WEBSITES PRACTICING TO DEVELOP LISTENING SKILLS

This tpaper tshows tthe tqualitative tstudy tof tthe temployment tof twebsites tto tpractice tEnglish tlistening tskills tof tstudents. tThe tsamples tin tthis tsurvey twere tthe tstudents tmajoring tin tEnglish, tone tof tschool teducation, tPontianak, tIndonesia. tThe topen-ended tquestionnaire tand tinterview twere tused tto tcompile tthe tdata. tThe tstudy treported tthat tthe tstudents theld ta tpositive tattitude ttoward tthe tuse tof tthe twebsites tfor tpracticing tlistening tskills tbecause tof tmany tadvantages tsuch tas tthe twebsites toffer tunlimited topportunities tto tlearn tand tpractice ttheir tlistening tskill tas tif tthey tare tin tthe treal tsituation twith tnative tspeakers tand tthese topportunities tprovided tthem tmore tnew tEnglish tvocabularies. tMoreover, tit tcan tfacilitate tthem tto tcreate tautonomous tlearning tstrategies. tIt twas talso tfound tthat tit twas tso tconvenient twhen tusing tthe tinternet tsites tfor tpracticing tlistening tskills toutside tclassroom tand tfrom tbook, tanywhere tand tanytime. tHowever, tthe tstudents texperienced ta tproblem twith tthe tnative tspeaker taccent tso tthey tcould tnot tunderstand tthe tconversation.


INTRODUCTION
Listening is often used together with the other skills of speaking, reading and writing. It is not only a skill area in language performance but also a critical means of acquiring a second language. It helps students to acquire good speaking habits as bottom-up and top-down model, the schema-building activities are also applicable to reading. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, applied linguistics recognized that listening was the primary channel by which the students gained access to second language data and that it, therefore, served as the trigger for acquisition (Rost, 2001).
Students who have a strong motivation in learning will surely maximize the benefits of both sources. Moreover, the teacher's task is to foster and increase motivation to learn through innovative teaching activities using up to date material resources. So as a teacher must also be diligent in exploring new teaching materials or media. For that purpose, the importance of utilizing computer technology.
According to Laborda in Mudofir (2015), English teaching should also pay attention to the use of technology in the learning and teaching process, such as the use of computers. Computers and language teaching can coexist in line with the learning process. Apart from being an unlimited source of information, internet technology can also be used by teachers all over the world to develop more innovative teaching methods to create a different atmosphere in the classroom. With the internet, each individual can create blogs, websites, wikis, language teaching methodologies, journals. From this, it can be proved that there is a positive effect on the integration of computers in language teaching.
Many teachers are challenged to learn computers have used in the learning and teaching process. The use of computers is not only for typing a text, sending messages, browsing the internet, but a computer can be used as a teaching tool so that it can motivate and instruct teachers to integrate computers and ICT in the classroom. Ru-Si and Chin-Chung (2007) investigated students' attitudes toward learning via the web of 1,866 Taiwanese university students by using an online survey. The results showed that the students had a positive attitude on the dimension of access to Internet technology for learning. Ahmed and Abdulaziz (2006) examined 47 University of Wisconsin-La Crosse students' performance on the Use of the Internet in learning. This study reported that students had a positive attitude Internet enriched teaching and learning environments in molding positive attitudes among students toward using the Internet for learning at a university in Malaysia.
The findings indicated that students had a positive attitude toward using the Internet as a learning tool and viewed the learning environment as supportive of using the Internet for learning. Moreover, the students with better basic Internet skills and who viewed the learning environment as promoting the use of the Internet favored using the Internet for learning. Furthermore, Sanders and MorrisonShetlar (2001) explored the relationship between student attitudes toward web-enhanced instruction and variables such as sex, race, age, year in school, computer experience, and learning styles. The study reported a positive effect of the Webcomponent on student learning. It was also found that age, race, year in school, computer experience, and learning styles did not affect student use of the web.
As the importance of listening skills and the use of learning via website and Internet in the age of technological education are mentioned above, therefore, this study is examined to explore both the students' attitudes about the advantages and their problem on the websites employment for practicing English listening skills in order to succeed in their English learning