Improving students listening comprehension through focused listening tasks

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES - HOÀNG PHƯƠNG THẢO IMPROVING STUDENTS’ LISTENING COMPREHENSION THROUGH FOCUSED LISTENING TASKS (Nâng cao khả nghe hiểu học sinh thông qua luyện tập kỹ nghe có trọng tâm) M.A Minor Thesis Field: English Methodology Code: 60 14 10 HANOI – 2010 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES - HOÀNG PHƯƠNG THẢO IMPROVING STUDENTS’ LISTENING COMPREHENSION THROUGH FOCUSED LISTENING TASKS (Nâng cao khả nghe hiểu học sinh thông qua luyện tập kỹ nghe có trọng tâm) M.A Minor Thesis Field: English Methodology Code: 60 14 10 Supervisor: Trần Hiền Lan, M.A HANOI – 2010 iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Page DECLARATION …………………………………………………………………… i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ………………………………………………………… ii ABSTRACT ………………………………………………………………………… iii TABLE OF CONTENTS …………………………………………………………… iv LIST OF TABLES…………………………………………………………………… vi PART A INTRODUCTION ………………………………………………… …… 1 Rationale ……………………………………………………….….…………… Aims of the study ………………………………………………………….…… Research questions…………………………………………………………… Significance of the study ……………………………………………………… Scope of the study……………………………………………………………… Methods of the study…………………………………………………………… Design of the study…………………………………………………………… PART B DEVELOPMENT……………………………………………………… CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW………………………………………… I.1 Different views of listening comprehension……………………………… … I.2 Importance of listening comprehension……………………………………… I.3 Classification of listening comprehension…………………………………… I.3.1 Real - life listening………………………………………………… I.3.2 Classroom - listening ……………………………………………… 11 I.4 Listening stages………………………………………………………………… 12 I.4.1 Pre-listening stage…………………………………………………… 12 I.4.2 While - listening stage ……………………………………………… 14 I.4.3 Post - listening stage………………………………………………… 15 I.5 Definition of task……………………………………………………………… 16 I.6 Kinds of listening tasks ……………………………………………………… 18 I.7 Language learners’ difficulties in listening comprehension ………………… 20 v CHAPTER II: RESEARCH ON CURRENT LISTENING TEACHING AND LEARNING SITUATION IN BIEN HOA GIFTED HIGH SCHOOL……… 24 II.1 Overview of current listening teaching and learning situation in Bien Hoa Gifted High School……………………………………………………… 24 II.2 Participants……………………………………………………………….…… 24 II.3 Research method …………………………………………………………… 25 II.4 Data analysis and discussion ………………………………………………… 25 II.4.1 Students’ attitudes towards listening skill…………………………… 25 II.4.2 Students’ experience in listening…………………………………… 26 II.4.3 Students’ comment on the listening materials used in class………… 27 II.4.4 Students’ comment on factors causing difficulties in their learning listening… ………………………….……………………………… 27 II.4.5 Students’ difficulties in listening to English texts………………… 28 II.4.6 Teacher’s strategies to motivate the students……………………… 31 II.4.7 The students’ expectation to their teacher………………………… 32 II.5 Major findings ……………………………………………………………… 32 CHAPTER III: MAJOR SOLUTIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ LISTENING COMPREHENSION …………………… 35 III.1 Choosing the suitable listening texts………………………………………… 35 III.2 Designing suitable tasks ……………………………………………………… 36 III.3 Helping the students to prepare well for the listening through the pre – listening stage ………………………………………………………… 36 PART C CONCLUSION ………………………………………………………… 40 Conclusions …………………………………………………………………… 40 Limitations of the research …………………………………………………… 40 Recommendations for further research ……………………………………… 41 REFERENCES …………………………………….……………………………… 42 APPENDIX ………………………………………….…………………….………… I iii ABSTRACT In recent years, English has become a compulsory subject in high schools in Vietnam, the need, therefore, to learn English is greater than ever before However, almost all students not have chances to develop listening skill at high school and listening is regarded as one of the hardest skills for the students There are various reasons for this: the students’ motivation, linguistic knowledge, background and experience are poor, the listening situation is unfamiliar to the students, and the teaching methods of some teachers are not really effective The researcher realized that although the students find the importance of listening skill and they have attempted to learn it well, there exists a lot of difficulties obstacle them to be efficient listeners The study has been conducted in the area of listening skill It focuses on the attitudes towards the learning listening and the difficulties in listening lesson of the students at English majored class of grade 11 in Bien Hoa Gifted High School, Hanam province When the problems have been identified, suggestions to improve the situation of teaching and learning listening to English would be made The thesis is organized into three parts Part A gives rationale for the study, and set up the aims, the research questions, the significance, the scope, the method and the design of the study Part B consists of three chapters Chapter looks at the review of related literature Chapter is the research on the current situation of teaching and learning listening to English in Bien Hoa Gifted High School Chapter offers some possible suggestions to improve the teaching and learning listening English in Bien Hoa Gifted High School Part C presents the limitations of the study and some suggestions for further study It is hoped that this thesis will make contribution to solve some of the existing problems of inadequate listening competence of the students in Bien Hoa Gifted High School Thank you for evaluating AnyBizSoft PDF Merger! To remove this page, please register your program! Go to Purchase Now>> AnyBizSoft PDF Merger  Merge multiple PDF files into one  Select page range of PDF to merge  Select specific page(s) to merge  Extract page(s) from different PDF files and merge into one ... FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES - HOÀNG PHƯƠNG THẢO IMPROVING STUDENTS LISTENING COMPREHENSION THROUGH FOCUSED LISTENING TASKS (Nâng cao khả nghe hiểu học sinh thông qua luyện tập kỹ... views of listening comprehension …………………………… … I.2 Importance of listening comprehension …………………………………… I.3 Classification of listening comprehension ………………………………… I.3.1 Real - life listening ………………………………………………... ………………………………………………… 25 II.4.1 Students attitudes towards listening skill…………………………… 25 II.4.2 Students experience in listening ………………………………… 26 II.4.3 Students comment on the listening materials used