Investigating the Difficulties that hinder Undergraduate Student’s Listening Skills

Abstract

This study aimed at exploring the hindrances that contribute to the difficulties of Bakhet Alruda University students come across in English listening skills. It evaluates whether the hindrances are connected with the listening text, the speaker, the listener, the environment, or the listening materials. It determines which specific hindrance poses the most difficulty for the students. The study adopted the descriptive method. The subject of the study was a group of first year students of second semester in Bakhet Alruda University. The study sample consists of eighty students male and female who took the listening course in 2019/20 at Faculty of Education Arts. Data was gathered by means of questionnaire, listening test, instructors‘ interview and observation of the listening environment. The researcher used the statistical package for social studies (SPSS package), by using frequencies, percentages, tables, figures, descriptive statistics, standard deviation, one sample T test and one-way analysis of variance. The results of the study confirmed that Bakhet Alruda University students encounter listening difficulties whenever they are engaged in listening tasks. The study determines fourteen hindrances that affected the students in their listening activities. Furthermore, the current study determined the students‘ listening hindrance that came out from the inconvenient listening environment, from the defective listening materials used in the course, and from the students‘ lack of exposure to native speakers. The result of analysing students difficulties toward listening skills showed that the fast speech of native speaker and their pronunciation were posed the most challenged for the students when they are engaged in listening exercises. The researcher recommended that these hindrances are going to draw instructors‘ attention to train the students on listening learning strategies, develop effective learning strategies and enhance their listening abilities. The results of the study may also be beneficial for the researchers having interest in listening skill.