GRADUATION THESIS find out factors affecting the listening skills by english major sophomore at industrial university of ho chi minh city

MINISTRY OF INDUSTRY AND TRADE INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY OF HO CHI MINH CITY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES - - GRADUATION THESIS STUDENT: LÂM THỊ THU THỦY CODE: 17023131 CLASS: DHAV13B COURSE: 2017 – 2021 SUPERVISOR: NGUYỄN VŨ MẠNH HOÀI, M.A HCMC, 5/2020 MINISTRY OF INDUSTRY AND TRADE INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY OF HO CHI MINH CITY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES - - Student’s name : LÂM THỊ THU THỦY Student’s ID :17023131 Class :DHAV13B Course :2017-2021 Student’s declaration: I declare that this graduation report is my own work and does not involve in plagiarism or collusion I accept heavy penalty for any cheating or plagiarism Date submitted : Signed Word count : : ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Firstly, I would like to say thank the Faculty of Foreign Languages at the Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City for generating chances for me to know how to work on the final proposal Secondly, I am sincerely grateful to Mrs Nguyen Vu Manh Hoai who instructed me on how to the Final Proposal He spent most of his own spare time focusing on our group study, gave me sincere suggestions, and comments that supported my product is more reliable and valid Thanks to his help, I feel my knowledge of English richer and larger Thirdly, I would like to say thank you to my peers, who worked with me and always gave me heartfelt suggestions when I got problems during completing the final proposal Last but not least, I would like to express my great appreciation to my parents who always take care of me and give me the strong power to everything In brief, I want to thank all people who gave me the power to overcome obstacles and let me get the final step of graduation Title: Find out factors affecting the listening skills by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to Find out factors affecting the listening skills by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City The quantitative was utilized in which there were certain tools were employed encompassing questionnaires in this research paper The participants of this study were 85 students of sophomor The findings clearly show that there were some mainly factors affecting listening skill including :limited vocabulary, linguistic challenges, the inability to concentrate As well as the solution to each of the proposed causes such as practice listening every single day through English films, English songs; enhance the vocabulary by reading English document TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT Pag CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1 RATIONALE: 1.2 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES: 1.3 RESEARCH QUESTION: 1.4 SCOPE OF THE STUDY CHAPTER 2:LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 OVERVIEW OF LISTENING 2.1.1 Definition of listening 2.1.2 The importance of listening skill 10 2.1.3 Factors affecting English listening 2.2 RESULT OF PREVIOUS STUDIES 2.2.1……………… .9 2.1.2 ……… 2.1.3………… .9 2.1.4……… CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH DESIGN 12 3.1 RESEARCH SITE 13 3.2.PARTICIPANTS 13 3.3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND RESEARCH METHODP 143 3.4 PROCEDURES 13 3.5.DATA ANALYSIS 13 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 14 4.1 RESEARCH FINDINGS 15 4.1.1 General information 16 4.1.2 Factors affecting listening skill 16 4.1.3 Method and strategies in learning listening skill 16 4.1.4 Suggest solFactors affecting listening skill 16 4.2 RESEARCH DISCUSSION 15 4.1.1 The real state of learning listening skill by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City………………………………………………16 4.1.2 Factors that affected on listening skill……………………………………………………………… 16 4.1.3 The strategies in learning listening skill…………………………………… 16 4.1.4 Recommendations 16 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 17 5.1 SYNTHESIS OF RESEARCH 18 5.2 SUGGEST SOLUTION 18 APPENDICES Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 1.1 Rationale Nowadays, listening skill plays an essential role in learning language However, it is also the most challenge for English major learner Because of the complexity and the subtle nature of listening to a second foreign language As a researcher, I would like to present the thesis “Find out factors affecting the listening skill by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City” Listening is one of the four language skills and of the two receptive skills It is an essential skill that we use in our day to day lives Listening entails recognizing voice patterns and converting them into phrases and sentences When we listen, our ears pick up individual sounds (letters, stress, rhythm, and pauses), which our brain then translates into signals that we understand Listening also has a major role in the academic circumstances Listening and reading skills are also help learners absorb information through what they read or listen However, when reading, learners can easily grasp information by underline key word or back to the text for clearly understanding, which a listener can not it in most listening context such as discussion or Tv programme In addition, listening is one of the most significant ways that people communicate their thoughts and ideals to each other To become a fluent speaker in English, you need to develop strong listening skills Listening not only allows you to comprehend what others are talking to you It also makes it easier to communicate with others It helps you how to correctly pronounce phrases, how to use intonation, and where to put emphasis in words and sentences Therefore, the researcher decided to deeply work on this investigation in order to make a contribution to the improvement in learning listening skill of students 1.2 Research Objectives Firstly, the study is carried out in order to survey the state of learning listening skill by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City so that find out the reasons for those difficulties Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 Secondly, I would like to help students find out factors that effecting directly and indirectly on listening skill Finally, because of difficulties,the majority of students are not interested in learning listening skills, so that this study gives some suggestions for effective listening 1.3 Research Questions What are the real state of learning English listening skill for English major sophomore at IUH? What are the casual factors that English-majored sophomores made in their listening? What are strategies and suggest some solutions to improve their English listening skill? 1.4 Scope of the study The study about factors affecting the listening skills by English major sophomore at IUH Because of the limited time and understanding, research cannot cover all the difficulties students face in listening skills.It only focus on common difficult that student get in listening skill Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 Chapter 2: LITERATURE REVIEW Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 2.1 Overview of listening 2.1.1.Definition of listening Listening is one of the most important skill Through the listening people can speak what they want to say.Listening as a language bridge that using in communication In the eyes of many researchers and learners of English, listening is complex and active mental process that involves perception, attention, cognition, and memory So, the term “Listening” has defined by different authors Howatt and Dakin (1974) stated listening is the ability to identify and understand what others are saying This involves understanding a speaker’s accent or pronunciation, his grammar and his vocabulary, and grasping his meaning According to Postovsky (1975), listening differs in meaning from sound discrimination to aural comprehension Pearson (1983) stated “Listening involves the simultaneous organization and Combination of skills in Phonology, Syntax, Semantics, and knowledge of the text structure, all of which seem to be controlled by the cognitive process Thus it can be said that though not fully realized, the listening skill is essential in acquiring language proficiency” Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 Normal Di 琀 cult Very di 琀 cult Easy 55.00% Chart 4: The students’ assessment of learning listening skill As the pie chart shows, only 2% students considered listening skill easy to learn The rest did set clear , over a half of them, namely 55%, stated that listening skill is difficult to learn When asked about the reason they added when listen word or everything pass so quickly so they can not pick up the sounds and after listening many times, they feel headache and depressed because they not understand and when listen to a whole conversation, but only hear the other or words, and all of the information is over passed Therefore they are not patient enough to listen and feel that listening is really difficult 33% of students believed that listening skills are extremely difficult to learn Finally, 10% students considered learning Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 18 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy listening ID number: 17023131 to be 33.33% normal 36.94% hour hours hours Other answer 20.22% 9.51% Chart 5: How much time you spend listening skill in everyday? As pie chart shows , nearly 40% of students spend an hour practicing English listening every day When asked about the reason they said, they comment an hour is enough for their listening skills because it does not make them feel pressured to listen to English actively like relaxing 33% student have other answer for speding time to learn listening skill, while 20% for hours , and 10 % for hours When asked how to practice listening daily, most of them answered that they mainly practice listening skill through English songs, Youtube channel or application Because it has a melody that makes them not feel as boring and pressured instead of when they have to focus on doing academic listening lessons Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 19 Chart 6: What types of exercises you usually encounter when learning listening skill? It is clear from the chart, 46.4% of students choose multiple-choice questions as the main type of exercise they encounter They also said that because multiple-choice questions appeared in part of the IELTS listening test and were the easiest part, they encountered the most 42.9 percent believe they are commonly encountered on short answer question exercises Besides, 38.1% of learners said that summary completion is the type of exercise they usually encountered In other hand, they feel that map is the most difficult type of exercise that usually appeared in part or of the IELTS test with 33.3% of participants choose 4.1.2 Factors affecting listening skill by English major sophomore at IUH This part presents finding about factors affecting listening skill by English major sophomore at IUH A detailed comparison of the factors affect students' listening skills between their own assumptions is drawn below Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy 20 Limited cultural and social knowledge Chart 7: Factors affecting listening skill Among the listening problem factors that the second year English-major students have to face while learning listening was shown in Chart The factors related to limited vocabulary had highest percent with 59.5% , the participants respond that limited English vocabulary interferes most with their listening skill They comment that their vocabulary source is poor, so it’s very difficult for me to understand the content of the spoken text if the text contains lots of new words Followed by the listening factors related to linguistic chalenges (54.8%), students provide some insight into the causes of these problem in classrooms, they are usually exposed to the full and formal forms of the English language Their teachers as well as their classmates usually pronounce words separately and clearly and their intonation seem to be flat That is the reason why when they listen to natural spoken English in which people frequently use reduced forms as well as colloquial words and expressions, they find it difficult to understand The factors related to limited cultural and social knowledge account for 33.3% The next two factors including other factors (noise, poor tape quality and long material, the poor equipment), and the inability as the fourth and the fifth positions, at 21.4% and 17.9% respectively.They added sometimes the recording texts are so long and difficult with unfamiliar topics that they cannot concentrate on listening to understand and answer the questions And the complexity of grammatical structures In short, the results of the questionnaires and the interviews indicate that listening text itself is the main source of listening comprehension difficulties In particular, unfamiliar words, complex grammatical structures, lengthy spoken texts with unfamiliar topics impede comprehension And sometime the noise both outside and inside Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 21 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 classrooms is a main obstacle to listening They explain more that all the classrooms at IUH are not sound-insulated, so usually while they are focusing on listening, the sudden noise disturbs them and as a result, they fail to concentrate on the listening Moreover, large class is referred by many students as a hindrance to their listening skill 4.1.3 Method and strategies in learning listening skill This part present about method and strategies in learning listening skill by English major sophomore at IUH 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 song English to Listen Chart 8: How you self- study listening? It is clear from the chart that listen to English song is the leading method that students selfstudy listening skill, at 66.7% When asked why, they said that there are several different types of music that they interesting Watch movies accounting for 50% ranked as the second common method The next two method including listen to new in English and listen to foreigners directly as the thirth and the fourth positions, at 29.8% and 27.4% respectively Lastly, the proportions of listen to tapes or disks of the syllabus accounted for 11.9% In conclusion, most of the students like listening to English song , watching English movie and listening foreigners directly Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 22 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 17.25% 42.75% 16.34% VOA channel BBC channel CNN channel Testalk channel 23.66% Chart 9: Which youtube channel you usually use to listen English? 23.80% 14.30% 27.40% 8.30% Spotlight Duolingo Cake Memrise Others 26.20% Chart 10: Which application you usually use to listen English? Chart and chart 10 demonstrate youtube channel and application that sudents usually learn listening skill through From the chart 8, it is obvious that 56% participants often learning listening English through VOA channel While, only 21.40% of them choose CNN channel As presented in chart 10, the participants’ lowest regarding the application that they usually use to practice listening skill to Memrise is 8.30% , while the participants’ highest to Duolingo accounting for 27.4% Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 23 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 Do no 琀琀 hing Iden 琀琀 fy genre of words Read all the content listening Chart 11: What you usually before you listening? It is clear from the chart, most of them take not key words as the main they before listening exercise with 58.3% , they said that it is the very first step that must be taken and it will decide the whole listening exercise, followed by read all the content listening (45.2%) 33.3% students indicated that they usually identify genre of words before they listen Finally, only 14.3% of them asserted that they notthing before they listen So while listening, what students should do? The next chart will show this question 80 70.2 70 60 50 40 33.3 30 20.2 20 10.7 10 Listen to word by word Focus on the new words Listen to key points Other ways Chart 12: What you while you are listening? Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 24 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 The questionnaire statement chart 12 shows that almost (70.2%) of students think that have to listen to the key points while listening It's a pretty great response because it’s a positive activity make their listening skill easier Over 30% participant choose listen to word by word However, some of them choosing focus on the new words and other ways at 20.2% and 10.7%, respectively Strategies Do not translate into your native language Guessing at meaning Listen for the gist (or general idea) of the conversation Don't concentrate on detail until you have understood the main idea(s) Predicting what the speaker will say Teachers must develop students’ micro skills of listening comprehensio n Table 1: The strategies in learning listening skill The table above illustrate the strategies that second year English major at IUH usually to learn listening skill As present in the first row of the table, 30% students ensured that they Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 not translate into your native language with neutral The greatest proportion belonged to those who guessing at meaning with 26% satisfied Those who usually listen for the gist (or general idea) of the conversation, don't concentrate on detail until you have understood the main idea accounting for 25% with satisfied 26% participants with satisfied about predicting what the speaker will say It is obvious that 23% satisfied about the strategies that teachers must develop students’ micro skills of listening comprehension 4.2 Research Discussion Through the findings of the survey, the real state of learning English listening skill for English major sophomore at IUH and factors affecting their English listening skills as well as some strategies in learning listening skill are clearly present below 4.2.1 The real state of learning listening skill by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City The first finding is involved the real state of learning listening skill by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City The majority of students have learned English for more than years (44%) As the research, most of them are aware of the importance of listening skills (53%) They consider listening the most challenging skill to acquire and they appreciate the role of listening skills in the development of communication skills There are types of listening exercises that they often encounter including multiple choice, short answer question, summary completion and map Everyday they spend an hour on listening practice and listen mainly to songs, news and youtube channels 4.2.2 Factors that affected on listening skill This research also examines the factors that affecting listening skill Limited vocabulary is considered the main factors affecting listening skill (59.9%) They comment that their vocabulary source is poor, so it’s very difficult for them to understand the content of the spoken text if the text contains lots of new words Besides, linguistic chalenges are also affecting listening skill (54.8%) In natural spoken English in which people frequently use reduced forms as well as colloquial words and expressions, they find it difficult to understand There are two next factors limmited cultural and social knowledge and the inabilyty to concentrate And finally, there are some other factors (noise, the poor equipment , bad healthy) 4.2.3 The strategies in learning listening skill Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 26 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 Effective listening requires methods and strategies As the result of findings, most of participants often take not key words before they listen (58.3%), this will make the listening process easier, they have to focus on the main points that they have underlined from which to capture the main information Besides, everyday they also spend time practicing their listening skills through youtube channels such as VOA (56%), BBC (31%), Tedtalk (22.6%), CNN (21.4%) Moreover some strategies were listed about the student’s satisfied such as not translate into your native language, guessing at meaning, listen for the gist (or general idea) of the conversation, don't concentrate on detail until you have understood the main idea, predicting what the speaker will say, teachers must develop students’ micro skills of listening comprehension 4.2.4 Recommendation Based on the findings, the research would like to propose some suggestions for learning listening skill affectively It is inferred from this study that insufficient vocabulary is one of the main factors of listening skill problems among second-year English major students at IUH It is, therefore, important that before listening, teachers equip students with key words related to the vocabulary sources by asking them to guess the meaning of new words which are used in the listening contex background knowledge of the content of the listening text before listening Teachers can encourage their students to discuss what they already know about the topic they are going to listen as well as to predict what they might hear in the listening text so that the students become more familiar with the topic before listening The English linguistic knowledge which includes pronunciation, connected speech, accents, discourse markers, slang and idiomatic expressions, and grammatical structures is concluded from this study as the number one factors in learning listening skill Therefore, it is necessary for students to be exposed more to authentic English by listening to native voices through English songs, English news, films, plays, daily conversation or stories which are suitable for their levels In addition, teachers should equip their students with linguistic features such as transition languages, colloquial expressions or grammatical structures at convenient time during the listening sessions Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 27 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 Chapter V: CONCLUSION Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 28 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 This final chapter provides the summary of the findings in the present research and suggest recommendations for students in orther to improve their listening learning Limitations of the research are presented also Recommendations for futher research are then suggested 5.1 Synthesis of the research To achieve the author’s goals in this study The researcher report is divided into five chapters that are sequentially connected The first chapter provides a concise overview of the study's hypotheses The second chapter analyzing critically the published information through summary , classification, and comparison of prior research studies, reviews of literature, and theoretical articles in chronologically or thematically organization The third chapter presented research methodology and research method that using in this study, in addition to explaining the steps of the testing process and the methods for analyzing information obtained The following chapter analyzes the data from the online questionnaire, presents the study's findings, and compares them to the findings of previous works This chapter also assists the author in determining the answers to the three research questions mentioned in the introduction The last chapter is some suggestion to improve English listening skill Limitation of this study and recommendation for further research are presented also 5.2 Suggest solution for improving listening skill According to the survey results, there are three major factors that influence English listening capacity including: limited vocabulary, linguistic challenges, the inability to concentrate As well as the solution to each of the proposed causes 5.2.1 Limited vocabulary Vocabulary limit is the biggest factor influencing 3rd year students' listening skills at IUH As we all know, vocabulary is an integral part of learning every language There are many ways, in my experience, to expand vocabulary for listening skills Listen to English on a daily basis on subjects that interest you Many experiments have shown that we only absorb effectively when we are interested in the topic In addition, you should read many documents in English The more you read, the richer your vocabulary will be While reading, pay more attention to words you don't know Try to guess the meaning based on the text first, then look up the Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 29 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 dictionary after that Listening and reading regularly are one way to help you develop vocabulary 5.2.2 Linguistic challenges In term of linguistic challenges , which include grammar, related vocabulary, accents, discourse markers, slang and idiomatic phrases, and grammatical structures As a result, students need to be exposed to more genuine English One of the best and most successful tips for overcoming this challenge is that you should listen to native voices through English songs, English news, films, plays, daily conversation or stories which are suitable for their levels While you may not fully understand every exchange that takes place and every word that is spoken, watching and listening to television and radio can help you to gain an appreciation of the conversations taking place and the tone and intonation that underpins them In addition, teachers should equip their students with linguistic features such as transition languages, colloquial expressions or grammatical structures at convenient time during the listening sessions 5.2.3 Factors related the failure to concentrate The failure to concentrate affects spoken texts New words, the length of the spoken text, the activity of searching for the answer at the same time as listening as well as thinking about another question all lead to the focus loss Many interviewed students admit that if they hear a new word or phrase in the audio, they want to figure out what it means, and as a result, they lose concentration on the recording's material One tip for this factor is that you should listen to keywords, determine the necessary type of words to fill in, and then predict the answer In addition, motivation is one of the important factors in learning English in general and students' English listening skills in particular It can be difficult for student to maintain concentration when listening to English When encountering words they have never heard of, it is difficult to distinguish Students may confuse one word with another because they not know the pronunciation.Moreover, there are many topic they are not really interesting Students should expand their knowledge in a large topic For all that, students find listening very boring even if they are interested in a topic because it needs a huge amount of effort in order to not miss the meaning So, motivation comes from practice.In every single day, students should spend at least an hour for listening skill.Students can listen everything by English.Even if you are busy and don't have a lot of time, you can listen while driving to work or school, taking public transport, exercising or doing housework It can be their favourite topic from there they expand vocabulary and knowledge It also helps them improve their English listening ability Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 30 Submitted by: Lâm Thị Thu Thủy ID number: 17023131 5.2 Limitation of the study Regarless of great effort devoted to this research, limitations and restrictions are still unavoidable The first limitation is that it only focused on a limited number of second-year students of English major Therefore, the result of the study can’t be generalized Besides, the researcher could not cover all the aspect of difficulties Secondly, it is worth mentioning the limit of time, experience to some extend In addition, it was carried out solely based on questionnaire The result of this research would have been more reliable if other instruments and methods such as interview, observation, or action research had been applied 5.3 Suggesstion for the further study Because of the limitation, this study could not cover all of aspects of the study Besides, the study only focuses on factors affecting listening skill for only second-year students at IUH in order to help them improve listening skill To get better results, futher research should be considered to conduct in a wide range of respondents to have more comprehensive picture of the problem The more participants a research involve, the more reliable and valid it will be Other instruments or methods such as observation, interview, and action research should also be carried out to increase the credibility of the research Supervisor: Nguyễn Vũ Mạnh Hoài, M.A 31 ... present the thesis ? ?Find out factors affecting the listening skill by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City? ?? Listening is one of the four language skills and of the. .. sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City The first finding is involved the real state of learning listening skill by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh. .. me get the final step of graduation Title: Find out factors affecting the listening skills by English major sophomore at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City ABSTRACT The purpose of this