Introduction
Rationale of the study
Technology is becoming more and more prevalent in today’s classrooms in Vietnam and a part of the classroom as an instructional and research aid for teachers and students However, there are not many studies on the effect that technology such as video or Internet in the classroom has on students’ attitudes towards learning There are a lesser number of studies on the effect of video to support teaching and learning listening skill in the classroom Many questions have arisen from the use of technology in general and video-assisted instruction in particular in listening class but so far without satisfactory answers Do students’ attitudes about learning change when using video in the classroom?
Does it motivate students to learn more? Does it affect a student’s academic listening comprehension in the classroom? What impacts do technology in general and video in particular have on a student, when they view the challenges of a listening lesson? How should video-assisted instruction be designed and used in listening class?
In the process of acquiring foreign language in the light of Communicative Approach, listening seems to be the most challenging for learners at the People’s Security Academy Second language (L2) listening comprehension is a complex process, crucial in the development of second language competence Knowing the context of a listening text and the purpose for listening greatly reduces the burden of comprehension However, students still often have difficulty in comprehension and lack concentration as well as attraction in listening class They try hard to hear every single word, to interpret any minutiae of spoken English and totally collapse at the end Such a fact shows the necessity and an urgency to provide students with a new and effective listening setting
Video materials have long been used in the classroom as an important tool for teaching listening and speaking in the world In recent years, combining video with IT – information technology (computer-based streaming audio and video) – is being developed
It allows teachers to transport virtually the target language environment into the classroom so that live or prerecorded news, music, sports from all over the world can be viewed by students in real time The main advantage of using video as a technology for language teaching is considered to be its ability to present and immerse learners into complete communicative situations (Lonergan, 1984) Another greatest advantage is the ability of video to cover non-verbal aspects of communication and its cross-cultural comparison potential (Stempleski & Tomalin, 1990)
It may be said that video is the best means of demonstrating native speakers’ natural fluent communication and their natural behavior in the process of communication
Learners can not only hear how native speakers speak, they can observe and learn how they behave when speaking It also gives materials for oral communication because learners may brainstorm and discuss what they have seen and heard, role-play it, enact it, develop and transform it in their own speaking, etc They can do that in pair intercourse, small group communication, whole-class discussions actively involving everyone present in the classroom The observed native-speakers’ behavior may be imitated in such communication so that cultural components of communicative competence are acquired together with its linguistic components
In this study, the researcher would like to investigate the use of video-assisted instruction for second-year English majors at the PSA in listening class This study will describe an action research project for video-assisted instruction as well as collaborative teaching and learning It also gives an account of how the teacher-researcher reflected on her teaching and modified her teaching methods, followed by a description of the changes in students’ listening comprehension and their attitudes toward learning listening skill compared with traditional audio-only version.
Significance of the study
Although listening skill has always been given a significant position in language teaching, the questions of how to teach and learn listening skill effectively often pose great problems to both teachers and students This study primarily explores how the use of video-assisted instruction affects second-year English majors at the PSA in listening class
It, therefore, serves as a valuable resource for teachers to gain a deep insight into the practice of video-assisted instruction at the target university More importantly, an inventory of video-assisted instruction as well as practical evaluation and modifications in teaching methods aims at assisting teachers to effectively teach listening skill to English help the target population to succeed in improving listening comprehension On a larger scale, the study can be beneficial to teachers of English and English majors at other universities, who may undergo the same context of teaching and learning this skill.
Aims of the study
The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of video-assisted instruction on enhancing second-year English-major students’ learning at the PSA in listening class
Based on the findings, an action plan is implemented to evaluate the effectiveness of this instruction as well as the students’ improvement in their listening comprehension
To achieve this purpose of the study, the following research questions are addressed:
Research Question 1: How does video-assisted instruction affect students’ learning (i.e comprehension and retention) in listening lessons?
Research Question 2: Does the use of video in teaching listening change the attitude of second-year English-majors toward learning listening skill?
Research Question 3: Do students’ learning (i.e comprehension and retention) and motivation (i.e., attention and satisfaction) in video-assisted instruction differ from that in traditional audio-only instruction?
Research Question 4: Does the use of video in listening class improve students’ listening competence?
Scope of the study
The research limits its scope to listening skill and to its participants of second-year English-majors of intermediate level at the People’s Security Academy
Of four skills of language teaching, I choose listening skill to deal with as I have tried out some listening lessons using video and I have found that listening in the classroom derived from the use of video is very interesting and hopeful Also, I realize changes in my students’ attitudes toward learning listening skill Furthermore, this issue in language teaching has not been exploited sufficiently so far
The choice of participants is simply a matter of convenience as I am teaching listening for second-year English-majors at the People’s Security Academy at the moment
Personally, I suppose that students at this level are more suitable for the application of this teaching method Hence, audio-visual lessons are very demanding to most students, and require them relevant background knowledge to comprehend
The materials for my listening lessons are collected from several sources such as movies, films, news, documentaries or video clips downloaded from the Internet However, as Underwood (1989) pointed out that what determines the difficulty of a teaching material is not just the material itself but also what the students are asked to do with it, the selection of authentic materials is still limited due to several reasons Firstly, the preparation for the lessons is very time-consuming Secondly, teachers always find it difficult to design appropriate exercises and tasks for their students Finally, not all teachers are competent in
IT (information technology) so that they can cut, record, edit the video and apply it into their listening lessons.
Design of the study
The thesis is divided into six parts:
Chapter 1 introduces the research problem and rationale of the study It also states the significance, aims, scope and methods of the study
Chapter 2 not only provides an overview of background to the study, including key concepts and theories relating to the research topic but also discusses previous studies of this field to reveal the research gap which needs filling In addition, the chapter enlarges upon the context of teaching and learning listening skill at the PSA and exposes the problem formulation
Chapter 3 presents the methodology applied in the study including participants, instrumentation, research process and plan of action In addition, the procedure of data collection is also embraced
Chapter 4 presents the results of the research and data analysis, from which major findings are revealed and discussed Additionally, the reflection of the action plan is implemented
Chapter 5 reviews the findings and indicates some limitations of the study Also, discussion and suggestions for further study are put forward
In summary, the chapter has dealt with the rationale, research problem, purposes, scope and methods of the study An overview of the thesis design ends this chapter With all the contents above, the chapter acts as a guideline for the development of the later parts of the study.
Literature Review
Definition and benefits of using video in language classroom
According to Longergan (1994), the term “video” has two meanings For some, it means no more than replaying television program on a video recorder, for viewing in class or private study For others, it implies the use of video camera in class to record and play back to learners their activities and achievements in a foreign language Longergan defines the term “video film” as a photographic process, involving the effects of light and chemicals on sensitive paper He also categorized the sources of video materials used in language teaching as follow:
- video recordings of language-teaching broadcasts and films;
- video recordings of domestic television broadcasts, such as comedy programs and new programs;
- video recordings of specialist films and television programs, such as documentaries produced by industry, or educational programs;
- video language-teaching materials made for the classroom rather than for public transmission as broadcasts;
- self-made video films, involving the teachers and learners
An important attribute of video is the ability to use both auditory and visual symbol systems (Baggett, 1984) It appears that when audio and visual systems are presented together, each source provides additional and complementary information that retains some of the characteristics of the symbol system of origin Baggett (1984) observed that information obtained visually was more memorable, on the basis of her finding that summaries written a week after viewing a movie were judged to be more complete than those written a week after listening to the audio-only version Kozma (1991) also supported the fact that the visual component is memorable He argued that simultaneous processing of auditory and visual information may aid learning In addition, video might be efficient for learning complex skills because it can expose learners to problems, equipment, and events that cannot be easily demonstrated
According to Dusenbury, Hansen, & Giles (2003), video-assisted instruction has the benefits of standardizing messages, so it might be able to increase the fidelity of implementing instruction The M.A thesis conducted by Nguyen M., T (2005) also summarized general benefits of using video in language classroom as follow:
It is quite easy to notice the compelling power of video in the classroom, a power that is even enhanced by concentration on short sequences Video, in other words, stimulates students’ motivation, and maintains their interest and concentration better than sound-only learning environment
Using video in language teaching can enhance students’ understanding and retention of information It brings students also kinds of situation, with full contextual back-up
Video is used to help enhance the meaning of message trying to be conveyed by the speakers through the use of paralinguistic cues In addition, it allows students to see body language and speech rhythm in second language discourse through the use of authentic language and speed of speech in various situations
Video is a window on English-language culture
Video can be used as a stimulus or input for discussion, for writing assignment, projects or the study of other subjects
Video, as a moving picture book, gives access to things, places, people, events and behaviour, regardless of the language used
Using video in language teaching allows differentiation of teaching and learning according to the students’ abilities, learning styles and personalities
Teaching with video can widen the range of activities in the classroom
The students dealing with video in their learning improve a range of social skills, including communication, negotiation, decision-making and problem- solving
He also found out that the video course not only teaches English through video but gets students to use the English they have learned in talking about the video In addition, using video creates a great number of tasks and activities that stimulate communication and particular spoken language among students
In the book titled Video in Action, Stempleski & Tomalin (1990) are convinced that the introduction of a moving picture component as a language teaching aid is a crucial addition to the teacher’s resources
First of all, through motivation Children and adults feel their interest quicken when language is experienced in a lively way through television and video Using a video sequence in class is the best thing to experiencing the sequence in real life
Second, through communication Teachers have observed how a video sequence used in class makes students more ready to communicate in the target language
Third, through non-verbal aspects of communication Video allows us to see gestures, expression, posture, dress, and surroundings – the setting of communication and to freeze any moments to study the non-verbal communication in detail
Finally, through cross-cultural comparison Observing differences in cultural behaviour is not only suitable training for operating successfully in a different community
It is also a rich resource for communication in the language classroom
To sum up, the use of video can make language more accessible to learners by:
making it easier to integrate and contextualize listening, speaking and pronunciation, reading and writing activities
motivating learners and helping them in their efforts to use the language naturally in their own lives by seeing how the characters succeed in communicating with native speakers and getting things done in their everyday activities
bringing native speakers into the classroom (on video), providing additional models for pronunciation, intonation, and rhythm besides that of the teacher
raising learners’ awareness of non-verbal aspects of communication
increasing listening comprehension: paralinguistic features (facial expression, body language, context, setting…) help learners comprehend more than from listening to audio tape only
stimulating learner interaction and communication with co-learners as they discuss the video itself or ways in which it relates to their lives and experiences
raising cross-cultural awareness: learners enjoy observing similarities and differences between the behavior of the characters in a video clip and that of their own families and friends.
Theories of listening comprehension
2.2.1 Introduction and definitions of listening comprehension
Research has demonstrated that adults spend 40-50% of communication time listening (Gilman & Moody 1984), but the importance of listening in language learning has only been recognized relatively recently (Oxford, 1993) Since the role of listening comprehension in language learning was taken for granted, it merited little research and pedagogical attention Although listening played an important role in audio-lingual methods, students only listened to repeat and develop a better pronunciation (for speaking)
The role of listening has been considered as a tool for understanding and a key factor in facilitating language learning Listening has emerged as an important component in the process of second language acquisition (Feyten, 1991)
Listening is an invisible mental process, making it difficult to describe Listeners must discriminate between sounds, understand vocabulary and grammatical structures, interpret stress and intention, retain and interpret this within the immediate as well as the larger socio-cultural context of the utterance (Wipf, 1984) Rost (2002) defines listening, in its broadest sense, as a process of receiving what the speaker actually says (receptive orientation); constructing and representing meaning (constructive orientation); negotiating meaning with the speaker and responding (collaborative orientation); and, creating meaning through involvement, imagination and empathy (transformative orientation)
Listening is a complex, active process of interpretation, in which listeners match what they hear with what they already know
According to Underwood (1989), listening is the activity of paying attention to and trying to get meaning from something we hear She also emphasized: “To listen successfully to spoken language, we need to be able to work out what speakers mean when they use particular words in particular ways on particular occasions, not simple to understand the words themselves” (Underwood, 1989:1) The author called for listening beyond word level, and stressed the necessity for associating utterances within their context as a prerequisite for successful comprehension
Specifically, listening theory is about an active process in which individuals focus on selected aspects of aural input, construct meaning form passages, and relate what they hear to existing knowledge (O’Malley, Chamot, Kupper, 1989:418) During the process of lexis, syntax, semantics and discourse) and non-linguistic knowledge (knowledge about the topic and about the context, and general knowledge about the world and real life)
Rivers & Temperly (1978:63) defined listening as a complex operation integrating the distinct components of perception and linguistic knowledge It is not a passive but an active process of constructing a message from a stream of sound with what one knows of the phonological, semantic, and syntactic potentialities of the language
All in all, listening has been conceptualized in different ways and from different points of view However, the role of context-based listening is also found and highlighted in many definitions
There are two distinct processes involved in listening comprehension Listeners use 'top-down' processes when they use prior knowledge to understand the meaning of a message Prior knowledge can be knowledge of the topic, the listening context, the text- type, the culture or other information stored in long-term memory as schemata (typical sequences or common situations around which world knowledge is organized) Listeners use content words and contextual clues to form hypotheses in an exploratory fashion On the other hand, listeners also use 'bottom-up' processes when they use linguistic knowledge to understand the meaning of a message They build meaning from lower level sounds to words to grammatical relationships to lexical meanings in order to arrive at the final message
Listening comprehension is not either top-down or bottom-up processing, but an interactive, interpretive process where listeners use both prior knowledge and linguistic knowledge in understanding messages The degree to which listeners use the one process or the other will depend on their knowledge of the language, familiarity with the topic or the purpose for listening For example, listening for gist involves primarily top-down processing, whereas listening for specific information, as in a weather broadcast, involves primarily bottom-up processing to comprehend all the desired details
On one hand, research from cognitive psychology has shown that listening comprehension is more than extracting meaning from incoming speech It is a process of matching speech with what listeners already know about the topic Therefore, when listeners know the context of a text or an utterance, the process is facilitated considerably because listeners can activate prior knowledge and make the appropriate inferences essential to comprehending the message (Byrnes, 1984) Therefore, teachers need to help students organize their thoughts, to activate appropriate background knowledge for understanding and to make predictions, to prepare for listening This significantly reduces the burden of comprehension for the listener
On the other hand, listeners do not pay attention to everything; they listen selectively, according to the purpose of the task This, in turn, determines the type of listening required and the way in which listeners will approach a task (Richards, 1990) differentiates between an interactional and a transactional purpose for communication
Interactional use of language is socially oriented, existing largely to satisfy the social needs of the participants; e.g., small talk and casual conversations Therefore, interactional listening is highly contextualized and two-way, involving interaction with a speaker A transactional use of language, on the other hand, is more message-oriented and is used primarily to communicate information; e.g., news broadcasts and lectures In contrast with interactional listening, transactional listening requires accurate comprehension of a message with no opportunity for clarification with a speaker (one-way listening) Knowing the communicative purpose of a text or utterance will help the listener determine what to listen for and, therefore, which processes to activate As with the advantages of knowing the context, knowing the purpose for listening also greatly reduces the burden of comprehension since listeners know that they need to listen for something very specific, instead of trying to understand every word
In short, second language (L2) listening comprehension is a complex process, crucial in the development of second language competence Listeners may use all of the above processes to comprehend Guiding students through the process of listening not only provides them with the knowledge by which they can successfully complete a listening task; it also motivates them and puts them in control of their learning Therefore, teachers can help students develop their listening comprehension through these processes by designing appropriate listening instructions and activities.
2.2.3 Listening in language learning and teaching
Listening comprehension as a separate component of language learning and instruction came into its own only after long and significant debate regarding its validity A large volume of research has demonstrated the critical role of input, and particular
“comprehensible input” in language acquisition, underlining the primacy of the role played by listening comprehension in second language teaching
Until recently, listening comprehension activity in foreign or second language classrooms was limited to testing listening comprehension The underlying rationale was that if students are successfully learning the target language, they should automatically be able to decode the aural version of structures and vocabulary they learn in their textbooks
The application of video in language teaching
The application of video in the classroom has offered exciting possibilities for language teaching and learning so far There have been a lot of books studying and presenting techniques for using video in the classroom Teaching with video equipment does not imply that an entirely new methodology should be taken over but relate to the teacher’s own professional experience and local conditions
In his book titled “Video in language teaching”, Lonergan (1984) introduced teachers and teacher trainers to some general principles concerning the use of simple video equipment in the language classroom With these insights into teaching with video, teachers can develop their own techniques and language-learning materials However, the book only limits to simple video equipment: basically, a camera and video recorder Also, there is a limit to what new technology can offer the language learners of the future
Therefore, as he pointed out: “the teacher should analyse what the technology can offer; apply sound pedagogical principles to that, and adapt and use the technology for his or her own specific language-teaching situation”
Another book discussing about video techniques is Video in Action by Stempleski
& Tomalin (1990) It provides a full-scale collection of recipes for using video in class
Once you have chosen a sequence of video, you can browse through recipes until you find a suitable one This book not only deals with equipment and the ways how to run a video library but also answers a number of questions about video and its use
The application of ICT in general and video in particular in Vietnam has considerably enriched the variety of methods, resources and a range of activities for learning languages On one hand, it gives more opportunities for communication between peer learners On the other hand, it breaks the routine of learning words or grammar patterns and adds to the positive attitude of both learners and teachers Video has gained popularity in language-teaching classroom in recent years in Vietnam Several language- teaching centers, schools and university use teaching materials aided with audio-video
However, using video-assisted teaching materials is very time-consuming and expensive due to the need of facilities for study Only well-equipped schools or language centers can meet the requirements of the course using video
The situation of video application in universities under Ministry of Public Security is rather gloomy Students are not interested in learning English as it is not a major subject
Only the PSA and the People’s Police Academy have English majors The equipment and facilities needed for language learning and teaching, therefore, is relatively sufficient For example, the laboratories are equipped with cabins and headphones, computers, projectors and even multi-media projector as well as Internet access, which facilitate the teaching of listening skill using video a lot Students can view online video clips, films, documentaries and news In other words, both teachers and students have a lot of opportunities to approach English learning and teaching in a new and effective way However, the investment of building this kind of laboratories needs a large amount of money Each university can afford to have one or two models like these Furthermore, not all teachers of English are able to deal with video edition like cutting, recording, editing or making a video clip suitable for their listening lessons This kind of work requires teachers to master computer software ICT competence is always Vietnamese teachers’ weakness which becomes a hindrance for the application of technology in general and video in particular in their teaching Obviously, the application of video in teaching listening skill is not satisfactory
In summary, the application of video in language teaching has been clarified and closely linked with the process of designing questionnaires in order to investigate the effect of video-assisted instruction on second-year English majors at the PSA It is, therefore, necessary to study the context of teaching listening skill to English majors at the PSA.
Previous studies and fitness of the present study into the field
In the context of Vietnam, especially in HULIS, there have been few studies on the use of video and on the effect of video-assisted instruction on students’ listening competence Nguyen, M.T (2005) conducted a study titled “Design a listening and speaking syllabus using video for English language non-majors at pre-intermediate level“
In his study, he mainly built up a suitable syllabus with audio-visual aids to improve students’ listening and speaking skills He also embraced fundamental techniques and video activities in language classroom However, the syllabus he designed limited its scope to non-English-majors at pre-intermediate level with the purpose of improving listening and speaking skills The study was conducted on students of the above level in May School, at 36 Ly Thai To, Hanoi, where most teaching materials were aided with audio- video The method used in this study is qualitative including comments, remarks, comparisons and suggestions based on factual research, observation, experience and discussion Although the findings and syllabus were valuable and practical in the context of language teaching and learning in Vietnam, there are still several limitations in this study Firstly, the subjects of the study were students from a school – a foreign languages center, who were totally different from university students in terms of classroom setting, English proficiency, linguistic competence as well as materials and teaching method applied by teachers Secondly, the reliability of data collected was not sufficient as he did not present his questionnaires in the thesis, which might fail to depict the need analysis
Another thesis conducted by Bach, T., H., Y., (2009) studied on the effectiveness of video-assisted instruction on teaching listening for non-English-majors at Phuong Dong university This is an experimental research in which the participants were divided into two groups: the control (A) and the treatment (B) Both of the classes were second-year non English major students The results from pre-test showed that the listening competence in class A was better than class B However, after one semester applying video-assisted instruction to class B, the students’ listening competence was better than the control group who were not taught with video materials The only limitation of this study is its instrumentation The only instruments are pre-test and post-test whose validity and reliability are not high enough It is better if included other instruments such as journals or observation checklist
To sum up, thanks to the aforementioned research gap, the researcher feels an urge to conduct an investigation on the use of video-assisted instruction on English majors at the PSA in listening class
This chapter not only provides an overview of background to the study, including key concepts and theories relating to the research topic but also discusses previous studies of this field to reveal the research gap which needs filling These issues will be referred back in the next chapters.
Methodology
Participants
The participants of this study are thirty English-major students whose English proficiency is intermediate and four teachers of English at the People’s Security Academy
While the first group was involved in questionnaires, the latter was asked for in-depth information in semi-structured interviews and observation checklists
The target population of this study is the English-major students at the PSA but only 30 second-year English-majors: 12 males and 18 females were chosen to take part in this study due to the fact that there is only one English-major class for each course The class met once a week, for two hours each time, for 15 weeks There are only five students from Hanoi and the rest are from other provinces in the country Most of them have been learning English for at least eight years (i.e from lower secondary) However, their age and their learning conditions in high schools are very different More specifically, as some of them did not pass the university examination for the first time, they are older than their classmates Students from Hanoi had more opportunities to listen to English tasks in the textbook than those from other provinces due to the sufficient equipment and experienced teachers Their English proficiency is intermediate The average listening points at the first semester were not high
There are two reasons for this choice of participants Firstly, from their listening mark at the first semester, the participants proved to be of different levels at English, ranging from “not good” (grade from 5.0 to 6.0) to “fairly good” (grade from 7.0 to 8.0) and to “good” (grade over 8.0) This feature helps to diversify the information collected
Secondly, the choice of freshmen becomes inadequate as they are newcomers and their listening competence is limited due to little chance for listening English and insufficient equipment at their high schools On the other hand, the choice of third-year students is not feasible as they started studying ESP Consequently, second-year students are the most appropriate ones
Good Fairly good Not good
Chart 1: Final listening mark of second-year English majors in the first semester
In short, such a choice of student guaranteed the diversity of samples and the objectivity of the study results
Among thirteen teachers of English in the Foreign Languages Department at the PSA, only five teachers (including the researcher) are responsible for English-major classes This characteristic creates an opportunity for the researcher to have an insight understanding about their perceptions and beliefs To attain this purpose, in-depth semi- structured interviews were carried out on four teachers to exploit reliable data
The four teachers are varied in terms of gender and teaching experience The youngest aged 26 teaches English for four years while the oldest aged 51 with 27 years of teaching Two of these teachers do not totally teach English-major classes but non-English major ones However, only one teacher is being in charge of the class under investigation
Interestingly, three teachers are also applying video in their teaching.
Problem formulation
Most of the teachers of English at the PSA admit that teaching listening skill to English major students is the most challenging job It is not only time-consuming to prepare for listening lessons but also difficult to design appropriate tasks or adapt materials suitable for different students’ levels However, in the process of teaching listening to English majors, the researcher observes that a number of students do not seem interested or motivated All qualified English language teachers know that a listening process consists of three phases and each has its own purpose There are many different activities to use in each stage The most important listening skills teachers train the students to gain are listening for gist and listening for specific information They help the students to focus on the information required to finish the listening tasks What the teacher’s do (as mentioned above) only work well in the class where there are many good students
A lot of listening strategies have been applied in listening class Some classes were successful while other’s still had problems Although there was considerable improvement from the students when they listened to the tape or did the activities instructed by the teacher, their marks - the only instrument reflecting their learning progress - are often not high This shows that no matter how effective the listening activity itself can be, teachers and students are still facing obstacles in the classroom
The problems that students often face are lack of social knowledge, difficulties in comprehension and retention, and distraction Some teachers say that mot of the students often lack concentration in the classroom There are several factors affecting their attention during class time For instance, listeners are not attentive to the content of the lecture
Listeners are attentive to the teacher’s gesture and mannerism and are not focusing to the content Listeners are distracted by the room temperature or the surroundings This is not an uncommon situation Often teachers may observe this This is mainly because many people do not have good attention and listening skills The teacher, therefore, should find some ways to develop attention and listening skills which are very important for effective communication between the teacher and the learner
A new series of English listening textbooks and materials for students have been used in the PSA for recent years and there has been a lot of feedback from teachers who have used them One of the problems they face is that they are not satisfied with their teaching of listening Although they have been trying to find ways to make their listening activities more effective and interesting, the results obtained are not as good as what they want
Some conclusions have been withdrawn to explain the situation Many teachers stated that the new textbooks or teaching materials which contain a large amount of knowledge hinder the students’ learning A lot of students lack of social awareness to acquire language in this sense Others stated that they have many weak students who lack vocabulary, grammatical knowledge and have poor pronunciation Students of this kind reduce classroom learning and other potential learning environment Sometimes the problem originates from the teachers themselves Many teachers think that if they teach in a class with many weak students, they cannot spend a lot of time teaching listening They do not use all of activities they designed when writing lesson plans because if they do, the weak students cannot keep up
In the process of carrying out this study, the researcher also looked into other issues relating to language learning which have been discovered so far
The research took into account the psychology of learning habits and skills Certain psychological factors were considered as well such as memory, mental condition and ability
Students learn well if they are well-motivated Teacher can motivate even unmotivated students
- Visual learners learn through seeing
- Auditory learners learn through listening
- Tactile/Kinaesthetic learners learn through moving, doing and touching
Therefore, the researcher has tried out some lessons using video and realizes that video seemed to be the most effective and appropriate way to improve English majors’ listening competence as it combines both visual (for visual learners) and audio (for auditory learners) In many cases, teachers can organize activities and design listening tasks to activate tactile students to get involved in post-listening activity like role-playing or doing a project Also, there were dramatic changes in students’ attitude toward learning listening
Students seemed more motivated and interested in listening lessons using video
Consequently, the researcher felt an urge to conduct the study on the effect of video- assisted instruction on students’ motivation and learning in listening lesson A 15-week plan of action for implementing video-assisted instruction was made to investigate whether students’ learning and motivation in video-assisted instruction differ from that in traditional audio-only instruction.
Classroom setting
In the language laboratory, in order to view the live streaming video coming from the teacher, a computer will be configured with a video projector This projector will allow the video stream to be presented on a large screen for the whole class to view The video stream must be viewed from one place due to the audio The computer connected to the projector will have the only speakers in use in the classroom These speakers will be used for the audio portion of the video broadcast from the teacher The students were seated in cabins and listened to the audio with headphones To allow the teacher to communicate with students, the teacher will be outfitted with a wireless clip-on microphone This microphone will have a direct audio channel to the student over the LAN (local area network) to allow better communication and facilitation for the teacher Allowing the teacher to have this direct channel will help keep the students’ communication to the teacher separate from video broadcasting This will allow the interactions between the students and teacher to have a better communication structure.
Instruments
Semi-structured interviews were conducted among four teachers of English at the PSA Each lasted for approximately 15 or 20 minutes The interview consisted of two parts, namely personal information and interview questions The face-to-face interviews aimed at investigating teachers’ perception and evaluation of video-assisted instruction on English majors in listening class Thereby, the opinions and comments of other teachers help the researcher much anticipate the problem and implement some modifications in teaching listening With the approval of all the subjects, the tasks were tape-recorded for later reference The interviews were made in Vietnamese due to the preference of all respondents This choice of language did not threaten the reliability of the data but avoid any misunderstanding between interviewees and interviewer The best use of these interviews was that the ideas, perception and evaluation of other teachers toward listening and video-assisted instruction considerably contributed to creating corner-stone for problem formulation and the researcher’s self-evaluation later
Unarguably, the best aspect of interviews is that they provide us with actual voices and precise words Later, when reporting the data, this type of information can add credibility to the reports and vitality to the findings Apart from a list of questions, it creates a chance for the researcher to flexibly extend the contents to better exploit the information from interviewees Consequently, a rich and large amount of information may completely be obtained (Sample of questions for semi-structured interviews can be found in Appendix 1)
To answer the research questions, the researcher used a survey questionnaire for second-year English major students (Appendix 2) The questionnaires are developed to investigate whether the video-assisted instruction motivates students in their listening lesson and whether students’ listening competence is improved Each questionnaire comprised two parts Part 1 including five questions aimed at investigating students’ evaluation toward their listening competence and listening instruction as well as collecting some information on general background of the students such as the number of listening hours they spend per week Part 2, consisting 18 questions, was intended to investigate the effect of video-assisted instruction during listening lessons, the reasons and difficulties that they encountered when they were watching and listening video The questionnaire was written in Vietnamese to facilitate students’ understanding as well as to avoid misunderstanding and misinterpretation of the questions The items in the questionnaires are both closed and open-ended in format, allowing respondents not only to select one from among a limited number of responses but also to reply in their own words
Furthermore, difficult terminologies were simplified and clarified in the process of translation to aid students’ comprehension of each questions To ensure the validity of the questionnaires, the questions were reviewed by three individuals who have expertise in teaching and conducting research studies
On one hand, questionnaires seem to be more time-saving and fruitful in large scope than other methods On the other hand, questionnaires also emerge its limitations
Since the questionnaires consist of a mixture of closed and open questions, students tend to hesitate to answer open questions They are afraid to elicit the answers or brainstorm This fact motivates other exploitations of research method, which are classroom observation and achievement tests
According to Sagor (1992), the checklist involves three steps:
Agree on what constitutes a particular behaviour or category
Visit classroom to collect data
Arrange the data into categories
However, Wallace (1992) thought that being observed is an unusual event, and makes teaching under observation a more stressful experience than usual Consequently observation in this study is not associated with supervision, inspection or teacher-training
The focus of the observation is on the students: the way they work, the way they interact, the way they respond to the teaching, their on-task and off-task behaviour, and so on
The observation was done by the teachers concerned Even the teacher-researcher had her own checklists During the lesson, the teacher-researcher observed the interactions the students have with the teacher and with each other, their emotions, the way they responded to the teacher, the manner in which the students interacted with each other, their listening comprehension and retention By this way, checklist can yield rich data for analysis
Additionally, with the checklist process, more than one or two teachers can collect the data Non-reciprocal observation (i.e we are observed by others but we don’t observe them) is the most appropriate method since Wallace (1998) stated that it is the teacher who is initiating the process, and ultimately the evaluation that matters is the teacher’s personal self-evaluation In this case, we are benefiting from other colleagues’ perceptions and remarks Therefore, the research invited some of the colleagues who were also being in charge of English major students to observe the listening class using video The observers focused on investigating the effect of video-assisted instruction on students’ motivation and learning in listening class As Sagor (1992) said, these uses of checklists provided vivid portraits of how class time and activities were being used
Evaluation and testing not only help to investigate whether students’ learning is enhanced but also allow teacher to evaluate whether his action plan works or not
According to McNamara (2000), achievement tests cover and aim at measuring what language the students have learnt as a result of teaching They are closely associated with the process of instruction because they accumulate evidence during or at the end of the course to see whether and where the progress has been made
There are two achievement tests in the second-semester, one in the middle and the other at the end of the semester The first one was mid-term test which covered half of the fourteen units and the mark accounted for 30 percent of the total score The final test, which took up 70 percent of the total score, covered the later seven units but measured students’ achievement in the whole semester Both of the tests have the same format and criteria Listening tests lasted for 30 minutes with three pieces of video clips of different types and topics The length of each video clip was more or less than three minutes The following are some question types used in listening tests:
Multiple-choice: Of four options, students choose the best answer to the given question
True/False/Not given: students decide whether the given information is true or false or not mentioned in the video
Gap-filling: students are required to fill in blank with no more than three words to complete a sentence extracted from the video
Missing summary: students are given a certain summary of the video clip they would see later, which have some missing information They are required to complete the summary by adding the missing information they find in the video
Open-ended question: students are required to answer the question with no more than three words
The tests also had undergone strict evaluation of the same examiners (teachers of listening) because the result was taken as students’ final grades The evaluation of listening comprehension was based on the number of correct answers to the given questions
To sum up, the aforementioned instrumentation, namely interviews, questionnaires, observation checklist, and achievement tests were associated in order to collect the most sufficient amount of information needed.
Teaching procedure
After selecting an appropriate video material, a wide range of guiding questions, tasks and activities are designed to instruct and facilitate students’ comprehension and retention, as well as to stimulate discussion on the topic around in the video clip chosen
Video-assisted listening lessons are divided into three stages: Pre-viewing, While- viewing and Post-viewing The treatment of using video in listening class will last for two periods (approximately two hours) Pre-viewing stage serves as warm-ups including some pictures, posters or other visual aids to arouse students’ interest and evoke their concerns toward the topic In this phase, students are also provided with a certain amount of vocabulary and necessary grammatical structures and expressions for discussing and analyzing the video
While-viewing is the main stage of the lesson in which various tasks and activities are used to gradually guide students from general comprehension to details or vice and verse Students also use the structures and expressions given in the first stage to analyze and discuss the video Besides, other skills like recognizing and understanding body language, guessing from the context, identifying objects, describing places, people and events, etc are built up and developed During the lesson, the teacher will initiate the viewing of the video broadcast coming from computer In the first period, the students will watch a piece of video on a certain topic Then the teacher will check the students’ comprehension and retention through a range of questions and exercises reflecting
The second period or Post-viewing stage is mainly to enhance students’ retention
Additionally, it is an open discussion, where students can exchange information with one another, review and drill exercises and activities The teacher will help them with some hints Students will be given some questions or related topics to think over, either in spoken or written form, or both.
Plan of action
15-WEEK PLAN OF ACTION FOR IMPLEMENTING VIDEO-ASSISTED
1 Famous people: Napoleon Grammar points: Talking about the past and chronological order
2 Viewing some piece of news recorded from VTV4 Grammar point: Talking about the past (Past Simple, Past Progress, and Past Perfect)
3 Viewing some pieces of news recorded from BBC channel
4 Viewing part 1 and 2 of the film Mulan
5 Viewing part 3 and 4 of the film Mulan
6 Viewing part 5 and 6 of the film Mulan
Final Reflection and Reporting the outcome
- Evaluation (based on Observation checklist and the scores of mid- term test )
8 Language: How children acquire theirs
9 Viewing video clips about education programs:
How to make successful presentation
- How catnip get cats high
Vietnam War – The real story
Vietnam War – The real story
13 Viewing part 1 of the film The Bone Collector Grammar points: Making present and past speculations
14 Viewing part 2 of the film The Bone Collector Grammar points: Making present and past speculations
The action plan is divided into four stages:
The first one covers from unit 1 to unit 6 These lessons contain just simple and relatively easy video clips so that students can get familiar with watching listening If students find it hard to listen and view at the beginning, they will be discouraged As they are not exposed to English outside classroom, hence, when participating in this video- assisted listening class, students have opportunities to listen and speak in native-like contexts The purpose of each unit is different For instance, in unit 2, student view some pieces of news recorded from VTV4’s English news bulletin It helps to facilitate students’ listening as the speed and pronunciation of Vietnamese broadcasters is easier to listen for students Later, after viewing the news in English by Vietnamese broadcasters, students get involved in the news spoken by native speakers Kinds of news include weather forecasts, sport, news-bulletins and business news Each video clip lasts only two or three minutes
Some parts of the cartoon named Mulan are also extracted in Unit 5 and 6 The reason for this choice is that the language used in the cartoon is easier to understand and comprehend than in other kinds of films The speed of the conversations in the cartoon is more suitable for learners at low intermediate level
The purpose of the mid-term test in week 7 is to evaluate the progress made on the half way of the semester The researcher collects information from interviews, observation checklists and the result of mid-term test to expose preliminary evaluation of the effect of video-assisted instruction in listening class Hence, the teacher-researcher will make some modifications in the teaching method and designing the lessons in order to best exploit the potential of video in listening class and to help students improve their listening competence as well
The third phase consists of six units at higher level The topics of each lesson are more diversified and interesting, covering from documentaries to feature film In this stage, a lot of challenging activities are designed to stimulate students’ interest and involvement in the lesson The evaluation from stage 2 will help the teacher see whether the video- assisted instruction is effective and what problems arise during listening lessons using video Hence, the teachers will know where and how to modify the teaching and even video materials While-viewing and Post-viewing activities do not purely relate to listening skill but others For example, in unit 13 and 14, students have a chance to view a thrilling film titled The bone collector In this lesson, students will learn to predict what happened, what happening and what happens next They also learn to describe things and events This lesson helps Ss get familiar with context-based listening and daily conversations and have a general background of specialized English, specifically language used for crime scene investigation In the post-viewing discussion, students may be asked to complete a report of crime scene investigation about what they have just seen
Students will take the final test whose result accounts for 70 percent of the total score The test is intended to evaluate the whole progress of students and partly answer the first research question: How does video-assisted instruction affect students’ learning (i.e comprehension and retention) in listening lessons?
Data collection procedure
The results of the study were developed on the basis of empirical data collected through interviews, questionnaires, observation and two achievement tests The stage of data collection happened during the second semester of the school year The process of data collection was carried out in five main stages:
Firstly, the interviews were conducted among four teachers to obtain their perceptions, comments and evaluation toward the matter under investigation, which was the effect of video-assisted instruction in listening class The result of the interview was part of the database which the researcher used to make modifications
Secondly, listening lessons using video were administered to thirty second-year English majors The delivery of questionnaire was delayed till the end of the semester to ensure the objectivity of the information that students provided
Thirdly, a mid-term test was taken after six units to see whether and where the progress was made Together with the results of observation checklist, the problems during video-assisted instruction emerged Thereby, appropriate modifications were applied to improve students’ listening competence
Fourthly, right after the final lesson finished, the students were asked to complete the questionnaire The teacher did not use students’ names to assure anonymity The teacher clarified any questions the students might have about the questions
Finally, students took the final test which determined the whole progress of their learning
Meanwhile, classroom observation was implemented in the whole process Initially, observation checklists were distributed to the teachers that the researcher intended to invite This gave them some time to read the checklists carefully before attending the video-assisted class Observation checklist was also carried out by the researcher in every lesson The observers attended the video-assisted class twice during the second semester (one before the mid-term and one after)
The last step was to classify and analyze the data collected from interviews, questionnaire, classroom observation and achievement tests For questionnaires and achievement tests, the results and answers to close-ended questions were input into Microsoft Excel and automatically calculated and reported in percentages and frequencies
As regards classroom observation and open-ended questions in the questionnaire, contributive information was fully interpreted Meanwhile, the interviews among four teachers were minutely transcribed (see Appendix 3 for Findings from Interviews).
Data analysis procedure
Qualitatively, based on the data collected from interviews and classroom observation, a lot of truthful information about teachers’ perception and attitude toward the use of video in class, improvement of students’ listening competence and even their changes in attitude toward learning listening skill are provided
Quantitatively, with the result of survey questionnaire and two achievement tests, the researcher can work out the effect of video-assisted instruction on students’ motivation and learning and demonstrate it by tables and graphs The final test score will be compared with the score of the first semester and mid-term test
The analysis of the data was carried out in statistical procedure Descriptive analysis will be used and often reported in frequencies and percentages These descriptive statistics are numbers that classify, summarize and report the data
All the results collected from four sources will be comprehensively analyzed and discussed in the next chapter – Results and Evaluation
In summary, in this chapter, the context of teaching listening skill to second-year English majors at the PSA is initially revealed, which is an important basis of problem formulation Later, the chapter presents and justifies the research method applied in the study, namely participants, plan of action, instrumentation, the procedure of data collection and data analysis The interpretation of findings will be elaborated on the following chapter.
Results and Evaluation
Teachers’ perception and evaluation toward students’ listening competence and video-assisted instruction
4.1.1 Teachers’ evaluation toward students’ listening competence
Three of the teachers asked agreed that students’ listening competence is the weakest of four skills Only one teacher (T1) had a different idea when he affirmed that some of them can understand from 40% to 50% of a listening text As regards the problems students often have in listening class, two teachers believed that students do not have listening strategies while another teacher (T3) mentioned their lack of social knowledge and attention in class Also, students’ bad pronunciation hinders them from effective listening As reasoned by one teacher (T2), students are easy to be distracted from listening by the surroundings such as noise outside class or temperature in the room In short, it can be concluded that listening skill is the weakest of students in general and English majors in particular
4.1.2 Teachers’ perception of video-assisted instruction
Findings from the interview showed that teachers at the target university had a quite adequate perception of video-assisted instruction Evidentially, all of them, more or less, used video in their teaching of all four skills Being inquired about their perception of the issue, the interviewees exposed much of understanding and knowledgeableness
However, the frequency of their use is completely different To be more specifically, only one teacher (T3) said she always used video in her class Two teachers (T3&T4) often used video in their listening and speaking lessons whereas the rest rarely did this It is obviously realized that the frequency of using video is inversely proportional to the years of teaching English The older teachers tended to use video in class less than the younger ones
In terms of kinds of video materials being used, a wide range of video was listed including films, news programs, documentaries and drama clips which were mainly downloaded from the Internet It can be seen that a lot of various sources such as TV channels and video-based course books have still been ignored so far
4.1.3 Teachers’ evaluation toward video-assisted instruction
Interestingly, all of four teachers have reached a consensus when they talked about students’ attitude toward video-assisted instruction Justified by them, students seemed to be more interested and motivated in the lessons using video They also added that this instruction brought about better comprehension and retention from students “Students tended to raise more questions and discussed a lot after viewing” (T1) As regards the importance of video-assisted instruction, most of the teachers admitted that video is an effective tool to assist their teaching and to facilitate students’ listening comprehension
Only one teacher (T2) did not overvalue the role of video by raising other important factors such as learning styles, syllabus, and teaching methods To sum up, the positive and direct effects of video-assisted instruction on students’ listening competence have been recognized and acknowledged by all the interviewed teachers
In accordance with their approval on the significance of video-assisted instruction, a majority of respondents advocated the implementation of video-assisted instruction into classroom A teacher (T2) also claimed that “Using video in listening class will help them listen better and result in better interaction between teachers and students or students and students” Noticeably, this finding also correlated with Stempleski and Tomalin (1990) when talking about the benefits of using video According to them, the use of video can make language more accessible to learners by increasing listening comprehension: paralinguistic features (facial expression, body language, context, setting…) help learners comprehend more than from listening to audio tape only as well as stimulating learner interaction and communication with co-learners as they discuss the video itself or ways in which it relates to their lives and experiences
4.1.4 Teachers’ perception of difficulties in teaching listening using video
From interviewees’ responses, four main difficulties were exposed Firstly, the preparation for video-assisted lessons was a foremost problem Elaborated on this, one of them (T1) stated that “most of the teachers are afraid to prepare for the video-based lessons as it is very time-consuming They have to do everything on their own, like selecting appropriate materials, editing them and designing suitable tasks and activities.”
Another teacher (T3) shared the same view when she mentioned the technical problem, which is teachers’ incapability of using computer Two respondents put forward the limitations in teachers’ understanding and experience in this field T4 revealed that
“some teachers do not have experience in teaching listening using video” while “the students are familiar with passive learning” Therefore, “the new teaching method will get them shocked and make them feel hard to acquire” “If teachers do not know how to design appropriate tasks and activities, students will be easy to be distracted from learning” Another obstacle, from one teacher’s viewpoint, lied in the selection of video materials Reasoned for this, T3 pointed out that “teachers find it hard to select video materials suitable for their students’ level from a wide range of sources” because “it is like looking for a needle in a haystack” Finally, a very important problem that every teacher often faces is students’ motivation T4 analyzed that “if teachers decide to use video in listening lessons, there will be two possibilities Firstly, students will be motivated and they learn better Secondly, students will be motivated but they do not learn anything
Therefore, it is difficult for teachers to solve the latter matter”
In the search for the solutions to the abovementioned difficulties, most of the teachers emphasized an urge to seek for appropriate teaching methods which focus on instructing students how to listen and comprehend video materials Concerning the matter of preparation, one teacher (T1) proposed the combination of both video and audio-only instructions More specifically, he suggested using some short video materials as extra listening activities because it saved a lot of time With regard to students’ motivation, one interviewee called for the integration of listening skill with other skills “so that students can involve enthusiastically in listening activities This can be done in three stages of listening process.”
To sum up, it was noteworthy that most of the teachers who are responsible for English major students highly appreciated the importance of video-assisted instruction in all four skills Nevertheless, it was revealed from the interviews that there are still a lot of difficulties that teachers often encounter when using video in their teaching This fact can be traced back to the long prevalence of traditional teaching methods, lack of perception, experience and knowledge in the field, and insufficient equipment at the target university, which undoubtedly hinder them from investigating more on the use of this important teaching aid.
Reflection on the implementation of action plan in the first half of the second
4.2.1 Students’ performance in the first half of the semester
The action research was conducted with the aim of investigating the effect of video-assisted instruction on English majors in listening class After learning six units in video-assisted class (half of the semester), the students took the mid-term test The purpose of this test is to see whether this instruction is effective or not The result of the mid-term test partly exposed students’ progress and achievement
The students’ listening marks in the first half of this semester were also classified into three types, ranging from “not good” (grade from 5.0 to 6.5) to “fairly good” (grade from 7.0 to 8.0) and to “good” (grade over 8.0)
Good Fairly good Not good
Chart 2: Result of mid-term listening test using video
Good Fairly good Not good perc entage of students
1st semester mid-2nd semester
Figure 1: Comparison between the result of the first semester and that of mid-term test in the second semester
As can be seen from Chart 2 and Figure 1, the number of students who got fairly good marks nearly doubled after the first half of the second semester whereas the proportion of marks below 6 declined significantly from 63 % to 46 % Amazingly, the number of good marks remained stable at 13.3% This proves a considerable change in students’ listening scores in two different points of learning progress (before and after using video in listening class) However, the change does not absolutely reflect students’ improvement in listening skill This fact motivates other ways of evaluating students’ learning, which is classroom observation
4.2.2 Teacher-researcher’s self-evaluation toward the teaching process and students’ attitude in the first half of the second semester
Using the observation checklist (see Appendix 4), follow-up discussions with other observers (the assistants), and individual interviews with four teachers, the teacher- researcher self-evaluated the teaching process by examining whether the outcome is positive Constant reflection was conducted after Action Planning, during the process of evaluating and modifying Hence, several problems emerged when applying video in listening class
Firstly, the observation notes of the observers showed that the teaching process comprised three stages: Pre-viewing, While-viewing and Post-viewing However, in while- viewing stage, the teacher only showed the video clips to students and asked them to do various exercises and tasks No communicative activities were done in this phase
Therefore, there was no interaction between students and students Teacher just called out the answers and then gave feedback This teaching method made the students bored and passive Furthermore, post-viewing activities were not diversified or interesting as the teacher only focused on asking students to recall the main content or some details of the video This fact does not motivate students to enthusiastically involve in the lesson even though they like learning in video-assisted class than audio-only one
Secondly, using field notes and after follow-up discussion with the observers, the teacher-researcher discovered that in some lessons, there existed motivation but learning
Students focused on watching the video just for fun, not for getting information That is the reason why 100% of respondents like watching video with subtitle Moreover, the teacher was also alarmed by the interviews about this circumstance “If teachers decide to use video in listening lessons, there will be two possibilities Firstly, students will be motivated and they learn better Secondly, students will be motivated but they do not learn anything
Therefore, it is difficult for teachers to solve the latter problem” (T4) (see Appendix 3)
Students found it hard to concentrate on the content and speaker’s speech when watching listening to the video This is a very new problem that few researchers have been thinking about The benefits of using video in classroom have been realized broadly However, there still have been few studies on the opposite side of using video, which set up a new direction for further research.
Modifications
The instruction was modified and adjusted based on an analysis of the mid- assessment data (i.e mid-term marks, observations) in order to maximize student learning as follow.
Firstly, to facilitate students’ comprehension and retention, the teacher-researcher spent more time on pre-viewing activities by providing students with necessary vocabulary and expressions Teacher also activated the learning of the prediction strategy with the help of a power-point presentation Students were required to guess the meaning of new words through pictures or posters She even chose some short video clips relating to the topic to stimulate students’ learning motivation
Secondly, to increase communicative activities during while-viewing stage, students’ class performance was emphasized Such activities as pausing and describing, pausing and predicting, jumbled sequence and silent viewing not only stimulate learners’ motivation but also intensify teacher-student or student-student interactions After using this guidance, exercises like multiple-choice or fill-in-blank items were easier to finish
Kinds of video materials were also more diversified including feature films, documentaries, educational programs and video clips of nature Video activities may vary to be relevant to each type of video In addition, language focus activities which encourage independent learning strategies were repeated frequently as learners needed to build up the habit of noticing the details of language use in real context
In order to solve the second problem, the teacher-researcher had to find out how to develop interest and attention in the topic or content of the lesson As listener is an active participant, his interest and attention in a topic helps increase the listener’s comprehension
Listener may tune out of the topic that is not of interest The interest also helps to decrease learners’ poor concentration Findings from questionnaire (Figure 2) revealed that 90% of the respondents were in favor of films while documentaries rank the second (63.33%)
Figure 2: Most favourite video programs
Feature films are long, meanwhile teaching hours are short Teacher, therefore, had to fit films into a classroom schedule An effective solution is to use drama clips which are short sequences from drama films They can easily be integrated into a normal teaching program for illustration or inspiration They have high potential for teaching grammar, and especially for resisting distraction Another way was that teacher sliced up the film into several episodes and did it over several lessons
The post-viewing activities were modified to stimulate student-student interaction
According to the information from the survey (Figure 3), two thirds of the students preferred role-play while half of them liked watching-listening activity, followed by pause- prediction (46.66%), pause-description (40%), sound-off (33.33%) and post-viewing discussion (26.66%) These activities helped them feel more fluent, natural and closer to the native All in all, the class was always fun with these sorts of activities and students, hence, found it easier to learn their lessons
Percentage of the studied students
Role-play Pause - predicting Pause - describing Sound-off
Figure 3: Most favourite video-assisted classroom activities
In short, the purpose of these modifications is to diminish students’ interest in entertainment aspect of video The exchange between the teacher and the students, and between students and students, made the class more interactive.
Final reflection and reporting the outcomes
4.4.1 Students’ initial assessment on their listening skill
Result from the survey questionnaire revealed a prominent feature that almost every student (98%) expressed much of dissatisfaction in their listening competence when being asked whether they are satisfied with their listening competence A consensus was reached by four teachers in the interviews when they stated their students are generally weak at this skill On the other hand, one teacher (T1) reported that “not all English majors are bad at listening skill but the number of weak students is not small As they are English major, some of them can understand from 40% to 50% of a listening text The others fail to meet my requirements.” This comment entirely matched with the result of final test in the first semester, in which only approximately 36.7 % reached the score over 7
Percentage of the studied students
Concerning the matter of comprehension and retention, half of the class confessed that they were able to understand only 20% to 30% of a listening text Meanwhile 40% declared their comprehension could reach 30% to 50% Only three students (10%) who had the highest scores in the first semester affirmed that they could understand 50% to 70% of a listening text Amazingly, two-thirds of the students asked only remembered 20 % to 30% of the text even when many of them were able to understand 30% to 50% The rest reached the highest capacity of retention at the range from 30% to 50% The result brought about a fact that there was not a close relation between students’ comprehension and retention It can be inferred that even if students can understand the listening text quite well, it does not mean that they will remember it well
The importance of context-based learning using real world context for enhancing learning outcomes has been emphasized by sociocultural learning theorists (Merriam and Caffarella 1999) It is believed that real world contexts, where there are social relationships, tools, and engaged experiences, can make the best learning environments (Lave 1996) Context-based learning would be very effective and appropriate in teaching adult learners because they are already exposed to diverse contexts and are ready to learn in the context through a variety of experiences Among the various technologies currently available, video technology is suitable for context-based learning because it can convey the information or knowledge in a more interesting way and allows the portrayal of complicated contexts Therefore, the abovementioned fact calls for explicit introduction and effective exploitation of video materials, which by all means help enhance students’ comprehension and retention in listening class.
4.4.2 Changes in students’ attitude (interest and motivation) toward learning in video-assisted instruction
When being asked whether the students like learning in listening class using video, all of the students responded “Yes” which is a positive sign Before, two thirds of the respondents stated that they neither like nor dislike audio-only version However, the degree of agreement is different Five students who take up 16.66% said that they like learning in video-assisted class just a little meanwhile a much larger percentage (83.33%) liked it a lot Compared with the audio-only class, all of them declared their favor for the use of video in listening class As reasoned by some students, video not only encouraged them to listen better but also made them more enjoyable and interested The major responses of the participants were as follows:
- “The combination of watching the videos and discussing those with my classmates made the material easier to remember than listening from the tapes.”
- “Because I am a visual learner, learning with video kept me more focused and actively involved.”
- “I can easily recall parts of videos due to the visual interaction, where I am forced to think out the meaning The videos allow me to witness, not calculate the meaning, but actually see the interaction and how it plays out.”
- “Because the video clips stick in my mind, learning with video helped me retain information.”
As can be seen from the information above, video has greatly contributed to increasing students’ interest in learning listening skill which was considered to be boring, difficult and frightening in students’ eyes Remarks from other teachers who observed the video-assisted class revealed,
….The atmosphere of today’s class is quite interactive because of the real life issue The students were highly interested in this class
….The atmosphere of the classroom interaction is warm and fun The students were well-behaved and cooperative in the learning process
Concerning the matter of motivation, learner’s perception of motivation was analyzed in terms of attention, concentration, satisfaction and student-student interaction
The largest percentage belonged to satisfaction when all of the students felt satisfied with the teaching method using video Data collected from other teachers’ observation revealed that there was difference in the quality of students’ activities between video-assisted instruction and audio-only one The specific results were shown in Table 1 (the numbers in brackets show the persons who agree on the criteria) The criteria were evaluated before and after modifications It was apparently shown from Table 1 that more and more teachers chose “Excellent” for each activity performed by students after making modifications in teaching method Obviously, shortcomings and problems are always inevitable during the process of teaching listening using video and therefore, adjustments and improvement are
Before After Before After Before After Before After
Watching and listening to audio- visual materials
Exchanging information with other students or other groups
Responding to questions from teacher
Being attentive to the content 3 1 4
Table 1: Classroom observation checklist before and after mid-term test
4.4.3 Students’ assessment on the role of video-assisted instruction
10.0% 3.3%0.0% very important important slightly important unimportant
Notably, almost all of the students reached an agreement on the importance of video- assisted instruction when the majority (86.7%) believed that it is very important to use video in listening class No one descended the significance of using video in classroom
This result completely matched with teachers’ remarks, which were revealed in previous interviews, about the importance and necessity of applying video materials in teaching English It can be seen that almost every students expressed their eagerness and excitement to learn in video-based class Accordingly, when being asked about the way video is exploited in the class, three fourths of the respondents chose “very effectively” Only one student with opposite opinion accounted for a modest 3.33%
16.7% very effectively effectively slightly effectively ineffectively
4.4.4 Changes in students’ perceived learning (understanding and retention) and performance
Chart 3: Students’ assessment on the importance of video-assisted instruction
Chart 4: Students’ assessment on the necessity of video-assisted instruction
Perceived learning in video-assisted instruction and audio-only version was analyzed in terms of understanding and retention According to the result of survey questionnaire, the majority of students stated that video-assisted instruction helped them remember and comprehend much better while the rest said only a little Specifically, figure
4 and 5 showed the changes in percentage of students’ retention and comprehension after using video
20-30 30-50 50-70 70+ percentage of retention percentag e of stu den ts before using video after using video
Figure 4: Change in percentage of students’ retention after using video
20-30 30-50 50-70 70+ percentage of comprehension perc entage o f stud ents before using video after using video
Figure 5: Change in percentage of students’ comprehension after using video
Two major trends emerged from the percentage of students’ comprehension and retention before and after using video Firstly, as can be seen from Figure 4, the largest percentage of respondents (70%) said they remember only 20 to 30 % of a listening text
Only one student was able to remember 50 to 70 % of a listening text The rest (26.66%) ranged between 30 and 50% Outstandingly, these numbers changed dramatically after using video in class A large majority (70%) stated their range of retention increased from
30 to 50% 4 out of 30 students can remember 50 to 70% of a listening text Figure 5 witnessed the same increase in the number of students who said that video-assisted learning is more much comprehensible Also, over half of the students (56.66%) said it is easier for them to get the information based on the context The majority (86.66%) responded that they were able to partly guess the meaning from other clues such as body language and gesture In short, most of the participants perceived that the video-assisted learning instruction was more comprehensible and memorable than the audio-only instruction in regard to remembering and understanding the content
On the other hand, all of the students added that they also encountered some difficulties in dealing with video The main responses were as follow:
- “I often pay much attention to watching the video rather than listening to its content So I don’t understand much about the meaning of words or expressions.”
- “There are a lot of new words They speak too fast, so I can’t follow a video sequence.”
- “The difference in culture also makes me misunderstand the message underlined I think, cultural awareness is one of the most difficult problems that students often face”
- “Although I like watching video, it often distracts me from listening Therefore, video is not useful in doing listening tests.”
One of the main difficulties is that the use of video distracted them from listening
However, this is not a serious problem as over half of them said they were distracted just a little while over one thirds (36.66%) are sometimes distracted and sometimes not It can be inferred from the survey that students generally do not have good concentration habits The second problem is their lack of vocabulary which hindered them from comprehending the detailed content of the video These obstacles led to the fact that over 80% of the respondents felt disheartened when they were not able to follow a video sequence because of language difficulties, half of which was disheartened a lot This fact was slightly contradictory to the benefits of using video that they mentioned before On one hand, their attention and concentration capacity were increased when viewing video On the other hand, video distracted them from listening and detecting details Therefore, this discovery opened a new direction for further study from future researchers
Finally, students’ achievement in final listening test considerably reflected the effectiveness of this instruction
Good Fairly good Not good
Chart 5: Result of final test of second semester
As can be seen from Chart 5, only three out of thirty students accounting for 10%, got marks below 6, which is a dramatic accomplishment compared with 63.33% in the first semester and 46.66% in mid-term test of the second semester A larger proportion of fairly good marks took up 67% of the total scores 7 out of 30 students reached marks over 8, which is a very positive result
Discussion and Conclusion
Major findings and discussion of the research
Overall, the present study investigated thoroughly the use of video-assisted instruction for second-year English majors at the PSA in listening class Through the critical analysis of the instrumentation, significant results could be put forward as follows
Firstly, teachers’ perception and evaluation toward students’ listening competence and video-assisted instruction were explored through informal interviews Generally, they obtained a quite adequate understanding of the issue because all of them more or less used video in their teaching of all four skills In fact, the older teachers tended to use video in class less than the younger ones It can be figured out that using video in class requires teachers other skills which only the younger can meet According to them, listening skill is the weakest of students in general and English majors in particular Hence, the application of video in language teaching has brought about certain achievements In addition, four main difficulties in teaching listening using video were also exposed from their responses, namely the preparation for lessons using video, limitations in teachers’ understanding and experience in the field, selection of video materials and students’ motivation Some suggestion for the solutions to the abovementioned problems were revealed after that
More importantly, most of the teachers who are responsible for English majors highly appreciated the importance of video-assisted instruction in four skills In short, teachers’ evaluation and remarks significantly contributed to answering the first research question:
How does video-assisted instruction affect students’ learning (i.e comprehension and retention) in listening lessons? Accordingly, the positive and direct effects of video- assisted instruction on students’ listening competence have been recognized and acknowledged by all of the interviewees
Secondly, students’ achievement and teacher’s self-evaluation in the first half of the second semester were the basis of teacher’s modifications later After implementing half of the action plan, students’ listening scores were improved considerably in comparison with those in the first semester On the other hand, it was apparently shown from teacher’s self- evaluation that there was lack of student-student interaction in class On the contrary, students seemed motivated a lot but they did not learn much Therefore, some modifications were put forward to help students learn better and make the class more interactive and effective
Prominently, students’ attitude (interest and motivation) toward learning in video- assisted instruction, their perceived learning and performance changed significantly
Compared with audio-only class, all of them declared their favour for the use of video in listening lessons In relation to students’ attitude, almost all of the respondents (86.7%) believed that it is very important and necessary to use video in class Similarly, three fourths assessed the way video was exploited in class was very effectively Concerning the matter of understanding and retention, it can be concluded that most of the participants perceived that the video-assisted learning instruction was more easily understandable and memorable than the audio-only one After using video, the proportion of students can comprehend and remember better the content of the lesson increased considerably More specifically, the percentage of comprehending and remembering a listening text is much higher than that in audio-only version
In line with changes in students’ attitude and learning, their performance was apparently much better than that in the first semester To be specific, although the percentage of good mark increase inconsiderably (7 out of 30 compared with 4 out of 30 in the first semester), two thirds of the students got fairly good marks Surprisingly, the proportion of marks which are not good declined dramatically from 63.33% to 10% The aforesaid findings convincingly addressed the other three research questions: Does the use of video in teaching listening change the attitude of second-year English-majors toward learning listening skill? Do students’ learning (i.e comprehension and retention) and motivation (i.e., attention and satisfaction) in video-assisted instruction differ from that in traditional audio-only instruction? Does the use of video in listening class improve students’ listening competence?
In relation to the use of video-assisted instruction, the study conducted by Bach T.H.Y (2009) used only one kind of instruments which are pre-test and post-test As it is an experimental research, the validity and reliability of the instrumentation is not high
Therefore, the exploitation of semi-structured interviews, questionnaires, observation checklist and achievement tests not only successfully answered four research questions proposed at the beginning of the thesis but also helped to fill the research gap to a certain extend
In brief, the thesis investigated the use of video in language teaching as well as measured the impact of video-assisted instruction on learners’ learning and motivation in comparison with traditional audio-only version Also, this study will address some of the underlying reasons why the use of video has an effect (if any) on students’ learning interest.
Limitations of the research
The following limitations are offered in regard to this study
First, this study involves administering the video-assisted instruction for only two hours per week during a semester As a result, the treatment may not be strong enough to have a significant effect on the dependent variables
Second, this study has the minimum sample size of thirty In general, the research should use the largest sample possible to get reliable information, and there should be at least fifteen participants It should be replicated with a larger sample to enhance the generalizability of the results
Third, this study has minor technical problems that may influence the results The preparation for lessons using video is very costly and time-consuming Teachers have to spend a rather large amount of money on buying video materials such as CDs or DVDs in order to sort them out The large file size of the video clips may make it difficult for teacher to open the files or copy them from one computer to another The quality of streaming video and audio can be also a limitation for the learners who are becoming more accustomed to the quality of high-definition television These technical problems may be a factor that results in the learners having a bad impression about the video-assisted instruction Therefore, these types of technical problems need to be anticipated and resolved
Finally, not all teachers of English are able to deal with video editing like cutting, recording, editing or making a video clip suitable for their listening lessons This kind of work requires teachers to master computer software ICT competence is always Vietnamese teachers’ weakness which becomes a hindrance for the application of technology in general and video in particular in their teaching.
Suggestion for further studies
Further researchers who wish to conduct further studies on applying video in teaching English can delve into the topic by enlarging and diversifying the participants of the study Specifically, second-year English majors from other universities can be involved to make a wider scale of target populations The scope can also be first-year, third year or non-English-major students In such a way, the topic can be expected to produce more generalisable results
On the other hand, apart from listening skill, video-assisted instruction can be applied in speaking, reading or even writing skill The combination of pairs, for example listening and speaking, reading and writing, can be feasible with the application of video
Thereby, English teaching and learning will be more interesting, effective and motivating for teachers and students Furthermore, further investigations of this field can help to find out popular implications for effective methods to improve students’ listening competence in Vietnam
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Years of teaching English at the People’s Security Academy
1 What do you think about English major students’ listening competence?
2 What do you think are the problems students often have in listening class?
3 What do you know about video-assisted instruction?
4 Have you ever used video in your class? If yes, how often do you use video in your listening lesson?
5 If yes, what kind of video materials do you use in your lessons?
6 What do you think about your students’ attitude toward video-assisted instruction?
7 How do you assess the effect of video-assisted instruction on facilitating and enhancing your students’ listening comprehension?
8 What do you think are the difficulties teachers may encounter in teaching listening lessons using video?
9 What did you do or what do you think you can do to overcome the difficulties?
10 In your opinion, is it necessary for teachers to involve the use of video in class in general and in listening lesson in particular?
CÂU HỔI PHỎNG VẤN DÀNH CHO GIÁO VIÊN
Thời gian giảng dạy tiếng Anh tại Học viện ANND:
1 Thầy/cô đánh giá thế nào về kỹ năng nghe của học sinh?
2 Theo thầy/cô, đâu là những khó khăn mà học sinh thường vấp phải trong giờ học nghe?
3 Ý kiến của thầy/cô về việc dạy học có sự hỗ trợ của băng hình?
4 Thầy/cô đã bao giờ sử dụng băng hình trong giờ dạy của mình chưa? Nếu rồi, thì tần suất sử dụng băng hình trong giờ dạy nghe của thầy/cô là bao nhiêu?
5 Nếu có, loại băng hình nào mà thầy/cô sử dụng trong lớp?
6 Thầy/cô nghĩ gì về thái độ của học sinh đối với việc dạy học có sự hỗ trợ của băng hình?
7 Thầy/cô đánh giá thế nào về tác động của việc dạy học có sự hỗ trợ của băng hình đối với việc tạo thuận lợi và nâng cao khả năng nghe hiểu của học sinh?
8 Theo thầy/cô thì đâu là những khó khăn mà giáo viên có thể vấp phải khi dạy kĩ năng nghe có sử dụng băng hình?
9 Thầy/cô đã làm gì hoặc theo thầy/cô có những cách gì để khắc phục những khó khăn đó
10 Theo ý kiến của thầy/cô, giáo viên có cần thiết đưa băng hình vào giờ dạy nói chung và giờ dạy nghe nói riêng hay không?
QUESTIONNAIRE FOR SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH-MAJORS
This questionnaire is part of the thesis designed to investigate the effect of video-assisted instruction on second-year English-majors at the People’s Security Academy in listening class We are very grateful to your completion of this questionnaire We ensure that this questionnaire is used for this thesis only, not for any other purpose Thank you so much for your cooperation
A Put a tick () in the box to answer the following questions
1 How many hours do you spend on listening each week?
2 Are you satisfied with your listening competence?
3 Do you like your listening class?
Yes No Other (Please specify):
4 How much percentage do you understand a listening text in audio-only class?
5 How much percentage do you remember a listening text in audio-only class?
B Put a tick () in the box or write down the answers to the following questions
1 Do you like learning in listening class using video?
Yes, a lot Others (please specify):
2 Do you like learning listening in video-assisted instruction rather than in audio-only version?
3 Is it easier to hear and comprehend from video than from cassette record?
4 Do you think the video-assisted instruction results in better listening comprehension than in audio-only instruction?
5 Do you think your retention in video-assisted class is better than in audio-only one?
6 How much percentage do you think remember a listening text in video-assisted class?
7 How much percentage do you understand a listening text using video?
8 Do you think the use of audio-visual aids like video clips in listening class distract students from listening?
9 Are you disheartened when you are unable to follow a video sequence because of language difficulties?
10 Are there any difficulties in listening and understanding the video?
11 Do you think your pronunciation and intonation are better when you learn listening skill with video?
12 Do you think it is easier for you to interpret the information based on the context (place, setting, etc.)
13 Even if you do not know or understand the words or expressions being used in the video, will you be able to partly guess the meaning from other clues such as body language and gesture?
15 What is your opinion about the way video is exploited in your class?
16 What do you think about the importance of using video in listening class?
18 Are you satisfied with the teaching method using video?
17 What kinds of video or TV programs do you like most?
18 What kinds of activities in the classroom with video do you like most? pausing-describing pausing – predicting silent viewing (vision on-sound off) role-play watching – listening post-viewing discussion
CÂU HỎI KHẢO SÁT DÀNH CHO SINH VIÊN
(Phiên bản tiếng Việt) Câu hỏi khảo sát này nhằm mục đích tìm hiểu tác động của việc dạy học có sự hỗ trợ của băng hình đối với sinh viên chuyên ngữ năm thứ hai tại Học viện An ninh nhân dân trong giờ học nghe Chúng tôi đảm bảo rằng cuộc khảo sát chỉ nhằm phục vụ cho nghiên cứu này chứ không vì mục đích nào khác Rất cảm ơn sự hợp tác của các em
A Hãy đánh dấu () vào ô vuông cho câu trả lời của em
1 Em dành bao nhiêu thời gian cho việc học nghe mỗi tuần?
2 Em có hài lòng về kỹ năng nghe của mình hay không?
3 Em có thích giờ học nghe của mình trên lớp không?
Có Không ý kiến khác (Hãy viết ra):
4 Em hiểu được bao nhiêu phần trăm một bài nghe trong giờ học chỉ sử dụng băng cát- xét?
5 Em nhớ được bao nhiêu phần trăm một bài nghe trong giờ học chỉ sử dụng băng cát- xét?
B Hãy đánh dấu () vào ô vuông hoặc viết câu trả lời cho những câu hỏi sau
1 Em có thích học trong giờ học nghe có sử dụng băng hình?
Có, rất thích ý kiến khác (hãy viết ra):
2 Em có thích học nghe có sự hỗ trợ của băng hình hơn là chỉ nghe băng cát-xét hay không?
3 Em có thấy việc nghe và hiểu khi xem băng hình dễ dàng hơn là khi chỉ nghe băng cát- xét?
Có, rất thích ý kiến khác (hãy viết ra):
4 Em có cho là việc dạy học có sự hỗ trợ của băng hình sẽ khiến học sinh hiểu tốt hơn việc dạy nghe chỉ dùng băng cát-xét?
Có, rất thích ý kiến khác (hãy viết ra):
5 Em có cho là việc dạy học có sự hỗ trợ của băng hình sẽ khiến học sinh ghi nhớ tốt hơn việc dạy nghe chỉ dùng băng cát-xét?
Có, rất thích ý kiến khác (hãy viết ra):
6 Em cho là mình có thể nhớ được bao nhiêu phần trăm một bài nghe có dùng băng hình?
7 Em cho là mình có thể hiểu được bao nhiêu phần trăm nội dung một bài nghe có dùng băng hình?
8 Em có cho là việc sử dụng các thiết bị nghe-nhìn như dùng các đoạn băng hình trong giờ học nghe sẽ làm học sinh xao lãng việc nghe hay không?
Có, rất thích ý kiến khác (hãy viết ra):
9 Em có thấy nản lòng không khi không thể theo kịp một đoạn băng hình vì những khó khăn về mặt ngôn ngữ?
Có, rất thích ý kiến khác (hãy viết ra):
10 Em có gặp khó khăn nào khi nghe và hiểu bài nghe có sử dụng băng hình?
11 Em có cho là việc phát âm và ngữ điệu của em tốt hơn khi học nghe bằng băng hình hay không?
Có, rất thích ý kiến khác (hãy viết ra):
12 Em có cho là em sẽ dễ dàng hơn khi hiểu rõ được thông tin dựa trên bối cảnh (như địa điểm, sự việc, v…v…)
Có, rất thích ý kiến khác (hãy viết ra):
13 Thậm chí nếu em không biết hoặc không hiểu 1 từ hay một cụm từ trong băng hình, em vẫn có thể đoán được một phần nghĩa của nó nhờ vào các gợi ý khác như cử chỉ, hay ngôn ngữ cơ thể hay không?
14 Em thích xem băng hình
có phụ đề không có phụ đề
15 Ý kiến của em về cách mà giáo viên khai thác băng hình trong lớp học?
16 Em nghĩ gì về tầm quan trọng của việc sử dụng băng hình trong giờ học nghe?
17 Loại băng hình hay chương trình ti vi nào mà em thích nhất?
18 Loại hoạt động trong lớp với băng hình nào dưới đây mà em thich nhất?
Có hình mà không có tiếng Đóng vai
Thảo luận sau khi xem
Years of teaching English at the People’s Security Academy: 27 years
B Personal perception and evaluation toward students’ listening competence and video-assisted instruction
1 What do you think about English major students’ listening competence?
- “Not all English majors are bad at listening skill but the number of weak students is not small As they are English major, many of them can understand from 40% to 50% of a listening text The others fail to meet my requirements.”
2 What do you think are the problems students often have in listening class?
- “They don’t have listening strategies So, they find it hard to listen effectively”
3 What do you know about video-assisted instruction?
- “Using video, or in other words, authentic materials in class”
4 Have you ever used video in your class? If yes, how often do you use video in your listening lesson?
- “Yes, sometimes Some years ago, when I was teaching listening for first-year and second-year English majors, I used video materials in listening class every three weeks At present, I am teaching ESP for fourth-year English majors, so the frequency of using video is less”
5 If yes, what kind of video materials do you use in your lessons?
- “News, mainly downloaded from Internet I don’t have necessary equipment to record from CCTV system at home”
6 What do you think about your students’ attitude toward video-assisted instruction?
- “Students in my class seemed to be more interested and motivated when I used video They tended to raise more questions and discuss a lot after viewing.”
7 How do you assess the effect of video-assisted instruction on facilitating and enhancing your students’ listening comprehension?
- “They are necessary for helping students improve and facilitate their listening comprehension.”
8 What do you think are the difficulties teachers may encounter in teaching listening lessons using video?
- “Most of the teachers are afraid to prepare for the video-based lessons as it is very time-consuming They have to do everything on their own, like selecting appropriate materials, editing them and designing suitable tasks and activities.”
9 What did you do or what do you think you can do to overcome the difficulties?
- I combine both video and audio-only instruction In many lessons, I used some short video materials as extra ones, so it saved my time.”
10 In your opinion, is it necessary for teachers to involve the use of video in class in general and in listening lesson in particular?
- “Yes, it is Video materials help them listen more effectively.”
Thank you very much for your cooperation
Years of teaching English at the People’s Security Academy: 12 years
B Personal perception and evaluation toward students’ listening competence and video-assisted instruction
1 What do you think about English major students’ listening competence?
- “I think listening is their weakest skill.”
2 What do you think are the problems students often have in listening class?