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Page 1: A study on using VOA Special English program to improve vocabulary for the second- year English majors at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education

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DECLARATION

I certify the thesis entitled “A study on using VOA Special English program to

improve vocabulary for the second- year English majors at Hung Yen University of

Technology and Education” is the result of my own research and the substance of this

thesis has not been submitted for a degree to any other university or institution.

Signature

Le Phuong Thao

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ACKNOWLEDGMENT

This paper could have been completed without the help, encouragement and

support from a number people who all deserve my sincerest gratitude and appreciation.

First of all, I would like to thank Ms Nguyen Thi Anh Tuyet, my supervisor. I am

indebted to her inspiration, scholarly supervision and intellectual support throughout the

course of writing this graduation paper. Her continual encouragement, careful reading,

critical comments and patient guidance made my work more enjoyable and easier.

Special words of thank also go to all my informants for their willing participation

in this questionnaire. Without them this paper could not have been possible.

Finally, my deepest gratitude and appreciation go to my family, my friends and

my classmates. Their love, support and constant encouragement gave me a great deal of

strength and determination that help me during the stressful time of writing this paper.

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ABSTRACT

In general, Vietnamese students usually feel bored in learning listening

vocabulary and second year English major students in Hung Yen University of Technology

and Education are same. Because they have not changed their learning habits, such as

writing words on paper, trying to learn by heart or learning passively through the teacher's

explanations. To help students find language classes, specially get easier to learn listening

vocabulary more interesting, and to achieve more from VOA Special English, I conducted

action research to find the answer to the question, "Do VOA Special English help students

learn vocabulary effectively, and if so, how?". However we singled out the component of

VOA to study that in isolation. After reviewing academic opinions on this specifically

focused matter, of which there are relatively few, I began action research by questionnaires

in 57 second year English major students in UTEHY, and 5 English teachers at Department

of Foreign Languages, to get direct opinions. Also, as the finding shows, teachers and

students used VOA Special English to improve listening vocabulary. Finally, the research

recommends that the teachers should usually use VOA to teach student more appropriate

tasks and activities and be active creative as well to maintain the learners’ interest in

learning.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION .................................................................................................................... i

ACKNOWLEDGMENT........................................................................................................ ii

ABSTRACT...........................................................................................................................iii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ............................................................................................... vi

LIST OF TABLESS AND FIGURES ..................................................................................vii

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION........................................................................................... 1

1. Rationale of the study.............................................................................................. 1

2. Aims of the study .................................................................................................... 2

3. Scope of the study ................................................................................................... 2

4. Methods of the study ............................................................................................... 3

5. Design of the study.................................................................................................. 3

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW .............................................................................. 4

2.1 Introduction ................................................................................................................. 4

2.2 Theoretical backgrounds of vocabulary ...................................................................... 4

2.2.1 The important of vocabulary ............................................................................... 4

2.2.2 The Understandings of vocabulary...................................................................... 5

2.2.3 Listening vocabulary ........................................................................................... 6

2.3 Theoretical backgrounds of VOA ............................................................................... 6

2.3.1 The understanding of VOA Special English ........................................................ 6

2.3.2 The advantages of using VOA Special English .................................................... 6

2.4 Summary ..................................................................................................................... 7

CHAPTER THREE: THE STUDY ....................................................................................... 8

3.1 Methodology ............................................................................................................... 8

3.1.1 The physical setting ............................................................................................. 8

3.1.2 The listening course ............................................................................................. 9

3.1.3 Participants of the study .................................................................................... 10

3.1.4 Data collection instruments ............................................................................... 10

3.1.5 Procedure .......................................................................................................... 11

3.1.6 Summary ............................................................................................................ 11

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3.2 INTERPRETATION AND DISCUSSIONS OF THE DATA ............................... 11

3.2.1 Data analysis of students’ responses ................................................................. 11

3.2.2 Data analysis of teachers’ responses ................................................................ 21

3.3 Summary ................................................................................................................... 29

3.4 Recommendation and suggestion:............................................................................. 30

3.4.1. For teachers ...................................................................................................... 31

3.4.2 For students ....................................................................................................... 32

CHAPTER IV: CONCLUSION .......................................................................................... 35

4.1. Summary of the study .............................................................................................. 35

4.2. Limitations of the study............................................................................................ 35

4.3. Suggestions for future studies .................................................................................. 35

REFERENCE....................................................................................................................... 36

APPENDICES ........................................................................................................................I

APPENDIX 1...........................................................................................................................I

APPENDIX 2........................................................................................................................ VI

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

VOA: Voice of America

UTEHY: Hung Yen University of technology and Education

FFL: Faculty of Foreign Language

IELTS: International English Language Testing System

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LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Pie chart 1: The students use VOA Special English to learn Pie chart 2: The students’ time use VOA to learn listening vocabulary

Pie chart 3: The teachers use VOA Special English Pie chart 3: The teachers use VOA Special English Pie chart 5: The teachers’ toward student’s time should spend using VOA

Bar chart 1: The students’ topic attract learning in VOA Bar chart 2: The students’ attitude towards important of listening vocabulary

Bar chart 3: The students’ ways learn listening vocabulary Bar chart 4: The students’ factors affect learning listening vocabulary ability in VOA. Bar chart 5: The student’s activities attractive when learning listening vocabulary

Bar chart 6: Students’ ways improve listening vocabulary in VOA Bar chart 7: The teachers’ topics want to teach listening vocabulary

Bar chart 8: Teachers’ attitude towards the importance of listening vocabulary Bar chart 9: The teachers’ opinions on the ways to help students improve their listening vocabulary

Bar chart 10: Teachers opinion factors affecting learning listening vocabulary ability in VOA.

Bar chart 11: The teachers’ opinion activities attractive students Bar chart 12: The teacher’s opinion way to improving students learn listening vocabulary in VOA

Table 1: students’ reasons learn listening vocabulary Table 2: The students’ frequent situations meet vocabulary Table 3: The students’ frequent use methods to learn listening vocabulary

Table 4: The students’ frequent use techniques to learn listening vocabulary in VOA Table 5: The teachers’ frequent situations meet vocabulary

Table 6: The teachers’ opinion students’ frequent use techniques to learn listening vocabulary in VOA Table 7: The teachers’ opinion techniques should use to remember listening vocabulary in

VOA

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CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

1. Rationale of the study

No one denies the importance of English language in the present time as global

language. It is clear that English has become more and more dominant around the world.

Actually, in some countries it is used as the mother tongue and, other countries learn it as

second language in their schools. There is no doubt that English is language of

communication between the people from different cultures. Moreover, English is the

language of science and technology. It is also the language of computers that help to

integrate the people around the world via Internet technology and e-mail. Needless to say,

people who know English can deal with the Internet. Therefore, the need of mastering a

foreign language Specially English is becoming more and more necessary.

As for as we concern, study a language cannot be separated from studying

vocabulary. Yet it is true that the vocabulary is the focus of language. It is in words that

sound and meaning interlock to allow us to communicate with one another, and it is word

that we arrange together to make sentences, conversation, and discourse of all kinds.

Besides, vocabulary really plays an important role because it appears in every language

skill. Obviously, vocabulary is really important in any language learning.

However, it is not easy to study perfect English vocabulary. Almost students often

face up with some problems in learning vocabulary. At first, especially major English

student. In fact, it is difficult to memorize a new word with its meaning, spelling and

pronunciation, many students are often confused with knowing how can apply grammar

into sentences, sometimes, they cannot understand when being opposed to video and audio.

Moreover, techniques to teach English in university is traditional teaching methods and

similar activities days by days, which makes students become fed up with learning English.

Therefore, interesting techniques to teach English are necessary to help students learn

English vocabulary better; they also attract student’s interest on English.

There is a fact that most of the second-year English majors students at Hung Yen

University of Technology and Education agreed that vocabulary is very difficult to

remember and they fed up with learning new words. In addition, some students have never

focused on writing vocabulary; have ignored one of the most important things in learning

English.

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From the above reasons, I have the ambition of presenting using VOA Special

English to improve vocabulary in Hung Yen university technology and education with

hope that the second-year English majors will be interesting in learning vocabulary. Due to

my English knowledge limitation and the frame of the graduation paper, I would like to

choose the research paper entitle: “A study on using VOA Special English program to

improve vocabulary for the second- year English majors at Hung Yen University of

Technology and Education”.

2. Aims of the study

The main goal of my research is to provide using VOA to improve English

vocabulary in university to make students more interested in the lesson as well as to master

learned knowledge of that lesson in an effective way. In order to gain that aim, the specific

objects of the study are:

- To investigate the real situation of teaching and learning listening vocabulary of the

second-year English major student in at UTEHY.

- To study the theory related to vocabulary, psychology features of the second-year

English major students at UTEHY.

- To provide some suggestions using VOA to improve English listening vocabulary

to attract students interest and involvements in lessons.

In order to achieve the above stated objectives, the study finds out the answers to

the following research questions:

1) What are the students’ and teachers’ perspectives toward the teaching and learning

listening vocabulary at UTEHY?

2) What are the factors affecting the listening vocabulary of the second-year English

major at UTEHY?

3) What are the suggestions using VOA Special English to stimulate the students in

learning listening vocabulary?

3. Scope of the study

In fact, there are lots of various techniques to learn English vocabulary for

students. It requires much of time and effort. Furthermore, English vocabulary includes

meaning, grammar, pronunciation, and spelling. In my opinion, it is impractical to study

such a wide range, simultaneously, time, resources and knowledge of mine is limited, and

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this study can only focus on using VOA to improve listening vocabulary for the second-

year English major students at Hung Yen University Technology and Education.

4. Methods of the study

Conducting qualitative methods carry out the study. Survey questionnaires are

specifically designed for both teacher and the second-year English major students who

always using listening vocabulary. The using qualitative methods provide reliable data,

based on which the conclusions and suggestions are made in the next parts.

5. Design of the study

The study is divided into three main parts: Introduction, Development, and

conclusion.

Chapter I: Introduction shows the reasons to choose the study, the aims, scope,

methods and design of the study.

Chapter II: Literature review of the study Methodology: gives the theoretical

background of the study related to improve vocabulary and VOA Special English in

learning listening vocabulary: introduction, theoretical backgrounds of vocabulary,

theoretical backgrounds of VOA Special English, and summary.

Chapter III: There are three parts in this chapter. The first one conceptualizes the

framework through the discussion of the issues and ideas on theories for improve

vocabulary by VOA Special English. The second one presents the methodology used in the

study including the sample and sampling, instrumentation, data collected from the survey,

and the observation. And the recommendations and suggestion for the students to improve

listening vocabulary are provided in the last one.

Chapter IV: Conclusion: gives a summary of the major findings, limitation of

the study and the suggestion for further studies.

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CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Introduction

This chapter is concerned with some of the most important issues in the theories

of using VOA Special English to improve listening vocabulary. Two main features will

take into consideration, namely, theoretical backgrounds of vocabulary and theoretical

backgrounds of VOA Special English.

2.2 Theoretical backgrounds of vocabulary

2.2.1 The important of vocabulary

It can be said that vocabulary is comprised of four things: listening, writing,

reading, and speaking. All four of these elements are used to make up a larger structure

that is called literacy. While literacy has been important ever since humans first discovered

writing, it has become much more important in the information age.

More than ever before, information has been allowed to flow freely. While much

of this information is not very valuable, some of it can enhance your career, make you

more productive, and even save your life. Your vocabulary is the element that will

determine your cultural literacy.

When many people think of vocabulary, they think of it as a tedious learning

process. However, it is very vital to your success in our world of today. It is no longer

enough to just know what is happening in your neighborhood, city, or country. It is equally

important for you to understand what is happening on a global scale.

Improving your vocabulary from an early age will allow you to become informed.

It will allow you to successfully convey your ideas to others, and it can also improve your

career outlook. It is important for parents to focus on improving the education of their

children from an early age.

In general, vocabulary plays an important role in the development of each

language; its importance is concluded in this list:

An extensive vocabulary aids expressions and communication

Vocabulary size has been directly linked to reading comprehension

Linguistic vocabulary is synonymous with thinking vocabulary

A person may be judged by others based on his or her vocabulary

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2.2.2 The Understandings of vocabulary

Vocabulary is one of the language components which should be mastered by

English learners. Vocabulary has role, which parallel with phonology and grammar to help

the learner mastering four language skills.

There are many definitions about vocabulary.

A vocabulary is defined as "all the words known and used by a particular person"

and “all the words which exist in a particular language or subject” (Cambridge Advanced

Learners Dictionary) .However, according to Sebastian Wren, PhD , the words known and

used by a particular person do not constitute all the words a person is exposed to. By

definition, a vocabulary includes the last two categories of this list:

Never encountered the word.

Heard the word, but cannot define it.

Recognize the word due to context or tone of voice.

Able to use the word but cannot clearly explain it.

Fluent with the word – its use and definition.

Another definition of vocabulary: vocabulary is knowledge of words and word

meanings. However, vocabulary is more complex than this definition suggests. First, words

come in two forms: oral and print. Oral vocabulary includes those words that we recognize

and use in listening and speaking. Print vocabulary includes those words that we recognize

and use in reading and writing. Second, word knowledge also comes in two forms,

receptive and productive. Receptive vocabulary includes words that we recognize when we

hear or see them. Productive vocabulary includes words that we use when we speak or

write. Receptive vocabulary is typically larger than productive vocabulary, and may

include many words to which we assign some meaning, even if we don’t know their full

definitions and connotations – or ever use them ourselves as we speak and write (Kamil &

Hiebert, in press).

Besides, according to Webster’s Dictionary (1993-327) “Vocabulary is a list or

group of words and phrase, usually in alphabetical order”.

In general, vocabulary is a component of language that maintains all of

information about meaning and using word in language (Harimurti kridalaksana 1993-

27).It is one of the important factors in learning English besides sound system, grammar,

and culture. A vocabulary usually grows and evolves with age, and serves as a useful and

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fundamental tool for communication and acquiring knowledge. Therefore, a person's

vocabulary is the set of words they are familiar with in a language.

2.2.3 Listening vocabulary

In general, vocabulary is divided into four types: reading vocabulary, listening

vocabulary, writing vocabulary and speaking vocabulary. But, in this study, I focus on

listening vocabulary.

Listening vocabulary refers to the words we need to know to understand what we

hear. A person's listening vocabulary is all the words he or she can recognize when

listening to speech. This vocabulary is aided in size by context and tone of voice.

2.3 Theoretical backgrounds of VOA

2.3.1 The understanding of VOA Special English

The VOA is the Voice of America, the official U.S. international broadcasting

service. This is their Special English used to provide the same content in 46 languages.

The Voice of America has been broadcasting programs in Special English since

1959. Special English is VOA’s method of communicating with English learners around

the world in a way that is easy to understand. The vocabulary is limited to about 1,500

words. The sentences are short. The speed is slower than normal. Special English programs

are broadcast on the Voice of America, on radio stations around the world, on satellite

television and on the Internet. These programs present the latest world news as well as

information about science, medicine, education, economics, American history and life in

the United States.

2.3.2 The advantages of using VOA Special English

The VOA Special English program offers teachers and students the opportunity to

develop their high frequency vocabulary in all four skills, with a Special emphasis on

making that vocabulary available for speaking and writing. The Special English program

uses a basic vocabulary of 1,500 English words to deliver interesting written and audio

reports on news, music, language, culture, and other topics. Most of the vocabulary

consists of high frequency words, although some words are more difficult when reports

deal with topics like medicine and science.

The VOA Special English program has gained great popularity with English

learners around the world, especially with beginners. But we have learned that the

speaking and writing skills of advanced learners can also derive considerable benefits from

this pro - gram. Some advantages of the Special English program include:

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• It is easily accessible on the Internet at www.voanews.com/Specialenglish . This

saves learners much time and effort in finding appropriate English learning materials. In

addition, some websites that serve learner in Viet Nam offer a free downloading service of

the Special English program that is updated daily.

• The Special English program exposes learners to a large amount of

comprehensible input using high frequency words. The repeated use of these words and

their collocations in different contexts makes it easier for students to learn essential

vocabulary. Special English also offers instruction - al opportunities for extensive speaking

and writing.

• The Special English program arouses the learners’ enthusiasm for English

learning with its interesting, informative, and detailed reports. It exposes learners to

vocabulary used to express current issues that are widely discussed around the world and

thus provides learners with what they actually need in terms of vocabulary for authentic

com - mutilation, which is in stark contrast to the topics in their textbooks. Learn - ears are

highly motivated to learn from such relevant materials expressed by many words and

expressions that meet their communicative needs. When the material is interesting,

students are more likely to become engaged in the task and learn the content. The use of

interesting and relevant topics is especially critical for speaking and writing tasks (Nation

2001b).

These advantages led us to teach the following course to improve our students’

productive use of high frequency English words.

2.4 Summary

In summary, the chapter has so far conceptualized the discussion of issues and

aspects concerning the topic of the study. It has discussed the concepts relating theoretical

backgrounds of vocabulary and theoretical backgrounds of VOA. The following chapters

will display the metrology and findings of the research under the light of the above

discussed theories.

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CHAPTER THREE: THE STUDY

3.1 Methodology

The purpose of this part is to describe the research methodology used to answer

research question in this study. It presents the research questions, observes and provides a

description of the participants. In addition, it contains a description of the instrument and

procedure used to gather of the data.

3.1.1 The physical setting

The term “physical setting” refers to the place where the lessons take place, the

number of students in an English class, the equipments and different types of materials

available for teachers and students in teaching and learning English.

FFL was founded and developed in 1992, with the first name was the Basic theory

team with only 5 teachers. In 2003, the basic theory team and the faculty of Basic Sciences

were merged together to teach English and English major techniques. On December 2007,

according to the decision of the Rector Headmaster of UTEHY was changed to Faculty of

Foreign Languages.

Since its development into department in 2007, the Faculty of Foreign Language

in UTEHY has employed many more young teachers, making the number 36 who live and

work in different places like Hai Duong, Hung Yen and Ha Noi. All the teachers graduated

from well- known university such as: Hanoi University, Foreign Language University,

Hanoi National University of Education, etc. All of them have MA degrees. The

Department of Foreign Languages consists of 40 teachers including 3 Chinese teachers.

Their ages are from 25 to 45. Majority of them graduated from faculty of foreign languages

of Hanoi National University or Hanoi University. At the present, there is one post-

graduate in Britain, 15 masters and the rest ones are bachelor studying for the degree of

Master. Up to now, the department has trained 10 academic years, from K5 to K14. It

focuses on training English major in Hai Duong and Pho Noi campus. Everything has been

in the process of innovation and development for better things both of teaching and

learning.

The Faculty of Foreign Language consists of about 65 English second year major

students, who have learnt English for at least 8 years. They come from the different

provinces of country but most of them live rural areas, so their English level is very low.

At university, students have a lot of difficulties in learning English. For example, the

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university is located in small province so that students do not have opportunities to practice

with foreigners, teaching facilities do not satisfy learners such as: language laboratory,

library, etc. However, they find that English plays an important role for future jobs.

3.1.2 The listening course

The textbooks “Get Ready for IELTS (Listening)” (Jane Short) put into use in the

2016-2017 academic years. The book contains 12 units. Each unit focuses on a different

topic and these topics are ones that often appear in the IELTS exam. After every three

units, there is a Review unit which helps you to revise the language and skills covered in

the previous units. At the end of the book the Practice test gives learner the opportunity to

take an IELTS-style test under test conditions.

1. Friends abroad Travel: countries and, nationalities

2. Food and cooking: Food, cooking, measures and weights charts

3. Presentations: Academic subjects

4. Work: Types of work

5. On campus services: University facilities

6. Staying safe: Crime, protection and safety

7. Studying, exams and revision: Study habits

8. Shopping and spending: Spending habits, products

9. Hobbies, interest and sport: Interest and pastimes

10. Work-life balance: Time management

11. Comparing cultures: Food, dress, housing

12. Exploring the oceans: Natural resources, ocean life

Each unit starts with the Aims of the unit. They outline the key language and skills

covered.

Part 1: Language development provides exercises on vocabulary related to the

topic as well as key grammar related to the IELTS Task covered in the unit. Clear

structures are provided.

Part 2: Skills development provides step-by-step exercises and guidance on

specific question types that appear in the test. There are explanations and examples that

show you how to approach each question type. Useful tips are highlighted to help you

develop successful test-taking strategies.

Part 3: Exam practice provides one exam practice question for either Task 1 or

Task 2 in a format that follows the actual exam. You can use this to check whether or not

you are ready for the test. Finally, a checklist summarizes the key points covered in the

unit.

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3.1.3 Participants of the study

The participants for my study are teachers and second-year English majors who

are teaching and studying at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education.

3.1.3.1 Teachers

Five teachers of English department at UTEHY were invited to answers the

questions. Their ages are from mid-twenties to nearly fifty. The reason for choosing these

five teachers is that they are teaching the listening subject in the school year 2016-2017, at

the time this study was being carried out.

3.1.3.2 Students

Being 57 English major students of the Department of foreign language at this

university, they had to pass a very challenging university entrance examination. The

students here come from all parts of the country but almost all of them come from the

countryside or small hometowns. Although their level of English is not quite high, their

ability of English is quite the same. That is, most of the students have learnt English for at

least 7 years at secondary and high schools. The students are between 20 and 21 years old,

both males and females but females make up for a majority in the target population.

3.1.4 Data collection instruments

Measurement instrument was designed for data collection is responded

questionnaires (one of them is survey questionnaire for teachers and another is one for

students).

The questionnaire for students consists of 12 multiple choices. From these

questions, the researcher can find information about the students’ attitudes towards

learning listening vocabulary, second-year English majors’ type of using VOA Special

English in learning vocabulary, and what they would like to learn vocabulary to make them

motivated in studying listening vocabulary. The survey will be reliable because the

students are well- aware of their mission and they have enough knowledge of English to

answer all of these questions given in the survey questionnaire.

The questionnaire for teachers comprised 12 questions. They are multiple

choices. The purpose of this was to obtain the teachers’ opinions about using VOA to learn

and motivate listening vocabulary; activities and techniques they have been using to teach

the students; the teachers’ comments on the textbook, and their suggestions to improve it.

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3.1.5 Procedure

First, at the middle of periods, the survey questionnaire to the students was

delivered and they are asked to complete the questionnaire seriously within 15-20 minutes

in their classroom. The researcher asked the teacher for permission to have a personal

contact with the study population to explain the aim as well as clarify any questions that

students had.

Then, the survey to the teachers was delivered to 5 teachers of listening and they

had one week to complete it.

Last, basing on the result of the questionnaire, the classroom performance by

teachers was observed to check the validity and the reliability of it. The observation was

recorded in a narrative form, in which detailed notes were kept and interpreted, and then

the conclusions were draw from them.

3.1.6 Summary

This chapter presented the overview on objectives of the course, the subjects of the

study, the textbook, instruments of data collection and data collection. The author used two

different instruments: two survey questionnaires, and class observation with the purpose of

achieving more reliable, valid data. The author will present the data analysis, and

discussion for teaching and learning English Writing skill.

3.2 INTERPRETATION AND DISCUSSIONS OF THE DATA

This study, as indicated in Chapter one, was intended to find out type of

motivation possessed by the second year English major students at UTEHY, factors

affecting motivation and suggestions to motivate them. In this section, the data collected

from the questionnaire and observation were presented and interpreted.

The 40 copies of the questionnaire were delivered to the students and 6 copies to

teachers. The data is analyzed in this part of the study in the below tables and figures

which show the response for the question having in the questionnaires.

3.2.1 Data analysis of students’ responses

3.2.1.1 Students’ personal information

The numbers of students in this study was 57 and were chosen randomly from three

classes of TAK13. Among them, 53 are female and 4 are male. They are from 20 to 22 years

old.

Question1: Have you ever used the program VOA Special English?

After researching, the number of students using VOA makes up 63% of total.

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Pie chart 1: The students use VOA Special English to learn.

The pie chart gives data on the percentage of students using VOA to learn

listening vocabulary. The data show that the number students use VOA accounting for the

vast majority. With the highest percent, 63% of them have using VOA to lean. In contrast,

37% of students don’t use to learn listening vocabulary.

3.2.1.2 The reality of the students’ perspectives toward learning listening vocabulary in

VOA.

Question 2: If you use VOA in the future, what topics do you usually learn to improve

listening vocabulary when you use VOA Special English?

Bar chart 1: The students’ topic attract learning in VOA

According to the bar chart, if students use VOA, most of them 24,4% attractant

by all topic in VOA: Education, Science, Medicine, Economics, History, Life. The

percentages of students (23,2%) said that they feel common with Life, new words about

life is not difficult with them. Neatly, Education is one of the easy topics they want to learn

with second- year students (20,7%). The similarity about percentages between Science and

History (12,2%), students are same attractant with two topic. Lastly, History and Medicine

are lower (3,7%) they said that are two topics boring and long time, it has many Specialist

register of English, and very hard to remember.

63%

37%

YES

NO

0.0% 5.0% 10.0% 15.0% 20.0% 25.0%

Education

Science

Medicine

Economics

History

Life

All of them

20.7%

12.2%

3.7%

12.2%

3.7%

23.2%

24.4%

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Question 3: How much important is learning listening vocabulary?

Bar chart 2: The students’ attitude towards important of listening vocabulary

As can be seen from the data on students’ attitude towards is the importance of

listening vocabulary. There are 68% of students find listening vocabulary is very important

in learning English, 32% students said that it is important, and no one feels listening

vocabulary is not important or not very important in studying English. From the data

shown, we can see that most of student fully aware of the signification of learning listening

vocabulary in studying English.

Question 4: Why do you learn listening vocabulary?

Types of

motivation

Reasons Number of students

Instrumental

motivation

a. They are interested in learning listening

vocabulary, and in learning English in general

35 (45,5%)

b. They want to be better their listening

vocabulary.

13 (16,9%)

c. For their study 24 (31.2%)

d. One of the requirements in learning English. 4 (5,2%)

c. Others 1 (1,3%)

Table 1: The students’ reasons learn listening vocabulary

The table showed that the main reason of learning listening vocabulary of the

students (45,5%) is they are interested in learning listening vocabulary, and in learning

English in general.

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

VERY

IMPORTANTIMPORTANT

NOT

IMPORTANT NOT VERY

IMPORTANT

68%

32%

0%0%

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Similarly, about (31,2 %) of students claimed that they studied listening

vocabulary just because it necessary for your study. Nowadays, the students’ awareness is

higher and higher. They determined more clearly and exactly the purpose of learning, and

understood the importance and necessity of learning listening vocabulary in particular and

learning English in general. Thus, they would have better motivation to learn this subject.

Next, the students (16,9%) said they liked to learn listening vocabulary just

because their results is they want to be better your listening vocabulary.

Fourthly, students said that one of the requirements in learning English (5,2%) so

they need to learn listening vocabulary.

Lastly, the lowest percentage of the students (1,3%), they have some motivations

to learn listening vocabulary

In a nutshell, the students’ major reason for learning listening vocabulary is they

are interested in learning listening vocabulary, and in learning English in general.

Question 5: Where do you meet new words?

Situations Never Rarely Sometimes Often Usually

When you use VOA Special English

(reading, listening, watching news) 14% 12% 51% 19% 4%

When using / surfing the Internet (e.g. English websites, e-chatting (e.g. writing: QQ, MSN; speaking:

Skype) 2% 19% 28% 49% 2%

In textbooks and from classroom learning activities 2% 7% 49% 37% 5%

In vocabulary lists arranged in

alphabetical order 5% 12% 53% 30% 0%

In vocabulary lists arranged by meaning 7% 16% 39% 25% 5%

During English conversations with

others (e.g. teachers, classmates, foreigners) 0% 12% 40% 46% 2%

When reading English materials (e.g.

books, newspapers, magazines) 9% 7% 40% 33% 11%

When singing English songs or watching English movies / TV shows 0% 7% 40% 35% 18%

Table 2: The students’ frequent situations meet vocabulary

In general, we can see that students and have answers for situations vocabulary

appearance. 51% of students sometimes meet new words when you use VOA Special

English (reading, listening, watching news). 19% often, 14% never, 12% rarely, 4%

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usually saw new words. Most of students in surveys use VOA to learning listening

vocabulary so they often meet new words.

Students usually meet vocabulary use when using / surfing the Internet (e.g.

English websites, e-chatting (e.g. writing: QQ, MSN; speaking: Skype), 28% sometimes,

2% usually. In contrast, 19% rarely, 2% never use or learn by this ways.

Besides, other situations such as in textbooks and from classroom learning

activities and in vocabulary lists arranged in alphabetical order, in vocabulary lists

arranged by meaning, During English conversations with others (e.g. teachers, classmates,

foreigners), or when reading English materials (e.g. books, newspapers, magazines), when

singing English songs or watching English movies / TV shows are sometimes appear new

words (between 39% and 53%). (25% to 46%) often, (0%-18%) usually, (7%-16%) rarely,

(0%- 7%) never meet.

Question 6: If you use VOA, how much time do you spend on learning writing

vocabulary in VOA Special English on a day

Pie chart 2: The students’ time use VOA to learn listening vocabulary

As shown in pie chart 2, 33% of the students said that theirs time use VOA to

learn listening vocabulary about 1 or 2 hours. 18% spends 3 hours to study, 2% four hours.

And 14% others, it means that they can spend more four hours or less than a hour per day

to learn new words they meet in VOA Special English. With second-year major students,

1-2 hours per day to learn vocabulary is very suitable.

Question 7: When you want to learn or remember the vocabulary; how often do you do

any of the following on your own initiative?

33%

33%

18%

2% 14% A hour

Two hours

Three hours

Four hours

Others

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Bar chart 3: The students’ ways learn listening vocabulary

A. I learn through VOA Special English

B. At home I make lists of words and I study them. C. I write down the word as it sounds or make some sort of annotation to remember

its pronunciation.

D. On my own initiative I write the translation next to the word I would like to learn. E. I relate the English word with other words that are written or sound in a similar

way F. I write down the word together with an example sentence. G. I create my own dictionary.

H. I relate the word in English with an image, a drawing or a scheme. I. I repeat the words out loud several times.

J. All of them. According to bar chart: 19,7% students preferred write down the word as it sounds

or make some sort of annotation to remember its pronunciation . The explanation for this

could be that the second year English majors still kept the habit from the high school, this

is a traditional and effetely ways to learn listening vocabulary in VOA, and entrance

University they still use to learning. Also 13,7% confirmed that at home they make lists of

words and they study them.

In addition, 12,8% said that they liked create my own dictionary because they can

remember meaning or words easier by their writing, setting,… , and attract as well as

stimulate them in vocabulary more.

Also, about 12% of the survey students use VOA to learn listening vocabulary. It

means that many students don’t know how to using VOA to learn. VOA Specials English

is one of the best channels should use when students wants to learn better foreign language

in the world.

Moreover, 7,7% liked write the translation next to the word, write down the word

together with an example sentence, repeat the words out loud several times.

0.0%

5.0%

10.0%

15.0%

20.0%

A B C D E F G H I J

12.0%13.7%

19.7%

7.7%5.1%

7.7%

12.8%

4.3%

7.7%9.4%

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Next, 9% students choose that they use all of ways to learn listening vocabulary.

Lastly, 5,1% students were used the English word with other words that are

written or sound in a similar way. They said that this way is very difficult complex; they

don’t have much time to do this way. 4,3% relate the word in English with an image, a

drawing or a scheme, there are similar in two ways to learn listening vocabulary.

In general, a majority of the students said that write down the word as it sounds or

make some sort of annotation to remember its pronunciation which they liked best. Many

of them enjoyed create my own dictionary. And they don’t like used the English word with

other words that are written or sound in a similar way or relate the word in English with an

image, a drawing or a scheme

Question 8: According to you, which of the following factors affects your learning

listening vocabulary in VOA Special English ability?

Bar chart 4: The students’ factors affect learning listening vocabulary ability in VOA.

The bar chart pointed out that: students’ learning vocabulary abilities (20,2%),

difficulties in remembering meaning of general (18%). Difficulties in listening and writing

news in VOA Special English (15,7%). The English-learning environment and all of the

above factors are similar percentages (13,5%). Motivation to learn vocabulary (12,4%),

some students said that they have others reasons to effect their ability in learning listening

vocabulary in VOA .

0.0%

5.0%

10.0%

15.0%

20.0%

25.0%

A B C D E F G

20.2%

12.4%

18.0%

15.7%

13.5% 13.5%

6.7%

A. Students’ learning vocabulary abilities

B. Motivation to learn vocabulary

C. Difficulties in remembering meaning of general vocabulary,

Special words D. Difficulties in listening and

writing news in VOA Special

English E. The English- learning

environment F. All of the above factors G. Others

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Question 9: How often do you use these methods to learn listening vocabulary?

Methods Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never

Learning from VOA Special

English (listening and reading,

watching news) 19% 37% 40% 2% 2%

Learning from text books 9% 47% 40% 4% 0%

Learning from teachers 12% 42% 44% 2% 0%

Learning from your friends 16% 42% 37% 5% 0%

Learning from games 7% 33% 49% 11% 0%

Learning from Internet (music,

film …) 16% 54% 30% 0% 0%

Learning from synonym or

antonym words 7% 44% 42% 7% 0%

Table 3: The students’ frequent use methods to learn listening vocabulary

Table 3: Indicates students' preferences for some methods used to learn listening

vocabulary. Students always use learning from VOA Special English (listening and

reading, watching news), learning from friends, teachers, or Internet. The reason for this is

that these are the most basic contents for any good methods. Most of students often or

sometime use learning from VOA Special English (listening and reading, watching news)

(37;40%), learning from text books (47;40%), learning from teachers (42;44%), learning

from your friends ( 42;37%), learning from games (33,49%), learning from Internet

(music, film …) (54;30%), learning from synonym or antonym words (44,42%).

Obviously, the rest of the contents are by far the least – frequently, difficulty applied

because of the fact that they are out of the teachers' control and not meaningful for the

students' self – learning.

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Question 10: Which techniques do you use to remember listening vocabulary in VOA

Special English?

Techniques Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never

Write words on pieces of paper, then

stick them wherever visible 21% 51% 26% 2% 0%

Write words in both Vietnamese and English many times 21% 56% 23% 0% 0%

Stick words on the objects they

describe 19% 46% 33% 2% 4%

Listen repeatedly to a news (remember meanings, pronunciations) 16% 40% 44% 0% 0%

Others: 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

Table 4: The students’ frequent use techniques to learn listening vocabulary in VOA

According to their opinion, remembering of words is the most difficulty when

learning listening vocabulary in VOA, so they will apply their own tips in order to easily

memorize all words after watch or listen news.

51% students often use writing words on pieces of paper, then sticking them

wherever visible, which is common way to remember, applying this way will be easier in

learning English. 26% students sometimes using, 21% always, 2% rarely and 0% never use

this ways.

Meanwhile, writing words in both Vietnamese and English many times have 56%

students often using, 23% sometimes, 21% always, and nobody rarely or never. It proves

that students do come to realize which tips are the most suitable for learning vocabulary.

In addition, 46% say that they often stick words on the objects they describe. And

33% sometimes, 19% always, 4% never, 2% rarely use this way. Most of them think that

this is finical a way time-consuming

Next, Listening repeatedly to a news (remember meanings, pronunciations), 44%

students sometimes, 40% often, 16% always, 0% rarely or never. It means that almost

students use this ways to learning listening vocabulary in VOA.

From the figures, it shows a reality that students have many ways to learn

listening vocabulary English in VOA better and better.

Question 11: How attractive do you find these activities?

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Bar chart 5: The student’s activities attractive when learning listening vocabulary

The bar chart illustrates 5 types of activities to learning listening vocabulary:

learning through VOA Special English news, learning at home, learning with friends,

learning in class, finding synonym or antonym word. The students always attractive most

percentage among 5 activities, (61%) learning through VOA Special English news, that is

more than half students who know and use VOA Special English. (67%) learn in class,

(63%) learn at home, (49%) learn with friends and find synonym or antonym word. It

proves that students come to realize that with some activities, they would have more

opportunities and motivation to learn listening vocabulary English. In other words,

students are likely to think that they will learn better from 5 above activities.

Question 12: What ways should you do to improve your ability in learning listening

vocabulary in VOA Special English?

Bar chart 6: Students’ ways improve listening vocabulary in VOA

19%

18%

33%

19%

28%

61%

63%

49%

67%

49%

18%

19%

18%

14%

19%

2%

0%

0%

0%

4%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%

Learning through VOA special English

news

Learning at home

Learning with friends

Learning in class

Finding synonym or antonym word

Not attractive

A bit attractive

Attractive

Very attractive

0.0%

2.0%

4.0%

6.0%

8.0%

10.0%

12.0%

14.0%

16.0%

18.0%

20.0%

A B C D E F G H

17.0%

19.8%

17.9%

8.5%

10.4%

15.1%

6.6%

4.7%

A. Keeping a dictionary and thesaurus handy

B. Listening and trying to write down news

C. Looking up any new word

you do not recognize. D. Writing more

E. Using flashcard or post- it notes around your house

F. Learning words through

topics G. All of them

H. Others

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The bar chart indicates that in the ways to improve listening vocabulary in VOA,

keeping a dictionary and thesaurus handy, listening and trying to write down news, looking

up any new word you do not recognize, are reported to enhance the students' self -

learning. Students (19,8%) find them most useful because they help the students to use

different ways strategies for learning listening vocabulary . For example, they have to

listen and try to write downs to the whole news for the main ideas and then combine these

main ideas to make an outline. Through listening, they also have to list out new

vocabulary, structures and even phonological aspects and listening skills they use for

listening. The next group of useful contents falls on keeping a dictionary and thesaurus

handy, looking up any new word you do not recognize (17%%). What's more, informants

(15,1%) share learning word through topics in VOA would be of great tool to the students'

self - learning. Using flashcard or post- it notes around your house (10,4%)

It may help the students get easier to study new words. The rest of contents seem

that they are not really useful for the students ' self - study, however, they are necessary for

learning listening vocabulary in VOA Special English.

3.2.2 Data analysis of teachers’ responses

3.2.2.1 Teachers’ personal information

The total number of teachers is in this study are 6 people. Among

them, 3 teachers are female and 2 teachers are male. Although they are different ages with

different years’ experience in teaching English, all of them have experiences in teaching

writing skill.

3.2.2.2 Teachers’ attitudes toward the reality of the learning listening vocabulary in VOA Question1: Have you ever used the program VOA Special English to teach your

students?

Pie chart 3: The teachers use VOA Special English

80%

20%

YES

NO

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As you know, VOA Special English is very popular with English-learner and

teachers, 80% teachers said that they use VOA to teach their students, while 20% showed

that they don’t use this program. VOA is important program to English learner, especially;

listening in VOA Special English is easier way to achievement voluminous new words.

Question 2: If you use VOA in the future, what topics do you usually use to teach your

students listening vocabulary when you use VOA Special English?

Bar chart 7: The teachers’ topics want to teach listening vocabulary

From the chart, we can see that 37,5% informants like to education and

science. This can be viewed as a helpful part to enable the students to have book-learning;

they may reuse the source someday for another purpose. The next part, which can interest a

large number of the teachers (12,5%) believed that students will like to learn some topics

about economics or life . It is easy to realize that fact as it helps the students; the teachers

have more and more social knowledge.. Thanks to this, the students are more aware of the

life around their-self. It is a good way to help them to learn listening vocabulary better.

Another nobody thinks Medicine or History attracts students study listening vocabulary in

VOA Special English, these two topics are very difficult and have many Specialist register.

Question 3: How much important is learning listening vocabulary?

In this question, all the teachers have the same answers, and 100% of them fell

learning listening vocabulary is very important.

0.0%

10.0%

20.0%

30.0%

40.0%

Education Science Medicine Economics History Life All of

them

37.5% 37.5%

0%

12.5%

0%

12.5%

0%

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Bar chart 8: Teachers’ attitude towards the importance of listening vocabulary

It is clearly to be seen that all students highly evaluated the importance of

learning listening vocabulary in the language in teaching and learning.

Question 4: How much interested do your students feel in learning listening vocabulary

through VOA Special English?

Pie chart 4: The students’ interested in learning listening vocabulary in VOA

Pie chart 4 shows that nearly all teachers (60%) think the students

interested in learning listening vocabulary in VOA. 20% very interested and 20% little

interested. No one choose interested. VOA are become a program closer with English

learner in general, with second- year English major in UTEHY in particular.

Question 5: In your opinion, where do your students meet new words?

0%

100%

VERY IMPORTANTIMPORTANT

NOT IMPORTANTNOT VERY

IMPORTANT

100%

0%0%

0%

20%

60%

20%

0%

Very interested

Interested

Little interested

Not interested

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Situations Never Rarely Sometimes Often Usually

When you use VOA Special English

(reading, listening, watching news) 0% 40% 0% 60% 0%

When using / surfing the Internet (e.g. English websites, e-chatting (e.g.

writing: QQ, MSN; speaking: Skype) 0% 20% 20% 60% 0%

In textbooks and from classroom learning activities 0% 40% 0% 60% 0%

In vocabulary lists arranged in

alphabetical order 20% 20% 20% 40% 0%

In vocabulary lists arranged by meaning 20% 20% 20% 40% 0%

During English conversations with

others (e.g. teachers, classmates, foreigners) 0% 20% 40% 40% 0%

When reading English materials (e.g.

books, newspapers, magazines) 0% 20% 20% 60% 0%

When singing English songs or watching English movies / TV shows 0% 20% 20% 60% 0%

Table 5: The teachers’ frequent situations meet vocabulary

As can be seen from the table, 60% teachers said that their students often meet

new words when you use VOA Special English (reading, listening, watching news), when

using / surfing the Internet (e.g. English websites, e-chatting (e.g. writing: QQ, MSN;

speaking: Skype), in textbooks and from classroom learning activities, when reading

English materials (e.g. books, newspapers, magazines), when singing English songs or

watching English movies / TV shows. The reason for this choice is all above situations

very meaningful and useful inspire of the fact. Besides, in vocabulary lists arranged in

alphabetical order and in vocabulary lists arranged by meaning are never meet, because of

very trouble. In addition, during English conversations with others (e.g. teachers,

classmates, and foreigners) is a situation to appear listening vocabulary.

Question 6: According to you, if your students use VOA, how much time do your

students should spend using on a day?

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Pie chart 5: The teachers’ toward student’s time should spend using VOA

As can be seen from the pie chart 100% of the teachers who take part in the study,

they think students should use a hour per day to learning listening vocabulary from VOA.

Students’ time allocation for self-study at home is also a problem and it affects the learners

very much in mastering the listening vocabulary. However, it seems to be a disadvantage

of UTEHY second-year English majors.

Question 7: According to you, when your students want to learn or remember the

vocabulary; what should your students do?

Bar chart 9: The teachers’ opinions on the ways to help students improve their

listening vocabulary

A. Learn through VOA Special English B. Make lists of words and study them.

C. Write down the word as it sounds or make some sort of annotation to remember its pronunciation.

D. Write the translation next to the word

E. Relate the English word with other words that are written or sound in a similar way

F. Write down the word together with an example sentence.

G. Create self-dictionary. H. Relate the word in English with an image, a drawing or a scheme.

100%

0%0%0%0%

A hour

2 hours

3 hours

4 hours

Others

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25%

A

C

E

G

I

0%23.1%

7.7%7.7%

0%15.4%

7.7%7.7%

15.4%15.4%

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26

I. Repeat the words out loud several times.

J. All of them. To this question, many methods have been introduced by teachers with the hope

of helping students overcoming their difficulties in learning listening vocabulary. There are

some of the most outstanding ones: Make lists of words and study them (23,1%); write

down the word as it sounds or make some sort of annotation to remember its

pronunciation, write the translation next to the word, create self-dictionary, relate the word

in English with an image, a drawing or a scheme (7,7%); relate the English word with

other words that are written or sound in a similar way, repeat the words out loud several

times (15,4%). Besides, no one suggest their students learn through VOA Special English

or Relate the English word with other words that are written or sound in a similar way.(

15,4%) teachers thinks should learn by all above ways.

Question 8: According to you, which of the following factors affects your students

learning writing vocabulary in VOA Special English ability?

Bar chart 10: Teachers opinion factors affecting learning listening vocabulary ability

in VOA.

In this question, similarity 28,6% of these teacher find difficulties in

remembering meaning of general and all of the reasons. Besides, motivation to learn

vocabulary, difficulties in listening and writing news in VOA Special English and the

English-learning environment are 14,3%. No one choice students’ learning vocabulary

abilities or others.

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

A B C D E F G

0%

14.3%

28.6%

14.3% 14.3%

28.6%

0%

A. Students’ learning vocabulary abilities

B. Motivation to learn vocabulary

C. Difficulties in remembering meaning of general vocabulary, Special

words D. Difficulties in listening and

writing news in VOA Special English

E. The English- learning

environment F. All of the above factors

G. Others

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Question 9: According to you, how often should your students use these methods to

learn writing vocabulary?

Methods Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never

Learning from VOA Special English (listening and reading, watching news) 20% 20% 40% 20% 0%

Learning from text books 0% 40% 60% 0% 0%

Learning from teachers 0% 40% 60% 0% 0%

Learning from their friends 0% 40% 40% 20% 0%

Learning from games 0% 20% 80% 0% 0%

Learning from Internet (music, film…) 0% 20% 80% 0% 0%

Learning from synonym or antonym words 0% 20% 60% 20% 0%

Table 6: The teachers’ opinion students’ frequent use techniques to learn listening

vocabulary in VOA

To this question, many methods have been introduced with the hope of helping

students overcoming their difficulties in learning listening vocabulary. There are some of

the most outstanding ones: Learning from Internet (music, film…), Learning from games

(80%), this may be simple to attractive student self- study, practicing makes their

vocabulary perfect. Next, teachers think that student sometimes learn from text books or

learn from teachers, learn from synonym or antonym words (60%). (20%) teachers reckon

student always learning from VOA Special English (listening and reading, watching news).

Specially, students should enrich the techniques and tips as much as they can to improve

listening vocabulary.

Question 10: According to you, which techniques should your students use to remember

listening vocabulary in VOA Special English?

Techniques Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never

Write words on pieces of paper, then stick them wherever visible 0% 20% 80% 0% 0%

Write words in both Vietnamese and English many times 0% 0% 100% 0% 0%

Stick words on the objects they describe 0% 40% 60% 0% 0%

Listen repeatedly to a news (remember meanings,

pronunciations) 0% 60% 20% 20% 0%

Others 0% 0% 0% 0% 0%

Table 7: The teachers’ opinion techniques should use to remember listening

vocabulary in VOA

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This question is to find the techniques that the teachers suggest students apply to

learn listening vocabulary in VOA Special English. Looking at the table, we can easily see

that techniques sometimes learn by: write words in both Vietnamese and English many

times (100%), write words on pieces of paper, then stick them wherever visible (80%),

stick words on the objects they describe (60%), listen repeatedly to a news (remember

meanings, pronunciations) (20%) . And listen repeatedly to a news (remember meanings,

pronunciations) (60%), students should often use stick words on the objects they describe

(40%), or write words on pieces of paper, then stick them wherever visible (20%). It is the

traditional way for students study listening vocabulary in VOA. The other suggestions

(20%) think that rarely listen repeatedly to a news (remember meanings, pronunciations)

which may be take a long time and students can’t hard-study to learn by this way.

Question 11: According to you, how attractive do your students find these activities?

Bar chart 11: The teachers’ opinion activities attractive students

According to the bar chart, opinions of teachers about attractive students feel with

some activities. Teacher said that 60% student attractive with learning through VOA

Special English news, and 60% student a bit attractive. VOA is well-known with major

English students.

20% to 40% student attractive with learning at home, with friends in class,

findings synonym or antonym word, 20%- 80% a bit attractive through teacher’s opinion.

Both learning with friends and at home are 80% a bit attractive, teachers think that students

not enough hard to self-study or learn with team.

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

Learning through VOA special English

news

Learning at home

Learning with friends

Learning in class

Finding synonym or antonym word

60%

20%

20%

40%

40%

40%

80%

80%

60%

60%

Not attractive

A bit attractive

Attractive

Very attractive

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Question 12: According to you, what ways should your student do to improve your

students ‘ability in learning listening vocabulary in VOA Special English?

Bar chart 12: The teacher’s opinion way to improving students learn listening

vocabulary in VOA

The bar chart show that, both keeping a dictionary, thesaurus and learning words

through topics are 27,3 % , it means with teachers this can be seem a good ways to learn

listening vocabulary in VOA. 18,2% are listening and trying to write down news and using

flashcard or post- it notes around your house. Besides, 9,1% teacher think that looking up

any new words you do not recognize. To this question, many methods have been

introduced with the hope of helping students overcoming their difficulties in learning

listening vocabulary.

The collected data show that most of the students at UTEHY have a great desire

to improve their listening vocabulary by carrying out the activities self-study. The students

express their preference some ways to learn, this kinds of activity not only activates their

knowledge but arouse their interest as well. Another interesting finding is that the students

enjoy studying in VOA, Internet or by watching movie, listening song. It is believed that

students can learn vocabulary effective as the students can benefit from learning through

VOA; it provides them more and more new words, to share much information.

3.3 Summary

From the above analysis of collected data, we can see the current situation of

teaching and learning listening vocabulary in VOA Special English at UTEHY, and this

university proves itself to be a potential university in which the teachers and students are

0.0%

5.0%

10.0%

15.0%

20.0%

25.0%

30.0%

A B C D E F G H

A. Keeping a dictionary and thesaurus handy

B. Listening and trying to write

down news C. Looking up any new word

you do not recognize. D. Listening more E. Using flashcard or post- it

notes around your house F. Learning words through

topics G. All of them H. Others

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30

focus of the development, it is understandable that the teachers’ techniques may be

partially be accessing to up-dating with modern teaching techniques.

However, it can be inferred from the data that there exist a lot of difficulties in

teaching and learning listening vocabulary. There are some reasons for this: first, the

students spend most of their time study four skills as their first and important duty is to do

well the examinations to universities. They forget basic steps to learn best English is learn

vocabulary in general, listening vocabulary in particular. Second, the students seem not to

have appropriate learning method and have little experience in learning listening

vocabulary. Last but not least, the teachers do not spend much of their time to design

successful and effective to improve students leaning listening vocabulary, thus, it seems for

the teachers that teaching listening vocabulary in VOA Special English comprehension is

not more than testing.

From the survey we need to keep in mind that there are still mismatches between

the teachers and the students in the way the teachers create learning listening vocabulary

interest or motivation. Actually the teachers, students can use VOA Special English in

teaching or learning to improve students’ listening vocabulary, and make full use of

communicative approach in teaching and learning in order to increase interest for the

students in studying listening vocabulary.

Also in chapter three, findings from the survey show that most of the students are

active and well-aware of what they need to do to learn listening vocabulary. However,

what they have done seem not efficient enough to improve their listening vocabulary.

To solve and overcome all the problems and difficulties is not easy, this is a

matter of time and effort of both the teachers and students in the process of teaching and

learning listening vocabulary. In the next part I am going to suggest using VOA Special

English to improve listening vocabulary based on my knowledge, experience as well as

what I have found in the survey with the hope that they would be of a help to improve the

quality of teaching and learning listening skill for the teachers and the second-years major

English students in UTEHY.

3.4 Recommendation and suggestion:

Base on several difficulties of students on learning listening vocabulary English,

this part will introduce using VOA Special English to overcome those difficulties.

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31

3.4.1. For teachers

It is the teachers who should help their students to realize the nature of listening

vocabulary in VOA Special English. VOA Special English is an active rather than a

passive process which involves using a large number of skills and strategies at the same

time and need student take a long time with this program.

The teachers teach students about vocabulary use in receptive and productive

contexts and illustrating how the mastery of a large number of high frequency words in

receptive activities can help them dramatically improve their production of fluent and

accurate English. It is one thing to be able to understand a word, whether in a written or

oral context, but quite another to be able to use that word fluently to express oneself. More

speaking and writ-ing activities, with proper attention to high frequency vocabulary items,

are necessary to improve the students’ ability to use the words fluently. Equally important,

students realize that learning involves much more than memorizing the Vietnamese

definition of a word.

The teachers introduce for students know the VOA Special English program and

show them why it is an excellent source to increase both their receptive and productive

listening vocabulary. This introduction is essential to arouse students’ enthusiasm and

maximize the program’s instructional value.

Teachers devote to raising the students’ awareness of collocations through the

selection of Special English reports that contain interesting topics related to textbook

material and the most useful vocabulary and collocations.

For example, when the textbook’s topic is related to health problems, we choose

the Special English report “Freshman Fifteen” (Gollust, Moss, and Weaver 2005).

http://www.51voa.com/voa_Special_english/American_Mosaic_17601.html

This report deals with a relevant health problem that troubles college students

worldwide and has many useful collocations such as: put on weight, poor diet, and foods

high in fat and sugar. The students also find reports that correspond to a wide variety of

topics from their textbooks. The same health-related textbook chapter led them to choose

reports about a variety of health concerns such as SARS, AIDS, and Bird Flu.

Some techniques to explore VOA in teaching English vocabulary:

Steps to conduct a lesson with VOA:

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32

Step 1: Students listen to a select Special English report three times without the

script. Teachers require taking notes of key words and collocations while listening.

Step 2: Students then work in pairs using the words and collocations from the

report to discuss the topic.

Step 3: Students listen to the report two more times with the script projected onto a

screen; and focus on problematic vocabulary and concepts.

Step 4: Students do oral exercises in pairs or groups without the script, such as

asking and answering questions and translating collocations to make sure they can

use the words and collocations correctly.

Step 5: Finally, students do the fluency-oriented 4/3/2 activity. As an alternative,

they can write as much as possible about the report for fifteen minutes.

Techniques to assign homework with VOA

The students have to study at least one Special English report after class every

other day. After reading the reports and listening to the corresponding audio files, they use

the words and collocations to practice retelling the main ideas of the reports, either orally

or in writing. Retelling the reports orally to oneself is encouraged when no partners or

family mem - bers are available. Moreover, students must write summaries of their reports

in a note - book to prepare for their later presentations. If time allows, they can write

longer passages that include their impressions or opinions.

3.4.2 For students

Throughout the course students are instructed to keep a pocket-size notebook to

collect both new and familiar words, collocations, and sentences they encounter in the

Special English reports or from other sources. Jotting down even those familiar words and

collocations that they recognize helps them retrieve familiar vocabulary when speaking

and writing. They are encouraged to ask themselves these questions: “Can I use this

word/collocation at will when it is needed to express my ideas? If not, do I need to make it

a part of my productive vocabulary?”

Students are encouraged to carry their vocabulary notebooks with them most of

the time for frequent addition, review, and recycling of the entries. When they have time,

they can copy those entries into three-ring binders, which are classified into sections like

“Food,” “Family,” “Health,” and “Music.” Anything not belonging to a particular category

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33

goes into a “Miscellaneous” section. These binders’ help students organize, memorize, and

locate the entries.

Make a good self-study plan to explore VOA:

A study plan is an organized schedule that students create that outlines study

times and learning goals in VOA. Each person will have their most suitable self-study plan

that suit with their time, ability, subjects,… there are no model plan that can be use for all

of people, therefore, each students should make a careful plan. A good self-study plan will

help students reach their target quickly and control their time effectively. You can make a

good plan by following step:

Create a time chart of your current activities: time chart allow you see how you

spent your time from day to day. Students should spend from 1 to 2 hours to learn

listening vocabulary in VOA Special English. It can help you improve your

vocabulary, grammar, background knowledge and you can learn listening

vocabulary easily and effectively.

Develop a schedule: You have determined available days and times for learning

listening vocabulary. You should make a mark in your planner or calendar and thus

you are reminded every time you look at it.

Creating good learning environment

Learning environment for learning listening vocabulary in VOA, which is

listening laboratory besides cassettes tapes, tape recorders and written listening texts, is a

vital key affecting the quality of both learning and teaching listening vocabulary.

To create good learning environment, students should:

- Find a quiet place to listen in order to concentrate better during listening

comprehension process.

- Have good physical condition for learning: good radio, comfortable chair, etc.

- Make friendly and pleasant atmosphere

Besides using VOA Special English the learners should:

- Speak to native English and teachers and try to imitate their pronunciation

- Practice listening everyday to have sensitivity to connected speech

- Make conversations with friends in English and have peer correction

- Listen and try to memorize lyrics and rhythm of English songs - Watch news,

movies, etc on TV

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34

In listening vocabulary learning, the focus should be not just on expanding

learners’ vocabulary but also on helping they gain greater familiarity with high frequency

words and collocations. And this should be as much the case with advanced learners as

with beginners and intermediate learners. Efforts should be taken to enable second-year

English major students in UTEHY to progress gradually from receptive knowledge to

productive knowledge and from consciously knowing words to subconsciously and

automatically using them. VOA Special English focuses on high frequency of words and

collocations; it will make students have progress in their speaking, listening and writing.

The progress in turn will built up their confidence and increase their engagement with

these activities; moreover, the learning habits study by VOA Special English help them

become more independent, responsible and confident language learners who will continue

to pursue better proficiency in English beyond the course.

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35

CHAPTER IV: CONCLUSION

4.1. Summary of the study

To reach what the author aimed her study; at the study was divided into four

chapters with their own purpose. The first chapter covered rationale, aims, scope, methods,

and design of the study. The second chapter briefly covered the theories related to the

study, namely, theoretical background of vocabulary, and the theoretical backgrounds of

VOA Special English. The third chapter presented the overview on situation of teaching

and learning English listening vocabulary at UTEHY, and research methodology. The forth

chapter presented the author’s findings of the approach to listening vocabulary at UTEHY

through the questionnaires. This chapter also helps the author find the answers for three

research questions that stated in the introduction. And the last chapter is some

recommendation and suggestion for the teachers to improve English listening vocabulary

learning and teaching at UTEHY.

4.2. Limitations of the study

In any research papers, limitations are unavoidable. The study presented is of no

exception. Firstly, the difficulties found out in the study is just from second – year English

majors at UTEHY so there should be further studies on different subjects.

Secondly, the using VOA Special English to learn listening vocabulary suggested

through prove to be useful and effective, they are likely to be subjective and incomplete.

There should be some more techniques and activities to help second English majors of

UTEHY in particular and English major students in general make good advance in learning

listening vocabulary.

4.3. Suggestions for future studies

The following directions should be taken into consideration in the future research:

- The present research only suggests using VOA Special English to learn listening

vocabulary. Further research should focus on using VOA Special English to learn other

skills in English

First, further investigation into VOA Special English

Second, further investigation into how to improve other language skills through VOA

Special English

Third, further investigation into how to enhance the students’ awareness of VOA

Special English for lifelong learning vocabulary

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36

REFERENCE

1. Allen.F.A,(1983), Techniques in teaching vocabulary, NewYork : Oxford

University Press

2. Harimurti Kridalaksana, (1993), Kamus linguistic, (Jakarta: PT Gramedia pustake

Utama).

3. Harmer, (1993), The Prarice of English Language Teaching, Essex: Longman

Group UK Limited, ISBN 978-019-442169-0

4. Helena Anderson & Carol Ann Pesola, (1993), Languages and Children, The

Modern Language Journal 77.

5. Hiebert, E. H. (in press), Teaching and learning vocabulary: Bringing scientific

research to practice, Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

6. JoAnn Aebersold, Mary Lee Field, (1997), Language Arts & Disciplines.

7. Krashen, S, (1982), Principles and practice in second language acquisition, New

York: Prentice-Hall.

8. Paul Nation,(1990) Teaching and Learning Vocabulary.

9. Sebastian Wren, Ph.D. Vocabulary. BalancedReading.com

10. Webster's Dictionary (1993)

11. Wright, (1990), Pictures for Language Learning, Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, ISBN 0-521-35800-0

12. Wright and Haleem Safia, (1996), Visuals for the Language Classroom.Essex:

Longman Group UK Limited, ISBN 0-582 047811

13. Averil Coxhead Victoria University of Wellington New Zealand, Nation (2001b)

14. Jane Short , Get Ready for IELTS (Listening)

Some links in this study:

1. http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/vocabulary?a=british

2. http://learningenglish.voanews.com/

3. www.voanews.com/Specialenglish

4. http://www.51voa.com/voa_Special_english/American_Mosaic_17601.html

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I

APPENDICES

APPENDIX 1

SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE (STUDENTS)

This survey questionnaire is designed to find out your attitude and your

expectations towards teaching and learning English vocabulary. Your answers will be used

for researching purpose of my graduation paper entitle: “A study on using VOA Special

English program to improve vocabulary for the second- year English majors at Hung

Yen University of Technology and Education”. Thank you for your cooperation in

completing this survey questionnaire. 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.

Thank you very much for your cooperation!

Le Phuong Thao, senior student in Faculty of

Foreign Language, Hung Yen University of

Technology and Education.

Instructions:

The questionnaire is in two parts; please circle, tick each response or give short

answer in the provided space to your view (please use either English or

Vietnamese)

The “vocabulary” used in this questionnaire means “Listening vocabulary in

English”.

Personal information:

Your gender: Male

Female

Your age: …………….

Where are you from? The countryside

Town

City

How long have you learned English: ………… years.

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II

Students’ and teachers’ perspectives toward learning and teaching vocabulary at

UTEHY

1. Have you ever used the program VOA Special English?

A. Yes

B. No

( If tick “no” ,please move question 2)

2. If you use VOA Special in the future, what topics do you usually learn to improve

listening vocabulary?

( you can tick more than one answer)

A. Education

B. Science

C. Medicine

D. Economics

E. History

F. Life

G. All of them

3. How much important is learning listening vocabulary?

A. Very important

B. Important

C. Not important

D. Not very important

4. Why do you learn listening vocabulary?

(You can tick more than one answer)

A. You are interested in learning listening vocabulary, and in learning English in

general.

B. You want to be better your writing skill

C. You think learning listening vocabulary is necessary for your study.

D. It is one of the requirements in learning English.

E. Others

5. Where do you meet new words?

1= never; 2=rarely; 3= sometimes; 4=often; 5=usually

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III

Situations 1 2 3 4 5

When you use VOA Special English (reading,

listening, watching news)

When using / surfing the Internet (e.g. English

websites, e-chatting (e.g. writing: QQ, MSN;

speaking: Skype)

In textbooks and from classroom learning activities

In vocabulary lists arranged in alphabetical order

In vocabulary lists arranged by meaning

During English conversations with others (e.g.

teachers, classmates, foreigners)

When reading English materials (e.g. books,

newspapers, magazines)

When singing English songs or watching English

movies / TV shows

6. If you use VOA Special English in the future, how much time do you spend on

learning listening vocabulary in VOA Special English on a day?

A. A hour

B. 2 hours

C. 3 hours

D. 4 hours

E. Others

7. When you want to learn or remember the vocabulary; how often do you do any of the

following on your own initiative?

A. I learn through VOA Special English

B. At home I make lists of words and I study them.

C. I write down the word as it sounds or make some sort of annotation to remember

its pronunciation.

D. On my own initiative I write the translation next to the word I would like to learn.

E. I relate the English word with other words that are written or sound in a similar

way

F. I write down the word together with an example sentence.

G. I create my own dictionary.

H. I relate the word in English with an image, a drawing or a scheme.

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IV

I. I repeat the words out loud several times.

J. All of them.

Factors affecting learning listening vocabulary at UTEHY

8. According to you, which of the following factors affects your learning listening

vocabulary in VOA Special English ability?

A. Students’ learning vocabulary abilities

B. Motivation to learn vocabulary

C. Difficulties in remembering meaning of general vocabulary, Special words

D. Difficulties in listening and writing news in VOA Special English

E. The English- learning environment

F. All of the above factors

G. Others

9. How often do you use these methods to learn listening vocabulary?

(Put a tick in the appropriate column)

Methods Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never

Learning from VOA Special English

(listening and reading, watching

news)

Learning from text books

Learning from teachers

Learning from your friends

Learning from games

Learning from Internet (music,

film…)

Learning from synonym or antonym

words

10. Which techniques do you use to remember listening vocabulary in VOA Special

English?

(Put a tick in the appropriate column)

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V

Techniques Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never

Write words on pieces of paper, then

stick them wherever visible

Write words in both Vietnamese and

English many times

Stick words on the objects they

describe

Listen repeatedly to a news (remember

meanings, pronunciations)

Others:

11. How attractive do you find these activities?

(Put a tick in the appropriate column)

Name of activities Very attractive Attractive A bit

attractive

Not

attractive

Learning through

VOA Special English

news

Learning at home

Learning with friends

Learning in class

Finding synonym or

antonym word

Ways to improve ability in learning listening vocabulary

12. What ways should you do to improve your ability in learning listening vocabulary in

VOA Special English?

(You can circle more than one choice)

A. Keeping a dictionary and thesaurus handy

B. Listening and trying to write down news

C. Looking up any new word you do not recognize.

D. Writing more

E. Using flashcard or post- it notes around your house

F. Learning words through topics

G. All of them

H. Others

THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION!

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VI

APPENDICES

APPENDIX 2

SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE (TEACHERS)

This survey questionnaire is designed to find out your attitude and your

expectations towards teaching and learning English vocabulary. Your answers will be used

for researching purpose of my graduation paper entitle: “A study on using VOA Special

English program to improve vocabulary for the second- year English majors at Hung

Yen University of Technology and Education”. Thank you for your cooperation in

completing this survey questionnaire. 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.

Thank you very much for your cooperation!

Le Phuong Thao, senior student in Faculty of

Foreign Language, Hung Yen University of

Technology and Education.

Instructions:

The questionnaire is in two parts; please circle, tick each response or give short

answer in the provided space to your view (please use either English or

Vietnamese)

The “vocabulary” used in this questionnaire means “Listening vocabulary in

English”.

Personal information:

Your gender: Male

Female

Your age: …………….

How long have you been teaching English: ………… years.

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VII

Students’ and teachers’ perspectives toward learning and teaching vocabulary at

UTEHY

1. Have you ever used the program VOA Special English to teach your students?

A. Yes

B. No

( If tick “no”, please move question 2)

2. If you use VOA in future, what topics do you usually use to teach your students

listening vocabulary?

( you can tick more than one answer)

A. Education

B. Science

C. Medicine

D. Economics

E. History

F. Life

G. All of them

3. How much important is learning listening vocabulary?

E. Very important

F. Important

G. Not important

H. Not very important

4. How much interested do your students feel in learning listening vocabulary through

VOA Special English?

A. Very interested

B. Interested

C. Little interested

D. Not interested at all.

5. Where do you meet new words?

1= never; 2=rarely; 3= sometimes; 4=often; 5=usually

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VIII

Situations 1 2 3 4 5

When you use VOA Special English (reading,

listening, watching news)

When using / surfing the Internet (e.g. English

websites, e-chatting (e.g. writing: QQ, MSN;

speaking: Skype)

In textbooks and from classroom learning activities

In vocabulary lists arranged in alphabetical order

In vocabulary lists arranged by meaning

During English conversations with others (e.g.

teachers, classmates, foreigners)

When reading English materials (e.g. books,

newspapers, magazines)

When singing English songs or watching English

movies / TV shows

6. In your opinion, How much time should your students spend on using VOA Special

English on a day?

A. A hour

B. 2 hours

C. 3 hours

D. 4 hours

E. Others

7. According to you, when your students want to learn or remember the vocabulary;

what should your students do?

A. learn through VOA Special English

B. make lists of words and study them.

C. Write down the word as it sounds or make some sort of annotation to remember its

pronunciation.

D. Write the translation next to the word

E. Relate the English word with other words that are written or sound in a similar

way

F. Write down the word together with an example sentence.

G. Create self-dictionary.

H. Relate the word in English with an image, a drawing or a scheme.

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IX

I. Repeat the words out loud several times.

J. All of them.

Factors affecting learning listening vocabulary at UTEHY

8. According to you, which of the following factors affects your students learning

writing vocabulary in VOA Special English ability?

A. Students’ learning vocabulary abilities

B. Motivation to learn vocabulary

C. Difficulties in remembering meaning of general vocabulary, Special words

D. Difficulties in listening and writing news in VOA Special English

E. The English- learning environment

F. All of the above factors

G. Others

9. According to you, how often should your students use these methods to learn writing

vocabulary?

(Put a tick in the appropriate column)

Methods Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never

Learning from VOA Special English

(listening and reading, watching news)

Learning from text books

Learning from teachers

Learning from their friends

Learning from games

Learning from Internet (music, film …)

Learning from synonym or antonym

words

10. According to you, which techniques should your students use to remember listening

vocabulary in VOA Special English?

(Put a tick in the appropriate column)

Page 53: A study on using VOA Special English program to improve vocabulary for the second- year English majors at Hung Yen University of Technology and Education

X

Techniques Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never

Write words on pieces of paper, then

stick them wherever visible

Write words in both Vietnamese and

English many times

Stick words on the objects they

describe

Listen repeatedly to a news (remember

meanings, pronunciations)

Others:

11. According to you, how attractive do your students find these activities?

(Put a tick in the appropriate column)

Name of activities Very

attractive

Attractive A bit

attractive

Not

attractive

Learning through VOA

Special English news

Learning at home

Learning with friends

Learning in class

Finding synonym or

antonym word

Ways to improve ability in learning listening vocabulary

12. According to you, what ways should your student do to improve your students ‘ability

in learning listening vocabulary in VOA Special English?

(You can circle more than one choice)

A. Keeping a dictionary and thesaurus handy

B. Listening and trying to write down news

C. Looking up any new word you do not recognize.

D. Writing more

E. Using flashcard or post- it notes around your house

F. Learning words through topics

G. All of them

H. Others

THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION!