Using prosody to improve first year students listening skill at the college of finance and customs m a 60 14 10

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY – HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LINGUISTICS & LITERATURE - USING PROSODY TO IMPROVE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS’ LISTENING SKILL AT THE COLLEGE OF FINANCE AND CUSTOMS A thesis submitted to the Faculty of English Linguistics & Literature in partial fulfillment of the Master’s degree in TESOL By DƯƠNG THỊ THU HIỀN Supervised by NGUYỄN HOÀNG TUẤN, Ph.D HO CHI MINH CITY, FEBRUARY 2012 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY – HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LINGUISTICS & LITERATURE - USING PROSODY TO IMPROVE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS’ LISTENING SKILL AT THE COLLEGE OF FINANCE AND CUSTOMS A thesis submitted to the Faculty of English Linguistics & Literature in partial fulfillment of the Master’s degree in TESOL By DƯƠNG THỊ THU HIỀN Supervised by NGUYỄN HOÀNG TUẤN, Ph.D HO CHI MINH CITY, FEBRUARY 2012 CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I hereby certify my authorship of the thesis entitled “USING PROSODY TO IMPROVE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS’ LISTENING SKILL AT THE COLLEGE OF FINANCE AND CUSTOMS” submitted today in terms of the statements of requirements for thesis in Master program issued by the Higher Degree Committee, is my own work This thesis has not been submitted for an award of any degree or diploma in any other institution Ho Chi Minh City, February 2012 DƯƠNG THỊ THU HIỀN i RETENTION AND USE OF THE THESIS I hereby state that I, DƯƠNG THỊ THU HIỀN, being the candidate for the degree of Master of Arts of TESOL, accept the requirements of the university relating to the retention and use of master’s thesis deposited in the library In terms of these conditions, I agree that the original of my thesis deposited in the library should be available for any purposes of study and research, accompanying with the normal regulations established by the library for the care, loan or reproduction of theses Ho Chi Minh City, February 2012 DƯƠNG THỊ THU HIỀN ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to my supervisor, Dr Nguyễn Hoàng Tuấn His continual encouragement, careful reading, critical comments made my work much easier and more enjoyable Without his expert guidance and support, this research has never been possible My thanks also go to the teaching board of TESOL course at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities They are all great lecturers who devote their energy to teaching and giving valuable ideas and support for our theses I also take this opportunity to express my thanks to the college managing board, my colleagues, my friends and my family who have given me emotional support, helpful advice and ongoing encouragement Finally, I would like to extend my special thanks to the students who willingly participated in the experimental teaching and spent their time on completing my questionnaires and interviews so that I can accomplish this research iii ABSTRACT Among four skills which are speaking, listening, reading and writing being taught at the College of Finance and Customs for first year students, listening seems to be a problematic subject when students find it difficult to figure out the meaning of the text in real speech even though these students have a long time learning the language With the aims at easing this problem for first year students, the researcher carried out this study in order to explore and examine the use of prosody to improve students’ listening comprehension In the study, students were taught about stress, rhythm, and intonation with the hope of spotting the impact of prosody on helping students recognize and understand chunks of words Data were collected from 110 students of two different classes through a 12week quasi-experimental teaching procedure and used to make comparisons between pre-test and post-test scores The teacher-in-charge and students’ opinions were also collected to have a full understanding from different perspectives towards the issue Students’ responses to questionnaire and interviews, teacher’s comments and test results revealed that prosody had a positive impact on students’ listening comprehension Based on the findings of the study, some recommendations on the use of prosody in the teaching and learning at the College of Finance and Customs were also iv presented Finally, the results of the study can be used for further consideration to enhance students’ listening skill in other teaching and learning context v LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS Table 4.1 Students’ gender 56 Table 4.2 Students’ age 57 Table 4.3 Students’ length of English learning 58 Table 4.4 Students’ listening ability self-evaluation 62 Table 4.5 Score distribution of the pre-test on general English 62 Table 4.6 Means of General English test scores collected from two groups 63 Table 4.7 Independent Samples Test 63 Table 4.8 Class statistics 65 Table 4.9 Independent Samples Test 65 Table 4.10 Students’ scores in listening comprehension pre-test 66 Table 4.11 Means of two classes in the listening comprehension pre-test 67 Table 4.12 Independent samples test 67 Table 4.13 Comparisons between pre-tests and post-tests on each prosodic feature 69 Table 4.14 Score distribution of the post-test on listening 70 Table 4.15 Means of two groups in listening post-test 70 Table 4.16 T-test for equality of means of two groups in post-test on listening skill 71 Table 4.17 Means of pre-test and post-test on listening in each group 72 Chart 4.1 Students’ length of English learning 58 Chart 4.2 Students’ certificate 59 Chart 4.3 Experience in some aspects of pronunciation from students in Class A 60 Chart 4.4 Experience in some aspects of pronunciation from students in Class C 60 Chart 4.5 Students’ listening ability self-evaluation 62 Chart 4.6 Students’ scores in pre-test on prosody knowledge 64 Chart 4.7 Students’ scores in pre test in listening comprehension 66 Chart 4.8 Students’ attitudes about learning prosody in the quasi-experimental teaching 73 vi Chart 4.9 Students’ opinions about the usefulness of teaching prosody 74 Chart 4.10 Students’ opinions about the time allotted for teaching prosody 75 Chart 4.11 Students’ opinions about the improvement of their listening skill after the quasi-experimental teaching 76 vii TABLE OF CONTENTS CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY i RETENTION AND USE OF THE THESIS ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii ABSTRACT iv LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS vi TABLE OF CONTENTS viii CHAPTER INTRODUCTION 1.1 THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS 1.2 PRACTICAL CONCERNS 1.2.1 The teaching and learning materials 1.2.2 The teaching and learning situation 1.3 STATEMENT OF PURPOSE 1.4 RESEARCH QUESTION 1.5 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY 1.5.1 Significance of the study in learning 1.5.2 Significance of the study in teaching 1.6 LIMITATION AND DELIMITATION 1.7 DEFINITIONS OF THE TERM PROSODY 1.8 ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY CHAPTER LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 PROSODY 2.1.1 Definition 2.1.2 Functions of prosody 2.2 PROSODIC FEATURES 13 viii ... curriculum, to the teachers, to the students and the administrators at the college of Finance and Customs CHAPTER LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter gives brief background information about prosody and. .. foods At the meeting are Keith (Marketing Manager and Chair), Donna (Market Researcher), Fatima (Sales Manager) and 108 Jamie (Product Manager) Read the questions (1–6), then listen and choose the. .. skill; and to make some recommendations and contributions to the recent teaching and learning context at the college of Finance and Customs 1.4 RESEARCH QUESTION The main research question that guides