SOME SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS TO IMPROVE GRADE 12 STUDENTS listenING SKILL IN ENGLISH CLASSES AT LE LOI UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL

TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS PART 1: REASONS FOR TOPIC CHOICE PART 2: CONTENT I THEORETICAL BASIS Students’ psychological characteristics in learning Englis Importance in stimulating participation of students in English lesson Listening skill II THE REAL STATE OF AFFAIRS Researching method Researching questions Results of the convey III SOLUTIONS Suggested solutions to learn English listening skills at Le Loi high school 1.1 Increasing students’ listening interest and motivation 1.2 Making English listening interesting 1.3 Using visual aids in teaching listening 1.4 Raising students’ awareness of the usefulness of English Training students to become efficient listeners 2.1 Making students aware of the nature of the listeninging process 2.2 Making students aware of the purposes of listening 2.3 Teaching students different listening strategies 2.4 Encouraging students to develop extensive listening habit Improving teachers’ classroom techniques and subject background knowledge 3.1 Suggested Activities for English listening 3.1 - a Pre-listening Stage 3.1- b While-listening Stage 3.1- c Post listening stage 3.1-C Some sample activities used for post-listening stage: 3.1-C Improving teachers’ professional knowledge IV Summary PART 3: CONCLUSION Summary of the findings Limitations of the study and suggestions for further study Suggested further research REFERENCES APPENDIX A PAGES 3 4 5 6 7 10 11 11 11 11 12 13 13 13,14,15 15,16 17 17 18 18 19 19 10 21, ,27 INITIATIVE: “SOME SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS TO IMPROVE GRADE 12 STUDENTS' listenING SKILL IN ENGLISH CLASSES AT LE LOI UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL” PART 1: REASONS FOR TOPIC CHOICE No one can deny the importance of listening skills in foreign language learning because the key to acquire a language is to receive language input Krashen, Terrell, Ehrman, & Herzog (1984) claim that acquisition takes place only when students absorb enough comprehensible input The same claim was supported by Rost (1994) who confirmed that listening is vital in language classrooms because it provides input for learners As an input skill, listening plays a crucial role in students’ languagedevelopment Krashen (1985) argues that people acquire language by understanding the linguistic information they hear Thus language acquisition is achieved mainly through receiving understandable input and listening ability is the critical component in achieving understandable language input Without understanding inputs at the right level, any kind of learning simply cannot occur Thus listening is a fundamental language skill, and as such it merits a critical priority among the four skill areas for language students As an English teacher, with her own knowledge and experience in teaching, the author finds interested in studying the difficulties in learning the listening skill in English She would like to present the thesis “An investigation into difficulties in learning English listening skills at Leloi high school" She chooses this matter due to the following reasons PART 2: CONTENT I THEORETICAL BASIS Students’ psychological characteristics in learning English Students own age characteristics and innate skills which help them in learning language process Teachers must fully understand and take full advantages of them effectively These specific characteristics are: They learn a foreign language naturally as they learn their mother tongue They learn it through encouragement, which depends on each teacher’s methods If they are effectively motivated, they will perform better and more enthusiastically Besides, they learn through their listening and repeating, through cooperation and reciprocation in reliable atmosphere; and through interesting activities from which they gain their aims One of the things that makes teaching a source of endless fascination is the fact that no two classes are ever the same There always exists the complex interpersonal chemistry between teacher and students and between student and student In any given classroom, the factors such as position attitudes and individuals’ personalities will be in constant interaction creating a dynamic, unstable environment that can either facilitate the learning process or seriously impair it The role of expectations of both teachers and learners will be conditioned by individual personality factors such as introversion, cognitive style, prior learning and teaching experiences, and cultural factors Real-life observation also tells us that even if language learners can be shown to be following a common developmental route, they differ greatly in degree of ultimate success which they achieve As a teacher, one should be aware that learners differ in ways that careful thought when making decisions about what to be taught and how to teach Social psychologists have argued consistently that differences in learning outcomes must be due to individual differences between learners, and many proposals have been made concerning the characteristics which supposedly cause these differences Gardner and MacIntyre (1992, 1993) divided what they saw as the most important learners’ traits into two groups, the cognitive and affective Cognitive factors include students’ intelligence, language aptitude and language learning strategies Most discussions have limited affective factors to personality characteristics, language attitudes, motivation and emotional responses to the language learning process or language anxiety Krashen (1985) has suggested the notion of the affective filter This is a representation of the way in which affective factors such as attitudes, anxiety, competitiveness and other emotional responses can help or hinder language learning A learner who has generally negative attitudes towards learning A learner who has generally negative attitudes towards learning English will have a high effective filter and the task for the teacher will be sustantial The precise functioning of this filter highlights the role of the teacher in creating beneficial conditions for language learning The degree to which any of the factors discussed will become significant in a particular learning and teaching situation will depend partly on the reasons why learners are learning English Any individual may be influenced by a variety of motivations which will affect such things as anxiety, attitudes or willingness to try new learning strategies In short, there exist individual differences among learners and these differences play a significant role in language learning For a teacher, the challenge must be how to enable each learner according to his or her individual characteristics and cultural background Importance in stimulating participation of students in English lesson Students’ participation is very necessary for learning process to occur Lack of participation will have negative influence on all the learning process Through interacion in the target language students learn to communicate Hence, speaking skill is quite important Listening skill First of all, listening is the most important skill in communication in the real life Listening and speaking are two major parts of communication They are closely interdependent We are only able to talk sensibly when we understand what is said to us If we fail to understand spoken language, we may miss important information and respond in a funny way Moreover, in learning a language, listening is a useful means of providing learners with comprehensible input, which is an essential component of the whole language learning process And teaching listening skill in classroom helps learners make transition from classroom English to real- life English more easily and effectively Therefore, the author would like to this research so as to help teachers and learners pay more attention to this skill Secondly, learning listening skill is the most difficult in learning a foreign language Listening, like reading, is a receptive skill but it is often the most daunting for learners When reading, a reader usually has more opportunities to refer back to the text to clarify understanding, which a listener cannot in most listening contexts such as TV programs, meetings, discussions, lectures or conversations As Harmer said: Whereas the written word stays on the page and can be looked at more than once, the spoken word, unless recorded on tape or record cannot be repeated Of course in a conversation it is possible to ask someone to say something again, but the fact remains that while a reader can look back at something as many times as he wants, the listener cannot (Harmer, 1991) What is more, in teaching and learning English listening skill in Vietnam in general and in TanKy in particular, teachers and learners cope with a lot of problems and difficulties because of both objective and subjective reasons Thus, the author chooses this topic to point out the main difficulties which the learners have met and to find the reasons for them The last but not least reason for choosing this thesis title is that many learners are not interested in learning the listening skill They find listening classes boring On the other hand, practicing listening skill is difficult and it takes long time It is necessary for teachers to foster the passion for regular listening and to cater for some learners’ need to listen for relaxation and pleasure That is the reason the author would like to work out some suggestions so as to help teachers motivate their learners to study listening skill more excited and better II THE REAL STATE OF AFFAIRS Researching method This research is conducted through qualitative methods The data is collected through the questionaire for students, the interviews for teachers and the obeservations for several classes Researching questions As it has been stated, this study was carried out to gain insights into the areas of difficulties in listening skills encountered by the 11th grades at Le Loi high school and the causes of their unsuccessful listening comprehension Thus, it was designed in an attempt to seek answers to the following questions: What are the students’ difficulties in learning English listening at Le Loi high school? What are the causes of those difficulties ? What are the possible pedagogical implications that can help to reduce those difficulties ? Results of the survey At the beginning of the school year, before applying the new teaching ideas, I conducted a survey and the following are the results In terms of students’ attitude, they show a very negative one to the current teaching method 37% disliked listening too many notes when learning English 72% indicated that they had few opportunities to understand because there are too many difficult words Only 25% said that they liked English listening lessons The majority of the interviewees are experienced teachers in teaching English They all agreed that the difficulty they regularly met was the listening comprehension and stratagies to listen Table of how often students participate in different activities Activities individual work ( teams / class) Group work ( 4-5 students / group) Pair work Individually Never 28,7 12,4 1,8 Rarely Occsionally 54,3 16,8 41,5 45,1 43,2 46,3 7,7 Usually 1,2 18,7 92,3 From the above real situation, the participation in English class in Le Loi upper secondary school is not high and should be paid attention to Only a small number of students are interested in class activities such as pair work, group work, compared with individual activities It proves that the interaction among students is rather limited Consequently, listening skill is also limited This reality urged me to find some ways to improve my teaching and applying them to my everyday lessons III SOLUTIONS Suggested solutions to learn English listening skills at Le Loi high school The study has shown that the mastery of listening skill was a problem for many students at Tan Ky high school The listening difficulties fell into three categories: language problem, listening skill problem and subject background knowledge problem The major causes include the students’ limited linguistic and background knowledge, and unsuitable teaching methodology This part suggests some possible ways to reduce the students’ difficulties in listening lessons and improve the quality of teaching and learning English listening These suggested solutions include: increasing students’ interest and motivation; training students to become efficient listeners; improving teachers’ classroom techniques and subject background knowledge 1.1 Increasing students’ listening interest and motivation According to the results of the research, one of the causes of English listening difficulties is that a considerable number of students in our school have negative, low interest and motivation in learning listening Therefore, to reduce the difficulties in listening, the teachers should arouse students’ passion for listening by making English listening lessons more interesting and useful 1.2 Making English listening interesting As we have found from the questionnaire and from the small talks with the students, listening lessons turned out to be boring and not motivating enough for students This is because the lessons contain long texts with too many new words and about unfamiliar professional topics Therefore, it is necessary for the teachers to make the materials interesting enough to draw the students’ attention Firstly, teachers should provide easy listening lessons by simplifying, adapting the materials to suit the students’ level of proficiency so that the students can find themselves at ease and listen to Then, teachers should have a well-prepared pre-listening stage because this stage plays an important role and affects largely the effectiveness of the learning process In this stage, the teachers can utilize different techniques, for example: pictures, real objects, charts and diagrams, flash cards to stimulate the students After that, teachers can apply other various techniques to help students deal the listening tasks, for instance: pair work, group work, discussion, role play, interview Finally, teachers should create different activities or tasks in each lesson so that the students can avoid boredom Teachers can utilize a variety of techniques to draw students’ interest, the techniques are discussed herebelow 1.3 Using visual aids in teaching listening Visual aids not only are very helpful in motivating students but also so help students to understand the meanings of words clearly and memorize them quickly, especially in the vocabulary Most vocabulary are terminologies which are highly specialized, therefore it is advisable for teachers to use visual aids in teaching ESP vocabulary Visual aids can be: pictures, real objects, flash cards, charts, maps, diagrams, blackboard… Visual aids are better than any other explanations when introducing a word because it can give what exactly what students need to know without translating into their mother tongue Here below are some pictures that the teachers can use when teaching vocabulary Unit 13: hobbies Unit 15: Space conquest 1.4 Raising students’ awareness of the usefulness of English In order to enhance the students’ listening interest and better motivate the students to listen, it is important for the teachers to help the students realize how useful listening is Firstly, listening is one of the four language skills which are integrated So, listening well will help the students pick up vocabulary, structures or ideas to speak and write Secondly, once the students become proficient listeners, they can find listening the most effective way to get information and increase their professional knowledge and the most meaningful way of relaxation When the students have high motivation to listen materials, they will be more studious and will manage to overcome difficulties Training students to become efficient listeners 2.1 Making students aware of the nature of the listeninging process It is the teachers who should help their students realize that listening is an active process which involves the use of a number of skills and strategies and the drawing on sociocultural knowledge, knowledge of the language of the text and strategies for accessing meaning such as predicting information, sampling, deducing meaning or other listening techniques like bottom-up processing and top-down processing This understanding enables the students to actively take part in the listening process and overcome their problems such as vocabulary difficulties, lack of listening strategies and limited knowledge of the subject, to comprehend the text in the most effective way It may also 10 messages they receive Before listening, students need assistance to activate what they already knew about the ideas they are going to hear Simply being told the topic is not enough The pre- listening activities are required to establish what is already known about the topic, to build necessary background, and to set purpose(s) for listening Students need to understand that the: Act of listening requires not just hearing but also thinking, as well as a good deal of interest and information that both speaker and listener must have in common Speaking and listening entail three components: the speaker, the listener, and the meaning to be shared; speaker, listener, and meaning form a unique triangle (King, 1984, p 177) Some sample activities used for pre-listening stage:  looking at pictures, maps, diagrams, or graphs and (answering the questions, discussing as teachers’ requirement)  reviewing vocabulary or grammatical structures  words form  reading something relevant and discussing in pairs or in groups  playing a short game  constructing semantic webs (a graphic arrangement of concepts or words showing how they are related)  pairs or groups discussing to answer the guiding questions  Predicting the topic/content of the listening text: Students predict what they expect to hear from the listening, work in pairs, and feedback ideas to the board/teacher (Make sure you read the typescript beforehand and you can then feed in vocabulary in your introduction/lead in)  Predicting vocabulary: Once the students know the topic of the listening, they predict words or expressions that they think they will hear Again, write the feedback of these predictions on the board As students listen, they should tick the words they find Which pair predicted the most words?  Vocabulary selection/sort: In this activity, the students are given a group of words, some of which are from the listening, others are not Students decide which ones are from the listening 13  Sentence selection: This is the same as vocabulary selection, but students sort sentences instead  going over the directions or instructions for the activity  Getting students to read the text first: This is very good for the students who have big problems with listening (the hard of hearing, for example): they can read at home before the class  role play  doing guided practice 3.1-b While-listening Stage In this stage, students need to understand the implications of rate in the listening process The teacher should help them be skillful in this stage For doing listening tasks well, after listening to the text, students can run a mental commentary on it; they can doubt it, talk back to it, or extend it They can retell it in order to remember it; that is, they repeat interesting points back to themselves They can formulate questions to ask the speaker jot down key words or key phrases They can wonder if what they are listening to is true, or what motives the speaker has in saying it, or whether the speaker is revealing personal feelings rather than objective assessments Some sample activities used for while-listening stage:  listening with visuals (listen then number the pictures)  filling in graphs, tables and charts, conversation completing  T/F statements  matching  multiple choices (choosing the best answer)  answering questions  following a route on a map  checking off items in a list  listening for the gist  searching for specific clues to meaning  completing cloze (fill-in) exercises  distinguishing between formal and informal registers  Reordering (listening and numbering the events in the order, listening and number the sentence you hear) 14 3.1-c Post listening stage A post-listening activity represents a follow up to the listening activity and aims to utilize the knowledge gained from listening for the development of other skills such as speaking or writing First purpose is checking whether students have understood what they needed to understand and whether they have completed whatever while-listening task has been set successfully Another purpose of post-listening work is to reflect on the reasons why some students have failed to understand or missed parts of the message A third purpose is to give students the opportunity to consider the attitude and manner of the speakers of the listening text Another purpose of the post-listening work is to expand on the topic or language of the listening text Finally, some activities that are done after students have listened to a text are not really post-listening activities because they are The post-listening activities can be much longer than while-listening activities because at this stage the students have time to think, to discuss, to write Students need to act upon what they have heard to clarify meaning and extend their thinking Well-planned postlistening activities are just as important as those before and during 3.1-C Some sample activities used for post-listening stage:  Role-Play (in pairs or in groups to play the various roles, can be based on a number of different stimuli: role cards, stories, characters seen on television, etc as well as listening passages Listening as an input provide students a selection of language appropriate to the roles and situations which are to be developed)  Written work (writing summaries, essays, written exercises with a listening text, writing summary of a story)  Focus on problem phrases: In open class build up what students have heard on the board in a kind of mini-dictation approach Play the sentence or phrase several times, writing up words students have heard correctly as you go along, discarding wrong ones and indicating missing words with a line Helps solve mysteries or mishearing So for example with the following sentence: Are you going to any travelling while you’re there? After the first listening you might have: Are you going… travelling…… there? Then they listen again and call out the missing words and at the end practise saying it as on the recording 15  Extending notes into written responses (brief notes made at the while-listening stage can be extended into written texts) However, this type can be done only by students at a fairly advanced level The written text can be from one- sentences answer to specific questions to long pieces of prose It is a good idea for the students to listen again after the post-listening writing stage First, compare your notes with someone else´s Have you left out anything important? Then, summarize the extract from your notes What is the general point made by the speaker? Do you agree with this point? Can you suggest further examples to make the point? Or can you present counter-examples that disprove it?  Summarizing (can be done by extending notes made at the while-listening stage or by simply depending on memory  Jigsaw listening: A class of students is divided into small number of groups and each group listens to a different listening text, although all the texts are on the same topic, and then the groups exchange information to build up the complete picture Depends on each listening text being incomplete in some way, which is crucial for the completion of the task Jigsaw listening can be very motivating and enjoyable, but it has to be very well planned  Identifying relationships between speakers (listeners can often identify the relationship between speakers while they are listening to them)  Establishing the mood/attitude/behavior of the speaker (this activity depends on the listener interpreting what is said, how they are spoken The loudness/quietness of a voice might indicate anger of sorrow, excitement or boredom)  Dictation: The word dictation conjures up a picture of a class full of students busily attempting to reproduce, in written form, a piece of prose read aloud by the teacher  Count the number of words: Play a short phrase and ask learners to say how many words they have heard The teacher could also read out a number of sentences and the same, remember to read out the sentences naturally and include aspects such as weak forms Learners can be asked to compare in pairs before listening again and seeing the typescript  Transformations: Transform these sentences The meaning must stay the same Then check while you are listening to find the transformations 16 e.g It will have a big effect on peoples’ lives It will make (a big difference to people’s lives) We’ll give you the information you need We’ll tell you (whatever you need to know)  Form/ chart completion  Extending lists  Sequencing/ grading  Matching with a reading text 3.1-C Improving teachers’ professional knowledge It is undeniable that teachers play a very important role in the students’ success So, they should be trained in terms of background knowledge and teaching methodology The poor knowledge is a matter of all English teachers So they have to face so many difficulties, of which the gap of knowledge in the subject matter seems to be their biggest concern If the teacher does not have basic knowledge of the fundamental principles of the target discipline, it is very difficult for them to teach effectively That is why teachers should master the specialized content as much as possible IV Summary This chapter has made some possible suggestions to reduce difficulties that the learners at Le Loi high school encountered when learning English listening skills In order to reduce these difficulties, it is neccesary to improve the teaching and learning of English listening Firstly, teachers should arouse their students’ motivation by making English listening lessons interesting and useful In addition, teachers should train their students to become efficient listeners by making them be aware of the listening process, teaching them with a variety of listening stategies and encouraging them to listen extensively What is more, teachers should improve their teaching techniques by utilizing various types of activities during the three stages of teaching in order to provide their students with the clearest explanation of the vocabulary and gradually improve their students’ listening skills Finally, teachers should choose and adapt materials carefully so that they suit the 17 students’ needs and proficiency level PART 3: CONCLUSION Summary of the findings This study provides an analysis of some difficulties in learning English listening and the sources of these difficulties as perceived by the 11th grades at Le Loi high school This graduation paper is conducted with the purpose of helping the teachers to foresee the problems and find out ways to solve them The findings of the study show that when listening English, the students encountered difficulties in all the four areas of language The most common difficulties are in the area of vocabulary and subject background knowledge And listening skills are perceived the next difficult level The grammar area appears to be the least difficult of all The findings of the study also show that despite the awareness of the importance of listening skills, some students had negative attitude towards it, which made their listening more difficult Also, the students were not equipped with necessary skills to become successful listeniners and lacked linguistic knowledge as well as subject background understanding Finally, inefficient teaching methods and classroom techniques might be another cause of the students’ difficulties Based on the results of the study, the researcher has presented some suggestions including the ways to make English listening lessons interesting and useful, the ways to improve teachers’ classroom techniques, and to train students to become efficient readers It is hoped that what has been discussed in the study might be beneficial to both teachers and students as they helps them learn about their strengths and weaknesses, and thus, lay the foundation for future improvement and development in English listening syllabus Also it is hoped that the study will prove significant to those who want to conduct research in this area and who are concerned with this problem Limitations of the study and suggestions for further study Despite the useful information the present study provides, it has some limitations Firstly, methodologically, the study used only one instrument, i.e the students’ questionnaire Information gained from the questionnaire is just on the surface Also, the respondents are very likely to be affected by the researcher’s research agenda In other 18 words, the responses to the questionnaire may not reflect accurately what the respondents really think Therefore, future studies should use other methods such as observation and interviews A case study using multiple methods could be an appropriate methodlogical choice Second, the author only studied the issues of teaching listening sections in "Tieng Anh 11" whereas other skills such as reading, speaking and writing were not taken into account in this research Despite all the aforementioned limitations, the author hopes that the study will make a contribution to the better situation of teaching and learning English listening skills at Le Loi high school Suggested further research According to the results of the findings, teachers still faced many difficulties in teaching listening despite possible solutions suggested to help them overcome their problems Therefore, future researchers should carry out the research on techniques for improving listening skills and the effectiveness of teaching listening sections in the other textbooks such as "Tieng Anh 10" and "Tieng Anh 12" The author just conducted this research in terms of listening skills Hence, the follow- up research should be carried out on other language skills such as speaking, reading and writing CONFIRM OF THE HEAD OF THE UNIT Thanh Hoa, May 10th, 2021 COMMITMENTS DO NOT COPY Lê Thị Thùy Linh REFERENCES A Vietnamese Authors: Lê Thị Xuân Ánh (2001), An Investigation of Listening Strategies Used by Vietnamese Learners of English, Unpublished M.A Thesis, Danang University, Vietnam Đỗ Văn Hòa (2010), Improving Listening Skills for Third-year Students at Hong Duc University through Portfolio, Unpublished M.A Thesis, Hanoi National University, Vietnam Nguyễn Thị Thanh Huyền (2010), A Study of Using English Songs as a Type of Supplementary Material in Teaching Listening for First-year Non-major Students 19 of English at Phuong Dong University, Unpublished M.A Thesis, Hanoi National University Vietnam B English Authors: Anderson, A & T Lynch (1988), Listening, Oxford University Press Brown, H D (1994), Teaching by Principles, New Jersey: Prentice Hall Regents Brown, H D (2001), Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy (2nd Ed.), Longman Buck, G (2001), Assessing Listening, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Cele-Murcia, M (2001) Teaching English as a second or foreign language (3rd ed.) Boston MA: Heinle & Heinle C Additional Reference: Website: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CoolSpeech APPENDIX A Questionnaire for students This questionnaire is designed for my research into difficulties in learning English listening skills for the 11th form students in Le Loi high school Your assistance in completing the survey is appreciated All the information provided by you is solely for the study purpose, and you can be confident that you will not be identified in any discussion of the data * How long have you been learning English? * What is your average mark of English in 10th graders? ……………… 20 Thank you very much for your cooperation! Section A: Do you agree with these? Question 1: I find it important to learn listening skills □ Strongly agree □ Agree □ Disagree □ Strongly disagree Question 2: I find it difficult to understand the listening texts □ Strongly agree □ Agree □ Disagree □ Strongly disagree Question 3: I enjoy listening lessons □ Strongly agree □ Agree □ Disagree □ Strongly disagree Section B: Here are some of difficulties you may encounter when listening a listening lesson Please tick the appropriate box according to the level of difficulties you have Very difficult (VD) Difficult (D) Easy (E) Very easy (VE) 21 Question 4: Difficulties with vocabulary VD D E VE 4a I find it difficult to understand the words in the □ □ □ □ 4b I find it difficult to memorize the key words □ □ □ □ 4c I find it difficult to listen to the speakers' □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ contexts pronunciation 4d I have troubles in using the synonyms( such as: "kid" for "child" ) 4e I have troubles in using the homophones( such as: right and write, meet and meat ) 4f Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………….……………… Question 5: Difficulties with Grammar 5a I don’t remember all grammatical structures that I □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ have learnt and this makes it difficult to understand the content of the text 5b If the sentence is a new grammatical structure in the text I not understand its meaning 5c Long sentences are difficult for me to understand their meanings 22 5d Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………….……………… Question 6: Difficulties related to Lack of Background Knowledge VD D E VE 6a I find it difficult to understand the content of □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ unfamiliar professional topics 6b I find I don’t have enough professional knowledge related to the topics 6c I find it difficult to understand authentic materials 6d Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………….……………… 23 Question 7: Difficulties due to Lack of Reading Skills VD D E VE 7a.I find it difficult to find out the key words of the text □ □ □ □ 7b.I find it difficult to find out the main ideas of the □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ 7e I find it difficult to concentrate on the listening text □ □ □ □ 7f I have difficulties in catching up with the speed and □ □ □ □ text 7c I find it difficult to summarize the mains ideas of a listening text 7d I don’t know how to answer comprehension questions of a listening text the accent of the native speakers 7g Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………… 24 Section C Question 8: Please indicate what possible sources of your problems in English listening YES NO □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ 8f The teacher is too strict and demanding □ □ 8g I lack confidence and motivation □ □ 8h I lack vocabulary □ □ 8i I lack knowledge about the topics I am listening □ □ 8k The equipment such as CD players is in bad □ □ □ □ 8a.The texts are very too long and many unfamiliar words 8b The texts are full of new and complex grammar structures 8c Some texts are unfamiliar topics, which makes us difficult to understand 8d The teacher doesn’t teach us sufficient listening strategies 8e The teacher doesn’t give us sufficient practice of grammar and vocabulary condition 8l It is difficult for me to concentrate with noises around 8m Others ( Please indicate here) 25 …………………………… Question 9: To make your listening easier, what you think must be adjusted in the listening materials and the equipment ( choose as many as possible) 9a Listening texts should be more related to my life □ 9b Listening texts should be shorter and more motivating □ 9c Listening texts should have a limited number of new words □ 9d Using more modern technology or facilities: computers, CDs, □ cassettes, ect 9e Using more supplementary references to improve listening □ skill 9f Others ( Please indicate here) ………………………………………………………… 26 Question 10: To help you listen better, what in your opinion you expect from the teachers? (Choose as many as possible) 10a I expect the teacher to design more interesting and suitable □ listening tasks to students’ levels 10b I expect the teacher to give and carefully explain vocabulary □ 10c I expect the teacher to explain carefully grammatical □ structures in the texts 10d I expect the teacher to provide us more background □ knowledge related to the topics we are working on 10e I want the teacher to guide and instructing students how to □ listen and the task, emphasize the purposes or key words( equip you with necessary strategies in listening) 10g Others ( Please indicate here) ………………………………………………………… Thank you for taking time to complete this questionnaire 27 ...INITIATIVE: ? ?SOME SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS TO IMPROVE GRADE 12 STUDENTS' listenING SKILL IN ENGLISH CLASSES AT LE LOI UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL? ?? PART 1: REASONS FOR TOPIC CHOICE No one... solutions to learn English listening skills at Le Loi high school The study has shown that the mastery of listening skill was a problem for many students at Tan Ky high school The listening difficulties... the learners at Le Loi high school encountered when learning English listening skills In order to reduce these difficulties, it is neccesary to improve the teaching and learning of English listening