the effects of using speech acts awareness raising tasks on efl students listening skills

This study investigates the impact of tasks used to raise students'''' awareness of speech acts on the listening skills of EFL students at a language center in Ho Chi Minh City.. However, t

INTRODUCTION

Background of the study

Among the four skills, listening is a key driver of studying English because it can directly affect students’ communication ability An improvement in listening skills can empower students to not only understand the meanings expressed by speakers but also communicate effectively in any interactions If the underlying meanings of utterances cannot be understood correctly, interactions can break down as a result Moreover, in listening tests, effective listening skills can enable students to not only pay attention to pronunciation and intonation but also comprehend nuances and rhythm of the language This can give rise to an increase in their listening scores

However, poor listening skills can hinder students from their progress to higher English levels As stated by Underwood (1989), students' inability to control the speed of the speakers, to have things repeated, to have sufficient vocabulary for understanding, to recognize the underlying messages of the speakers, and to maintain their concentration while listening can be obstacles to those who wish to improve their listening skills This does not mean that all students may face all of these problems For some, the problem that may hinder their growth in English listening competence likely lies in their inability to understand underlying messages According to Willis (1981), there are “enabling skills” that lead people to listening comprehension, one of which is comprehending implied information associated with speakers’ attitudes and intentions (p 134) In other words, a listener may struggle to follow and understand what the speaker is trying to convey if he or she has no awareness of what people truly mean by their utterances The awareness of speech acts, “actions performed via utterances” (Yule, 1996, p 47), may allow listeners to overcome this struggle and thus understand the underlying messages of the speakers

In language teaching, speech acts have been a common research topic The first aspect to be explored is the effects of teaching them on raising learner’s awareness (Kondo, 2003; Al Aamri, 2014) Regarding Kondo

2 (2003), activities are held to raise Japanese students’ awareness of refusals

Meanwhile, Al Aamri (2014) aims at raising students’ awareness of requests and refusals As claimed by these researchers, after the interventions, students had a better awareness of the speech acts being taught and were able to apply their knowledge to their communication properly Another common aspect to be researched is the use of tasks and activities that raise learner’s awareness of speech acts for grammar teaching, with a lot of research being conducted in recent years on the relationship between awareness-raising tasks and students’ grammar competence (Roza, 2014; Amirian & Abbasi, 2014; Fatemipour & Hemmati, 2015)

However, there is little research conducted on the effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on the four English skills, let alone listening skills (Lee, 2007; Rashtchi, 2011; Rezaei & Hashim, 2013) There is one research concerning the teaching of speech acts to improve students’ listening skills (Harooni & Pourdana, 2017) In this research, students received the teaching of request speech acts that occurred every 15 minutes per session (10 sessions in 5 weeks) In each session, they listened to audio-recorded conversations taking place in authentic English contexts where “the most appropriate response was marked as polite and indirect speech acts by the instructor” (p.216) After that, some recordings were played, followed by several comprehension questions, and the students were advised to select the most suitable response to the pragmatic questions They concluded that “the positive impact of coaching to politeness and indirectness strategies on EFL students’ listening comprehension is promising as it enhances EFL students’ pragmatic competence and situational awareness” (p 219) The idea that raising students’ awareness of speech acts can develop their English listening skills can be seen as not new; however, it seems that little research has been focused on this topic, waiting to be further explored not only on the international scale but also on the Vietnamese context

In Vietnam, there has been wide interest in theoretical studies about speech acts, with a focus on contrastive analysis of speech act features between

3 Vietnamese and English (Nguyen, 2008; Lau, 2017) In addition, research has also been conducted on speech acts in textbooks from the viewpoint of content analysis (Nguyen & Nguyen, 2017; Nu & Murray, 2020; Tran & Yeh, 2020) However, attention is less likely to be paid to empirical studies of the effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on improving English four skills, let alone on students’ English listening skills Hence, additional studies of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on the English listening skills of Vietnamese students are needed.

Objectives of the study

1 To investigate the effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness on their listening skills.

Research questions and hypotheses

speech acts have on their listening skills?

In alignment with this question, the study formulates the ensuing hypotheses:

H0: There is no statistically significant difference in listening skills between the experimental group where tasks were used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts and the control group that did not

H1: Students in the experimental group show a greater increase in their listening skills compared to students in the control group.

Significance of the study

This thesis endeavors to fill the literature gap on the effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on improving students’ listening skills in the Vietnamese context This study adds more empirical evidence to give proof of the positive effects of enhanced awareness of speech acts on listening skills In addition, the findings of this study raise teachers’ awareness of the significance of the introduction of awareness-raising tasks and incorporate these tasks in class to boost their students’ listening skills

Scope of the study

The study mainly focuses on investigating the application of speech acts awareness-raising tasks and their effects on students’ listening skills in classes conducted at an English center located in Ho Chi Minh City This center offers IELTS courses on Listening, Reading, Writing, and Speaking to university and college students in the city This setting offers a contextual backdrop that is relevant to studying the effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on their listening skills

The temporal scope of the study was confined to the immediate effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on students’ listening skills

This investigation spanned over ten weeks, including a pre-test phase, an eight- week intervention phase, and a post-test phase This timeframe was to encompass the direct impact of these tasks on listening skills, considering the limitations that prevent a longer research duration.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Speech acts

Speech acts were coined by Austin in 1962 and since then this concept has set the stage for a deeper exploration of this pragmatic feature And from then, other researchers have examined and further elaborated upon this concept, presenting their definitions as well as categories

Austin (1962) coins the term speech acts as utterances made by a speaker who is attempting to do something or persuade the listener to do something He states that there are three parts of speech acts which are locutionary act, illocutionary act, and perlocutionary act (p 108) He defines the locutionary act as “meaning in the traditional sense” (p 108) Paltridge (2012) has the same idea with the locutionary act as he viewed it as “the literal meaning of the actual words” (p 55) Take the utterance “It is cold outside” for example This utterance refers to the outside temperature The next act is the illocutionary act which, as stated by Austin (1962), is the force of an utterance such as ordering, warning, or threatening Paltridge (2012) elaborates on the definition of this act, with the illocutionary act referring to “the speaker’s intention in uttering the words” (p 55)

For example, the utterance “It is cold outside” may suggest that the listener should put on a coat when going outside Finally, the perlocutionary act is defined as “the effect this utterance has on the thoughts or actions of the other person” (Paltridge, 2012, p 55) For instance, the utterance “It is cold outside” can cause the listener to put on a coat

However, Searle (1969) appears not to be in agreement with such a taxonomy of speech acts Austin’s taxonomy suggests that locutionary act,

7 illocutionary act, and perlocutionary act are performed separately in the respective order Searle (1969) disagrees as he thinks that speech acts should not be thought of as buying a ticket and getting on a train stand before getting off the train at one’s destination; rather, when a person performs an act, that person is performing other acts at the same time

Searle (1969) proposes three fundamental elements of speech acts including (1) the uttering of words, (2) propositional acts (referring and predicating), and (3) illocutionary acts (pp 23-24) These acts are done simultaneously rather than in the order they are mentioned The uttering of words, known as performing utterance acts, may include the uttering of any sounds The second kind is propositional acts which include reference and predication The former is the act done for the purpose of referring; referring expressions point to particular things, answering the questions Who?, What?, Which? The latter is the act of predicating – containing the verb and giving information about the subject being mentioned Four examples are taken from Searle (1969) to further illustrate the terms reference and predication, (1) Sam smokes habitually (2) Does Sam smoke habitually? (3) Sam, smoke habitually! (4) Would that Sam smoke habitually? All these utterances have the same reference and predication Although they perform different illocutionary acts, they all refer to ‘Sam’ and predicate the expression ‘smoke habitually’ The final element is illocutionary acts that are the intentions of speakers with their utterance From the three fundamental elements proposed, the key difference that can be seen in the points of view between Austin and Searle lies in the locutionary act or the literal meaning of an utterance From Austin’s point of view, the literal meaning of a sentence is independent of its context (Gripaldo, 2001) By contrast, Searle states that “whenever a speaker utters a sentence in an appropriate context with certain intentions, he performs one or more illocutionary acts.” (Searle & Vanderveken, 2005) In this study, Searle’s taxonomy of speech acts that includes propositional acts (acts of referring and of predicating), illocutionary acts, and perlocutionary acts is adopted

8 In summary, this study agrees that “the meaning of a sentence is determined by the meanings of all its meaningful components.” (Searle, 1968) but not as in Austin’s taxonomy where the words and phrases derive meanings from the meaning of the sentence (Gripaldo, 2001), which makes the term ‘locutionary acts’ appear to be unreasonable Therefore, Searle’s taxonomy of speech acts is adopted instead In this taxonomy, illocutionary acts are seen as “the minimal units of human communication” (Searle & Vanderveken, 2005) so there needs to be more discussion on this term in the next section for deeper understanding

A primitive taxonomy of illocutionary acts is presented by Austin (1962) as a basis for discussion rather than a systematic set of justified categories “I am not”, as he stated, “putting any of this forward as in the very least definitive”

(Austin, 1962, p 151) His categorization of illocutionary acts includes five categories: verdictive, expositive, exercitive, behabitive, and commissive Firstly, verdictives refer to “the delivering of a finding, official or unofficial, upon evidence or reasons as to value or fact, so far as these are distinguishable” (Austin, 1962, p 152) Some examples of verbs of this class are acquit, hold, calculate, describe, analyse, estimate, date, rank, assess and characterize Secondly, exercitives refer to “the giving of a decision in favour of or against a certain course of action or advocacy of it” (Austin, 1962, p 154) Several examples include order, command, warn, nominate, resign, urge Thirdly, commissives are used to

“commit the speaker to a certain course of action” (Austin, 1962, p 154) Some examples of verbs of this class include promise, intend, mean to, vow and dedicate myself to Next, behabitives refer to “the notion of reaction to other people’s behaviour and fortunes and of attitudes and expressions of attitudes to someone else’s past conduct or imminent conduct” (Austin, 1962, p 159) Some examples include apologize, thank, condole, criticize, welcome, resent, toast, defy Finally, expositives refer to “acts of exposition involving the expounding of views, the conducting of arguments, and the clarifying of usages and of references” (Austin, 1962, p 160) Some examples include affirm, deny, state, describe, class, identify, report, concede, object to, call, regard as

9 However, this categorization was criticized by Searle (1979) who pointed out some of its weaknesses The first one is that Austin may have assumed that “a classification of different verbs is eo ipso a classification of kinds of illocutionary acts, that any two non-synonymous verbs must mark different illocutionary acts” (Searle, 1979, p 9) This, however, should not be the case

Take “announce” for example One may announce promises, reports, and orders, but announcing is not identical to promising, reporting, and ordering In other words, an announcement should not just be considered an announcement; it can be an order or statement The second weakness that Searle himself considered as the most critical is an inconsistent and unsolid basis of principles on which Austin placed his taxonomy This leads to the third weakness where illocutionary acts and illocutionary verbs are persistently confused as “there is a great deal of overlap from one category to another and a great deal of heterogeneity within some of the categories” (Searle, 1979, p 10) For instance, the verbs such as "state” and “conclude” were listed by Austin as both verdictives and expositives Some more weaknesses that were proposed by Searle include “the distinct kinds of verbs within some of the categories” and “the difficulty that not all of the verbs listed within the classes satisfy the definitions given” (Searle, 1979, p 11) It is clear that all of these problems derive from a lack of “consistent principle of classification” (Searle, 1979, p 12)

To propose a more systematic set of principles of classification, Searle (1979) presented twelve criteria that help distinguish one illocutionary act from another The first one is differences in the point (or purpose) of the (type of) act which as he specified is “an attempt to get the hearer to do something” (p 2)

It is important to remember that this way of definition does not mean to imply that

“every illocutionary act has a definitionally associated perlocutionary intent” (p

3) The second one is “differences in the direction of fit between words and the world” (p 3) To be more specific, he proposed two directions that are word-to- world direction and world-to-word direction The former refers to the act of getting the words (propositional content) to match the world (as in assertions, explanations, and descriptions) while the latter refers to the act of getting the world

10 to match the words (as in promises, requests, and commands) The third one is

“differences in expressed psychological states” (p 4) In other words, whenever an illocutionary act is performed with propositional content, some attitudes or states are expressed accordingly For example, when a man apologizes for doing something, at the same time he may also express regret at having done it The fourth one is “differences in the force or strength with which the illocutionary point is presented” (p 5) Take the two utterances ‘I suggest we watch this film’ and ‘I insist that we watch this film’ have the same illocutionary point, but they are used with different levels of strength The fifth one is “differences in the status or position of the speaker and the hearer as these bear on the illocutionary force of the utterance” (p 5) For example, if the teacher asks the students to do homework, it is likely to be an order or command If a student asks another one to do homework, it may be a suggestion The sixth one is “differences in the way the utterance relates to the interests of the speaker and the hearer” (p 6) One can easily point out the differences in the interests of the speaker and hearer when the speaker boasts and laments The seventh one is “differences in relations to the rest of the discourse” (p 6) In other words, an utterance can be said with a certain expression that relates that utterance to other ones and the surrounding context The eighth criterion is “differences in propositional content that are determined by illocutionary force indicating devices” (p 6) There is a difference, for instance, between a report and a prediction is that the former can be about things that happened in the past or that are happening at the moment while the latter should refer to things that may happen in the future The ninth one is “differences between those acts that must always be speech acts and those that can be, but need not be performed as speech acts” (p

6) For instance, when a person wants to estimate, he or she does not even have to say “I estimate” to make estimates He just needs to use something to measure to show that act of estimate without stating it The tenth one is “differences between those acts that require extra-linguistic institutions for their performance and those that do not” (p 7) In other words, in some cases, to perform a certain act, there must be a special position between the speaker and the hearer For example, the

Listening skills

Listening is an indispensable component of the acquisition of any language (Rost, 2002) Unfortunately, Nunan (2002) refers to listening as the Cinderella of language skills (i.e., reading, writing, and speaking) because it is the most underappreciated skill in language teaching (Field, 2008) Some prevalent methods of teaching listening, like comprehension-focused approaches where students’ listening skills are expected to improve automatically when listening to audio clips and answering questions afterward, might have been borrowed from EFL reading instruction without appropriate adaptation Although these methods may contribute to gradual listening improvement, there is a need for the exploration of a more innovative classroom technique that can offer quicker and more impactful development of listening skills However, before exploring that classroom technique, we need to understand the nature of listening comprehension and the components that play an important role in being better at this language skill

According to Underwood (1989), listening is defined as “the activity of paying attention to and trying to get meaning from something we hear” (p.1) It is

13 regarded as a receptive skill, which means that students learn new words by understanding what they have heard or listened to Meanwhile, Purdy (1997) defines listening as a more active and dynamic process in which listeners need to attend, perceive, interpret, remember, and respond “to the expressed (verbal and nonverbal), needs, concerns and information offered by other human beings" (p

8), which indicates that being good at listening requires attention to be paid to not only speakers’ utterances but also their thoughts, feelings, and intentions

Mendelsohn (1994) states that a listener must have the ability to decipher the speaker’s intention, process linguistic forms, understand the entire message contained in the discourse, and comprehend the message without understanding every word Listeners should have the ability to analyze and assess what the illocutionary force of an utterance is In other words, listeners need to be able to comprehend the implied meaning of certain utterances in a specific setting, under a set of circumstances (Mendelsohn, 1994) Rost (2002) has a similar idea of what listening is He defined listening as the act of receiving what the speaker says, building and representing meaning, negotiating and responding to that meaning with the speaker, and generating meaning via participation, creativity, and empathy To add more depth to the definition of listening, Nunan (1998) states that listening entails actively interpreting and making sense of messages conveyed through both spoken words and non-verbal cues In this definition, listening involves not only utterances spoken by speakers but also their body movements or facial expressions All of these definitions agree that listening requires attention and the ability to decipher underlying meanings expressed by speakers

In summary, in agreement with the aforementioned definitions, the researcher views listening as an active process where listeners listen attentively to the utterances of the speaker and try to understand the meanings the speaker is trying to convey For the definition of listening by Nunan (1998), the researcher agreed that listening involves non-verbal cues as well, but regarding the context of teaching listening skills in class, looking at the speakers’ body movements or facial expressions while listening to their dialogues appears to be impossible One aspect that must be included in the definition of listening in this study though is

14 listening “actively” or “attentively” Listening should not be seen as a skill that is where students just sit on their chairs, listen to listening tracks, and write down their answers Listening requires several criteria that any student should meet to become better at it, which will be further explored in the next section

As discussed above, students who wish to improve their listening skills need to equip themselves with several components There have been several proposals for these components that a competent listener should have According to Anderson and Lynch (1988), to excel in listening, a learner must possess structured, contextual, and schematic knowledge of the language they are aiming to master Structured knowledge involves understanding the organization and arrangement of the language, including grammar, syntax, and vocabulary As for contextual knowledge, this implies grasping the meaning of words, phrases, and sentences within the context in which they are used, regarding factors such as tone, setting, and background information Schematic knowledge refers to the ability to interpret and understand the overall structure, patterns, and themes within the language, including recognizing common phrases, idiomatic expressions, and cultural nuances All these mean that a competent listener needs to know about the small units including syntax to something more subtle and abstract such as the ability to use the context for the analysis of expressed meanings by speakers

Mendelsohn (1994) emphasizes that effective listening in spoken language involves more than just decoding words Competent listeners need to recognize the speaker's intention, process various linguistic aspects such as filler words, deal with listening in an interaction, grasp the overall message contained in the discourse, understand messages even if not being to discern every word, and recognize different speech genres Additionally, listeners need to understand the purpose behind utterances, or their illocutionary force, within specific contexts and circumstances, to truly engage in meaningful communication Although stressing the importance of linguistic aspects, Mendelsohn seemed to focus more

15 on the significance of recognizing and understanding the intended meanings of speakers using knowledge of discourse

Listening comprehension, according to Rost (2002), is an inferential process This refers to the mental activity of making inferences or drawing conclusions from presented information or evidence In the context of listening comprehension, it means that listeners do not just take in the literal meanings of the words they hear but rather they apply their linguistic knowledge and general understanding of the world for the formulation of educated guesses regarding the intended meaning of the speaker In his point of view, listening is the act of receiving the speaker's utterances, interpreting their meanings, engaging in dialogue to negotiate understanding, and participating in the creation of meaning through interactions In other words, effective listening entails actively attending to the speaker's thoughts, emotions, and intentions, which demands active engagement and careful attention from listeners

Among recent research exploring the key components of listening skills is Tyagi (2013) who has a similar idea with the aforementioned researchers, that a competent listener must possess the ability to discriminate between sounds, recognize words and understand their meaning, identify grammatical groupings of words, identify expressions and sets of utterances that act to create meaning, connect linguistic cues to non-linguistic and paralinguistic cues, use background knowledge to predict and to confirm meaning and recall important words and ideas

In summary, there is a common consensus about what makes a competent listener Students who wish to become better at listening skills, apart from grammatical knowledge and the volume of vocabulary they possess, should equip themselves with the ability to recognize and decipher the intended messages of speakers’ utterances through the knowledge of context This indicates a need for a process encompassing several steps that listeners must go through to achieve listening comprehension

2.2.3 Teaching listening skills as a comprehension process

The process of listening comprehension is undeniably intricate, involving numerous sub-skills that occur unconsciously within our brains While this decoding process happens automatically, it poses challenges for students lacking adequate linguistic properties Students who do not possess the subskills and strategies as a guide to take them through this process are more likely to have feelings of frustration and demotivation as they cannot understand what the speakers are saying and even if they recognize that their listening skills do not improve and are being in a state of stagnation

To help address this problem in the context of teaching English listening skills, two approaches have been proposed: the top-down approach and the bottom-up approach In the former approach, students are expected to process information from higher-level cognitive processes down to the more basic elements It involves using prior knowledge and context for understanding to make educated guesses about what the dialogue or conversation can be about before processing the individual words and phrases

Meanwhile, in the latter approach, information is processed from the most basic components to higher-level understanding It involves starting with basic elements, such as individual words or sounds, and then stringing them together to form a complete understanding This bottom-up approach may entail decoding spoken discourse containing features such as intonation, accent, pronunciation, and discourse markers including pauses or fillers to understand their meaning and then combining them to comprehend larger structures, such as sentences or paragraphs These are often overlooked yet crucial aspects of listening components (Conti & Smith, 2019) so close attention is suggested to these fundamental features of the listening comprehension process to more effectively assist students in enhancing their listening skills

In the researcher’s humble opinion, both bottom-up and top-down processes should be combined to improve students’ listening comprehension By

17 combining both approaches, students can effectively use their linguistic knowledge while also making use of contextual cues and world understanding to comprehend the listening material comprehensively Bottom-up processing ensures that students have a firm hold of the fundamental elements of language embedded in utterances, while top-down processing enables them to integrate this information to understand the intended message of speakers Together, these processes should allow for improved listening comprehension among students

In summary, listening is an active process in which students are expected to listen attentively while trying to understand the meanings of speakers’ utterances To become a good English listener, a student needs to possess not only knowledge of grammar and vocabulary but also the ability to decode the intended meanings of speakers’ utterances by applying contextual and prior understanding This is because utterances not only have literal meanings but also meanings that go beyond the explicit words spoken by someone which are so- called illocutionary forces (Paltridge, 2012) Two approaches, including the top- down approach and bottom-up approach, can be adopted to facilitate the teaching of English listening skills and improve students’ listening comprehension But no matter what approaches are used in teaching listening skills, students need to notice, understand, and apply both linguistic and contextual knowledge to facilitate the decoding process while listening, or else their listening proficiency may stay stagnant despite countless hours of exposure to English listening This stagnation problem is prevalent among students who are preparing for the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) as although they have spent hours of training on its listening test, they struggle to improve their listening skills In this study, the participants were students who were preparing for their upcoming IELTS tests so it would be necessary to have deeper insights in this test in Chapter 3 Methodology.

Awareness-raising tasks

To explore how tasks used to raise awareness are going to be performed in class, a definition of conscious awareness is decided upon before tasks are defined

18 After that, different categories of task types are presented This section ends with a discussion of awareness-raising tasks

In 1990, Schmidt proposed the Noticing Hypothesis with three levels of awareness: perception, noticing, and understanding The first level is perception which refers to “mental organization and the ability to create internal representations of external events” (p 132) In other words, it involves the use of our senses to detect stimuli and create mental representations of the external world Perception has to do with the recognition of objects, events, and patterns in the surroundings For example, when a person listens to someone speaking, his auditory perception enables him to detect sounds during listening

The second level is noticing, often known as focal awareness A focally attentive person is highly aware, consciously in control, and selective in handling sensory phenomena To put it more simply, noticing is the conscious act of directing one’s attention toward certain aspects of one’s environment or internal thoughts and experiences When listening, they can choose to notice the content of what they are listening, to rather than the blurred ink of the texts printed on the paper or background noise in the next room

The third level is understanding It entails introspection and analysis At this point, a person can compare what he has noticed on one occasion to what he has noticed on other occasions From this analysis, they can easily grasp the concept of what is being taught and remember what they have learned more clearly By doing so, they can apply what they have perceived, noticed, and understood into their skills practice

This category of awareness would make sense regarding the context of teaching If teachers present input in their classes, they cannot be sure whether their students notice or just perceive what is being taught Without any notice, it would be nearly impossible for students to process the input to understand and acquire it subsequently Therefore, to raise the conscious awareness of students of

19 speech acts, it is necessary to help them perceive first, notice afterward, and understand speech acts eventually

According to the Noticing Hypothesis, learners acquire language not only through being exposed to input but also through actively noticing that input This act of noticing triggers a cognitive process that leads to the incorporation of those features into the students’ language repertoire Schmidt (1990) argues this conscious awareness, or "noticing," should be seen as a crucial step in the language learning process Concerning the scope of this study, integrating the principles of the Noticing Hypothesis can help draw students’ attention to speech acts within listening materials

In summary, conscious awareness encompasses perception, noticing, and understanding as interconnected cognitive processes that allow teachers to divert students’ attention to a certain feature in class Perception provides the raw sensory input, noticing involves selectively attending to relevant information within that input, and understanding involves interpreting and comprehending the meaning and significance of that information Regarding the scope of this study, conscious awareness involves students’ perception, noticing, and understanding of speech acts used by speakers when students listen to their listening materials As IELTS listening tests contain features of speech acts, it would be interesting to investigate the possible effects of heightened awareness of speech acts on students’ listening skills

Up to this point, the definition of listening and what makes a competent listener have been discussed along with the discussion of IELTS listening tests and of conscious awareness However, it may still appear quite vague regarding how the knowledge of conscious awareness is incorporated into tasks in class, so in the next section, tasks are going to be defined together with the discussion of different task types before ending with a discussion on tasks used to raise conscious awareness

A definition of tasks has been a subject of debate as there has been no consensus regarding their interpretation Different definitions of tasks have been proposed from various angles, ranging from practical application to more academic educational settings

Long (1985) defines real-world or target tasks, outlining what an individual is supposed to do with language in outside-class environments He argues that a target task is a piece of work undertaken for oneself or others, freely or for some reward Some examples may include buying a pair of shoes or making an airline reservation In other words, tasks mean the hundred-and-one things people do in everyday life, at work, at play, and in between (p 89) In essence, a task, as defined by Long, involves the practical application of language to achieve real-world outcomes or to fulfill specific needs or desires

In the classroom context, tasks are seen by Prabhu (1987) as “an activity which required students to arrive at an outcome from given information through some process of thought, and which allowed teachers to control and regulate that process” (p 24) One feature that separates this definition from the one proposed by Long lies in the inclusion of teachers The definition of tasks by Prabhu stresses the importance of teachers who play the role of a controller or regulator in any activity in class However, both definitions agree on the notion that tasks require the achievement of outcomes or desired objectives with the use of existing or given knowledge combined with cognitive processes such as critical thinking, problem- solving, and decision-making Whether it is inside or outside classroom environments, there needs to be a purpose or outcome for any task

Breen (1987) comes up with another definition where tasks are seen as “any structural language learning endeavor which has a particular objective, appropriate content, a specified work procedure, and a range of outcomes for those who undertake the task” (p 23) In this definition, Breen described tasks as organized learning activities within the language learning context These activities need to be based on content that is relevant and suitable for the student’s language proficiency

21 level, interests, and learning goals A defined set of steps or procedures is required so that students can follow them to complete the task One noticeable feature within this definition is that although a task has only one specific intended objective for its direction and focus, it may offer a variety of potential outcomes or actual achievements for learners who undertake them This shows that the outcomes a task can bring to students are more than the objective set out by the teacher

In summary, there are two main types of tasks including target tasks and pedagogical tasks Target tasks proposed by Long (1985) are activities that people do in daily life to achieve their purposes Pedagogical tasks, on the other hand, are a series of activities that are conducted in an instructional procedure where language use and interaction among students are expected to reach an intended outcome, hence the activation, acquisition, and development of their target language (Breen, 1987; Prabhu, 1987) As this study was conducted in the teaching context it is more reasonable to base on the definition of pedagogical tasks for the discussion of task types in the next section

In the realm of language teaching and learning, various task types have been proposed to facilitate effective language acquisition and skill development Task types encompass a range of activities designed to help students improve their language competence and achieve intended learning objectives

One of the categories of task types was proposed by Prabhu who suggested three task types which are information gap, reasoning gap, and opinion gap (1987, p 46) Information-gap activity involves the process of decoding or encoding given information to fill in the gap One typical example is when students are expected to fill in the gap in a table given to them by selecting the correct information being contained in a piece of text Reasoning-gap activity involves “deriving some new information from given information through processes of inference, deduction, practical reasoning, or a perception of relationships or patterns” (1987, p 46) One example is deciding on the most

22 appropriate means of transport for a particular purpose together with given criteria

The last activity – opinion-gap one – involves “identifying and articulating a personal preference, feeling, or attitude in response to a given situation” (1987, p

46) Some examples are the completion of a story or discussion of an issue

METHODOLOGY

Research approach and design

3.1.1 Rationale for a mixed methods approach

In this study, a comprehensive mixed methods approach, as recommended by Creswell and Clark (2017), was utilized to explore the impact of speech acts awareness-raising tasks on students’ listening proficiency This method integrated both quantitative and qualitative methodologies to offer a thorough comprehension of the research inquiry

The reasoning behind this methodological decision commenced with the quantitative component, involving the utilization of listening assessments sourced from the IELTS 18 Academic Student's Book for both pretests and posttests This strategy facilitated an impartial and measurable assessment of students’ listening proficiency The quantitative information provided a strong basis of objective measurements, including scores, percentages, and statistical patterns, essential for an impartial evaluation of the impact of speech acts awareness-raising tasks on students’ listening proficiency However, to explore the effects of speech acts awareness-raising tasks more thoroughly, a qualitative aspect was essential While quantitative data provided valuable insights, it could not adequately grasp how students applied the awareness of speech acts during their listening Therefore, qualitative data was gathered through semi-structured interviews which are a tool helpful for providing in-depth insights (Magaldi &

Berler, 2020) This qualitative data complemented the quantitative data, offering a

30 deeper comprehension of how students interpreted and applied speech acts during their listening activities, thereby augmenting the study's explanatory capacity

The study aims to find out the effects of speech acts awareness-raising tasks on students’ listening skills To achieve this, an experimental design is chosen

According to Cohen et al (2007), when adopting experimental research, researchers “deliberately control deliberately control and manipulate the conditions which determine the events in which they are interested, introduce an intervention and measure the difference that it makes.” (p 272) In other words, this research design enables researchers to change an independent variable and observe the influence of that change on a dependent variable In this study, experimental design is adopted with speech acts awareness raising tasks being the independent variable and listening skills of students being the dependent variable, and observing the effects of such an intervention on students’ listening skills is the aim of this study

There are some kinds of experimental design, such as the true experiment and the quasi-experiment The controlled or true experiments are conducted in laboratory conditions; meanwhile, the field or quasi-experiment can be conducted in the natural setting with variables being similarly isolated, controlled, and manipulated (Cohen et al., 2007, p 274) One key feature that distinguishes them lies in the fact that the former requires research to employ random allocation of participants to control and experimental groups while the latter does not Regarding the researcher’s teaching context at an English center of which the researcher is not the owner, it was beyond the researcher’s authority to choose a true experiment for this study as the researcher was not allowed to assign randomly students to control and experimental groups Therefore, a quasi- experimental design was adopted for this study

A quasi-experimental design: the pre-test - post-test non-equivalent group design was chosen for this study The word “non-equivalent” indicates that there

31 is no random assignment of participants to experimental and control groups since random assignment is out of bounds for the researcher The words “pre-test” and

“post-test” indicate that one test takes place before and another occurs after the intervention phase to measure and compare the effects of a treatment teaching method and a traditional teaching method In this study, there were two groups, an experimental group that received the intervention that involved the speech acts awareness-raising tasks and a control group that did not To demonstrate the structure of the research design in this study, the table below offers a summary of the key phases

1 Pretest administration Assessment of listening skills using one listening test sourced from IELTS 18 Academic Student's Book.

2 Intervention phase The intervention phase spanned over eight weeks.

3 Posttest administration Assessment of listening skills using another listening test sourced from IELTS 18 Academic Student's Book.

Analysis of pre-and post-test scores for statistical significance using SPSS

Collection of qualitative data via interviews with students

Comprehensive integration and interpretation of quantitative and qualitative data.

Research context

The study was conducted at Menglish home English center founded in 2019 The center has only one campus which is located in District 3 This center

32 offered classes from below IELTS 3.0 up to IELTS 7.0 in the form of intensive IELTS courses which equip its students with skills and knowledge needed to help them achieve their targeted IELTS scores.

Sampling and participants

The researcher is teaching as a teacher at this center and this is the only center at which the researcher is teaching As the researcher was able to ask for consent from the center administrator for the conduct of this study, convenience sampling was adopted since the students here were the only participants available to be studied by the researcher They were college and university non-English majors aged 18 to 21 years old They studied in two classes of which the researcher was the teacher responsible for teaching Listening skills The English level of the two classes was at band 5.0 There were 20 students in each class, which means that the total number of participants was 40 in this study There were one control group and one experimental group with 20 participants in each group Both control and experimental groups were administered by the researcher.

Intervention phase description

The textbook assigned by the center for the two groups was Complete IELTS Bands 5-6.5 by Cambridge University Press The intervention period for both groups lasted eight weeks with each week covering a unit and there was a 60- minute session on teaching listening every week for each group

The main difference between the control group and experimental group lies in the pre listening and post listening stages For example, in Appendix C on page 88, in the pre-listening stage in unit 2 ‘It’s good for you’ of the control group, the students took part in an activity where they could practice speaking English based on pictures related to the topic about Healthy hobbies Meanwhile, in the same unit, the experimental group started their unit by joining in an activity where they had to perceive, notice and understand the context of the conversation in the listening track To be more specific, they needed to recognize that the conversation took place in a hospital as well as the relationship between the speakers, one of whom is a supervisor and the others are newbie nurses Based on that, through

33 guiding from teacher, they were aware of the language use by the supervisor when she talked to newcomers

Another difference took place in unit 2 was when the students completed their listening for the first listening track In the control group, their listening answers were corrected before they moved onto the second listening track

However, in the experimental group, the students were given the listening script and they were asked to identify the utterances in that script that could be referred to as requests

Some examples how speech-act awareness-raising tasks were applied in the class involve analysing transcript and categorizing utterances based on their functions, doing a fil-in-the-blanks task where students were forced to listen selectively to the missing utterances, watching videos to identify speech acts through verbal and non-verbal expressions, predicting the content of conversations and speech acts that are going to be used in those conversations, drawing a concept map which connect speech acts with their functions and typical expressions and engaging in role-play activities to gain more awareness of how certain speech acts were used along with the appropriate utterances conveying such speech acts

The table below outlines the activities carried out during the intervention phase, detailing each activity and specifying the groups involved

Summary of activities in the intervention phase

This stage warms up students and ignites their interests at the

Speech acts awareness-raising tasks

Not only do the tasks at this stage make students more engaging in the listening tracks afterwards but they also raise students’ awareness of speech acts

Students listen to listening tracks and write down their answers

Teachers correct students’ answers Both groups

Speech acts awareness-raising tasks

Students do tasks to become more aware of speech acts used in the listening tracks

Students get involved in tasks

35 such as group work or discussion.

Research instruments

3.5.1 Pre-tests and post-tests: Cambridge IELTS 18

IELTS stands for the "International English Language Testing System." It is a standardized test designed to assess the English language proficiency of non- native English speakers who plan to study, work, or migrate to English-speaking countries The IELTS test evaluates the test taker's abilities in four key language skills: listening, reading, writing, and speaking In the scope of this study, listening skills are the main and sole focus

Four common listening skills are being assessed, including an understanding of main ideas, understanding of specific factual information, recognizing opinions, attitudes, and purpose of a speaker, and following the development of an argument (IELTS information for candidates, p 4) It can be seen that the test assesses test takers on their pragmatic knowledge, one of which is speech acts If the test taker can recognize opinions, attitudes, and purposes, it indicates that he/she perhaps has good knowledge of the illocutionary act This is because, in the listening test, there are times when one speaker gives utterances to express their thoughts and attitudes probably to persuade other speakers to agree with them or to show their disagreement with an idea So if the test taker cannot understand those implied meanings and follow their effects on other speakers, known as a perlocutionary act, in the recording, it will be difficult to choose correct answers with so many ideas being expressed in a short dialogue That is the reason why being aware of speech acts and having knowledge of these pragmatic features can be the key to higher scores for IELTS test takers

The IELTS Listening test consists of approximately 30 minutes, with 40 questions covering various question types such as multiple choice, matching, labeling diagrams/maps, and completing notes or summaries Divided into four parts, the test assesses different scenarios: everyday social contexts in Parts 1 and

36 2, and educational/training contexts in Parts 3 and 4 Test takers must demonstrate their ability to comprehend main ideas, specific factual information, opinions, attitudes, and the purpose of speakers, as well as follow the development of arguments So conscious awareness of speech acts is crucial for recognizing implied meanings of utterances said by speakers Such a conscious awareness may contribute to higher scores in the IELTS Listening test In the next section, the term ‘conscious awareness’ is going to be defined together with a discussion of how tasks used to raise conscious awareness can be applied in language teaching

Cambridge IELTS 18 was chosen with two practice tests, including test 1 (pretest) and test 3 (posttest), taken out to test participants’ listening skills before and after the intervention Each test lasted 30 minutes including four parts with 10 questions in each part as follows 1 with a conversation between two people in an everyday social context, part 2 with a monologue taking place in an everyday social context, part 3 with a conversation between two people and up to four people in an academic context, part 4 with a monologue on an academic subject The students were instructed to write their answers on the question paper as they listened to the recordings, and at the end, they were given an additional 10 minutes to transfer their answers to the answer sheet Each correct answer was awarded one point

One reason for this choice was because the students in the two classes were preparing for the IELTS exam and the textbook being used was also relevant to IELTS Listening tests being taken from this book would align what the researcher taught in class with what was assessed Another reason lies in the fact that this book was published by the renowned and reliable publisher Cambridge University Press & Assessment Claimed by this book publisher as “EXACTLY like the real exam”, its authenticity was ensured as “every single part of our practice tests with real students under exam conditions” was checked for “the most authentic experience possible” (Cambridge IELTS 18, 2023, p 4)

37 The pre-test was test 1 taken from Cambridge IELTS 18 with the content and its task types as follows section 1: Transport survey (Form completion), section 2: Becoming a volunteer for ACE (Multiple choice and Matching), section 3: Talk on jobs in fashion design (Multiple choice), section 4: Elephant translocation (Note completion) The post-test was test 3 taken from IELTS Cambridge 18 Academic with the content as follows section 1: Wayside Camera Club (Form and Table completion), section 2: Mushroom picking (Multiple choice), section 3 Automation and the future of work (Multiple choice and Matching), section 4 Space Traffic Management (Note completion) These tests are outlined in more detail in Appendix A from page 75 onwards

Hyman et al (1954) describe interviews as a form of inquiry that is common in social sciences Among the various types of interviews, one widely used is the semi-structured interview According to Magaldi and Berler (2020), the semi-structured interview is characterized as an exploratory form of interviewing

In an interview format, interviewees’ perspectives are more likely to be explored within a reasonably openly designed framework rather than in a standardized type of conversation, as in questionnaires

Mason (2002) outline several fundamental characteristics of semi- structured interviews, which were relevant to this study These included the necessity for interactive dialogue, an informal tone, a thematic topic-based narrative approach, and the acknowledgment that knowledge is context-dependent and situated Those characteristics are related to the interviews planned for this study Fundamentally, the interviews involved an exchange of dialogue, with prompting and probing questions posed in a relaxed, informal manner Moreover, the questions were biographical, and aimed at eliciting personal experiences and perspectives The interviews were conducted with the recognition that knowledge is inherently contextual, shaped by students within their respective learning environments

38 To ensure that the questions effectively capture the information sought by the researcher, one of the first tasks that should be done is to write down the key areas that need to be dealt with in a study (Tuckman, 1972) The interview questions were generated considering targeted focus areas These involve the effectiveness of tasks that are used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts and their impacts on students’ listening skills The interview questions were created based on the criteria proposed by Arksey and Knight (1999, pp 93-95), some of which include carefully considering the choice of vocabulary; steering clear of biased language, ambiguity, and imprecision; avoid leading or double- barreled questions; avoid making assumptions about the respondents’ knowledge

An interview protocol was developed and designed as detailed in Appendix B pp

Reliability and validity of instruments

In this study, a thorough approach was employed to uphold the reliability and validity of both quantitative and qualitative research tools Regarding the quantitative assessment, the reliability and validity of the tests used in this study were assured using several methods Firstly, for the assessment reliability, Cronbach's Alpha was used for the calculations of pretest and posttest scores of a sample of 12 learners in the pilot study, having a value of 0.928 Such a figure for listening tests suggests that they have a strong internal consistency Secondly, tests 1 and 3 were taken from Cambridge IELTS 18 for the assessment of English listening proficiency As stated in Cambridge IELTS 18, practice tests are authentic and they all undergo the same process of design as the IELTS test (p

4) Such supervision and evaluation indicate that the tests in this book were possible to demonstrate an acceptable degree of validity

Regarding the qualitative assessment, the validity of the qualitative assessment was also ensured The interview questions were developed based on the focus areas in this study and relevant literature To improve the credibility of the interview questions, they were first employed in the pilot study to identify any issues or shortcomings before they were carefully revised to

39 ensure that the interview process ran smoothly and that the data collected was of high quality.

Data collection procedures

This study conducted an extensive data collection process spanning 10 weeks It utilized a combination of quantitative and qualitative approaches to investigate the impacts of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on their listening skills

Regarding the quantitative phase, the data collection process spanned ten weeks During week 1, pre-tests were administered to both groups to gauge the initial listening proficiency levels of the students This was succeeded by an intensive eight-week intervention phase The study concluded in week 10 with a posttest aimed at assessing the effectiveness of the interventions This sequential methodology facilitated a thorough and systematic gathering of data, which is crucial for analyzing and interpreting the study's outcomes

Regarding the qualitative phase, students were selected using randomization to empower the researcher to select interviewees impartially so that the qualitative findings sourced from interviewing answers were as objective as possible and data collection occurred through individual interviews guided by an interview schedule Five students were chosen from the experimental group, as 5 would be the minimum requirement for a phenomenological study recommended by Creswell (1998) After identifying those involved in the interviews, the researcher sent a consent email to the students, asking for their participation in interviews with the researcher The interviews commenced on December 11, 2023, and concluded on December 18, 2023, spanning approximately one week All interviews were conducted online via Google Meet and were recorded for transcription And the language use during interviews were Vietnamese as it would allow the students to express their thoughts more easily and their answers were then translated into English with the researcher’s effort to show the interviewees’ thoughts as close as possible The duration of each interview varied, ranging from

40 approximately 15 to 20 minutes, contingent upon the depth of responses provided by the participants Following the interviews, transcription was carried out utilizing a straightforward transcription approach chosen to ensure legibility and facilitate subsequent analysis, as recommended by Kuckartz (2018)

Moreover, during transcription, measures were taken to anonymize all data to safeguard the identities of participants and maintain confidentiality.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

Quantitative data – pretest and posttest results

As the sample size was small, the Shapiro-Wilk tests were used as a means of measuring the normal distribution They were conducted on the listening scores of each section and the total scores of pre-tests and post-tests

The normal distribution tests df Sig

Table 4.1 provided the descriptive statistics of the Shapiro-Wilk tests for the results of students regarding the total scores of the pretests and the posttests

The tests were applied to the sample with a hypothesis that the sample had been

44 generated from a normal distribution If the p-values are less than or equal to 0.05, we can reject such a hypothesis and say that the data does not fit the normal distribution As seen in Table 4.1, the p-values of the two groups were more than 0.05 Hence, the hypothesis for the normality tests was accepted at the 0.05 level of significance Based on the normality status, a parametric test was then selected

Due to the distribution-free status, the researcher decided to employ appropriate parametric tests Descriptive statistics including mean scores and SD were first employed to present an overview comparison of pre- and post-test scores of the experimental group and control group To gain a deeper insight into the intervention impact, Independent Sample tests were conducted

The descriptive statistics presented in Table 4.2 provide a comprehensive overview of the changes in listening scores observed between the two groups throughout the intervention period

Descriptive Statistics for Mean Test Scores across two groups

Regarding the average test scores, the experimental group saw a rise from an initial mean of 18.05 to a subsequent mean of 20.95 in the posttest, indicating a significant increase in listening scores Conversely, the control group's mean score climbed from 17.95 to 19.5, suggesting a somewhat lesser improvement compared to the experimental group

Regarding the standard deviation (SD), which gauges the dispersion of scores around the mean, a significant decrease was observed in the experimental group, dropping from 2.03 in the pretest to 1.82 in the posttest This decline

45 indicates a more uniform distribution of scores within this group following the intervention In contrast, the control group experienced a slight decrease in SD from 2.18 to 2.06, suggesting a minor reduction compared to the experimental group

In summary, the analysis reveals a positive effect of speech act awareness- raising tasks on IELTS listening scores, particularly evident in the experimental group's notable improvement in mean scores Moreover, the decrease in standard deviation (SD) within the experimental group suggests not only an enhancement in scores but also a reduction in performance discrepancies, indicative of a more homogeneous skill level among students While mean and SD are important measures, they should be complemented with Independent Samples t-tests and

Paired Samples t-tests in the subsequent data analysis phase to delve deeper into the nature of the data and address the research question more comprehensively

4.1.3 The total pre-test scores between the control and experimental group

Independent Samples t-test was used to compare the results of the pre-tests in the control and experimental group to see if there was a significant difference or not

The Independent Samples t-Test between total pre-test scores of the two groups

Levene's Test for Equality of

Variances t-test for Equality of Means

46 The results of Levene’s Test for Equality of Variances were checked before the results of the actual t-test were examined As the p-value for Levene’s test was 0.59, greater than 0.05, the t-value in the row marked “equal variances assumed” was used With p = 0.882 > 0.05, the t-test results indicated that there was no significant difference between the total scores of pre-tests of the control group (M = 17.95, SD = 2.18) and the experimental group (M = 18.05, SD = 2.03)

In summary, the lack of a significant difference in total scores between the two groups before the intervention suggests that, initially, both groups had similar levels of listening proficiency This ensures that any observed differences in post- test scores could be attributed to the intervention itself rather than pre-existing differences in students’ proficiency levels Such balance in baseline scores enhances the validity of the study's findings, allowing for a more accurate assessment of the intervention's impact on improving listening skills

4.1.4 The total post-test scores between the control and experimental group

Independent Samples t-test was conducted to compare the total scores of post-tests between the control group (M = 19.05, SD = 2.06) and the experimental group (M = 20.95, SD = 1.82)

The Independent Samples t-Test between total post-test scores of the two groups

Levene's Test for Equality of

Variances t-test for Equality of Means

The results of Levene’s Test for Equality of Variances were checked before the results of the actual t-test were examined As the p-value for Levene’s test was 0.377, greater than 0.05, the t-value and degrees of freedom in the row marked “equal variances assumed” were used The results for the t-test indicated that there was a significant difference between the total scores of post- tests between the control group and the experimental group (t(38) = 2.356, p <

0.05) To be specific, the mean total post-test score of the experimental group was 1.45 points higher than the mean total post-test score of the control group

In summary, the significant difference observed in the t-test results between the total scores of post-tests for the control group and the experimental group suggests that the intervention had a noticeable effect on the listening proficiency of the students Specifically, the experimental group, which underwent the intervention aimed at raising awareness of speech acts, demonstrated a statistically significant improvement in their post-test scores compared to the control group

This finding implies that the implemented intervention, involving tasks focused on speech act awareness, had a positive impact on enhancing the listening skills of the experimental group students The statistical significance of this difference reinforces the effectiveness of the intervention in improving listening proficiency among students when compared to those who did not receive the treatment

4.1.5 The scores across various sections between pretest and posttest in the control group

4.1.5.1 Descriptive statistics across various sections in the pre- and post-test in the control group

The descriptive statistics presented in Table 4.5 provide a comprehensive overview of the changes in listening scores observed across various sections in the control group

Descriptive Statistics for mean test scores across the control group’s sections

As can be seen from Table 4.5, all of the sections in the control group experienced a rise in the pretest compared to the posttest from 6.6 to 7.05 in section 1, 4.95 to 5.55 in section 2, 3.8 to 4.05 in section 3, and 2.6 to 2.85 in section 4

However, to explore whether their changes were significantly different or not, Paired Samples t-tests were adopted

4.1.5.2 Score changes across various sections in the pre- and post-test in the control group

A paired Samples t-test was conducted to compare the scores across various sections in the pretest and posttest in the control group

Paired Samples t-Test between pre- and post-test scores across various sections of the control group

Mean Differences t df Sig (2-tailed) Pre test Section 1 - Post test

49 Pre test Section 2 - Post test

Pre test Section 3 - Post test

Pre test Section 4 - Post test

Findings from Table 4.6 indicated that there was a difference between pre- and post-test scores in section 1 in the control group, t(19) = 2.438, p 025 Also, a difference was witnessed between pre-and post-test scores in section 2 in the control group t(19) = 4.485, p < 0.01 for section 2 These indicate that students experienced an increase from their pre-test scores to their post-test scores regarding sections 1 and 2

By contrast, findings from Table 4.6 showed that there was no statistically significant difference in students’ pre-and post-test scores across section 3 and section 4 in the control group with t(19) = 1.751, p = 096 for section 3 and t(19)

4.1.6 The scores across various sections between pretest and posttest in the experimental group

4.1.6.1 Descriptive statistics across various sections in the pre- and post-test in the experimental group

The descriptive statistics presented in Table 4.7 provide a comprehensive overview of the changes in listening scores observed across various sections in the experimental group

Descriptive Statistics for mean test scores across the experimental group’s sections

Qualitative data – interviews

The purpose of this section is to describe the themes that were identified as part of the thematic analysis process There were three main themes including improvement in scores for sections 2 and 3, students' unfamiliarity, and a need for more practice Figure 4.1 was created to present a graphic illustration for such themes

Thematic map of the effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts

4.2.1 Improvement in sections 2 and 3 scores

Students expressed the importance of having an awareness of speech acts in sections 2 and 3 when they did these two sections Such awareness improved their scores in sections 2 and 3 as N stated in her response “I feel like, uh, when I did the tasks, my score went up, and it's like, I find it easier to understand and to guess the meaning of the speakers” This may be because they did not have to understand every single word but still could choose correct answers because they could follow and track the intentions of the speakers as stated by T in one of his

Tasks used to raise student's awareness of speech acts

Improvement in sections 2 and 3 scores

60 responses, “I find that sections 2 and 3 improve Um I notice what speakers actually mean when I listen And I can choose answers even when I do not catch every word” He stated this because in section 2 and section 3 of IELTS listening tests, the speakers would possibly mention all options and sometimes students were confused and could not follow what the speakers were saying So having an awareness of speech acts meant that students did not have to understand everything but could choose correct answers as H stated in his response “It's like I realized

I don't need to understand everything, but I can guess what is meant by speakers in that part, and I can choose the answer from there” This helped students become less confused as one of the students stated “In the past, I used to focus on the overall picture and try to listen to every word, which often led to confusion” And

N agreed with this by saying that

“I find it easier to understand and to guess the meaning of the speakers, like, it's not necessary to, to understand every word in the passage The best thing is to, um, identify who says what, and then, um, understand their purpose when saying that sentence, then you can, um, choose the answer easier.”

This answer indicated that before the intervention phase, students tended to think that to choose correct answers, they needed to understand every word and did not have any effective strategies to deal with section 2 and section 3 A similar answer can be found in B who admitted in his response that “I didn't, like,

I didn't know that I needed to know the speaker's intention when I listened before I joined your class, you know?” or N who expressed that “I initially thought that I only needed to understand what the person was saying, the literal meaning of those sentences, then I would choose the answer but I am still not sure” It appears that they had no clue about how to approach sections 2 and 3 when he did IELTS listening tests But thanks to enhanced awareness of speech acts, all students being interviewed stated that the sections in IELTS listening tests they improved the most were sections 2 and 3, as stated by H, “Improvements are in section 3; I have

61 fewer mistakes, and in section 2, I can hear and guess the speaker's intention and choose correct answers”

In summary, students all said that they performed better in section 2 and section 3 as they became better aware of the implied meanings of speakers during their listening They realized that they did not need to listen to every single word and just by noticing the speakers’ intention, they could stay away from confusion and choose more correct answers However, they shared that in the first few classes of the intervention period, they were grappling with recognizing and identifying speech acts as they were not familiar with such knowledge before

Students expressed that they struggled to adapt to this intervention teaching method in the beginning as this was their first time being exposed to recognizing and identifying the implied meanings of speakers as P expressed in her response, “I find it interesting and helpful, but sometimes at first, I couldn't guess the intention, now I do it better This is something new for me, I haven't learned this before, in nearly 10 years in school, we didn't have this” Although she had a keen interest in tasks used to raise awareness of speech acts and found them quite useful, she admitted that during the time she learned English, especially listening skills, she was not taught how to realize and analyze speech acts, thereby not knowing their importance in English learning B stated that “The tasks you taught were a bit difficult because it's difficult to switch from instinct to, it has something to apply to what I learned because I've never applied this method before, this is my first time doing it” This means that before the students joined the experimental class, they had no clue what to listen for when they listened to IELTS listening tests, especially sections 2 and 3 So it might cause difficulty for them in the first few weeks of the intervention period as stated by N as follows

“For those tasks, in the beginning, like, the first week, when I first started,

I found them, difficult to understand, but, like after the next two classes,

62 then, um, slowly I began to understand what it is, um, it's like, you know, how it goes, then, yeah, I started to apply it to when my listening.”

She expressed her initial struggle in recognizing and identifying the implied meanings of speakers especially when did a task where she needed to identify and analyze speakers’ intentions using the transcripts of listening tracks “I think the analyzing transcript task is also, um, pretty good so it doesn’t have to be changed, because at first, um, I didn't get it, but gradually I found it useful” But as she familiarized herself with this task, she began to appreciate its positive effects on her listening skills As “there are some places where it's like the speaker says no, but, means yes, not that no means no”, this indicates that misunderstanding can occur and students may not understand what the speaker implies if they do not have awareness of speech acts

In summary, students appeared to have difficulty in being able to notice and identify implied meanings of speakers in the first weeks of the intervention period However, towards the end of the intervention period, students’ ability to notice and recognize implied meanings of speakers became better as they were able to follow and track the implied meanings of speakers to choose correct answers as shared by H, “It’s like, it leads me to the answer and shows whether the idea spoken is right or wrong, agree or disagree, so I can filter the answers in a logical way to increase my chances of being correct”

As mentioned previously, students were not familiar with the intervention teaching method before as they were not taught any knowledge of speech acts or anything like that P said, “This one, you have to practice a lot to get used to it, so

I think, um, with more practice, students will get more comfortable” She stressed the importance of practicing noticing and identifying implied meanings of speakers to familiarize oneself with doing so in the future B had a similar with P but he thought that tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts were also necessary for classes with higher English proficiency, as shared “I think I need

63 more practice And according to me, in the higher class., um, the higher band students also need this knowledge and they need to practice” This indicates the importance of being more aware of speech acts when teaching listening skills in classes with higher English levels

One interesting recommendation for future implementation of speech acts awareness-raising tasks was proposed by N as she thought it would be livelier if the teacher introduced videos in place of listening tracks

Synthesis and discussion of findings

This section synthesizes findings from both quantitative and qualitative analyses on the impact of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on their listening skills It draws on data from pre-and post-test scores and student

64 interviews to address the research questions and hypotheses regarding the intervention’s effectiveness on students’ listening skills

The comparison of pre-and post-test total listening scores indicated that both the experimental group and control group showed an improvement in their listening skills However, the experimental group showed a greater increase in their listening scores in comparison with the control group

This finding is in alignment with the assertion of Padang, Purba, & Saragih (2022) and He (2023) who stress the importance of applying speech acts’ theory in improving listening skills Looking at the component sections of the listening tests in more detail, it is clear that while both groups experienced similar improvements in section 1 and section 4, a large difference can be seen in their post-test scores of sections 2 and 3 with the experimental group recording a larger rise in the listening scores in these sections These findings are supported by qualitative analysis of student interviews where they shared that the sections they think they have performed better are sections 2 and 3 which they could not do before the intervention period Their better performance in sections 2 and 3 can be attributed to their heightened awareness of speech acts as they are now able to notice, identify, and understand implied meanings of speakers during listening

Previously, they did not know how to appropriately approach sections 2 and 3 in IELTS listening, believing that listening to every single word could lead to choosing correct answers It can boil down to the way students have been taught at school where pragmatics knowledge seems to be neglected in EFL textbooks in Vietnam This finding is aligned with results from Tran and Yeh (2020) who found that Vietnamese EFL textbooks did not provide students with knowledge of pragmatics adequately and logically Due to previous lack of knowledge of speech acts and the positive effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on their listening skills, students ask for more practice to help them become better at noticing, recognizing, and understanding speech acts

65 In conclusion, this chapter has analyzed the effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on students’ listening skills The comprehensive blend of quantitative and qualitative analyses revealed that while both the intervention method and the traditional teaching method enhance listening skills, the effects of the intervention were more significant, especially in section 2 and section 3 of IELTS listening, thereby enhancing the understanding of the importance of speech act awareness in teaching listening skills Moving forward to Chapter 5, the study summarizes the main conclusions, discusses broader pedagogical implications, acknowledges the study's limitations, and suggests areas for future research

CONCLUSION

Summary of key findings

The study evaluates the effects of tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on their listening skills, employing a mixed-methods approach Quantitative findings show that such tasks significantly enhance students’ listening skills through improved in IELTS listening tests, especially in sections 2 and 3 Qualitative data reveal students’ changes in the way they approach their IELTS listening tests, being able to notice, recognize, and understand the implied meanings of speakers and thus having more correct answers Besides, they also reveal that there is still a lack of features of speech acts being integrated into Vietnamese EFL textbooks These findings establish a foundation on which the implications of this research are based in the following section.

Implications for pedagogy

The investigation into the effects of tasks aimed at increasing students' awareness of speech acts on their listening skills has produced valuable insights, prompting a discussion on its broader implications The implication involves listening teaching applications, each highlighting different aspects of the enhanced awareness of speech acts in language education

The findings advocate for a focus on enhancing students’ awareness of speech acts when teachers teach listening skills Being able to notice and interpret the meanings of speakers’ utterances is one of the key requirements when listening (Rost, 2002) However, knowledge of pragmatics, including speech acts, seems to be neglected The development of pragmatic competence in an EFL setting significantly differs from the socialization process through which it is acquired in first-language contexts (Kecskes, 2015) This study agrees with Ton

67 Nu and Murray (2020) who claim explicit input is necessary for the development of pragmatic competence Therefore, when preparing for IELTS listening tests which test students’ ability to recognize and interpret underlying meanings of speakers, teachers should apply tasks to raise their students’ awareness of speech acts for the improvement in students’ listening skills.

Limitations and future research

This study has several limitations that should be acknowledged Firstly, the use of convenience sampling at a single educational center in Ho Chi Minh City may restrict the generalizability of the findings The specific demographic and educational context of the participants may not fully represent the diverse range of English-learning students Secondly, the eight-week duration of the intervention might not adequately capture the long-term effects and sustainability of tasks designed to raise students' awareness of speech acts on their listening skills Lastly, future research could address these limitations by incorporating a larger, more diverse sample across multiple educational settings to enhance the generalizability of the findings Longitudinal studies are also recommended to evaluate the long- term impacts of such tasks on students' listening skills.

PRE-TEST

sourced from IELTS 18 Academic Student's Book.

2 Intervention phase The intervention phase spanned over eight weeks.

3 Posttest administration Assessment of listening skills using another listening test sourced from IELTS 18 Academic Student's Book.

Analysis of pre-and post-test scores for statistical significance using SPSS

Collection of qualitative data via interviews with students

Comprehensive integration and interpretation of quantitative and qualitative data.

The study was conducted at Menglish home English center founded in 2019 The center has only one campus which is located in District 3 This center

32 offered classes from below IELTS 3.0 up to IELTS 7.0 in the form of intensive IELTS courses which equip its students with skills and knowledge needed to help them achieve their targeted IELTS scores

The researcher is teaching as a teacher at this center and this is the only center at which the researcher is teaching As the researcher was able to ask for consent from the center administrator for the conduct of this study, convenience sampling was adopted since the students here were the only participants available to be studied by the researcher They were college and university non-English majors aged 18 to 21 years old They studied in two classes of which the researcher was the teacher responsible for teaching Listening skills The English level of the two classes was at band 5.0 There were 20 students in each class, which means that the total number of participants was 40 in this study There were one control group and one experimental group with 20 participants in each group Both control and experimental groups were administered by the researcher

The textbook assigned by the center for the two groups was Complete IELTS Bands 5-6.5 by Cambridge University Press The intervention period for both groups lasted eight weeks with each week covering a unit and there was a 60- minute session on teaching listening every week for each group

The main difference between the control group and experimental group lies in the pre listening and post listening stages For example, in Appendix C on page 88, in the pre-listening stage in unit 2 ‘It’s good for you’ of the control group, the students took part in an activity where they could practice speaking English based on pictures related to the topic about Healthy hobbies Meanwhile, in the same unit, the experimental group started their unit by joining in an activity where they had to perceive, notice and understand the context of the conversation in the listening track To be more specific, they needed to recognize that the conversation took place in a hospital as well as the relationship between the speakers, one of whom is a supervisor and the others are newbie nurses Based on that, through

33 guiding from teacher, they were aware of the language use by the supervisor when she talked to newcomers

Another difference took place in unit 2 was when the students completed their listening for the first listening track In the control group, their listening answers were corrected before they moved onto the second listening track

However, in the experimental group, the students were given the listening script and they were asked to identify the utterances in that script that could be referred to as requests

Some examples how speech-act awareness-raising tasks were applied in the class involve analysing transcript and categorizing utterances based on their functions, doing a fil-in-the-blanks task where students were forced to listen selectively to the missing utterances, watching videos to identify speech acts through verbal and non-verbal expressions, predicting the content of conversations and speech acts that are going to be used in those conversations, drawing a concept map which connect speech acts with their functions and typical expressions and engaging in role-play activities to gain more awareness of how certain speech acts were used along with the appropriate utterances conveying such speech acts

The table below outlines the activities carried out during the intervention phase, detailing each activity and specifying the groups involved

Summary of activities in the intervention phase

This stage warms up students and ignites their interests at the

Speech acts awareness-raising tasks

Not only do the tasks at this stage make students more engaging in the listening tracks afterwards but they also raise students’ awareness of speech acts

Students listen to listening tracks and write down their answers

Teachers correct students’ answers Both groups

Speech acts awareness-raising tasks

Students do tasks to become more aware of speech acts used in the listening tracks

Students get involved in tasks

35 such as group work or discussion

3.5.1 Pre-tests and post-tests: Cambridge IELTS 18

IELTS stands for the "International English Language Testing System." It is a standardized test designed to assess the English language proficiency of non- native English speakers who plan to study, work, or migrate to English-speaking countries The IELTS test evaluates the test taker's abilities in four key language skills: listening, reading, writing, and speaking In the scope of this study, listening skills are the main and sole focus

Four common listening skills are being assessed, including an understanding of main ideas, understanding of specific factual information, recognizing opinions, attitudes, and purpose of a speaker, and following the development of an argument (IELTS information for candidates, p 4) It can be seen that the test assesses test takers on their pragmatic knowledge, one of which is speech acts If the test taker can recognize opinions, attitudes, and purposes, it indicates that he/she perhaps has good knowledge of the illocutionary act This is because, in the listening test, there are times when one speaker gives utterances to express their thoughts and attitudes probably to persuade other speakers to agree with them or to show their disagreement with an idea So if the test taker cannot understand those implied meanings and follow their effects on other speakers, known as a perlocutionary act, in the recording, it will be difficult to choose correct answers with so many ideas being expressed in a short dialogue That is the reason why being aware of speech acts and having knowledge of these pragmatic features can be the key to higher scores for IELTS test takers

The IELTS Listening test consists of approximately 30 minutes, with 40 questions covering various question types such as multiple choice, matching, labeling diagrams/maps, and completing notes or summaries Divided into four parts, the test assesses different scenarios: everyday social contexts in Parts 1 and

36 2, and educational/training contexts in Parts 3 and 4 Test takers must demonstrate their ability to comprehend main ideas, specific factual information, opinions, attitudes, and the purpose of speakers, as well as follow the development of arguments So conscious awareness of speech acts is crucial for recognizing implied meanings of utterances said by speakers Such a conscious awareness may contribute to higher scores in the IELTS Listening test In the next section, the term ‘conscious awareness’ is going to be defined together with a discussion of how tasks used to raise conscious awareness can be applied in language teaching

Cambridge IELTS 18 was chosen with two practice tests, including test 1 (pretest) and test 3 (posttest), taken out to test participants’ listening skills before and after the intervention Each test lasted 30 minutes including four parts with 10 questions in each part as follows 1 with a conversation between two people in an everyday social context, part 2 with a monologue taking place in an everyday social context, part 3 with a conversation between two people and up to four people in an academic context, part 4 with a monologue on an academic subject The students were instructed to write their answers on the question paper as they listened to the recordings, and at the end, they were given an additional 10 minutes to transfer their answers to the answer sheet Each correct answer was awarded one point

One reason for this choice was because the students in the two classes were preparing for the IELTS exam and the textbook being used was also relevant to IELTS Listening tests being taken from this book would align what the researcher taught in class with what was assessed Another reason lies in the fact that this book was published by the renowned and reliable publisher Cambridge University Press & Assessment Claimed by this book publisher as “EXACTLY like the real exam”, its authenticity was ensured as “every single part of our practice tests with real students under exam conditions” was checked for “the most authentic experience possible” (Cambridge IELTS 18, 2023, p 4)

37 The pre-test was test 1 taken from Cambridge IELTS 18 with the content and its task types as follows section 1: Transport survey (Form completion), section 2: Becoming a volunteer for ACE (Multiple choice and Matching), section 3: Talk on jobs in fashion design (Multiple choice), section 4: Elephant translocation (Note completion) The post-test was test 3 taken from IELTS Cambridge 18 Academic with the content as follows section 1: Wayside Camera Club (Form and Table completion), section 2: Mushroom picking (Multiple choice), section 3 Automation and the future of work (Multiple choice and Matching), section 4 Space Traffic Management (Note completion) These tests are outlined in more detail in Appendix A from page 75 onwards

Hyman et al (1954) describe interviews as a form of inquiry that is common in social sciences Among the various types of interviews, one widely used is the semi-structured interview According to Magaldi and Berler (2020), the semi-structured interview is characterized as an exploratory form of interviewing

In an interview format, interviewees’ perspectives are more likely to be explored within a reasonably openly designed framework rather than in a standardized type of conversation, as in questionnaires

POST-TEST

The Menglish home English Center Class:

PART 1 Questions 1-4 Complete the form below.

Write ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer

Wayside Camera Club membership form

Email address: dan1068@market.com Home address: 52 1……… Street, Peacetown Heard about us: from a 2………

Reasons for joining: to enter competitions to 3………

Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer

Title of competition Instructions Feedback to Dan 5 ‘………’ A scene in the home

The picture’s composition was not good

Which TWO warnings does Dan give about picking mushrooms?

A Don’t pick more than one variety of mushroom at a time

B Don’t pick mushrooms near busy roads

C Don’t eat mushrooms given to you

D Don’t eat mushrooms while picking them

Which TWO ideas about wild mushrooms does Dan say are correct?

A Mushrooms should always be peeled before eating

B Mushrooms eaten by animals may be unsafe

C Cooking destroys toxins in mushrooms

D Brightly coloured mushrooms can be edible

E All poisonous mushrooms have a bad smell

Choose the correct letter, A, B or C

15 What advice does Dan give about picking mushrooms in parks?

16 Dan says it is a good idea for beginners to A use a mushroom app

17 What does Dan say is important for conservation?

A selecting only fully grown mushrooms B picking a limited amount of mushrooms C avoiding areas where rare mushroom species grow

18 According to Dan, some varieties of wild mushrooms are in decline because there is

A a huge demand for them from restaurants

B a lack of rain in this part of the country

C a rise in building developments locally

19 Dan says that when storing mushrooms, people should A keep them in the fridge for no more than two days

B keep them in a brown bag in a dark room

C leave them for a period after washing them

20 What does Dan say about trying new varieties of mushrooms?

B Expect some to have a strong taste

C Cook them for a long time

Which TWO opinions about the Luddites do the students express?

B They are still influential today

C They have received unfair criticism

Which TWO predictions about the future of work are the students doubtful about?

A Work will be more rewarding

C People will want to delay retiring

D Working hours will be shorter

E People will change jobs more frequently

What comment do the students make about each of the following jobs?

Choose SIX answers from the box and write the correct letter, A-G, next to Questions 25-30

Comments A These jobs are likely to be at risk

B Their role has become more interesting in recent years

C The number of people working in this sector has fallen dramatically

D This job will require more qualifications

E Higher disposable income has led to a huge increase in jobs

F There is likely to be a significant rise in demand for this service

G Both employment and productivity have risen

Write ONE WORD ONLY for each answer

● is a concept similar to Air Traffic Control, but for satellites rather than planes

● would aim to set up legal and 31……… ways of improving safety

● does not actually exist at present

Problems in developing effective Space Traffic Management

● Satellites are now quite 32……… and therefore more widespread (e.g there are constellations made up of 33……… of satellites)

● At present, satellites are not required to transmit information to help with their 34………

● There are few systems for 35……… satellites

● Small pieces of debris may be difficult to identify

● Operators may be unwilling to share details of satellites used for

● It may be hard to collect details of the object’s 37……… at a given time

● Scientists can only make a 38……… about where the satellite will go

● Common standards should be agreed on for the presentation of information

● The information should be combined in one 39………

● A coordinated system must be designed to create 40……… in its users

Project: Tasks used to raise students’ awareness of speech acts on listening skills Time of Interview:

To facilitate my note-taking, I would like to audio tape our conversations today

Please sign the release form For your information, only the researcher on the project will be privy to the tapes which will be eventually destroyed after they are transcribed In addition, you must sign a form devised to meet human subject requirements Essentially, this document states that: (1) all information will be held confidential, (2) your participation is voluntary and you may stop at any time if you feel uncomfortable, and (3) I do not intend to inflict any harm Thank you for your agreeing to participate

I have planned this interview to last no longer than 20 minutes During this time, I have several questions that I would like to cover If time begins to run short, it may be necessary to interrupt you in order to push ahead and complete this line of questioning

1 Did you notice any differences in your approach when taking the IELTS listening test, compared to before joining this class?

87 2 Which sections in IELTS listening test do you think require you to pay attention to the implied meanings of speakers?

3 Which section in IELTS listening do you feel most improved when you become more aware of implied meanings of speakers?

5 What do you think about the importance of being more aware of implied meanings of speakers in IELTS listening?

6 What is your opinion about the role of tasks conducted in class to help you become better aware of implied meanings of speakers?

7 Did you have any difficulties when the teacher conducted these tasks in class?

8 What improvements or changes would you suggest for these tasks if they are to be conducted in the future?

(Thank the individuals for their cooperation and participation in this interview

Assure them of the confidentiality of the responses and the potential for future interviews.)

LESSON PLAN FOR CONTROL GROUP

Lesson plan- Week 2 Lesson title: It’s good for you

Aims: This lesson aims to provide students with the ability to improve their health- related vocabulary and listening skills

At the end of the lesson, learners will be able to:

● Learn more vocabulary about the health topic

● Know how to do a map labelling listening task

Teaching methods: Pre-While-Post approach Teaching aid(s): TV, laptop, slides, papers Material(s): Complete IELTS Bands 5-6.5 Total class time: 60 minutes

Lead into the lesson - T helps students get started with the pictures in the book, elicit some possible questions, e.g

When did you last make a salad for yourself?

How often do you cook at home?

Warm up: Draw a mind map - T asks students to work in groups and draw a mind map to point out the reasons why nurse's job might be stressful or unhealthy

; advice they would give them about how to have a healthy lifestyle

- Ss draw mind maps and then present their ideas

- T tells them that the words they hear when they listen will not be the same as the words used in the questions

- T tells students to underline the key ideas in the questions

- T plays the recording once only as in the exam

92 to work in pairs and compare answers

- T plays the recording again and correct students’ answers

- T asks students to look at the places A-H on the map below and pick a place and tell their partner how to get there from the main building

- Ss use the words and expression s in the box to ask each other

- T plays the recording once only as in the exam

- T then asks students to work in pairs and compare answers

- T plays the recording again and correct students’ answers

- Ss listen to the recording

Interactive game: https://www.eslkidsgames.com/direction s-game

- T divides students into two groups

94 one student from each group

- T then asks one student to be the one who asks for direction and the other who gives directions

- Learn new words - Finish Unit 2 in the workbook

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

This chapter aims to present the study's findings and is divided into two main sections based on two types of data: quantitative and qualitative In the first section, quantitative data was derived from pre-and post-test scores of both the experimental and control groups and analyzed through normality testing, descriptive statistics, and referential statistics In the second section, qualitative data obtained from interviews underwent structured evaluation via thematic analysis, condensing interview transcripts into essential points and categorizing them into different codes This section was structured into some thematic sections, aligning with the theoretical framework and interview guide, with each subsection focusing on thematically related codes To ensure reading coherence, interview transcripts were translated from Vietnamese to English

4.1 Quantitative data – pretest and posttest results

As the sample size was small, the Shapiro-Wilk tests were used as a means of measuring the normal distribution They were conducted on the listening scores of each section and the total scores of pre-tests and post-tests

The normal distribution tests df Sig

Table 4.1 provided the descriptive statistics of the Shapiro-Wilk tests for the results of students regarding the total scores of the pretests and the posttests

The tests were applied to the sample with a hypothesis that the sample had been

44 generated from a normal distribution If the p-values are less than or equal to 0.05, we can reject such a hypothesis and say that the data does not fit the normal distribution As seen in Table 4.1, the p-values of the two groups were more than 0.05 Hence, the hypothesis for the normality tests was accepted at the 0.05 level of significance Based on the normality status, a parametric test was then selected

Due to the distribution-free status, the researcher decided to employ appropriate parametric tests Descriptive statistics including mean scores and SD were first employed to present an overview comparison of pre- and post-test scores of the experimental group and control group To gain a deeper insight into the intervention impact, Independent Sample tests were conducted

The descriptive statistics presented in Table 4.2 provide a comprehensive overview of the changes in listening scores observed between the two groups throughout the intervention period

Descriptive Statistics for Mean Test Scores across two groups

Regarding the average test scores, the experimental group saw a rise from an initial mean of 18.05 to a subsequent mean of 20.95 in the posttest, indicating a significant increase in listening scores Conversely, the control group's mean score climbed from 17.95 to 19.5, suggesting a somewhat lesser improvement compared to the experimental group

Regarding the standard deviation (SD), which gauges the dispersion of scores around the mean, a significant decrease was observed in the experimental group, dropping from 2.03 in the pretest to 1.82 in the posttest This decline

45 indicates a more uniform distribution of scores within this group following the intervention In contrast, the control group experienced a slight decrease in SD from 2.18 to 2.06, suggesting a minor reduction compared to the experimental group

In summary, the analysis reveals a positive effect of speech act awareness- raising tasks on IELTS listening scores, particularly evident in the experimental group's notable improvement in mean scores Moreover, the decrease in standard deviation (SD) within the experimental group suggests not only an enhancement in scores but also a reduction in performance discrepancies, indicative of a more homogeneous skill level among students While mean and SD are important measures, they should be complemented with Independent Samples t-tests and

Paired Samples t-tests in the subsequent data analysis phase to delve deeper into the nature of the data and address the research question more comprehensively

4.1.3 The total pre-test scores between the control and experimental group

Independent Samples t-test was used to compare the results of the pre-tests in the control and experimental group to see if there was a significant difference or not

The Independent Samples t-Test between total pre-test scores of the two groups

Levene's Test for Equality of

Variances t-test for Equality of Means

46 The results of Levene’s Test for Equality of Variances were checked before the results of the actual t-test were examined As the p-value for Levene’s test was 0.59, greater than 0.05, the t-value in the row marked “equal variances assumed” was used With p = 0.882 > 0.05, the t-test results indicated that there was no significant difference between the total scores of pre-tests of the control group (M = 17.95, SD = 2.18) and the experimental group (M = 18.05, SD = 2.03)

In summary, the lack of a significant difference in total scores between the two groups before the intervention suggests that, initially, both groups had similar levels of listening proficiency This ensures that any observed differences in post- test scores could be attributed to the intervention itself rather than pre-existing differences in students’ proficiency levels Such balance in baseline scores enhances the validity of the study's findings, allowing for a more accurate assessment of the intervention's impact on improving listening skills

4.1.4 The total post-test scores between the control and experimental group

Independent Samples t-test was conducted to compare the total scores of post-tests between the control group (M = 19.05, SD = 2.06) and the experimental group (M = 20.95, SD = 1.82)

The Independent Samples t-Test between total post-test scores of the two groups

Levene's Test for Equality of

Variances t-test for Equality of Means

The results of Levene’s Test for Equality of Variances were checked before the results of the actual t-test were examined As the p-value for Levene’s test was 0.377, greater than 0.05, the t-value and degrees of freedom in the row marked “equal variances assumed” were used The results for the t-test indicated that there was a significant difference between the total scores of post- tests between the control group and the experimental group (t(38) = 2.356, p <

0.05) To be specific, the mean total post-test score of the experimental group was 1.45 points higher than the mean total post-test score of the control group

In summary, the significant difference observed in the t-test results between the total scores of post-tests for the control group and the experimental group suggests that the intervention had a noticeable effect on the listening proficiency of the students Specifically, the experimental group, which underwent the intervention aimed at raising awareness of speech acts, demonstrated a statistically significant improvement in their post-test scores compared to the control group

This finding implies that the implemented intervention, involving tasks focused on speech act awareness, had a positive impact on enhancing the listening skills of the experimental group students The statistical significance of this difference reinforces the effectiveness of the intervention in improving listening proficiency among students when compared to those who did not receive the treatment

4.1.5 The scores across various sections between pretest and posttest in the control group

4.1.5.1 Descriptive statistics across various sections in the pre- and post-test in the control group

The descriptive statistics presented in Table 4.5 provide a comprehensive overview of the changes in listening scores observed across various sections in the control group

Descriptive Statistics for mean test scores across the control group’s sections

As can be seen from Table 4.5, all of the sections in the control group experienced a rise in the pretest compared to the posttest from 6.6 to 7.05 in section 1, 4.95 to 5.55 in section 2, 3.8 to 4.05 in section 3, and 2.6 to 2.85 in section 4

However, to explore whether their changes were significantly different or not, Paired Samples t-tests were adopted

4.1.5.2 Score changes across various sections in the pre- and post-test in the control group

A paired Samples t-test was conducted to compare the scores across various sections in the pretest and posttest in the control group

Paired Samples t-Test between pre- and post-test scores across various sections of the control group

Mean Differences t df Sig (2-tailed) Pre test Section 1 - Post test

49 Pre test Section 2 - Post test

Pre test Section 3 - Post test

Pre test Section 4 - Post test

Findings from Table 4.6 indicated that there was a difference between pre- and post-test scores in section 1 in the control group, t(19) = 2.438, p 025 Also, a difference was witnessed between pre-and post-test scores in section 2 in the control group t(19) = 4.485, p < 0.01 for section 2 These indicate that students experienced an increase from their pre-test scores to their post-test scores regarding sections 1 and 2