the rules of pronunciation in order to help them hear the different forms of rapid natural speech and ask them to imitate native speakers’ pronunciation Listening activities should be presented according to their level of complexities; that is, listening activities should be provided from the very simple texts to the lower level students and moved to the very complicated authentic materials to the advanced students The ways that teachers use to give feedback on learners’ performance also affect their motivation to help them to develop their confidence in doing listening tasks Teachers should encourage their learners to always listen to music, documentaries, and news on the radio and television, talk to native speakers face to face or on the Internet so that they can create and reinforce a good habit of listening Conclusion Listening comprehension has been applied as its main requirements in many English language programs Though it is a complex process, the strategies of listening comprehension must be used simultaneously that teachers should give learners suitable listening strategies There is no an ideal method that fits all types of English classes Listening activities should be arranged from basic to more complex as the learners gain in 78 DUONG THI MINH MAN English language This paper indicated the factors that caused some serious problems for learners’ listening comprehension and also offered some useful suggestions for students to improve their listening comprehension ability It is hoped that those selected information will contribute to the improvement of teaching and learning in listening comprehension REFERENCES [1] “How can Teachers teach listening?”, TESOL International Association Journal [2] Jack C Richards, “Teaching Listening from Comprehension to Acquisition”, Cambridge- English Language Teaching [3] “Strategies for teaching listening”, www TESS- India.edu.in Raeesa Ali- English Educational Supervisor at MOE, “How to teach listening effectively?” [4] https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/772887-the-only-way-to-do-great-work-is-to-love BIỆN PHÁP KHẮC PHỤC KHÓ KHĂN CỦA NGƯỜI HỌC KHI HỌC KỸ NĂNG NGHE HIỂU TIẾNG ANH DƯƠNG THỊ MINH MẬN Khoa Ngoại ngữ - Trường Đại học Quảng Nam Tóm tắt: Nghe đóng vai trị tích cực việc phát triển kỹ giao tiếp cho người học Lắng nghe người khác nói tiếng Anh thường xuyên, người học cải thiện phát âm, lưu lốt thân họ Người học mong muốn giao tiếp tốt tiếng Anh, nhiên họ chưa nhận thức tầm quan trọng việc luyện tập kỹ nghe kỹ thuật Kỹ nghe cần có thời gian tần xuất luyện tập thường xuyên mang lại hiệu Người học học nghe môn học họ chọn tiếng Anh chuyên ngành sâu giảng đường đại học Và vậy, họ gặp nhiều khó khăn q trình trau dồi kỹ Nghe hiểu cần hướng dẫn giảng viên Bài viết đề cập đến giải pháp giảm thiểu khó khăn học kỹ nghe hiểu với số phương pháp giảng dạy từ kinh nghiệm thực tiễn giảng viên Từ khóa: Nghe hiểu, Khó khăn, Giải pháp 79 ... https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/772887-the-only-way-to-do-great-work-is-to-love BIỆN PHÁP KHẮC PHỤC KHÓ KHĂN CỦA NGƯỜI HỌC KHI HỌC KỸ NĂNG NGHE HIỂU TIẾNG ANH DƯƠNG THỊ MINH MẬN Khoa Ngoại ngữ - Trường Đại học Quảng Nam Tóm tắt: Nghe đóng vai trị tích... học Và vậy, họ gặp nhiều khó khăn trình trau dồi kỹ Nghe hiểu cần hướng dẫn giảng viên Bài viết đề cập đến giải pháp giảm thiểu khó khăn học kỹ nghe hiểu với số phương pháp giảng dạy từ kinh nghiệm... việc luyện tập kỹ nghe kỹ thuật Kỹ nghe cần có thời gian tần xuất luyện tập thường xuyên mang lại hiệu Người học học nghe mơn học họ chọn tiếng Anh chuyên ngành sâu giảng đường đại học Và vậy, họ