Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1The Background of the Research
近年来，中国和西方国家之间的沟通已迅速增加。英语是我们日常生活中得到越来越多的重视。人们已经进行了大量的研究人员对外语教学和听力。听力语言学习所有“的技能，尤其是在开始阶段也许是最关键的，它是一种综合性技能。它具有重要的影响语言习得（范德格里夫特，1996）。Krashen的输入假说（Krashen的，1985年）在第二语言习得，语言输入的基础上，没有这一点是没有语言学收购，语言收购的基本条件。倾听是语言输入在叙事语言收购的技能之一，这是至关重要的。根据美国外语教学方法的专家进行的统计，百分之四十五，我们总的通信时间都花在听。听力主要是在所有的学习和之前说，读，写在发展的所有沟通技巧（门德尔松，1994）。In recent years, communication between China and western countries has beenincreasing rapidly. English is obtaining more and more importance in our everydaylife. People have carried on a large number of researchers on foreign languageteaching and listening. Listening is perhaps the most critical for language learning ofall skills, especially at the beginning stage, and it is a kind of integrative skill. It hasimportant influence on language acquisition (Vandergrift, 1996). Based on Krashen'sinput hypothesis (Krashen, 1985) in second language acquisition, language input,without which there is no linguistic acquisition, is the basic condition of linguisticacquisition. It is crucial that listening is one of the skills of linguistic input innarrative linguistic acquisition. In accordance with the statistics conducted byAmerican experts of foreign language teaching method, forty-five percent of ourtotal communication time is spent on listening. Listening is primary in all learningand it comes before speaking, reading, and writing in the development of allcommunication skills (Mendelson, 1994).
语言学习通常由四种不同类型的口头沟通：阅读，写作，听力和口语。许多调查表明：听比其他形式的口头沟通更频繁地使用。听是第二语言学习者的语言表现的一个重要组成部分，无论是在学校沟通，在社区或在今后的工作中。通过正常的过程中，每天，听用于近两倍说话和四到五倍之多的读写。近年来，听被认为是沟通的关键，在工作方面一般职业能力，管理能力，与上司和下属之间的关系的有效性。然而，听仍然是最不被理解的语言学习过程中的重要作用，尽管承认它起着沟通和语言习得（莫雷，1991）。Language learning usually consists of four different types of verbalcommunication: reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Many investigationsindicate that: listening is used more frequently than other forms of verbalcommunication. Listening is an important part of the linguistic performance ofsecond language learners, whether they are communicating at school, in the community or at work in the future. Through the normal course of a day, listening isused nearly twice as much as speaking and four to five times as much as reading andwriting. In recent years, listening was perceived to be crucial for communication atwork with regards to general career capacity, managerial competency, andeffectiveness of relationships between supervisors and subordinates. Yet listeningremains one of the least understood processes in language learning despite therecognition of the important role it plays both in communication and in languageacquisition (Morley, 1991).
Listening comprehension is a kind of important language skill in the teaching ofEnglish as a foreign language (TEFL). However, listening comprehension has notbeen paid more attention to in Chinese middle schools, where the teachers often usetraditional teaching approach which mainly means the teacher-centered class. In thelistening class, the teachers just play the tape for the students then some materials aregiven to test how much the students have mastered rather than teach some effectivelistening method of dealing with the listening problems. As a result, Chineselanguage listeners are even called as “tape-recorder，，. In the situation, the students areusually unmotivated and bored and become inactive in the listening activities. Thiskind of listening learning could not satisfy the students' needs and expectationsduring their middle school studies. For a long time, the listening teaching in middleschool has become this kind of class where teachers just play the role oftape-recorder and repeat the listening materials to the students. The listening teachingprocess is just testing not teaching.
Nowadays, listening has become an important part of the national entranceexamination; listening teaching has been paid more attention to as well. Many middleschool English teachers have noticed the importance of listening. However, thespecial listening training is not sufficient for listening course. As a result, the studentsin the middle school could not accept enough chances for listening and just listen tothe tape recorders and answer the questions, and then the teacher would cheek theiranswers. In the process of listening teaching and learning, the role of students ispassive, which is opposite of the requirement in the English standard. The Englishstandard requires that in the listening class, the students should be the active part andthe teachers just work as the guiders and supervisors and not just repeating andimitating the tape materials. In listening, content understanding is very important.Sometimes even if hearing every word of the material, the students also could notunderstand the main idea of the listening passage, which is influenced by thecontextual understanding which could be trained by the teacher.
Chapter 2 Literature Review
2.1 Definitions of Listening and Listening Comprehension
“Language is a means of communication by which our thoughts and feelingscan be expressed. In any language, speech is primary and oral communication is themost important medium. In learning a foreign language, listening comprehension isthe first and fundamental step in the attempt to master the target language. It isespecially so when the learning of a second language takes place in the environmentof the first language, or the mother tongue?” (Zhao Demei，1995:1) Listening,speaking, reading and writing have always been regarded as basic skills in languagecompetence. Among them, listening comes first. A normal person, when he is not inthe state of sleeping, will spend 70% of his time on all kinds of communicativeactivities. Among it, 11% of time will be spent on writing, reading is 15%，speakingis 32%, listening is 42%. Undoubtedly, listening and listening comprehension comefirst in various language skills. As a result, we could get the conclusion that listeningis the primary skill in the sequence listening, speaking, reading and writing. Rost(1992: 141-142) stated that listening is important in the listening class and offers theinput information for the learners. Hedge, T. also expressed his point of view that thesociety nowadays needs some changes from the printed media to the sound worldwhich will require the learners a higher level of proficiency in listening. Cultivatingthe students' communicative competence is the objective of the foreign languageteaching. The listening takes the first part and works as the leader, for children begin to leam their mother tongue by listening before they speak, such as the ones whowants to leam a second language. Moreley (1991:81-106) also stresses that "theimportance of listening can not be underestimated; it is imperative that it can not betreated trivially in second and foreign language curricula.
Chapter 3 Listening Comprehension Activities.......... 39-51
3.1 Types of Classroom Listening Performance.......... 39-43
3.2 Tasks for Listening Comprehension.......... 43-45
3.2.1 Components Listenin.......... 43-44
3.2.2 General Meaning Listening..........44-45
3.2.3 Details Listening.......... 45
3.3 Listening Teaching Model ..........45-51
3.3.1 Pre-Listening Stage..........46-47
3.3.2 While-Listening Stage.......... 47-49
3.3.3 Post-Listening Stage ..........49-51
Chapter 4 Research Design and Result Discussion..........51-69
4.1 The Aim of the Research ..........51-52
4.2 The Research Question.......... 52
4.3 Methods.......... 52-54
4.3.1 Subjects.......... 52-53
4.3.2 Instruments.......... 53-54
4.3.3 Research Procedure.......... 54
4.4 Data Collected Through the Questionnaires.......... 54-56
4.5 Analysis of the Data..........56-67
4.6 Analysis through Interview ..........67-69
Chapter 5 Implications of the Research and Suggestions.......... 69-75
5.1 Major Findings of the Research ..........69-70
5.2 Implications and Suggestions.......... 70-73
5.3 Limitations of the Research ..........73-74
5.4 Suggestions for Further Study.......... 74-75
Conclusion
Listening comprehension is a kind of important language skill which is requiredto be developed in the English teaching of middle school. In this paper the authoranalyzes the factors that contribute to the problems existing in English teaching inhigh school and points out some main problems in our listening teaching. Then, somesuggestions to improve and develop the teaching of English listening comprehensionin senior high school are recommended.In order to know the problems and barriers existing in listening, the author hasdesigned the questionnaire which is used to study these questions. 1) What problemsand difficulties do students confront in listening comprehension? 2) How can wehelp students overcome the difficulties which they encountered when doing thelistening practice? According to the data from the result, many problems come out.Both for students and teachers, to improve the listening learning, there are still manythings to do. The present study is just a preliminary attempt, and it only touched thesuperficial level of this kind of research. There is also a long way to go on thestudying English listening comprehension of senior high school students.
Listening plays an important role in daily communication. With the reform andopening policy and entering into the international market, china is facing more andmore international exchanges. A lot of complex talent person with high Englishproficiency should be cultivated. As a result, English teaching is becoming more andmore important. Listening teaching must base on the listening theory. In addition, acareful analysis of the specific problems existing in listening teaching and learning has an important significance. English listening teaching started later comparing withthe other counties, and the listening comprehension activities or methods need to beexplored furthermore and get more experiences. Therefore, teachers should be readyto solve different problems in listening and try to offer practical solutions in time.There are also some deficiencies in this research. How to improve listeningcomprehension still requires teachers and students to explore further.
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