Vinh University Foreign Languages Department *********** §Ëu ThÞ V©n Pre-listening activities used in listening lessons Graduation thesis Field: Methodology Graduation Thesis Vinh - 2005 Vinh University Foreign Languages Department *********** Pre-listening activities used in listening lessons Graduation thesis Field: Methodology Student: §Ëu ThÞ V©n, 42A1 Supervisor: Lª ThÞ Thóy Hµ, M.A Vinh - 2005 §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 2 Graduation Thesis §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 3 Graduation Thesis Table of contentS §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 4 Graduation Thesis Page AcknowledgementS I. Part I: Introduction 1 1. The Rationale for choosing the subject 1 2. The Aims of the study 1 3. The Scope of the study . 2 4. The Methods of the study . 2 5. The Design of the study 2 Part II: Development 4 Chapter 1: Theoretical Background 4 1.1. Listening skill 4 1.1.1.Definition . 4 1.1.2. The importance of listening skill 4 1.1.3. Stages of listening process . 6 1.1.3.1. Pre-listening . 6 1.1.3.2. While-listening 7 1.1.3.3. Post-listening 7 1.2. Principles and procedures for teaching listening 8 1.2.1. Principles . 8 1.2.2. Procedures . 10 1.3. Factors affecting the listening process 12 1.3.1.The nature of speech 12 §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 5 Graduation Thesis Page 1.3.2. The nature of listening task 13 1.3.3. The listener 14 1.3.4. The speaker 15 1.3.5. The visual support 15 Chapter 2: Pre-listening activities used in listening lessons 16 2.1 Pre-listening . 16 2.1.1. Overview 16 2.1.2. The role of pre-listening tasks . 17 2.1.3. The aims of pre-listening tasks 18 2.1.3.1. Motivating students . 18 2.1.3.2. Activating or building related knowledge 19 2.1.3.3. Setting purposes for listening . 20 2.1.3.4. Setting the context 21 2.2. Pre-listening activities and their procedures to apply 21 Chapter 3: The survey 34 3.1. Overview of the survey . 34 3.1.1. Aims of the survey 34 3.1.2. Informants and their background . 34 3.2. Description of the survey questionnaire 34 3.2.1. Survey questionnaire 34 3.2.2. Result and Findings 36 §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 6 Graduation Thesis Page 3.3. Suggestions of some typical pre-listening activities . 39 3.3.1 What should be considered before applying a pre-listening activity into the class time 39 3.3.1.1. The teaching style 39 3.3.1.2. The time available 40 3.3.1.3. The content of listening text . 40 3.3.1.4. The class learning level 40 3.3.2. Some typical samples of pre-listening activities 40 Part 3: Conclusion 45 ReferenceS §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 7 Graduation Thesis Acknowledgem ents here are many people to whom I am indepted. First of all, I would like to give my special thanks to my supervisor - Ms Lª ThÞ Thóy Hµ- M. A- for her whole- hearted supervision. T I would like to express my deepest thanks to the many teachers at the FLD of Vinh university whose very interesting lectures on English, especially listening skill and methodology are useful for this study. I would also like to give my thanks to those who took part in my small survey as well as my friends for their constructive opinions for the research. Finally,I feel obliged to my parents for their spiritual support. Definitely, I would not be able to do anything without their help. Vinh, May 2005 §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 8 Graduation Thesis §Ëu ThÞ V©n §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 9 Graduation Thesis Part I: Introduction 1. the Rationale for choosing the subject Nowadays, English has been becoming an international language and being used in all fields of international exchange, between different people all over the world. In almost universities, English is taught as a compulsory subject and it will be examinable in the university graduation certificate. Nevertheless, the results of students were so far behind the expectation. The reason why students fail to achieve an acceptable competence level in the language studying in spite of having studied it from the very first of school is still a big question. Students have to cope with many kinds of problems in learning English. However, listening skill is considered to be the most difficult one. Now, it is being taught as one of basic language skills in many schools but many problems still remain. Students usually find it tiring and difficult to learn and teachers have many difficulties in motivating their students to learn this skill effectively. Students find it difficult to understand the listening task if they don’t know any thing about what they are going to listen to or they are not ready to deal with a new listening task. So, activities before listening are very necessary and important. They help students feel more confident, interested and active and thus, help them to study more effectively. I myself have been studying listening subject more than 3 years at university but I find the results of English listening tests often not very good and I also have observed many freshmen making a very little progress after much practice of listening. Now as a 4 th -year-student of English, I wish I could do something to help students in lower courses in improving their listening skill. This leads me to the decision of choosing the topic “Pre-listening activities used in listening lessons” for my study. 2. the Aims of the study. §Ëu ThÞ V©n-42A1 FLD-Vinh university 10