When I began this project, I hoped to gain insight into the L2 listening process and explore metacognitive listening strategies instruction. The project yielded more data than I have been able to analyze in the time-frame. The findings that I have been able to analyze provided rich learning opportunities for both of these areas. Considering the study as a whole, several important findings and trends emerged. The role of language proficiency was influential throughout the project, bringing out other influential factors such as the complexity of the listening text. The surprising diversity of responses to the intervention indicates that there are other personal, learning, and affective factors influencing students’ approach to listening. Overall, there was improvement in student performance in the listening lessons supported by the questionnaire, interview and observation data. Students engaged in employing metacognitive strategies during the study, though the long-term implications are not clear.
Language Proficiency
At the beginning of Phase I, the main student variable I focused on was skilled listening through the deployment and management of multiple strategies while listening. The distinction between skilled and less-skilled listeners has informed the development of L2 listening strategy research and was the focus of other studies utilizing the Pedagogical Cycle (Vandergrift & Tafaghodtari, 2010; Goh & Taib, 2006; Fahim & Fakhri Alamdari, 2014; Bazorgian, 2012, 2014; Cross, 2011). These studies found that less-skilled listeners showed more progress in listening performance and metacognitive listening strategies awareness and use. However, in my project, analysis of the data suggested that language proficiency was a more important variable for this sample and context. Students in the intermediate and advanced groups (which I created by informally assessing student performance, engagement, and listening behavior in the class) benefitted most overall. This can be seen in examining the two categories of directed attention and mental translation analyzed in the needs assessment. Examining the difference between the first and third questionnaires, there is less of a gap between the lower and higher proficiency students in reported directed attention and mental translation. There is an overall increase in directed attention. A few students made remarkable gains, such as student six who increased reported attention by 25% (see Table 13). However, student six also increased mental translation by 31% which may seem to be a sign of ineffective strategy use. On closer analysis, the change is a result of rating translation of key words higher. This is also true for students three, four, and seven. This indicates that students may be utilizing translation for new vocabulary or other content they recognize as both important and less familiar. In contrast, higher reliance on mental translation for student fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen was due to higher scores on translating overall and word by word, indicating reliance on ineffective skills, possibly due to the difficulty of the listening texts.
Language Proficiency
At the beginning of Phase I, the main student variable I focused on was skilled listening through the deployment and management of multiple strategies while listening. The distinction between skilled and less-skilled listeners has informed the development of L2 listening strategy research and was the focus of other studies utilizing the Pedagogical Cycle (Vandergrift & Tafaghodtari, 2010; Goh & Taib, 2006; Fahim & Fakhri Alamdari, 2014; Bazorgian, 2012, 2014; Cross, 2011). These studies found that less-skilled listeners showed more progress in listening performance and metacognitive listening strategies awareness and use. However, in my project, analysis of the data suggested that language proficiency was a more important variable for this sample and context. Students in the intermediate and advanced groups (which I created by informally assessing student performance, engagement, and listening behavior in the class) benefitted most overall. This can be seen in examining the two categories of directed attention and mental translation analyzed in the needs assessment. Examining the difference between the first and third questionnaires, there is less of a gap between the lower and higher proficiency students in reported directed attention and mental translation. There is an overall increase in directed attention. A few students made remarkable gains, such as student six who increased reported attention by 25% (see Table 13). However, student six also increased mental translation by 31% which may seem to be a sign of ineffective strategy use. On closer analysis, the change is a result of rating translation of key words higher. This is also true for students three, four, and seven. This indicates that students may be utilizing translation for new vocabulary or other content they recognize as both important and less familiar. In contrast, higher reliance on mental translation for student fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen was due to higher scores on translating overall and word by word, indicating reliance on ineffective skills, possibly due to the difficulty of the listening texts.
These findings partially support the efficacy of the implicit, task-based instructional approach implemented in this project. However, more exploration of the data is needed to fully understand the changes revealed in the questionnaire. Further exploration of the research question in different contexts, with fewer time and listening content constraints, is necessary.
Additional Influential Factors
Although language proficiency has a strong influence overall, there are fewer clear patterns in other data comparisons. Students seemed to respond to the interventions based on factors beyond the scope of this study and my planned assessments and data collection. I was unable to fully explore the affective factors measured in the person knowledge category of the MALQ. Additionally, I was not able to collect data on related variables such as motivation, learning styles, educational background, or age. Some changes I had hoped to see which were not apparent in the MALQ were changes to efficacy, perceived difficulty of the task, and nervousness. There was some fluctuation, but overall no positive trends.
Positive Changes
Even though changes appeared small as measured by the MALQ data, the changes noted in observations and interviews indicate that they were important. Student behavior in the classroom changed over the course of the lessons. Students shared ideas with each other and discussed how they had understood the content or made decisions on what content was important to include or how to deal with unknown vocabulary. There was also an open atmosphere in which students asked questions and were able to discuss their answers.
While I cannot confidently say that my intervention raised student awareness or even changed many students’ metacognitive listening strategies, it did engage students in applying metacognitive strategies while listening. Students focused on the listening process and many felt they had made progress and gained more confidence in being able to listen to academic texts and take notes. If I have the opportunity to implement this approach in the future, it will be important to work on ways to raise students’ awareness of the strategies they are employing while listening and to present new or underdeveloped strategy instruction and practice.
Need for Authentic Listening Experiences
Reflecting the findings from Phase I and II revealed that many strategies students reported were embedded in the lesson task sequence. For instance, student three discussed in detail how she listened for main ideas during the first listening, then paid attention to details the in the second listening. Her deployment of strategies reveals metacognitive awareness; however, I did not explore other listening contexts which were less controlled or did not allow multiple listenings. In addition, students wanted more authentic material. Several students mentioned in their notes and during lessons that the reason the listening content was so difficult to understand was because it did not seem real to them and the topics were sometimes uninteresting. When they watched the video on talking dictionaries, several students wanted to discuss the rare languages they themselves spoke or knew of from their own countries. One mother described how it felt when her daughters could not understand her native language and requested that they switch to English. The level of engagement during that lesson was extremely high and students appeared highly motivated to understand the content. A few students re-watched the video during the following weekend and visited the website featuring the talking dictionaries mentioned in the film. Since part of my intention in this project was to equip students for future academic contexts, adding authentic listening might have improved students’ ability to transfer strategies outside the classroom.
Additional Influential Factors
Although language proficiency has a strong influence overall, there are fewer clear patterns in other data comparisons. Students seemed to respond to the interventions based on factors beyond the scope of this study and my planned assessments and data collection. I was unable to fully explore the affective factors measured in the person knowledge category of the MALQ. Additionally, I was not able to collect data on related variables such as motivation, learning styles, educational background, or age. Some changes I had hoped to see which were not apparent in the MALQ were changes to efficacy, perceived difficulty of the task, and nervousness. There was some fluctuation, but overall no positive trends.
Positive Changes
Even though changes appeared small as measured by the MALQ data, the changes noted in observations and interviews indicate that they were important. Student behavior in the classroom changed over the course of the lessons. Students shared ideas with each other and discussed how they had understood the content or made decisions on what content was important to include or how to deal with unknown vocabulary. There was also an open atmosphere in which students asked questions and were able to discuss their answers.
While I cannot confidently say that my intervention raised student awareness or even changed many students’ metacognitive listening strategies, it did engage students in applying metacognitive strategies while listening. Students focused on the listening process and many felt they had made progress and gained more confidence in being able to listen to academic texts and take notes. If I have the opportunity to implement this approach in the future, it will be important to work on ways to raise students’ awareness of the strategies they are employing while listening and to present new or underdeveloped strategy instruction and practice.
Need for Authentic Listening Experiences
Reflecting the findings from Phase I and II revealed that many strategies students reported were embedded in the lesson task sequence. For instance, student three discussed in detail how she listened for main ideas during the first listening, then paid attention to details the in the second listening. Her deployment of strategies reveals metacognitive awareness; however, I did not explore other listening contexts which were less controlled or did not allow multiple listenings. In addition, students wanted more authentic material. Several students mentioned in their notes and during lessons that the reason the listening content was so difficult to understand was because it did not seem real to them and the topics were sometimes uninteresting. When they watched the video on talking dictionaries, several students wanted to discuss the rare languages they themselves spoke or knew of from their own countries. One mother described how it felt when her daughters could not understand her native language and requested that they switch to English. The level of engagement during that lesson was extremely high and students appeared highly motivated to understand the content. A few students re-watched the video during the following weekend and visited the website featuring the talking dictionaries mentioned in the film. Since part of my intention in this project was to equip students for future academic contexts, adding authentic listening might have improved students’ ability to transfer strategies outside the classroom.