Testing Effects of Foreign Language Listening Anxiety on Chinese University Students' English Listening Test Performance

The present research explored how foreign language listening anxiety (FLLA) affected Chinese university students' English listening test performance and how proficiency and gender mediated the effects of FLLA on the latter. Two different populations from two universities in China answered the 20-item Foreign Language Listening Anxiety Scale (FLLAS) as well as a demographic questionnaire and took an English listening test. Analyses of the collected data revealed the following major findings: (a) Five latent factors underlay the FLLAS, (b) when working alone, FLLA significantly negatively predicted students' English listening test performance, and (c) when working with proficiency and gender, English proficiency level, gender and FLLAS2 (proficiency in English listening) significantly predicted students' English listening test performance. These findings confirm the negative effects of FLLA on students' English listening test performance. They also indicate that English proficiency and gender mediate FLLA's effects on the latter, with English proficiency not only directly but also indirectly affecting the latter.

A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF COLLEGE ENTRANCE EXAMINATION BETWEEN CHINA AND JAPAN IN TERMS OF LISTENING COMPREHENSION

This research is a comparative study of college entrance examination for English listening test in China and Japan. The comparison will be conducted between China’s CEEBA (College Entrance Examination in Beijing Area) and Japan’s NCT (National Center Test of Japan) in terms of difficulty of the tests and validity by checking whether or not they are measuring the items that are intended to measure. And according to the analysis and study some suggestions to improve the both tests are expected to be found out.

The Contextual Factors on English Listening Test

Context is a very important concept in linguistics, has a very important role in language acquisition. This paper, through analysis of the English listening test and application context theory to help the candidate to overcome the difficulty in English listening test.

A Comparison of Using L1 (Indonesian) and English to Answer English Listening Comprehension Questions

English test results show that a lot of Indonesian students obtained low scores in listening. Students say they understand what speakers say in an English listening test but they have difficulties in answering the questions in English. This shows that students’ English receptive skills are higher than students’ productive skills. This research intends to find out what the difference in results is when students answer English listening comprehension questions in L1 (Indonesian) and English, and what the students’ perception is on the use of Indonesian language in English listening test. This research uses the mixed method along with a listening test, questionnaires, and interview as data collection tools. The findings show that these learners have difficulties to answer the test in English. The test answered in Indonesian received better scores than in English. Moreover, the questionnaires and the interview result show positive feedback on the use of Indonesian language. This shows that the learners actually have good listening skills and that their low-test scores are mostly due to their difficulty in expressing their thoughts in English.

Analysis on the Reliability and Validity of Teachers’ Self-designed English Listening Test

Language testing plays a vital role in English teaching. It can accurately reflect the teaching effect in a short period of time, and it is also an indispensable teaching method to assess the knowledge of students. The current study takes the final test of adult English listening class in School of Continual Education as an example, under the theoretical language assessment framework of Bachman and Palmer, uses the data collected by the statistical analysis software SPSS to test the reliability and validity of the listening final exam from a statistical perspective. The study found that the reliability and validity of the selected listening test were generally acceptable, the differentiation among students was obvious but it has high item difficulty. Therefore, it is necessary to improve the authenticity of the listening test and the communicative skill of the listening material. This study is conducted to find out the problems of the current listening test in the School of Continual Education, and propose specific solutions based on the basic elements of the language test. It is hoped that the research in this article will play a positive role in designing adult English listening tests.

The Effects of Audio Comedy Test on Listening Comprehension Skills of EFL Learners

<p class="Abstract"><em>This study aims to investigate the effects of audio comedy on English listening comprehension test results of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. The English listening test comprises four sections; each section has a seven-minute comedy audio mode and 13 questions, and participants listen to the four sections successively. This study was conducted with 117 sophomore, junior and senior students at Sebelas Maret University in Indonesia. Two-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was adopted to distinguish between male and female students on the four successive test sections measuring English listening comprehension skills. The findings are: 1. Successive practice tests will stimulate English listening skills; and 2. Successive practice tests will improve students’ English listening skills. The comedy audio mode creates a low-stress English listening atmosphere and reduces the learner’s anxiety.</em></p>

QUALITY OF LISTENING TEST VALIDITY OF THE NATIONAL LEAVING EXAM FOR SMA

This study reports quality of content validity of items of listening test of National Leaving Exam for SMA in Samarinda is constructed. The quality was identified from task coverage, item difficulty, objective of item, and test format. This study used content analysis with qualitative design. The study revealed that content validity revealed three major findings. Task coverage is dominated by the first and the second year of SMA (8 items are from first year, 8 items are from second year, and 4 items are from third year of SMA). Of 20 items, 9 (45%) are easy, 7 (35%) moderate, 4 (2o%) hard. The questions in the items are specified into 9 (45%) general, 5 (25%) comprehension, 4 (20%) application, and 2 (10%) analysis. The analysis on the Table of Specification reconstructed from the English listening test showed that the test has low content validity.