MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES ĐỖ THỊ MINH CHÂU TEACHING LISTENING COMPREHENSION AT FOOD INDUSTRY COLLEGE OF HO CHI MINH CITY: PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS M. THESIS IN TESOL SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF TESOL Supervisor : NGUYỄN TIẾN HÙNG, Ph. HO CHI MINH CITY – March, 2007 CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I hereby certify my authorship of the thesis submitted today entitled: TEACHING LISTENING COMPREHENSION AT FOOD INDUSTRY COLLEGE OF HO CHI MINH CITY: PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS in terms of the statements of requirements for Theses in Master’s Programs issued by the Higher Degree Committee. Ho Chi Minh city, March 2007 ĐỖ THỊ MINH CHÂU 1 RETENTION AND USE OF THE THESIS I hereby state that I, ĐỖ THỊ MINH CHÂU, being the candidate for the degree of Master of TESOL, accept the requirements of the University relating to the retention and use of Master’s Theses deposited in the Library.
In terms of these conditions, I agree that the original of my thesis deposited in the Library should be accessible for purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the Library for the care, loan or reproduction of theses. Ho Chi Minh city, March 2007 ĐỖ THỊ MINH CHÂU 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my thesis supervisor, Dr. NGUYỄN TIẾN HÙNG, who not only assisted me with all his heart in my preparation for the thesis draft and accomplishment of the final work but also provided valuable comments on the individual chapters as well as the whole thesis. I also wish to thank the whole teaching staff of the 2003- 2006 TESOL course at Ho Chi Minh University of Social Sciences and Humanities, who have made me well-qualified with the background knowledge to fulfill this thesis.
Next, my profound thanks are expressed to the Directorate of Food Industry College of Ho Chi Minh City for permission and encouragement to my carrying out this project. I also thank my colleagues for their enthusiastic cooperation and appreciated suggestions as well as the students here who took part in the survey for my research. Finally, I am grateful to my family, especially my husband Lưu Hoàng, who have always been supportive during my studies, especially the time when I made this thesis. 3 ABSTRACT Listening in language teaching has undergone several important influences, as the result of developments in linguistics and even global politics.
Since 1980, listening has been viewed as a primary channel for language learning (Richards 1985; Richards and Rodgers 1986; Rost 1990). Furthermore, nowadays, in the age of globalization, communicative competence gains more and more attention in comparison with language competence. However, the teaching of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in Vietnam cannot catch up with the current theory and methodology in the world (Appendices D, E, F, G, H). In this context, I wonder how much prominence has been given to the teaching of communicative skills, especially listening comprehension.
The answer is that there is a belief that listening practice in Vietnamese EFL classes, especially those at college or university, is hardly touched on, or if it is, it will be incidental. As a teacher of English at Food Industry College of Ho Chi Minh city (FICH), I was motivated to conduct this study because students seem to acquire no listening skill, let alone to develop it, after the compulsory English course at FICH. There have been much considerable research on difficulties confronted by the EFL learners while acquiring this skill (Literature Riview). But listening obstacles have not been widely researched in the field of a training program.
This leads to the following purposes of the study: 4 1. to find out the real problems of the teaching of listening comprehension in the compulsory General English course at FICH 2. to identify the difficulties of the learning of this skill 3. to suggest some feasible solutions to them.
Both qualitative and quantitative approaches including three methods, namely description, observation and questionnaire were employed to find out the answers to the research questions. The findings indicate that the amount of teaching time and the listening objective according to the curriculum, and the class size play important roles in the efficiency of teaching listening comprehension. And the problems of teaching this skill can be one of the sources resulting in difficulties for students in acquiring it. These are associated with the internal factors of learners such as their affective statuses, listening habits, information processing capacities, English proficiencies, and their belief about listening activities.
Other barriers concerned the nature of listening strategies the listening material used and teaching methods. Based on the findings, a series of pedagogical implications are provided in the hope of providing students access to communication skills in English. 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION. Background to the study.
Context of teaching listening comprehension at FICH. Statement of purpose. Overview of thesis chapters. 5 CHAPTER 2 : LITERATURE REVIEW.
Some important definitions related to the research. Definitions of “listening”. Top-down and bottom-up processes. The nature of listening in real- life communication.
The purposes of listening in real-life communication. The nature of listening comprehension. Characteristics of real-life listening. The nature of listening comprehension in classroom.
The importance of listening in second language learning. The objective of listening comprehension in classroom. The purposes of a listening activity. Important features in listening to English as a foreign language.
Types of classroom listening performance. Types of listening activities. Principles for designing listening techniques in classroom. The role of the learner.
The role of the teacher. The format of a good listening lesson. characteristics of a good practice activity. Characteristics of effective teaching.
Characteristics of an effective listener. Characteristics of an effective listening course. Related studies on difficulties in learning listening comprehension. Difficulties due to the process of listening or the speech processing40 2.
Difficulties due to the task. Difficulties due to the learner. Difficulties due to the limitations of the present listening teaching and listening materials. Summary of the chapter.
Overview of the research. Data collection method. 51 CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION. Results from description.
Description of the compulsory General English course at FICH. Description of the listening tasks in the course book. Description of the listening learning conditions at FICH. Results from the observation.
Observation results of pre- listening stage. Observation results of while-listening stage. Observation results of post-listening stage. Summary of the observation results.
R esults from the questionnaire. Results from the questionnaire for students. Results from the questionnaire for teachers. Discussion about the results.
Limitation of the study. Summary of the chapter. 128 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION AND SOLUTIONS. To overcome difficulties from the course.
To overcome difficulties from the present listening teaching style135 5. To overcome difficulties from the listening learning conditions. Summary of the chapter .166 9 LIST OF APPENDICES Page APPENDIX A: Questionnaire for students (Form A- English). 139 APPENDIX A’: Questionnaire for students (Form A’ - Vietnamese).
144 APPENDIX B: Questionnaire for teachers of English (Form B). 148 APPENDIX C: An extract from the general curriculum issued by Ministry of Education and Training for Electrical Engineering Technology – Level: college. 151 APPENDIX D: Article 1 – Teaching English to non-major students: Out-of-date and Ineffective. 154 APPENDIX E: Article 2 – English in Vietnamese colleges and universities159 APPENDIX F: Article 3 – Bridge the gap in teaching English between in Vietnam and in the world.
163 APPENDIX G: Article 4 – Seven years at school: Why cannot pupils speak English?. 164 APPENDIX H: Article 5 – Why cannot pupils speak English?. 165 10 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CUP = Cambridge University Press EFL = English as a Foreign Language FICH = Food Industry College of Ho Chi Minh City HCMC = Ho Chi Minh City LC = Listening comprehension OUP = Oxford University Press LIST OF TABLES Page Table 1. 121 LIST OF FIGURES Page Figure 1.
122 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION This first chapter is composed of four parts. First of all, the background to the study including theoretical and teaching backgrounds and the context of teaching listening comprehension at Food Industry College of Ho Chi Minh city is presented as the premise for the thesis. The purpose of the thesis is then stated and followed by the general research questions which the thesis set out to answer. The final part is for the overview of the thesis chapters.1 BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY “Foreign language”, especially General English is one of the compulsory courses for non-major Vietnamese students in the first school year.
No one can deny the primitive purpose of this subject. That is to provide learners access to communication in the global integration. And communication cannot successfully take place unless what is spoken is also understood. As a result, this course is expected to be an integrated one in which listening and speaking skills play an important role.
But teaching and learning English, especially the above mentioned two skills, at college and university these days, in fact, are believed to be ineffective. Not only those who are involved in these acts such as administrators, teachers and students but also the society find this course a waste of time, energy, and money due to 14 its inefficiency. As a result, it is not surprising that there have been some articles in newspapers and magazines writing about this alarming state (Appendices D, E, F, G, H). It is time to find out problems and urgent, feasible solutions to improve this situation.
Theoretical background In this day of mass communication (much of it oral), it is of vital importance that learners of a foreign language be taught to listen effectively and critically. The reason is that, according to a lot of considerable research, listening has rightly assumed a central role in language learning. For example, “Essential to all interaction is the ability to understand what others are saying. In other words, listening is one of the fundamental language skills.
It's a medium through which children, young people and adults gain a large portion of their education--their information, their understanding of the world and of human affairs, their ideals, sense of values, and their appreciation. Furthermore, Rost (1994) points out that listening is also vital in the language classroom because it provides input for the learner. Without understanding input at the right level, any learning simply cannot begin. And David Nunan also agrees that listening is assuming greater and greater importance in foreign language classrooms.
But in fact, most of foreign language learners find listening comprehension very difficult to acquire or develop. This can be explained by the previous research on listening task difficulties (Brown and Yule (1983), Anderson and Lynch (1988), learners problems (Penny Ur) and limitations to the present listening teaching. Yet there is little information available on the barriers or difficulties to the learners’ acquirement of this skill after a language course. Teaching background In the era of globalization, the teaching and learning of English have been given more and more attention in none-English-speaking countries because English is considered an international language in all social interactions.
Vietnam is also a point in case. But here, foreign language teaching is often viewed from a very narrow perspective – that of the teaching act. If students are not learning, it is assumed to be the fault of the teaching method, the materials or the teachers. However, the success of a language program 16 involves far more than the mere act of teaching.
The same as any successful educational program, other factors are also involved.