Students’ Metacognitive Awareness about Listening in Foreign Language Lessons

Abstract

The paper deals with listening as a skill in foreign language learning; in this case, on a bachelor degree of the Italian language studies. It is a skill that has often been neglected, while being a path to successful foreign language learning, together with other three skills. The objective of the paper is to get an insight into the students’ awareness about their methods of listening at the Italian language practice classes. The research was conducted according to the MALQ questionnaire (Metacognitive Awareness Listening Questionnaire) along with the additional two open-ended questions. The results show, on one hand, a positive attitude of the students towards listening and the first impression of them being successful listeners. On the other hand, however, the analysis, in particular of the open-ended questions, reveals that they do not regulate well the strategies necessary for the successful listening. We conclude that such a questionnaire is a useful tool in becoming aware of the problem and in thinking about the listening strategies, where the role of the teacher is to help students consciously develop strategies and subsequently become independent in their implementation.