Trang 1 --- GRADUATION PAPER FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS A STUDY ON TECHNIQUES TO IMPROVE LISTENING SKILL BY WATCHING ENGLISH TALK SHOWS FOR THE SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT HUNG
HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES - GRADUATION PAPER FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS A STUDY ON TECHNIQUES TO IMPROVE LISTENING SKILL BY WATCHING ENGLISH TALK SHOWS FOR THE SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION (NGHIÊN CỨU NHỮNG KĨ THUẬT ĐỂ CẢI THIỆN KỸ NĂNG NGHE THÔNG QUA VIỆC XEM CÁC CHƯƠNG TRÌNH DIỄN ĐÀN BẰNG TIẾNG ANH CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ HAI CHUYÊN NGÀNH NGÔN NGỮ ANH TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC SƯ PHẠM KỸ THUẬT HƯNG YÊN) Supervisor: Hoang Thi Ngoc Lan, MA Student: Le Thi Linh Student number: 11317033 Hung Yen – 2021 HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES - GRADUATION PAPER FIELD: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS A STUDY ON TECHNIQUES TO IMPROVE LISTENING SKILL BY WATCHING ENGLISH TALK SHOWS FOR THE SECOND-YEAR ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT HUNG YEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION (NGHIÊN CỨU NHỮNG KĨ THUẬT ĐỂ CẢI THIỆN KỸ NĂNG NGHE THÔNG QUA VIỆC XEM CÁC CHƯƠNG TRÌNH DIỄN ĐÀN BẰNG TIẾNG ANH CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ HAI CHUYÊN NGÀNH NGÔN NGỮ ANH TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC SƯ PHẠM KỸ THUẬT HƯNG YÊN) Student: Le Thi Linh Student number: 11317033 Supervisor: Hoang Thi Ngoc Lan, MA Hung Yen – 2021 i DECLARATION I certify that the thesis entitled “A study on techniques to improve listening skill by watching English talk shows for second-year English major students at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education” is the result of my own research and the substance of this thesis has not been submitted for a degree to any other university or institution Hung Yen, May 2021 Signature Le Thi Linh ii ABSTRACT This study investigates techniques to improve listening skill by watching English Talk Shows for the second-year English major students at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education The data was gathered by survey questionnaires, which were delivered to 64 second-year English major students of FFL at UTEHY My Hao campus and Khoai Chau campus, but only 40 of them used watching English talk shows to learn listening skill The interview was also used to collect information from second-year students of FFL at UTEHY The findings revealed that the majority of students regarded listening skills as an extremely difficult task, and that they were likely to make a variety of mistakes during the listening and writing down processes It additionally found that these students have practiced in their own ways As a result of my research, I suggested some techniques to people who want to improve their listening skills by watching English talk shows iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The completion of this graduation paper owns the help of people who have enthusiastically contributed in different ways First of all, I would like to express my sincere thanks to my university - Hung Yen University of Technology and Education and the team of teachers in the Faculty of Foreign Languages for giving me an opportunity to make use of my speciality that I am educated here It was a great honour for me to make up for this study based on my knowledge that I have learned at my university Next, I would like to express my profound gratitude to my supervisor, Mrs Hoang Thi Ngoc Lan, M.A who gives me a great deal of support and guidance Without her help, my thesis would have never been completed In my studies, it is inevitable that the ideas of many writers in the field are reflected and developed To all the authors of the publications in the list of references, I offer my sincere thanks I also would like to express my special thanks to the second-year students in the Faculty of Foreign Languages at Hung Yen University, both My Hao campus and Khoai Chau campus who support me with my research Last but not least, I am extremely grateful to my parents and friends for their love, sympathy, support and companionship in this time They created the best conditions in terms of time and spirit for me to my graduation thesis Besides, they are not only my companions but also the motivation and purpose for me to try to complete this research Their beliefs were the backbone of my research iv TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION i ABSTRACT ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES vii LIST OF ABBREVIATION viii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale of the study 1.2 Aims of the study 1.3 Research questions 1.4 Scope of the study 1.5 Method of the study 1.5.1 Survey questionnaire 1.5.2 Interview 1.6 Design of the study CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Overview of listening skill 2.1.1 Definitions of listening 2.1.2 The importance of listening skill 2.1.3 The difficulties of listening 2.2 Overview of English Talk Shows 10 2.2.1 What are talk shows? 10 2.2.2 Popular English Talk Shows 11 2.2.2.1 English talk Shows produce in foreign countries (Native speaker) 11 2.2.2.2 English talk Shows produce in Viet Nam (Vietnamese speak English) 12 2.3 Applying English Talk Shows in learning English 14 v 2.3.1 Difficulties when listening English Talk Shows 14 2.3.2 Techniques applying English talk shows to learn listening skill 15 2.4 Summary 17 CHAPTER 3: THE STUDY 18 3.1 Participants of the study 18 3.2 Methodology 18 3.3 Survey questionnaire 19 3.4 Interview 19 3.5 Data analysis 19 3.5.1 Data from the survey questionnaire 19 3.5.1.1: Students’ attitudes towards improving listening skill by watching English talk shows 20 3.5.1.2: The difficulties of the second-year English major students when using English Talk Shows to improve listening skill 23 3.5.1.3: The techniques of using English talk shows to improve listening skill 27 3.5.2 Data from the interview 29 3.6 Findings 31 3.6.1: The positive attitudes towards English talk shows to improve listening skill 31 3.6.2: The challenges that the second-year English major students at UTEHY face when using English talk shows to improve listening skill 31 3.6.3: The useful techniques for the second-year English major students at UTEHY 32 3.7 Recommendations 32 3.8 Summary 33 CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSION 34 4.1 Summary of the study 34 vi 4.2 Limitations of the study and suggestions for further study 35 REFERENCES 36 APPENDIX 1: SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENTS I APPENDIX 2: QUESTION FOR INTERVIEW FOR STUDENTS V vii LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES Chart 1: The number of students watched English talk shows to learn listening skill Chart 2: The attraction of English talk shows to students Chart 3: The time per day students watch English talk shows at home Chart 4: Students’ frequency of meeting difficulties when watching English talk shows Chart 5: Self-assessment of students about their study methods Table 1: The subtitles students use frequently when listening to English Talk Shows Table 2: Students' preferences for the types of talk shows they prefer to watch Table 3: Students’ difficulties when watching English talk shows Table 4: Techniques used when watching English talk shows 10 Table 5: Students’ activities while watching English talk shows viii LIST OF ABBREVIATION UTEHY: Hung Yen University of Technology and Education FFL: Faculty of Foreign Languages M.A: Master of art in teaching English as a foreign language TAK17: the second-year English major students at the Faculty of Foreign Languages at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education 29 Others (please write specify here) ……………………… (Note: ss = students) Table 5: Students’ activities while watching English talk shows It can be seen clearly that students usually pay much attention to pronunciation, stress and intonation when watching English talk, with 60% The activity- take notes is used frequently by students, which made up 72.5%> Whereas, for other activities, there were just less than 45% and down Especially, they did not often practice everyday Basing on these gathered data, it can be included that although they have practiced themselves by some ways, they could not improve dramatically 3.5.2 Data from the interview The interview consists of questions for junior students in UTEHY Because of the Sars-covid-2 pandemic, I interviewed by calling phone to them (2 students on campus and students on campus 2) and collected lots of useful information Question 1: What you think about using English talk shows to learn listening skill? In this question, most of the students said that learning listening skill by watching English talk shows is very interesting One of them said that learning listening skill by English talk shows is interesting This method helps to improve the listening skill as it is the input and output of the learning process Question 2: Do you think English talk shows help improve listening skill? From interview, all of students admitted that English talk shows helps them to improve listening skill Student 1: “Of course! English talk shows helps me get accustomed to English intonation So my listening comprehension is better than before.” Student 2: “Yes! It helps me a lot in improving my listening skill, mostly building a wide vocabulary.” Student 3: “Right! English talk shows help me better on level of listening Because, I’M not surprised when I hear.” 30 Student 4: “Of course, I got cultivated my listening skill through English talk shows that I could realize a special thing from English talk shows giving for me.” Student 5: “It helps me get accustomed to English intonation” Question 3: How often you watch English talk shows? For this question, students said that they often watch English talk shows, about 30 minutes to an hour, mainly watch English talk shows on YouTube There is one student spends about 15 minutes every day to watch it and this student spend more time to watch it on the weekend We can see, they are practice listening everyday but efficiency is not high Question 4: What are your difficulties in learning listening skill by English talk shows? In general, watching English talk shows help students improve their listening skill a lot but also bring many difficulties for them After interviewing, I collected the following difficulties: Student 1: “During watching process, fast speech rates and new words are problems I got that make me less focus on listening” Student 2: “Firstly, the talking speed of the characters is too fast Second, the pronunciation of native speakers is difficult to listen And the last one, I didn't have many opportunities to use the structures that I listened in the English talk shows.” Student 3: “My limited vocabulary is a big difficulty when I learning by watching English talk shows However, I lose this difficulty after many times watching a same English talk show.” Student 4: “When watching, I often lack of concentration in English talk shows which is not my favorite topic” Student 5: “I have trouble trying to understand every single word when I hear it” Question5: In your opinion, what techniques you often use to apply English talk shows to learn listening skill? With this interviewing question, most 2nd year students have a unique solution to the problem they are facing Since then I have gathered techniques suitable for 2nd year students to improve their listening skill, namely: Student 1: “In my opinion, we should try to get key word that you can improve your level on listening skill” 31 Student 2: “From my point of view, we should watch the subtitles and watch the same program many times to memorize the sentence structure and intonation they use And we should choose the talk show which is difficulty suitable for our ability” Student 3: “From the second-year students' view, we should watch English talk shows which have us idol, because it makes a big motivation to focus on listening” Student 4: “Practice make Perfect So we should be watching English talk shows every day at least 30 minutes per day.” Student 5: “From my own difficulty, we should not try to understand every single word We should take the keywords and take notes” 3.6 Findings In finding out, we are going to discuss the findings of the study in order to answer three research questions proposed in the introduction 3.6.1: The positive attitudes towards English talk shows to improve listening skill In general, it was found that there was a positive attitude of students towards English talk shows to improve listening skill Most of the students confirmed that they have often learnt English listening skills by watching English talk shows However, with found data after, it is possible that students have faced many difficulties in using this method, which will be given and discussed in the next part 3.6.2: The challenges that the second-year English major students at UTEHY face when using English talk shows to improve listening skill Most of the second-year English major students at UTEHY thought listening skill very difficult but very interesting However, their daily practice is still difficult Some main reasons found in the study are: fast speed speaking, a lot of new words, limited practice, limited vocabulary, which have affected students a lot during their English listening skill learning process In addition, the subjective factor is also the main element making students’ English listening skill learning process harder In particular, the students always tried to understand every single word, so they usually missed the speaker's speech They could not recognize English sounds and had problems with different accents Besides, they usually tried to get the meaning of the sentence, often found it hard to capture all the information and not predict what the 32 speaker was going to say They usually had limited vocabulary and needed to listen many times to understand Moreover, as can be seen from the study’s result, most students had difficulty with following the speed at which speakers speak 3.6.3: The useful techniques for the second-year English major students at UTEHY Basing on found challenges in the study, some techniques to solve those challenges were given and discussed First of all, with the difficulty of lack of concentration, the reasonable technique is to watch episodes with celebrities who are students' idols In this way, it can motivate the students to pay more attention to the show According to the survey, the suggested technique for dealing with the problem of too fast speed is to control the speed of speech with the rewind button Next, for the difficulty of lack of vocabulary, the best way may be to practice more regularly Students should build a wide range of vocabulary, practice themselves at home to widen their knowledge Then, with the difficulty of lacking following over the speed at which speakers speak, the found technique is to listen to the way native speakers make sounds disappear or join them together Besides, they should create a habit of listening and taking note of the keywords during watching English talk shows, then check the content by looking at English subtitles In conclusion, it is generally said that existent challenges were solved with the suggested techniques above The author hopes that these suggested techniques can assist students in practicing listening skills by watching English talk shows 3.7 Recommendations Due to the information from the consultation with second-year English major students at UTEHY, the majority of the students say that they have to face a variety of problems when using English talk shows on listening skill Based on difficulties, the author will give some techniques for students effectively with English talk shows in listening skill Watch episodes with celebrities you like to motivate yourself to focus on English talk shows Control the speed of speech with the rewind button Building a wide vocabulary 33 Try to listen and take note of the keywords Grasping the content of it and then checking it with the typescript Listen to the way native speakers make sounds disappear or join them together Watching English Talk Shows everyday with a clear plan 3.8 Summary In this chapter, I have presented some suggestive techniques to improve listening skill to the students at UTEHY In the next part, the writing gives conclusion with the major findings, limitations of the study and some recommendations for further studies 34 CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSION This chapter will deal with a summary of the study, limitations of the study and some suggestions for further studies 4.1 Summary of the study The main purposes of this study are to point out the importance, difficulties which the second-year English major students at UTEHY have when learning listening skill by watching English talk shows Besides, the researcher suggests the most effective techniques for them to improve their listening skill when watching English talk shows To achieve this aim, the study is divided into four chapters with their own purpose The first chapter is an introduction that contains the rationale, aims, research questions, scope, and methods for the study The second chapter presents the literature review such as the theoretical background, definition, types, process, importance, difficulties and strategies of title The following chapter is a study chapter that demonstrates the study's method, data analysis, discussion, and strategies based on the questionnaire and interview This chapter also finds out the answers for three research questions The last chapter contains the summary, the limitations and the suggestions for further study After all the data collected from the two research instruments (survey questionnaire and interview) are analyzed, the author finds out some major findings which shed light on the research questions are revealed below: The study has been completed to help the second-year English major at UTEHY to avoid difficulties that they may have in learning to listen as well as improve their listening skill by watching English talk shows The findings show that the students regularly watch English talk shows and consider it to be an effective way to improve their listening skill It helps students become familiar with the different accents and intonations, the real speed of speech as well as learn more vocabulary While watching English talk shows, the difficulties that students often face can be listed, such as limited vocabulary and background knowledge, different accents, fast speech rate, etc 35 The researcher also finds some solutions to enhance students to improve their listening skill by watching English talk show, including taking notes while listening, brainstorming vocabulary related to the show, concentrating on what students like, etc 4.2 Limitations of the study and suggestions for further study In the process of conducting the study, although the researcher has made a great effort, there are still some limitations Due to the limitation of time, experience and knowledge, the researcher only focuses on the second-year English major students, so their opinions about improving listening skill by watching English talk shows could not be considered as representative of all students learning English In addition, data collection was done through questionnaires and observation As can be seen from the students' questionnaires, the information to be obtained was quite limited and not accurate Some students can answer things that they actually not or they misunderstand some Because of these constraints, the results of data analysis cannot be generalized Moreover, this researcher does not cover all the uses of English talk shows in four language skills Therefore, the researcher hopes that further studies will be carried out on other aspects, such as authentic video material to find out some interesting and useful methods which can be used to improve listening skill for all English major students In conclusion, despite some limitations, the author hopes this study will be able to contribute to improving listening skill in English for the second year English major students at UTEHY 36 REFERENCES Anderson, K., & Lynch, T (1998) Listening Oxford: Oxford University Press Brett, P A (1997), A comparative study of the effects of the use of multimedia on listening comprehension, System Volume 25, Issue March 1997, pp 39-54 Brown, G & G Yule (1983), Discourse analysis, Cambridge University Press Dunkel, Patricia A (1991), Listening in the Native and Second/Foreign Language: Toward an Integration of Research and Practice, TESOL Quarterly, Vol.25, No3, pp 431-457 Ferris, D & Tagg, T (1996a) Academic listening/speaking tasks for ESL students: Problems, suggestions, and implications TESOL Quarterly, 30, 297320 Ferris, D (1998) Students' views of academic aural/oral skills: A comparative needs analysis TESOL Quarterly, 32, 289-318 Gilakjani,A.P and Ahmadi, M.R (2011) A Study of Factors Affecting EFL Learners' English Listening Comprehension and the Strategies for Improvement Journal of Language Teaching and Research, Vol 2, No 5, pp 977- 988 Gilbert, M B (1989) Perceptions of Listening Behaviors of School Principals School Organisation 9, 271- 282 Howatt, A and J Dakin (1974), Language laboratory materials, ed J P B Allen, S P.B Allen, and S.P Corder 10 Italki (2021) retrieved from https://www.italki.com/article/1202/10-tips-to-usetalk-shows-to-transform-your-listening?hl=en 11 Martin, Robert "Oral communication," English Language Arts Concept Paper Number Portland, Oregon: State Department of Education, 1987 9pp [ED 284 314] 12 McCarthy, M (1991), Discourse analysis for Language Teachers, Cambridge University Press 13 Morley, Joan (2001), Aural comprehension instruction: principles and practices, Third Edition, Heinle & Heinle Publisher P70 37 14 Morly J (1991) Listening comprehension in second Foreign Language Instruction InM Celece- Murcia (ED), Teaching English as a second or foreign language (pp81-106) 15 Murphy, D and Candlin, C.N (1976) Engineering Discourse and Listening Comprehension; K.A.A.u Project in Listening Comprehension First annual report Department of linguistics and modern English language: University of Lancaster 16 Rankin, Paul T "The importance of listening," English Journal, 19, October, 1928, pp 623-630 17 Richard Nordquist (2019) (Ph.D., Rhetoric and English, University of Georgia) , retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/listening-communication-term1691247 18 Rivers Wilga, M.(1986) Teaching Foreign Language Skill., The University of Chicago Press, p.157 19 Ronal, Katharine, and Rosklley, Hephzibah "listening as an act of composing" Paper presented at the 36th conference on College Composition and Communication, 1985.12pp (ED 257.094) 20 Rost, M (1994), Introducing Listening, London: Penguin, pp 141-142 21 Rost, M (2009) Teacher Development Interactive: Listening White Plains NY: Pearson Longman 22 Strother, Deborah Burnett "Practical applications of research: on listening," Phi Delta Kappan, 68 (8), April 1987, pp 625-628 23 Thomlison's (1984), T Dean "Relational Listening: Theoretical and Practical Considerations." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the 5th International Listening Association 1984 30pp [ED 257 24 Underwood M (1989) “Teaching listening” New York: Longman 25 Vogely, A (1995) Perceived strategy use during performance on three authentic listening tasks The Modern Language Journal 79 (1), 41–56 26 Willis, J (1981) Teaching English through English England: Longman p134 27 Wilt, Miriam E "A study of teacher awareness of listening as a factor in elementary education," Journal of Educational Research, 43 (8), April, 1950, pp 626-636 38 28 Wolvin, A., Coakley, C (1991) A Survey of the Status of Listening Training in Some Fortune 500 Corporations Communication Education, US I APPENDIX 1: SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENTS Hello! My full name is Le Thi Linh, I am from class TAK15.1, Faculty of Foreign Language at Hung Yen University Technology and Education This survey questionnaire is designed for my study entitled “A study on techniques to improve listening skill by watching English talk shows for second year English major students at Hung Yen university of Technology and Education” Your support in completing this survey will be appreciated Please select the answer by tick the checklist items or express your ideas in the blanks All the information provided by you is for learning purposes only and you can be confident that your identity will not be disclosed in any discussion of data Your answer will help me a lot in the research process Thank you for your cooperation! Please tick ( ) for each response that you choose I General information ❑ Male Your gender: ❑ Female Your age: ………………………………… How long have you been learning English? …………………………… II The survey questionnaire PART A: Students’ attitudes towards improving listening skill by watching English talk shows Have you ever watched English talk shows to improve listening skill? ❑ Yes ❑ No What you think about improving listening skill through watching English talk shows? ❑ Very interesting ❑ Interesting ❑ Normal ❑ Not very interesting What is the subtitle you usually use when practising listening by English Talk Shows? ❑ English Subtitle ❑ Vietnamese Subtitle ❑ No Using Subtitle II How much time a day you spend on watching English talk shows at home? ❑ More than an hour ❑ 30 minutes - an hour ❑ Less than half an hour ❑Never PART B: The difficulties of the second-year English major students when using English Talk Shows to improve listening skill How often you have difficulties in using English talk shows to improve listening skill? ❑ Always ❑ Usually ❑ Sometimes ❑ Rarely ❑Never 2.What kind of English talk shows you often watch? (You can choose more than one option.) ❑ English talk shows produce in foreign countries ❑ English talk shows produce in Viet Nam What difficulties you often face when improving listening skill by watching English talk shows? Difficulties Yes No Lack of concentration The speed is too fast Lack of vocabulary Try to understand every single word Try to get the meaning of sentence Lack of following over the speed at which speakers speak Do not establish learning habit Others (please write specify here) …………………………………………………… Do you know how to apply watching English Talk Shows to improve listening skill? ❑ Yes ❑ No III PART C: The techniques of using English talk shows to improve listening skill What techniques you often use to improve your listening skill by watching English talk shows? (Please select × in the cell of your choice) Techniques Strongly agree Watch episodes with celebrities you like to motivate yourself Control the speed of speech with the rewind button Building a wide vocabulary Try to listen and take note the keywords Grasping the content of it and then check it with the typescript Listen to the way native speakers make sounds disappear or join them together Watching English Talk Shows everyday with a clear plan Others (please write specify here) Agree Neutral Disagree Strongly disagree IV While you watch English talk shows, what you to improve listening skill? Activities Always Try to get key words of the speaker Take notes Try to grasp the overall meaning Practice every day more than half hour Pay attention pronunciation, stress to and intonation Others specify (please write here) …………………………… …………………………… …………………………… …………… Thank you for your cooperation! Usually Sometimes Rarely Never V APPENDIX 2: QUESTION FOR INTERVIEW FOR STUDENTS What you think about using English talk shows to learn listening skill? Do you think English talk shows help improve listening skill? How often you watch English talk shows? What are your difficulties in learning listening skills by English talk shows? In your opinion, what techniques you often use to apply English talk shows to learn listening skill? Thank you for your kind cooperation!