الفهرس 
The problem of the studyOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
Introduction:
Technology is becoming increasingly important in both our personal and professional lives, and our learners are using technology more and more. It is well known that our modern life is highly affected by the era of information technology. Based on this fact, it is indispensable to take advantage of the modern technological facilities in aiding the task of English language education as teaching English with technology can be useful. Students trying to learn English as a second language need further language support. They need to practice listening, reading, speaking, and writing skills in order to develop their experience and skills, especially in listening. The listening skill is a critical skill that underlies all verbal communication inside and outside a classroom.
Listening is considered one of the most essential skills for both communication and language learning. It facilities the other language skills: speaking, reading, and writing and provides the basis for developing them. Thus, developing the students’ listening skills is directly related to putting forward the factors that take a part in the listening process. As a result, there are three approaches to teach listening skills, top-down, bottom-up, and interactive models. In the top-down processing, listeners get the gist and main ideas of the listening passage. In bottom-up processing, listeners focus on individual words and phrases, and achieve understanding by combining the details together to build up the whole content. Therefore, listening is considered as interaction between the top-down and bottom-up processing (Al-Yami, 2008; Barani, 2011; Harmer, 2001; Kultu, 2009; Koa, 2006, p. 171).
Listening comprehension is defined as an activity in which listeners employ a variety of mental processes to comprehend information from oral texts. Listeners focus on related aspects of aural input, construct meaning from message, and relate what they hear to existing knowledge. Students face key problems when listening to English as a foreign language such as: hearing sounds; understanding intonation and stress; coping with redundancy and noise, predicting, understanding colloquial vocabulary; understanding different accents; and using visual and aural environment clues. The causes of these problems may be related to learners who do not perceive certain sounds, the interference of English system of stress, intonation, and rhythms, learners try to understand every single word, they cannot guess what’s going to say for easier perceiving and they are not familiar with the vocabulary used in colloquial speech (Kao, 2006).
El-Koumy (2000) clarified that though listening to English as a foreign language has recently become an important communication activity, it is still largely neglected in Egyptian schools and universities. This neglect is largely due to the fact that no agreement exists regarding what listening entails, and how it can be taught. In the same context, Ali (2010) clarified that language learners faced several problems in listening such as the lack of control over the speed at which speakers speak, the listeners’ limited vocabulary, inability to concentrate and some problems related to interpretation.
Motivation is very important to get success in language learning. Dörnyei and Ushioda (2013) stated that motivation plays more important role in the second language learning process. Without sufficient motivation, even individuals with the most remarkable abilities cannot accomplish long-term goals, and neither are appropriate curricula and good teaching enough on their own to ensure student achievement. On the other hand, high motivation can make up for considerable deficiencies both in one’s language aptitude and learning conditions. Shindler (2009) emphasized that, although language aptitude account for a considerable proportion of individual variability in language learning achievement, motivational factors can override the aptitude effect. However, there are two distinct types of motivation concerned with second language learning; integrative motivation and instrumental motivation (Wong, 2011). Motivation from two aspects can increase the students’ learning process in foreign language.
Instructors all over the world have always made use of technology in order to enhance the learning process and improve the learning impact. With the revolution of computers, computer-enhanced learning rose as a modern and challenging trend. Over the last years, teaching is being aided by online simulations, electronic educational content-learning platforms and virtual classrooms. The use of technology in education is an asset and instructors should definitely invest in, as students nowadays spend a lot of time using computers, tablets and the Internet and they are definitely “digital natives” (Sharples, 2013, p. 221).
The advancement of computing and communication technology has promoted the learning paradigms from conventional learning to e-learning, from e-learning to m-learning and it is evolving ubiquitous learning (u-learning) .U-learning aims at accommodating learners in their learning style by providing adequate information at anytime and anywhere as they wish for it.
By ubiquitous learning environments, it is possible to identify where learners are located and thus to simultaneously transfer the relevant information from the primary source to where the learners are. In this way, context-aware ubiquitous learning environments equipped with such a technology enable an individualized learning process. Learners are able, with the mobile devices they possess, to access learning contents anytime and anywhere without any limitation all time or space, in an individualized way. They can continue their learning processes in learning environments which are flexibly designed in all respects (Jones, 2004, p.409).
U-Learning can simply mean any kind of learning in which learners can have access to information almost anywhere/ anytime in different contexts .The Ubiquitous Learning Environment is an environment in which learners have access to knowledge through technology, and they work cooperatively to learn almost anywhere at any time regardless of their geographical location . Essentially, a Ubiquitous Learning Environment provides a student with a pervasive setting in which learning can take place. Learners can use desktop computers, laptops, or mobile devices such as smart cell phones and PDAs (Casey, 2005).
Context of the Problem
The researcher recognized that there is a difficulty in students’ English listening skill during her experience in teaching at the secondary stage. The students have difficulties in listening comprehension because they are trying to understand every single word, they do not recognize the words that they know and they have problems with different accents. Students are accustomed to the traditional methods of teaching listening in which they simply listen to a spoken message in order to answer some comprehension questions at the end. The interview with some teachers who teach at the same stage revealed that there were many reasons behind second year students’ poor listening comprehension skills and lack of learning motivation at the secondary stage:
1- Teaching listening is one of the most challenging tasks for any EFL teacher .This is because successful listening skills are acquired over time with lots of practice. In addition, teaching listening is not given enough importance especially in the Egyptian schools, this means that teachers neglect it in spite of its great significance in learning English as a foreign language. Moreover, students may encounter some problems in the comprehension process; this may occur because of low abilities in listening and lack of effective listening strategies.
2- The low ability in listening skills is one of the largest inhibitors for students, who are non-native speakers. While listening, a student suddenly discovers that he or she does not understand what is being said. Therefore, many students just tune out in an internal dialogue trying to translate each word. Other students are convinced that they are unable to understand spoken English well and then become demotivated .The latter concerns the way teachers focus on teaching this skill based on traditional methods that have become somehow boring and very old fashioned. This makes learners unable to concentrate on what they listen to.
3- The teachers hardly focus on teaching pronunciation. Pronunciation is neglected and teachers think that learning /teaching pronunciation should be left at higher levels, and this is a wrong decision made by the teachers; pronunciation should be taught from basic levels so that the learners get used to it and practice it from an early stage.
The previous results are consistent with the results with the studies conducted by: (Hamouda, 2013; Gilakjani& Ahmadi, 2011 ; and Latif, 2012) who asserted that the students have difficulties in listening comprehension and listening skills are clearly ignored by most teachers and totally ignored in the final EFL examinations.
Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of using a proposed EFL program based on a ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) for developing students’ listening skills and learning motivation in Desouk AL-Azhar Institute for Girls. This study had the following specific objectives:
1- Identifying the listening comprehension skills required to be developed for the second year secondary stage students.
2- Determining if there was a positive impact of using a proposed ubiquitous learning environment on improving the students` listening skills and learning motivation.
Questions of the Study
This study attempted to answer the following main question: What is the impact of a proposed EFL electronic program based on a ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) for developing Al-Azhar second-year secondary stage students’ listening skills and learning motivation?
The main question was divided into the following sub questions:
1- What are the listening skills necessary for 2nd year secondary stage students at Al Azhar?
2- What is current level of 2nd year secondary stage students in listening skills?
3- What are the characteristics of the proposed ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) for developing listening skills and learning motivation of 2nd year secondary stage students at Al Azhar?
4- What is the effect of the proposed ULE on developing the EFL listening skills of 2nd year secondary stage students at Al Azhar?
5- What is the effect of the proposed ULE on developing the learning motivation of 2nd year secondary stage students at Al Azhar?
Hypotheses of the Study
This study attempted to test the following hypotheses:
1-There is a statistically significant difference between the mean scores of the experimental group and those of the control group on the post test of overall listening skills favoring the experimental group.
2-There is a statistically significant difference between the mean scores of the experimental group and those of the control group on the post test in each listening sub-skill favoring the experimental group.
3-There is a statistically significant difference between the mean scores of the experimental group and those of the control group on the post administration of overall learning motivation scale and its domains favoring the experimental group.
4-There is a statistically significant correlation between the experimental group scores on the post test of overall listening skills and the overall learning motivation scale in the post administration favoring the experimental group.
Results of the Study
Based on the findings of this study, results revealed that the proposed EFL electronic program based on a ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) had a positive effect on the development of Al-Azhar second-year secondary stage students’ listening skills and learning motivation. This was proved through the higher mean scores that the experimental group obtained in the Post- listening skills test and the post administration of the learning motivation scale.
Recommendations
In light of results of the study, the following recommendations are suggested:
Ministry of education is recommended:
1. To enrich the Egyptian English curriculum with various communicative listening activities in every listening lesson in all educational stages.
2. To provide schools with computer laboratory in terms of up-dated computer devices connected with the internet access and smart boards. These aids help teachers to activate and employ ULE as virtual environment in learning.
3. To provide the syllabus with new strategies, approaches, and techniques.
English Supervisors are recommended:
1. To hold workshops that aspire to make teachers acquainted with the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE).
2. To hold training courses to help teachers to implement ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) in teaching listening skills.
3. Preparing and publishing instructional materials about the effectiveness of using the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) in teaching listening skills and developing students’ learning motivation.
4. Urge the teachers to use various techniques and activities which are profitable for more productive achievement such as using the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE).
English language teachers are recommended:
1. To use the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) with all English skills; listening, speaking, reading and writing.
2. To attend workshops and training courses concerning teaching listening skills.
3. To adopt modern techniques those enhance students’ participation and interaction.
4. To read and search for useful listening strategies.
5- To explain the objectives and the content of the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) before engaging students in ULE as an effort to get their attention and increase their active participation.
6. To design learning activities and materials which provoke students’ interest to actively engage with the task according to their preferred topics.
7. To provide students with entertaining, instructive and an effective environment such as the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) which can provide students with opportunity to communicate with others in the form of synchronous or asynchronous communication. In ubiquitous learning environment learners gained the right knowledge at the right situation and time in the right way. They got information immediately and interacted with colleagues and instructors.
8. To utilize technology where possible to improve their students’ learning motivation and EFL listening. This could be achieved by using the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) where , students become more creative and initiative when they are engaged in different challenging and interesting activities.
Recommendations for Further Studies
1. This study was limited to the listening skill. The ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) should be applied with other English skills and sub-skills.
2. Investigating the effectiveness of using the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) in developing students’ listening skills and learning motivation to primary and preparatory stages.
3. Investigating the effectiveness of using the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) in developing other language skills; namely writing, speaking, and reading.
4. Finding out the effect of the ubiquitous learning environment (ULE) at different stages of education (elementary, intermediate, and university).
5. Investigating the effect of ULE on enhancing students’ critical thinking and higher-level thinking skills.
6. Investigating the impact of ULE on developing students’ motivation and attitudes towards learning speaking.
7. Investigating EFL teachers’ attitudes towards using ULE in teaching.