The effect of discourse markers on intermediate learners’ listening comprehension

This research was designed to investigate the effects of discourse markers on EFL Iranian learners' listening comprehension. Fifty eight male and female students took a pre-test as a proficiency test first, 39 students out of 58 are needed. To gain this aim, a language proficiency test, i.e., Nelson test will be given to the total participants. After calculating Mean and Standard Deviation, each person with +1SD above the mean will be assigned to high level of language proficiency and each one with   -1SD below the mean will be assigned to low level of language proficiency. Then they were assigned to two experimental groups and a control group, twenty students for high level proficiency of DMs group, nineteen students for low level proficiency of DMs group and nineteen students for control group were selected. During four sessions of the treatment, each experimental group worked on four listening passages taken from IELTS sample. The participants in two experimental groups were encouraged to think and notice meaningfully to the DMs and their functions how concepts are linked in listening passages by DMs. Along with the experimental groups, the participants in the control group also worked on the different four listening passages. At the end, three post tests were performed in one session. Finally One-way ANOVA was used to analyze the results of the control and the two experimental groups’ post- tests, and a significant difference was observed in the high proficiency experimental group of DMs and control groups, but there was not observed any remarkable difference between the low proficiency group and control group