The Baby in the Bathwater

Author(s):  
Patrick Healy

This chapter is informed by the author's experiences of teaching English as a Second or Other Language (ESOL) before moving on to teach English for Academic Purposes (EAP). Accordingly, it is shaped by the laments of ESOL practitioners at their perceived Cinderella status and an understanding that EAP teaching is regarded by much of the academic community as support work. Qualifications in EAP per se are not awarded, but rather, like scaffolding, language teaching sits alongside a student's principal course of study. Most EAP teachers have provided scaffolding to the educational edifice at a range of levels spanning compulsory and post-compulsory education. This affords a unique perspective on what teaching looks like at different levels. Founded on a familiarity with pedagogy at other levels then, the chapter draws on personal insights into teaching practices at universities and posits that certain characteristics of teaching younger learners might be equally effective in EAP and throughout the post-compulsory context. After all, pedagogy, the term used to describe teaching throughout educational levels, derives from the Greek “paid,” meaning child, and “agogus,” meaning leader. Thus, pedagogy literally means “the art and science of teaching children” (Knowles, Holton, & Swanson, 2012).

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 170-178
Author(s):  
I Nengah Astawa

Teaching English for specific purposes (ESP), which is in contrast with English for Academic purposes (EAP), has gained specially great attention since 1960’s. One of the examples of  ESP is English for guiding. The main purpose of implementing English  for tourism in some schools or collages is to give the students ability  to communicate mainly orally so as to  be able to fulfil the student’s need for his or her future career . In reality  very often  cultural misunderstandings which may produce fatal consequences emerge among those who are involved in tourism industry. Due to this circumstance, inserting sosio-cultural aspects in the teacher’s language teaching interaction is  indeed beneficial. In this case, the role of the teacher to include some cultural aspects in language teaching, beside giving formal grammatical language forms, of course is highly worth considering. Teaching English for tourism industry  is not regarded appropriate yet if sosio-cultural aspects are not adequately included. In other words, beside teaching the language forms, English teacher should incorporate sosio-cultural aspects  into his/her interaction.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rashed Al-Tamimi

This paper examines the history, policies, and discussions relevant to the teaching of English as a foreign language (EFL) in Saudi Arabia. It investigates the value of EFL within the Saudi education system and surveys the extent to which English has been adapted to suit the needs and customs of Saudi citizens. While focusing on major policy issues related to planning and implementing EFL instruction, the paper examines how stakeholders have worked to preserve Saudi culture, Arabic, and the structure of Saudi society. It seeks to determine whether EFL courses in Saudi schools meet the needs of students, the results of which are compared with Saudi policies on language teaching. The study then presents observations on the compatibility of teaching practices and policies, as well as the issues involved. Saudi Arabia faces several challenges that have greatly hindered the planning and implementation of language-teaching policies. This study proposes strategies for strengthening these policies to fully achieve the desired objectives. It also shows that English is gradually being naturalized in Saudi Arabia, absorbing cultural, religious, and social values and beliefs.


2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 59
Author(s):  
Leila Ranta ◽  
Justine Light

Teachers using a task-based language teaching (TBLT) approach are always searching for learning tasks that have the potential to prepare learners for the real world. In this article, we describe how an authentic academic assignment for graduate students in a teaching English as a second language (TESL) course was transformed into a task-based lesson for undergraduate English for academic purposes (EAP) students. We provide a brief review of TBLT and how it fits in with the goals of EAP programming. We then describe the original academic task, followed by a detailed overview of the EAP lesson and reflections on its implementation. Les enseignants qui utilisent une approche actionnelle (TBLT – task-based language teaching) sont constamment à la recherche de tâches d’apprentissage susceptibles de préparer leurs étudiants pour le vrai monde. Dans cet article, nous décrivons la transformation d’un travail académique authentique pour étudiants aux cycles supérieurs qui suivent un cours d’enseignement de l’ALS en une leçon actionnelle pour des étudiants d’anglais académique au premier cycle. Nous offrons un aperçu de l’approche actionnelle et de la mesure dans laquelle elle cadre avec les objectifs des programmes d’anglais académique. Par la suite, nous décrivons la tâche académique originale pour ensuite présenter une des- cription détaillée de la leçon d’anglais académique ainsi que des ré exions sur sa mise en œuvre. 


2012 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alice Henderson ◽  
Dan Frost ◽  
Elina Tergujeff ◽  
Alexander Kautzsch ◽  
Deirdre Murphy ◽  
...  

This paper provides an overview of the main findings from a European-wide on-line survey of English pronunciation teaching practices. Both quantitative and qualitative data from seven countries (Finland, France, Germany, Macedonia, Poland, Spain and Switzerland) are presented, focusing on teachers' comments about: ● their own pronunciation, ● their training, ● their learners’ goals, skills, motivation and aspirations, ● their preferences for certain varieties (and their perception of their students' preferences). The results of EPTiES reveal interesting phenomena across Europe, despite shortcomings in terms of construction and distribution. For example, most respondents are non-native speakers of English and the majority of them rate their own mastery of English pronunciation favourably. However, most feel they had little or no training in how to teach pronunciation, which begs the question of how teachers are coping with this key aspect of language teaching. In relation to target models, RP remains the variety of English which teachers claim to use, whilst recognizing that General American might be preferred by some students. Differences between countries are explored, especially via replies to open-ended questions, allowing a more nuanced picture to emerge for each country. Other survey research is also referred to, in order to contextualise the analyses and implications for teaching English and for training English teachers.


Author(s):  
Maria Giulia Ballatore ◽  
Ettore Felisatti ◽  
Laura Montanaro ◽  
Anita Tabacco

This paper is aimed to describe and critically analyze the so-called "TEACHPOT" experience (POT: Provide Opportunities in Teaching) performed during the last few years at Politecnico di Torino. Due to career criteria, the effort and the time lecturers spend in teaching have currently undergone a significant reduction in quantity. In order to support and meet each lecturers' expectations towards an improvement in their ability to teach, a mix of training opportunities has been provided. This consists of an extremely wide variety of experiences, tools, relationships, from which everyone can feel inspired to increase the effectiveness of their teaching and the participation of their students. The provided activities are designed around three main components: methodological training, teaching technologies, methodological experiences. A discussion on the findings is included and presented basing on the data collected through a survey. The impact of the overall experience can be evaluated on two different levels: the real effect on redesigning lessons, and the discussion on the matter within the entire academic community.


English for Academic Purposes course focusing on the academic language needs of students is a subfield of English for Specific Purposes (ESP). It is a type of specialized course to integrate specific subject matter, language content, and material based on learners’ needs. The study aims to evaluate the British Council’s English for Academic Purposes (EAP) coursebook in terms of content, sequencing, learners’ autonomy, motivation, feedback and focus on language skills. Furthermore, the study tries to provide a general perception of the usefulness and effectiveness of the coursebook for undergraduate students. The EAP Students’ Manual coursebook is used as a primary source for the data collection. The researcher has chosen Nation & Macalister (2010) model of language teaching principles to analyze and discuss the data. The study found the coursebook a useful, effective and an appropriate source of English language learning in terms of the investigated aspects of the book. The findings report that the coursebook provides practice and practical usage in all domains of the academically required English language skills. It helps the students to build language competency and to be more independent learners. In addition, it provides an opportunity to the learners to think in the target language, use the language more practically and learn it in a natural type of environment. The study concludes and suggests that the content needs to be supplemented with English language audios and videos presenting the students relevant documentaries and helping material in order to make the coursebook and the learning process more useful, effective, interesting and motivating. Furthermore, the study recommends that while choosing /designing a coursebook for a certain course, it needs to be evaluated following the various criteria and language-teaching-principles suggested by different language researchers.


English for Academic Purposes course focusing on the academic language needs of students is a subfield of English for Specific Purposes (ESP). It is a type of specialized course to integrate specific subject matter, language content, and material based on learners’ needs. The study aims to evaluate the British Council’s English for Academic Purposes (EAP) coursebook in terms of content, sequencing, learners’ autonomy, motivation, feedback and focus on language skills. Furthermore, the study tries to provide a general perception of the usefulness and effectiveness of the coursebook for undergraduate students. The EAP Students’ Manual coursebook is used as a primary source for the data collection. The researcher has chosen Nation & Macalister (2010) model of language teaching principles to analyze and discuss the data. The study found the coursebook a useful, effective and an appropriate source of English language learning in terms of the investigated aspects of the book. The findings report that the coursebook provides practice and practical usage in all domains of the academically required English language skills. It helps the students to build language competency and to be more independent learners. In addition, it provides an opportunity to the learners to think in the target language, use the language more practically and learn it in a natural type of environment. The study concludes and suggests that the content needs to be supplemented with English language audios and videos presenting the students relevant documentaries and helping material in order to make the coursebook and the learning process more useful, effective, interesting and motivating. Furthermore, the study recommends that while choosing /designing a coursebook for a certain course, it needs to be evaluated following the various criteria and language-teaching-principles suggested by different language researchers.


Author(s):  
Ольга Миколюк

This article examines the communicative approach as one of the most successful methods of teaching English nowadays. The basic principles are aimed at teachers and students, efficient classroom activities and styles of learning. Furthermore, there are some guidelines for teachers and even a critique of communicative language teaching in this article.


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