The Difficulties in Understanding Strong and weak forms, in Listening to Native Speakers in English Language.

Abstract

This study was conducted in University of Zalingei in (2017) aimed to investigate the impact of learning strong and weak forms perception in process of listening to native speakers, speech for third year students’ ability in understanding such sounds of grammatical words in connected speech. The researcher used the analytical descriptive approach, first data collected through to audio test for (50) students who are listening to English native speakers. Second information from books and relevant sources and the researcher demonstrated the following outcomes. 80% of 3rd year students have some difficulties in listening to connected speech regarding the perception of weak forms of grammatical functional words in English Language. 60% of wrong answers of the respondents due to the lack of competence as their scores are very low in some sentences and high in others. 50% of their performance in answering the questions show that students are unaware of the reduction rules that govern the use of this category of words in natural spoken English. 55% methods of teaching always focus on the pronunciation level only and ignore the learning of these forms, which might have contributed to this state in English phonetics and phonology. 70% Of the third year students have problems of sound perception was the result of low exposure, familiarity, and training to listening of the connected speech sounds in English language learning.