Skkn the effectiveness of using pictures to improve listening skill for the 11th form students

A INTRODUCTION I RATIONALE OF THE STUDY Nowadays English has become more and more important part in Vietnam and it is an international language Therefore, it has been taught in Vietnam from primary schools to high schools as a compulsory subject Although English undoubtedly plays an important role in Vietnamese society, and everyone seems to be eager to master English However, the truth is so surprising Most of the students are reluctant to study English because it is a compulsory subject in school Therefore, they are afraid of learning English Only few of the students who are in the major classes find it necessary and interesting to master English, but the thing they are interested in is grammar only As a result, they are rather weak at the skills, especially listening I have been teaching English at Nguyen Quan Nho high school for many years and of course I always try my best to teach English effectively I found out that listening stages are very important in teaching listening and it also has significant effects on the students’ listening performance However, I have encountered a lot of difficulties due to the level of the students, and we haven’t found any effective solution yet, which makes me think a lot I am now in charge of teaching English in grade 11 During my teaching time, I have found that my students have many difficulties in listening as I have mentioned above No matter how effective listening activities themselves can be, teachers and students are still facing obstacles in the lesson The first, compared to Reading comprehension, Listening comprehension is considered more difficult for learners in foreign language setting because there are more factors such as the rate of speech, speaker’s accent or the cultural content of the talk that listeners can’t control The second, according to the syllabus of English subject, there are only three English periods per week for each grade; students not have enough time to practice listening The third, the condition for learning English and communicating with native speakers is not good enough and we have to make teaching aids for listening lesson ourselves That is also a big problem because not all teaching aids we made are effective tools The last, listening is the basic language skill in language learning However, students always think it is difficult to listen well To foster the students’ listening comprehension skills and prepare them as active listeners in language learning is a big challenge Scholars and linguists have done a lot of research to help students to acquire the skills However, we cannot rely on some methodologies completely So I believe that listening is crucially important for the whole learning process And my students’ skkn experience and that of my own proved to me that we did not have much chance to listening while in high school and we gradually got into a habit of learning “mute English”, which was obviously harmful to a language learner Additionally, the amount of students in each class does not permit teachers to monitor all of them It is said that pictures play an important role in language teaching Listening skill can be taught with the help of pictures because they are an effective resource There have been a lot of research and studies done by scholars and researchers on the use of pictures to help improve students’ listening comprehension Therefore, I decided to choose the theme “The effectiveness of using pictures to improve listening skill for the 11 th form students” as the topic of my research AIMS OF THE STUDY The study is aimed at: - Investigating the situation of teaching and learning listening to the 11 th graders in classroom - Investigating the effectiveness of using pictures in teaching listening to th the 11 graders at Nguyen Quan Nho high school - Providing some suggestions and implications for the improvement of listening teaching at Nguyen Quan Nho high school by using pictures in addition to other techniques SCOPE OF THE STUDY With this study, I put focus on investigating and discovering obstacles or difficulties encountered by students in English listening lessons at Nguyen Quan Nho high school From these findings, the internal and external causes are analyzed to give some suggestions for tackling them in order to motivate students and help improve students’ listening competence by using pictures The study was conducted on the students of grade 11 at Nguyen Quan Nho high school with the textbook “Tiếng Anh 11” RESEARCH QUESTIONS This study is carried out to find the answer to the following questions: How to motivate the students in English listening lessons? To what extent does the use of pictures help improve my grade 11 students’ listening comprehension? skkn How the students feel about the use of pictures in improving students’ listening comprehension? METHODS OF THE STUDY In order to get the goals of the study, I used some methods such as: Observation method: The subjects performed self-exploration research project conducted classroom visits, attended colleagues’ lessons Experimental methods: Teachers teach test conducted on each specific purpose requires some listening lessons Investigation method: Teachers ask questions to check understanding content assessment of the students’ lessons skkn II DEVELOPMENT LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Previous studies According to Mueller (1980), who studied the effect of visuals on the listening process, the use of visuals providing contextual cues to a listening passage is effective in enhancing learner’s comprehension The descriptions can simply be series of different pictures; students have to identify which picture is being talked about, or rearrange some disordered pictures in a correct order as they listen Similar exercises can be done with odd pictures cut out of color magazines A number of such pictures are stuck upon the board and the teacher improvises a story that somehow brings some of them in The teacher can help students by indicating which picture he/she is referring to as he/she can leave them to work out the sequence for themselves In his article, Alex Case (2009), stated that students' listening comprehension can be developed with the help of pictures in various ways He introduced 100 activities that can be designed to improve the students' listening comprehension in a listening class Before listening to the tape, the teacher provides his/her students with a picture and ask them write as many sentences as they can describe the things in the picture and then listen to tape to see how many of the sentences they hear are similar to one of the sentences they wrote, for example In a journal on using pictures in listening class, Zhang (2000), said that the advantage of using pictures is that it is easy to prepare, easy to organize, interesting, meaningful and authentic Images of reality in the unnatural world of the language classroom can be brought by pictures Moreover, the help of pictures is very useful in developing students’ listening comprehension, particularly “directed listening” They both provide a general background and context and help to guide the students' listening This idea can be described as selecting the correct pictures from the provided ones after listening to the tapes, or listen to the description of maps or diagrams and students have to draw the pictures they hear It can be seen that the role of the use of pictures in improving students’ skkn listening skill is quite effective Therefore, I would like to implement the strategies in my classroom 1.2 Review of theoretical background 1.2.1 An overview of language teaching and learning 1.2.1.1 Definitions of language teaching and learning What is learning and what is teaching and how they interact? A search in contemporary dictionaries reveals that learning is "acquiring or getting of knowledge of a subject or a skill by study, experience, or instruction." A more specialized definiton might read as follows: "Learning, is relatively permanent change in behavioral tendency and is the result of reinforced practice" (Kimble and Garmezy 1963). Teaching may be defined as "showing or helping someone to learn how to something, giving instructions, guiding in the study of something, providing with knowledge, causing to know or understand." Breaking down the components of the definition of learning, we can extract, as we did with language, domains of research and inquiry: - Learning is acquiring or "getting" - Learning is retention of information or skill - Retention implies storage systems, memory, cognitive organization - Learning involves active, conscious focus on and acting upon events outside or inside the organism - Learning is relatively permanent but subject to forgetting - Learning involves some form of practice, perhaps reinforced practice - Learning is a change in behavior Teaching cannot be defined apart from learning. Nathan Gage (1964) noted that "to satisfy the practical demands of education, theories of learning must be 'stood on their head' so as to yield theories of teaching." Teaching is guiding and facilitating learning, enabling the learner to learn, setting the conditions for learning If you look at learning as a process of operant conditioning through a carefully paced program of reinforcement, you will teach accordingly If you view second language learning basically as a deductive rather than an inductive process, you will probably to choose present copious rules and paradigms to your students rather than let them "discover" those rules inductively Jerome Bruner (1966) noted that a theory of instruction should specify the following features: The first, the experiences which most effectively implant in skkn the individual a predisposition toward learning The second, the ways in which a body of knowledge should be structured so that it can be most readily grasped by learner The third, the most effective sequences in which to present the materials to be learned The last, the nature and pacing rewards and punshiments in the process of learning and teaching "Teaching is guiding and facilitating learning, enabling the learners to learn, setting the conditions for learning" Foreign language learning, like other subjects, is part of the overall development of all students Through learning a foreign language, the students can enrich their experience of life, broaden their world vision, and enhance their thinking skills Language learning is most effective when students' interest, motivation and attitudes are taken into consideration Therefore, evaluation should be summative and formative and designed and administered to encourage the learners rather to frustrate them It should be carried out in terms of what students can rather than what they cannot 1.2.1.2 The goal of teaching listening To accomplish this goal, instructors focus on the process of listening rather than on its product - They develop students' awareness of the listening process and listening strategies by asking students to think and talk about how they listen in their native language - They allow students to practice the full repertoire of listening strategies by using authentic listening tasks - They behave as authentic listeners by responding to student communication as a listener rather than as a teacher - When working with listening tasks in class, they show students the strategies that will work best for the listening purpose and the type of text They explain how and why students should use the strategies - They have students practice listening strategies in class and ask them to practice outside of class in their listening assignments They encourage students to be conscious of what they're doing while they complete listening tape assignments - They encourage students to evaluate their comprehension and their strategy use immediately after completing an assignment They build comprehension checks into in-class and out-of-class listening assignments, and periodically review how and when to use particular strategies skkn - They encourage the development of listening skills and the use of listening strategies by using the target language to conduct classroom business: making announcements, assigning homework, describing the content and format of tests - They not assume that students will transfer strategy use from one task to another They explicitly mention how a particular strategy can be used in a different type of listening task or with another skill 1.2.2 An overview of listening 1.2.2.1 Definitions of listening What is Listening? Listening is one of the four language skills (reading, speaking, listening and writing) Listening is the ability to accurately receive and interpret messages in the communication process Listening is key to all effective communication, without the ability to listen effectively messages are easily misunderstood Listening is one of the most important skills you can have An active process of getting information, ideas “Listening is the process of receiving, constructing meaning from, and responding to spoken Listening is the active process of receiving and responding to spoken (and sometimes unspoken) messages It is one of the subjects studied in the field of language arts and in the discipline of conversation analysis Listening is not just hearing what the other party in the conversation has to say "Listening means taking a vigorous, human interest in what is being told us," said poet Alice Duer Miller "You can listen like a blank wall or like a splendid auditorium where every sound comes back fuller and richer." Listening is receiving language through the ears Listening involves identifying the sounds of speech and processing them into words and sentences When we listen, we use our ears to receive individual sounds (letters, stress, rhythm and pauses) and we use our brain to convert these into messages that mean something to us Listening in any language requires focus and attention It is a skill that some people need to work at harder than others People who have difficulty concentrating are typically poor listeners Listening in a second language requires even greater focus Like babies, we learn this skill by listening to people who already know how to speak the language This may or may not include native speakers. For practice, you can listen to live or recorded voices The most important thing is to listen to a variety of voices as often as you can skkn To become a fluent speaker in English, you need to develop strong listening skills Listening not only helps you understand what people are saying to you It also helps you to speak clearly to other people It helps you learn how to pronounce words properly, how to use intonation, and where to place stress in words and sentences This makes your speech easier for other people listening to you to understand 1.2.2.2 Process of listening - Receiving Receiving is the intentional focus on hearing a speaker’s message This stage is represented by the ear because it is the primary tool involved with this stage of the listening process - Understanding In the understanding stage, we attempt to learn the meaning of the message, which is not always easy Deciding what the message means to you - Remembering Remembering begins with listening; if you can’t remember something that was said, you might not have been listening effectively However, even when you are listening attentively, some messages are more difficult than others to understand and remember Highly complex messages that are filled with detail call for highly developed listening skills - Evaluating The fourth stage in the listening process is evaluating Evaluations of the same message can vary widely from one listener to another The stages two, three, and four are represented by the brain because it is the primary tool involved with these stages of the listening process - Responding Responding - sometimes referred to as feedback - is the fifth and final stage of the listening process Your reaction to the message It can be emotional and intellectual For example, you are giving positive feedback to your instructor if at the end of class you stay behind to finish a sentence in your notes or approach the instructor to ask for clarification The opposite kind of feedback is given by students who gather their belongings and rush out the door as soon as class is over This stage is represented by the lips because we often give feedback in the form of verbal feedback; however, you can just as easily respond nonverbally 1.2.2.3 The importance of listening Listening plays an important role in communication in people’s daily lives As Guo and Wills (2006) state “It is the medium through which people skkn gain a large proportion of their education, their information, their understanding of the world and human affairs, their ideals, sense of values” According to Mendelson (1994) “of the total time spent on communicating, listening takes up 40-50 %; speaking 25-30 %; reading 11-16 %; and writing about %” Emphasizing the importance of listening in language learning, Peterson (2001) states that “no other type of language input is easy to process as spoken language, received through listening…through listening, learners can build an awareness of the interworkings of language systems at various levels and thus establish a base for more fluent productive skills” Listening has an important role not only in daily life but also in classroom settings Anderson and Lynch (2003) state that “we only become aware of what remarkable feats of listening we achieve when we are in an unfamiliar listening environment, such as listening to a language in which we have limited proficiency” Most people think that being able to write and speak in a second language means that they know the language; however, if they not have the efficient listening skills, it is not possible to communicate effectively That is, listening is the basic skill in language learning and over 50% of the time that students spend functioning in a foreign language will be devoted to listening (Nunan, 1998) Rost (1994) explains the importance of listening in language classroom as follows: Listening is vital in the language classroom because it provides input for the learner Without understanding input at the right level, any learning simply cannot begin Spoken language provides a means of interaction for the learner Because learners must interact to achieve understanding Access to speakers of the language is essential Moreover, learners’ failure to understand the language they hear is an impetus, not an obstacle, to interaction and learning Authentic spoken language presents a challenge for the learner to understand language as native speakers actually use it Listening exercises provide teachers with a means for drawing learners’ attention to new forms (vocabulary, grammar, new interaction patterns) in the language To summarize, listening has an important role both in daily life and in academic contexts as it is crucial for people to sustain effective communication 1.2.2.4 Teaching listening comprehension In spite of the importance of listening in the development of the communicative and cognitive skills, it did not start to take its place in language teaching curriculum until 1970s However, in recent years, with the emphasis given in communication in language teaching, listening started to take its long deserved place in language programs For most second and foreign language skkn learners, being able to communicate in social contexts is one of the most important reasons why they learn a language Through listening, the learners receive input that is essential for language learning to take place Therefore, teaching listening comprehension is important as listening lessons “are a vehicle for teaching elements of grammatical structure and allow new vocabulary items to be contextualized within a body of communicative discourse” (Morley, 2001) In addition, since English is being used as an international language for communication by people from non-native English speaking countries lately, teaching listening has gained more importance lately On the other hand, teaching listening has also been a challenge for language teachers for several reasons Mendelson (1994) proposes three reasons for why listening was poorly taught First of all, listening was not accepted as a separate skill to be taught explicitly for a long time Supporters of the idea argued that language learners would improve their listening skill on their own while they are listening to the teacher during the day Secondly, teachers felt insecure about teaching listening And finally, the traditional materials for language teaching were not efficient enough to teach listening Although it is a challenge to teach listening for many foreign language teachers, there have been many improvements in teaching listening over the years According to Rubin (1994), when teachers and researchers understand the significance of the listening skill in language learning and its role in communication, they start to pay more attention to teaching this skill in language classrooms The more teachers are aware of the stages of the listening lesson, the more beneficial they would be to their students in terms of helping them related to their listening comprehension concerns and needs As the figures illustrate, there are three parts in a usual listening lesson: prelistening, (while) listening and post-listening Pre-listening part, which involves tasks such as activating previous knowledge of the learners and teaching vocabulary, prepares students for the tasks that they are going to while listening When current format of a listening lesson is compared with the early format of a listening lesson, teaching unknown vocabulary items shows difference Field (2008) presents several reasons for not teaching all unknown words Firstly, it is time consuming to teach unknown words Field argues that the time spent for teaching unknown vocabulary can be used for listening to the text again Secondly, it is not like real-life listening since students will encounter different words and try to understand them at the time of speaking Last but not least, by teaching all the words in a text without considering their importance in the text, teachers divert students’ attention to form rather than meaning and that is why Field suggests teaching only critical words which are highly important 10 skkn for students in order to understand the listening text In the while-listening part of the lesson, learners activities such as listening for gist, and sequencing that help them to comprehend the text 1.2.2.5 Listening comprehension problems Studies conducted on listening in the field of second and foreign language learning revealed that listening is one of the most difficult skills for language learners Because of the overemphasis on grammar, reading and vocabulary, learners who learn English as a foreign language have serious problems in listening comprehension Students find some features of listening comprehension easier than others In that sense, some of the main difficulties that the students encounter while listening are: “hearing sounds, understanding intonation and stress, coping with redundancy and noise, predicting, understanding colloquial vocabulary, fatigue, understanding different accents, using visual and aural environmental clues” Underwood (1989) lists the common obstacles that students experience while listening as speed of delivery, not being able to have words repeated, limited vocabulary, failing to follow signals like transitions, lack of contextual knowledge, being able to concentrate, and habits like trying to understand every word in what they hear In answering the question “What is successful listening?”, Anderson and Lynch (2003) emphasize four different ways in which the listener can or cannot process incoming speech: first, the listener may not hear adequately what has been said; second, speech may contain words or phrases that the listener can hear adequately but is unable to understand because of syntactical or semantic problems; third, the listener may perfectly hear and understand the speaker but have switched off consciously or unconsciously; and fourth, the listener attends to the message fully and tries to construct a coherent interpretation from it One of the main problems that English language learners encounter in listening is that there are unfamiliar sounds that appear in English but not in their native language, and this leads to comprehension difficulties The use of intonation, stress and rhythm may also prevent learners’ understanding of the spoken English For a language learner, comprehending the meaning of the spoken language requires more effort when they are compared with native speakers of that language For instance, outside noise or pronunciation differences affect learners more than the native speakers Although learners are able to cope with this situation in their own language First of all, although language learners 11 skkn recognize the words when they see them in written form or pronounced slowly, they cannot understand them just because of the rapid speech or they just not know them Secondly, learners may not be familiar with the soundcombinations, lexis and collocations which help them make guesses to fill the missing parts Not being familiar with the colloquial vocabulary is also one of the problems by itself that students face with Finally, language learners have a tendency to believe that for successful comprehension they have to understand everything For language learners, it is difficult to make predictions, especially if they are not familiar with the commonly used idioms, proverbs and collocations Also, various features of spoken language such as stress and intonation have a significant role for certain situations In addition, trying to interpret unfamiliar lexis and sounds for a long time is very tiring for many language learners The different accents they are exposed to could also be problematic for many language learners English is spoken around the world for communication and they should be provided opportunities to familiarize themselves with different accents which may help them to overcome this problem Another important problem is students’ lack of ability to use the environmental clues to grasp the meaning Since listeners try to catch most of the details in a lesson while listening in a foreign language, they spend more effort than a native speaker does 1.2.3 An overview of picture 1.2.3.1 Definition of picture A picture, as they say, is worth a thousand words But what about the word picture? We’re not going to write a thousand words on picture - although we could Believe us when we say we could So, here’s a briefer word picture (see what we did there?) on the origin of this versatile word In its most general sense, a picture is a visual representation of something, especially in the form of a painting, drawing, photograph, or the like A picture can also refer to a mental image, among other senses One meaning of picture, as a verb, is “to represent something in a picture or pictorially”- pictorial being a related adjective form variously used to refer to pictures The word picture entered English around 1375 - 1425, borrowed directly from the Latin word pictūra, “the act of painting, a painting.” The word is based on picture, the past participle of the verb pingere, meaning “to paint.” The verb could also mean “to draw, embroider, represent,” among other senses 12 skkn The meaning of the word picture has been very stable in English Just as it originally did in the late 1300s, a picture can still refer to a drawing or painting whether it’s your kid’s crayon-scrawled family portrait on your fridge or Leonardo DaVinci’s Mona Lisa in the Louvre Both are masterpieces, as far as we’re concerned Please note, though, that when referring to formal or professional works, we often use the name of the medium (painting, photograph, film), with picture referring to more informal or amateur creations But picture has also been remarkably adaptable, readily lending itself to images created by new technologies: photography, cinema, TV, and all the pictures we take on our smartphones and post on social media DEMONSTRATION 2.1 Lesson plans My students are grade 11, I will select some listening lessons to design the lesson plans so that the use of pictures can be easily applied basing on the “TIENG ANH 11” I want to illustrate this idea by some following examples  For rearranging activity: I take this activity from Unit - TA 11 FRIENDSHIP 13 skkn - First, I ask my students to work in groups to study the given pictures carefully and then try to guess where Lan and Ha met again, and guess and talk about how Minh has been Long’s best friend - Then, I call some groups to give out their ideas, but I have not corrected them yet Just to see if there is any difference among them - Now, I provide the students with the listening tape and they are described in the listening text as they listen to the tape - Finally, I will give out the information about the friendship between Ha and Lan, Minh and Long  For rearranging activity: I take this activity from Unit - TA 11 A PARTY 14 skkn - First, I ask my students to work in groups to study the given pictures carefully and then try to guess the activities to happen in Mai’s birthday party that they think it can be (Note: It’s not important whether their predictions are correct or not) - Then, I call some groups to give out their ideas, but I have not corrected them yet Just to see if there is any difference among them - Now, I provide the students with the listening tape and they are described in the listening text as they listen to the tape - Finally, I will give out the information about Mai’s birthday party  For rearranging activity: I take this activity from Unit - TA 11 COMPETITIONS 15 skkn - First, I ask my students to work in groups to study the given pictures carefully and then try to answer the questions: What is the Boston Marathon? Who you think can take part in the Boston race? (Note: It’s not important whether their predictions are correct or not) - Then, I call some groups to give out their ideas, but I have not corrected them yet Just to see if there is any difference among them - Now, I provide the students with the listening tape and they are described in the listening text as they listen to the tape - Discuss in groups and listen to the tape again to give out the final answer - Finally, I will correct students’ answers  For picking out items from pictures: Unit – TA 11 CELEBRATIONS - First, I will provide my students with pictures - Second, I give them some activities and ask them to work in groups to get familiar with the Japanese people in New Year’s Days - Discuss in groups and listen to the tape again to give out the final answer - Finally, I will correct students ‘answers  For rearranging activity: I take this activity from Unit 10 - TA 11 NATURE IN DANGER 16 skkn - First, I ask my students to look at the provided pictures about some national parks in the United States and some problems which national parks are currently facing - Ask students to work in groups to discuss the differences described in the pictures in groups and answer the questions: Can you name some of the prblems which national parks are curently facing? What should be done to protect the national parks? - Then, I call some groups to give out their ideas, but I have not corrected them yet Just to see if there is any difference among them - Now, I provide the students with the listening tape and they are described in the listening text as they listen to the tape - Discuss in groups and listen to the tape again to give out the final answer - Finally, I will correct students’ answers  For rearranging activity: I take this activity from Unit 13 - TA 11 HOBBIES 17 skkn - First, I will provide my students with pictures - Second, I ask them to work in groups to talk about some activities they usually in their free time - Discuss in groups and listen to the tape to hear a student talk about his hobby Then decide the statements are true or false and write the mising words - Finally, I will correct students’ answers 2.2 The tests Three tests will be designed for the students: one pre-test (without the use of pictures) and two post ones (with using of pictures) The tests remain the same before and after using of pictures The tests are designed basing on the listening sub-skill: Identify the main facts and details, relate cause and effect, identify sequence of events, predicting outcomes, and inferring meaning from the contextual clues First of all, the pre-test is given to the students without the help of pictures as a placement test After a month of teaching with using of pictures (6 lessons), I will deliver the first post test - Achievement test - to the students Then, the first comparison is made basing on the result of the first post test Again, after another month, the students’ listening ability will be tested by the second post - test - Achievement test When I have finished marking the second post - test, the final comparison must be created to show if using of 18 skkn pictures helps improve my students’ listening comprehension 2.3 Student questionnaires I think this method, typically provide the access to a reality to investigate my research questions because using questionnaires with selected questions given to students is the best way to have their answers about their feeling about using of pictures, about the tasks that I often give them or ask them to I will collect data through this method for week in my school The number of closed questions and opened-ended questions written in handouts will be given to my 41 selected grade 11 students The questions should be focus on their feeling about using of pictures DATA ANALYSIS As I have mentioned in Research design, I decide to use students’ questionnaires which is useful because it can be used to present information in a way that allow me to understand the information in a table form as research instruments to collect data for my action research Hence, I will start analyzing the obtained raw data by the use of frequency, percentage and critical discourse analysis of teacher’s diary after collecting the data When the data have already been analyzed, I can conclude about using of pictures in helping my grade 11 students improve their listening comprehension RESEARCH RESULTS The number of students who desire listening lessons Classes Time 11B4 (Frequently using pictures in listening lessons) 11B5 (Rarely using pictures in listening lessons) At the beginning of the school - year 2021 - 2022 13/41 (31.7%) 12/39 (30.7%) At the end of the school - year 2021 - 2022 30/41 (73.1%) 19/39 (48.7%) The data from the table shows that by using pictures in teaching listening skills for the students, I have obtained many positive results Using pictures in lessons textbook 11 really have its effects because the students are active, enthusiastic, excited to learn By using this method, the students who are always afraid, shy, lazy now are active and confident in learning, makes the listening 19 skkn period more and more exciting They were excited in the listening lessons Besides, the students are able to guess and talk about the pictures in a real competitive and friendly atmosphere, which encourages them to learn English more From these activities they can understand English better It is really the motivation to all students when taking part in listening lessons RECOMMENDATIONS I hope that the teaching strategy of using pictures in teaching listening skills will much benefit my students as they have more chances to engage in listening activities Students who are timid, shy and feel less motivated when joining in listening classes of this kind will feel more confident More importantly, competition among the students when talk about the pictures was an important factor to motivate students to work in listening lessons, because it is important for them to be the best and to be recognized Students will be aware of their responsibility in the speaking process.They should understand that one way to improve speaking is practicing with others, interacting with others, and learning from others III CONCLUSION Listening is one of the important language skills to students, to master it requires a lot of time and efforts The problem for both teachers and students in the learning process is to find teaching methods and how to practice listening skills effectively The experience initiative carried out with the purposes 20 skkn mentioned above have already provided several effective suggestions of using pictures for students in listening lessons in English 11 It will be helpful for the students to improve listening ability Therefore, student will be interested in learning English, easy to understand what the teacher said, students aren’t afraid of listening in listening lessons and students will also predict the kind of vocabulary they will be likely to hear It is hoped that with this research, it will give some new ideas on how to improve the students listening skills through pictures and this potential will be realized and to develop the strategies with more students Although the study has accomplished the objectives set at the beginning, it can not avoid some limitations Due to the short time, limit of knowledge and the scope of the study, the study can not cover all the uses of pictures in listening skills and language elements Therefore, further study can focus on the use of pictures as a motivator in reading classes, writing classes, listening classes and language games as an effective technique to teach for students Obviously, mistakes are unavoidable, all comments and remarks on this research will be highly appreciated I would like to hear the comments of all colleagues to make my subject more complete! I hereby declare that this initiative is due to the experience I myself have written, not copy anybody’s I sincerely thank you!     COMMENTS AND ASSESSMENT OF THE SCIENCE COUNCIL Thieu Hoa, May 25th, 2022 The author Trần Thị Thương REFERENCES GA Mueller (1980) “Visual contextual cuea and Listening comprehension: An experiment”, The Modern Language Journal 64 335- 40 Alex Case, (2009) “100 Ways to Improve your TOEIC Listening”Articles - UsingEnglish_com.mht 21 skkn Zhang, J (2000) “Warm-up Exercises in Listening Classes” The Internet TESL Journal Kimble and Garmezy (1963) “Teaching listening comprehension” Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Nathan Gage (1964) ) “Listening” Oxford: Oxford University Press Jerome Bruner (1966) “Teaching and researching listening” Great Britain: Pearson Education Guo, N & Wills, R (2006) “Language Learning” Mendelson (1994) “Teaching listening” New York: Longman Anderson, A & Lynch, T (2003) Listening Oxford: Oxford University Press 10 Nunan (1998) Skills and strategies: Towards a new methodology for listening 11 Cahyono & Widiati (2009) Learning and teaching English: A course for teachers Oxford: Oxford University Press 12 Gramham, S 2006 “Listening Comprehension: The learner’s Perspective.” System 34: 165-82 13.Morley, (2001) Listening Comprehension - Strategies in Second Language Acquisition Applied Linguistics 14 Mendelson (1994): Listening Materials – Dr Jennifer Tan - Language specialist at SEAMEO Relc Singapore 15 Language Testing Materials – Dr Chan Yue Weng - Language specialist at SEAMEO Relc Singapore 16 Action Research Materials –Dr Tan Su Hwi – Language specialists at SEAMEO Relc Singapore 17 The text book of English 11 Appendixes Questionnaires Do you like listening comprehension with using of pictures? Why? Why not? 22 skkn To what extent does using of pictures help you improve your listening comprehension? Explain Do you think that when listening with using of pictures, you become more active and confident? Give your example Does using of pictures help you and your friends become more co-operative? Why? Why not? How you feel about using of pictures in helping you improve your listening comprehension? 23 skkn ... comprehension Therefore, I decided to choose the theme ? ?The effectiveness of using pictures to improve listening skill for the 11 th form students? ?? as the topic of my research AIMS OF THE STUDY The study... after listening to the tapes, or listen to the description of maps or diagrams and students have to draw the pictures they hear It can be seen that the role of the use of pictures in improving students? ??... aware of the stages of the listening lesson, the more beneficial they would be to their students in terms of helping them related to their listening comprehension concerns and needs As the figures