Listening is one of the most important skills. In the process of learning English, if you understand well, learners can communicate in English confidently and effectively. To learn a language, especially English, students must first learn to listen. However, in the English class, listening seems to be overlooked because the language teacher focuses a lot on grammar and reading. Students spend years in middle and high school learning grammar structure and reading skills, rarely practicing speaking or listening. Most of the students do not really study well in English, especially with listening skills; they are not aware of their importance, so they have not spent much time practicing this skill. In such a context, teachers play a key role in guiding, inspiring, and motivating students to perceive and consciously practice listening more and more properly. In this article, the author mentions the dictation listening method as a useful tool to help teachers find suitable resources or design their own dictation listening exercises to teach listening skills more effectively while helping students improve and enhance their English listening practice skills.
CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale Listening is one of the most important skills In the process of learning English, if you understand well, learners can communicate in English confidently and effectively To learn a language, especially English, students must first learn to listen However, in the English class, listening seems to be overlooked because the language teacher focuses a lot on grammar and reading Students spend years in middle and high school learning grammar structure and reading skills, rarely practicing speaking or listening Most of the students not really study well in English, especially with listening skills; they are not aware of their importance, so they have not spent much time practicing this skill In such a context, teachers play a key role in guiding, inspiring, and motivating students to perceive and consciously practice listening more and more properly In this article, the author mentions the dictation listening method as a useful tool to help teachers find suitable resources or design their own dictation listening exercises to teach listening skills more effectively while helping students improve and enhance their English listening practice skills While reading and writing skills can be directly observed, listening is an abstract and complex process of identifying, understanding, and interpreting spoken language Many students have serious hearing problems Choosing the right method has great significance in developing listening skills and improving students' comprehensive foreign language learning efficiency Dictation is one of the teaching techniques that can be used By using dictation, students not only sit and listen to the material but also focus on the phrases, sentences, and clauses they hear in short-term memory and repetition This study shows us the importance of dictation techniques and demonstrates that dictation techniques are important This technique has potential for learners It helps to improve listening skills effectively and positively The study attempts to investigate the impact of dictation use and, ultimately, to define an overarching definition of dictation, the advantages and challenges of dictation, and strategies for dictation For the above reasons, the topic "An investigation into the effects of applying the dictation technique in improving the listening skills of English-majored juniors at the Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh" City" was made 1.2 Research Objectives This study aimed to explore the definitions of spelling methods In addition, this study was conducted to understand the benefits and effectiveness of this method in improving listening ability Besides, explore the limitations and challenges that this method faces in helping students learn easily avoid errors when applying 1.3 Research questions: The study mainly focused on the following three questions: What is dictation technique in listening skill? 2. What are the benefits and challenges of applying the dictation technique in listening skills of English-majored juniors at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City? How can we apply dictation technique effectively in listening skill? 1.4 Scope of the study This study was limited to third-year students majoring in English at the University of Industry in Ho Chi Minh City Furthermore, these students are using dictation to improve their listening skills This study was limited to a specific number of students The researcher decided to select 120 third-year students to conduct an online survey through a Google Form in order to collect the data that they needed CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Definition of keys 2.1.1 Listening 2.1.1.1 Definition of listening There are countless definitions of the term "listening” The first and most fundamental skill that beginners must learn in order to learn a new language is listening Being a receptive talent, it allows language learners to pick up new words from what they have already heard or listened to The capacity for production is influenced by the capacity for receiving If they have high listening abilities, they will comprehend and even be proficient in speaking and writing, which are productive skills According to Underwood (in Gilakjani, 2011), listening is an action that involves paying attention to the speaker and attempting to interpret what we hear Rost (1994) explains that listening is an activity that helps students understand their environment Listening is also a necessary element in creating effective communication Despite the fact that every researcher has their own definition of listening, all studies demonstrate that listening is the process of recognizing and understanding what others are saying The act of understanding vocabulary and grammatical structures, identifying different sounds, and interpreting stress and intonation may all be summed up as hearing due to the aforementioned components The definitions given above lead the researcher to the conclusion that listening is the capacity to recognize and understand what others are saying Listening is the process of interpreting spoken language, which includes recognizing sound discourses, comprehending the meaning of specific words, and comprehending the grammar of sentences that may be used in a conversation or discourse 2.1.1.2 Significance of Listening According to Rost (1994), listening is vital for language acquisition since it gives students input and is crucial for their language development Wilson (2008) listed a few more justifications for listening, including information collection, enjoyment, agreement, appraisal, and criticism In addition, the other reason for listening is to improve speaking skills by improving pronunciation Krashen (1985) and Hamouda (2013) contend that having good listening abilities is crucial for receiving information that is easy to comprehend If there is no input, learning will not take place According to Hasan (2000) and Hamouda (2013), listening comprehension creates the ideal circumstances for the development of other language abilities Listening comprehension is crucial since it is a mechanism by which we receive input, and without it, learning cannot take place, according to Rost (1994) and Ziane (2011) According to Doff (1995) and Ziane (2011), speaking development is significantly influenced by listening That is, until we improve our listening skills, we cannot improve our speaking abilities According to Rost (2002), mastery of speaking is correlated with growth in listening He proceeded by saying that, as listening is the language ability that is most commonly employed in everyday life, it is also the most crucial talent to develop This presumption holds that one of the essential skills for a language learner to gain input during the learning process is listening In fact, listening input has a significant impact on both written and spoken output Teachers and students should pay close attention when listening in order to achieve their oral and written goals 2.1.1.3 Difficulties in listening Azmi Bingol, Celik, Yidliz, and Tugrul Mart (2014) assert that there are many challenges that students may have when trying to understand what they are hearing The idea is to be aware of these challenges and make an effort to resolve them 2.1.1.3.1 Quality of Recorded Materials Hasan (2000) noted that the challenges students have in listening comprehension connected to the hearing material include new terms, lengthy, complicated texts, and challenging grammatical structures Students’ difficulties were related to the listener In addition to the listening content, the pupils had issues with the listener It implies that their difficulties with hearing and understanding were caused by themselves According to Asmawati (2017), a listener's limited command of the English language makes it difficult for them to understand what is being said 2.1.1.3.2 Accent Rosa (2012), who argues that poor pronunciation is the main problem leading to the students’ difficulty in listening comprehension, Kurniawati (2015) mentioned a few factors that cause students’ difficulties in listening comprehension: declining health conditions or illnesses, elusive material, lack of support, and lack of training to improve English listening, whether with their classmates or with native speakers Munro and Derwing (1999) assert that excessive accented speech can cause serious comprehension loss Regional accents can affect the spoken message that listeners comprehend, and known accents are simpler to grasp than unfamiliar accents, claim Bloomfield et al (2010) According to the book "Accessing Listening," when listeners first hear a strange accent, like Indian English, after studying American English for a long time, the new accent completely disrupts the listening comprehension process and prevents them from understanding the lecture in its entirety (Buck, 2001).Azmi Bingol, Celik, Yidliz, and Tugrul Mart (2014) assert that there are several barriers to listening comprehension that students may experience The objective is to be aware of these challenges and make an effort to address them 2.1.1.3.3 Memory All listeners use a set of cognitive processes known as memory, commonly referred to as working memory, to interpret, temporarily store, and remember information (Baddeley & Hitch, 1974) The relationship between working memory and listeners' understanding of second language has been shown in a number of research According to a study by Miyake and Friedman (1998), listeners with greater memory capacity were more effective at understanding the message while it was being delivered in a second language According to Leeser (2007), the performance for common themes improves when working memory span improves during the listening comprehension process, particularly in the case of short term memory Therefore, it is anticipated that increasing memory capacity and cognitive skills will have a positive influence on listening comprehension in foreign languages 2.1.2 Dictation technique 2.1.2.1 Definition of Dictation technique Johansson (1973) argued that dictation should be changed for more advanced pupils because it is only suitable for starting students He suggested partial dictation as a solution to this issue Test- takers who opt for partial dictation receive a passage with some ostensibly challenging language passages blanked out The entire chapter is recorded on tape and is only spoken aloud to testtakers once Students must listen to the recording and mark the passage with the missing information Richards, Platt, and Weber (in Fachrurrarzy, 1989) noted that dictation is a method used in language instruction and language assessment in which a material is read out to the students, with pauses when the students are required to try to properly record what they heard Grammar and vocabulary may be learned using dictation as a model for learning English phonetics Dictation has also been considered an effective tool that can help teachers and learners during language teaching and learning processes to promote learning (Hassankiadeh, 2013: 129) Hassankiadeh (2013: 130) highlights the fact that, although some research focusing on dictation as a tool for learning rather than merely a testing procedure, there is little focus on the methods, tactics, and strategies that might be employed in language schools Additionally, Richards and Schmidt (2010) pointed out that the dictation approach requires students to write down exactly what they heard amid pauses after hearing a passage read aloud to them It is a technique that may be applied to language instruction or testing In short, the act of decoding continuous sound sequences and rebuilding them into written forms like words, phrases, and sentences is known as dictation 2.1.2.2 Kinds of dictation technique: Dictation has been used in different forms In reality, conventional dictation is the fundamental type of dictation; however, additional types have developed to make up for it According to Farhady, Jafarpur, and Birjandi (2007), they include partial dictation, prompted imitation, dictocomp, and dictation with competing noise a Partial dictation The construct validity of partial dictation as a test of listening comprehension in English as a foreign language was investigated by Cai (2012) The study's objective was to show that partial dictation items can assess higher-order listening comprehension skills He came up with two different dictation items The initial type of test was a typical partial dictation test While holding the written form with gaps, the students listened to a tape Sigott (2004) suggested that it is unlikely that partial dictation is a true reduced redundancy test since test developers choose which parts are "challenging" and should be removed rather than deleting them randomly Further, he argues that Johansson's (1973) assertion that partial dictation is a test of general language Competency should be subjected to more rigorous empirical tests because deletion in partial dictation is not done at random We want to show that partial dictation is valid according to the criteria in this study b Elicited imitation In terms of the information supplied to the examinee, this is comparable to dictation, but it differs in terms of the response method In this scenario, the examinee hears the information, just like in conventional dictation, but is required to repeat it or else recall what was said rather than write it down In this instance, the students listen to the material, but instead of writing it down, they are asked to repeat it or otherwise recount what was said Nasution (2017) describes this as a research technique intended to reveal learners' grammatical competence by having them repeat sentences The rationale behind this is that, when their capacity is strained, their errors will reveal their underlying rule system (p 17–18) c Dicto-comp Chun (2010) shows that in the dicto-comp, the learners have to remember the ideas in a text of more than one hundred words and express them in the words of the original or in their own words (p 120) d Dictation with competing noise Noise dictation is another name for this kind of dictation The insertion of noise during dictation is meant to mimic a natural environment In this sort of dictation, the examinees are given instructions to listen to a text one or more times as it is read out or played back on tape at a conversational pace They are then instructed to recall what they heard and write it down 2.2 Results of previous studies 2.2.1 The benefits of applying the dictation technique in listening skill Dictation is a popular technique with positive effects that has been widely used Therefore, many previous studies have been conducted and discovered various advantages of this technique Most studies show that using dictation makes students' ability to hear the target language more successful Rahmat (2018) conducted a study with the title "The Effect of Using Educational Multimedia in Dictation on Students’ Listening Comprehension" A listening comprehension test was used as one of the research tools in this study In the academic year 2014–2015, the study conducted a survey of 175 students (containing an experiment group and a controlled group) at MA DARUL HIKMAH Pekanbaru Their findings showed that this technique, a form of listening exercise, was a useful instructional strategy for helping students increase their listening comprehension, particularly when learning narrative audio and text Yet, the majority of the study's conclusions only touch on the most basic issues without stressing more significant ones Hariswan Putra Jaya, Nova Lingga Pitaloka and Alhenri Wijaya (2020), they conducted the research with the title: Running Dictation to Develop Students' Listening Comprehension Ability The goal of the study was to determine if employing the running dictation approach improved students' listening comprehension and their perceptions of the technique This study focused on 19 second-semester FKIP Sriwijaya University Class II B students who were enrolled in the Intermediate Listening course A questionnaire and a hearing test were used to gather the data 50 questions made up a listening test, which was separated into three categories: monologues, lengthy discussions, and short conversations A questionnaire was used to find out how the students felt about utilizing running dictation The researchers employed descriptive statistics, percentages, paired sample t-tests, normality tests, and quantitative data analysis The study's findings revealed that the second-semester pupils significantly improved after applying An additional study on the benefits of dictation techniques conducted by Chun (2010), developing Intensive Listening Skills: a case study of employing Rapid Speech for long-term dictation jobs This study found that dictation encourages students to pay attention and concentrate on relevant words and expressions, which is similar to the findings of the other studies stated above Students can also identify their listening process flaws Dictation practice also improves good memory skills for the target language items and encourages the capacity to draw conclusions from context The study used a range of tools, including dictation practice and three questionnaires, to collect both research data Unfortunately, only 61 people simultaneously participated in the inquiry By drawing general conclusions, the researcher will not be able to successfully complete the study's objective with a significant impact size It is believed that students at IUH would gain from adopting dictation method based on prior research on the benefits of this methodology First off, kids' listening comprehension is enhanced through dictation Second, by encouraging focus, precision, and correctness in listening activities, students have the opportunity to apply their understanding of vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar Finally, learning new terminology related to the languages used in contemporary science, technology, social, and economic fields The next step is for students to identify their areas of weakness when it comes to hearing and comprehending English spoken by native speakers and work harder to develop their listening skills Dictation practice also enhances good memory skills for the target language and encourages the capacity to draw conclusions from context 2.2.2 The challenges of applying the dictation technique in listening skill In connection with previous research results, many researchers have conducted research to explore the impact of dictation on language proficiency learning The majority of the students at MADARUL HIKMAH Pekanbaru were found to be unable to grasp English conversation when they were listening to the dialogue of an English movie that the instructor had showed them, according to an observation that was conducted on Thursday, January 22, 2015 Only about students, or 20% of the students, were able to so They could hear the movie's English dialogue, but they were unable to understand it, so they preferred to read the translation script at the bottom of the TV screen That implies that the lessons they have been learning in school for a very long time will not be particularly helpful to them in real life Additionally, it demonstrates that English language instruction is ineffective there Besides, Fatimah Mulya Sari conducted research with the title" Improving Students’ Listening Ability and Thought Dictation Technique at the First Year School." In this study, the researcher discovered certain issues with pupils who had trouble writing whole sentences The researcher needs more time to persuade the students to discuss their issues In contrast, more than half of the kids in this class participated in class activities and understood the dictation activity Dictation is a useful teaching method that may be used to increase students' listening skills since it can encourage active engagement from the students and improve their listening skills during the session According to Takeuchi (1997) and Kiany and Shiramiry (2002), it has been demonstrated that dictation can help EFL students perform better on tests of listening comprehension Previous research suggests that juniors at IUH majoring in English may face difficulties when participating in dictation activities due to poor visual thinking and memory capabilities This can lead to meaning errors, structural errors, phonological and spelling errors, and the dialect and pronunciation of the native speaker Additionally, poor memory capabilities make it difficult for people to recollect information, construct words, organize written sentences, and assemble phrases properly 2.2.3 The use of dictation technique in listening skill Dictation, according to Zhiqian (1989), can assist both the instructor and the students in effectively fulfilling the learning objectives According to this, dictation is therefore a particularly effective tool for teaching English effectively fulfilling the learning objectives According to this, dictation is therefore a particularly effective tool for teaching English Dictation may be used to teach listening in a variety of ways, including: - First off, dictation may be used to instruct pupils of any academic level Dictation is effective even in very large classes - Second, dictating and listening are quite similar The kids' attention is completely concentrated when the teacher dictates anything to them - Thirdly, dictation encourages pupils to actively engage in listening exercises Dictation is very beneficial for helping the students master the use of a language - Fourthly, dictation enables students to transfer the spoken language to the written language In creating the written language, the students are trained to reproduce spoken language based on their comprehension - Finally, practicing dictation allows you to improve your vocabulary, reading speed, and a number of other linguistic skills, including spelling and punctuation Dictation is therefore helpful for learning languages You should concentrate on acquiring the idea of a book while reading it for the first time in its entirety (Wang Ping, Liu Hongquan, 2008) To correctly finish certain words and take some notes while listening to the main, the second and third times are repeated in phrases Students should practice both dictation and listening while listening, and if the group is paused, they should use the pauses to record the content Verify the content's major points one last time, paying close attention to grammar, spelling, and other linguistic errors We must hone our abilities while also acquiring the fundamental knowledge necessary to listen well By watching movies and listening to music, we can improve our listening abilities and become more accustomed to the accent, speech rate, and pronunciation of native speakers Moreover, keep expanding your vocabulary As listening is an abstract activity, it is impossible to comprehend the entirety of the text if you lack the vocabulary necessary to comprehend the context You than partial dictation As can be seen, this is also the type of spelling exercise that is popular with teachers In addition, dicto-comp (to rebuild the dictated passage using your own words) and dictation with competing noise (dicto-comp and dictation with competing noise are similar, except students listen to a text with an extra noise in the background) are also frequently used, with rates of 57.5% and 52.5%, respectively In conclusion, it can be seen that teachers are also applying more teaching techniques to improve the learning status of students This method also has a positive effect, so teachers apply it The results show that this method is becoming increasingly popular with people Question 3: How often you practice dictation technique in learning listening skill by yourself? Figure 5: Students' level of dictation practice in self-study listening skills Options Participants Percentage Everyday 12 10% Few times a week 62 51,7% Once a week 24 20% Few times a month 21 17% Never 0,8% Table 3.3 Students' level of dictation practice in self-study listening skills The pie chart shows data on how often students use dictation when learning listening skills According to the students' responses, the level of several times a week accounted for the highest